By Small and Simple Things.... week 69!!!! (We are SOOOOOO Excited!!!)

Forgetting Sunscreen Motra Z??

Hello Hello!! :) 

Wow. What a week. The weeks here just keep getting more and more exciting, it is amazing!! I absolutely love being a missionary more than anything else in the entire world. Honestly, it is miraculous. 

Good luck Poopers and Parker with starting school! That is crazy sauce, but I hope that it all goes super super well! Stay strong. Work hard. and don't procrastinate because it only brings you sorrow. You really should try and fix it, but you could do it tomorrow. ;) honestly though, don't procrastinate. I am a living witness of that. Go get 'em! :) 

Poor Elder Stuart forgot tennis shoes

Service project clearing for futbal field

This week all of the Tirana missionaries got together with the Shkoder missionaries and did a major service project! We went to the near by orphanage and we were working in their back yard, starting to build a soccer field for them. That day we were just taking out tree trunks and cement borders and the good old dirty stuff. It was so much fun! I miss getting all sweaty and dirty working in gardens. It was a stinkin' blast! Everyone got some pretty good blisters from that day. It was totally worth it. It was exhausting though, we were up there all day. It was so much fun though! 

Sister White and I have started to have super intense chess matches during our lunch hour or after nightly planning. It is a lot of fun though, because neither of us are really good at chess-but we pretend we are. haha. and yes, we are keeping score. It is tied 2-2. hahahaha. 

Missonary selfies are the best... 

This past week we found some spaghetti squash!!! So we baked it!!! It was so good!! It didn't taste how I remember it tasting, but maybe that is because I don't have my couple tablespoons of Costco butter to put in it. But it was still super super good. Afterwards we baked the seeds as well. It was a ton of fun. It smelled like fall. We loved it! 

We have started visited a widow in our ward. She is so stinkin' adorable, I can't even handle it!! :) She is the sweetest thing, she can't hear really well though. So we are practically yelling at her so that she can understand us, and she just laughs and smiles because she still can't understand/hear us all the way. During the prayers she has to peek so that she knows when we say Amen, and she just giggles when we say amen. She is stinkin' adorable!! I am pretty sure that cute widows/widowers in wards are the meat of the ward families. I love this girl so much! 

It was cooler this week. Like a lot. I didn't sweat as much, which was really nice. hehe. The weather is finally starting to cool down! The leaves have already started to fall. So, I walk down the streets like a 5 year old as I am jumping on all the leaves that I can to get them to make that wonderful "crunch" noise. It is so much fun!  

American football. I don't think that Albanians have ever heard of that sport nor seen the football. It was hilarious, because the Elders had brought that with us to play the real manly sport of soccer. But on the walk home, Sister White and I stole the football and started throwing it to each other. It was really funny to see all the facial expressions of everyone around us. I guess they haven't seen one of those before. hehe. 

Motra White and Motra Zollinger

Yesterday we had another member visit, and I was able to visit the real Linda Inftiu!! :) I was so excited!! I had met her already a couple of times at church but I was able to go to her house! I told "her" in the MTC, as her daughter pretended to be her and we practiced our albanian and our teaching. I was so happy when we left her house last night! She is amazing! and while we were there, her daughter, Sister Iftiu who was one of my MTC teachers skyped her and I was able to say hi to her! It was super cool! :) 

Missionaries trying to get the frisbee...

Still being obedient

Coastal View of Durres

Coastal View of Durres

Another view of the coast Durres

Missionaries Pday Activity at Skenderbeu's castle

Today for p-day we went to Durres. We went to Skenderbeu's castle. It was absolutely gorgeous and breathtaking!! The castle was a little ruined down, but it was so cool to go there! It was right on the beach too. oh my heavens, it was so gorgeous! That was such a big temptation being that close to the water, especially because the sun was just beating down on us. But we didn't get in it! A couple of times the elder's football got in the water. So we threw rocks behind it to get it to push to us. Then when the frisbee got in the water, we tried the same time. But not all elders have good aim, and it hit the frisbee right in the center and broke it. haha, it was actually hilarious. We hung out at the castle for about an hour to goofing off and playing and having a blast... but then little satans had to come around the corner and ruin everything.There were about 5 teenage girls in bikinis that were coming over; but as soon as the elders saw them coming we all left. so take that Satan. ya fathead.  Durres is gorgeous though, especially the beach and everything. I took a lot of photos too. But the photos just don't do it justice. It was so much fun hanging out with the Durres Missionaries as well!! I got to see Sister Riley again! I miss that girl so much, she is amazing! and Sister Davis! I love them both so much!! :) 

This past week I became obsessed with the scripture Alma 37:6. It has taken on a whole new meaning for me, especially as we have done that for a lesson with all of our recent converts and active member lessons. It has been so good!! We are so lucky that we have the Book of Mormon, because in verse 6, we can learn how God works. We can learn His pattern to answering our questions, and how our personal revelation  will come. God gave us the answer and what His answer will look like. He literally put the answer in our hands. It is by small and simple things that God works. Every thing in this Gospel, is line upon line and precept upon precept. Because it is avash avash we can grow so strongly in our faith and our patience and our character as we are preparing ourselves and working so that we can receive answers. Joseph Smith is a perfect example. He had a question to learn of the truth, and so he studied and prayed. Then eventually he went to the grove to ask God which church to join. That answer that he got has changed history, and God knew the impact that that answer would have, and so God instructed Joseph Smith line upon line, avash avash. Joseph didn't have the first vision and then that next day find the golden plates, and get the priesthood, and then fully restore the church. That would have been absurd if it happened like that! God doesn't work like that (not saying that God couldn't have done that, but God worked how it explains in verse 6). First, Joseph had the first vision. Then a couple years later as directed by Angel Moroni he recovered the Golden plates. He received the priesthood. After some time the whole church was restored. But it didn't happen over night. It was a year span before everything was restored that needed to be restored. It is just like a sunrise. It isn't dark one second and the next BAM! light. There's no beauty in that, and there's no learning in that. We can't be grateful for the light if we don't know what it's like to be in the dark. This past week I have been thinking a lot about my mission thus far and I am just amazed at this same principle. All throughout my life God has been working with me in small and simple things so that I could be here in Albania at this time interacting with the people that I am. When I first got in the MTC and I heard people speak Albanian it sounded like complete and utter gibberish. But i took it one day at a time, and it was small grammar principles added upon other principles and I was able to speak a little more. And now, almost 16 months later, I am able to talk to people and converse with people and they can understand me! This most certainly did not happen overnight. But I am so grateful that it didn't. Because if it had been easy to learn this language, then I wouldn't have been able to grow as much as I have. I wouldn't have the testimony that I do now about how God keeps His promises and how He helps us in everything. I am so grateful that God works by small and simple things, that He tries us with our patience.  I also know that once we are familiar with how God works and how He will answer us, that our lives will change! We will know even stronger that God in fact does love us and cares for us. That even when we think that we are not getting any answer, that we will realize that we have already started to get some answers. I know that it is true! God loves us, so much! 

Have a wonderful week! Smile lots serve lots and treasure trials!!! :) 

Love,

Motra Zollinger

            

A Tender Mercy in 3 Flats...... Week 68 (So close!!!!)

Motra Zollinger and Motra White in Korce, Albania

Hello Hello!!! :) 

I hope that everyone had a wonderful week this past week! It really was such a beautiful week! 

It was a super busy and fun filled week. So many things that I want to say, haha, let's see if my brain remembers them. 

First off, our investigator was able to get baptized on Saturday! It was so amazing and go gorgeous! Both of her two little angel daughters were able to come with her. So many people showed up from the ward and other missionaries' investigators; it was amazing!  She was so happy and gosh, i don't even know what to say, words cannot even describe the happiness that I saw in her eyes and her families' eyes and her daughters eye. It was amazing. 

There are these fruits, I think they might exist everywhere, but the first time i saw them (or atleast knew I was seeing them) was here in Albania. They are called figs. They look like gross alien brains and I refuse to eat them. Except for one time a member gave us candied ones, because i couldn't not eat it. Yeah, so Sister White loves figs. But I don't. Last p-day there was a fig tree and they were all eating a christmas feast of figs and i was gagging as she threw them to me to catch. So, Tuesday morning during companionship study Sister White read to me the verse in the Bible where it says that Christ ate a fig, then she says "Christ ate a fig. So you need to eat a fig." haha. it didn't work. 

I had to say good-bye to my Albanian companion. Her mini-mission came to an end and she headed back home. I am going to miss her so much!!! 

The Motra's enjoying the rain

We had an exchange with Shkoder this past week. It went really well. and, guess what?! I DROVE FOR THE FIRST TIME FOREVER!!!!! It was so much fun! I was a little nervous at first...but it went really well. In albania, if cars are going slow and you want to pass them up you can go on the other side of the road and pass them up (like onto oncoming traffic's lane), i only did that a couple times. It was exhilerating. It was like I was in fast and furious. haha, just joking. it was a little terrifying and i only did it when i had to. But, driving wasn't that bad. I thought it would be awful like having to eat a fig, but it wasn't! mwaa. 

Cinnabon and hot chocolate

Poor Elder say "cheese"

Albania has some of the coolest lightning storms. Honestly, they are glorious. On the way back from the exchange there was red lightning. It was so pretty! We have had thunderstorms almost every other night this past week. It was so glorious. One day, sister White and I were actually outside when it started to rain, and we were between the real Shqiponja and Zogu i Zi when it started to rain really bad, so instead of taking the bus we just walked. It was so nice!! haha, we got a lot of weird looks. Then on Saturday after the baptism we were walking to go tracting. A thunderstorm had just started. We were walking down the street when a huge lightning bolt struck what looked like  not too far, like half a mile and as soon as we saw the light there was a huge clap of thunder. It shook the ground a bit! It was so awesome!!! I love the rain storms here! That night during language study, I did it by the window so that i could keep looking outside to see the thunder...it was so pretty! 

Elder with Motra Zollinger

Key: anetar-member, fort-strong. The funniest thing happened during one of our lessons with a recent convert. We were talking about Elder Ballard's talk from general conference. Sister White was talking about how amazing the member is that we were teaching (which was comletley true) and then she says "ti je nje anefart". As soon as I realized what she had said I just busted out laughing, and sister white was laughing super hard too. The member didn't know any english, so she didn't get what happened. I totally knew what she was meaning to say "anetar e fort" but then it just came out anefart. I tried to hold it in the rest of the lesson. But everytime I thought of it, I just would laugh. So after the lesson as we were walking to the gate i just said "so, she's an anefart, eh?" haha. I just started to laugh super hard and sister white was opening up the gate and then she kicked me. hehe. it was hilarious!! 

haha, i totally just sneezed as i am writing this, and it was worse than the usual wet squeeze toy. it sounded like a horse laughing. haha, it just got really quiet in here... #awkward

We had a basketball activity on Friday night. It was a lot of fun! hehe. Sister White and I were on opposing teams, which was fun. Good thing we had already done companionship inventory that day ;) haha. jk. it was a lot of fun though! The elders investigators who are 10 and 12 years old showed up, and so it was a lot of fun! They are adorable little boys! it was a blast. Then on Saturday we had futbol. It went really really well! It was a ton of fun! After futbol, i tried to touch my toes and I was able to touch my toes without cheating; haha, the practicing for excercise in the morning has paid off. #score haha. Doing activities with the youth and investigators is so much fun! I love it a lot! 

So, the reason that I am writing my email today is because yesterday morning we got a call from the APs that asked us to help escort some minors from Gjakova to the FSY (it is like efy) activity in Korce. We were so stoked! Everyone talks so much about korce and how gorgeous it is and everything; so we were super super excited to go! The drive down was absolutely gorgeous. So gorgeous!! Parts through the mountains reminds me of the drive up to Park City and Heber valley, so that was weird but it was so pretty! We drove by a lake and on the other side of the lake was Macedonia. It was gorgeous. We got the girls to the hotel for FSY and we got to stay for about 30 minutes there, because they gave us some food. It was so cool! There were about 80+ youth at the activity. I didn't even know there were that many youth in Albania! It was so awesome and i wish i could have just stayed  there! I was sorta hoping the furgon back to Tirana would have already left so that we would have to stay at FSY for a day, but alas por yorik, it didn't happen. The drive back from Korce was good, but super long. Sister White got super car sick on the way back and i felt super bad... and those roads are so windy (not windy like with wind, but windy as in not straight roads...i don't know how to spell that... haha). The drive was still super pretty though. It was a lot of fun overall. And by the time we got home the p-day hours were spent so we were given some time today to email. 

 

On sunday as we were doing language study we got a call from one of the senoir couples for us to come to the Elder's choir practice because the elder who usually played wasn't able to come because his companion was sick; which mean they needed me to play the piano. They sure were desperate. So we went to the church. They were singing Ye Elders of Israel (I think) and I saw that it was 3 flats. I just said "oh man. I'll do my best, but I can't do 3 flats." For some reason I always have a mental block if a song is over 2 flats or sharps because I think that I cannot do it. I said a quick prayer and then started to play for the choir. After I played through it, I was almost speechless. I just sat there thinking "what? What just happened. that has never happened to me before." I was able to play the entire song only making a couple minor mistakes, but not bad enough that they couldn't sing. It was honestly a miracle. I remember feeling so shocked as I realized what was happening, being able to sight read this song and to be able to do it well enough to help the choir. It was a tender mercy in 3 flats. For those that are really good at piano, 3 flats is nothing. But for a sister missionary named Sister Zollinger, 3 flats was enough to make me super nervous, and it may not seem like a big thing for a lot of people. But this was a huge thing for me. It meant so much to me, that God would help me so that I would be able to play that song well enough for the choir. And as the next hour and a half went on, I played for the stake choir as well. I do not say this to boast in any matter, but rather to testify of the marvelous works of God. In the middle of elementary school I took piano lessons. It was fun in the beginning, but as time went on I just wanted to play soccer and not do piano. Practicing became a chore that I hated to do, and I eventually dropped it the last couple years of high school because i didn't make enough time for it and I didn't think that I wanted to do it. But something that I have realized is that sometimes God gives us talents not to help or benefit us, but to help and benefit those around us. Sometimes at the beginning a talent that we have might not be something that we want to do, but it often times is something that God has given us because it is what He needs us to do; and as we continue to grow closer to Him that talent will be able to grow in us and our desire to use it. That is what i realized on sunday as I played the piano. Along with a great feeling of gratitude for my parents who stuck with their deicision for me to play the piano throughout my youth, even though sometimes it was probably not an easy thing to get me to practice nor the sound of me trying to practice; but I am grateful for their support. Don't give up on yourself or your talents quicker than what the Lord does; because the Lord is never going to give up on us. Ever. We are given tender mercies of the Lord so that we can continue to go on in our lives. I don't necessarily believe in coincidences, because I believe in God. But, I do believe in Tender Mercies. I love what Elder Bednar said about tender mercies, "We should not underestimate or overlook the power of the Lord’s tender mercies. The simpleness, the sweetness, and the constancy of the tender mercies of the Lord will do much to fortify and protect us in the troubled times in which we do now and will yet live. When words cannot provide the solace we need or express the joy we feel, when it is simply futile to attempt to explain that which is unexplainable, when logic and reason cannot yield adequate understanding about the injustices and inequities of life, when mortal experience and evaluation are insufficient to produce a desired outcome, and when it seems that perhaps we are so totally alone, truly we are blessed by the tender mercies of the Lord and made mighty even unto the power of deliverance." I testify of the worth and value of tender mercies. They are real and they are powerful and humbling. They don't always happen when we want them. But they always happen when we need them. 

Have a wonderful week!! Smile lots, serve lots, and treasure trials!! I love you all!!

Love,

Motra Zollinger 

P.U.S.H. ............ week 67

Tirana, Albania (?-she did not say for sure)

Hello  Hello!!! 

Wow. What a week! This week was such a good week and it was so much fun!! I hope that you all had an amazing week as well! :) I am so glad that Mom had such a wonderful birthday! Happy Birthday again mom! 

Our investigator passed her baptismal interview and she will be getting baptized on Saturday! I am so excited for her! 

So, the week started off really exciting on Tuesday during lunch. I was on an exchange with my awesome albanian sister, Motra Hysa. We went to a resteraunt for lunch and we were going to meet the elders for lunch. While we were waiting for them I had to go to the bathroom (like always), and so I went to the bathroom. The door, had a normal key in it that I had to twist to lock the bathroom door. But this key ended up mocking me and I locked myself in the bathroom for a few minutes! haha. it was hilarious, and awful, and embarassing at the same time. When I first tried to unlock the door, the key just wouldn't really fudge. I just giggled and though "not funny, move key..." but then it wouldn't. It was only us in the resteraunt and another man and the workers so i really couldn't yell for sister hysa, besides she couldn't do anything because I locked myself inside, and everyone would know it was the american girl that locked herself in.  I kept trying to just open the door thinking that it would magically unlock itself. ha, NOT. I heard someone talking, and so I stopped making noise to see if someone was talking to me. But then I just tried to keep opening up the door, because I was embarrassed because i realized that they were talking to me. after a couple minutes the door unlocked itself. I just swung open the door and grunted a little, and it was a waiter who was trying to tell me how to unlock the door. I must have had a weird expression on my face, because he just looked at me and giggled a little and then i just thanked him for his help and then went and sat down. haha, sister hysa and the elders got a kick out of it. I thinkt hat's the last time I am going to the bathroom at that resteraunt. haha! 

So, back home whenever I found a spider or a big bug, i would never kill it. Unless I was weeding, because then it was in my territory. I would always put a cup over it and then leave it for my dad to take care of or something because I didn't want to kill it. So, today I was in the bathroom and I saw something move... turns out it was a cockroach. But, that's okay. So I went and got a cup and put it over the cockroach and then walked away, because I had done my business. haha, sister white thought I was crazy when she saw the bug. haha. it works though! It died! 

While on the exchange me and sister hysa were just lying in our beds talking. We have a photo of David and Goliath in our room, and sister Hysa was looking at the photo when she said: Kush eshte ky? Skenderbeu? (Who is this? Skenderbeu?) haha, i laughed so hard I almost cried!!! Skenderbeu is the big Albanian hero who helped them in the wars. it was hilarious. 

We have been having such gorgeous weather here lately because we have been getting such good rain storms! They have been glorious and so nice!  Albanians absolutely hate the rain. It is like cats and water. We were walking outside to go to street contacting right as it started to rain. Me and Sister White just squeeled of excitement and rain in the rain. I don't think an Albanian has ever given me a weirder look before. hehe, it was hilarious. 

Sister White's eye swolled up super bad yesterday, and we called the mission nurse and she told her to wear an eye patch. But we didn't have one... so sister white made her own eye patch. it was adventurous! her eye is doing better today! 

Motra White

Motra Z, White and an elder

The hike 

This morning we woke up super early to go on a morning hike before it got super hot. It was so gorgeous!!! :) It was such a pretty view and it was so much fun! It was a way good work out as well. We had to fight our way through thorns and big bushy trees, aka we journeyed our way through the albanian forest. I kept on threatening everyone there though that if there were any spiders that we would all be dead. thankfully, there were none. There was a big fig tree though, and everyone got quite happy about it and started to pick them. personally, I think figs look like alien brains and i refuse to eat them. But everyone else had a fun time. and then a goat herder and his goats came by and Sister White fed one a fig and then all the herd came over and started to surround the tree. hehe, it was hilarious! One tried to get me to feed him, but I told it to go away. haha, no thanks. they were cute though, they had weird eyes. but it was so much fun! Nature is so stinkin' pretty! 

Cave, mine of some sort found on hike

Opening to cave/mine

We went to an awesome member's house this week for a lesson. The mom was so amazing and sweet and made us the best byrek that I have ever had since being here in Albania!! It was so amazingly good!! :) 

Motra Z and Motra Hysa

Byrek meal

Motra Z with Elder Guymon in Kosovo

Elder Rasband with Motra Z in Kosovo

Zone Conference up in Kosovo was so nice!!! I was so excited to go back up to Kosovo! I was able to see all the members that I absolutely loved! It was so glorious and so amazing! It was so cool to see all of my missionary friends as well. gosh, I just love being a missionary so much! The conference went really well! It was bittersweet, because all the missionaries that are going home next month they gave their final testimony. I was first. I am a Zollinger. I should be last, not first; haha, so it was weird going first, but it went really well.  It was an amazing conference! I especially liked Sister Weidmann's training. She shared a story with us, and it was so powerful and so applicable and I wanted to share it with all of you. 

P.U.S.H.

A man was sleeping at night in his cabin when suddenly his room filled with light, and the Savior appeared. The Lord told the man he had work for him to do, and showed him a large rock in front of his cabin. The Lord explained, that the man was to push against the rock with all his might.

This the man did, day after day. For many years he toiled from sun ·up to sun down, his shoulders set squarely against the cold, massive surface of the unmoving rock, pushing with all his might. 

Each night the man returned to his cabin sore, and worn out feeling that his whole day has been spent in vain. Since the man was showing signs of discouragement the adversary decide to enter the picture by placing thoughts into the man's weary mind: "You have been pushing against that rock for a long time, and it hasn't budged. Why kill yourself over this? You are never going to move it." Thus giving the man the impression that the task was impossible and that he was a failure. These thoughts discouraged and disheartened the man.

"Why kill yourself over this?” he thought. I will just put in my time, giving just the minimum effort; and that will be enough." And that is what he planned to do, until one day he decided to make it a matter of prayer and take his troubled thoughts to the Lord.

"Lord" he said, I've labored long and hard in Your service, putting all my strength to do that which You've asked. Yet, after all this time, I haven't even budged that rock by half a millimeter. What's wrong? Why am I failing?"

"MY friend, when I asked you to serve Me – you accepted. 

I told you that your task was to push against the rock with all your strength - which you've done. Never once did I mention to you that I expected you to move it. Your task was to push. And now you come to Me - with your strength spent, thinking that you've failed. But is that really so?"

"Look at yourself. Your arms are strong and muscular. Your back sinew is mighty. Your hands a callused from the constant pressure; and your legs have become massive and hard. Through opposition you've grown much and your abilities now surpass that which you used to have. Yet you haven't moved the rock. But your calling was to be obedient and to push and to exercise your faith and trust in My wisdom. This you’ve done. I, my friend, will now move the rock.”

At times, when we hear from God, we tend to use our own intellect to decipher what He wants. What God ACTUALLY wants is just simple OBEDIENCE and FAITH IN HIM. By all means, exercise the faith that moves mountains, but know, that it’s still God who moves the mountains.

 No matter how our life is, we are asked to simply push. Push Until Something Happens. Sometimes it may seem that we are pushing for ages, but just like happened in this story; no effort goes wasted. Every effort is to make us stronger and better than before. Sometimes we are pushing for a long time, but sometimes that is all that God is asking from us. I know that there have been times throughout my mission that I have had a rock before me, and I had to push and push. Praying until something happens is the key to life; but it will be the key to life only if we do it with obedience, love, and a desire. So when the days are hard: push. When you are tired and feel like you can't go on anymore: push. When you are having a wonderful day: push. No matter the situation: push. 

I love you all! Have a wonderful week! Smile lots serve lots and treasure trials!! :) 

Love,

Motra Zollinger