Baptism and Jolly Rancher

3/12/17

 We had a baptism this last week! 王俊賢 Wang Jun Xian is so cool! he told us yesterday that his girlfriend in mainland China agreed to get married in the Salt Lake Temple. Granted, she isn't baptized yet and even after that they have to wait a year, but it is so cool that he has already set his sights on the temple and to have an eternal family. The back of his phone case has a picture of Christ, his phone background is the Salt Lake Temple, he didn't answer his phone on Sunday because he turns off his phone for the Sabbath, and he always talks about the difference in his life since meeting us missionaries. So awesome!

     Last week I was able to go on two companionship exchanges with different Elders in the zone. I love being able to go on so many exchanges in a transfer, because I get to learn from every Elder I go with. Each missionary receives their own insights and revelation, teaches in their own unique way, and comes from a completely different background. There is a lot to learn from the people you surround yourself with, and I know of no better place to find good people to surround yourself with than in the church.

     Kind of had a funny story during sacrament meeting yesterday. As I have shared before, lately I have been bringing little snacks or things to help me stay awake during sacrament meeting and so yesterday I brought this jolly rancher I had found in our apartment. Unfortunately, the humidity in Taiwan is so high that pretty much any hard candy will go gooey after just a day or so. I forgot about that until I took it out of my pocket and tried to unwrap it. Well, there I was, sucking on a jolly rancher and quite awake learning a lot from sacrament meeting, but with a big problem--my hands were sticky!! We all know how many hands missionaries shake right after sacrament meeting, so I was in a predicament. Sucking on my fingers didn't help, so I was done for. I remember thinking to myself, "Sorry, Heavenly Father. I probably should have brought something else. What can I do to clean my hands?" A few minutes later, completely out of the blue, Wang Jun Xian pulled out some wet-wipes to clean off his hands. I asked for one, and boom! Clean!

     I think this funny little experience taught me two awesome lessons. The first is prayer. Recently I have been trying to keep a prayer in my heart (i.e. praying while biking, asking for help during lessons, giving thanks for tender mercies), and it is truly incredible how many of those prayers get answered. We don't have to reach out in a Rameumptom prayer to access God's help and love--a simple heartfelt prayer works just fine.

     The second is forgiveness. Ironic that the 'jolly-rancher incident' was during sacrament meeting (where we take the sacrament and are forgiven). Like eating a sticky jolly rancher, we often make mistakes in life. While we do our best to cover them (licking my hands), there truly is no other way to be forgiven than to repent and ask God in prayer for His mercy, and for His empowering love. When we do, when we make that change and turn back to face towards Him, He is there every step of the way. He offers us the way. How grateful I am for that opportunity to repent daily of my many sins and weaknesses, big and small, and become one with His will. I love you guys and hope you have a great week!

Next to me in the gray suit is Wang Jun Xian (this is at his baptism). Two in front of me wearing the black suit on the first row is a guy named Bobby, who is absolutely hilarious. He speaks English pretty well, and pulls these random English idioms out all the time. I taught him supercalifragilisticexpialadocious this last week and he has been using it all the time now. He is so stinking funny, and gives us these cards all the time (I will send you a picture of his cards when I get my camera charged). Sorry, I have a little bit of extra time but I'm not sure what to say about last week. This next week has the Mission Conference with Elder Funk of the 70 and interviews with President Jergensen, so it should be pretty exciting!! I have a huge tasklist a mile long with a ton of different goals I have and stuff I'm working on.... I should take a picture of a bunch of little stuff like that to show you guys.... Hey, Elder Facer had a really good suggestion last week. I know we probably don't have to sign up for classes at BYU yet, but the suggestion was to sign up for a ton of classes with your brother or sister because then if one of you has to miss the class or something like that you can just bother each other for help and apparently it is really useful and super fun! I would love to take a bunch of classes with Sarah!!

Letter to Mission President

3/5/17

Weekly letter to the Mission President:

We had a pretty crazy week at church, and had three different individuals just walk in before church. One older man was a little crazy and just got up and left in the middle of the sacrament prayer, but another one was invited by his co-worker to just come and check out our church sometime so he did in the morning, not realizing our church wasn't until the afternoon. While studying on the front steps of the church garnered a few weird glances from members walking by, I don't think we would have met those other three people. This last week I was on exchanges with Elder Garlick and Elder Jorgensen. Elder Garlick is doing awesome work, and I admire his love for others and diligence in finding. The only thing Elder Facer and I are working on with their companionship is helping Elder Chiu have more opportunities to take the lead of the area. Elder Jorgensen and Joly are doing good too, they just feel like they could use a few more solid investigators. I talked with Elder Jorgensen for a while about it and helped him realize that if they are obedient, working hard, and trying new things, the rest might just be patience. They have a lot of energy, so I think they will do great. One big take-home I had from Mission Leadership Council was about the key indicators. I sort of realized that they weren't measuring our efforts and success so much as the progress of our investigators, and that makes a big difference. Now when I see red I don't think "I'm a bad missionary", but "Oh no! My investigators aren't progressing! What can I do to help them??" There are a few companionships in our zone that I think would really benefit from that insight, so I will share it with them this next week. Thanks for an awesome MLC President, we're excited for the Mission Tour next week!

Friend asking about the biggest lesson learned on my mission that I want to apply throughout my life:

I feel like at the beginning of my mission I worried a lot about all the little things. I wanted to do all the little things right like a good missionary and didn't know how to be like those awesome missionaries. It was a big list of little things to do better. I often wondered why my mission president was so awesome and smart and knew all the answers to the thousands of questions we ask him about missionary work. Then, it sort of hit me. When we understand our purpose as missionaries, we don't need to be taught the little things. They come automatically. There is a scripture and I forget where, but if we keep our covenants we don't have to be commanded in every thing. When we understand our covenants and purpose as missionaries or even as children of God, the rest makes sense. We are guided by that knowledge. I don't know, that was a big lesson I learned on my mission, and I feel like my mission has taught me so much about this higher law that shoots down roots that become the everyday thoughts and actions in our lives. That's what I want to apply throughout my life. I want to constantly learn and be taught about this higher law of heaven.

Prayer and Bob

3/5/17

 Great week here in "Dirt City" (土城) last week! We have a baptism this Saturday! His name is Wang Jun Xian 王俊賢 (King Handsome Virtuous)! He was originally going to get baptized last Saturday, but then we figured out he had been drinking tea so we switched it to this week. Pictures to come if I can find my camera's battery charger.........

     Really great week with an investigator named Bob Xie 謝長恩. He is 15, and we met him at English class after he had come for a few weeks. We started sharing the gospel with him, and he is pretty interested. His other interests include watching horror films and drawing bleeding people (he loves the movie Chucky and wants to be a blood makeup artist for a living). This week we were able to set up and meet with him at his house (very rare thing in Taiwan), and we got to meet his Mom as well! His Mom expressed to us that their relationship lately has been really bad, because he is really lazy and so she is always yelling at him to get his stuff done. I am so excited to be meeting with them, because that is just what the gospel is for! The gospel heals and strengthens families, and I know as she sees the change in her son after we keep sharing with him, she will want that change for herself and the rest of her family as well. So exciting!

   The lessons yesterday in church were mostly focused on prayer, and I learned a lot of really cool things as I finally made it through a Sunday without falling asleep! One cool principle I learned as I read through the Gospel Principles manual was that our thoughts, words, and actions are all affected by our prayers. I don't know why, but I thought that that was really interesting. Communication with our Father in Heaven really can affect every aspect of our lives--so good prayers will help you be a better person in everything you do, and bad prayers won't. How awesome is that?! Love you guys! Have a great week!

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HAPPPYY BIRTHDAAYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was going to send out your package last week, but it just so happened to be the Taiwanese version of Memorial Day (二月二十八日) so the post office was closed!! I was so disappointed!! It's on it's way now though, so hopefully you will get it soon and then you can have another birthday celebration!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! LOVE YOU DAD!!!

Bitter cold. Warming up this next week. We get extremely detailed weather reports every night from one of Elder Facer's recent converts in another area. Taiwan is doing great. About all the news channels can muster is Donald Trump, so that's pretty much what's happening in Taiwan. Their biggest news isn't theirs....

I'll just share with you family a few other things I wrote to other people, you can read them if you want. I figure if you guys are desperate for stuff about my mission I might as well give you everything I write on Preparation Days....

In response to the hardest part of my mission and what to do to prepare:

Hardest part of my mission... Well I can share two that have been really hard. The first is that the decisions others make affect your everyday life as a missionary. In high school, it seems like you have a ton of homework and other things to be busy about, but at least it is all more or less up to you whether you do it. On a mission, every single little thing you do has to be consistent with the expectations of your companion, your mission leaders, and your mission president--something I found extremely hard at the beginning of my mission. In other words, a companion says, "I want to go knocking instead of street contacting." The very last thing you want to do is knocking, but you have to go do it because your companion wants to. Other people make decisions, and you have to adjust even if you don't agree. The second was the culture of Taiwan, but unless you go to Taiwan you shouldn't experience this issue. The problem is that they have been without the gospel for over 4 or 5,000 years, so preaching the gospel with them you first have to overcome 5,000 years of culture. It's a good thing we have the Spirit or it would be impossible. I think the best things you can do to prepare are to read Preach My Gospel (chapters 1, 3, 4, 5, and 6, the rest you can always learn later) and really ponder the Doctrine of Christ (faith in Christ and His atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end)