Monday, October 14, 2013

This way to the Tree of Life!




Hello family that I love!

Well, this was a good week! It felt weird, a lot of things fell through and a lot of interesting problems came up with some of our people, but it was good overall.

I'm just going to go in order of what happened this week.

Monday was a really weird P-day because we ended up helping Sister Wright with a big luncheon she was doing for her 3rd graders at her school. It ended up being a lot more involved than we expected so we were there for quite awhile. But it was good to help her. She was stressed and has been really sick. Those little Thai kids are just sooooo cute! And soooo excited to speak with us falangs!

Also, on Monday, Bia called us to tell us that she had several orders coming in and would be too busy with work to meet for the whole week! She's been keeping commitments, praying, reading her scriptures, etc... and she gets blessed with more work, but those blessings distract her from meeting with us and keeping her commitments. So, we stopped in to visit with her a few times, but she never could actually sit down and have a lesson.  President Senior suggested that we teach "Keep the Sabbath Day Holy" and share a scripture from Matthew with her. We were excited to do that, but she can't meet. So, we're hoping when we drop by tonight she'll let us teach. She's so close to baptism but just gets distracted so easily. It's kind of been a pattern. But, I really think she'll get baptized, it's just probably not going to be when I'm here (unless I stay!). 

A week or so ago we were talking with a pharmacist at his shop and a man walked in to buy something. He saw us and said that he'd learned from elders years ago! We went to find him at the market on Tuesday. His name is Brother Nai. He sells treats at the market and has a small family. He has a Book of Mormon. We basically just introduced ourselves and gave him a scripture to read and reminded him about prayer. We'll meet with him again and maybe he'll start learning again!

Also, while we were at the market people kept randomly giving us samples of things! We left the market with a huge bag of treats that had been given to us. People are so generous and love to make falangs happy! In fact, the other day we were out contacting and we were talking with a lady selling a sticky rice banana thing at her house. A man bought some and then motorcycled away. But then a few minutes later he returned and handed us a few of his sticky rice things. He said, "We must take care of the falangs and let them experience things," or something along those lines. Anyway, people are just so friendly all the time. So grateful!

On Wednesday we went to teach Sister Du. When we got there she had prepared lunch for us without telling us. How sweet and kind! She'd made this really good bean sprout dish and was excited to serve us. I love her! And then we had a great discussion about President Monson's Conference talk from last conference about obedience.

Also, yesterday we went to visit sweet Sister O. She's way cute and has been inactive for quite a while, ever since her dad passed away years ago. Yesterday when we were at her house she kept asking us if she could go buy us treats because she would receive a lot of "boon" especially since we are teachers/ missionaries. Basically, in Buddhism you keep yourself in balance if you do more good than bad. So, to make up for the bad you receive "boon" by doing good acts... such as buying falang missionaries candy, or giving sandwiches to dogs on the street, or giving soda to statues. She prays to Buddha a lot to get over some health issues she has. Yesterday we taught that it is God that we pray to to receive blessings, help, etc... And it is only God that we must worship.

On Wednesday we went out to a bonog to find a lady that we'd contacted into last week. We found her as well as her younger sister! We introduced prayer and the Book of Mormon to them both. The original lady was not too interested, but her sister was! Once we handed her a Book of Mormon she would not put it down. She just kept reading it and saying, "good reading!" (that doesn't really translate well! haha) Anyway, we're hopeful that she'll become a new investigator!

On Thursday the Zone Leaders came to share with us what they'd learned from their training with President Senior about goal setting. It was really great! As we set goals they encouraged us to start with the end in mind and work backwards to really assess what we need to do to make those goals. 

This week we taught Y. and Cream. We committed them to reading the scriptures and praying together. We also committed them to come to church. They didn't, but hopefully they've been reading and praying. We'll see them in the next few days to teach again.

Okay, so here's my small miracle of the week: We, along with the elders, planned a finding activity to replicate Lehi's vision in a nearby park. We were in charge of making popcorn balls to hang from the tree to look like the fruit from his vision. Popcorn here is hard to come by and very expensive. We weren't really sure what to do because we didn't want to spend too much money or time on the popcorn. So, Friday morning we were finishing our studies and Sister Chuanphid randomly showed up at the church with a HUGE bag of popcorn. Not sure if she planned on giving it to us, but when she saw us she excitedly handed us the bag! Wow! Thank you Heavenly Father. We are so blessed, even if it's just small things that help us not waste time and money!

And that finding activity turned out really well. We hung the popcorn balls from the tree, made an iron rod, and a sign that said, "This way to the tree of life." haha Then we invited people to follow the rod to the tree. It was way fun and a whole bunch of members came with us to help. We got to talk to alot of people and get alot of phone numbers. 

General Conference was awesome! And we got to see it all, except for the last session, in English! So great to hear from our leaders. There are so many I could talk about, but I loved Elder Ballard's challenge to reach out and share the gospel with just one friend before Christmas. How awesome if everyone does that!

We watched the last session in Thai because one of our investigators came to it. It was cool to hear it in Thai, and one of the translators was Brother Goodman (my mission prep teacher at the Y!) So cool!

Also, this made me laugh. We were out biking past a wat and two 12- 13 year old monks saw us and started yelling about how cute we were. That is sooo against monk rules! haha

Okay, that is the bulk of this week. We shall know tomorrow probably who is going to stay and who is going to move. Wahoo! Can't wait to find out.

I love you all sooooooo much!

Love,

Liz