Dear Mother,
It's been another great week in Bangna! I love it still, even though this week has been kind of crazy. We've had a lot going on, but overall it has been pretty good. The highlight of the week was that our companionship had 15 investigators at church! We didn't have any baptisms and we're super sad and worried for the people that missed their baptism date(s). However, the Lord has blessed us and continues to bless us in all aspects of the work! We've almost had more people at church than my companion has ever had and we've been a balanced companionship every week so far! We taught a lot of lessons this week, too! I'm so excited for the work!
I don't have a lot to say this week. The crazy stuff going on is just some internal affairs type things that can be summed up by repeating that this transfer is so different from last.... What I can say is that President Senior now wants us to focus more on families. Part member families and to focus on the goal of preparing Thailand for a temple. We're going to try to work more with members and families because last year, the TBM had so many baptisms, but most of them were single people. Now we'll try to work with these people to help their families. President Senior said if we do this, focus on the family, we'll have more baptisms than we've ever seen before in Thailand. The President wasn't sure how we'd do it because it's a new change, but he said someone has to been the one to make it work and show how it can be done. My companion and I are super excited to take on a new challenge. Last week I may have seemed overwhelmed with the changes, which is true and I still feel that way, but now I also feel like there's a ton of good that can be good, too. With a focus on members and families, maybe we'll be able to repair any of the negative changes that may have occurred.
I'll sum up the week and then find a spiritual thought to share.
On Monday, we went to a driving range and hit some golf balls. We then ate lunch with some members and went shopping. We went back to the church for FHE which we didn't have a lot of people at, but it was still good. We had a ton of fun playing games together and I'm sure people shared great spiritual thoughts, but I still can't understand very much.
Tuesday we had a district meeting, ate at coldstone, and had a great English class. We had so many people, it was great! This week, we also had a class for children, a Thai class, an advanced English class, and a regular English class. I found out that I'm not very good at teaching English and it was pretty tough, but I think everyone had fun. While contacting, I even ran into someone from our English class who had come in the past and I remember that they said how fun English class was. I hope it was just as fun as this week, too.
On Wednesday, we gave a blessing to a member which was a cool experience, we street contacted, taught, and had BoM class. Sister Hatch led the class and it was good. We didn't play any game though and it was quite different from last week. We'll see if we can't get more participation from people next time.
Thursday we taught and invited the whole day. We also visited a pakistani family that came to Thai class. It was a really cool, interesting, and humbling experience. They believe in Christ and were forced out of their country. Their son was beaten, their daughter almost kidnapped and the dad who used to work in the Air Force were all forced to come to Thailand on a travel visa that will expire in a few weeks. The family has very little. They have seven people in their family all living in a room made for just one or two. They need help finding work and have a lot of language barriers. Only two of them speak English and are looking for work.
On Friday we invited and taught and also had a missionary homecoming. Saturday we taught a lot and had a meeting with some of the ward missionaries. We also played sports. We found a Frisbee this time and we had a pretty good sized group. After someone through the frisbee over the fence into the jungle, we played soccer instead.
Sunday was overall a good day. We had a lot of people come to church and we taught several people, we also had a four hour long training meeting with President Senior and this is when he told us to focus on families. It's another change for this transfer, but I'm super excited because I love talking to people. Random people off the street are awesome, don't get me wrong, but it's also so awesome to be able to help people in their families. We had District dinner again, too, but our companionship was teaching so we pretty much missed it. We got to do all the dishes though so we did contribute.
I know that no matter what happens, what's going on, or what people may do that is out of our control, Christ is always with us. We can always turn to Him and we can always have His Spirit with us when we focus on what is important and when we remember Him. No matter what may occur, we can always know that He loves us and He wants us to be happy, successful, and loving. We can always rely and turn to the Lord no matter our circumstance. Because He loves us so much, we wants us to love, to serve, and to turn outwards. I had to reference The Character of Christ talk again, but it is such a great talk of just how to become more like Christ. As we strive to become more like Him in all aspects of our lives, we will find it easier to love others and to build relationships of love and trust with those whom we care about. The Gospel of Jesus Christ is truly a blessing in our lives and one of the greatest blessings of the Gospel is being able to share it. When we share what we know, what we feel, and what we believe, we will be able to touch the lives of others. When we feel that we have happiness and we share that with others, our own happiness will grow as we help others come to feel of it also. I know that our Father in Heaven loves us. I know that He is familiar with us personally and He knows all of our strengths, weaknesses, struggles, hardships, ailments and illnesses, difficulties and frailties and I know that He knows exactly what we need to turn our weaknesses into strengths. If we us the enabling power of the Atonement everyday and work towards becoming what the Lord wants us to become, we will be surprised at what we can actually accomplish. I know that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the true church. I know that Jesus is the Christ and that He died for us and took upon Himself everything so that we could overcome and grow. I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet, that the Book of Mormon is true, and that through reading, pondering, and praying, we can know the truth of all things through the power of the Holy Ghost. I know that these things are true because I have prayed and I have seen the effect that it has had in my life and in the lives of those around me.
Elder Sun
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