Third Area: Metairie, Louisiana

I have just begun my fourth out of thirteen transfers, and I have been transferred to a different part of New Orleans.  Here is my updated address, which will be good through July 31, if not longer:

Sister Ryan Palmer

2300 Edenborne Ave #2-136

Metairie, LA 70001

Metairie is pronounced MEH-tuh-ree.  It is a noticeably more affluent part of town.  It kind of reminds me of Scottsdale, Arizona, in some ways.  We live in a gated apartment complex, which has at least one pool for residents.  Some residents pay extra money for a covered parking permit, and there are tennis courts directly on top of the covered parking.  Every morning at 6:30, a Vietnamese woman named Trang is out there running laps and practicing her serve.  

Before I got here, Sister Price and Sister Mullen talked to her and started "playing tennis" with her 3-4 days a week.  Trang is Buddhist but said that she would be willing to meet with us to learn more about Jesus Christ.  We plan to watch a Church-produced movie called "Finding Happiness" with her, which allegedly is a great introduction for people from Asian backgrounds about the basic beliefs of Christianity.  

http://store.lds.org/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Product3_715839595_10557_21144_-1__195735

Sister Price was trained here in Metairie nine months ago, and she never left until Wednesday.  We joked with Bishop Holmes (my new bishop) that she needed her membership records transferred to her new ward (in Baton Rouge).  [This joke is probably only funny to Mormons who know that missionaries' membership records remain in their respective "home" wards.  For example, my membership records remain in the Albuquerque University Branch for the duration of my mission.  Sister Price's membership records are actually in her home ward in California.  But because she stayed in Metairie for six transfers, the people down here grew to see her as a permanent part of the ward.]  Sister Price is now serving in Baton Rouge, and she is one of two sister missionaries that President Wall asked to serve as "traveling sisters."  President Wall is anticipating the need for sisters to be able to do "exchanges," and calling two sister missionaries to serve as traveling sisters is a way to meet that need.  In the past, we sisters have been too far away from each other to perform exchanges.  An exchange is just what it sounds like: a chance for half of a companionship to go to a different area and work with half of another companionship, thus learning from someone who is not their normal companion.  Elders get to go on exchanges at least once every transfer cycle.  The district leader works side-by-side with every elder in his district, the zone leader work side-by-side with each district leader in their zone, and the assistants to the president work side-by-side with each zone leader in the mission.  In this way, every missionary has a role model for how to be more diligent and Christ-like in missionary work.  When mission leaders conduct exchanges, they take part in every phase of missionary work, including planning, finding, and teaching.  

Sister Price and another excellent, experienced sister missionary (Sister Johnson) have each been transferred to Baton Rouge.  Both Sister Price and Sister Johnson have been paired with junior companions who they will work with six days a week.  Once a week, Sister Price and Sister Johnson will travel together to the rest of us sisters (in McComb, Covington, Chalmette, Metairie, etc) and "go on splits" with us, so that we can learn different, more effective ways of planning, finding, and teaching.  Their junior companions will stay in Baton Rouge, together, and work their two areas, together.  By December, there will be 22 sisters in the Louisiana Baton Rouge Mission.  That's a lot!

Since Sister Price was transferred to Baton Rouge, that left Sister Mullen to stay in Metairie with me.  Sister Mullen is a Temple Square sister, and she will only be here for another three and a half weeks (the Temple Square transfer cycle is different from ours).  Sister Mullen is from Calgary, Alberta.  

Sister Kimberly Mullen attended BYU for her first three years of college before coming on the mission.  When she returns to Temple Square, she will have only two transfers (three months) left before she goes home to Calgary.  She has served as a district leader and zone leader, and last summer, she taught more lessons in Mandarin than in English.  (Her companion at the time was from China, and I guess Temple Square is a popular destination for Chinese tour buses every summer.)  

I pretty much consider her my third trainer.  She excels at introducing the Book of Mormon to people immediately and testifying about it.  She has already taught me so much about how to better fulfill my missionary purpose.  I wish she could stay in Louisiana longer, because she is one of the best missionaries I have ever worked with.  But the Temple Square sisters only stay in our mission for two transfers (i.e. three months) before returning to the Square.  Did you know that the Temple Square sisters add a third verse to the song "Called to Serve"?  We sang that today.  It references Isaiah 2:2.  I had not noticed until today that Isaiah talks about "all nations" flowing into "the LORD's house."  That prophecy is totally fulfilled with the Salt Lake Temple!  

It's even built "in the top of the mountains."

I obey with exactness

My companion and I read three pages from the Missionary Handbook (also called the White Handbook) every morning at the beginning of our companionship study.  Here is a quote from the White Handbook:

CHILDREN

The following guidelines apply to all missionaries, regardless of age or sex.

Because of increasing legal complexities, be extremely careful around children.  If charges of inappropriate behavior are made, you may find yourself involved in a lengthy court case.  If you are found guilty, you could face a substantial jail sentence and Church disciplinary action.  

As in all other relationships, never be alone with a child.  Avoid any behavior that could be misunderstood or could appear to be inappropriate, including tickling, changing diapers, holding children, and allowing children to sit on your lap.  Never babysit children of any age.  

Here is a story of how I successfully practiced exact obedience to the letter of the law, while still showing a five year-old that missionaries care about him:

We visited Sister Ponthieux and her three children on this past Saturday.  She has a seventeen year-old daughter and two young boys.  The boys are the high-energy ones that I wrote about in the past (in the Itsy Bitsy Spider story).  The boys were relatively well-behaved on Saturday because we were all outside, where they could be high-energy and high-volume.  Caden is the three year-old, and he was playing in the inflatable kiddy-pool.  T.J. is a precocious, creative five year-old and he was playing on the swing.  At one point, T.J. was getting ready to throw a temper tantrum.  I walked up to him, and said, "Well, T.J. I'm not allowed to actually pick you up, but I'm gonna pretend that I'm picking you up like a cannonball."  And so I squatted down, put my arms around an invisible five year-old, and carried a heavy, invisible five year-old for ten feet from the swing set to the play pool, and then I pantomimed dropping him into the play pool, and I made a fairly big splash.  Then I pretended that I was really confused, as if I had lost little T.J.  I asked, "Where did Cannonball Boy go?"  And then T.J. started giggling and trying to escape from me.  We did that whole charade over and over again.  I think it made Sister Ponthieux happy that the sister missionaries were able and willing to make the lesson family-friendly.  And I showed T.J. that he didn't need to seek attention by acting out, but that he could get positive attention by letting adults take care of him and set the terms.  Sister Hartshorn and I talked about the interaction afterward, and we decided that part of why my "ploy" worked was because no one has every played Invisible Cannonballs with him before.  Because Invisible Cannonballs isn't a real game, or at least it wasn't before Saturday! 

Law of Unintended Consequences

Hurricane season begins on Friday 1 June 2012!

To make sure that we are all prepared, President Wall devoted an hour of Zone Conference to emergency preparedness.  Every single missionary now has a gallon-sized Ziploc bag filled with one extra pair of pants or shorts, one extra t-shirt, one extra set of garments, and one extra pair of socks.  In a second Ziploc bag, we all have one extra tooth brush, one extra tube of toothpaste, one extra bottle of shampoo, one extra bottle of conditioner, a few (in my case, 50) alcohol wipes, an extra comb, an extra stick of deodorant, an extra bottle of bug spray, and more.  Each missionary will be getting a 72-hour kit of food, vacuum-sealed.  Each companionship has four gallons of bottled water.  We are ready for a storm!  (Even while we all pray that the hurricanes avoid Louisiana entirely.)

Last Sunday, the six "younger" missionaries serving in the New Orleans First Ward met with our stake president, President Gabriel Stock for about an hour.  Stake presidents (and mission presidents, too, for that matter) are to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as colonels are to the United States Army.  It's a big deal that the New Orleans Colonel decided to talk with some New Orleans First Lieutenants.  

President ("Colonel") Stock told us about what he wants us to do differently in order to help the missionary work progress in the stake.  His main theme was that he wants us to light a fire under the members (so that they can "be contagious").  He thinks that we can do that by teaching them the same so-called "missionary" lessons that we would teach investigators of the Church.  It's been a while since President Stock was a First Lieutenant, and they've changed the Standard Operating Procedures since then.  And so he asked us whether we keep track of lessons taught to members.  We explained to him that we do, but only if the members are recent converts or less-active members.  I then jokingly pointed out to him that, curiously enough, our missionary planners have a blank row underneath all of the other key indicators, which he could perhaps ask us to use in order to keep track of lessons to active members.

A week later, we learned in our district meeting that we are going to start keeping track of lessons taught to members who are NOT recent converts or less-active members.  

Go figure.  

Not So Spiritual Update

Six weeks ago, when Sister Hartshorn and I got our new car (a Chevy Malibu), the tire pressure was low enough for the "check tire pressure" light to be on.  All she had to do was turn the ignition on, and the warning popped up.  [That is, the previous missionaries - teenaged boys - did not take care of a problem that originated while the car was under their stewardship.]  So we went to a gas station and filled it up, but without a pressure gauge.  Luckily, the Chevy Malibu was new enough that it had a digital pressure gauge on the dashboard for us to monitor.  Still, we were a little scared that we were going to over-inflate the tires and lose an eyeball or two.

About one week ago, we were told that we were trading out our Chevy Malibu for a Toyota Corolla.  The Corolla, too, was previously operated by teenaged boys.  We traded on Tuesday morning, and we made sure to clean everything out of our old Chevy Malibu so that they elders would be getting a clean car.  What we got in exchange was a car that probably hadn't been vacuumed in months.  It looked like someone took a handful of hay and scattered it on the interior floor of the car!  It was also missing up-to-date insurance cars.  So we did the responsible thing and texted the Office Elders, who get to develop some pretty enormous "managing a large organization" skills and requested that they send down new insurance cards as soon as possible.

On Saturday, we switched out the Toyota Corolla for a Ford Fusion.  This car was also lacking up-to-date (i.e. non-expired) insurance information.  So we requested a new card from the Office Elders for the Ford Fusion, too.  Moreover, in the glove box, we found the overdue mileage log and receipts from gas stations.  Saturday was May 5th, and we were supposed to mail in the mileage log and the receipts by May 3rd, at the latest.  So we texted the Office Elders and let them know that Baton Rouge North Spanish's mileage log/receipts would be mailed on Monday morning, but that they would probably arrive late.  [Remember, s'il vous plais, that our area is NOT Baton Rouge North Spanish, but rather, Chalmette English.]  

Even though I'm sort of ranting about it right now, I was careful to be significantly more diplomatic when I texted the Office Elders.  But I just wanted to point out that the Office Elders have undoubtedly learned that even when they send out texts in March 2012 asking missionaries to check on their insurance cards, the only way to really know that the cards are up-to-date is to ask Sister Hartshorn and Sister Palmer to drive the car for a day or two.  

I realized today that I've been getting a little bit crankier than is healthy.  I was annoyed at the Walmart pharmacy, I was annoyed at the Walmart cashier.  I was annoyed at a disabled little old lady who was trying to park in the Walmart parking lot, because she was driving closer to my companion than I thought was respectful.  (That's the sort of thing that would annoy a prison inmate.)  And that's not good.  Because my face is an open book, and people can tell when I'm annoyed.  

Not to mention the fact that feeling cranky just doesn't feel good.  

Or that Heavenly Father wants me to love the people of Louisiana, and you can't do that if you're annoyed at them.

Spiritual Update

On Sunday evening, Sister Hartshorn invited Chris to read Enos, which we think will help him understand how it feels to be converted.  

We are meeting with him later this evening, and we will follow-up with him to see if he read it.  If he didn't read it, we'll read it with him, and if he did read it, we'll ask him some questions about it.  

We role-played that lesson today, and during the role play, I learned about two major questions of the soul that I need to learn how to answer as a missionary.  First, how does a person make the Gospel of Jesus Christ a need, instead of just a want?  Enos' soul hungered for his testimony, more than his body hungered for wild beast.

Too, Savior told both the Jews and the Nephites that "blessed are they who do hunger and thirst after righteousness."  Food and water are needs, not wants.  The Gospel needs to be as vital for us as food and water, not a mere hobby like gardening or badminton.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is more important than a game of badminton.

For our investigators to know that the Book of Mormon is true, they are going to need hunger for that answer, not merely crave it.  I'm not sure, yet, how we can help investigators transform their desire for the truth into a need for the truth.  That's a big question, and it's one I'm going to have to study on my own a bit.  Do y'all have any suggestions?  If you do, send me a snail mail or an email!

The second question that I thought of is why Enos needed to know for himself.  Why do you have to get an answer from God?  Why isn't it sufficient to just know in your mind, because it makes sense?  I'm not sure if Chris understands why he needs to have a sure answer from the Holy Ghost.  For those of you who were born in the Church, why did you feel a need to get your own testimony?  Write to me!

My address is: 

Sister Palmer

3701 Golden Street #3

Chalmette, LA 70043

And my email is ryanwpalmer@myldsmail.net

Missionary Lesson #32: The longer you serve, the more inadequate you feel

We learned last night that one of our recent converts, Jamie G, has some serious misgivings about the temple and the covenants that we make in the temple.  

Jamie has taught me that the longer you serve, the more inadequate you feel.  Sister Hartshorn (my companion) tells me that Elder Bednar said that same thing when he came here in January.  

I'm a little bit stressed out by the need to help Jamie feel at peace with the temple.  I know that I spent four and a half years of my life angry with God, because of a misunderstanding that I had about the temple covenants.  And I also know that the classmate/ward mission leader who explained the nature of covenants to me was inspired by the Spirit when, over three years ago, he resolved my concerns.  Heavenly Father is trusting me to help guide Jamie and gather her into the garners so that she will be safe from the storms of life.  My ability to explain doctrine to her may influence the rest of her life.  What I am doing matters, and if I mess it up, someone else suffers.  

Missionary Lesson #33: The Ten Commandments of Finding

Our District Leader, Elder Dyre, gave an AMAZING instruction this past Tuesday at district meeting.  He had us open up Preach My Gospel and highlight the so-called "Ten Commandments of Finding."  Like all commandments, each of the Ten Commandments of Finding includes a promise.  They are:

1.  Work effectively, and the Spirit will be with you, protecting you and prompting you (PMG 156).

2.  Pray for spiritual sensitivity to recognize opportunities to serve people, and Heavenly Father will put prepared people in your path (PMG 156).

3.  Immediately testify of Gospel truths, and you will find more people to teach lessons to because they will have felt the Holy Ghost (p. 159).

4.  Ask for referrals from everyone, and you will have many people to teach (p. 159).  

5.  Address the importance of family, and you will find people to teach (p. 159).

Caption: If we were to come across this family, we could talk to them about how faith in the Savior will help them to have a happy family.  We could testify that Heavenly Father wants families to be eternal.

6.  Work with members, and more people will be baptized and retained (p. 160).

7.  Develop a "How can I help?" attitude with ward members, and they will trust us with their family and friends (p. 161).

8.  Strengthen your own faith that God is preparing His children to receive the restored Gospel, and He will put people in your path (p. 167).

9.  Serve everyone, and people will recognize us as servants of God and we will have increased opportunities to teach the restored Gospel (p. 168).

10.  Pray for opportunities to do good, and we will be led to people being prepared to receive the restored Gospel (p. 168).

Caption: In this picture, two sister missionaries obey the Tenth Commandment of Finding.