First full week in Taiwan

Hey, so first full week in Taiwan and it was super productive. This whole opening a new area is super tiring. We try to spend as much time as possible on the streets trying to find new investigators and its really starting to pay off, we've met some super cool people and tonight's schedule is actually full with appointments. 

So Thanksgiving was last Thursday so that was fun. We spent the whole day out finding as normal but a couple Sisters in the ward prepared a little "American Thanksgiving" and it was the cutest thing ever. There was of course a big turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, but also stuff like fried rice and other Taiwanese foods. So super grateful for them. 

This week we had a little more focus on the members. When we first got in the ward there were a few members that were super excited to have Elders but it seemed like nobody wanted us to come visit them and some actually seemed a bit reluctant to even talk to us. So yeah we knew we had to do something about it. So me and Elder Hammond put our brilliant minds together and decided to call every member of the ward, thank them for their service and ask if we could serve them. This has helped tremendously with bringing the missionary spirit and energy to the Zhubei 3 Ward. It actually was what led to that little service project for the Ni family, which is a super great missionary family and a great help to the missionaries.

Me and Elder Hammond have been focusing a lot on following the spirit, as every missionary or I guess anybody should, but we've been making it an effort to base like every decision off it. And we have seen miracles. In our effort to call the members of the ward we ended up calling a less active member that we know nothing about. She answered the phone and was like super happy and nice and actually committed to come to church on Sunday. So that by itself was kind of amazing and not how less active calls usually go. But Sunday came around and right before sacrament started a Brother in the ward said an investigator family just arrived. So we went outside to find that the less active sister had brought her husband, son, and daughter. When she was asked to introduce herself in gospel principles she gave a little background on her families’ church situation. She said her and her husband had been members for ten years but hadn't been active in a while and her two children had not been baptized. She went on to say that in the past both the bishop and a set of missionaries had called her and tried to get her to return to church but she rejected them. However, lately she had some struggles as a mother and found that she really needed some extra help that she knew only God and Jesus Christ could provide. She made a promise to herself that the next time people from church tried to contact her she would accept their invitation to come to church. And the next day she got a call from myself and Elder Hammond. That day at church every lesson was perfect for those new to the gospel and they had a wonderful experience. After church me and Elder Hammond went to check up on the family and the father looked at us and said that he wanted us to come to their home this week and teach his kids the missionary lessons. 

I love seeing little miracles like these. It kind of reminds mean about the sons of Mosiah on their missions in Alma 17:5 " Now these are the circumstances which attended them in their journeying’s, for they had many afflictions; they did suffer much, both in body and in mind, such as hunger, thirst and fatigue, and also much labor in the spirit." Laboring in the body and mind is part of missionary work but it shouldn't be the only focus. Laboring in the spirit is essential and when done properly, I think it brings the most miracles. 

艾長老