This is the week! (this is what Elder Bauer wrote in my planner this week)

First off my homecoming talk will be on April 30, 2017 at 11:00 am and the address is: 

530 Villa Drive

HEYBURN, Idaho

Everyone is welcome!!!! Please come :) and invite your friends

It is pretty weird when you can count the days you have left on two hands, I literally never thought I would get to this point, I hit a spot on my mission where I just realized that I am a missionary and that this is just my life and it will never end so I just accepted it, but that isn't quite the case anymore. I am so glad for the wonderful things that I have been able to learn over this past year and a half. I have learned a lot about myself and a LOT about the gospel and about missionary work and the importance of it. I have learned a lot about Wisconsin and the people here and I have really come to love it here, and to love the people, and their obsession with football, cheese, and alcoholic beverages. I really love how beautiful it is here it is so green and even in the winter the snow is pretty. I will definitely miss it, I will treasure the experiences that I have had here, and the people and the friendships that I have made. 

I am just so grateful because I feel like before my mission I had a testimony, but I can now say that I am converted. That is my favorite phase in the Book of Mormon "and all those who were Converted unto the Lord, never did fall away" I want to be that person who never falls away from the Gospel of Jesus Christ because I know that it is the way, I know that He is the way. I know that it is only because of Jesus Christ that we have any hope at all, it is because of Him that we can repent and what a wonderful gift that is. It is only because of Him that we can over come death and be reunited with our families for eternity. It is only because of Him that we can have eternal life and we all know that eternal life is family life. Elder Bednar says that if a testimony is what you know, than conversion is consistently being true to what you know. It is living what you know, which means having faith in and accessing the atonement of Jesus Christ everyday, and every week, and every month and every year for eternity. The only way that I have come to know this and gain a testimony and conversion to my Savior is through reading and studying and pondering and praying about the Book of Mormon, it is in fact another testimony of Jesus Christ and I can honestly say that it is the one thing that has brought me closer to my Savior. I loved President Monson's talk for conference and how he invited us all to read it and to gain a testimony of it. I can promise you along with Moroni that if you read it and sincerely pray about it that you will feel the spirit of God, and you can know for yourself the truthfulness of it, and the truthfulness of Jesus Christ. 

One thing that gives me comfort at the end of this wonderful journey I have been on is that I can still be a missionary, and not only can I be, but I am still supposed to be a missionary. Each one of us has this role and responsibility and calling to share the gospel with the world, to spread it to all the earth, we took upon us this responsibility when we were baptized, when we made covenants with Heavenly Father to take upon us the name of Jesus Christ and be his representatives and share this message with the world. Even when I take off this black tag I will still be a missionary. I want to thank everyone for everything for all of the help and support and emails and letters and cards and packages everyone has sent me, it is a lot easier for me to do the Lord's work when I knew that I had a whole bunch of people cheering me on. I hope that everyone had a fantastic Easter! I love you all! 

Sister Koyle

Exchanges with Sister Mansfield, we both go home together 

 This is all of the JW material that I picked up :(

​Weekly Planning: Sister Hess did this and then I looked at the boards later and noticed what she put. M is for missionary and my commitment is to teach repentance and baptize converts :)

So members fed us cheese cake 4 times this week! #Blessed This is a picture of the snickers one. 

We went to Lambeau again for Sister Hess' Birthday, this is the Pro shop, they have cheese cup holders to hold your beer. 

Elder Allton, Elder Sluga, Sister Haderlie, Sister Rasmussen, Me, Sister Hess, Elder Goldsberry, Elder Palacios at Lambeau. 

Also Sister Hess turns 21 today!

Well this week was packed, Monday we had interviews, Tuesday we had p-day, Wednesday was my last Zone Training Meeting and it went super well, Thursday we blitzed with the Marquette sisters, Friday was my last Mission Leadership Council in Oshkosh, and Saturday we exchanged with the Spanish Sisters. I wish soo badly that I knew Spanish, but that's alright, I will learn someday soon. Literally when I went to the spanish area, I was useless, Sister Rasmussen taught all of the lessons all by herself and I just stood there or sat there until it was over and then I said Gracias, Audios! or Hasta Luego, that was a new one that I learned. :) It is funny though because even though I had no idea what anyone was saying and I almost fell asleep during one of the lessons, I still knew what was going on, I would catch words here and there and the tone of their voice tells a lot, and I could tell by what page of the pamphlet Sister Rasmussen was on and things like that. 

President Williams said that he is going to squeeze everything out of me that he can over these next few weeks, so that is great, that basically just means that he wants me to work really hard, and give it everything that I have. In my interview with him last week the first thing he says is "Sister Koyle!! You have three weeks left!!" and I was like almost in tears, like Oh really? Well thanks for telling me President, I had no idea, why don't you just twist the knife a little harder? 

Anyways, enough about that subject. In MLC someone said "God's work is not to fix situations, but to build people." And I was just thinking about that and how completely true that statement is. We know that His work and His glory is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. That means that we are here to learn and to grow and the only way that we can do that is through experiences, good and bad. We know that because of Jesus Christ that immortality is a gift given to all, everyone can overcome death and be resurrected because Christ broke the bands of death and that is what Easter is all about. We also know that we can have eternal life by living the gospel of Jesus Christ. President Williams often talks about how eternal life is not a matter of geography, but a matter of becoming, becoming like our Savior. There will be ministering angels in the Celestial Kingdom, but I don't want to be a ministering angel, I want to be able to reach my full potential, and receive all that the Father has in store for me. That means continuing to have faith in Jesus Christ, continuing to repent daily, or more, continuing to make covenants, and to keep and renew the ones that I have made through partaking of the sacrament weekly, and continuing to follow the spirit. I know that this is the way, that following Jesus Christ is the way, to true joy and happiness in this life and in the next. I hope that everyone has a fabulous Easter.

Love,

Sister Koyle

 Blitz's with Sister Wallace, one of the Marquette sisters

 Exchanges with Hermana Rasmussen, one of the Spanish sisters.

This is me in the Neville museum last week, living my dream mission in Africa :) It looks pretty legit doesn't it? 

​The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the way, and it is found in The Book of Mormon :)

We found this awesome street art, so we just had to take pictures with it.

And a miniature Lambeau field made from like 15 thousand legos

General Conference

So my mission president is extremely busy, so the only time he could do interviews with the Green Bay districts was yesterday, so therefore our P-day is today! Conference was great! my old mission president was called as an area 70 I believe. We were sitting in the chapel with a bunch of other missionaries, we all heard Raymond A. Cutler and we about flipped out! So that was pretty exciting. There were so many great talks though. I cannot choose a favorite, but I did really enjoy Neil L. Andersen's and how he talked about overcoming the world. And I really liked S. Mark Palmer's and how he talked about missionaries, it was really wonderful for Sister Hess and the zone leaders and I to hear his talk because we have been discussing what to talk to the missionaries about tomorrow for zone training meeting. I love how he said "What can we do to change the hearts of those missionaries who have not yet learned the joy of being obedient?" and then he talked about what Jesus did and how in Mark it says "Then Jesus beholding him loved him". So then the question changes to, What can I do to change so that the missionaries can feel Christlike love through me? How can I be more Christlike? I'll let myself answer that question :) 

This week has been pretty great, we have had some cool experiences, one morning for companion study we sang how great thou art, and then a few minutes later the old catholic lady from downstairs was knocking on our door. She said that we just sang her favorite song and that we sounded like angels, then she gave us chocolate and gave us an open invitation to come down and talk with her whenever we wanted, so that was a very sweet tender mercy. 

As of Friday, the new Easter video has officially been released! to watch this amazing video go to https://www.mormon.org  Then, share it with everyone you know :) Because believe it or not, not everyone knows what Easter is actually about! Seriously, just go knock on people's doors and ask them, and you will be surprised when people say they thought it was about chickens and bunnies. We are so blessed to have the knowledge that we have about our Savior, that we can be resurrected again because of him and that we can have eternal families, and return to live with Heavenly Father, and Jesus Christ for eternity. There is no greater blessing. I love this work, it is truly the Lord's work, and what a blessing it is to share the gospel with others. 

Love,

Sister Koyle

Exchanges with Sister Hendricksen 

 Fish Fry Friday

The new Easter cards! Jesus is watching . . . always watching :) 

​​One of my favorite general conference quotes

Sorry this is so long, at least you aren't the one who had to write it, you just get the joy of reading it :)

Well this week has been fantastic, My whole mission I always wanted to serve in the UP, I never got called up there, but this week I did get to go on exchanges there for one day and two nights, so that was great, basically all of my wildest dreams came true. We also met some super cool people up there in Marquette. This one girl was just walking down the street and we started talking to her and she was so awesome, and super open, she willingly gave us her address and set up a return appointment. Then we went our separate ways and Sister Jaeger goes "do you remember her name?" and I said "no, I'm soo bad at remembering names" and then Sister Jaeger goes, "I just realized we didn't get her phone number." At this time we had been knocking on a door, and the people weren't answering and I said, maybe she will come back, and sure enough we waited about 5 minutes and we saw her walking back down the street so this time we got her name and phone number. Talk about Second chances. 

Another time this week, Sister Hess and I were going to go tracting and we picked a street and then the first door that we knocked on opened right up and it was this girl about my age and she just let us right in, we didn't even have to ask, and we sat down and she said that other sisters had taught her before and that she has been reading the Book of Mormon, and she wants to come to church. So that was super cool, she wasn't able to come this week because it was her son's birthday, but she said she will be there next week and we have an appointment with her this week. 

Also a while ago we got a member referral for this sweet catholic lady who has two little girls, and we were able to teach her this week and invite her to church and she was so sweet, she said "Thank you for letting me come to your church" And then she actually came with her two girls and she made a lot of awesome comments in Sunday school and relief society. You never know what someone's reaction might be when you invite them to church. 

Also we were tracting this week and we met this beautiful lady, she was pretty stand off ish at first and she didn't want to hear our message but then we offered to say a prayer with her and she said sure and let us in and we asked what to pray for and she just let her heart open and told us about all of these crazy struggles that she and her boyfriend have had, they got in a bad motorcycle accident almost a year ago and he is still in the hospital and wasn't even supposed to live, but this week he was able to stand for 8 minutes on his own, so she asked us to pray for him and during the prayer she was just balling her eyes out, she has such strong faith, and she knows that she couldn't get through this without God, we ended up leaving her with a Book of Mormon and told her that she would find comfort as she reads it. 

Wow sorry this email is so long, it was just a super great week. Also can we talk about the women's broadcast? it was so good! I loved Carol F. McConkie's talk about being holy, it reminded me of a training that I had one time, many people try to stay above the world's standards, because at least they are "better" than the world, but the world is quickly going down hill, so if you are above the world you will inevitably eventually go down hill with them, and their lack of standards. But God's standard is high, it is always the same and unchanging, so we should always be striving to live according to God's standards, and progressively becoming better each day. As we do this we will become holy, we will stand out, we can forsake the world, we can be converted and receive all that the Father has. 

Love,

Sister Koyle

​The Green Bay zone. My last zone conference :(  Fun Fact, Apparently The Green Bay zone is the largest geographical zone in the United States :)  And Houghton (which is the tip of the U.P.)  is the farthest away from a temple in the United States. 

I went on exchanges with Sister Jaeger to Marquette Michigan! This is a picture of us by Lake Superior.  So I'm basically a pure Yooper don't ya know, eh? ;)  (A Yooper is what they call the people who live in the U.P. and they call the people in the lower part of Michigan "trolls" because they live under the 5 mile long bridge that connects upper Michigan and lower Michigan) Another fun fact, apparently The Upper Peninsula down to Wisconsin is the only place where the time change is north to south. 

​We found this tracting :)  No matter who is president, Jesus is King. :) 

​Also found this tracting :) 

​Here is a little bit better picture of Lake Superior, it looks just like Lake Michigan :)

Hali's Baptism

So Hali was supposed to get baptized last week, but things just didn't work out because there is a lot going on with her family moving and things like that, so we just kinda put it on the back burner for a bit. But on Tuesday we met with Hali and she said "I'm getting baptized in four days" and we said What!? you are? and we asked her parents and they said WHAT?! and then we all had a mutual agreement that Hali could get baptized in four days, so then she did and there were a ton of people there, and it turned out great and the next day her whole family came to church for all three hours. They looked so great all together. 

Anyways Sister Hansen left, which was unfortunate, but now Sister Hess is my companion, she was my STL for 6 weeks in Waukesha so we have gone on exchanges before. So most of the time it just feels like we are on exchanges and like we aren't actually companions, even though we are. Well not much else has happened. We just keep trying to find people to teach and bring members to our lessons. We have about three people who have so much potential, and they are super great, and they have come to church once, and they see the goodness of the gospel, but they just aren't fully committed, so that is really frustrating. But I am very glad that we do have people to teach, and that we are continually finding more and more. A YW gave three of her friends a Book of Mormon and then they asked her if they could come to church with her, so they did! And we asked if we could meet with them for a lesson and they said yes, but we couldn't set up a time yet because they didn't know their work schedules, but we are excited for them. 

I found this awesome scripture in 1 Peter 3:10 "For he that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile:"  There are definitely some treasures in the scriptures.

I hope that everyone has a spectacular day and week, I love you all! 

Sister Koyle

Said goodbye to this nerd! 

 So Hali got baptized on Saturday! that was pretty exciting. Also this is my new comp Sister Hess, she is great!

This is Hali's adorable family :)

and My last mission planner :(

I got to shake President Nelson's hand

So this week was wonderful, we had zone training meeting, which never ceases to amaze me, I think that it is a pure miracle when 30 young adults from ages 18-22 gather together and we have a very organized, very uplifting, and spiritual meeting all together for 3 hours, and discuss goals and how to reach them together as a zone and how we can be better missionaries. I have no idea where else you would see that happen, especially without any supervision of any sort, but it is because we are accountable to our mission president and to the Lord. Also this week we had an exchange with the Spanish sisters and we blitzed with the Marquette sisters, so that is always a great joy. 

On Friday night we drove down to Waukesha and we slept at the sisters apartment there, then Saturday morning we drove over to Madison, for our mission conference with President Nelson. The first thing that he said was good morning, you look beautiful and handsome, then he told us to thank our parents. So thank you Mom and Dad, for raising me in this gospel and for teaching me all that I need to do, and for supporting me on a mission, and for always loving me, and for loving each other, and especially for loving the Lord. Then President Nelson said, "I know we aren't supposed to talk about marriage while you are on your missions, but I'm going to talk about marriage while you are on your mission. Your mission is very temporary, marriage is forever. You sisters when your prince charming is down on his knee and asks you to marry him, say wait a minute, and then ask yourself, does he love the Lord more than he loves me? and if the answer is yes, if he loves to serve the Lord and to keep the Lord's commandments, then his capacity to love you will be infinitely greater." (this isn't a direct quote, but it is pretty close) He also talked about how repentance and conversion are synonyms and how repentance means change and if we aren't always changing for the better then we aren't fully converted to the Lord. We got to ask him some questions and one of them was how do you prepare for a conference talk? and his response was "on an airplane!" for this upcoming conference he is on draft 14, and he says it isn't good enough yet. Oh yeah he also showed us the new Easter video, which is really great, it almost brought me to tears. It was so cool to be in his presence, I thought that it would feel like I was basking in all of his glory, but it didn't, it felt like he was one of us, it felt like I already knew him before, he is so humble, and loving and kind, and not to mention very spry, he seems way younger than he is, he is 92, but he gets around like he is a healthy 70 year old. 

It has been a wonderful week, and now this coming week transfers are here and I am killing my companion, Sister Hansen, she flies into Salt Lake this Thursday. Green Bay will miss her greatly, and so will I. My new companion will be Sister Hess, who used to be my STL in Milwaukee North! I wish you all a fantastic week. 

Love,

Sister Koyle

P.S. thanks again for everyone that sent me Birthday wishes! they are much appreciated! 

P.P.S. We were tracting and it was cold and this guy said "either go get in your car, or come in and have a beer!" so we did neither and kept on tracting :) hahha gotta love Wisconsin. 

Bowling last week! (on my birthday)

 matching, yes we most definitely planned this

My cute companion! She is free on Thursday after 2 if anyone needs a date. 😉 

Blitzes with Sister Wallace 

​Robin, thanks for the Swedish Fish!!! Sister Hansen is actually a Swedish Fish because she is half Swedish and she has red hair.

Hey, It's my Birthday!

...ergo, I'm not going to write an email today because I don't feel like it :) my week has been great, but the coming week will be even better. Stay tuned next week to see how meeting President Nelson goes for us this Saturday. #BESTBIRTHDAYPRESENTEVER

Also, I would like to thank everyone who so lovingly wished me a happy birthday, I really appreciate it! 

Here is a video of a bald eagle at the zoo :) 

Also here is a video of me feeding a giraffe at the zoo last week. 

 Exchanges with Sister Hendricksen in Manitowoc.

 Some of the sisters at MLC, this is actually all of Sister Naughton's companions, besides the two that have finished their missions.

Last district meeting of the transfer.

Elder Xiong, Elder Bauer, Sister Hansen, me, Elder Dold, and Elder Williams