Monday, September 5, 2011

Pressing Forward

My Wheels
Hello everyone,
Wow sounds like everyone is having such an awesome time.  Sounds like school started off great for Julia and Spencer.  Julia, those bruises look nasty, keep working hard with volleyball and they'll notice how good of a player you are and hopefully move you up.  Spencer's goin' to Homecoming!!  Atta boy!! Dude, boating is gonna be such a fun activity for that.  You gotta get me some pics of that soon.  Mom and dad, thanks for your letters.  They really help me move on with this missionary work and help me become a better missionary!  Dad I know just how felt with those "I don't have any time" or here it's, "I'm in a rush".  I don't know if this is how it was for you, but EVERYONE here is always in a rush, have no free time.  I kinda mess with them and say "ni hen xingku" (knee hun shingkoo haha).  It means that they are such a hardworker.  Also, when people want to be "punks" to us, they'll start speaking Taiwanese, which is another language that they speak here, but its an unwritten and evertying.  So yeah... So enough of all that.  Lets start with what happened this week. 
So we are still not having as much success as we would like.  We continue to have appointments set up, but these people never show up.  However, last Tuesday one guy actually showed up.  His name is Chen, and he is such an awesome guy, wanting to learn more.  We taught him the first lesson and he was willing to start reading the Book of Mormon which is awesome.  Wednesday, we then met with a Brother Jiang and watched "Finding Faith in Christ" with him.  He could see that he felt something during the movie, but all he would say about it was that it was a good movie.  We invited him to be baptized, he has been taught everything, but says he is too busy to come to church and so that is why he isn't progressing as we'd like him to.  However we're still working our hardest with him.  So the weather Wednesday was a little crazy.  So the typhoon that I guess hit Japan came right passed Taiwan and so we felt the effects of it a little.  I was on the other side of the island as it passed by so it wasn't as bad.  Just crazy wind and lots of rain.  So today we had a "Specialized Training" for all the trainers and trainees, me.  We went over a talk that Elder Bednar gave to the missionaries in the MTC called, "Becoming a Preach My Gospel Missionary."  I was lucky enough to have heard it and so this training pumped me up to become a better missionary.  
So lately, we found out our investigators have been to "buhao yisi" (boo how ee suh) to say that they didn't have interest in our message.  But it helped us realize that it is so important to teach to their needs rather than throwing all the messages right in their faces and expecting them to believe it all.  Also, right now we are focusing more on working with the ward leaders because we really think it could strenghten our ward.  Our ward isn't the strongest right now, and we don't know why.  So we will be trying to become better friends to ward members and leaders.
The language is coming, the work is fun but hard, and the church is true.  This is the Lord's work and he truly has a hand in it.  Without Him, missionary work would be impossible to do.  Hope all is well with you wherever you are and may the Lord bless you all. 
With all my love, Elder Smith
p.s. I'll be looking for that package :) can't wait.  Oh and dad, here is my adderss that you wanted so you could look it up. It's in charcters and that's how it is on google maps so... my address is on the 2nd line