The best time to plant a tree {1.27.14}

Kendallville is in another snow emergency. Oh boy! This means I have limited time on the computer. So, here's what I'll tell you... life is crazy and the church is true! :) These seem to be two reoccuring themes for me lately.

Sister Wight and I have had a few crazy experiences this week, like getting stuck in a snow drift for THREE HOURS. It was kind of ridiculous. We did get to have a good heart to heart though. And it was touching to see how many people (The Elders, men from the ward, and complete strangers) came to our rescue despite the deep snow and freezing temperatures. It took 7 men, 3 trucks, a snow plow, and a snow blower to get us out (with two other cars getting stuck in the process!) to get us out! Talk about crazy. Everyone told us to go home after we finally got out, but that is not the missionary thing to do! So we didn't. We went and taught someone the Gospel instead.. even though we were exhausted. And guess what? HE asked US when he could be baptized. Yep!

And thus we see, life is crazy and the church is true.

I could go on about similar experiences but I'll just suffice by saying that God is very gracious and 6 of His children are now preparing to be baptized in the month of February in Kendallville, Indiana. MIRACLES NEVER CEASE!!

Man, I wish I could explain to you some of my thoughts and feelings this week. They've kind of been all over the place this transfer, so I asked one of the elders to give me a blessing this weekend. Wow, I wasn't even sure why I needed it, but I really felt prompted to ask and boy am I glad I did. Heavenly Father just really needed to talk to me and I guess I wasn't listening good enough on my own. Good thing Elder Martin is really in tune with the Spirit. So is Dad-- he emailed me some similar things this week without even knowing. Anyway, the Spirit came over me SO strongly. I didn't want it to end afterward and neither did anyone else, so we gathered in the chapel and sang a few hymns. Holy cow. I will never forget this experience. The Spirit was so strong I was literally shaking.

After much contemplation and a few more heart to hearts I was able to finally put my finger on something that's been "poking at my soul."

Since then, I've been seriously studying charity. And I would suggest you do the same! Here are a couple thoughts... Don't just do what's right, do it for the right reason: The pure love of Christ. Charity is not an act it is a condition that results from a succession of righteous acts and sincere prayer. Charity is the highest, noblest strongest kind of love. Wow.

Did you get a chance to look at this month's Ensign? I love love love President Uchtdorf's talk, as always. He says, "The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now."

Go plant a tree :) Or a seed of faith or charity.

I love you with all of the charity I can muster!

xoxox

Sister Kayla Rolfe

 

Oh one more thing! Church was cancelled Sunday so we watched church videos at a members house with one of our investigators who is becoming baptized next week :) It was wonderful.

Will you take the challenge? {1.21.14}

Hola!

We spent 4 days this week in Fort Wayne. Let me tell you about it. We had a zone meeting and zone conference (with the Porters). I would try to tell you about it but there was so much information my mind can't really sort through all of it right now so maybe we'll come back to that later. I will tell you that I got to see my Foxy!!!! :) And we watched a motivational video about our past year. Every stake in our mission exceeded the number of baptisms they had in 2012 in 2013! Did that make sense? Anyway, our stake had the most improvement, going from 21 baptisms in 2012 to over 55 baptisms in 2013!! Holy cow! This is, without a doubt, the hastening of the work. It's amazing to be a part of all of it. We have so many investigators we hardly have time to teach them all-- a problem I am definitely not complaining about!!

Saturday night we headed back to Fort Wayne for the baptism of an entire family. They have 8 children! 6 members of their family were able to be baptized and it was one of the most spiritual experiences I've had yet on my mission. They are such a strong family and you could see the light in their eyes after they were baptized. There were so many people at the baptism that it had to be moved into the chapel! And then the chapel was full! There was seriously more people there than we have in our branch at sacrament. It was wonderful. That's what this work is all about, you know? Love! People, families, coming together and supporting each other. I love seeing the member missionary work move forward. Two members of our branch and one of our investigators were able to join us at the baptism.. it was such a special night. I actually was able to teach the restoration with another sister after the baptism and the Spirit was so strong! Wow. just wow.

Saturday was also the #socialmediasplit! I hope you all got a chance to check it out and to share some of the posts! Our members were so supportive and I think had a little too much fun with it :) There were basically paparazzi at Ian's baptism! Which was also very special. There were so many people there we had to open the dividers!  Elder Chambers and I sang When I am Baptized.. you may have seen that on Facebook I hear? And two of our investigators were there! Hooray! One of them has committed and is preparing to be baptized on the 7th of February!! She is so strong and is facing a lot of opposition, but she knows that this is the next step for her. Pray for her!

This morning as I was studying I decided to read one of my favorite talks I've been thinking about for a while, The Challenge to Become by Elder Oaks. As I read, I was filled with the Spirit of revelation and could hardly write my thoughts fast enough. After, I felt strongly that I needed to share this in my email today but I don't know if I'll be able to organize my thoughts so bare with me... Basically, we're not just here to be convinced of the Gospel. It's not even enough to go through the motions of the things we know we should be doing. Better yet, we are here to Become converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Not only to know and declare it, but to Do and Become. Elder Oaks says, "The final judgement is not just an evaluation of a sum total of our good and evil acts--what we have done. It is an acknowledgement of the final effect of our acts and thoughts-- what we have become." When all is said and done, what kind of person are you? Where is your heart? What are your desires? I know this definitely caused me to do a lot of thinking and soul searching. The tricky thing about all of it is that we have to lose ourselves to find ourselves. If we're focused on becoming this wonderful person, we'll only get caught in the trap of pride. We have to really learn to look outside of ourselves to become Christlike. And let's be honest, that's hard to do! But it's possible when we understand the Atonement.

Becoming the person my Father in Heaven knows I am has been the focus I've had for my mission and studying the Atonement has helped me toward becoming that person more than anything else. The better we understand the atonement, the better we can access it and let it change our lives.

In this month's Ensign there was a talk by Elder J. Christopher Lansing, "Enduring Well." He talks about struggling to run his family business after his father passed away. One night his father appeared to him in a dream and told him "Chris, we really don't care about the business up here. What we care about very much is what you become because of your business." Wow. That puts things into perspective, doesn't it? We are here to prepare to return and live with our father in Heaven (and our families!) and to become more like Him. That's it. Nothing else matters.This life was never meant to be our end goal-- it's simply a means to an end. So don't live like you're never going to leave!

Our family relationships-- even more than our church callings-- are the setting in which the most important part of that development can occur. Being a successful church leader is not enough-- we must be good mothers and wives, fathers and husbands. Exaltation is an eternal family experience and it is our mortal family experiences that are best suited to prepare us for it.

Mom and Dad, I can't thank you enough for exemplifying this for me. I have never met a better parent or spouse and my poor husband has some pretty high expectations.

I have a testimony that I am on this Earth to learn Heaven, not to earn Heaven. I am here to prepare to return and live with my Heavenly Father and my Eternal family by becoming more like my Savior Jesus Christ. I also testify that you all are here to do the same. I promise you that nothing else matters.

I love you all so much,

xoxoxo

Sister Kayla Rolfe

 

Sorry for rambling and not making sense!

D&C 123:17 has come up multiple times in my life the past few weeks.. read it!

 

"What we get during our life is inconsequential, but what we become in life makes all the difference."

New Year, New Companion {1.13.14}

My dear loved ones,

Once again, I find myself not knowing where to start. So let's start at the beginning of this week.

Monday-- snowed in! Kendallville was in a level 3 snow emergency (still) so we didn't leave the house for a grand total of 48 hours. We had a bit of cabin fever, to say the least. Those of you who received the video we made will understand :) We actually had some powerful lessons over the phone though. The work will not be stopped! :) I also found out that Kendallville was colder than the south pole that day. That's never a good sign!

Tuesday-- FINALLY got out of the house!! We didn't even care that we were plowed into our parking lot and had to risk frostbite to dig ourselves out.

Wednesday-- transfer calls. President Porter said the Lord loves everyone, but he doesn't trust everyone and He trusts me enough to let me train again--that was cool. Found out we were being separated :( Shed a few tears (understatement of the year). Visited some of our loved ones so Sister Fox could say goodbye. I didn't ever want the day to end but of course it was the fastest day of my mission yet! I don't know how I got so lucky to be Sister Fox's trainer, but I'm so grateful I was!! She is one of a kind and I love her with all of my heart and soul. Oh man, I feel like a proud mama with my baby leaving home. It's amazing how close you can grow to someone so fast!!

Thursday--- woke up at 4 to get down to Ft. Wayne so the Hereth's could drive us to Ohio for the transfer meeting. Sister Fox was transferred to Huntington, Indiana (in my stake!!!!!) and she is opening a new area and training!! She will be amazing. Huntington is one lucky ward! I am staying in Kendallville and training Sister Wight!! It's going to be a great transfer! President told us about a missionary who was being interviewed and told the reporter, "I spend most of my day in dark places." Well, it's true. But we are the light! We bring the light of Christ into dark places and invite the captive to come forth into the light. We are showing them a more excellent way and we are changing lives. Isn't that powerful? It makes me want to be the best missionary I can be. I have seen that light enter people's lives and it is something special. D&C 115:5 is my scripture of the week. Light is contagious.. spread it!

Friday-- We had two very powerful lessons with a few investigators who are extremely close to coming onto date for baptism. Pray for them!! One of our investigators has refused to pray out loud since we met her-- even alone. She was in the hospital last week, reading the Book of Mormon with her husband, and decided to give it a shot. Wow. There relationship completely turned around. They used to fight like cats and dogs and now I've never seen a couple so in love. Before we left today, she offered (without even being asked!) to say the closing prayer. It was so beautiful It brought me to tears. The Gospel changes lives.

That night, I felt like we needed to visit a less active member of our branch. She has poor health and we found her disoriented and not well. We called a family in our branch to give her a blessing and make sure she was alright.. long story short, she ended up in the hospital in Ft. Wayne that night. :( We were able to visit her with a couple women from our branch the next day and she was doing a lot better. It was so neat to see our branch pull together so quickly for her though. Within 10 minutes of calling, we had two priesthood holders at her house administering to her and one of their dear wives taking care of her. They didn't hesitate to drive her down to Ft. Wayne at 10 o clock that night and to stay with her so she wouldn't have to be alone. That is something I love about the Church. We really are a family and I know that no matter where in the world I go I have that. How comforting!

Saturday-- After visiting our friend, we stopped in the cafeteria for some gelatto (yum!! Mom, reminded me of our MANY gelatto stops in Italy :) and ran into another member! Her father in law was also in the hospital, so we visited him as well. He is in one of the Ft. Wayne wards so their elders (our zone leaders) gave him a blessing that morning that turned around his health and strengthened quite a few testimonies. In fact, they were able to go back the next day and teach the restoration to this man's nonmember girlfriend and she committed to be baptised in February!! Once again, I am so grateful for righteous priesthood holders and the power of the priesthood.

Sunday-- 5 investigators at church!! I love how at home I feel at church. There's been a lot of change this week and it's so nice to have that as a constant. I love my people here in Kendallville.

 

And an announcement for the coming week.... Ian is being baptised Saturday!!!! We cannot wait :) Saturday is also the social media split and I'm going to tell the memebers to tag me.. so when you see the pictures pop up SHARE them!! And make sure you use the hashtags... #mormon #socialmediasplit....... you'll have to check out the other pictures with those hashtags too. The Ohio Cincinnati mission is going to flood the internet with the Gospel :) If you're curious, we've chosen the 18th because that's the day the Book of Mormon musical opens in Cincy. We are prepared!

 

Wow, what  a week. I love you and I'll leave you with this thought from my studies this week:

Don't pray for your circumstances to be changed, pray for the strength to deal with your cirumstances. Through the enabling power of the atonement we can receive strength to adapt (school of life, woot woot) to our circumstances and act as the agents that God created us as.

 

With all of the love in my heart,

Sister Kayla Rolfe

xoxoxo

Snowed In! {1/6/14}

On Monday (1/6/14), we got an email from Bro. Blackham (Kayla's "Ohio dad"):

I got a text today from Sister Rolfe. Her and Sister Fox are snowed in! The town has declared a level 3 snow emergency so only emergency vehicles are allowed out. The town is shutdown so she is unable to email. She said they had quite a bit of snow and it was cold. Her and Sister Fox are a bit stir-crazy since they were in the snow emergency yesterday, too. She said they are fine and have enough food. She said they have things to do until they can go outside. She expected they can email later this week.
Mark



We heard briefly from Sister Rolfe on Wednesday (1/8/14):

Hello everyone! just wanted to check in and let you all know that I am alive and well. I only have a minute to email and I'm using an iPad so I'm sorry but you won't be receiving any lengthy details about missionary life today. I think the saying "many are called, few are frozen" is appropriate today. yes, we were snowed in for 2.5 days. It was the strangest thing to stay inside for that long as a missionary. I felt like I was sinning! it was crazy and I've seriously never seen so much snow in my life! It feels like we're living in a snow globe that someone turned upside down! when we were finally allowed out yesterday afternoon the temperature was -3.... -40 with the wind chill. I'm pretty sure I almost got frost bite in my fingers but we survived and the gospel is still true!

the awaited news....

sister fox and I are both training new missionaries! she will leave and I will stay in Kendallville. we're so sad to be separated but really excited to train our new missionaries! 

I wish I could say more... there's so much to say. just know that I love you!

xoxoxox

sister Rolfe 

 D&C 64:32-34

Christmas Miracles All Around {12/30/13}

This was definitely a Christmas I will never forget! Wow.

Christmas day was wonderful. Sister Fox and I read Luke 2 together and also D&C 76 (read it!) before opening our stockings and presents. I actually really like that tradition and think I'll keep it. We were absolutely spoiled by mom and dad. Holy cow! And by friends and family and branch members! A family in our branch brought us over a gourmet breakfast-- cinnamon rolls, yum!!

Oh and I finally had my first white Christmas!! There was no snow on the ground when we went to bed, but when we woke up everything was covered! It was like a movie!

We drove up to Angola (30 miles north, almost to Michigan) and spent some time with our district at the McClellans (our new senior couple). Their blog isohiomcmission.blogspot.com if you want to check it out. We sang while Sister M played the Uke, took family pictures, and watched a video on youtube-- A Missionary Christmas. Then we headed back to K-Ville to call our families!!! Definitely my favorite part of the day! :) And I'm spoiled and got to talk to my Ohio family, the Blackhams, on our way back! It was SO good to talk to everyone. There's just not even words to describe my happiness. I love my family!!

We spent most of the evening at our branch president's house. We love his family-- the Powell's. They live out in the country about 30 minutest from K Ville. Their daughter Lis is basically our 3rd companion and she is preparing to go to Monterrey in 3 months for her mission! Woot woot! We ate a DELICIOUS dinner (red noodles), had a concert, watched Joy to the World, and of course enjoyed each others company.

The rest of the week was the craziest thing of my life. I don't even know what to say except-- I survived! Seriously, I felt like I was in battle. God's army, right? The adversary was working around the clock on Lori and Sister Fox and I were right there alongside her, facing some pretty ridiculous battles. It's so annoying how well he knows us and our weaknesses. But I won't go into more detail because that's not whats important. What's important is Lori made sacred covenants with Heavenly Father this weekend and became a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints! Sister Fox and I got to stand inside the font doors and watch and I felt like a proud parent. There is honestly nothing in this world like helping your brothers come into the light of the gospel. I have been able to see the light in Lori's eyes brighten as we've taught her the Gospel and she's made huge changes in her life. Then, we she was baptized by water and fire, she was glowing. I have chills just typing about it!

Joe was also able to be baptized and confirmed this weekend!! What a special way to spend Christmas-- helping others to Come unto Christ. And do you want to know how we find Joe and Lori? Simply by opening our mouths. We opened our mouths and talked to them when they were placed in our path and our mouths were filled. (D&C 33: 8-10)

Sister Fox and I sang Come Thou Fount with Elder Martin and Elder Chambers at Lori's baptism and Nearer My God to Thee at Joe's. We also talked in church and planned/put on a nativity open house at the church last evening. This was the longest/fastest week of my life. At the end of each day Sister Fox and I felt like saying: And the Kendallville Sisters have done it again! Even though it wasn't us at all-- the only way I possibly survived/pulled off this week was through the grace and mercy of Heavenly Father. We did our best and he did the rest! :) We're confident that we can take on anything after the past couple weeks of our lives.

The nativity I mentioned--it was a huge success! We had 6 investigators there who had never been to church before and we got a new investigator!! And our branch members were great and fellowshipped them! What a great end to a great week. Even though I can't even keep up with my own life sometimes anymore, I love it so much. I love Kendallville. I love the people. I love my branch family. I love sister Fox. This has been such a growing experience for me and I don't want it to end yet! (transfers are on the 7th!).

One more miracle story for you!Dorothy went to the hospital for pneumonia this week so we went to visit her and Rex there. We were talking about Lori's baptism and Dorothy said, "I think you better go Rex because I have a feeling we're going to be next." What?! Then Dorothy told us she needed to find peace in the hospital so she read the Book of Mormon-- the whole first book of Nephi-- and was able to sleep through the night for the first time in a hospital. The next day her and Rex started reading together and read through 2 Nephi 13. They've been praying together, too, and Dorothy even prayed out loud!!! (She never has before!!) Rex told us, "I love the Church so much." Holy cow!! God is really working with this amazing couple. I have seen their lives completely change for the better because of the Gospel.

I love the Gospel. I love sharing it. I love you!

xoxoxo

Sister Kayla Rolfe

"Compared to God we are nothing, but to God we are everything"