First thing I have to say, is Good Luck Twin! I love you Car! You're going to be an awesome missionary, and the experience of serving a mission will be the greatest time of your life up to this point. I can promise you that! Hey Family and Friends! How's it going? This week flew by, and so much happened. It was amazing how many miracles that I saw this week. I'll try and remember them all. I'm probably just going to be all over the place as I write this, like last week. English class on Tuesday was not that great, probably one of the worst ones that I've been apart of here. We didn't have that many people, so we combined the basic and advanced classes. The students just were not participating and seemed bored most of the time, and me and Elder Oak are completely out of ideas for new things to teach and games to play. Any ideas for activities that will get the students speaking English? We need help! Wednesday was a pretty good one. The Zone leaders came over to Thonburi at 8:00 a.m., just in time for studies, so we switched-off and studied with them. I was with Elder Raven, my Pa (trainer). He hasn't changed a bit. We had District meeting at the church after that, and we did a role play. I was the investigator for the Sisters from Bang Khae, and they made me act like a girl. It was hilarious, and we could not stop laughing throughout the entire thing. Then me and Elder Raven took off and went to Asoke. DOWNtown Bangkok. The office Elders, AP's, International Elders, and Bangkok west zone leaders work in that area, and it's way sweet. The rest of the mission gets jipped when it comes to apartments. I realized when I got there that I would be with 3 of my former comps (Bartling, Raven, Segura) and Elder Hunsaker, from my district in Buriram. Pretty cool. We taught one of Elder Raven's investigators that night, Sis. MaiMii. We were planning on teaching the Plan of Salvation, but she talked basically the entire time, so we were only able to share a couple of scriptures about Lehi's Dream. Definitely a long lesson, but it's all good. Elder Oakeson and Elder Radmall came back to Asoke that night, so the apartment was pretty packed. We all went and played sports the next morning, which apparently the Asoke elders do every morning. Not going to lie, I'm pretty jealous. And I enjoyed soccer a lot more than I thought I would (even though I was one of the worst on the field). I'm stoked to play with my nephews when I get home. We headed home after that, and were able to meet with Run at the church. That's where the first (major) miracle of the week happened. We started off by watching Finding Faith in Christ, and talked a little bit about that and repentance and some other stuff. We were kind of all over the place, so it wasn't going that great. But then we asked her if she was still planning on going to Singapore this Sunday. She said that something had gone wrong with her documentation, and she wasn't able to go. She didn't know what had happened, but me and Elder Oak did. We explained to her that it was a blessing from our Heavenly Father. He didn't want her to go, and he provided a way. I know that to be true, 100%. Friday was just a lot of planning for the coming week, along with a lesson with Soda. We taught the Gospel of Christ, but she seemed really unfocused. But we asked some inspired questions and that really got her talking, and it turned out to be a great lesson. We haven't officially changed her date to March yet, but we're stilling planning on it. Probably this week. Saturday was one of the craziest, yet one of the best days of my mission so far. We had to get up at 5:30 that morning to make sure that we could be in Asoke by 8. We had meeting/devotional thing with all of the Elders and Sisters in Bangkok. All of my former comps were there, so it was really cool to talk to them. We had to speakers at the devotional, Elder Richard F. Evans, and Elder Gerit W. Gong, both members of the First Quorum of the Seventy. Elder Gong is in the Asia Area presidency, and Elder Evans is the head executive of the missionary department. It was an awesome meeting. Elder Evans took most of the time and talked about how the key to true conversion is repentance, because repenting is what allows us to have the companionship of the Holy Ghost. I learned a lot of great things, and me and Elder Oak are planning on applying them to our work. Once we got back to Thonburi, we had four lessons lined up. We first taught Sis. Jenny the 10 Commandments. Sis. Jiab (the girl who got baptized last week) helped out and will be a great friend for her. The second lesson, we taught Jiab herself about the ordinances of the temple. She really has a desire to go. I honestly cannot wait for the day when Thailand gets a temple. It will be one of the happiest days of my life. The 3rd lesson was with a guy named Boss, and he definitely is a boss. He's a referral from a member that came to the baptism and church last week. We gave him a Book of Mormon last Sunday, and he's finished it already! Less than a week! And he's already talking about baptism for himself. That was the second major miracle that I saw this week. The final lesson we had was with Dukadan. We taught her about the 10 commandments as well, and the lesson was awesome. She had some concerns with the "no-worshipping" (since she was Buddhist), and the Sabbath day with work (just like everyone else). But we spoke straight to her, the Spirit was very strong, and she just...got it. She came to the conclusion that she had to follow it, and so she is. She even left the church with us and headed to the store to buy some things so that she didn't have to buy them on Sunday! Awesome lesson. Sunday was great! We got an assignment from Pres. Senior yesterday to contact a white family that was on vacation here that he had met, and get them to church. So we did, and they got there. When sacrament meeting started, we had 4 investigators there. By the end of the meeting, even though some were a little late, we had 8 there! So awesome. Soda, Dukadan, Run, Boss and his wife, Jenny, and two ladies that had come to English class a couple of weeks ago named Ming and Bee. The Lord is doing work in Thonburi! We were able to meet with Ming and Bee afterwards as well. Ming was semi-interested, but Bee asked some great questions about prayer, so we taught her about it and challenged her to try it out that night. We should be meeting with them again tomorrow. That night, Dukadan called us and gave some great news. She has been scared to talk to her parents about her learning with the Elders and going to church, but when she talked to her dad last night, she just told him straight up, and he didn't get mad in the least. He just said that "all religions teach to be good." That was the 3rd major miracle this week, along with her lesson the night before. She said she is "excited to be baptized soon!" I'm so stoked for her! She also said that she had a day off today, and wanted to spend the day reading in the scriptures, so we gave her some chapters to read (Mosiah 4&5). We'll probably be giving her a date this week. Today is solid. Had another zone sports day this morning, bishop's house for tacos a little later, and then Dan's tonight. I'm loving Thonburi right now!
So it's still freezing there, huh? Sorry! Yes, I am happy that I am missing the coldest winter in 40 years. The farewell sounds like it was a hit! Wish I could've been there.
Well, gotta go! The Church is True!
Love,
เอ็ลเดอร์ชาร์ป
Elder Sharp
Rool has gone International
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