Email address: lauren.fullmer@myldsmail.net

Monday, October 26, 2015

October 26, 2015 - Missionary life..... Sorry!



Hello friends and family..... My entire email just got deleted... -_-
why. Grr so I don't really have too much time to retype ,so I am
sorry! But here's some pictures to make up for it!
Love all of you!

Awesome Quotes by apostles and prophets! :
"We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to
become each day"(The Transforming Power of Faith and Character,
Richard G. Scott)

"To effectively serve others, we must see them through a parent's
eyes, through Heavenly Father's eyes. Only then can we begin to
comprehend the true worth of a soul. Only then can we sense the love
that Heavenly Father has for all of His children. Only then can we
sense the Savior's caring concern for them." ( Through God's Eyes By
Elder Dale G. Renlund)







Monday, October 19, 2015

October 19, 2015 - My missionary life

Hey all!

So this week was full of miracles!

We have been so busy and just been working hard to teach people and find new people. We were doing pretty well with being able to teach people. We got to Sunday and it seemed that we were still below our goal. We wanted to teach just a few more lessons. Well Sunday morning we woke up and Gibson shimai was as sick as a dog. All the color was drained Sent from my iPad

We went out in this new area really far from where we usually go and we tried to talk to some new people. We had no luck with that. We went back up to the pretty busy area and we walked up the street because we felt like we should. We walked for a bit and we saw this guy walking his dog and we were like "woah we know him!" And we waved at him. We had met him before and so he recognized us. He waved back and picked up his dog and ran across the street (dodging cars) to talk to us. He walked over and we started teaching him and invited him to come to church next week. 

Later Sunday evening we decided to go visit this girl who had previously wanted to go baptized. We showed up at her house at about 7:45 and she wasn't home ,but her mother and father were. So we asked them if we could sing a Hymn to them. They were a little confused ,but they said sure. It was cold out so they invited in to their door way. We walked it and pulled up the song book on our iPads. The song we picked was "I am a child of God". The lyrics go like this:

301
I Am a Child of God
1.I am a child of God,
And he has sent me here,
Has given me an earthly home
With parents kind and dear.
Lead me, guide me, walk beside me,
Help me find the way.
Teach me all that I must do
To live with him someday.
2.I am a child of God,
And so my needs are great;
Help me to understand his words
Before it grows too late.
Lead me, guide me, walk beside me,
Help me find the way.
Teach me all that I must do
To live with him someday.
3.I am a child of God.
Rich blessings are in store;
If I but learn to do his will
I’ll live with him once more.
Lead me, guide me, walk beside me,
Help me find the way.
Teach me all that I must do
To live with him someday.
After we had finished singing, the husband wanted to read the lyrics again. So we let him, he didn't say much ,but he turned to his 10 year old daughter on his left side and said "you are a child of God". It was the coolest moment of my mission to see this love in this family. At that moment I could see this family all in white. There we were in this family's home they are kneeling and singing "I am a child of God" with this sweet family and I could just see them all in white getting baptized. I've never felt such a pure happiness in my life. 

Nephi 11:17, 22-23
17 And I said unto him: I know that he loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things.
22 And I answered him, saying: Yea, it is the love of God, which sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men; wherefore, it is the most desirable above all things.
23 And he spake unto me, saying: Yea, and the most joyous to the soul.

I don't know a lot but I do know that God loves us his children, and his love is something we should want above all things. I promise if you feel that love that you will never be the same. It's awesome! I love all of you! Stay happy! And keep being awesome people!

Love,
Fullmer shimai 










Monday, October 12, 2015

October 12, 2015

Hey hey everyone
THis week was pretty busy. We are still shooting for more lessons and slowly our numbers are getting closer!

Monday: so every Monday we have FHE (family home evening) with at the church with some of our young single adults. Usually it's us and the elders and we share a spiritual thought and do some kind of game or activity. This week the elders were in different areas because they are zone leaders ,so the turn out for FHE was us and two people. Yoko and tatsunori. So we wanted to focus on god's love and we were going to go out and try to give people these hearts we had made and have yoko and tatsunori do it too. So we showed them a video on god's love and we were going to let them know what we wanted to do. However we finished the video and tatsunori said "I want to be a dad! I want to be a dad!" He really wants to get married and have kids, but right now he's not dating anyone right now and he's super busy with his job. So our FHE turned into girl talk about marriage. It was so funny. 

Recently it's been getting colder. That kinda scares me because the members show me pictures of snow covering cars and they always joke that I'm just going to freeze. But it will be a new experience that's for sure! 

Saturday/ Sunday: so we got to watch general conference this week. General conference was amazing. I can't pick one talk that I loved but I heard quite a bit that I thought was so good. I am incredibly thankful that we have leaders in our church today that can give us guidance and answer questions we have. One incredibly powerful talk that hit me so hard was "Behold thy Mother" by Jeffery R. Holland. In it he said  "no love in mortality comes closer to approximating the pure love of Jesus Christ than the selfless love a devoted mother has for her child." Isn't that amazing. I've never really thought of that before. I've never thought of the sacrifice that my mother gave in raising me and the pure love she has for me and my siblings. All during the talk I thought of the times that she comforted me and helped me and a just made me want to call home. But of course I can't do that. It took me a bit to recollect myself ,but it helped me too. I wanted to go find people to teach so I could teach them about this pure love. 

I feel like I always come back to love in my emails. I just think that the church is all about love. God loves us so he sent his son to atone for our sins and to bare us up when we fall. Jesus Christ loves us with a perfect love so he willingly suffered our pains. I feel like as a missionary all I am really doing is sharing god's love. Well at least attempting to I'm sure I could do better ,but I'm trying to share the love. They tell you as a young missionary to just share your love with people even if you can't speak the language. I used to wonder "how do I share love if I can't speak this language?!" I've learned that people all speak the same language of love even if we are different. People want to feel and be loved. It's just a normal thing ,so finally figuring that out made it so much easier to love people around me. Someone slams a door in my face.. That's fine.. There are still a child of God so I love them. Easy huh? Well sometimes hard ,but when you figure out how to see people how God sees them it becomes a whole lot easier. I'm not saying I know how to perfectly love people and how share love ,but I'm figuring it out. 

Well I hope you have a great week everyone! I love you!

Love,
Fullmer shimai






Monday, October 5, 2015

Oct 5, 2015 - My missionary life

Hey everyone!
Just another great week in beautiful Nihon (Japan). We are super busy
everyday ,but that's good because when we're busy we are happy. My
companion and I decided that we needed to get 20 lessons every week. I
wish I could say we got that ,but we didn't quite hit that ,yet. So we
have been working as hard as we can to teach and talk to people. I
know that when people are ready to come unto Christ they will.

Tuesday English class:
Oh gosh, English class.... Wow. It was something. So a 60 year old guy
showed up a little early. His name is Tom. Tom is something. When I
met him he said " you are very beautiful." I said thanks and kinda
laughed it off. He asked me "do you have a boyfriend?" I said " yup I
do and he's great" I thought it would be better to lie so I did, so I
pulled up a picture I had on my iPad of me and some friends I pointed
at a friend saying this is my boyfriend. He said "oh I am jealous". I
was like ahhh awkward. So Tom is a funny guy.
So for class we did some self introductions and favorite colors, and
how many kids you want. Dale choro said he was from Tokyo and everyone
was so confused. He's from California! We got to Tom and for the how
many kids you want question he said "i'm 60 and single. I give up" we
all laughed at that. He's so funny.

Friday
First we went and visited Mizuki shimai. She's about 80 years old and
she is the cutest little grandma. We went to her tiny little
apartment. I was on edge because I didn't know what to expect. We rang
her door bell and then Gibson shimai opened the door a bit and we saw
her just standing in the door way. We said "mizuki shimai!" And she
kinda just lit up. She likes to sing and hum random songs ,so she
started humming and dancing and we hummed and danced with her. We
brought her this raisin bread from the store she likes and she was
just so happy. We walked in to the apartment and she hugged Gibson
shimai and then me and then she wanted to hug both of us. So funny
thing about Mizuki shimai she's like 4 feet tall. She was between me
and Gibson shimai ,but her head was like at our waists and she was
pushing us together to where Gibson shimai and I were pretty much
hugging each other. It was like one big sandwich and on top of that
she's gripping our waists and she started to kinda tickle us. So I was
nose to nose with Gibson shimai with a little grandma nestled
in between us and she was tickling us and humming. That's when I
realized I was in a different country. We kept laughing because it was
so funny! After we finally sat down, we sang a hymn with her and
talked about Jesus and his light. She told us that we have a light and
that she was so happy to be with us today. She said that she loves
light and that she knows it comes from God. She is such a sweet little
grandma. We got to hear
the most pure and innocent testimony from her. It's like when you
teach little kids and they are just so full of love. It's like that
and I love it.

The area I am is tiny maybe 30 ward members ,but I have never seen so
much love from people. When I was watching some of the members during
church I could just feel the love of God from everyone. There is one
man in the ward and he is in a wheel chair. He can't control his body
anymore, he used to be normal ,but he was in a really bad car accident
,so he understands and can kinda speak ,but he can't really use his
arms or legs anymore. Its like he has mini spasms. His mother puts him
into his wheelchair and wheels him around ,but during the second hour
of class, she has to go teach class. So Tatsunori Kyodai took the man
to the other class we were in. I watched him hold out the book for the
man so he could read the book and pat him gently on the back.
 Mizuki shimai is also taken care of in a loving way. One woman helps
her go to the right class and brings her to church then home. She
kinda holds on to Mizuki shimai because she doesn't really know what's
going on ,but that woman just cares so much for Mizuki shimai. It's
wonderful.
This area is so great.

I know I'm only 19 years old ,but because of this experience I have
gotten to see just a little glimpse of heaven. These people in this
ward are God's Angels. They are amazing examples of disciples of
Christ and I want to be like that. I've never seen so much love
before.

1 Nephi 11:22-23

22 And I answered him, saying: Yea, it is the love of God, which
sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men;
wherefore, it is the most desirable above all things.
23 And he spake unto me, saying: Yea, and the most joyous to the soul.

God's love really is the most desirable thing. I always teach that
missionary work is love. That's all sharing the gospel is. It's
sharing God's love. I love these people and I have felt God's love in
my life ,so I know what it feels like to have that joy and because I
have felt it I want to share it with everyone. I know that this church
can and will bless everyone's life. So this week, I have a challenge
for you... Love someone. Tell your family you love them, do a small
act of kindness, give someone a hug, anything is awesome! It doesn't
have to be big just something small. When we share love, we can feel
love more abundantly in our life. And who doesn't want to feel love?
So go love someone!
Love all of you!

Love,
Fullmer shimai