In the field #8

 Bonjour!!! Well life is good here in Arras! Its worlds different than Bruxelles! haha its the frenchiest little french town and i love it! barely anyone speaks english. we also have all the little country towns surrounding Arras too. Just picture the most beautiful french countryside that everyone dreams about...yeah thats where I am serving. Its beautiful and everyone is really nice! The work is a little slow here so please send up some prayers for the people in Arras!  And also the ward here is incredible! they are so unified and excited to work with us! I know we will see miracles here.

   My new companion is Sister Covington! I was actually in the MTC with her. Of course the whole "language" aspect was a bit of a worry but its working out. Last week when we were on the train some french guy was talking to us about the train tickets and everything and i am so use to just letting soeur thibault just answer....but she wasn't there. and soeur covington's trainer wasn't there either. so i looked at her and she looked at me and thats when i realized...i HAVE to know what people are saying to me. So we stumbled our way through that conversation and we decided that we will only speak in french with each other. Soeur covington and i have not spoken english together. its a great blessing to have a companion who truly wants to be here and who has the same goals as me. I have seen my french even just this past week improve like crazy! Its surprised other people and it has even surprised me! I know that it is the gift of tongues and because of the Lord that i have been blessed with this.

   We haven't taught a whole lot of lessons this week. But one cool experience we had together! It was about 830 at night and i knew that we couldn't return to the house but we had literally done everything else we had planned and back up planned. we stood in the empty street for a moment and thought about what we could do...we decided that we should just go and try to find people. so miraculously this asian woman comes walking down the street! so we ran up to her and started talking. Turns out she speaks english and not french...only time that has happened haha. Soeur covington was shocked because she hadn't heard anyone speak enlgish here for the 3 months she's been here. but anyways! we started talking and she was on vacation and she lives in finland at the moment. She grew up not believing in God but she was open. She said she had tried praying a couple times and that she always felt good when she did that. We then explained the Holy Ghost, the nature of God and Jesus Christ. We taught the restoration and first vision and about the book of mormon all there on the street! we found out that she has three friends that are mormon and she has a book of mormon in chinese. We committed her to ponder about what we have said and to pray to God that night and ask if he's there. We then prayed with her on the road. It was truly incredible! IT was a 40 minute lesson too. legit. And when we left it was because we had to go, not her. she actually didn't want us to leave. Sadly she was going to Paris for the next two days but we gave her info to go to the church there. There are truly miracles everyday!

   Doris is getting bapised this friday! I am very excited for her! Sadly I will not be able to go since i am too far. She has been prepared and she is ready to be baptised thats for sure!

   Well I love you all! Do work!

Love Soeur Finneran

In the field #7

Bonjour mes amis! Well all is well here in Strombeek! This past week we had a few activities with the ward and that was nice. We went to an activity with the young men and young women and we actually had 3 non members show up so that was good! They really enjoyed themselves and got to know the people in the ward. They definitely feel more comfortable now with the people in the ward. And then we also stake conference with all the wards in beglium. It was crazy how many people were there! Its great to see how many member there truly are in Belgium! We had a few investigators show up with us and really had a good time! Doris is getting very excited for her baptism and really got along with the members from our ward! She also is making plans to move to Chicago next year. So I will be able to go visit her after the mission because she will not be too far. We also did belgium legality this week so I was able to see all the missionaries from the MTC. Its always an uplifting experience to be able to talk to those I am serving with.

Well the news is is that I will be going to Arras. Its an area in Paris Nord! My companion will be Soeur Covington who was in the MTC with me. I will keep you posted!

Love you!

Love Soeur FInneran

P.s. Congrats Ashlyn on getting married soon! Love you!

In the field#6

  BONJOUR!!! :) Comment ca va tout le monde!?  Well things are great here in Belgium! Transfers will be here next week so I might leave but more than likely I will stay here. But I can't imagine them leaving me and Soeur Thibault together. Which rips my heart out a little bit because she truly has become one of my greatest friends. But I will try not to think about being seperated from her. 

   BUT!!! DORIS IS GETTING BAPTISED!! :) The woman I wrote about last week...she has accepted to be baptised on the 6 of July! We are so excited! We taught her a few times this week and explained more about the restoration and the need for that and then we asked her to be baptised and she said yes! she told us she has been praying and waiting 3 years for us to bring her this message. She truly has been so prepared to receive the gospel. Its just such a testimony that no matter where you are in the world, the Lord is preparing people to accept His gospel. What a wonderful thing this is! :) I love Doris to pieces!  And all my other invetigators too! 

    Another story...This past two days we have not been able to get to our appointments on time. Supposedly twice a year they have these great big yard sales in the streets for like 2 days so thats what was happening. THe bus' weren't working sometimes and it was just crazy. But it ended up being perfect because evertime that happened our investigators told us that it was a good thing we were late because they wouldn't have been able to talk to us really if we would have showed up on time. The Lord knows exactly what needs to happen and He makes it happen! :) And also He places people always in our paths that we need to talk to. Yesterday when we were on a bus (finally after waiting for like 25 minutes) we walked on and stood next these two other people. The guy looks at us and is like.
"OH! Hey!!! OH hi missionaries! Hows it going!?" (in english - welcome to Belgium). He then began to tell us that he is Belge but had been in new york for the past 5 months and met with the missionaries there. He said that he loves the missionaries and is so grateful for their efforts. He said that it truly has made a difference in his life and he has been able to find God again and he is so much happier than he was before. He will be traveling lots for the next year or so but we encouraged him to continue to learn about the church and promised him blessings. And he was also with this girl from Spain. She was so awesome! She told us that at this moment she is living in belgium but really has lost her way spiritually. She even started crying a bit on the bus. We told her we would love to share our message with her and she accepted gladly and gave us her address and phone number. We are really excited to get to know her better! And then we got off the bus and parted ways and walked into the wrong direction and walked into a big group of kind of sketchy men...haha whoops but then we kept walking and this guy (in english again) stops us and says, "HEY! Where are you from!?" We told him U.S. and Canada and then he started asking us if we were there to teach him about relgiion and help him get back to church and stuff. He also asked if everybody was invited to church. we said of course and gave him the Elders phone number. :) 

  The lesson honestly that i learned really strongly I think this week is to not judge a book by its cover. There are people all around us who are in need of the gospel and who have their own struggles, but if we are judgmental we will never be able to help them. 

   I love this gospel and this work! Its not easy but it never was meant to be easy. Salvation truly doesn't come easy. It wasn't easy for Jesus Christ, and as His representative right now, I know that it will not be easy for me. But all in all, there are miracles everyday that help me to see the big picture and it truly, in the end, is all worth it. Every single second. So make it count!  :) I love you all!

Love Soeur Finneran

P.S. ALISON NIXON! If you could please give your email to my sister... I would LOVE to hear whats happening in your life! And also JEANETTE!!! Seriously gurl what are you doing!? Get out of your little BYUI bubble and send me a quick note! OK much Love! :)

In the field #5

Bonjour mes amis! Well the sun is finally shining here in Belgium! I heard from Kendal last week and she said that it was so hot in germany and i was really confused because I looked out the window and it was pouring rain here and really cold! I heard yesterday from the Finnish family in the ward that Finland is actually 20 degrees warmer than in Belgium...Its an odd place here...but I love it! :) But today I actually didn't have to wear a coat! And for that I am super grateful! :)

First things first! The work...This week has been difficult with lessons because people sometimes cancel on us or just not show up to lessons. C'est la vie. BUT we met this one woman named Emma! She is from Camaroon and a little bit older. We walking down the street and decided to talk to her. She said it was ok for us to come over the following day! So we met with just barely on Saturday and we talked about the Restoration. She thought it was very interesting and she was really open to the idea of God's true church being restored in its fullness. We left her with a pamphlet to read. So Soeur Thibault accidentally left her scarf at her appartment so the following day (yesterday) we went over to get her scarf and we thought, why not teach a little something something. So she was super happy to see us and she told she studied the entire pamphlet. She had questions for us about Adam and a few other questions that we were able to help her understand. She was happy with our answers and said she will pray more about it. We gave her a book of mormon and she said she would start reading it for the lesson that we have with her today! She also said that she will for sure come with us to church next week! :) She told us that normally she just takes the metro home but she felt instead on friday to take the trams and buses. She then told us that that is why she was able to meet us and that we were all suppose to meet each other! :) :) :) And then we asked her to give a closing prayer and in her prayer she mentioned how she knows that we knew our Father in Heaven before we were here on this earth. Guess what we are teaching tonight...? Thats right plan of salvation! HECK YES! :) We will also commit her to being baptised! We are more than thrilled to have the incredible opportunity to teach her! She is the definition of a golden investigator!

Funny story... So we were walking around finding people to talk to and these three guys come up to us and ask us for directions. They were defs italian. Its funny how you can here accents no matter what language it is. They actually all spoke english better so we talked to them for a bit. One lives in New York and actually saw the play the Book of Mormon so we talked to him a bit about that. We also gave them a mormon.org card and tell them to read the actual book because its even better than the play. haha but they actually did invite to go clubbing with them that night too...three times. We also told them more than three times that we are missionaries and we are here to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. haha but overall they were pretty nice! Sometimes i wonder why missionaries get hit on so much...We wear long skirts and modes blouses, etc...and we get hit on all the time. Everyone loves them a good missionary I guess! :) haha

Well I love you all and good luck with everything you got going on! OH and seriously...go teach with the missionaries! Hardest thing in my life is trying to convince members to come teach with us! Don't be one of the difficult members! I promise that you make such a huge contribution to missionary work! My scripture for the week. "Be still, and know that I am God." Take a moment to be still this week. You won't regret it! Bisous!

Love Soeur Finneran

In the field #4

Bonjour mes amis! So this letter will not be long just like all the other ones. My bad. haha Sorry they don't give us a lot of time! But Just to update you with Belgium...Its still really cold here! It has rained the entire week, all day every day. I still wear tights, boots and my winter coat! But I heard that is just what beligium is like! Haha but its super green here so that is a definite bonus of all the rain! :) We meet lots of new people everyday and we are continue to have lessons every day too! Here is a fun little story! So we were on the tram and we looked over and saw a woman who we for some reason had a picture of in our area book... We recognized her so we got off at the stop that she got off at... haha i know super creepy whatever! But we followed her for like 2 minutes and then we just started running for her and we yelled, "Madame we have a question for you!" haha she stopped and we ended up talking for like 40 minutes in the road. She is supposedly a member and she has been inactive for years and years. Her husband and daughters are not members but maybe someday she will let us go to her house to teach them! We ended up teaching a lesson right there in the road too and had a prayer and everything! haha in every way possible it was probably super awkward! BUT it was what needed to happen and I am glad we followed the spirit to go and talk to her. I read a quote that I wrote from one of the apostles in my scripture study this week. It said, "A true friend is someone that makes living the gospel easier." Its so important to be that good and true friend! I love you all and miss you!
Love Soeur Finneran

Pictures

In the Field #3

Bonjour tous! Well I know its crazy that I am already writing again! time flies eh!? This week has truly been incredible! On wednesday we had the opportunity to go the King's palace here in Bruxelles and see his gardens. They are literally ridiculous! SOO big! It took us like an hour and half to walk through. But also that same day was Fete de Travaille so no one works. It was especially busy that day. But it was beautiful and fun but very tiring! That night we didn't have any appointments so we went out contacting! We went to go visit an inactive and she happened to live in a pretty muslim area. She wasn't home so we decided to go contacting somewhere else. But on the way back to the metro we saw a lady and felt that we should talk to her. So we started talking to her and her friend and her friend was all like," Im leaving." and she just walked away. It was for sure awkward and I thought that the other lady was going to get mad or something but NO! She invited us to come over right then! Her name is Rachelle and she is from Camaroon and she is awesome! We went to her house and met her mom. We taught them the plan of salvation and they loved it. She invited us over the next day to teach her again! This time she brought another one of her friends who was very religious! We taught them all about the book of mormon and they all accepted one. Rachelle had read the pamphlet and prayed about it and she said she felt good so that was awesome! She said she would start reading the book of mormon. We went over the next day too and taught them a little lesson and prayed with them! She has 2 or 3 other friends that she would like to introduce to the church! She is so legit! They said they were going to come to church but...they didn't really show up..so that was actually really sad but its ok! NEXT WEEK! THey will come for sure! :) We are going to go over this week and see wazzup. And again walking around that same area we stopped and talked to another lady from the cote d'ivoire and she invited us to come over the next day. She was actually there! So we went there yesterday and taught her and her husband about half of the plan of salvation! She likes the message and he really loves Jesus so I definitely see potential there! :) We are meeting with them again next weekend! We have been just talking with so many more people and thats honestly the trick! Just talk to everyone. And try not to make it awkward... haha I am still working on that one! Well time is running out again so I must go... But I love it here! I love this work! I know that this is the Lord's work! I know that when we simply just open our mouths to share the gospel, the words we need will come. I testify that that is true! I know that Jesus Christ truly is the son of God and that He Lives. I love you all!

Love Soeur Finneran

P.S. Just a shout out to MA MERE!!!! You are the best mom in the whole world! Seriously though... I am the luckiest! Love you so much mom! Happy mother's day next week!