Sis Meyer, Bowman, Jensen, and me after conference
Dear friends and family,
I think I have been exalted. I have heard from 15 prophets and
apostles (and more) of the Lord , and I am spiritually full. K not
really, but conference was so great! My favorite talk was probably the
one about who's side you're facing, or Elder Bednar's
message to members not of our faith. I think both of those are such
good reminders to always face toward the Lord, and share the gospel
whenever we have the chance. I can't believe that next conference I'll
be pretty much speaking mandarin! I better be fluent,
because I don't think they have any translators. I thought it was so
cool that people spoke in their native language! Haha I couldn't help
but think that's what I'm going to sound like when the cantonese guy was
talking, but I promise that mandarin sounds
a little prettier than that. Not by much though (: in one session, I
sat next to an elder from Suva, Fiji, and that was a pretty humbling
experience. We got talking, and he's a convert and the only member in
his family, and this was the first time he's got
to see the prophet speak. I cant believe how lucky I've been to watch
conference in the comfort of my own home, with all of my family,
throwing chocolate covered raisins at each other (: I thought of you
guys all day, and tried to guess what you were doing
throughout the day. I did remember sunday breakfast, and I even
splurged with a muffin and orange juice haha. Definitely not as good as
egg mcmuffins and orange julius. I taught my tongban and roommates how
to play 'where's Kristin (in the choir)?' and we had fun with that.
I've got to keep some traditions alive, right?
Thanks so much for the packages, Will and Shauna! And thanks
everyone for writing me and keeping me updated. I really do love
hearing from you guys! Even if you think it's just boring, I like to
hear what's going on in the real world (:
Oh boy. We still had the devotional on sunday night, which means
we still watched movies after. This week, our MTC devotional
was from Elder Bednar and it was AMAZING. It was about how to tell if your
thoughts are from the spirit, or just from
you. QUIT WORRYING ABOUT IT. It doesn't matter who they're from. If
they're good, they are from God because all good things come from our
Heavenly Father. He told three stories of how he had a thought, but had
no idea if it was his natural man thinking
or the spirit. Then years later he found out that it only could have
been the spirit. So just act when you have a thought, because you never
know!
Every week, we have MTC training online, and this week it was how
to introduce family history work to members and nonmembers. I'm just so
thankful that dad has been such an awesome example to me in finding
names that I could bring to the temple. I've
loved being able to index and more recently, find names for myself. I
really hope I'll get to share that with others in Taiwan, especially
since they're so family orientated. I encourage each of you to find the
spirit of Elijah through family history work.
It really doesn't seem that fun but once you get the hang of it, it's
addicting! Also, If we have any cool stories from our ancestors, then I
would love if someone could send them to me!
I noticed that I have 70 bucks in my account now, or 2000 Taiwanese
dollars. That means it's getting closer! I even ate a bag of chips
today with our departure date as the expiration date. That made it
official (: A few missionaries got emails today
from older missionaries in our zone that went stateside waiting for
visas. They came! They're all in Taiwan! Now I'm really hopeful that
ours will come on time. But. One elder was denied because he didn't
have 4 years of seminary. Sis Bowman doesn't have
4 years either, but I'm really hoping she'll get to go to Taiwan
somehow. Thank goodness I went to all 4 years of seminary, and loved it
nonetheless!
Last monday, we skyped people from Taiwan for the first time and it was a little scary, but way fun! They call it skypee haha(: sadly,
all we could see was a picture so that made it a little harder, but it
was still really good practice. We'll do skypee
now instead of TRC.
Everyone has been sick again this week, but I've stayed immune. I
have no idea how, but I'm just so grateful I haven't had to miss class
or anything. I've still got perfect attendance (:
Alright, this was totally a tender mercy. So I was talking with
this elder in our zone, Elder (Levi) Crockett. I'm better friends with
his tongban, E Gathwright, but for some reason we just started talking
one day at lunch. Turns out he was really good
friends with Joseph and had like 5 classes with him at BYU. I thought
that was really sweet that I could meet him. He's the sweetest guy!
Me and Sis Bowman finally got to do our callings this week! This
week, we got two new districts (both going to Taibei - whoo!) So we got
to train them on emails and TALL and all that jazz. It was fun (: I
think we're getting the next batch of missionaries
in another week or two.
As for our investigators, we made so much progress this week!!! Oh
my goodness. K I'll start with He JM, our semi-golden investigator. We
started teaching her the plan of salvation, and she just humbly accepts
pretty much everything we teach her. We
invited her to watch conference, and I really hope she did! Well, I'm
sure Ke Lao Shi did, but I hope that she'll say that He JM did (: then
there's Liang JM, our less active. We really made a break through. For
some reason, I didn't really make any small
talk when we met with her and just hopped right into what we wanted to
share with her. We asked her the time before to read a chapter (2 ne
4), but she forgot. So we went over it, and likened it unto her. Then I
asked her (It had to have been by the spirit
because I never could have thought of this) if she could ask Heavenly
Father anything, what would it be? She tried to brush it off and say I
don't know, or I just wouldn't ask him anything. Then I said, "IF"
again. She thought real hard and told us a question
she had. We invited her to just watch one session of conference and she
WILL receive an answer. Obviously we told her to watch sunday morning,
but as I watched, I wished she would have seen saturday morning. I got
so much revelation for her though! I just
really hope she actually did watch though. I'm so hopeful for both her
and He jiemei.
Well, it really has been a great week. With news of the older
missionaries going to Taiwan, I really just can't wait to get into the
field. My zhongwen definitely isn't ready for that, but I know that the
Lord will help me. He didn't call me to Taiwan
to fail. He called me to speak zhongwen because He knows I can learn it
and be successful. I know that he's preparing the Taiwanren to receive
the gospel, and I hope I can be prepared for them in turn. I really
love this gospel so much, and I'm so excited
to share it! Oh, one more story. For our devotional, this guy named Vai
Sikahema (that's probably wrong haha) spoke to us. He played football
for BYU and the NFL and all these things. He shared a story of when he
was on a plane, and this 10 year old kid
was sitting next to him with a BYU shirt on. Score. then another lady
sits in between them and starts to read the bible. Double score! They
get talking, and she eventually asks about initial sin. Vai asks the
kid what article of faith he knows about Adam,
and he recites the second one. She ends up asking for a BOM to be sent
to her, and all this stuff happens. It's a long story, but she was
never heard of again, and the kid ended up going on a mission and wrote
Vai a letter saying you saved me. I just hope
you all will have the courage to share the gospel wherever you are. You
never know who it will really be helping.
I love you all so much! Thank you for all of your prayers and support, I really do appreciate it. Have a good week! Jia you!
Sister Facer
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