Mary's mission letter Aug 27, 2012

Hello Family!

That is so exciting for Brian and Becky!  What a neat opportunity! And
a blessing for them!  It sounds like the kids are all geared up!
School starts next week here, so everywhere we walk there are
backpacks hanging and stand with notebooks, pens, pencils, etc.  It's
so funny the difference though-because I know in there, if you walked
into a store, it would be evident that school is starting, but here,
just walking down the street it's evident-I love our little outdoor
markets!  What a neat opportunity for Josh, to be able to serve as
counselor in the Elder's Quorom-that is fantastic-and he'll do great!
I'm glad that Dad is healing up nicely-is he starting to get feeling
back in his fingers then or can he not tell because of the pain?

I know last week I said Anik was getting baptized-and she still
is-however, we changed it almost right after I wrote you last week-the
branch had some things going on this week and so did Anik-so we
decided, along with Anik, that this Saturday would work better.  So
she'll be baptized this Saturday.  We are SO excited for her! She is
so ready! She met with Pres. Carter last week and said a prayer with
all of us-he is so funny and told her that she already prays like a
Mormon.  We all just laughed, but she didn't really get it.  It's kind
of weird, because they always show things on the TV about "The
Mormons"-it's always stuff that's not good and not true-so people get
pretty freaked when they see the Book of Mormon or when they recognize
us as Mormons.  In general there are 3 categories of people-the people
who don't know anything about us, and haven't even heard anything on
the TV (Anik...), the people who have heard about us-good and bad-and
don't really care either way, and the people who believe what they
hear from the TV and think we are the most terrible people.  It's
always interesting, because we can usually tell when something new has
been shown on the TV, because people tend to be more stiff towards us.
 I am so grateful that no matter what everyone else says-I know this
really is the Lord's church, that we are doing His work, and that He
has prepared people to listen to and accept this gospel.  I am
continually amazed at how the Lord pours out His blessings on us!

I studied a bit about repentance this last week and have thought a lot
about receiving forgiveness.  I'm not sure I've ever understood or
felt so strongly the power of forgiveness that I felt this last week.
Wow. I know now, more than ever, that Jesus Christ truly is our
Savior; my Savior. That He really did suffer for US-but if we really
want to taste of all that He offers us, we too have to do our part.
And as we sincerely repent, with a broken heart and contrite spirit,
then He cleanses us and we are filled with the peace and joy that only
He can give us.
Anik and her granddaughter came to church again yesterday and we are
working with her family, we want them to feel all she has felt and
experienced. We also have a new family we are teaching from a little
city about 20 minutes from here-Giannae and her 2 kids.  They are so
great!  They came to church together yesterday and seemed to really
enjoy it.  Giannae she is filled with so much faith and has already
immersed herself in reading the Book of Mormon. We're excited to see
them grow in the gospel.

With Anik's baptism so close, I've thought a lot about our baptismal
covenants and how every Sunday we have the opportunity to partake of
the sacrament, renew our covenants, and be cleansed again.  Wow! It's
like baptism every week, so long as we have properly prepared for it.
Will you all read D&C 20:37 and see if you too qualify for baptism?  I
heard once that if every week we qualify for baptism, we can be sure
that the promise of a remission of sins and always having the Spirit
with us, will be ours.  The Lord is so merciful and good to us!


I hope you all have a great week!  I love you!  Good luck as school
starts! I hope good routines start and are formed quickly!

I love you all!  Hugs all around!

Metz sirov,

Sis. Broadbent

Mary's Mission Letter Aug 20, 2012

Barev Family!  It sounds like your week was good-especially your
weekend. I can't believe that the Haslam boy is home already!! It
seems like he just left!  I was surprised to hear how short Dad's
surgery was-and I'm glad everything is going well.  Is his foot also
healing well?  I always love stake conference-and it sounds like it
was another great one! Sounds like some great speakers-Chad, Callee,
Pres. Christiansen-I think I could always happily listen to them! And
I'm excited to hear that Callee's mission papers are starting to
progress again-I've gotton a couple of letters from her and it sounds
like things are going well, despite that it's hard.  I wrote her back,
but I don't know when she'll get it.  Brian and Becky are adopting? As
in Brian Preece? I had no idea! That is so great! Congrats to them!
I have a few things I've gotten for you all for Christmas-ornaments
and a couple other things, but I haven't decided whether or not I
trust the mail service enough to send them-I'll let you know what I
decide, but if I decide not to send it-would you all be ok waiting
another year for it all?
What a week! And what a week we have ahead of us!  Anik came to church
yesterday and it was so great!  I feel like she is already feeling
apart of the branch and is comfortable there! She also brought her
little granddaughter and she had a great time!  She passed her
interview with our district leader for her baptism!!!! YAY!!! She has
to meet with President Carter because she's had a few abortions-it's
so sad, because abortions are a regular part of the culture here and
nearly every woman has had at least one, if not many.  I'm so grateful
for the knowledge of the gospel-that we've been given the opportunity
to repent and that we truly know and value that we are children of our
Heavenly Father. We talked to her after her baptismal interview and
she told us how good and warm she felt and how happy.  I am so excited
for her!  Yesterday as I was sitting in church I just felt so
overwhelmed with joy and peace as I thought about the progress that
she has made and the immense love I feel for her and her family.  I
feel so blessed to have helped teach her! It truly is remarkable!  We
are so blessed!
We also had a less active family come to church for the first time in
6 or 7 years! We were THRILLED to see them there-especially because
we've been working with them for the last few months.  It was so neat
to see the joy that was evident in their faces at being back to
church.  The mom just began crying as she was greeted by many of our
members.  I was reminded how everyone has a place in the fold of the
gospel and how precious each and every person is to our Heavenly
Father.  We had a good Sunday, to say the least.  I was just smiling
and felt like crying at the joy I felt!  This gospel really is
amazing!
Some of our members also had the opportunity this last week to get
their partriarchal blessing.  The Patriarch lives in Russia, so he is
only here every so often.  The members that received it were just
beaming!  What a neat opportunity!  And how neat for those of us who
already have received our blessings, that we can continually read,
ponder, and experience those feelings of comfort time and time again.
Have you read your blessing lately?
I read Pres. Eyring's talk from this last conference and there were
just a couple of things I want to share.  He talks about building our
foundation on Christ because that is truly where we find our strength.
 He says, "If the foundation of faith is not embedded in our hearts,
the power to endure will crumble."  He then talks about how
consistently choosing right creates solid ground.  It's back to that
diligence thing-if we pray daily, study daily, weekly attend church,
komats komats we grow-we are strengthend and we become more like our
Savior.  "It is serving God and others persistently with full heart
and soul that turns testimony of truth into unbreakable spiritual
strength." "If we have faith in Jesus Christ, the hardest as well as
the easiest times in life can be a blessing."  I was just thinking how
yes, life is a challenge, but how if we are built on Christ, we will
all be just fine-and we will find those learning opportunities and
blessings everywhere.  We really are so blessed!
I know, without a doubt The Book of Mormon is true. The Holy Ghost has
testified to me many times, and I have felt the power of that book.
This is Christ's church-we truly have the fullness of His gospel.  He
is our Savior and through Him all things are possible.
I love you all!  I hope you have a great week and that all goes well!
You are constantly in my prayers!

Alma 38:10-14

Love you!
Metz sirov,
Sis. Broadbent

Mary's Mission Letter for Aug 13, 2012

Here is Mary's letter for the week!

Just as a side note - she is referring to Doug having Carpel Tunnel surgery today (everything has gone well so far - if I can just get him to lie down and relax!) and that he also tripped last week at scout camp and pulled the ligament on the bottom of his right foot, so he gets to also wear a boot for the next few weeks!!  We decided that he is truly falling apart!!

Hope you all have a great week!!

Laurie

Barev Family!
I hope Dad's surgery goes ok! Dad-you need to be more careful,
especially because we all love you so much! I am constantly grateful
for the priesthood power that we have because of the gospel-how
wonderful that Josh was able to give you a blessing!  I can't believe
that the Brigham temple is almost in operation-I remember it was close, I
guess I just forgot that it would be dedicated this year!

What a blessing to have another temple so close-no matter how small!
There is truly so much power in the temple-and after feeling how the
members here crave to go to the temple-I think I will be forever
grateful that we are blessed with so many so close to us!  Even within
a 12 hour drive there are so many! Where as it's a 3 day drive from
here.  We are definitely blessed.   Sometimes I think that because
we've always had one so close that people forget how there are
thousands of people who would die to only be an hour away from a
temple!

We received some new direction from Pres. Carter this week-in the last
couple of months there have been a couple of new cities opened-one
here and one in Georgia-he gave the Elders the direction to go about
doing good, making friends, and making a good name for the church-and
to really serve the people.  After seeing what an impact it had on the
people and on our Elders-he felt to extend the same invitation to
us-so we have been trying to go about doing good-looking for more
opportunities to serve and not being as concerned with numbers.  Sis.
Tolman and I really want these people here in Artashat to know that we
really are servants of Christ and we want them to see the light that
is in us and feel the love we have for them.  We've already made more
friends and I just feel so good about it.  After all-we really are
Christ's servants, so why not do the things He would do.  We had a fun
experience-we were walking back from an appointment, we had passed a
couple of men cutting wood for the winter, offered to help-they just
laughed and said it was work for men and not for American women (we
had to laugh at that).  About 5 minutes later, we came to another
family that were splitting wood and hauling it into their
backyard-despite that it is probably extremely shameful to help with
such work, and despite that we had already been rejected once-we
offered to help-and they let us!  We helped load up wood for about an
hour and just got to know this family.  It was way neat-to literally
serve these people.  Sis. Tolman and I were just laughing through it
all, because all of the surrounding neighbors, from several houses
down the road, were sitting outside watching us.  There was this
gathering of people just staring.  But it was so great!  I feel like
if nothing else, all those people know that we want to serve them-even
if we are from America, are girls, and are wearing skirts-we want to
serve them.  I feel like we are truly becoming the Lord's hands and I
feel so blessed to be apart of this work-to have a mission president
who is inspired and receives revelation to help this work go forward.
With that-I was thinking about the scripture D&C 88:40-it talks about
light cleaving to light and virtue cleaving to virtue.  As
missionaries we are always praying that we will be led to those who
are prepared and that they too will be led to us.  I feel like as we
become more like the Savior-as we become His hands and as others see
the good in us-as they see Christ's light in us-then this scripture
will be fulfilled-as those that heed the feelings that come because of
the light of Christ that is in them-then we will be led to each other.
 That they'll see us and our light and will want to know why we have
the light we have-they will want the light we have in their lives.  I
was just remembering one of the things that Sis. Webb said when we
were preparing to sing in conference-how she said that any time we are
in a room we either add to it or detract from it.  Will you all try to
be more aware of the light that is in you and will you make an effort
to add to where you are and not detract?  I truly know this is the
Lord's work-that He wants to use us as His tools, but we too must do
our part.  He is so aware of each of us and wants us to be happy!

We sent Arminae off on Friday-she is going to be such a great little
missionary!  I'll send pictures when I get a chance.  And I'll start
putting a list together for Christmas.

I love you all!  I hope the week goes well!  Love you!

Metz sirov,

Sis Broadbent

Mary's Mission Aug 6, 2012

Barev marev family!
I'm so grateful that everything is going well and that last week was a
mistake and not that something had happened.  I can't believe that
school starts so soon!  Sis. Tolman and I were just talking this
morning about how when we think of August we always think of school
starting.  It's even harder to believe that Beth and Joe and getting
so big! 9th and 6th grade! Wow!  

  Anik is the older woman in the picture-Mary,
the younger one, is her daughter in law, she always partcipates, but
because of the baby she doesn't come to church, so we're focusing on
Anik right now.
This week has been a crazy week! But so good!  Last Tuesday we
received a mini missionary-Arminae-she's a member from Charanzlavan
(?).  She is adorible and is getting ready to serve her mission in
England-so this is kind of a last practice before she goes.  Pres.
Carter wants to make sure she is really ready, because sometimes the
missionaries from Armenia really struggle as missionaries.  Before
anyone in Armenia can even submit mission papers they have to serve a
mini mission, to kind of get a feel for what it will be like, and I
guess to prove that they are serious about going on a mission and can
really handle it.  She leaves in less than a month, so Pres. Carter
also gave us the task of helping her buy everything for her mission.
We spent a whole day last week and will have another full day this
week of just shopping.  Despite my "love of shopping" we had a pretty
great time-I'll be grateful when we finish this week!   Arminae is so
cute-she is SO little!  So short and just petite!  I'll try to send
pictures next week. She has such a gentle nature and it's so neat to
see her interact with everyone-she loves her people so much!  I feel
like I'm learning so much from her-about the language, the culture,
and interacting with people.
Anik came to church this week! We were SO happy! We decided she needed
to come on her own, instead of us arranging to pick her up and going
with her. She wasn't there when church started and we were so
disappointed, but she ended up coming a few minutes late and she
really enjoyed the day! We couldn't stop smiling when we saw her!  I
feel like it was a pretty big step for her and I was just SO happy!
We really do find our joy in the work and in bringing others to
Christ!
We had the best Branch Activity this week-we went up to this little
place in the mountains about 20 minutes away-it was shady and
beautiful!  It was kind of a resort thing-and I felt like it would be
something we would have in America-it was GORGEOUS! And so nice to
sit, rest, and play with our members.  It was fun to get to know them
all more.  We had the most delicious BBQ-it's funny how cooking
everything in nature gives it such a great flavor-it kind of reminded
me of shik-ka-bobbing-because they put potatoes, onions, and meat on
skewer things, but they are way bigger than ours.  I'll send pictures.
We had the most amazing experience with a member of our branch-Virab-I
think I've told you a little about him already.  His health hasn't
been very good lately and when we went to visit last week, it was
really bad.  He is always struggling to breathe and it's just not
good.  Anyway-we decided to talk about D&C 25:12 and about how singing
is really like praying and is the perfect way to express feelings, as
well as to invite the spirit.  We sang "I Need Thee Every Hour" to
him.  As soon as we started singing, Virab joined in, with his raspy
voice, but he was singing with as much gusto as he could muster.  By
the time we got to the first chorus, Sis. Tolman and I were both
crying-the spirit was just so strong!  And I love him so much!  It was
such an amazing and spiritual experience!  I can't describe to you how
it felt, but just writing about it makes me want to cry again.
Other than that, this week I've been thinking about the temple-I feel
so blessed to have been able to go as often as I was able to, and I
miss the temple so much!  I hope you are all taking advantage of
having a temple as close as you do!  Especially because I know how you
all understand the importance of the temple.  Here's a little thought
from Sis. Silvia Allred "Temple covenants and ordinances are powerful
symbols of Christ and His Atonement.  We all received the same
instruction, but our understanding of the meaning of the ordinances
and covenatns will increase as we return to the temple often with the
attitude of learning and contemplating the eternal truths taught."
Will you all find a time with in the next couple of weeks where you
can go to the temple and just relish in the spirit that is found in
the temple?  Will you think more of the covenants you've made?  After
all "Temples are a source of spiritual power and strength...a place of
revelation...the House of the Lord"

I love you all!  I hope this week goes well-that you enjoy
it-especially as school is getting ready to start.

Metz sirov,

Sis. Broadbent