Purple Flowers

As some of you know I love the color Purple. You have never seen purple beauty in nature till you come to Finland. Its unreal how amaziing it is. The colors in Finland that you see the most are vibrant green and deep, rich purple all over the place in many different shapes and forms in flowers. Its breath taking, eli hengensalpava!

This week was our zone conference with our Mission President, Pres. Rawlings. It was bittersweet. I have learned so much from him, and come to understand better the healing and enabling power of the Holy ghost through him. The whole mission and I are very excited to welcome our new mission president at the end of the month but goodbyes are always hard to say. The theme of this zone conference was involving the Lord more. How we are working so hard to do His work, but forgetting the small things like always asking the Lord for guidance and help to Who specifically, and What they need at the moment that will help them understand how much this gospel will mean and help in their lives. Because of this, I have been working so hard to constantly have a prayer in my heart, to being constantly lead, and recieving more courage to do bold things. It has made me realize the small blessing, because I am searching for them more. 

President said that it is when we mess up that we normally have gotten distracted and stopped praying, when we get on the bus and if we arent praying for courage and discernment to know who is ready, we might end up sitting by ourselves, or by someone who isn't ready at this moment. Thats when we let discouragement set in. It is so true, I ask for courage, but sometimes stop praying for it, because I assume it is a one time gift I will recieve. The courage come as the prayers continue, the extra love comes as we plead for it. Its not a one prayer, reiceve the courage/love package. It comes when we contiually ask for it and qualify for it. 

We went on splits the next day, I was finally able to get out of my tampere side that I have been in for 10 months....ya Im getting old! We were doing our studies and had planned to just do language and eat and then go out, but in the back of my mind I had a thought that we should go out now for a little and pray to find the one. So we left on that prompting, walked around for a good 30 minutes not finding anyone who had time or wanted to talk, but as we are about to turn back home to get food, I see this cute Mom holding her adorable son. We stopped and talked with them and were able to apply the gospel in a way that we set up a return appointment to come back next week and talk about the movie we had given her, Finding Happiness. It was way cool, because if we had stayed in to eat, we would have missed her and the opportunity to give her this inspiring message. 

At church the second counselor from Sweden, gave a talk and I just loved it. It was about the Karate Kid, how after practicing wiping the floors, painting the fence, fixing the cars, Daniel-san got frustrated thinking that he was there to learn how to fight. Finally as he is about to quit, because he cant see how this is helping him become a karate master. Then Master Miagi, showes him that the waxing on and off of the floor was helping him fight and combat the hits Miagi, threw at him, and the painting the fencing had helped him learn how to block, and so forth. Sometimes in life we are waiting for the traing to become a fighter, or a karate genius, and get frustrated that the Lord gives us challenges that seem to be stopping us from becoming the person we want to become. Little do we understand how the Lord is actually preparing us even better than we could to become the people the characters that we truly have always wanted to be. It about seeing the big picture and trusting that the Lord knows best for us. Instead of just enduring the hard times, learning to love them because we know how strong we will become at the end. 

There is this couple from church that have such an amazing story that I just found out, that has inspired me. They seem like your normal happy young mormon couple with an adorable baby girl. I just learned that both were barely members and hated coming to church and were drinking and smoking and doing all that stuff. One day they met eachother, neither knowing that the other was actually a member of the church. Sis. H said that if she ahd known veli. H was a member she would have never started dating him. But they started dating and slowly found out that both were members. As time went on, they realized they wanted to get married in the temple to be sealed for time and eternity, they wanted the happiness from the gospel. So they both worked hard to get worthy, Sis. H sent veli. H on a mission, and when he came back they were sealed together in the Beautiful temple, and now they have the strongest testimonies of this gospel, and are a eternal family. This gospel is the key for deep abiding joy and security. Their story touched me deeply. 

I love you all and hope you have a great week! Next week is Juhannus, the longest day in the year! so excited, the sun never sets!! 

Rakkaudellani,

Sisar Hubner

P.S. On splits a drunk man came up to us and invited us over to his place, when I said sorry we dont have time he slapped me on the bum! It was the weirest thing, good thiing I am tall and he mostly got just my legs! Man, drunk people these days!

Another funny story, there is a member from our ward that was wearing a leather vest, and I tried to ask him if it was leather (naka) but I ended up askin him if it was naki (sausage). Are you wearing a sausage vest? hahah this language still trips me up sometimes!