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| Beautiful sisters and great friends! |
" Well guess what. Our music rules changed and ANY gospel music you have lying around I desperately want to listen to. Can you send that, too? We can listen to reverant church music. So instrumentals, violin, piano, choirs, soloists, etc. I REALLY want a piano CD I can do ballet to.. if you want to wait until Christmas I understand :) But I am so excited. I love music.
ALSO GUESS WHAT IS THE BEST THING EVER?! We have permission to use our resident gym. I am so excited for tomorrow morning I want to cry.
I had a big zone meeting on Saturday :) It was pretty good. The General Authority is coming next month so this was just a mini zone development meeting. It was definitely what I needed! Got me all fired UP!
From a letter to Ian:
"Did you love conference?! I know I'm a missionary, so I'm going to be much dorkier about it - BUT I LOVED CONFERENCE! I got something out of every talk, but I wanted to share one of my biggest impressions with you. It was in Elder Martino's talk. He said something that really hit me - it was something like "don't doubt because something defies logic - that's what Laman and Lemuel did!" I've always felt that my biggest gift and greatest flaw was my logical thinking. I love when things add up and balance out. I love puzzles that can be solved and hard questions that can be answered. In math,science, business, and adult-life, that's great! It has been such a blessing. I've tutored people that struggle with it and realized what a blessing it truly is. When it comes to the Gospel, it's pretty good, too. I like how simple it is, but how beautifully complex it is also. (Jesus the Christ, dude. Good book. It brings some serious depth to the gospel.) I like finding connections and deeper meanings. It's so exciting. BUT - where my logical thinking is my downfall is in my Faith. I struggle with faith sometimes. I have questions that probably will never be answered in this life! And when things don't add up perfectly, little doubts cross my mind. I hate it, hate it, hate it. But it happens. Our Stake President (Pres. Platt) spoke to us about this by using Isaiah 55:8-9.
8 ¶For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.
9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Even when I feel so smart, he's smarter. Even when I try to make sense of things, his sense makes more sense. His thoughts are simply higher than mine! And I need to trust the witnesses I've had from the past. Dumb Laman and Lemuel kept forgetting their testimony-building experiences and their questions turned into doubts real fast. :) So, anyways, my faith has been much stronger since conference and realizing my mind's silly tendencies.
She reminds him of his spiritual experiences he had, especially Youth Conference. "It sounds like Y.C. was a powerful experience for you. And if you're ever struggling with your testimony you'll always have that to fall back on. One of my favorite verses is Alma5:26 (Ponderized!)
26 And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?
because it reminds me to remember times when the spirit has spoken to me and that the spirit should be able to do that anytime! The spirit was strong at Y.C, but "Can ye feel so now?"
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| Showing off her new haircut! |
One last thing, in a letter to Rachel she recommends reading the talk titled "The Inconvenient Messiah". It was really good. Here's a link: https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/jeffrey-r-and-patricia-t-holland_inconvenient-messiah/
Have a blessed week, yall!
Love, Sister Bartsch
I miss my sister. She's so amazing. Love you Koda!!! <3 Morgan
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