MERRY CHRISTMAS

Dumelang borra le bomma!

Wow so what can i possibly say? This week has been one of the most inspiring and incredible weeks! Man where can I even start! So the mission president and his wife made an announcement last week that all of the missionaries in our mission would be driving to Gaborone for a Christmas devotional and program. So this week on Tuesday we got to drive down to Gaborone which is about 5 hours away from where I stay in Francistown. We got there around 1 and wow it was great! We got to see all of the missionaries and we had so much fun! All of us were suppose to come up with skits for each district or group of missionaries so it was truly entertaining! When we got there they fed us lunch (Cafe Rio like salads so for those who dont know, the best salads ever!) Then we had our performances and man it was so funny! Of course the elders in our group wanted us to rap, so all of sisters did a rap and of course yours truly had to bebop. Hah! It was so funny! We had hats and caps and it was so funny! Everyone loved it! So after that we had a little devotional with the President and he taught us about Christmas and how the story of the tree of life in the Book of Mormon relates to the Tree of Life. It was truly amazing and great. I never even heard it before. So something else truly mind blowing happened as well. 

So recently me and Sister Lyon have been doing tracting and just trying to find more people to teach. So one of our investigators, Ishmael Adam who is on date to be baptized and who is doing absolutely great, invited his sisters to our Christmas party at church. So at the party they both told us they wanted to be taught and so we set up appointments and went to see them. So neither of them know English at all and so we were just really overwhelmed. So we just knew that this would be great if we could get his whole family to learn the gospel and be baptized and so we were really just trying to figure out what to do. We take translators to our lessons but oftentimes people tell us they dont want us to teach them through a translator, they want to hear it directly from us. It really is something that has been bothering me somewhat and just been heavy on my mind. So Wednesday was definitely inspired. After the devotional our mission president made another huge announcement. He has decided that our mission will now will officially learning Setswana!!! He said that we will learn it in stages, little by little, but eventually we will get preach my gospel lessons in setswana so we can teach everyone! Man, I honestly know that God is answering prayers. As we were trying to find a solution, God provided us with one, so now we are learning Setswana! He said we will start having language study every day and we also will get notebooks to write things down and just learn faster! So honestly I am freaking out, but im so excited as well! So this week I have been practicing and practicing. I know it will take time but I also know that this is going to open so many doors for us. It just reminded me of the scripture that says that all things are done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things. I think will help us better teach his children and also help all of our issues we are having with staying here. 

So im pretty exicited! This week is Christmas and I know it will be great. Its very different being here because everyone leaves and so its hard to find people to teach or have anyone to see. There were about 20 people at church yesterday and so I think its easy to get discouraged and down during this time that we are away from our families. But we read a talk by Jefferey R. Holland called "Christmas Within You" and it talks about how we still need to work hard during this time and being on mission is a wonderful time to really understand the true meaning of Christmas. I love you all and I appreciate the many letters, cards, and packages. They are really great and I know that God will continue to watch over and bless you all during this time of year. I also want to encourage everyone to also take this time to get closer to the Savior. There is no better time to remember him and get to know him than this season. I know that Christmas is an invitation for all of us to "Come and See." We can all experience and share the love of our Savior. So Ke a itse gore Buka ya ga Mormone ke a nnete.(I know that the Book of Mormon is true). I know that I wouldnt want to be anywhere else except Africa sharing this message with my brothers and sisters. I love you all and I hope you all have a wonderful Merry Christmas!

Ke a Gorata

Sister Scott

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CHRIST IS The Reason For The Season

Dumela My wonderful family and friends!

I hope all is well and everyone is doing okay. So this weel has been absoulutely amazing and crazy on so many levels.So for one, Me and Sister Lyon are companions. Yes we were in the MTC together and we had a blast and now we are together!!! Im so excited and so happy. Honestly this usually doesnt happen. Normally there is a senior companion and we are with someone who has been out longer than us, but boh of us have been out four months so this will be the best transfer!

So this week was pretty crazy for a few reasons. First of all, Sister Lyon was working in a different area, but since we don't have enough sisters anymore she is now in Monarch with me and we are working in Monarch but still seeing her investigators in Francistown so we are going to be really busy! This week I had my first dinner appointment as well! Yay for DA's. One of the members of the bishopric invited us over and we had a traditional Botswana dinner. Can you say amazing??? Honestly it was probably the best food we have ever had so it was really nice. So I really enjoyed that. Also Saturday was our Christmas party, so we didnt really get to teach as many people simply because we were helping and preparing for the party. So we had to help get food and set everything up for the big party! It ended up being so great! We cooked outside over the fire and made just alot of traditional food like samp, and morogo, and chicken and things like that. It was all super good!! The sisters even let us help then cook which was so cool! It really was an African party! We had music and dancing and everything it was so fun! They were just doing alot of dancing and singing and I had so much fun! Everyone was laughing because I told them im officially a Motswana so I of course was singing african songs with them! Ah! I love them all so much. I honestly love the people here and I feel like they are my family and that my family just got way bigger! It was pretty much the best party ever! I can't wait for next year :)

Also this week we had interviews with the mission president where he just sits and talks with each of us and sees how we are doing. It was really nice as always and he told me that he is really excited to see what happens with me and Sister Lyon. We both are brand new on mission but he has high hopes for both us of so I feel super motivated to work as hard as I can! Im super excited! We have a few baptisms coming up and so i'm super excited for those as well. We are teaching our group presidents sister and her name is Maipelo. She is great! She is very sweet and we have only taught a few times but I can tell she is going to grow so much. She just listens and smiles and says how beautiful it is and she said she already knows that she needs to be baptized. It is just so cute!!! I love her already! I just love everyone and im so happy! Teaching her just really made me see how important family is. Families are a gift from God and I wonder what heaven will be like if my family is not there. I dont think it would be very nice, so its so important that we share this gospel with them. That we bring our families together especially during this Christmas season. We should all remember that Christ is the reason. 

Ke a gorata,

Sister Scott

All I Want For Christmas..........

Dumela my lovely friends and family!

Well its about that time. Time for the holidays and Christmas season even though I will be having a very hot Christmas I definitely am pretty excited! So things have been pretty crazy and pretty hectic as well so this letter might be short and all over the place so my apologies! So today is transfer day so missionaries are leaving and guess what... IM STAYING HERE. haha. Almost all of the other missionaries are going to new areas but im staying in the same one still lol so either im doing really good or I've been forgotten haha. So yes I am getting a new companion again, I don't know who it will be so for the mean time me and Sister Lyon are going to be together again working in two areas, both Monarch and Francistown which is like the two of us covering both Little Rock and North Little Rock haha. So this will be fun! PLus Sister Vuki, the one from Tonga she is leaving! She left yesterday and her mission is over so im pretty sad but she stays in Utah so I will definitely see her again! But her parents are coming to get her so that's pretty exciting!

Anywho this week has been a crazy one indeed. Since last week we pretty much knew that Sister Twongeirwe was leaving so we tried to work really hard. Monday we had another braii and so we grilled meat and then watched a movie(only church approved) haha and just hung out. It was super nice. This week we really focused on a lot of less actives and just doing our best. The average for missionaries is to teach about 24 lessons and we hade like 34 so we were pretty much on fire. Its just amazing to me how many less actives there already are when the church has only been around a few years, maybe like 4. So that's something that I definitely want to change and also focus on. I don't want to leave burdens and just baptize anyone. I just want to bring people that will be stable and stay strong, that are truly converted to the gospel. So this week was also great because I finished the Book of Mormon. It took me about 3 months and 2 weeks. But it was so great! I just love it. My favorite chapters are Ether 12 and Moroni 7. They are pretty much the best. I learned so much about faith, charity and the atonement. Ah! I'm just really happy! Something that I learned the most is about patience. Sometimes its easy to just get upset and also just get impatient with people. Sometimes its easy to just stop teaching someone after they dot do what you ask, or they wont come to church, or they wont read. But something I realized is that God is very patient with me so I need to be patient with other people as well. Sometimes I forget that its not my mission at all but that it is HIS mission. So my goal is to do what he would do and say what he would say and be an example of Christ.

I love this work and I see the spirit working in and through us everyday. This week something pretty amazing happened. So im learning Setswana. Little by little and when I say little I mean little haha. I know just random words and things like that. So we have two investigators, a mother and daughter and they barely speak English at all. So we went this week to check on them and we didn't have a member with us to translate so we were just planning on making an appointment. So we go and talk to them and they tell us they want us to teach. So honestly I went into panic mode. I was just thinking, "They don't understand us and we don't understand them we just need to come back." But they said they wanted us to teach and if we just teach slow they will be able to understand. So im panicking like 100% but I think, "Okay, here we go." So the lesson was on the Word of Wisdom so I started off teaching, completely overwhelmed and all. So as we keep teaching and talking to them, for the first time they were understanding everything we were saying. Even though they couldn't really understand English they understood and even talked back to us. That moment was so memorable and amazing. I know that it was only through the spirit that we could understand one another and even get them to commit to living it. I just have a testimony that God definitely makes a way for his righteous purposes. We are just instruments in his hands. We are that clay in his hands and he molds us into who he wants us to be.

But anyway things are going pretty great! Sorry this letter is short but things are pretty crazy!  Also thanks everyone for the letters they are wonderful! So thank you all and I love you all! Ke a gorata!

Lorato

Sister Scott

Happy Chicken Day

Dumela all you wonderful people :)

So this week was probably the craziest week ever!! So much has happened and I don't even know where to start! First off I was slightly depressed that this week was Thanksgiving and I had no idea what we would do to celebrate and so it was just too sad! Haha but I tried to focus on other things like our baptism!!! So Tuesday we went and Tshenolo had his interview and he passed! I literally have never felt so much joy in my life! I was so excited and happy for him. Just seeing him from the first day until then was so amazing!

But life continued on as normal until Wednesday Elder Davis one of the Senior missionarires called and he told us that a missionary who was serving in Ghana was coming back home to  Monarch where I am serving. He said that he would be home Thursday and so we could go to the airport and welcome him home. So we thought it would be so cool so then we decided that maybe we should organize like a welcome home party or something at the airport for him so we decided we would find his family. We knew that he wouldn't be back until Thursday night so we figured we had two days, but something just told us to go ahead and plan it all out. So we actually cancelled our appointment and tried calling around town and talking to members to see if anyone know the Elders family so that we could tell them he was coming back. So after many calls and driving all over town we finally found his brother and his sister. They told us their mom had passed away so we told them that we would take them to the airport tomorrow to meet him since they were not members. So they agreed. We felt good. Our service was done. Well... we thought wrong! A few hours later Elder Davis calls us back and tells us that the Elder was coming home today, in like 2 hours! Seriously my heart dropped. I couldn't believe it. So we definitely went into panic mode. We went and bought posters and markers and balloons and made signs for him, the fastest and craziest posters I have ever seen and rushed to the airport with his family. And it was all worth it. When he got off the plane and saw his family his face was definitely priceless. At that moment I was so happy. It was only all possible because of the spirit. If we hadn't listened to that prompting to find his family no one would have been at the airport to meet him and he doesn't even know it was all us, but it doesn't even matter. It was definitely God. :)

    So as if my week was already crazy enough Thursday was Thanksgiving! I was so super sad and so me and all the sisters got together and we decided we needed to do something! So no one here even knows what turkeys are but guess what are on every street running wild...CHICKENS! So what did we decide to do? Have a Happy Chicken Day :) (Warning this part is not suitable for children under 18: So we actually got a live chicken and one of the sisters ......... yeah and then we cooked it )  :) Haha. Let me just say, I will not look at chicken the same. So we had a real thanksgiving! We had roasted chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans, corn, rolls, sweet potatoes and PUMPKIN PIE. (Pumpkin sent from America to one of the sisters.) So it was the best thanksgiving ever and my first one in Africa that I will never forget!

And if that wasn't enough, Saturday was my baptism! It was really special and just great! I truly love the work and I truly love being here! I'm still continuing my Book of Mormon reading and I honestly have been struggling trying to find what part is my absolute favorite and this week I was continuing in Ether. Ether chapter 12 which Is probably the best part ever written. It really talks about faith, and how faith brings miracles. Faith seems so small, but it is something so great. Faith and Hope together can bring miracles. In the Preach My Gospel it defines hope as the abiding trust that all things will work together for your good. When we trust God and we know that he will take care of us he will work miracles in our lives. Faith can be our anchor that hold us strong and steadfast and we will be immovable. I love Faith. I want to grow my faith and I know that Faith brings miracles!! So I encourage everyone to nourish and strengthen their faith. Be immovable for God. I love you all! And thanks for the wonderful letters and cards! They are great! It is great to hear from you! I wish everyone a good day!

Ke a gorata,

Sister Scott

(P.S. Transfers are again next Monday so we might get new companions againnnnnn)