Two Things I Didn't Want in My Mission: Use Facebook and Ride a Bike

Something that I really learned this week was that a lot people don't know how the Bible came to be, which I find so surprising. We had a tour of less than happy people I don't even know. They brought about how John says in Revelation that no one should add to his book. We began to explain just a bit about the history of the Bible being collected together in 4th century and boy, they didn't like that. This isn't too missionary like to say, but, "WHAT THE HECK?" That is my thinking after the tour. All but two people in the tour were just "attack, attack, attack."

At one point, the grandfather, there was family of Romanian Christians, raised his hand, "Oh, he has a question." Nope. He got very angry at us. I can see why learning the Gospel in your native language is always the best option. He misunderstood what we said. But it ended well enough, as the Holy Ghost was able to whisper to the grandmother, and she took a Book of Mormon in Romanian. Sadly, we found her restoration pamphlet in the Tabernacle. But we both know she was touched by what she was able to learn. She was also the most interested in what we had to say.

I want you all to know that the funniest part of the day is when we go home and are there when Sister Smith M. and Yoshida come home. We just share the most random things that happened that day. We all get really into the stories too.

WE ARE GOING TO BECOME A FACEBOOK MISSION!!!?????!!!!!?!!?!?!??!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!??!???!!!!! 

Sister Smith told us (it was announced in Zone Conference). There were two things I did not want to do on my mission, use Facebook and ride a bike. Well, if we are becoming a FB mission, that probably means that when I am outbound, I will ride a bike. I have been praying so hard not to though. I would rather walk everywhere.

I had the best 2nd phone call ever with a lady named Shelda! So good, and we are gonna call her next Monday to see if she prayed and read. We reported to the local missionaries so they can know, but they didn't seem to care that much. Maybe it was just the personality of the Elder, to get over excited about things. Oh well! There are other missionaries that are excited about our supporting the investigator, but those investigators don't respond back. We just can't have both.

Sister Glanzer

PS. Sorry, I ran out of time... Pictures next week!

Random Photos from Visitors to Temple Square

We received two photos of Allison from two different people visiting Temple Square.  We just love getting these random photos from folks we don't know, but who are very kind in sending them to us.  Thank you!

Thank you Tami Hirsch from Highland, Utah for this photo.  Tami was visiting TS with her two youngest children and met these two dear sister missionaries.  :-)

Thank you Stephanie Jacobsen for this photo of six wonderful TS missionaries! Stephanie was at the temple to take photos and saw these dear sisters and took their photo.  Her son is at the Mexico MTC and will be serving in the California Carlsbad Mission.

Heavenly Father Listens To Me, No Matter What Age I Am

What happened this week? A lot! We didn't go to Welfare Square because we had interviews with President. Which are always good! Mine doesn't last too long, I never remember what I want to talk about or ask, and my question don't formulate fast enough for me in the short time. But they are always good! 

Sister Leavitt and I only speak English. She has broken French and I have spotty Spanish. The sisters in out district speak Spanish, French, German, Russian, and Ukrainian. I was able to take a German, Russian/English, and French tour!! And I contacted an Italian Motorcoach (49 people). Very exciting! Exchanges are the only way I get to have a companion from Europe! I haven't had one yet. We finished our exchanges with the sisters in the District. They are all doing well, having their own things to grow and improve upon as missionaries, but they'll make it!

The highlight of my week was possibly the eclipse! See waaaaaay back in 6th grade in the space science text book there was a map foretelling the future eclipses that would occur! I remember thinking, "I WILL BE THERE!" Fast forward eight years later, I had completely forgotten until Thursday morning, President announced that the mission bought glasses for us all to have during the eclipse! I now know it was that determination in 6th grade is why I got called to Temple Square, not to preach the Gospel, but to see a 90% eclipse.  Not really, but I bet Heavenly Father remembered how excited I was for that, and thought He would remind me that He does listen to me, no matter what age I am. 

I was also kind of hoping some crazy stuff would go down on Square the day of the eclipse, but nope. It was just a regular day just with weird lighting and crescent shaped shadows from the leaves for a bit.

It was pretty cool. We missed the peak because of a man in our flagpole tour talking and talking just to talk. I asked a question of him about his culture and religion that took a long time to explain. He is a nice guy, and his wife too.

 I have been out for 11 months and 2 days! WOW! 

More exciting news, people that I have sent to locals, more of them are being taught! One was even set on date for baptism! Though most of them forget that I will call and follow up with them, so sadly they don't answer the phone. That's okay, if all I can do is add them to my prayers, I will! 

We went on exchanges with our zone leaders yesterday! That is always a good learning exchange for me! Sister Beltran from Mexico! She was with me when Kasey, Sam and LeighAnne came to so square. She was great to have there and to teach with!

That's all!
Sister Glanzer

Sister Tuttle and I got some good bonding time after a long time of brief chats.

My radical eclipse picture. A man had a set of these glasses taped to his fancy camera so he could get some good shots.

Cute little sister missionary sponsored sign.

The trees on Church property just have Christmas light vines.

Sister Ranieri and I always manage to wear these outfits on the same day, more that once.

Yes, I went on a hike dressed exactly like that! I left the med kit in the car, but I was ready. 

President needed to model the glasses for us.

We look like we are ready for school! Lunch boxes and backpacks!

We need a pic with our cool protective glasses!

Look Who Found Allison!

Some of Allison's really good friends stopped by and saw her! Sam and Kasey Nelson and LeighAnne Barnes. She had a great time being able to see them while on her mission.

"I was on exchanges with Sister Beltran. We were finishing personal study on the Square in the morning, then they asked us to cover the Beehive House until the sisters come. We were there for 10 minutes and then they came, so we went behind the house in front of the COB to finish planning. We walked towards the Square and as we neared the Reflection Pool, "lLook, there are my friends." 

Χαίρετε

Now what on earth does that word mean? Hello in Greek (I hope). I got to announce again in front of the Conference Center (Music and the Spoken word is there for the summer). While we were waiting for everyone to come out of the building, but before the choir of TSM sisters sang, a man comes up to me and asks if his group of 23 people from Greece could join my tour. This was a super tour! They told us there are about 700 LDS in Greece (I looked it up and they were right, 772). There were two highlights of the tour, 1)  the tour guide told us, "Just the beliefs, they don't care about the history." Jaw drop of joy! 2) At the end, we gave out all of the six copies of the Book of Mormon we could find. Woot! Sister Leavitt said that there was a lady who was crying a bit. Never so much had I left a tour knowing that future members of the church were going to come from this tour, whether it was themselves or someone close to them. Amazing.

Another tour, just yesterday, we had the 6pm Flagpole tour (every hour and half hour we offer free English guided tours of Temple Square and Spanish and Mandarin every hour). We had a group of nine and gave three books. We had a French family and the mom wanted a book. Just she came with Sister Leavitt and I to the desk to get one. We shared a bit more with her and she really loved it. She asked us if we felt peace here, because that is what we were giving to her. She cried a little bit too. She loved what we shared about the family. Sadly she didn't refer, but we know that one day missionaries will meet her and she'll accept the Gospel. 

As for Teaching Center. TWO PEOPLE I SENT TO LOCALS ARE STILL MEETING WITH THE MISSIONARIES! Sadly, as always, they don't pick up the phone. I am so thankful that we are allowed to call the local missionaries to know how the individual ladies are doing. I am very excited for them! 

It is that time of transfer again where interviews are the day after P-Day! We are actually doing something a bit different starting this transfer. Before companionships would arrive at a time, one would meet with President (spiritual needs and assessment, guidance, the like, checking that we are staying worthy to our promises with God), the other would meet with Sis. Risenmay (physical and mental health and needs), then swap. But now the district will meet with Sis. Risenmay for two hours role playing lessons that we teach as missionaries, all the while President is meeting with us one at time. This will be new. They said that is what they did when they presided over the Utah Salt Lake City South Mission (We think, there are a lot of SLC missions). Remember a Zone is about 20 sisters, and a District is about 6-8 sisters.

Missionary life is still going good. One of the best ways for young adults to prep for life and to be strong disciples of Christ in the real world. Never would I trade this experience for anything that I could have done for 18 months if I hadn't.

"Until next time, God be with you til we meet again" - Lloyd D. Newell, Music and the Spoken Word announcer

*Que Choir singing* (not the choir) https://www.lds.org/music/library/hymns/god-be-with-you-till-we-meet-again?lang=eng

Sister Glanzer

PS. We are going on a hike today

This sister is going to another VC, she was here for MTC contacting... She is Sister Allison, How legit is that?!

When you ask me, what did you learn to say in Chinese? Hai Bian Bao Bao (sounds like: hime yen bow bow) Spongebob. That is what we sing in our apartment. Sister Yang Y. (as Patrick Star) has left the apartment, but her memory lives on. Sister Smith M. as Spongebob. art work by Sister Glanzer A. Face warping curtsy of the church allowing us to have Photo Booth on our iPads.

Look Who Found Allison!

The Clark family from the Oroville Ward had to search high and low for Allison. They didn't find her on Temple Square.  Didn't find her at Welfare Square. Looked again at Temple Square and finally found her!

Saying Goodbye Is Hard

When we got the moving text, in our apartment only Sis. Yang Y. got the text. Which means, either Sis. Leavitt and I will stay together, or Sis. Smith M. will be with one of us. Then we didn't get any texts about any other assignments, so we continued to speculate.  THEN! we thought we could be in a trio and then going to bed on time wouldn't be a problem (wishful thinking)!

Zone: North 1

P-day: Wednesday

District Leader: Sister Leavitt

Zone Leaders: Beltran (Mexico) and Cochain (France)

Assignment: Welfare Square

Companion: Sister Leavitt round 2! She wanted to have a comp for 12 weeks ever since the end of January. (the criteria to be my companion is that the sister needs to be a district leader, just so you know )

So the transfer that just ended was probably the saddest transfer to complete. I had three previous companions go home; Sisters Tripptree, Morales, and Da Luz. Now my companions that are in the mission are my two MTC ones and Sister Leavitt. But also Sister Monzalvo and Herr left. They were my zone leaders last transfer, and Sister Monzalvo was the only one for more that one transfer. That was a hard goodbye. 

That is a sad thing about missions and transfers, every six weeks you say good bye to friends that saw you grow so much. People that you grew pretty close to... And you have no idea if you will ever see each other again. Will I make it to Brazil? Or Mongolia? To Australia or Guatemala? Who knows? There's a maybe for one of the countries. Granted, I will make it to Orem more easily so I have one companion I'll see again! USA companions have their perks.

The unlucky thing about the end of the transfer is that whoever we find and says that we can contact them later, we can't count them as a new investigator unless we have a specific return date. We only have a bunch of potentials. It is great, but tricky because we aren't perfect and they might slip out of sight.

We only have two new sisters in our district, Sis. Fedotova from Ukraine and her trainee (who we called to find out, but she didn't answer). We still have sister Calderon and Trevino.

Sister Glanzer

The last picture of the zone

Sister Herr and Monzalvo are just joining our district, see?

I got to see Rachael and her mom last week! I was able to give them a tour of the square, and then left them to explore the conference center

I left to make departing plans with sister Da Luz, now I have a few gems on my iPad

We just dropped Sister Da Luz off at the airport

Some neat construction

Salt Lake Temple Square Mission

Mission photo taken July 18, 2017

Family Is A Divine Gift Given From God

I want to start off with two phone calls that I took. The first one was in the evening sometime ago between this an last p-day. This man called in about genealogy. Sweet! Just refer him to a local chapel and the ward Family History person will take it away (I do not know much on how it all works). "What gives your church the reason for doing [family history]?" How he said that question, I knew right then, he was looking for a reason to quarrel with me. The conversation goes on and on. He then brings in nation geographic and their DNA thing they do, which is neat. 

"Which do you think I should do?" 

"Both." Because our Family Search services are free for anyone to use, and knowing the names of ancestors is super cool! 

That caught him off guard. He wasn't really letting me explain or speak very much but that was my chance to let him know my purpose. I was glad I could end on a good note with this man, but being aggressive about my beliefs isn't what I want to do over the phone.

The next phone call was two days ago. Another man calls about wanting a Book of Mormon. I would explain about something, then that would lead to a, "In the bible it says this." Funny thing about that, this lead us back to genealogy. He brought up some scripture some where in Titus about, you should avoid genealogy. (Titus 3:9 if y'all are interested)

The people that were given that counsel were people who were vain and proud in their hearts of their ancestors and used that status to gain, praise and power. Today, the genealogy is going to get you nada, zippo, zillich. My favorite thing is when people take scripture out of context, not thinking about the time or the people it was originally written for. Our church does genealogy for various different reasons, but I know that family is a divine gift given from God, and so we would have a natural inclination towards finding about who I am related to in the 1200's. That is why we have temples, for bringing those family ties, and making them forever connected.

We ended on a good note, and he said yes to missionaries! 

As for outbound, no I am not going, but I guessed that. Welfare square, I feel like I haven't been there for ages! There was a Leadership meeting on Monday so we had to find a cover. It feels like whenever there was a holiday or a meeting, it was our shift for Welfare Square. Kind of sad, I rather like it there. BUT! This week is when we discover if we move, if we train, if we become district leader or zone leaders! Or if no text other than the moving one, Sister Leavitt will remain a DL, and I a DLC . So having Wednesday p-day is very dangerous, because my next p-day could potentially be over a week away. Sad, but that's the way of the Temple Square mission!

'Til next p-day! Which no one knows when, except President, his wife, his assistants, and the office assistants and the Temple Square coordinators. So at least eight people. 

Sister Glanzer

Our service project was to disinfect toys and hard surfaces on a daycare for mothers going through rehab for things. This table is designed for the feeding time of the infants! Sooooooo Cute!

We had a sleepover (went to bed on time) of our roommates again

My oldest sister sent me a box of stuff!

My favorite jar I've had for almost 6 month broke

Happy 24th of July!

Zone conference! It was set up a little differently this time. We were seated at tables so we could write and do things better and it was also more comfortable to be at a table. I hope we do this again. The theme was to have the Book of Mormon be a more open book while on the square and in the teaching center.

We watched a bit of the training for the new mission presidents and their wives by D. Todd Christofferson. Something that was really eye opening was when he said that this dispensation, a period of time where prophets are brought back after a time with none, was the only dispensation to start off with new scriptures. In the past the prophets have written scripture, and so that time ended with what ever was revealed to the prophets of those times. Our day was started with scripture because we needed a witness of Christ that hadn't been translated many different times. As we read the Book of Mormon with the Bible, we cannot mistake who Christ is, and what His purpose is. Same with God as well. Pretty neat, right? I never questioned why the Book of Mormon had to be done before the church was officially organized in April 1830, but that makes so much sense! 

A little less than half of Temple Square sisters are famous on KSL in SLC. KSL reserved the spot for the sisters to sit. We were in the background of almost everything they filmed in front of the Brigham Apts. Maybe they wanted a good cheering crowd. We cheered for everything that passed us. When other nation's flags came past we stood up and cheered hard! They had banners of which floats had won what award that year and people dressed as pioneers were the carriers for those. And some local wards (Mormon congregations) had these really neat floats in the parade! I was more focused on filming the bands though. I love marching bands. Only a few had uniforms, the rest wore t-shirts and similar shorts. ;)

For those of you not familiar with the 24th of July, it is a Utah State holiday, that is celebrated by various other Mormon communities in the US mostly (Sis. Herr from German didn't know what it was, which is understandable) It commemorates a) The first Mormon Pioneers coming to the Salt Lake Valley, and b) to honor all Mormon handcart pioneers. I did not know the first one! But the first year they had been in the valley they did celebrate by showing patriotism to the US. The very government that rejected them, but they knew without the freedom of religion, the Gospel of Jesus Christ wouldn't have been restored here. Members in other nations do not have to show patriotism to the US because they are part of the church, seeing as sisters from other countries didn't really know about it. They also fed us! Some ward fed us Sunday night, and the mission for Pioneer day.

Wrist Update: I got a less bulky, left-handed brace that doesn't do as much, but is more manageable. And my wrist is slightly less swollen.

District Update: I have never worked so much as a district leader companion (DLC) and I love it! If we are a family, the four sisters are the children, and Sis. Leavitt and I are the parents. She is more fathery in her role. She'll describe how she feels about something and how she just wishes they would use what she gives, and I tell her she is knowing just a little about what parents go through and what Heavenly Father must feel about us too! I am more mothery, so she says, making sure we have good district unity, being friends with them all. Look at us working hard for the district! 

Good bye all! God be with you until next p-day!
Sister Glanzer

 

July 24th Pioneer Parade

Those girls shouted out to us, so we cheered really loud and hard back! 

Every year there is an apostle and this year it was President Uchtdorf! His wife had to direct his attention to us. Thanks Harriet!