Vanhin Dyches kävi Oulussa (Elder Dyches visited Oulu)

Hi everyone I hope all is going well this week! All your beautiful, beautiful snow is making me so jealous!! We enjoyed some snow in Oulu, but are feeling quite left out here without some good snow....but at least it is getting a little colder. I am looking forward to talking to you on Christmas and I hope you are all safe and doing well. This week was exciting for many reasons. We enjoyed greatly the spirit and instruction from the meeting with Elder Dyches of the Seventy in Oulu. I learned a lot about how to be a master teacher and help our investigators understand clearly. I have a lot to apply, but I am grateful for the opportunity to practice and improve in teaching daily. We also are very excited about our "golden" investigator from last week (young man met street contacting) working towards a baptismal date in January! He came to church (wearing a white shirt, suit, and tie might I add) and is sincerely praying and reading! It has been a complete joy to teach him and hear about how he has found more "suunta" (direction) in his life By meeting with us, reading, praying, and coming to church.

Some fun ihan suomilainen (completely finnish) Christmas things: telling everyone "Hyvää Joulun Odutusta!!" (Good Christmas waiting! :)) and then these fun little things called pikku joulu. They are just little Christmas partys before Christmas that everyone has. Fun stuff....Hope all goes well with work, school, life etc and Hyvää Joulun odutusta teille!!

-Sisar Clark

ps no pics this week because random circumstances made it so we are emailing at the library and Ive heard that library Computers will wipe out your pics from your memory card ....so maybe next week 

Hyvää Itsenäisyyspäivää!! (Happy Independence Day!)

Hey everyone! You have all been so great at writing, so good that I haven't been able to keep up with responding! I appreciate your emails so much! Thank you! I'm working on responding faster :) I hope that you are all doing well at home. This week was a very exciting week with celebrating Itenäisyyspäivä (all Finns watch this presidential speech/party....most say they just watch it to see all the famous people's beautiful dresses etc. ha) (as missionaries we celebrated it by sharing the gospel! What better way to celebrate!) and today is the most beautiful blue sky day to celebrate John Sibeliuksen päivä (the composer of Be still my Soul). 

We found a new (one might say) "golden" investigator this week from street contacting. He is a young Finnish man studying right now and he seems to have just pure sincere desire to find truth. We are very excited about teaching him more and seeing his progress. The members here have been just stupendous: the Relief Society organized a calendar thing where every day of Dec. someone tries to do something thoughtful for us....we have just been blown away with how kind and loving they are. 

Sisar Hales and I are jumping out of our seats with excitement about a big mission conference with Elder Dyches visiting the mission. To attend this meeting, Sisar Hales and I are practically taking a tour of Finland (get a map and check this out haha): We take a train from Lappeenranta to Kouvola from Kouvola to Kuopio from Kuopio to Oulu (woo hoo visiting the most north Sisters can serve in Finland!), then to get home we take a train from Oulu to Seinäjoki from Seinäjoki to Jyväskylä from Jyväskylä to Tampere from Tampere to Tikkurilla then finally to Lappeenranta again. Wow crazy! We are pretty humbled that the church can make meetings like these possible. They help us feel the spirit and be excited to share the gospel again and again.

I love you all and am looking forward to skyping home soon! :)

-Sisar Clark

pics - an absolutely gorgeous day and view of the harbor (days like these are so sweet and rare :))

- and what is an itsenäisyyspäivää without a good flag picture :)

Kaksikymmentäviisi Mormonin Kirjat!! (25 Book of Mormons)

Hey fam! This week was great! Missing you tons, but feeling so so blessed here in Lappeenranta. This week Sisar Hales and I were amazed to see so many fruits of our labors. We had an incredible week where so many street contacts wanted the Book of Mormon (we gave out 25! woo that feels good!...flooding Lappeenranta) and we found a lot of solid potential investigators with return appointments! We are feeling the spirit, happy, and ready to continue working hard (a great companion makes hard times so much brighter and better). Here are some things that have been big focuses in the mission (pretty much ever since I came in country....just haven't really told you much about it yet sorry ha):

- Tracting! and we have found so many successes from that. It just happens to be very successful in Finland.

- Church Videos! We have been doing a ton of our contacting with a focus on church videos such as "Because he lives" and the new christmas video "A Savior is Born". They have been really successful as well. One struggle is we have to ask if we can watch it on their phone or something (because we don't have Ipads) and it is very common for Finns to not bring their phones places etc. Nonetheless, we have really enjoyed working with these focuses

Also, this week Sisar Hales and I ended up teaching/finding a lot of Muslims. We have been asked many times "why do we need a Savior?" We have studied and pondered about this a lot recently and I have found a lot of insight, clarity, and comfort in what the Book of Mormon teaches in Alma 42:11-15; 23-25. Our Heavenly Father's plan is perfect and full of happiness because of Jesus Christ. I'm looking forward to this time of year where we can remember him even more.

A scripture that I pondered a lot this last week was D&C 88:67. It talks about having an eye single to the glory of God, and if we have that we will be filled with light and be blessed to comprehend all things. That is something I'm focusing on more as I teach and find; having the pure motive of serving our Heavenly Father.

I love you all! Have a good week :)

-Sisar Clark

pics:

-classic finland street (aka running out of pics to send home)

-enjoying lunch in the Mikkeli young womens room :)

Kala Seikkailu (Fish Adventure)

This week was another awesome week! Probably the biggest blessing for me has been feeling the spirit so strongly in our lessons. It is such a comfort to know that the Holy Ghost will take the message to our investigator's hearts and we are not required to be perfect teachers or missionaries. Also, Sisar Hales and I talked a lot this week about how grateful we are for this opportunity to share our testimonies so many times a day. It is such a privilege to truthfully declare what you know to be true and feel the spirit testify through you. Man it feels so great. 

So some fun random thoughts from this week include: I met two former Olympic runners in one day (one an investigator, and another a foreigner we were talking to on a bus). We take very long bus and train rides to head north to Mikkeli every week for District Meeting and they are absolutely gorgeous! It is so cool to see true Finland country side. One awesome members brought us a ton of fresh fish that he caught himself that morning. Sisar Hales and I had never dealt with fish like that before, but I was not about to that this awesome opportunity slide so I mustered up all I could remember from our trip to Alaska and did my best. Surprisingly it actually turned out pretty well! What a fun mission memory that one will be haha :) It snowed more! Yay!

Although we won't be able to celebrate Thanksgiving in the normal way, I'm grateful for this week to remember the importance of living with a heart full of gratitude. I feel very blessed to be a missionary in these last days. I'm so grateful for the power of the Book of Mormon, Holy Ghost, and prayer combined to solidify our faith and understanding. I'm grateful to have a loving Heavenly Father and to be placed in such a loving, supportive, and faithful family. I love you all and hope you have a good week.

-Sisar Clark

p.s. someone enjoy a piece of one of Mom's pie for me this week! (I will definitely be missing those!)

Se saattoi lunta!! (It snowed!!!)

Hei! This week will be one of those mission highlight weeks that you just remember forever. It was incredible! So many blessings! First off, my new companion Sisar Hales is heaven sent. She is a "pro" at pretty much all missionary work and I've already learned so much from her. She is cheerful, so fun to contact and teach with, has a great drive for obedience, and just is great. I'm pumped to work with her. Lappeenranta is a dream area. Wow, the branch is just stuffed full of incredible strong and loving members. (so much to tell you and not enough time or words for it all ha....more awesome details will come in following weeks). We live right next to (and run along in the mornings) the largest lake in Finland, Lake Saimaa, and our area goes all the way to the Russian border....so I might try and learn a few Russian words too. It finally snowed!! and it was glorious!! Definitely lifted our spirits. It has been been cloudy every single day for the past week and a half (so cloudy that even in the 5 hours that the sun is up you still could not even point to where the sun it) and it usually is completely dark by around 3:30 or 4. (definitely can be a little mentally overwhelming...mutta älä huoli kaikki on parhain pain (but don't worry all is well)).And there was one day where we had a solid hour where we could see tiny bits of blue through the clouds!! That was SO exciting haha...cameras were out and everything.

The work this week was pretty miraculous as well. We found two! families that are investigating now from tracting and we gave out more Book of Mormons than I could even imagine could be done in a week. It was a pretty exciting week for Sisar Hales and I :) I'm feeling so incredibly blessed right now and very grateful for warm coats, leggings, and gloves. I love you all and I am very grateful for your wonderful emails and prayers. Good luck this week!

-Sisar Clark

pics: - our first snow!

- spots of blue sky!!

Minä menen Lappeenrantaan! (I'm going to Lappeenranta!)

Change calls: I'm going to Lappeenranta to be with Sisar Hales! Lappeenranta is on the east of Finland, right next to the Russian border (I'll wave to Tommy while I'm over there ha). It is a little more north than Kerava, so hopefully a little more chance of snow! Lappeenranta has its own branch (not ward). It has been pretty rough to say bye to ward members and investigators here in Kerava (especially on Sunday), but I'm excited to meet those in Lappeenranta too. One thing I'm super excited about is that it is the only other place like Kerava where sisters serve in a ward/branch all by themselves. I'm selfish and have absolutely loved having the whole ward to ourselves :) this week has been a great opportunity for me to look back on the past four months here in Kerava and see where I have grown (and where I still need to grow). It was a big blessing and really fun to realize how much I can understand and speak the language (especially understanding talks and lessons in church). But I've heard that the language is a little different in Lappeenranta so I'm sure all that understanding will take another big hit pretty soon haha.

This week was really nice because I was reminded of how my goal isn't to become a "perfect missionary", but to become the missionary the Heavenly Father wants me to become. Focusing on following the spirit rather than perfection has brought the spirit so much more. I'm so grateful for Heavenly Father's personal plan for each one of us. He truly has helped me this past week specifically with contacting. I felt like my ability to ask questions, extend commitments, and understand the language improved a lot.  I saw the Lord's hand in the work when a teenage boy shared his testimony of Christ and what it means to receive an answer through the Holy Ghost after reading Moroni 10:3-5 with him. I've never seen a teenage boy respond so maturally and sincerely to sister missionaries talking to people on the street. We have an appointment to teach him later this week (sadly I will not be here then...but I'm excited for him!)

I was reading in Ether during personaly study and was very impressed with the Jaredites' faith as they prepared and then immediately got in the boats (or immediately put themselves in the Lord's hands). In Ether 6:4 it says "and it came to pass that when they had done all these things they got aboard of their vessels or barges, and set forth into the sea, commending themselves unto the Lord their God." I hope to implement their example in my work.

Thank you for your prayers and support these past six months. I am so blessed. Have a good week!

-Sisar Clark

Mahtava vähemmän aktiivinen jäsen (The wonderful less-active member)

This week was wonderful and I feel like there have been so many things I've wanted to tell you all, and they may all come out at once. So warning this could be a little scrambled, but hopefully worth it.

First off wow, that was so fun to see so many emails from all my siblings this week! Thank you! Change calls are this week: I don't want to leave Kerava. From everything I've heard about other areas, Kerava is definitely the best for so many reasons. I feel so blessed to have started out here. But katsotaan (we'll see). I know that whatever happens will be from Heavenly Father and will be the best for me so I'm excited to find out what that is. I loved seeing all your fun halloween costumes! You all looked great! (even scary Rob and Kari!) :) Halloween isn't really a thing here in Finland, but All-saints day is=candles all over cemetaries. Sadly, we didn't get the opportunity to see this, except for a small priests grave that is near our home. But, they do that for Christmas and their Independance day (Dec. 6th) as well and everyone says it is one of the most gorgeous things ever so I look forward to seeing it.
So this week was full of last minute cancelled appointments and finding many locked doors while trying to contact formers, but all is well! The biggest blessing for me this week was this wonderful less active woman that was recently found. She moved around and somehow her records got lost, but she was found and now she comes to church ready to learn, participates in all the lessons, asks us to come and teach her from the beginning because she wants to know everything, studys the scriptures and the lesson manuals for the following weeks lessons, prays, and works diligently to do what is right! She is on the older side, but has energy and motivation to do hard things. She is such a fun and impressive example to me! This week the weather suddenly warmed up a ton (especially today), but it has been getting a lot darker. It is usually completely dark before we go in for dinner (5 pm) and will only keep getting darker earlier from this point on. Everyone seems a little down because rumor has it that it isn't supposed to snow until January. We are praying for snow too! The temple was wonderful and such a great refuel. Ah I love this gospel, I love and am so grateful for our family. I'm so grateful for Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father's plan for us. I hope you all have a nice week! I love you and am praying for you! Keep working hard, I know things are stressful at home, but I know that we are Clarks and we can do hard things. :)

-Sisar Clark