September 8th

Family,

Another beautiful week in Tasmania!  I would never guess that we are just coming out of winter, we have been spoiled.   I swear Tasmania is Australia’s best kept secret.  This last week, Sister Chan and I were able to give a training in District Meeting on finding.  It turned out pretty well, we did a role play at the end where we had missionaries close their eyes and randomly grab a pamphlet, then use the pamphlet in a finding situations.  It definitely pushed some of the missionaries, especially on elder who picked a law of chastity pamphlet.

After the District Meeting we went outside to find that a member had prepared us all a HUGE lunch.  She made more than 100 sandwiches with soup and dessert.  She told us we were expected to eat EVERYTHING.  There are 10 people in our district and everyone was full with 80 sandwiches still left.  We ended up just passing the sandwich platter around the table over and over again with everyone taking a sandwich each time it went around.  So many sandwiches. BUT we finished everything…SUCCESS!

One thing I found out this week: Sister Chan HATES dogs. Hates, hates, dogs.  Every time a person with a dog passes us on the street she runs past and says, “They tried to kill me!” Today as we were doing morning run, two dogs on leashes across the street from us ran across the street from us and ran into each other, started barking at each other and doing other typical dog things.  After we ran past them, Sis. Chan turned to me with a complete serious face and said, “There was a war.” HaHa.

In our ward’s relief society lesson this past week the topic was faith.  The Relief Society President, who was teaching the lesson, shared a quote that I loved.  It stated, “For a seed to achieve its greatest expression, it must come completely undone.  The shell cracks, it’s insides come out and everything changes.  To someone who doesn’t understand growth it looks like complete destruction.”  Often  in the church we hear the scripture from Alma 32:28 where faith in the “word” is compared to a see.   It is something you plant in your heart and see grow over time if it is nourished.  But I think one of the lines of the scripture that I often overlook is the “if” clause presented at the beginning of the scripture. It says that the see can start to grow IF you do not cast it out by your unbelief.” And why would someone cast out that see of faith?  Because in order for faith to grow there needs to be change and that a change can be painful.  However, as a missionary, I can testify that it is from perseverance and continued efforts to increase faith that we can start to see the blessings that faith brings and it is at this point that faith does “enlarge the soul” and “enlighten understanding”

Love you all!  Have a fantastic week!

Love,

Sister Sarah Bennion