September 8, 2013

Hello! I'm here! ... well, it's been such a fast week that I hardly know what to talk about!! It's been the first week in the last year that it hasn't rained even once... quite an accomplishment I think! Some things that I'll get out of the way before I start to get into the real stuff:

 

I haven't gotten the box yet, but I'm going to Mission HQ on Friday to pick up my new trainee and hopefully the box will be there! I'm not sure how many of my old shirts I'm gonna want to keep... they're pretty nasty! That's just kinda what happens when you're riding for miles under the tropical sun in Taiwan! 

Alright! What a great week! Let me tell ya! On Monday - Friday was basically full of strict road proselyting! We're trying to build up our teaching pool once more, seeing as we've had quite a few of investigators drop out in these past couple weeks... as hard as it is to ride under that sun for hours every day, it's so much fun. Carrying the message of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the most amazing thing anyone could ever do. I'm so privileged to be out here Preaching Repentance to this people! 

On Saturday, we were making lunch for a family in our ward, and I got stuck with the desert portion of it... so we decided to make a big chocolate cake! It wasn't until we were at the Chapel that we found out we had no pan to bake the cake in!! hahaha so we pulled out one of those HUGE cookie sheets and baked it in that, just praying that it would turn out okay! As it was baking, one of our Investigators just randomly walked in and said he had a teacher that wanted to talk to me...  I said: "Us?" (meaning Elder L and I) and he says: "No, she wants to talk to YOU." ?!?? Talk about being a little nervous! So he takes me downstairs as we leave our cake to bake in the oven, and meet this guys teacher. She's a leader in another Christian Church school somewhere in Daya and she came to check our Chapel out... apparently we were stealing her student. She was super nice, and we had a great talk with her about the way our Church worked and gave her a whole tour of the Daya chapel. In the end, she was really happy about it all! She didn't say a whole lot, but we were laughing with her and chatting... the sad part of the story is that our investigator didn't come to church yesterday!!! Man! He had a goal to be baptized next week, but it didn't happen. We're still praying that he'll come back to us! The happy part is, even though we left the cake cooking in the oven to teach a lesson, it came out perfect... the work of God always comes first!~! haha

Yesterday was incredible. We had a great Church meeting, as always, and then spent the day preparing and inviting people to come to a musical fireside at night. The fireside turned out SO good! We had a chance to throw together a couple musical numbers and invited the 3 wards to do some of their own musical numbers with the choirs... music rocks!! Elder L and I put a musical number together with the Sisters in our District that turned out pretty awesome... "I Hope They Call Me On A Mission." I put together a little arrangement with Guitar, Ukulele, Piano, and a little miniature flute thingy-ma-jig... It was super fun! We also did "If You Could Hie To Kolob" and "Because He Lives" which both turned out super incredible! I love those songs so much! 

My Spiritual share for the week is, yet again, about the song "Because He Lives." I testify to you all that He does live. He lives and loves us. He may have suffered His life for us, but as much as I know He died for us, I know He rose from the grave and was exalted to stand by the throne of God, and inherit His own throne. He did these things that we might also be able to overcome the atrocities (I'm impressed I still remember that word!) of the world! I love Him so much! He is my Light, my Joy, and my Song! 

    

I love you guys tons!

Elder Noll