Ties in Thailand: Wow, what a good week

Dear Mom,

This week was another great week! I loved talking with my family. I felt so impressed with their examples and their love. It was just a really uplifting and powerful experience. I feel like the importance of families is one thing I've learned while on my mission. There are a lot of things I never showed appreciation for enough and I think I have an even greater appreciation for my family now.

This week we also had two investigators be baptized, that was for sure a major highlight. In addition to that, we've been able to spend an increased amount of time with the Bishop and ward leaders lately. I believe it has resulted in a great start to the beginning of an upward trend in the missionary work. Last Sunday, we went out with the ward council members and visited many less active members. We saw the results of those visits this Sunday when 11 people of whom we had visited came to church who didn't really come to church very much. It was so great when we were able to sit down in ward council meeting and discuss the visits we did. Many members shared great experiences. I definitely learned the importance of visiting in the homes of members. More importantly, having members visiting in the homes of members. This is a method that we've talked about and have started to focus on - member missionary work. We had visited some of these people numerous times on our own, but it seems like when we went with members too, it was so much better.

There have been so many things that I have learned from just this past week. I feel like my Sundays, at least sacrament meetings, have been increasingly meaningful to me. As a mission, we have been trying to place an even greater emphasis on the spiritual welfare of missionaries. Sometimes, we get caught in a 'trap' of just doing work. President Johnson said "I worry about how busy you are on Sunday worrying about other people that you don't worry about your own personal Sabbath experience. Remember, the Sabbath is for you too, especially the opportunity to partake of the sacrament. Turn your focus to the Savior and to yourself during that sacred ordinance, and use it as a way to lift your soul. It will refresh you and position you to do even better as a missionary." I feel like I come out of sacrament meeting with a good spiritual uplifting. It makes me view everything so much differently. I often catch myself thinking of investigators and other people in sacrament meeting, but now when I do so, it's not a busy 'stressful' thinking like before, but calm, easy thoughts/revelation.

Our teaching of english that we're doing twice a week in Don Mueang seems to be going okay. It definitely looks like we're developing and growing it well. It's a great way to have members invite their friends and family in a warm, non-threatening environment. The members really like the idea of having activities there instead of the church and we'll be sure to get member support out here. We're thinking about trying to do many more things here, some YSA activities, a BoM class, maybe trying to start up a sports night. It seems like here in Thailand, many things are run by the YSA.

We were also able to do a switch offs with some great missionaries on Friday. I was with the District Leader, Elder Greenwood. I felt like he's a missionary who 'gets it'. We talked mostly on how to work better with members. We had a great member visit with him where we were also able to see some honest, good opinions from members on missionary work. He talked about how some members get 'tired' of missionary work and we discussed how we can help members kindle the fire to work. We decided we had to set a good, loving example and invite members to act. Two things I saw and learned that I really liked was that Elder Greenwood has a great focus on the 'why'. He focused so much that God loves us. I feel like he was a powerful teacher of that. I could tell that all the people we met with really liked him and could feel God's love through him. In each appointment and lesson, Elder Greenwood was very genuine and really got to know people. It made them then have a desire to know him, then have a desire to know what he was saying. I left like it was literally a perfect example of "People don't care what you have to say, until they know how much you care". We visited an RC/LA family, some ward leaders, then some other members. I felt like Elder Greenwood was an example of: "Live in such a way that those who know you but don't know God will come to know God because they know you."

Time has flown by so fast, and now we only have two weeks left in this transfer cycle, it goes by so quick. It feels like I only just got here and my companion says he feels like he still has a year left of his mission.

B Best and S Uum were both baptized and are both way solid. I feel like they are so humble and have seen the Lord work mighty changes in their lives. Saturday and Sunday were great baptismal services.

-It's way cool that Sister McCuen met a Thai person in Japan. So many people we meet like to travel to Japan. The saints in Thailand really do have so, so much faith.