On The Wall (Sort Of)

If you walk into almost any LDS meetinghouse,  you will find a display case with plaques for each missionary serving from that congregation. Each plaque will have a picture of the missionary, their favorite scripture, and the mission to which they have been callled.  It is very interesting to see the geographic diversity of assignments. When you walk into the Minot Stake Center, you will now see Hermana Tonini's plaque.  (They have her plaque in the display case but they haven't quite figure out how to hang them on the wall.)

Week Four - Get Me Out of Here

SO, hello first of all! Today is our first real/full pday and I couldn't be happier. I'm getting a little antsy just because I'm going a little insane here at the CCM. I love my district with my whole heart but I'm getting a little tired of the classes. It's all good, I only have less than two weeks left here, isn't that just crazy?

My comp and I decided this week that we are going to finish the Book of Mormon by March 17th, two months since we left home. I picked up where I left off in 2nd Nephi before I came out and I'm almost done with Mosiah! All I want to do is just sit and read my scriptures, and I've NEVER had that desire before! I've learned and felt so much this time compared to the one time ever I read it for Personal Progress. I feel like when you read to feast it makes a huge difference than reading it to check off the box. You know? Also I love the book of Mosiah. So much. Also in one of our Book of Mormon classes this week we read a FANTASTIC chapter, so if you're looking for a good read check out Alma 38.

Also last Thursday while we were playing volleyball, which we do every day during gym time, Hermana Harper and I went for the ball at the same time. My comp spanked it and can you guess where it went? Right in my face. I went blind in my right eye for a quick second because that's how hard it hit me. We all got a good laugh out of it though, especially Elder Hagemeyer. It brought him to his knees he laughed so hard. Let's just say it's always a good time when we play volleyball.

Also I've really been praying to have more patience and charity. Charity has been easier to work on because I just do little acts of service whenever I can. But patience? Patience is on the inside and I've ALWAYS struggled with patience. Everyone in my life probably knows it too. And if you pray to develop a Christlike attribute, Heavenly Father blesses you with opportunities to grow. Which means I've had a lot of times this week that have tested my patience. A lot. I think the key point is to RECOGNIZE that they are opportunities to grow. I still have a lot to work on because I wasn't very patient in those times, BUT I'm getting better at recognizing when the Lord blesses me with opportunities to grow.

(I told my comp about this and she thinks everyone is going to think ALL of my patience trying came from her. So I am here to say they weren't ALL from her)

On Sunday, in one of our devotionals, my comp and I were asked to say the prayers. When Presidente Lyons announced it, he said "Elder Tonini will be saying the opening prayer" MY FACE GOT SO RED!! And he said Elder Harper too!! It was funny for the two of us because like two hours earlier we were talking about how sometime we are more of Elders than our Elders in our district sometimes. Mainly because we both grew up with three brothers. I firmly believe God has a sense of humor.

So since it's our fifth week that means we start a new segment called "Congrats you get to pretend to be an investigator now" on top of all of the other teaching we do. So pretty much you create a profile based on someone you know (so I'm using Camie's story of course) and then two missionaries from your district teach you. We only did the first rotation this week, which was teaching Elder Snowden with Hermana Braybrooke. We only have ten minutes for this lesson. And obviously since it was the first one, we had to get to know him. However, we wanted to leave him at the end with at message of Christ and how we are here to bring people to Him. I testified of my Savior while showing my favorite picture of the Savior and I just felt the Spirit so much. And the love I have for Him. And of His love and understanding. I just felt all of it at once and I cried. Of course. Classic Hermana Tonini. Everyone was so confused when my whole district saw I was crying bc it was only a ten minute basic lesson. But, I testified of Christ you know?

We had a crazy good lesson with Anastacia this week! She's been taking lessons for six years? (Our teacher isn't very good at background) so we told her that since she definitely knows all the doctrine, we are just going to focus on how each part of the gospel impacts her personally. That's so key when teaching is application. Otherwise, your words mean nothing. Also beforehand I prayed that I would be the Holy Ghost's tool instead of the other way around. And it helped to teach with the Spirit. It was just a great lesson, and it's all because the Spirit was there.

Yesterday was Valentine's Day how crazy?? My first holiday out in the field! Hermana Tueller wrote the three of us cards and left them on our desks in the morning. It totally made my day bc it reminded me of how Mom would always get us a little something for the holiday even though she loathes it. It was just a little touch of home, and it was perfect.

Last thing, our devotionals last night was broadcasted from the Provo MTC. AND GUESS WHO I SAW TWICE?? ELDER MCKAY MOULTON MY BEST FRIEND! I started crying bc it was such a gift from God I felt. Like I got to see him blown up on the screen watching him take notes and preparing to serve out in the field. I just love all the Elders, because that means they are all worthy Priesthood holders. My comp and I are like best friends with Elder Mikos and McCormick because Elders are just so much fun and have such strong testimonies! I'm just so grateful for their worthiness to be out here.

Also for pday today we didn`t want to go to lunch bc that meant having to get back in a dress. So we ate queso and chips for lunch (that Hermana Harper got from her mom) and we warmed the queso on the iron. Brilliant huh? Our bff Elders taught us that little trick.

And then I decided I wanted to learn how to do a handstand, which as you can see, I accomplished.


















Also since I barely have any pics this week, here`s another one from the temple that I love.

Love y'all with all my heart,
Hermana Tonini

Christ is My Redeemer - Week Three

So, we got to go to the temple again today!!! I love the Mexico City temple, it is so beautiful!!!!! I was a wonderful experience both times. However, today I did the whole session in Spanish. It was way cool because the name I was doing was a woman from Mexico, so it was really neat to make those covenants for her in her own language, you know?

I had a wonderful surprise this week!!! I got Krispy Kreme this week, twice, on the same day! Mom and Dad sent me a box and my best friend Tori, who clearly rocks, sent me some too. I actually cried when I picked the two up because I felt so loved!!

This week FLEW by!!! I am already halfway done here at the CCM!!! This email is going to be super short, and I'm sorry for that. I will make up for it with pictures.  

My favorite day this week was Sunday. It was the best Sunday of my entire life of Sundays. This is because the whole day was centered around Christ. The lesson my comp and I gave, the Relief society lesson, David A Bednar's The Character of Christ, and the devotional from my mission president. I wish I could just share everything that I learned and felt, but I just don't have alot of time today since we spent six hours of the day for the temple. Just know that I love my Savior with all my heart. And that's what I came here to do: invitar a las personas a venir a Cristo. 

Love y'all.

-- 

Sister Tonini

California Riverside Mission

MTC Care Packages

Hermana Tonini has mentioned in both of her letters about services that deliver care packages to the Mexico City MTC.  What is neat about these services is that they hand-deliver them to the MTC so you don't have to pay postage to Mexico or worry about the Mexican postal service (hopefully it is better than the Brazilian postal service - but I digress).

We used Missionary Package Mexico to send her a dozen Krispy Kreme doughnuts but they have a number of other options.  Just Google "missionary package mexico" and you will find a number of sites that provide free delivery service to the MTC.

Don't forget - she is only there until February 27th!  Let's show how much we love her!

God Truly Answers Prayers

My testimony of personal revelation has grown this week. Here´s what I wrote in my journal on the 27th:

So, we have our new investigators tomorrow, and we had to prepare. Hermana Pavon wanted us to find a BOM verse for it, so I prayed to know where to begin my search and to find materials to help Lucia, who's mad at God for her miscarriages. I went to the Index...Bible Dictionary...nothing. Then I thought of General Conference. Never before had I used General Conference to find a scripture. It was everything I needed and more. God Shall Wipe Away All Tears was WRITTEN for Lucia. It truly was revelation. It´s crazy how normal and accessible revelation is. I always just imagined like prophets...you know? We all have access to personal revelation and it´s so wonderful.
You know what? I´m just going to write all of my spiritual experiences directly from my journal so I don't waste time.

28th:
We taught Lucia today and it did NOT go as planned. The only thing we used from our prep was the story of Paul and the thorn. What was super cool was that when Hermana Monroy was talking, all I could think about was how perfect she could relate. Then, once she finished, Hermana Harper was all: Hay un apóstol se llama...uh...Pedro. Me: Pablo? Her: OH, Pablo.      But like I knew in that moment that she received the same revelation as me at the same time. Like, I was already opening to my bookmark and I took over from there. Super neat.

29th:
We watched the Restoration today, and by the end almost 90% of the Hermanas in the CCM were in tears. Including me of course. It strengthens my testimony of Joseph Smith every time I watch it.
Kind of a cool moment: last night while Hermana Dayes was braiding my hair, we were talking about deep doctrine. We talked about how there are a ton of planets, yet there´s only one Christ and he came to ours. He came here to repent for every world´s sins. Because our world has the most wickedness, but there´s opposition in all things. And today in Devo they talked about it!!!! The speaker even added on how that´s why we had Michael, Gabriel, Peter/James/John, and Joseph Smith PLUS Christ to balance the wickedness. Plus, a neat scripture: D&C 135:3. It was just crazy how an obscure topic was built upon for us in less than 24 hours. Plus, it just added even more "mad respect for Joseph Smith" (as Hermana Harper put it)

31st:
Today was a perfect day. Last night I decided to pray with a question. I always pray for help, but never with questions. Except for when I prayed to know if the BOM was true, but that's really it. I had read yesterday, ´´Ask and ye shall receive, knock and it shall be opened unto you.´´ I knew I was going to the temple on Pday so I prayed that when I went, I would know if I was good enough. I was feeling so inadequate. And I know those feelings come from Satan, but I was just looking at all of the Hermanas and seeing their strengths. How was I supposed to be good enough to preach about a perfect gospel and a perfect love?

My answer came faster than I thought. It came today. We prepared to teach the Restoration and we started by asking Lucia if she had prayed to see if our lesson about how God loves her is true. She said no. From that point, our whole lesson plan was out the window. We talked about prayer the entire lesson. It was incredible. We listened, we answered her questions, Hermana found a scripture, everything. Afterwards, Hermana Monroy asked us how we though it went and she asked to see our lesson plan because we didn´t read ANYTHING off paper. We had never done that before. We told her how we listened, followed the spirit, and taught people not lessons. She didn't need the Restoration, she needed prayer. She even told us that our lesson will inspire Lucia to pray and "su lección fue perfecto." Perfect. I was a part of teaching a lesson that portrayed the perfect concept of prayer. We moved tables and sat in awe of the power of the Holy Ghost. We felt so much gratitude that we prayed. I started to cry because then, ten minutes after our lesson, the Spirit put into my remembrance my prayer and my question from last night. I'm not inadequate. I can do this. With the Spirit, I can do my best to preach about His perfect love.

(Side note, I know that if we work hard and prepare, that the Lord will make up the rest when we attempt and fail to completely capture His perfect love. I just didn't have a testimony of it. My comp is so good at teaching and testifying, and I felt like I wasn't as good as her. I couldn’t testify with the strength she has. That's why I prayed with my questions of inadequacy.)

This week has been super spiritual, if you can´t tell. And we get to go to the Mexico City temple today!!!!! That´s why I am emailing so early - we are leaving at 12 and not getting back until 6. I will have pictures of the temple next week!

So here in the CCM, I've goofed up a lot. There's always one thing a day. I don´t have time to share all of them, so I will leave you with just one:

"We taught Anastacia today and I messed up. We were talking about prayer so I asked if I could share a scripture in the BOM. I then went on with my whole intro of the BOM and then it was time to read the verse. And that's when I realized the verse I wanted to read was in the Bible. Me: ´"Uh....um....los siento. Actualmente está en la Biblía, PERO leemos en los dos, la Biblía y en el Libro de Mormón."

Classic Hermana Tonini. Love and miss you all.

Hermana Tonini

CCM - Week One

HELLO! This has been the longest and most difficult week of my life. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I had the coolest experience getting here. I was sitting first class, reading Jesus the Christ, when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see a man and he said: Did you serve in Riverside California? (Thanks Dad for the luggage tags) (Also this is a Spanish keyboard that does not have quotation marks) It turns out that he was a member, and he served in like Carlsbad, California! He owns a business in Mexico City, so that}s why we were on the same flight. He stayed with me all the way until we were out of security. He wouldn't even leave me until he found the driver for me. While we were waiting for luggage, we actually saw two Elders and knew they had to be..well....Elders! So we scooped them up too and he finally left after he found our guy. The driver didn't have a sign and spoke zero English so this Brother was honestly a tender mercy for the three of us. One of those two Elders is actually in my district! Elder Hagemeyer or something weird German. So we call him Elder Hache (h in Spanish). The other one was super cool and I got to talk to him for like an hour since we waited at the airport for two hours for more missionaries. However, the huge group of eleven missionaries never showed up, just one, Elder Snowden (also in our district). That was the flight my companion was on, and their flight got delayed FIVE hours because of a funny smell.

My district is fantastic. Our district is actually famous around here because we have SEVEN Hermanas and only four Elders. Usually districts are lucky to just get four Hermanas. Hermana Harper is my companion and she is such a goon. She has four brothers just like me, and one of them is even named Jacob! We also both went to BYU-I, but not at the same time because she did a year of school and then worked the semester I was at school. Then in our room we have Hermana Bassett and Hermana Tueller. Then we live in a house with five rooms, so there's a total of...you guessed it...twenty Hermanas in our casa.

The CCM is so beautiful. Sure, it looked like a prison when we pulled up because of the walls and the security gate, but still. You can see the colorful slum houses up on the mountains right outside the walls and I love it. I also love the people here. I felt inspired on the first day, second meal, to go sit with some Latinas. It has been such a blessing. We have so many new friends, we can work on our Spanish, and I have grown to love the people I am going to go teach. What was really neat was when our Mission President found out that the Latinas that we sit with aren't actually our district. He came up to us the next day in the street and talked to us more about how being in the CCM is truly a blessing for us American stateside missionaries because we have a chance to learn every chance we get. Usually the Americans sit by district, and the only Americans who get put in Latino districts are the ones that are here for three weeks like them. He even said: Y'all are the best Hermanas here at the CCM. How cool?? And now a lot more Americans sit with the Latinos during meals. However, a couple days ago we realized that the other pair of Elders were super homesick so now we have District Dinner so we could feel more like a family. Not as good, but there has to be balance in all things. The food is INCREDIBLE. Papaya is def my new fav fruit. There's always a ton of fruits and vegetables during every meal, and there's usually always beans and tortillas. Every meal has a different dish, and on Tuesday night we have PIZZA! Speaking of which, the only time I have used dairy pills is for pizza. I have decided to just eat the food I can eat so my body will like me a little better and so I can truly cherish when I do use my pills and eat dairy. The salsa is always SUPER yummy (our teachers speak only in Spanish but will insert a really enthusiastic SUPER sometimes, so we joke around about it)

So, they made us teach a fake investigator the entire first lesson in Spanish before even having our first language class. Her name is Nilka and she is actually our teacher. It's so difficult to teach in Spanish, especially when the church vocab is way hard. I'm not going to go into detail about every lesson. Just know that we have had good ones and bad ones. The coolest one was when I read the First Vision in Spanish to Nilka and I started crying when the first word came out of my mouth. The spirit testified so strong to me that the Restoration did happen and that Joseph Smith truly saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ in the Sacred Grove. Just the spirit in general here, I have felt it so many times I don't have time for all of them.

There's way way way more, but I really don't have time. I love y'all so so so much.

More Flexibility Announced for Mormon Missionary Daily Schedules

Changes are coming to the daily schedules of full-time missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The announcement was made Wednesday, January 25, 2017, following approval by the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Missionaries around the world, in counsel with their mission presidents, will be able to customize their schedules for safety, cultural, health, productivity and other needs.

Sister missionaries meet with a couple in Thailand.

“The most significant change in the schedule is to give the missionaries and also mission presidents the latitude to make the necessary decisions and adjustments in the daily work of the missionary,” said Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

Latter-day Saint missionaries typically get up at 6:30 a.m. to exercise, shower, eat breakfast and study before proselytizing during the day. They return to their living quarters by 9:00 p.m. Those hours will now be more flexible depending on the culture of the country where the missionaries are serving.

For example, missionaries in Latin America may need to arise and return to their living quarters later. The culture in some African nations may call for missionaries to leave and return to their apartments sooner.

The missionary preparation day will also be adjusted to allow more flexibility and time for laundry and shopping, communicating with family and the mission president, exercising and participating in recreational activities.

“The thing I love about this new schedule is that it allows the missionaries to exercise their agency to determine how to best use their time,” said Sister Bonnie L. Oscarson, Young Women general president and a member of the Missionary Executive Council. “It shows that the Lord trusts them to use their time wisely.”

“I think one other thing that’s intriguing about this is that this is a worldwide Church and one size doesn’t fit all,” explained Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. “So to be able to make that adjustment in areas and missions I think is very significant.”

Church leaders believe the policy change will improve the health and productivity of the missionaries, as well as provide post-mission benefits.

“It will allow missionaries after the mission to make that smooth transition into their life and have that same flexibility as they have those same goals to continue to pray and to read their scriptures and to remain close to the Lord in their life,” said Elder Brent H. Nielson, executive director of the Church’s Missionary Department.

The Church is also simplifying the information missionaries report related to those they are teaching. These “key indicators” include the number of people they find to teach, those who attend church, individuals being taught who have set a date for baptism, and those who are baptized and confirmed into the Church. 

There are currently more than 71,000 missionaries serving in 422 missions worldwide.

http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/more-flexibility-announced-mormon-missionary-schedules