Week 70: Ah...so blessed!!

Dear Family and Friends,

I am so sorry I literally have 2 minutes to write this email. I am the worst ever. SORRY! But This week was seriously amazing. I love the work of the Lord. He really works through our weaknesses to make us stronger. Hans and Fiston came to church on Sunday and we had a great time. We had Thanksgiving dinner with Susan, Henk, Lois, and Jarno! SO much fun. We had a campfire. 

 

Susan told us that she thanks whoever is listening (prayers in her own way) and when she does, she feels good! We have 3 new potentials for this week! And we are just busy busy busy. I love that I have the chance to be on a mission. I love my companion. She is the best! 

And I am so sorry that I can't write any more...But just know that I am doing great. I am so excited to see you in 2 weeks!! IT is seriously flying by. I don't even know what to think. Heavenly Father is just amazing though and I know that he loves me and that He looks after all of His children. I am sorry that this is so short! LOVE YOU GUYS AND MISS YOU LIKE CRAZY!! STAY STRONG.

 

LOVES, Sister Kohlert

Week 69: We Are the Architects of Our Own Happiness

This week was yet again a super busy week with exchanges and appointments, traveling and of course, AWESOME missionary work. I love missionary work. And there are sooo many forms of missionary work. We seriously are so blessed to be members of the restored church of Jesus Christ. I have no doubt that Heavenly Father loves us. No doubt.

I was pretty much the whole week out of Utrecht on exchanges and I thought it was AWESOME! It's sometimes tiring but it's ALWAYS rewarding. Haha I was able to work with SISTER BROPHYon Wednesday AND Thursday because our greenies (sister Lemich, Sister Maughan and sister Jensen) had to go down to Brussels for legal stuff. And so Wedensday I was with sister Brophy and it was the best thing. I love working with her. Even though we knocked doors almost the whole day, we still had a blast! We were even able to find a couple of good potentials for them which was great! I always feel better when I leave a city and they have at least one new potential. We aslo got Chinese for dinner because that exchange was our for sure last exchange together..crazy. We can't believe that the time is going by so quickly. It was a great way to look back on all of the fun experiences and blessings we received from Heavenly Father throughout our missions. So we worked hard in Breda! On Thursday sister Reeder jointed us and we also had another great day of contacting! We even gave an almost lesson to this lady at her door. It was way cool. And we used the gift of tongues and understood what an Arabic person was saying haha ;)

We had a wonderful first lesson with a new investigator, Fatmata, on Friday and we are excited to teach her! (: She is from Africa..somewhere. haha And after her lesson we were planning on going to visit another potential and then we got a text from a member telling us that his wife needed help at the church for the wedding reception and wanted to see if we could go. We decided that supporting the members was more important so we headed to the church. MIRACLE. She was so stressed but once we got there, we worked hard and got everything done WAY before it needed to be. She was soooo grateful and she even was offering to come on joint teach with us if we ever needed someone. Seriously a blessing. Then she continued to tell more members what had happened and they were all so happy. It goes to show that just the little things can make a huge difference. Turning outward and helping others is always the right way to go.

I wanna talk about this great talk I read this week! And I read it a month or so ago so sorry if I already talked about it but it seriously is amazing. It's call "we are architects of our own happiness" by Gerald J. Causse CES fireside and sadly I just looked at the time and I have to get off but I hope you guys can get the chance to read it! haha

"..Your happiness is not really the result of the circumstances of your life. It is more the result of your spiritual vision and the principles upon which you base your life. These principles will bring you happiness regardless of the unexpected challenges and surprises you will inevitably face during your journeys here on earth."

Love you all!!! MISS YOU!!!!!!!!!! Next monday is TURKEY BOWL and we are going to have a blast! :) LOVESSSSSS

Zuster Kohlert

Week 68: Running around with my head cut off...

Hey family!! How are you doing!? haha It was funny cuz daddy wrote in his letter that it feels like he just was writing me yesterday...and I feel the exact same way. Like I feel like there is nothing to special to tell you guys but I should probably tell you something anyways. haha I think I am hitting the "oh I'll be home in 4 weeks and can tell them in person" stage of my mission. haha Sorry, I will try my hardest not to let that happen. 

I love Heavenly Father. He is so amazing. I think this week I was sooo caught up in the "bigger" details of missionary work that I wasn't able enjoy the small little miracles that happen every day. And then I look back on my week and I think, "man, what did I even do this week that brought this amazing happiness to those aroundme?" Then I thought of some amazing things and so I will share those things with you!

I had the privilege of working with 2 of the sisters in my zone this week and it was amazing. I swear, these greenies are no regular greenies. They came pre-trained and ready to preach the gospel. I learned soo much from them. On one of these exchanges I was able to be in Capelle!! And I got to visit a TON of the previous investigators that we had when i was there. It was soo cool! Iris is doing great, Mano is doing awesome but sadly the Meisjes are not doing as well. There were some awesome things that happened that made me realize that exchanges are SO inspired! It was cool to see. Sorry, the stories would take WAY to long to explain..haha But just know that the Lord planned exchanges PERFECTLY this week. 

 Another little thing: haha just randomly after praying before going into an appointment a couple passed by us and before I knew it my hand grabbed a pass a long card and my mouth was speaking to them. Turns out that the lady had just told her husband a couple of days before that she wanted to find a new church! so that was cool!

We were knocking doors yesterday, after a long and hard day, and we just kept enduring even though NO ONE wanted to listened. The last house that we knocked on was this 23 year old girl(Lady?) haha who was so cool and wanted to hear about what we believed in. We gave her a restoration on the door and unfortunately she didn't want us to come back but she was definitely sincere and said she would read the plan of salvation pamphlet. It was just cool to see that we still could plant seeds even when we had bad days. The catch was that WE NEEDED TO PUT IN THE WORK.

We also had dinner with Susan and Henk again this week! They are amazing. ANd guess what? Henk's children were there! Löis (girl, 16) and Jarno (boy, 13) And afterwards we got a call from Susan saying that the kids LOVED us and they want to come to the thanksgiving dinner that we are having with Susan and Henk! COOOLLLL HUH??? We taught them about heavenly father last time. I hope they felt His love.

We fasted and prayed for an lessactive who was getting brain surgery this week and everything went super well! He is back to his normal self just after 4 days! (: fasting and praying works my friends!

We set up 2 appointments with potential investigators for this week so we are excited! 

I am feeling super trunky...and it sucks. But focusing on the work has definitely helped! Am so ecited to be able to see you guys! AHHH It's crazy. I love you and miss you! Hope you have a wonderful week, I know mine is going to be CRAZY. haha

Love you, 

Zuster Colie Kohlert

Week 67: The Lord is Amazing!

All I have to say is the LORD is amazing. Seriously. I was pretty stressed about training and becoming a sister training leader but He has blessed me with the best greenie EVER. Her name is sister Maughan (pronouced as if you were to say "hey, MAAANNNN.") I hope that made sense. Haha she is 20 and is from Highland, Utah. She has 10 siblings and she is a twin. What else....? SHE IS AMAZING. So motivated and just a really good missionary. She keeps me sane. haha She also is JUST LIKE ME. I swear we are the same exact person. Haha I like her a lot. Her Dutch is also very good. So after picking her up and seeing how amazing she was, I was SO releaved. She is amazing and she can sing like a babe (I am listening to her right now haha she doesn't know I can hear her..haha)

I am almost out of time...sorry, I was trying to figure out classes. But pretty much we are teaching the same people...Finston, Daniel, Hans, Mellonie, Jan, and Jeremy along with Susan and Henk and some less active members. Everyone is going good. We had dinner with Susan and Henk (she's the awesome American and he's an amazing Dutchman) and they told us that they LOVE having us over. He gets out of bed right on time because he's so excited to see us and to get home on time from work! Sooo cool huh?

Jan said he would like to get baptized...we just have lots to teach him. And we are just sooo excited to go contacting and do awesome work here. I love it. I love change, it's amazing. haha (:

I learned A TON about faith this week. Faith is Jesus Christ is SO important. If we have faith, that means we will act and do the things that Jesus has asked of us. And if we do those things we will always have the Spirit with us. I love feeling the spirit. It is such an amazing gift. I hope we all can strive a little bit more on listening to the spirit. (:

I am sorry that I neglect you guys in my emails. I wish I had more time. BUT know that I love you and I will see you in a month or so!! OH TASI AND KY!!! CONGRATSSS!!!

I love youououuuuuuu!!!

Zuster Kohlert