June 20, 2012

Hi mom! :) Haha! I'm so glad that you're addicted to nuttella now! For a while I really despised it. #memories BUT now I definitely understand the love for it! Haha, you don't need to send nutella over here! That would be so expensive!! BUT I really wouldn't mind pictures. ;) I definitely understand paperwork first though, so don't feel rushed!!  I'm so jealous that you got to hang out with Brianne this weekend! I was thinking about her today! When is she putting her mission papers in? Also, I'm not surprised that both Sarah and her raided my closet. That's alright though, I promised them a shirt with just my face on it, and I never made them. So, I guess the closet raid will suffice.  My clothes are definitely holding up. People tease me for how new my clothes still look. ;) But really though. Real quick-did dad get my email? You went to the IC office?!?!?!?!? Wa! That must have been AMAZING! ESPECIALLY since it's basically the busiest times they've ever had!!! So cool!! The funniest thing that happened this week was something that I said...yes. I have one of those "lost in translation" mission stories. So if you say, sihk baau le, it means that you're really full. Well, we were at a cheng out (a dinner appointment) at a member's house my second week here. At the end of dinner I thought I said "I'm really full." I just found out this weekend that instead of saying "sihk baau le" at that cheng out I switched the two words and said "baau sihk le" meaning "to poop". So basically instead of showing my gratitude to them by telling them I ate so much that I'm full, I told them "I really need to poop." ...woops.  SO the miracle of the week. When we went for a zone find in Yuen Long, I went with my companion to Gam Tin. For all three hours we were trying to talk to people. A lot of people rejected us. Some people were willing to listen for a couple of seconds. Others were willing to chat a bit, but not really interested in learning more about Jesus Christ. So on our way back we were walking through this alleyway full of doors to knock on. As we were going through the alleyway, we randomly stopped this guy that was passing us to see if he'd like to learn more about Jesus Christ. He looked at us and said, "I'm really sorry, I don't speak Chinese." He ended up being from Britain and just working here. We were able to teach him the first lesson. It was a pretty great lesson too! He ended up being willing to learn more about our church and was actually fairly interested.  It's really amazing to see the blessings God bestows upon us as long as we follow the scriptures teachings- that is to "thrusteth in your sickle with all your might". We walked all over Gam Tin for about 3 hours, finding nobody willing to learn more about Jesus Christ, but while we were walking back to the train station to go back, we met one person willing to listen more about our message. Despite the lack of success we seemed to have at first, we were able to find one person prepared to receive the gospel. I say that that is success. How great the worth of the soul is to God. Being able to help bring just one person unto Christ is such a joyful occasion! Teaching people the good news of Jesus Christ and His restored gospel, is the only thing I want to be doing right now. I'm so glad that I am here. I love it. I love discussing about Jesus Christ and gospel 24/7. I hope you all are sharing this gospel with others as well!! It's so wonderful. It brings hope into one's life. It brings happiness. It brings peace. I know that God really called another prophet to direct His church. Without straight direction from God through prophets, we would be lost. Gospel truths would be distorted or tweaked a little bit. Because we have a prophet of God on this earth today, we can know how to come back to God's presence and live with our families for time and all eternity.  I hope you all are doing so well!  How is the family?? Also, when is Susie's baby due? I got Reid and Susie's letters the other day. Made my day. I also got Callie Varner's letter!! I love you all! I hope you all are striving to learn more about Christ and His gospel. It really has brought happiness and peace to my life and I know it will bless your life as well. I love you all! Have a wonderful week! :) -Elder Johnson