The sun is shining and I am keeping my butt prints out of the sand!

What a summer!!!! Hellooooooooooo suntan! Another week flies by with stories to go with it! I really am in the most wonderful ward ever! The members here are so supportive and take such good care of us! There is nothing better than serving under the shadow of the beautiful temple in Chorley!! :) 

Moos or Booze?

We had a district lunch the other week. As I have proven in past emails, when you sit down for a meal with a bunch of elders you are guaranteed to hear the "darnedest things" (shout out to Bill Cosby!)

One of our elders lived somewhere in Asia for a portion of his childhood. For some reason we were having a conversation about meat (so spiritual right?!) and he told us about how in Japan they raise cows drinking alcohol and the meat from these cows is an insanely expensive delicacy! 

I decided that I could strike it rich in Japan by opening a restaurant that features what I declare to be: THE HANGOVER BURGER! 

Experts on a Grave Subject!:

Location: District Meeting

Topic: Exciting changes in the future of our mission (i.e. Ipads mixed with family history)

The above information translated into the language of district leader: "Ok everybody! I want you to be SO excited! We are getting ipads soon, so as of NOW, we are going to be preparing to become experts on dead people!"

Some say tomato, some say tomaaaaato......some say family history, so say dead people??? Whatever works, right?

Silly Scripture of the day: 

Alma 60:6 ;) 

It's a common missionary joke that this scripture can be used by old missionaries who never get letters or emails from home! I can now testify that this is true! 

You know it's really hot when.......

We had a sisters meeting last week where we talked about health and nutrition. It was in the beautiful, brand-new Manchester YSA building (a 6 floor building in the middle of the city!). 

Fact: 70ish sister missionaries, all crammed into the small room of the top story of the YSA building on a humid, hot July day, all simultaneously doing aerobic dance equals.......

HOT HOT HOT HOT GROSS!

Before the meeting started, all the sister were moaning about how hot they were. Me- trying to be optimistic- piped in: "It's not that bad! We can endure it!"

Just as I said this, a group of Tongans and Aussies walked in the room and 2 of them at the same time yelled out

"It's so hot! I'm gonna die! This sucks!"

Ok! At that moment I immediately decided that honestly was the best policy and I revoked my previous, miss optimism comment!

You know it's really hot when the Aussies and Togans are complaining about the heat!! 

End of story!

Please Sir, can I have some more?;

We have wonderful new Utah missionary in our district!... And had so much fun messing with him a little bit during our district lunch!

We had a pitcher of water for the whole table. As he went to pour the last bit of water into his glass, one of the elders bursts out: "Hey! Don't do that before asking if anyone else wants some!!"

We all immediately caught on to where he was headed with this.

We then all played along:

"Ya! Seriously! You gotta be careful man! They don't do refills in England! Even on water!"

It is a common complaint among the N. Americans here that England doesn't have free refills on pop! So we had so much fun as we were able to convince this elder for a couple of seconds that this applied to water as well! No refills! Sorry! ;)

England can be stingy on their drinks...but not that stingy thank goodness :) 

Companion Unity 101:

We  had the most hilarious insight the other day! One of the elders in our district is a former assistant to the president. Him and his previous companion (who is still currently an assistant) are the ultimate bromance! They were a great companionship and incredibly unified! They still love each other and every once in awhile we see the assistants driving through Chorley because the elders were having a little bromance reunion. 

I realized something epic! So our elder here in Chorley is white, and his former companion is black, so they were like a human ying-yang! So beautiful! We I've decided I want to start calling them Elder Ying and Yang now! How epic is that symbolism?! :) 

You Know You've Been A Missionary For Too Long When....:
Sister M is still in touch with some elders who served in her home branch in Ukraine. While they were on their missions, they wrote a rap about crepes! 

We have been playing it on replay for the past week (it is hilarious). The other night I had a pathetic epiphany about myself: 

"I can't believe I've hit the point where I'm dancing to a song about crepes! This is so sad!"

This is how you know that you have officially been listening to way too much EFY music! If a song about crepes is appealing, you know the MOTAB has gone too far! 

Deep Doctrine:
We were teaching a family home evening to a large group of families last week. We were obviously discussing missionary work and someone asked why we keep talking about missionary work so much! A YSA gave the best answer I have ever heard:

"It's obvious! It's because we are dumb and we don't just simply listen and do it! They keep asking us and we keep procrastinating so they will keep bothering us until we just have some faith and do it so we can experience some blessings.

The scriptures (John 21: 15-17) even teach us this. Look at when Jesus was talking to Simon Peter! He asked him to show his love by feeding his lambs! Did you ever notice though that the second and third time Jesus asks this, that he asks Peter to feed his SHEEP, not his Lambs.

The reason for the word change is because it took Peter so long to respond to Jesus' request the first time that by the time he actually understood it and did it, the lambs had grown up into adult sheep!"

Tender Mercy:

This is actually a serious story! I wanted to share this little miracle about prayer. 

So I lost my glasses the other week. I was freaking out about it and literally could not find them anywhere. The thought of spending money on new glasses really stressed me out. After a lot of panicking and searching, I suddenly remember a basic gospel principle that is so simple that primary children learn it frequently in Sunday school! 

Pray!

I couldn't believe that I had forgotten something so basic that I have been taught to do since I was 3! I got on my knees and offered a simple (probably child-like) prayer to my Heavenly Father, asking to have help to find my glasses.

Literally 10 minutes later the assistants called and said they had found my glasses in the car! The Lord answers prayers! Let us never forget to do the simple, basic things that we know are right! They will build our faith and deepen our link with God! It was a simple, but a beautiful answer to a prayer! He really does love us and listens to us.

Now time to ruin the spiritually mood again......

Why on earth were my glasses in the assistants car may you ask?

Sheepish confession time!

Sis. M and I may or may not have stolen their car at our last multi-zone meeting! ;)

We have been joking about stealing our zone leaders car forever (they live just down the street from us, and they sometimes rub it in our face that they don't have to use the rubbish Chorley bus system)! They are so protective of their car! We have been trying and failing to steal their car at every meeting this transfer so we could take a picture of us in their car and then wait for them to figure out that we are missing and have them come outside to find us in the car and find them locked out... (unfortunately they have been keeping their keys in their trouser pockets so we haven't been able to do it).

Well turns out stealing an assistant's car is way easier than stealing a zone leaders car. Our assistant was chatting to some elders outside the building with his keys in his hand.

Fact: men don't multi-task

We casually just walked past him, took the keys out of his hand, said thanks and walked off towards the car. He was so distracted talking that he automatically responded: "you're welcome" and kept talking. We were half-way down the car park before he realized what he had just done! When he finally caught on, we then broke into a sprint and dove into the car and locked up! We had some fun taking pics and watching him freak out and dance around as we turned on the car and pretended to start driving. 

We would have actually driven it around the car park a few times, except..... we had no missionary to back us up (gotta love missionary rules!). I opened the window a crack and asked the assistant if he would be so kind as to watch us while we backed up the car. To my shock, he said no ;) 

So during all that fun, I dropped my glasses in their car. 

The end :) 

Butt Prints in the Sand: 

I was introduced to this poem this week! I loved it! If you haven't read the poem Footprints in the Sand, go read that before you read this one. Footprints in the sand is a famous poem and very beautiful and inspirational, but me-- being the silly, sarcastic sister that I am-- can almost relate to this poem even more!

One night I had a wondrous dream,

One set of footprints there was seen,

The footprints of my precious Lord,

But mine were not along the shore.

But then some stranger prints appeared,

And I asked the Lord "What have we here?"

Those prints are large and round and neat,

"But Lord, they are too big for feet."

"My child," He said in sombre tones, 

"For miles I carried you alone.

I challenged you to walk in faith,

but you refused and made me wait.

You disobeyed,

you would not grow,

The walk of faith, 

you would not show,

so I got tired,

I got fed up, 

and there I dropped you on your butt."

"Because in life there comes a time,

When one must fight,

and one must climb,

When one must rise and take a stand,

Or leave their butt prints in the sand."

Don't leave your butt prints in the sand! Get off your butt and go "do something more than dream of your mansions above!" :) 

I love you!

Hope the time goes quickly for you and slowly for me!

Sister Martin