Luau anyone

We were invited to a Luau in one of the wards we were working at! It was a lot of fun... And A lot of people

I have video's too but it wont let me load :)

An Epistle to the Gentiles

1. I, Sister McFarlane, a missionary of the Lord Jesus Christ, write unto you my dear friends that the grace of God be upon you for the unrighteous deeds that thou hast done.


2. For behold it has been many months since the good Lord hast called me away on his errand. For many months have I labored crying repentance unto the inhabitants of Provo, Utah.


3. And it came to pass that as I have been diligently working amongst my people, I became wearied from not hearing from my brethren and friends.


4. Many epistles have I written unto thee my brethren. Awaiting your response. I plead unto the Lord at night that thou hast not forgotten me, thy sister. And as I have prayed the spirit of the Lord came unto me saying:


5. Peace be unto thy soul, a few of thy friends do love thee and stand by thee. And thy mother and thy father. But this I say unto you by way of commandment, go unto thy friends and cry repentance unto those that doth forget thee.


6.Thus being filled with the spirit, keeping the commandments of the Lord, I doth now write unto you, my beloved friends, To call you to repentance, and exhort you to turn yourselves from this evil deed and say unto you write your friend who has gone away.


7. For behold, if ye do not this thing which I have commanded you. I will return home and remember thee no more. And it supposeth me that I speak of these things in vain, but I say unto you that ye are the support of thy missionary friend.


8. Many have said a Letter! A letter! We've already sent a letter! Know ye not that two letters are better than one? That there are more weeks in a mission than one?


9.Behold, I know not more than thou art unsuccessful and hast drawn away thy support. I do not desire to murmur but behold it grieveth my soul.


10. Behold doth a nursing mother forget her sucking child? Nay neither have I forgotten thee, i have ye taped to the bedroom wall.


11. And now my beloved friends, may the Lord our God who has redeemed us and made us free, keep you continually in his presence, yea and may he favor thee, that ye may be blessed.


12. O remember, remember what the Lord hast spoken, I am His servant and plead with him for your cause. I do away your epistle. Adieu.

People from the mission

Alright, so I've decided that it was about time to share some pictures of some of the people that I've been working with on my mission. First off they're not your typical people you'd think that they'd be interested in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. To be honest, I didn't think so either until I really got to know them, and their concerns and helped them come unto the Savior.  They have a smile on their faces now every time that we come over, there is a gleam in their eye that show that they have accepted Jesus Christ into their lives.

First is Jerome Black. He come from the deep bayous of southern Louisiana. And I must confess that his Crawdad Gumbo is to DIE for. When he was a child, he and his older brother were Crawdad fishin' for dinner one night, when he was bit by some type of bug on his hand, it was really gross, he showed pictures. And by the time they got to the hospital, it was too late, his hand had to be amputated.  So he's my first amputee that I've taught.  His family is a God Fearin' Family, they attended the Baptist Church that was started by his great great grandfather, but as he got older to start making his own decisions, he stopped going to church and moved to Switzerland to be a goat farmer. Go figure. He was there for about five years before the owner of the Goat farm went bankrupt and lost his farm. So with no job, Jerome moved to Springville in search of a better job.  But his search hasn't gone so well, and is now working at a fast food restaurant. We met him  while he was working and we were there for lunch, he started asking us questions about the church, and now he's on date for the end of August.

Next is Elizabeth Newbury. She is a native to Privet Drive in Surrey England. Her grandparents were coverts to the church, and her parents were born and raised in the church, essentially Elizabeth was baptized when she was 8. But when she got old enough to make her own decisions she stopped going to church. Then last June she and her active family moved to Springville to be closer to Zion per se. Her parents invited us over for dinner one sunday and we started talking to Elizabeth to see if she'd be interested in meeting with us so we could help her coming back and help her get to the temple. She does have a smoking problem but I think it will be easy for her to give it up since she picked it up 3 years ago. So as of right now, she comes once a month, but once she gains a testimony of these things she'll be more stable in church.

 



 

This is Billy The Goat, he was referred to us by Jerome. He too came to Springville from Switzerland, to find a better goat life. We have only met with him once, because he is really hard to get a hold of. Because he's at so many different farms partying it up with other goats, so he's usually pretty wasted when we stop by.

 

 

Then Nothing is worse than waking up in the morning to this person in your room everyday!

7-11 Day

So this week happened to be the greatest week for two special reasons.

First: 7-11 Day had finally come again! What is 7-11 Day you ask? Well sit right there and read a bit further. So this day only comes once a year and it always falls on July 11th. On this fantastic day the Gas Station/Corner Store so proudly named 7 Eleven gives away a FREE SMALL SLURPEE! With those who are not familiar with 7 Eleven and their slurpees, they're also known as slushies at other corner stores. So me and my companion go to the only 7 Eleven store in our area and grabbed us a slurpee! Brain Freeze anyone?! The day of free slurpees started at 11:00 am and ended at 7:00 pm on July 11th. Good thing we grabbed one because it was a hot day here in Springville Utah.  And then it rained all night. Amazing. Then i was on exchanges with the spanish sisters and we tried to hit up another 7 Eleven in their area, but the line was super long so we left and went to Sonic instead and got Happy Hour Drinks only for $1.29. Who can beat that? Well besides 7 Eleven on 7-11 day! But sonic has happy hour everyday! :)

Second: At 1:00 pm July 11, 2012 I Whitney McFarlane, said good bye to my Aunt Julie as two Elders at the MTC took my luggage out of the car and walked down the hall with them. This was the day I began my journey to be a Servant of the Lord! And now its July 11, 2013, I've gone a whole year already, a year of happiness, a year of refinement, a year of stress, a year of working my tail off, being a servant of the Lord.  I have seen peoples lives change as the grasped the Gospel, feasted upon the words of Christ, Repented of their sins and were baptized for the remission of their sins. In the  year I have been out i have served in five areas.

1. Orem Sunpark: I covered two stakes here. Sunset Heights and Park Stake. With 10 baptisms. Since I've left the southern half of the sunset heights stake broke off and became a new stake. The sisters there now cover 3 stakes adding the Vineyard Stake. But still covers the same amount of area. I was there for 18 weeks.

2. American Fork East: I covered three stakes here. American Fork, American Fork Central and American Fork East. With 3 baptisms. I enjoyed Christmas here with my two companions. Woke up to my stuffed dog hanging from the celing fan. Great Snow ball fights with the Land Lords kids. Even took one to the head. I was here for 6 Weeks.

3. Vernal- I only covered one stake here. The Vernal Stake. With 3 Baptisms. There are a total of Five stakes in Vernal and each of the stakes had their own set of missionaries. The weather during the winter is horrid and the snow is deep. But once the Snow melted it was a lot of fun hiking McConkie Ranch. I was here for 18 weeks

4. Heber City East- I covered two stakes here. The Heber North and Heber East Stakes. With 3 baptisms. Beautiful Place, a lot of farms with horses. Hiked the wasatch mountain stake park, twice. Loved Dairy Keen Shakes. Heber is the home of my True name... Sister Mac-n-Cheese. I was here for 6 weeks.

5. Springville Kolob: I cover 3 stakes here. Kolob, Hobble Creek, and Hobble Creek West. Have had 2 baptisms thus far. With 3 lined up for this weekend. Making a total of 5 this transfer. Then we have one lined up for Next transfer. 6 Baptisms ya'll. Thats exciting. We opened this area for sisters, the elders were here before us. And our theme song is "If you could hie to Kolob"!

So in 6 months i'll be stepping off the plane in Orlando Florida. can't wait to see all ya'll and hope ya'll are doing great!

Love Sister McFarlane

4th of July

I do hope all ya'll had a great 4th of July celebrating the birth of our nation. I am grateful that the Lord has Prepared and preserved this lad so he can bring forth his righteous purposes. It has been prophesied in the book of mormon that this land has been consecrated by God, that whosoever comes to this country shall serve God.  That this nation will be a free nation with no Kings or rulers . I know that it was through God's will that the founding fathers and the patriots were able to win the revolutionary war so that this nation could be free. And because of the freedom we have it opened the gate for the Restoration of Christ Church back on the earth. Everything is done according to gods will.

For the beautiful 4th of July, all 217 full time missionaries were in the Provo 4th of july parade. In which we walked  from the Provo high School down to 900 e about a two mile walk. The missionaries in the UPM were the stars of the parade! For those who are my friends and were in Provo that day. I apologize I did not see you!  But it was good to see previous companions, and Sisters and Elders from areas i've served.

Elders Poulsen, Bilodeau, Galke, Stephens, and ME!

One Year Mark!

Me and Sister Lolofie

Me and Sister Cadiente from the same stake WHOO

Our Mission Banner

Scotsman

Me and Sister Wood

President and Sister McCune

I lived across from this High School

MISSIONARIES!

Later that evening we had a district Activity also know as District Confinement. As as district we had to stay inside a chapel from 5-9 pm and we watched how to train a dragon, approved by the mission president.  After the movie we played games, which i won 3 out of the 4 rounds In my District there is me, and my companion sister Lyle. The spanish sisters Hermanas Hernandez and Montanares, and the Elders Bradford and Anderson. It was fun. :)

after eating Norwegian Pancakes with Norwegian Nutella

Our District playing in the dark!

I believe I can Fly...POP

So Friday Night Me and my companion were driving around to go visit some families. And as we were driving there was this little bird that flew onto the road, and it just stood there. Most normal birds just fly away right. Yeah not this one. We had our windows down and then we heard a POP! My companion starts freaking out and pulls over. I get out of the car to look for evidence of this bird on the road, in which there were none. So we go and visit people, and i decided to check the back tires of the car, and sure enough on the back drivers side tire, there was evidence of the bird... Fresh Meat. HAHA. So I texted teh Elders in my district and said "Sister Christiansen killed her first bird with the car, this calls for a celebration at Dairy Keen." So Saturday we went to Dairy Keen and only 2 out of the 4 elders came to lunch. And those two Elders, Tetterton and Galovin, made a card for my companion. It was epic.

Guess who I ran into on Sunday? Elder Kohler who served in our ward in roughly 2002! He knows you and your family, the barkers, the rhames, and possibly my family. We were speaking in a ward here and he was also one of the speaksers and he asked where we were from before church started, and I told him from Florida and he asked where, and I said Crystal River, and he's like I served there in my mission. I saw my first manatee there at a park and I was like Homossassa Springs>? and he's like yeah, I haven't heard that word in such a long time! And So its really cool! Ask your dad or look in your dads missionary book thing and see around what time Elder Kohler was there. He said he replaced Elder Han from Australia.

So much History

 So my companion and I went and helped a family put flowers on graves of their family members. And while at the cemetery the wife showed us a grave of an indian prince, and stones of pioneers who have come to utah, especially to Heber City.  Broadheads, Murdocks and Sweats are a few of the names that founded Heber City. There is SO much history in a cemetery, I kind of want to know who these people were and what they did and what their role was in the foundation of the church.  There were a lot of children buried here.  as well. Here are pictures

This is the Indian Prince Tom Tabby

Tom Tabby- Son of Chief Tabby

One day of 1867, Chief Tabby came into Provo River Valley after the Indian peace Treaty

with his dead son in his arms. As he rode up on his horse, Joseph Stacy Murdock, the Mormon

presiding Bishop, recognized Chief Tabby. After a brief greeting, Chief Tabby said that he was holding

his own dead son, who was killed in an accident while hunting. The Chief knew that Joseph was the religious leader among his people, so he asked that Joseph bury his son in the custom of the Mormons. With a feeling of great sorrow for his friend, Joseph conducted a christian funeral service and buried Tom Tabby under a beautiful pine tree which had been planted several years before by John H. Murdock in the Heber Cemetery. 

   When the final prayer was said Chief Tabby said "my son has been buried in the White Man's Custom, now he will be honors in the indian fashion." A rick of ceder logs was then laid upon the new grave and the boys favorite pony was led up to it, where is throat was cut and the animal was laid upon the pier and the logs were set a fire. As the embers slowly died, chief Tabby got on his horse and rode into the Mountains east of Heber with his braves.

How cool is this?

My heart goes out to the Guerra Family

Never in my life, would i have thought that I would be writing a blog with such serious matter. One that will probably be closest to my heart than any other blog. Right now my heart is swollen with sorrow, with joy, and with love. Never would I have thought that I would be attending a funeral/memorial service for a fellow servant of the Lord in the Utah- Provo Mission. Never would I have thought I would be saying "see you later" to a friend of mine. But this passed Thursday, I had to. 

Jeffery R. Guerra, 23, passed away Thursday May 9, 2013. He was out doing his morning exercise as part of the normal missionary routine, and he collapsed. They rushed him to the hospital to find out that he had had a brain aneurysm. He was rushed to surgery and when the doctors were able to do what they were supposed to do, it was too late, his brain was gone.  My dear friend that I only got to know for a transfer (6 weeks) back in October 25-Dec 5, had passed away. His parents and siblings were flown in from Sweden where they had currently reside after leaving Peru nearly 19 years previous. 

On Thursday we were at a Zone Training Meeting and we had received a text message from the mission office that Elder Guerra had experienced a medical emergency and was in the Hospital. Later that day we got a second text saying that he had a brain aneurysm and was going into surgery.  Then we didn't hear anything for the rest of the day. We had gone to Taco Bell after our Zone Training Meeting and I asked my Companion if people died from Aneurysms, and she said she didn't know. For some reason I just knew that something wasn't going to be okay with Elder Guerra, but we went on our way doing what we normally do as missionaries and I had nearly forgotten about Elder Guerra. Then Around 8 pm, we were in an Appointment and I pulled out the cell phone to get a phone number for the people we were with, and I saw that President McCune had called and left a message. My heart was racing, I knew something wasn't right, otherwise why would President call? So after the lesson we called president back and his voice was heavy laden, stressful, mournful. He had told us that we lost Elder Guerra. I just started crying because I was in his very first district when he came out of the MTC, we had become friends. And that hurt me a lot, never in my life did i ever think this would happen while I was on my mission. 

We had the Memorial Service for him, and majority of the Zone's did a special musical number for the program, Eastern Utah Zone did "I know that my redeemer lives" and his parents got up and spoke and told us a little more about Elder Guerra. Ever since he was a child he was trying to be like Christ. They had told us a story of when he was 1 1/2 years old and living in Peru, where it was christmas time and his dad was the bishop. There were children who came from poor families and Elder Guerra's dad knew that they wouldn't be getting presents for Christmas. So all the gifts had been given out and they had noticed a little child with no shoes on and Jeffery only 1 1/2 at the time said "Papi, give him my gift i have plenty of toys." Another story they told about how he had found this baby bird who had fallen out of the tree and he did his best to take care of it so it could live.  They shared a few other stories like this, and I just knew that Elder Guerra was preparing for something GREAT, and that Heavenly Father had a plan for him on earth, granted it was only 23 years, but thats all Heavenly Father needed of him and now he's on the other side doing missionary work.  And how as I can just say that I'm grateful for the plan of salvation, to know that there is life after this life, and that Elder Guerra was definitely called home for a special reason. 

I have deep love for his Family, they were so strong. Going through all this reminds me of when my step-dad passed away. And I know without a doubt that the Plan of Salvation is real. That Heavenly Father has a plan for each one of us so that we can be able to return to him and if we have faithfully finished our mission that Heavenly Father has sent us out to do, He will welcome us back into his fold saying "well, done my good and faithful servant" And I know that is what he is going to say to Elder Guerra. He did all that he could to be more like Christ, to love one another as Christ would, to help others on their way. 

All I can ask of you guys, is to pray for the Guerra Family. Thank you.

LOVE ALWAYS,
SISTER MCFARLANE

Working with the Ward Mission Leader!

I just want to testify that Heavenly Father hears and answers prayers. My Companion and I on saturday were talking about  going out and working with our ward mission leaders to visit families who they thing could benefit from a visit from the sister missionaries, and the first WML that came into my mind was Brother Bestenlehner of the Maesar 1st ward, so I sent him a text and this is what happened.

Us: Hey, Bro. B. are you available tonight at 8?

Bro B: Sure- who are you teaching?

Us: We were wondering if we could come out with you and go visit some people you think that might need some spiritual upliftment from the sister missionaries? Less-Active, Non-Member or Members who might be going through a hard time. Your choice.

Bro B: Sounda Great!

Us: Awesome, we'll be at your house around 8.

So during the day while Brother Bestenlehner was at work he knelt down in his office and Prayed to know which family we should visit. And a certain family came to his mind. And through out the day, he started thinking about two other families, but again the spirit prompted him to go to the other family. So that night we went to the family, that the Lord Prompted us to go to. To find out that the wife was praying that someone would give her a blessing And she asked how did we know that she needed help. And we told her that we were prompted to come over. So this family is less active and going through a lot of trials. I shared a scripture from the book of mormon with the family about trusting god in our trials. I have know idea where this scripture is, because I tried to find it again to put in a talk that i gave on sunday, and i couldn't find it. So it was a very spiritual night indeed.

 I have a testimony that some of the answers to our prayers are simply through other people, and we just need to recognize that. :)

May 10th is my Ten Month Mark! WOO! Can't wait!

General Conference!

Okay, so how often does a Missionary get so go to general conference? Well in the Utah Provo Mission, The missionaries here get to go twice in their missions. And guess who go to go for the first time ever O_o? Guess. Yup... You got it. It was ME! :D I had the opportunity to attend the Sunday Afternoon Session of General Conferece! *Bounces* I was excited! So me and my temporary companion Sister Alcantar, left our apartment at 9:30 am to be in Heber by 11:45 am and was up in Salt Lake by 12:45 ish. and So we had an hour or so before conference started. So we had lunch, that was packed by our loverly Mission Mom, sister McCune. Then we walked to the Conference Center, President told us that we needed to be carefull of the Protesters, so I was expecting like Tons of them there. And there weren't as many there, there was one that was a Christian Jew, who had taken the missionary discussions from one of our missionaries here in the UPM. And he was saying that Satan and Jesus are not brothers, that Christ created Satan. and The sad thing was that Members were arguing back. I was like Come on, Satan is just tussling up your feathers. And there was another guy who was dressed up like the Devil with a banner sign that said "Hello, I am Satan. And these street preachers are my missionaries." It truely breaks my heart that people do this, that the Advisary has a great hold upon these peoples hearts that they do these things. Because seriously, do they not have anything else better to do than to cause trouble? The worst thing is that they show Temple Clothing. yeah.

So in Conference we were on the left hand side of the building in the front here is a picture so you can see for yourself where we were at

I wish we could have been front and center! But I can't complain because how often do you get to go to conference. 

And this months conference was amazing, on how we need to build a christ centered home. To raise our children to know and follow the ways of the Lord so that we can be built upon a sure foundation, when trials and temptation come our way we will not fall away. We need to be converted. Husbands are to LOVE their wives and wives are to LOVE their husbands. And as husband's and wives they are to LOVE their Children.  We need to be Faithful to our spouses, we need to teach our children right from wrong. It is our responsibility. I cannot wait until the May Ensign comes out so that I can study and mark up the ensign. They are modern day scriputre! 

After conference, we had the opportunity to walk around Temple Square. We went to the Visitor Center, got a picture of the missionaries with the Christus. Then we went to the Tabernacle, really cool place. Then we were going to into the assembly hall but twas locked, i Guess they had some kind of meeting going on there. Then we went into the South Side Visitor's Center and it was amazing! All about Families and how they fit into Heavenly Fathers plan. and There they had the cut out of the Salt Lake City Temple. Pretty Neat. And then we went home.  It felt weird to be out of the mission for that long. But the one thing i was grateful for was that I didn't run into any family members while I was in Salt Lake. Thanks Julie and Family for not being there :P

Then on the Trip. Sister Alcan Tar and I did some sight seeing. Will up date pictures later once I get them from her! :)

Love you all

Dry Fork, Petroglyph and a Dead Deer

So its P-day and what better way to spend it than driving 20+ miles into the middle of nothing trying to find Dry Fork Canyon to end up going the WRONG WAY! We called Sister Leota, and she couldn't remember where it was, then we called Sister Cooley (who is actually a non member)  and she said to keep taking the road we were on, but we were like "yeah, its not this way, so we turned around and called Sister Ercanbrack (Also a Non Member) and we got us in the right direction.
   Now that we're in Dry Fork we see a sign and we pulled over and took pictures, and across the caynon there is an American Flag on top of a mountain, it was HUGE! 15'x25'. here are pictures.



Pretty Amazing right? Well guess what... a girl the day after we went here committed suicide off the cliff!  Anway we got back into the car to drive a little further and here we find an amazing view area, so we pulle dover. We got out and started walking around and we found a trail along the side of the mountain. We followed it a ways and then I climbed on some rocks and i found Petroglyphs.  They're so cool. What are Petroglyphs? They're rock carvings made by native american's many many years ago. And along with these amazing beautiful art work, people added graffiti destroying the beauty of the scene. Enjoy the petroglyphs.

Another really cool thing about this place has to do with sounds! So my companion was on one side of the trail and I was on the other, and when we talked to each other we had no problem hearing heach other. It was way cool. This happens because the sound revirbarates off the wall of the rock we were by, so the sound carries. But if you were in an open field with nothing for the sound to bounce off it "carries away in the wind" wicked cool.
    As I was trying to show Sister Quist something and there I find this container. And I was like What the Heck.?! So I opened it and there i find a GeoCache. Never seen one of these things before in my life. So what is Geocaching? Its a hidden object that is strategiclly placed, you have to have a GPS to do this. I don't know much more but the website you tell you more. Geocaching.net. Apparently there are tons in Vernal. This one we found was left in November 2004! It was really cool. One rule is if you take something out of the container, you  must put something in to replace it. So Sister Quist took a dinosaur finger puppet and we left a "key to our heart". These things are cool must check more into it.

Now its the end of our p-day. We enjoyed Heavenly Fathers Creation, and the art work of the native americans. Its time to head home, shower and get ready for our one appointment for the night. I was heading back to the car and there were some birds on the ground making noise and i went to go check ito ut and then i'm like "OH MY GOSH THATS GROSS!"



A half eaten deer. Yup! :) Here are more pictures of heavenly fathers creation