Sister Syd: Canada Week 68: Let go of expectation and have a Happy New Year!

Hello my friends and family on the last Monday of 2020! HOW INSANE IS THAT?! Hopefully somewhere among the crazy and different you all had a good Christmas celebration and are looking forward to the new year! Our week was full of adventure and laughter - God for sure has a sense of humor. We are so grateful to be spreading peace and love this time of year and always!

Our week began with some fun member lessons centered on focusing on Christ for Christmas. It has been so wonderful bringing an even greater focus on Him during this holiday season. Due to Covid, most people have had a much quieter time this year than usual. I think it has given each of us more time to think and reflect on our Savior and all that He is, and all that He does for us. Our member's testimonies are amazing, and I am so grateful to be here teaching them and getting to know them. As for God's sense of humor - this is because we have been given lasagna for supper almost everyday for the past 2 weeks. This also happened last year - I just take it as a sign from Him to make me laugh during the hard times. This week we served others with some 6 foot greetings as we dropped off Christmas gifts to some cute, older single ladies, some single moms, and one of a recent convert who is alone. It was so fun to bring a smile to their faces even if it was just for a moment. They are all wonderful!

On Christmas Eve and Christmas Day our awesome Mission President and wife put together a couple fun Zoom get togethers for all the missionaries. Christmas Eve we watched part of a movie revolving around Christmas during World War One. It gave me a new perspective as to how our Christmas looked a little this year. We also learned more about Mary and Joseph as we watched some cool clips that shed light upon each of them and on the culture during that time. They also gave me a stronger focus to their faith in the whole plan God had laid out for them. This really strengthened my testimony in the details of Christ's birth. Christmas day was good - different - but still good! We had a mission Zoom party for a few hours. We watched "It's a Wonderful Life," interacted with each other and focused on Christ. That evening Sister Crowe and I went and walked around a path lit up with beautiful lights!

My thoughts this week revolved a lot around expectation. This has always been a struggle for me. I question what things are "supposed to" look like, feel like, be like, sound like, etc...the list could go on and on. Sometimes I find that it can be hard to just let it be, to just live in the moment with a heart full of trust. To believe things will all work out, that things will be how God needs them to be as we do our best and trust in Him. This has been a story in 2020. We all had ideas and goals and expectations of what the year was supposed to be, and pretty sure not one of us expected a worldwide pandemic to join the party, but it did. Somehow we all have learned how to live life in new and different ways. Was everyday beautiful? Probably not, but hopefully we were able to find some reasons to smile! Most, if not all, of life is a choice. We all have the choice of what we do each day, what path to take, what to make of ourselves, our attitude toward different situations and dealing with the unexpected things placed on our paths. I testify that attitude and mindset make a huge difference in our lives. We can't fill our minds with everything that isn't happening, or of things that we can't do, or what we aren't becoming. I'm guilty of this way too often. Satan thrives off of this stuff and we can't give him power. We need to learn to flip it and choose optimism. We need to choose to see what we can STILL do, even if it is different. We must Choose Christ. Christ makes everything possible. Christ gives us hope. Christ gives us light. Christ gives us the opportunity to choose optimism and to choose joy. I am well known for thinking way too much about every finite detail of everyday. It is so easy to get wrapped up in expectations. I have also learned about the thief that comparison within expectation can be. It is a learning process every day in how to trust more in God - to trust Him to take the reigns, to just let things be, to learn as we go, and to just do our best and recognize that this truly is enough!

The year 2020 taught me many things. I could write pages. What have you learned? I simply want to state that 2020 was the year that I truly learned the value of Jesus Christ as my Savior, exemplar, friend and brother. It was a year that I truly, without a doubt, felt eternally encircled the arms of my Heavenly Father's love. It was the one and only entire year that I had one true focus every day as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It was a year I loved God's children and felt the immense love God has His children, through me. It was also a year full of distraction, distress, heartache, struggle and darkness - but everyday can't be roses and rainbows. If we didn't have the bad days how would we appreciate the good days? This past year I became more deeply converted to my Savior Jesus Christ, and because of this, I was given strength - through Him - to pick myself up each and everyday.

I know that my Savior lives. I know that He loves me. I know that He loves you. I know that His love is incomprehensible, but that we have the amazing ability to feel it. We are each of great value so don't ever give up. Just keep trying and keep going. I promise the good that comes from God will outweigh the hardship at one point or another. I am so grateful for Jesus Christ. He truly is my Savior.

I love and miss you all! HAPPY NEW YEAR! I hope the new year brings more peace and joy than turmoil to you all!

Love, Sister Merrill