Choking

What a difference seven days makes! Today I can barely make out Mount Royal from my apartment because of all the smoke from the wildfires. There are 80 wildfires burning just north of us. And that's just Quebec Province! Other provinces are having a devastating fire season as well. Depending on which direction the wind and the weather patterns are flowing, some days we are choking on the smoke and other days are just fine. I feel a little guilty when I pray that the smoky air will be cleared from Montreal because that means it will just move to another city to choke my brothers and sisters elsewhere. And I don't wish this nasty air on anyone! Our young missionaries were even told to do no street contacting today...to stay indoors!

Last Sunday this was the same shot from my balcony.

I sure do love this House of the Lord! I love that He lets me come inside to visit whenever I want to. When I walked in these doors on Friday I was very concerned about something. I cried and prayed for the first 15 minutes. And then a beautiful peace descended on me. I felt like everything was going to be okay and that I didn't need to worry. I was in SUCH a different mental place when I came out than when I entered God's holy house. I feel very blessed to serve in a mission where there is a temple nearby and that my assignment allows a TON of flexibility.

I needed a break from the big city so after I left the temple I just drove and drove until I found a quiet place. 

Not really ideal to be trekking through the forest dressed in my Sunday clothes and shoes, but it worked.

Here's a thought I had while capturing documents this week. When I held and read this letter written by my great grandfather about a year ago, it was a very emotional experience for me because I was holding a piece of paper that he had touched. I was looking at his handwriting. I could see the folds in the paper. It felt personal to me. 

     

As I was looking at the signatures on this document that I had just captured, I thought to myself that perhaps when a descendent of one of these people sees these signatures, she or he could possibly have a similar experience to mine because a signature is a very personal thing, unique to each person.

It's the little, tiny things that keep archive missionaries going! 🙌😄

On the fun side of things...

A week ago I was invited to a Nigerian barbeque which turned out to be more like a wedding without a bride and groom. Lots and LOTS of yummy Nigerian food with fun dancing!

This weekend Sister C and I explored a huge market with fresh produce and flowers in abundance. I was kind of excited to find mangoes. Hehe. They were nowhere as scrumptious as my African freshly-picked mangoes, but they were good.

Missionary moments:

• The young elders in our Mandarin speaking branch brought a new friend to church a few weeks ago. I could hear them speaking English to him while I was playing prelude music for sacrament meeting. I felt prompted to pop down off the stand and introduce myself. Last week the elders said they were teaching him a lesson right after church and asked if I'd like to attend the lesson. I was so disappointed that I couldn't because I had to attend branch council meeting at the request of the branch president. Our friend wasn't at church today. The missionaries told me that he is suffering with allergies so I texted him letting him know I noticed he wasn't there. Though my role is tiny, I'm thankful to have any role in helping others come unto Christ! I have a feeling this man will be baptized and be a leader in the branch in about a year's time.

Running total of captures: 32, 146

Truly Inspired By Our Missionaries and One Courageous Woman

All of the senior missionaries in our mission are asked to do apartment checks with the young missionaries. We met four of the young elders this week as we visited them in their apartments. I took the chance to leave them with a super short doctrinal message as well. They said it was strange being on the other side of the teaching. I loved getting to know these four elders a bit. Check out this bathroom in one of their apartments! Oh my!

God's hand is moving over the Canada Montreal Mission. The number of people that our young missionaries have been finding in the past few months is astronomical! Check out the numbers in this graphic. The number on the left is how many new friends were found, followed by the goal for that week.

Our exploring this weekend took us to the Old Port. It's where the community of Montreal began back in 1642. We were fascinated by the Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel. It was started by a woman named Marguerite Bourgeoys. She focused on educating girls and women. She made a conscious decision to not become a nun because she wanted to do God’s work among His children, not be isolated from them. She pointed out that the Virgin Mary was not “cloistered” and so she followed that path as well. What a hard worker! What determination she had! I was so inspired after learning about her life.

Here are some photos from the chapel:

Missionary moments:

• A young woman who worked at the chapel was passionate about the historical stories she was telling us. When I found out she was just as excited about her own family history, I sent her to FamilySearch.org.
• A young man who gave us a tour of the foundation of the church that burned down said he knew of our church. When I asked how, he said he's just curious about a lot of things so he's looked it up online. I said if he was really curious, he was invited to come to church with us and see what it is like. He declined.

Running total of captures: 19,469

Senior Missionaries...WHAT rules?

Our supervisor came to visit from Pittsburgh last week and informed us that in a few weeks all four of us missionaries will be moving into the same room. The first 2 weeks of my mission, there were 5 work stations and 6 missionaries. Since I was the last one who arrived, I was just doing supporting work and getting good advice from the veterans. Then one of the couples went home and I have a spot now. I work in a room by myself on the third floor which I call "the cave". The other 3 missionaries are on the 5th floor.  I'm looking forward to being in a room together.

You can see my work station in "the cave" on the left.

It was 94° last Wednesday! Wow! That was a new record high for the 1st of June in Montreal. What happened to all of those cautions of "You're going to freeze" when people found out where I'd be serving?!?

This cute missionary is going home this week. So last week she wanted to go to the top of the Ferris wheel and watch the lights change on the Jacque Cartier Bridge at 10 pm. Two other sister missionaries went with us but only Sister C and I went on the Ferris wheel. It was so fun! And we had a brilliant view!

I also learned that Cirque du Soleil was started in Montreal. Gotta go catch a show one of these days! There are SO many fun things to see and do in this city!

Senior missionaries arriving home at 11:00 pm! Whatcha gonna do?

Last week the young missionaries in our mission found FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY new people to teach! Astounding! I was so inspired by them that I decided I wanted to find just one person for them to teach. I've been getting to know the security guards at the archives building where we serve every day. Last Friday I invited one of them to come to a stake activity with us on Saturday night. It gave us the chance to talk to him about his religious beliefs and show him around the chapel where the activity was held. We've been asked by those in charge at the archives to not talk about religion while we're inside the archives building. It was fun to be with this man in another setting so we could discuss religion with him. It seems that he might be open to talking with the missionaries. Stay tuned!

Running total of captures: no idea, I forgot to send in my report on Friday...Yikes! It will give you something to look forward to next week.