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| With Sofia Liu |
Yesterday was SO fun! We had an awesome church service.... Huangcong Min blessed the sacrament, and Jerry passed the sacrament! He passed it to US while we were sitting next to Chen Yilun! All 3 of our recent converts at church, ah, love it!! Then after church we took a ward picture, so fun!!! Then the ward provided dinner. Since it is Christmas time and everyone knows we missionaries are missing American Christmas, we get a lot of free stuff! Like mostly food haha, so much foooooddd!! Then our ward gave us the nicest surprise...care packages from the ward with cards signed by everyone! OH wow, I was so touched, it was so nice! Full of candy and instant noodles! Haha yay:) And Jerry gave Sister Branch and I key chains with his name on it....a little strange, but so awesome! I absolutely LOVE our ward to pieces!!!!
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| Christmas Necklaces! |
Then we taught Tony and his family!!! He seems to really want to learn about his gospel, but his wife is kind of opposed...so we aren't sure if he'll progress but we hope so!!! He will continue to come to English class though so that’s good! We had a music party that same night for all of the wards in the stake to come to! It was beautiful singing and we got to talk to our members after! And JOY CAME!!! Yah, miracle right there! She showed up after it was over of course, always late, but she still came and got to feel the Spirit!
With Joy!
Then Friday we got to go to Taipei for Temple Tour Training!!! Let me tell you, seeing all of my beloved sisters and feeling their love and having everyone tell me they missed me and hear about everyone's success was JUST what I needed! Turns out I'm not the only one having trouble with skirts flying up while riding bikes and worrying about gaining weight and struggling with Chinese! That and along with President and Sister Day's training and delicious brownies made for a PERFECT day!!! I miss all of my amazing missionary friends so much!! Also...I saw all the new missionaries!! So, so fun!
So...in the MTC it was a joke that I had old lady clothes because we saw me wearing something an older sister missionary was wearing at least 3 times. Well this past month I saw an Ama wearing my favorite pants that I got from China and then this past Thursday I saw an Ama with MY BAG. Aw man...whatever, I guess I'm just fitting in to the Taiwanese culture:)
So the HIGHLIGHT of this amazing week was exchanges on Tuesday and Wednesday. Why you ask? Because I was leading the area with Sister Cutler!!! On Tuesday when we exchanged, she had been in Taiwan for 4 DAYS. No pressure right?? So, I basically told Heavenly Father that I was leaving it to Him for me not to get lost, for me to be able to speak Chinese, etc. because I had absolutely no confidence that I could do it myself.
Exchanges with Sister Cutler
Lo and behold, we saw SO MANY MIRACLES. We found 4 new investigators in one day, had 6 lessons in 30 minutes, handed out 4 copies of the Book of Mormon, and had a recent convert lesson with Yoyo. We didn't get lost and my Chinese was the best it's ever been. I learned from this many things...1. I need more confidence in myself. I actually do know what I'm doing sometimes. 2. When we trust Heavenly Father, crazy awesome things happen. Never in my life have I turned something over to Him quite so completely.
I can promise you all right now, if I were to have tried to do it on my own and rely only on my own abilities, we probably wouldn't have even been able to get back to our area from the chapel. But because I just said "Ok, I can NOT do this, please help me" we saw miracles. Also, we had awesome peikes of Sofia and the Tan sisters who just went out there and proclaimed the gospel with all their might.
Not to mention, how AWESOME Sister Cutler is!! She never got frustrated, she said what she knew how to say, she was sincere and kind and told me things that I needed to hear. She is fabulous and she's only been on island for a little over a week!! So my friends and family, here is a real life example of what amazing things can happen when we trust God, because He knows our full potential even when we don't know our own.
Monday was great too because we went to Yang Jiating's house and Jerry gave the lesson!! He shared a story from his childhood - in school, everyone brought gifts for their classmates, but he didn't get any. He went up to the teacher and asked why he didn't get anything - the teacher gave him a sock, and said that this the best gift that he could receive because then he could put things in it. He said he didn't really understand it until recently - at the Christmas party that we had for English class a couple weeks ago, he got a Christmas stocking for the white elephant gift exchange. He asked us where the gift was and we kept telling him that that was the gift and that he can put things on the inside. He said that he took it home and pondered it - he came to a realization that he has so many great gifts in his life, one of the greatest being the Book of Mormon.
He says that we gave him such an amazing gift when we gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon, because the previous missionaries he met with wouldn't give him one and he wanted a copy of the book that he heard would change his life and tell him how to return to live with our Heavenly Father. He is so amazing. Of course something from Jerry's childhood relates to something from the time we first met him, OF COURSE!! Our lives are forever intertwined with Jerry's and I love it. He applies everything to the gospel and says everything happened to lead up to now, getting to know and learn of the true gospel of Jesus Christ.
I want you all to go on your Facebooks RIGHT NOW and post the link to He is The Gift on your profile. http://youtu.be/uzjFEMmM0Xs
THERE I even copied it for you!!! Please, please, please go watch it, it is amazing and such a good missionary tool. I can't use Facebook, so you all can just share it for me. :)
This has been such a good week for my testimony to grow. I know that I have so so, so much to work on but through this experience and with God's help, I can do it! I am fully ready to let this mission mold me in to who He wants and needs me to be. I challenge you all to remember that He is our Father and the one we should trust the most. Also remember that Jesus is our Savior and all mistakes and inadequacies can be made right through Him! Without his death, his birth which we celebrate this month would have been just another birth. So let us utilize the precious gift of Him.
Quotes of inspiration that I learned this week:
"Thoughts of helplessness, hopelessness, or harsh condemnation are not
from the Lord." -AML
"If you never try, you'll never fail so try it well." -Smiles for Life, Alex Boye
"Your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of
God." -1 Corinthians 2:5
"Our detours and disappointments are the straight and narrow path to
Him." -Pres. Howard W. Hunter
"We celebrate the birth of a Savior who lives today and still works for our salvation. He knows what each of us needs and how to give it to us." - A Missionary Christmas
I love you all very, very much and I can't wait to hear about what Christmas miracles you have experienced!!!
Sister Wright (Taiwan Taipei Mission)
Rèn Jiěmèi 任曼欣姐妹
Christmas Care Package from home!
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