Week 37: A Whole New Kind of Country, Pt. 2

Howdy!

Wearing one of Hermana Jones’ yellow dresses (she loves and is yellow)

This is the last time I feel like I’m actually able to start my weekly in a customary Southern fashion, so I figured I would. If I seem sad, now you know why.

I’m so glad I got to talk to my family on Father’s Day! I love them so much ❤ 

So many amazing miracles have happened in this one week that I am beyond grateful for. The people I’ve had the privilege of meeting, the lessons that I’ve (been) taught, and the companions I’ve had. Both teaching as a missionary, and living in this not-so-little apartment.

When you need to see if anyone has a bigger pan, you have to use something for scale.

I am admittedly very tired from a long day of packing and stressing over being able to ship myself off to a foreign country, so I’m afraid I don’t quite have it in me to describe in grandiose detail the many escapades we went on. A quick rundown of events, though:

1. Becoming instant kindred spirits with Hermana Jones (it’s so unfair we only got a week together; she has forever changed me)

This is at the Greatest Relief Society Activity of All Time

2. The Relief Society activity that had the most delicious cupcakes in the universe. Angel was fellowshipped so well there!

3. Talking to four Steves at one apartment complex while trying to find a member.

4. Being able to do the training for a spiritual and powerful district council.

5. Performing all of “High School Musical” from memory for the quad in a five-part installment.

6. Finding an entire family and their chickens.

7. Going back to their house to make sure we recorded the address correctly, then finding three women, one of them being a Spanish-speaking mom with three kids.

8. Someone we’re teaching inviting us to play soccer with her little daughters and “unos amigos,” only to get there and have her show up with practically a barrio.

9. Explaining all of season one of “Downton Abbey.”

10. Hermana Reidhead becoming everyone’s hairstylist.

From left to right: Half of Hermana Aguilera’s face (I am so sorry, mija!), Hermana Radford, Hermana Jones, yours truly, Hermana Reidhead

I got to bear my testimony on Sunday night as a way to say goodbye to the mission, and it was such a powerful experience. I love the TNM so much, and I’ll never be able to express how much I’ve learned in its entirety. I read from D&C 80. I made some edits to make it about me (as I do with many things):

1 Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you my servant [Mary Newton]: Go ye, go ye into the world and preach the gospel to every creature that cometh under the sound of your voice.

2 And inasmuch as you desire a companion, I will give unto you my servant[s] [Ashley Volk, Dantzel Petersen, Savannah Stevenson, Paola Aguilera, and Kylee Jones].

3 Wherefore, go ye and preach my gospel, whether to the north or to the south, to the east or to the west, it mattereth not, for ye cannot go amiss.

4 Therefore, declare the things which ye have heard, and verily believe, and know to be true.

5 Behold, this is the will of him who hath called you, your Redeemer, even Jesus Christ. Amen.

There are so many beautiful promises and pearls of wisdom in this passage of scripture. Each verse pricks my heart. I just want to say that I know that Jesus Christ himself has been who called me. I don’t know why, but he did. And I was in Columbia, and I was in Bowling Green, and now I’m going who-knows-where in Guatemala. But I am so honored, and so humbled, and I can’t wait to see what joy it brings me. 

— Bon voyage (that’s not Spanish!),

Hermana Newton

Week 36: A Little Bit Longer

Greetings!

Pix with the the Bowling Green hermanas! Clockwise from left, Aguilera, Newton, Boden, Reddish, Reidhead and Gomez.

All things are well in the city of Bowling Green, Kentucky! The people we teach are amazing, as always. The missionaries we serve with are so hard-working, kind and conscientious. Hermana Aguilera is growing into a spiritual giant.

I love Hermana Gomez so much. We were in Home MTC together.

A lot happened, but I don’t know how to fit everything into stories. Thankfully, there are a lot of pictures for some reason (?), so for the little I write, there will be much more to see. Which is what many people pay much more attention to in weekly emails.

Having Sister Forbush in the apartment was oodles of fun.

Since I’m going to Guatemala next week, I was prepared to be moved down to Nashville tomorrow, since transfers are happening. You know, so that driving down to the airport isn’t a ridiculous juggling of events. But apparently President Weaver doesn’t care about juggling, because I’ll be staying in Bowling Green until I leave the country! Pretty exciting stuff.

Sister Forbush made German pancakes on exchanges! Low-quality photograph, very high-quality food.

But because I thought I was leaving Bowling Green, we had a ton of lessons with the people we were teaching, and for the most part, I was viewing this week as a last hurrah. And full of hurrahs it was! Hermana Aguilera and I found an atheist and got him interested in reading the Book of Mormon. We did a couple of door approaches, and through it, we found true paz. Allow me to explain.

The nightly calls with the district leaders are always fun.

So we were going over to visit Angel, our most progressing person. We had prepared a lesson to set her on date for baptism, and were visiting her with Hermana Boden and Hermana Forbush, who were together on exchanges. When we got there, however, there were no cars, and no Angel! What rotten luck. So we decided to visit formers in the neighborhood, and to walk to a woman named Cynthia’s house. We had actually tried to call her the week before, and she hadn’t responded. So we got to the house, and inside was a guy named Joey. He was definitely not Cynthia. He was very polite, but also very uninterested. So we wished him well and started to make our way back to the car to meet up with the other sisters and eat the brownies that were awaiting us. As we walked, we saw a woman on her porch, sitting with the cutest baby boy. I figured I might as well go for it, so I said, “Your baby is so cute!” Then she responded in Spanish, then I responded in Spanish, and then she went, “Hermanas!” and invited us on her porch. She gave us water and told us that she used to play soccer with the missionaries who served here before she got pregnant with her youngest baby and COVID happened. Her name is Paz, and she invited us in so that I could play some alabanzas with her on the piano. It was surreal, and I’ve never felt more like a missionary.

Paz invited us into her home so I could accompany her on the piano! So cool!

In Mosiah 26, it reads:

24 For behold, in my name are they called; and if they know me they shall come forth, and shall have a place eternally at my right hand.

I love so much about this simple verse, but what really stands out to me is that middle phrase: “if they know me they shall come forth.” In stake conference this week, the visiting general authority, Elder Martino, talked a little bit about Spanish vocabulary. In Spanish, there are two ways you can say “to know,” and they are the words saber and conocer. Saber implies an intellectual, detached knowledge, whereas conocer is a more personal, intimate connection. When we look at our relationship with knowing Jesus Christ, would we translate that using saber or conocer? If the answer is the latter, the action described in Mosiah 26 applies to us.

Bowling Green 1B on the prowl for people ready to hear the message of the restored gospel.

I love being a missionary. I am so glad that I decided to come forth to the Tennessee Nashville Mission, even if I wasn’t originally the most excited at the prospect. I am so thankful for the people, and for the love, and for my Savior. And I’m thankful for you, too. And hope that you’ll have a fantastic week.

— Atentamente,

Hermana Newton

Week 35: Too Young to Die

What is up, everybody?

This transfer has flown by ridiculously fast. Can you believe I only have a week left before who knows what will happen? Because I sure can’t!

We found some snacks left in the church freezer for the missionaries.

This week we had interviews with President Weaver. It was such a good conversation, and he really helped me a lot. I am so grateful for him, and I’m really going to miss having him as my mission president. That feels so weird to say. But everyone keeps on talking about how I’m basically dying* in the mission, which is another equally weird concept. I barely hit eight months on Monday, and, as mentioned last email, I had my twentieth birthday!

Fun fact about me and Sister Smith: We literally have the exact same hair color.

Being on exchanges with Sister Smith was such a good birthday present. She and Sister Forbush gave me a fantastic card, along with a “#1 Dad” stuffed dog. What can I say? I’m paternal. We had an amazing finding experience and some awesome contact with a part-member family. We also got to talk to a member who’s the fellowshipper for one of the people we’re teaching, Coe. The icing on the cake was when Sister Haver and her adorable daughters stopped by while we were at the park and gave me a gift! There’s additional icing, which includes all of the letters that arrived to me by mail (thank you SOOOO MUCH I loved them!), surprising one of the people we’re teaching in the drive-thru where he works, and calling my family. I know that I had gotten to talk with them the day before, but it is so fun to talk to the people you love most on your birthday.

Me getting my special birthday gift from Sister Haver! Thank you so much (:

Hermana Aguilera and I had one of the best comp studies of all time on Monday! And because of it, we made a resolution to have the most powerful, spiritual, epic comp studies this entire week. We’ve come up with all of these different goals and focuses that I’m really excited about. I’ll sure be missing her when I head down to Guatemala.

I’m still not exactly sure what the Guatemala situation is. I thought I’d find some details from a Guatemala reassigned missionaries group on Facebook, but, to my utter dismay, there isn’t one. President Weaver asked me what I knew in terms of travel plans, and I told him my portal said that I started on June 24th, but didn’t provide anything else. President Weaver then told me that last he heard, I would be flying out on the 17th. Suffice it to say that the travel process is very confusing, and I am trying so hard not to stress, which goes so against my natural way of being.

Our zone has been reading the book of John together this transfer. It’s basically been New Testament Book Club. Which is what a Bible study is in general. This week, I was reading from chapter 10, and I absolutely loved these verses:

11 I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.

…

17 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.

18 No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

In a lesson we had yesterday, we asked the member present on the lesson to share his testimony about the Atonement of Jesus Christ, and Hermana Aguilera and I were also able to share our own. But I would love to testify of it here, too.

There is so much power in choice. The fact that Jesus actively decided the entire time to suffer and die for us is mind-blowing to me. It is insane for me to think about how Christ made the choice to have everything that happened to him happen. And the reason that he did it was purely for love. I am so grateful for that, and the only way I can begin to give thanks is by sharing that with other people. Thank you for letting me share that with you today.

— All my love,

Hermana Newton

* Missionary lingo for completing missionary service.

Week 34: The Edge of (Being a) Teen

This is the last day my angst can be socially acceptable.

I got to hold a hamster owned by one of the people we’re teaching! When I took off my mask to take the photo, the kids said that I looked like “the girl from the movie.” Very specific, I know. They showed me the DVD case, and they were talking about Dorothy from “The Wizard of Oz”!

That’s right! Tomorrow, I will have officially been alive for two decades. That’s a whole score, for those of you who aren’t aware. I have been sitting with anticipation since Saturday afternoon to open my birthday package, but I have withheld, and tomorrow, I’ll finally be able to crack open that bad boy, along with other events. I won’t spoil all of the surprises I have in store for my festivities, but tomorrow, I’ll be on exchanges with Sister Smith! I’m sure that’s going to be one hoot and a holler.

A birthday letter?! How exciting!

As always, what a fun week this has been! So much has happened. Probably too much. But I’ll cover as much as I can for the viewers at home.

First of all, I really love my district so much. Elder Gambill and Elder Yanez are the funnest district leaders. Definitely in my top five out of the four that I’ve had. They’re so kind and thoughtful, and so is everybody else in our district. It’s such an amazing gift to know all of those missionaries!

Hermana Aguilera taking a picture of me taking a picture of Hermana Aguilera

Also, I got to sing in church! The elders’ ward had asked Elder Yanez to do a special musical number because he’s a phenomenal pianist, but he didn’t want to brave through it alone, so he asked if one of us hermanas would be willing to sing with him, and of course I volunteered because (spoiler alert) I love to sing!

Anyway, we performed “I Will Walk with Jesus,” which is such a sweet song. It’s a little newer, so some of the older kids on this list may not know it, but trust me, it is so good. And it was so fun to sing! Shout out to Sister Haver, a member of the 2nd Ward who’s related to one of my mom’s friends, Ronna Park! We were able to say quick hellos after sacrament meeting, and she said hi from my mom! Which was so fun.

Getting Dairy Queen to celebrate Hermana Reddish’s nine months!

We also got to meet with Caleb, whom the sisters who were previously in BG1B were teaching, but he had been up in Alaska bear hunting, so we hadn’t been able to meet with him. But let me tell you: I am meant to be here for Caleb. He has some really good questions, and a lot of them can be addressed by just becoming a member of the Saints book club. Which he now is.

We happened to be in a lesson with Caleb on Monday when, as we were finishing up, we got a call from President Weaver. Caleb was kind enough to let us answer. I was very confused as to what President Weaver could possibly be calling for, because I legit had no clue. But then he asked to specifically speak to me, and it turns out that they’re starting to process my visa application for Guatemala!!! I don’t know when I’m leaving or anything, but for now, it sounds like I’m going to be making it. I am just so grateful and excited and in awe of this amazing blessing. Talk about a birthday present.

Riding up to district council, as per usual

For district council this week, Hermana Aguilera and I got to do part of the training. As part of it, we shared the story of Naaman, found in 2 Kings 5. Naaman is a captain for the Syrian army. He’s pretty highly regarded, but he has contracted leprosy, which, at this time, is an uncurable disease. So he goes to the prophet Elisha to heal him:

10 And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou shalt be clean.

11 But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought, He will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leper.

12 Are not Abana and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? may I not wash in them, and be clean? So he turned and went away in a rage.

13 And his servants came near, and spake unto him, and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it? how much rather then, when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean?

I love this story, and in part, I think it’s because I’m very much Naaman. Both of us had an expectation of how the Lord would treat us. I expected to go to Guatemala, and Naaman expected for a prophet to come out of his house and grandiosely heal him. But that’s not what we received.

Expectations are really hard to combat. We’re always trying to anticipate what comes next and to make things go our way. But if things had gone my way, I never would have served with the missionaries here. I never would have had the experiences I wrote about this week in my weekly email, or any of my weeklies. I never would have gotten to meet the amazing people of Tennessee and Kentucky, who have changed my life in a very real way.

I am so grateful for my mission, and I am so grateful for the journey ahead. That, above all, is the best birthday present I could ever ask for.

— Still 19,

Hermana Newton