Dear family and friends,
I'm glad that you had a great week, with General Conference to top
it off! We'll get to see it next week! Cannot wait!
Also, I really
hope we get to see the "Meet the Mormons" movie! That sounds awesome!
I hope it's really good!
Well, this has
been a crazy, amazing, awesome week!
Tuesday
night we headed out to Bangkok for Missionary Leadership Council which was held Wednesday morning at the
Chaengwatna chapel. It is just the biggest boost to meet together with
missionaries and receive instruction and guidance for the mission. I LOVE MLC!
Elder and Sister Meeker are the cutest. They prepared a delicious pancake
breakfast for us. Afterwards, we started our meetings and had a really
great training. Lately we've been trying to focus on being
"all-around" missionaries, that not only find, teach, and baptize,
but also retain and activate. Of course, this is so important, but sometimes
it's overwhelming to do it all. So, two of our zone leaders in Bangkok, Elder
Quinn and Elder Delagarza came up with a new verb for the mission: BRAFT-ing.
It stands for just those things: baptize, retain, activate, find, teach. So,
now we are supposed to ask ourselves every day if we are BRAFT-ing, what can we
do to BRAFT better, etc... haha. Kind of funny, but really great! In the
training we focused on each of these elements and how we can be efficient in
all areas. Every day we should be doing all of these things, so we learned
how we can help the missionaries be better BRAFTing missionaries, and therefore
better all-around missionaries! Everyday I'll go through
my planner and write a B, R, A, F or T, next to each activity we have planned
and then I can see what we may be missing. Really, it's nothing we didn't know
already, but hopefully it will help people organize
better. A big focus of finding was asking for referrals and involving members
better. Also, we're now not going to have companionship baptismal goals, but
rather district baptismal goals. We want more unity in our districts. This also
takes away the competitiveness that sometimes happens. I think this is all so
inspired and I love it! So, amazing training! I just love the missionaries in
our mission so much. They are all so dedicated and so willing to do what the
Lord wants. I am so inspired by the people that I serve around. What a blessing
to be serving! I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!
After the
training we ate a delicious chili dinner prepared by Sister Senior and had some
time to chat with everyone! What an awesome day!
So, after
training on Wednesday we hit the road to Pittsonulok to go train the Elders that
are in Gamphaengphet and P-Lok. It was fun to go see a new area that I’ve
heard so much about but never been to. We stayed in a cute little hotel by the
church that night, went for a nice adventure run the next morning, studied, ate
lunch at a cute little cafe, and then presented the training with the
zone leaders that afternoon! So much fun! The elders there are just awesome and
so excited to apply the training.
After that we
headed back on the bus to Chiang Mai, about 6 hours. Longest bus ride ever!
haha They like to play these really obnoxious soap operas on the buses, so we
just try to sleep through it. haha But, the seat that I was on was a
little sketchy. I was lying against the window and reached down to grab
something from my bag at my feet and my seat unbolted from the floor and I
nearly fell off. There were three soldiers sitting in the row behind me and
they tried to grab my chair and all looked way concerned. haha
Anyway, we made
it back to Chiang Mai on Thursday night and the next morning we had a
training here for Lampang, Chiang Rai, and Chiang Mai. They all met here, the
training went really well. Pres. Senior came too because he had come up to do
interviews for the upcoming zone conference (I didn't get interviewed, I will
at ZC on the 17th). Anyway, that was really fun to see everyone! They're
all doing well!
Right after the
training we had to run. The government officials that we teach English to had
scheduled a lunch date with us missionaries here in Chiang Mai. So, all eight of us
got picked up in a government vehicle and were taken to a hotel for a
delicious lunch. It was so kind of them. They are very gracious people and
wanted to show their thanks by taking us to lunch. The editor of the newspaper
was there to take pictures as well so we should be in the upcoming edition of
Chiang Mai News (or whatever it's called)! Kind of a neat experience.
It's been a really neat thing to work with these people, and apparently,
one of the officials might be interested in learning with the Elders!
As far as our
investigators go, Sister F. was doing pretty well. She had learned
everything and really has the desire to be baptized. She has passed her
interview already and will be baptized! The plan was for yesterday. However,
her mom is very opposed to all this and wouldn't let her go. We've
talked to her and we're going to try to go visit the mom. I really
think things will work out okay in the end. F. is so awesome and has so much
faith. She just wants to do what's right and I know she'll be able to be
baptized this week.
We have another
few investigators that are really great: Brother Th. and Sister O. They are
boyfriend/girlfriend and are so cute. Sister O. is Christian, Brother Th. is
Buddhist. They want to get married and he wants to raise his family Christian.
They love church, they love our restoration message, and they will be baptized.
We can only meet them on Sundays, so it may take a little while. We're just so
happy that they are so humble and excited to learn and follow Jesus Christ, and
that Sunday is their day off.
Brother Md.
is progressing very well! He's quite the faithful church-goer and we're hoping
he will be baptized this week. He's been out of town, but he's back now and so
hopefully things will work out for this week! He's just so great. We have more
new investigators but I'll write about them more next week once we get another
chance to teach.
So, this has
been one amazing week! So much happening and it's so exciting. I love serving
in Chiang Mai with Sister Ference. We are seeing a lot of miracles and feeling
so blessed! I love this area and I love the people we work with. I love sharing
this Gospel and seeing people accept it into their lives! Life is
sooooo good!
Love,
Liz
