Loving my Mission

This week went great! Sister Ellsworth and I are continuing to work happy and hard! I personally feel like now that I am training I'm like 10x more tired than I used to be. But, that's ok ... it's a good tired. And I'm happy every day doing the Lord's work!

Monday we went to Lion's Rock! It is a supppper cool hiking place. But, by Hiking I mean Climbing up never ending stairs. I felt like Frodo and Sam and Gollum climbing up to Shelob's lair. (My daughter is so literate! - Dad)  But, it was a beautiful climb up to the top of this mountain! And on the top is the coolest view of Hong Kong!!! Hong Kong is such a cool and amazing city!

Sister Ellsworth, Sarah, and Sister Sharp

Sarah is awesome!!!!!! She was confirmed and given the Gift of the Holy Ghost in sacrament meeting yesterday. Yaya! So excited for her.

We have another investigator, Vivien, who is also super awesome. She is from Mainland (of course) and here for work. We actually met her because she found our church online and so then we got her referral and were able to give her a call. She is super great! I called her on Tuesday night to invite her to come to English class again this Wednesday and she told met that she was so glad I called because she was a bit upset because she felt like God wasn't hearing her prayers. She said that she really needed to find this book today and after trying as hard as she could she decided to pray. And then she prayed like 8 more times. She still couldn't find the book. I told her that sometimes God answers our prayers in ways that we don't expect, but that God always has a plan. She was satisfied by my answer. And then ... in English class the next day we read a story from the Children's section of the Liahona. It is about a little boy who is really ill and he asks Heavenly Father to heal him but it takes a really long time before he can get better. As Vivien was reading the story she was like "OH! I see! It's like me! I think this is an answer to my prayers!" She was super excited! The last paragraph said something about how God always knows what is best for us and somehow he will always answer our prayers - and Vivien was like "I think God is just trying to teach me the same lesson!"

So yup! This week went really well. Just some good ole missionary work! We are being so blessed over here in Hong Kong. And I am really starting to understand how great the gift of tongues is. I didn't realize how much I could speak (or at least how much the Lord would help me speak) Chinese until my companion doesn't speak very much. But, even now Sister Ellsworth's Chinese is improving sooo fast too! Basically, we are really blessed to be out here doing the Lord's work.

At dinner the other night a member ordered every person an entire chicken. I repeat....the ENTIRE CHICKEN! And we ate every single part (except the head...she didn't make us eat the head). And when her daughter couldn't finish her whole chicken Sister Ellsworth and I had to eat that one too. I had an entire one and a half chickens. I was soooo full!

At the top of Lion Rock - with obligatory peace sign!

Tired!!!

 

Finding Experiences

This week has been so good! As scheduled Sarah was baptized yesterday!!!!!!!!! She was so happy and her baptism meeting was so good. She shared such a great testimony afterwards. I myself learned a powerful lesson. Remember how she had told me that I had called when she was having a bad day? Well she said that happens all the time and that she was so grateful that I was listening to the spirit and called her just when she needed it. So awesome! I'm so happy that we were able to help her to come to understand who she really is as a daughter of God. I learned to never ever shove away the little promptings. as small as they seem - they could mean a lot to someone else. 

Sister Ellsworth is doing awesome! I have a great trainee! She is really excited to be doing the work here and is ready to jump in and work hard. Plus, we are having lots of fun together!

Our other investigators are doing really well too. We have one, Cynthia, who is just amazing. We met with her yesterday and she came in with her Book of Mormon all highlighted and tabbed up. She had very obviously been studying it. I asked why she had marked it up and she said that the things she marked are things that can help her or others. And we were like "yes! That is exactly what the BoM is for!" 

Our finding this week went really well. I think we were really led by the spirit. We had one experience where we got on a bus and the guy across the aisle was speaking on the phone in Mandarin and so of course I had to talk to him (after he hung up). We just small talked and then he started telling me about how he had seen missionaries before and that he actually lives pretty close to one of our chapels. He personally isn't religious, but he said that he doesn't normally take this bus and so then I said "Well yeah I think Heavenly Father led you to us!" and he was like "Oh yeah, maybe!" SO, that was pretty cool. 

Doing missionary work is the best! Time flies by sooo fast - like super duper fast. I am really working on not wasting any moment of it. I am so grateful that I have the opportunity to put all my heart, might, mind, and strength into serving the Lord.

Hey! Just thought I'd share some other experiences from this week. We really were so blessed meeting people who needed to hear the gospel. 

Beathly:

So while walking home from the Kowloon Tong chapel we passed by a lady and I was like "Ok we need to talk to her" and so I turned around and started talking to her. She was super nice. We talked for a bit and we shared a bit about what we do. I felt impressed to tell her that we share with everyone our message because we know that everyone is a beloved child of God and then I told her that she is a daughter of God and that he loves her more than she can imagine. She immediately burst in to tears. She told us a bit about how her life has been a bit hard recently and then also told us about her father's death. We just testified of God's love for her and her family and then we also talked a bit about the Plan of Salvation. She called us angels and said that we came right when she needed it. I'm so grateful for that experience. 

80+ year old guy in the park: 

We were in the Kwun Tong park and Sister Ellsworth said she had to sit to fix her socks (she told me afterwards that she felt impressed). So, she sat and then started to say something to me in Chinese. The old man next to her heard us and was like "Oh you speak mandarin?" and he said it in Mandarin too! Which, is pretty rare because most of the older generation don't speak Mandarin, but he was actually from the mainland. We ended up talking to him for like an hour. He personally doesn't have any religious background. He said that his schooling taught them all to be atheist. But, none the less he was really interested in what we said. If anything, the fact that we spoke Chinese was a testimony enough that there was something out there helping us to learn this language. By the end of our conversation (and it really was a good conversation - he was super nice and funny) we could see the change. I think he had begun to open his heart and let the Light of Christ out. 

He Jiemei: 

While finding on Wednesday we stopped a lady and told her that we were church volunteers who share about Jesus Christ. She was like "really??? I have been wanting to learn about Jesus but no one will tell me." She too was raised with no religious background but was interested by what her friends believed. We taught her a bit about prayer and then rescheduled her for Friday. On Friday we met and expanded more on who God and Christ are and about communicating with Heavenly Father through prayer. We asked how she felt about it and she said that she felt a special feeling and she knew that what we were saying was true. She also said she felt it the moment we stopped her on the street! 

So these are just a couple of examples of some of the really awesome things that have happened this week. The Lord really is leading His work and helping us to find those who are ready to receive Him.

Ok that's about it for this week!!!!!!! I love you guys sooo much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Training

Hello everyone! What a week!

On Thursday morning I said goodbye to Sister Law (who is now doing Cantonese work) and picked up my new trainee Sister Ellsworth!!!!!! She's awesome! She is also 19 and she comes from Arizona. She has the best attitude and is so ready to learn. I'm super excited to be working with her.

I've only been training for a few days now, but it has been such a blessing. I didn't realize how much Chinese I could speak until I was with a companion who doesn't speak a ton (two months in the MTC really doesn't teach you that much...hahah). I've also realized how much I really have learned in the 5 months I've been here. What a blessing!

Sarah is doing great! She is still super duper excited to get baptized next week! Also, she went home for Easter break and brought me back some yummy treats :)

We had some fun lessons this week. Last night we visited an investigator and her son and played "blessings." It's basically like bingo but instead of using numbers the squares have different blessings that the gospel gives us. It was super fun and her son really enjoyed it. BUT, I had the weirdest experience yesterday! SO, when I went to pick up Sister Ellsworth on Thursday we had a bit of a training meeting with President Hawks. During it he asked me and the other sister training if we have ever felt "despised". and I was like "ehhh not really..." I mean I've been rejected but not despised. But then! Yesterday while going to visit our investigator the guards to her apartment building would not let us come in. We were like "we are just going to visit a friend! She invited us" and they (yes, multiple) were yelling at us to get out! It was super weird. And then our investigator sent her son down to pick us up so that we could get in and the guards still didn't believe us. They were like "Absolutely not! Get out!" Finally they called her and she was like "Yes! Let them in!" It was so weird! haha But that's ok! Good experience I guess.

Anyways, this week was great because we got to watch GENERAL CONFERENCE!!!!!!!!!! SO GOOD! If you haven't seen it yet stop reading this and go watch it right now. Seriously, it's so good! We have living prophets and apostles guiding us. So awesome!

(Sorry no pictures this week!)

Ok, I think that's it!!!!!!! I love you all soooooooooooooo much!!!!!!!!

Busy and Blessed

This week has been super duper!  Last p-day we went to Big Buddha (for reals...BIG) and then today we went to an Indian Buffet (and now I'm really big too). 

With it being Easter break many of our members and investigators have gone home for the holiday. And so, we thought that we would have a week relatively empty of plans, but it turns out we were just as busy and blessed as ever! 

Sarah is suuuuper excited for her baptism! We met with her this week to prepare her for and then have her baptism interview. It was awesome! She is so ready! She shared with us her testimony about the Savior and told us all about how she has changed since coming to know "our church." She said that when we would sincerely tell her that she is a daughter of God she had no doubt that he existed and that what we told her was true. She said that since she has really started to understand who she is as a daughter of God she has changed a lot and that her friends and people around her have all noticed it. Ahhh she's so great! I'm so happy for her! 

While getting on the metro the other day we ran into a man named Tom! He had met Sister Law before because he is the former investigator of some other Elders. He was super cool and nice. We got onto the train with him and sat down and ended up talking with him (all of us missing out stops) all the way to the end of the line. We helped him to better understand some of the answers to his questions that made it hard for him to believe in God like "Why do bad things happen?" and "Why is there poverty and unfairness?" We tried to answer as best we could and also explained that God truly is everyone's loving Heavenly Father. When we got to the end of the line we got off and went to the other side of the station so that we could get back on and go the other way. While waiting we decided to say a prayer together. And so we went to a bench, Sister Law and I both sat down and then he actually chose to sit on the floor pretzel style and then the three of us took turns saying a prayer. We also invited him to watch conference and hopefully continue to get answers to his questions! It was a super cool experience! I am so grateful that we were in the right place at the right time so that we met with him. 

Biggest news of the week!!! I have absolutely LOVED being Sister Law's companion! We have so much fun together!!!! I love her so much. But, I got a call this morning from President Hawks. A new Mandarin sister (this first one since I came) is coming this week and I will be training her!! Gah! I'm so scared! I don't feel like I know Chinese or any skills that I need to be able to help a new missionary. But, I am confident that the Lord will help me to do what he needs me to do! Wish me luck! 

Ok, that's it!!!! Here are some big Buddha and Indian food pictures! Love you all sooooooooo much!!!!!!!!!!!!! But really...pray for me that I will be able to speak Chinese and train a new missionary!