December 28, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

I know what you all are thinking right now. I wasn't going to email you on my last p-day. Lucky for yous that's not the case, yesterday was just public holiday because of boxing day.

All I can really say this week is that I can't believe I have made it this far! I am so happy that I came on a mission. Thank you to everyone who has helped prepare me to be able to become a good missionary and for all the wonderful examples I have grown up around. You all have really made a difference in my life.

I will miss everyone in Australia so much! I have grown to love so many people here!! Life after my mission will be different, but I will never forget the lessons I have learned here in the last 18 months.

Real quick update on a couple things from our missionary work this week. First miracle, we found a lady named Mary from Mauricious who speaks French who Sister Teriipaia taught. (I tried to listen and figure out what they were talking about but it was pretty useless) And our other miracle this week was that Mona came to church!!!!! She really enjoyed herself and I know that she really needs the gospel in her life. I plan on keeping in touch with her after I get home and hopefully I will be able to hear about her getting baptized one day!

Christmas was really good. We visited the Toh's, the Akaiti's and a couple in Cranbourne ward that invited us over with the Cranbourne Sisters. It was relaxing and surrounded by people who I love.

Yesterday was a really exciting final p-day as well. Sister Valdes took us to the city to walk around and do some souvenir shopping. My favourite part about it was that we got to meet up with the Footscray Sisters (Sister Rhodes)!! It was so hard to say goodbye to her, but I know that I will be waiting on the other side to meet her when she gets home next year!

As a final testimony and witness of Jesus Christ I want to tell each of you that I know with all of my heart that the gospel is true! God loves us and knows us individually. He knows our needs and He wants to help us to return to live with Him again. We are engaged in the work of salvation, and it is the best work any of us could do. Keep going strong everyone and I will see each of you very soon!

Love yous heaps!

Sister Bingham

1. Christmas! :)

2. lego Christmas tree in Melbourne

3. Merry Christmas from Melbourne

4. p-day in the city!

5. I will miss President and Sister Valdes so much! They are the best stake president!

December 20, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

This week's been pretty fun, except not a whole lot has been going on with our missioary work. We had exchanges which went well. Sister Almond and I were able to see Puao and Trenyce which was nice because we hadn't seen them in ages.

Our missionary Christmas party was heaps of fun! I spent most of the time talking with Sister Rhodes. It was great to catch up with her again!! I also got to perform in the talent show, something I wasn't really expecting. Sister Tihoni (from Tahiti, serving in Cranbourne ward) taught me, Sister Teriipaia, and two other sisters a Tahitian dance that we performed on Friday. It was really fun and I was actually surprised how much I miss all that stuff!

Saturday morning we got a callout from President and Sister Maxwell advising us not to be out in the heat if it's over 35C. Well, it reached 40C (somewhere around 100F) so we weren't able to do any tracting that day. We kept trying to follow up with heaps of people and noone was home, so we eventually decided to go hang out at the ward Christmas party. We were really happy when we showed up and found out that Rhonda had come with her daughters and grandkids. After all the many people we invited, I'm just glad that at least one of them showed up!

Since this week is Christmas I decided to end with a quote I have on my planner this transfer from Thomas S. Monson.

"To catch the real meaning of the spirit of Christmas, we need only drop the last syllable and it becomes the Spirit of Christ"

Merry Christmas everyone!!!

Love yous heaps!

Sister Bingham

1. so dang hot!!!

2. she's my favourite! <3

3. the Christmas tree is looking nice this year!

December 13, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

Another week come and gone. It always goes by so quickly! Well, the sicknesses continued this week. On Tuesday I woke up in the middle of the night and in the morning with the worst sore throat and headache. I called Sister Maxwell in the morning to see what the best thing would be to do and she said to take Tylenol and rest. I still decided to go to zone meeting that day, which just made my headache worse, but it was still good. I also developed a small cold the past couple days, but it is on the mend which I am happy about.

We've also had another trial recently in terms of getting around. Our allotted K's (kilometers) for the month got reduced by 600, way too much for our big, spread out area. Sister Teriipaia and I spent a whole morning going and looking at bus schedules to try and figure out how we can make it all work out, but it isn't looking too good for us. We have decided to try and take bus/metro when we can, but those don't even get us to all of the suburbs that we cover so it will be hard, but we are just going to try our best.

We saw a couple of our investigators this week. Meaghan is doing well. She read from the Book of Mormon this time, and she even read the pamphlet we left her as well. We mostly talked about prayer with her because she had some questions about that.

We had a new investigator this week. Her name is Aura and she is from Mexico. She is pentecostal, but has friends who are members in another stake. We taught her the restoration and it went pretty well.

We also got permission this week to go to a member's house and watch the christmas devotional. I really enjoyed watching it and felt the Spirit a lot! I loved Elder Bednar's talk about Christ being the light, and then making the connection to all the christmas lights we see around during the christmas season. I hope that we will all remember Christ and the light that He can bring to our lives during this christmas season.

Love yous heaps!

Sister Bingham

1. language study at the park. :)

December 6, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

Well, it is the moment you have all been waiting for: my last and final transfer news... So my new companion is Sister Teriipaia, from Tahiti and I am follow-up training her! Fourth daughter, whoo hoo!! She has a heart of gold and is such a goof ball! I know we are going to have heaps of fun together this last transfer.

I got off to a rough start this week. Wednesday morning after I woke up I felt like I had an eyelash stuck in my eye. I ran to the bathroom and looked, but couldn't see anything. After flushing my eye out several times with water and contact solution and still nothing I decided to call Sister Maxwell. She predicted that I might have a case of conjunctivitis (pink eye) and guess what. I did! What a great way to start my last transfer, getting sick. I haven't been sick my entire mission until this week... I'm all goods now though, the doctor gave me some eye drops and it cleared right up.

Meaghan is doing well. We managed to catch up with her again this week. She didn't read the chapter we left her from the Book of Mormon yet, but she felt really bad and said that she would read it before our appointment this week.

On Saturday we tracted into a really nice lady, Aura, from Mexico. We talked with her for a long time at her door and then she invited us in and gave us orange juice. We taught her about the Book of Mormon and she was excited for us to bring her one in Spanish this week. She was a miracle!

On the other side of the spectrum, we met a lady this week that believes that she is Judas (like the one from the Bible that betrayed Jesus). Yeah... that was a bit of a different conversation but all goods!

Hope yous are doing well and enjoying the Christmas season! If you haven't already, make sure to look up the new Christmas message on christmas.mormon.org

Love yous heaps!

Sister Bingham

1. best p-day ever!!! President and Sister Valdes got permission to take us to the beach!!

2. AMM

3. kangaroos!!

4. transfer meeting

5. my new comp

November 29, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

Tomorrow is transfer day and Sister Rhodes is leaving me. I am so sad!!!!!!!! I will miss Sister Rhodes SO much! She has become my best friend over these past three months that we've been together. We've laughed together, we've cried together, we've had amazing joys, and devastating disappointments as well. I will miss all the good memories we've had, but I am moving forward into my last transfer with my head up. It hasn't been all that easy for me these last couple weeks stressing about everything going on here and things I have to worry about for when I get back, but I know that this last transfer will be great and that I will be able to finish strong! As Elder Pearson said, you sprint through the finish line, not to it.

We had a couple really cool miracles this week. First is Monica. She is a Hindu mum we tracted into a couple weeks ago and this week we were able to catch up with her with Shannen and teach her a lesson. It went really well and she seems really open to learning so far.

Our other miracle was Rebecca. She converted a few years ago and lately has had a hard time coming to church. A couple weeks ago we were able to finally meet her and this week we went by and taught her the restoration lesson again. Then yesterday she came to church! It was great and she was so happy to be back!

I know that missionary work can be so rewarding, but it can also be so exhausting and disappointing. As I've been having a harder time these past couple weeks I've noticed how 'conveniently' miracles are placed in my path right when I need them to lift me up again. Heavenly Father is aware of us and our needs. He might not always relieve us of our trials straightaway, but He will give us the strength and upliftment that we need to keep on going!

Love yous heaps!

Sister Bingham

1. best burger in the world!

2. said goodbye to one of the families in our ward yesterday. Still got heaps on the list for today!

November 22, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

Another week come and gone. It always goes by so fast!! Well, this week we had a lot of changes to our teaching pool. Quite a few investigators and potentials dropped, and some new ones picked up as well. We also had a few other good things happen for us, like taking out two of the recently returned missionaries in our ward and teaching five less active lessons. It's been busy for sure!

One of the new investigators we picked up this week was Meaghan. I know, it is still weird for me too to teach someone with my name. She's really great though! We met her tracting last week. She got in a really bad car accident a few months ago and pretty much only sits at home and goes to physio now until she gets better. She is Christian and really misses going to church so she was really happy to talk to us. We taught her the Restoration yesterday and she was really open and wanted to learn. One of the things I have noticed in my many months being out, and that was emphasized to me this week, is the importance of the people we teach to being open and having a willing heart. It is a complete 180 experience trying to teach someone who just wants to prove you wrong and convince you of all the reasons why they are right as opposed to teaching someone who is willing to learn and act on the things that they receive. If we have a sincere heart and are actually looking for answers, God will be much more willing to give us those answers, we just have to want it first.

I hope yous enjoy your week and spending time with family for the Thanksgiving holiday. I don't think I'll be able to celebrate with yous so make sure to eat some pie for me!

Love you heaps!

Sister Bingham

November 15, 2015

Dearest family and friends,

Sadly, this week has not been too exciting. Tuesday and Wednesday were both slow days for us, everyone kept cancelling on us! But all goods, we never lose hope!

Thursday we had zone conference. As always, it was heaps of fun and full of the spirit. Sister Rhodes and I gave a mean as training as well so that was fun!

Friday we took Sister Rhodes to the doctor because she hadn't been feeling well for about a week or so. Then we spent the next two days letting her rest and recover.

The one lesson we did get to teach this week was Rhonda, and it was really good! She kept her commitment to read the Book of Mormon every day, and she even read more than one chapter a day. Her long friend in the church, Sister Jenkins, came with us and it was great! I know and can feel that she will come back to church someday. I just hope that day is soon.

I will leave yous this week with my ponderizing scripture for this week. It has taught me a lot about charity.

"And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing."

-1 Corinthians 13:2

Love yous heaps!

Sister Bingham