Haha fam what is good! Talyon's
mission call is so exciting-- someone give that kid some love for me. That’s
sweet I’m stoked for him!
This week has been so much
fun. I’m gonna have to pull out
the journal to remember all the good stuff ;)-
So last week elder Calderon and I
cruised to central plaza- this giant mall place- to go contacting and find
people who want to learn about Jesus and be baptized. Clearly it was inspired
bc we ran into one of our investigators Nayana, this cute little Thai lady speaks
English and is a casino black jack dealer in Vegas for 6 months out of the year
haha. She is super cool though, and has a baptism date for this Sunday the 8th,
so we'll see how that goes. Then
elder Calderon took me to this heavenly place in the mall where there’s just a
bunch of massage chairs and so we took a nice hour nap in the chairs. It felt wayyyy good haha except it got
weird when I would open my eyes every once in a while to see Thai girls on the
floor above like staring down at us hahahaah. Cereal here is different so I’m pretty bummed about that,
but I found Nutella the other day so I’ve been having Nutella peanut butter
honey and banana toast which has been bomb. Some of the Thai food here is
definitely different, but my companion’s been pretty nice to me so far. We only have gone to eat at a member’s
house once so far and she fed us spaghetti haha so nothing unusual yet.
We taught English Tuesday night and
it was actually super fun haha playing like little games with all the Thai
people they are so cute. Some super good news this week: I finally bought my
new bike and it is capital D- Dope!
I fly around Thailand now.
We started teaching a new girl this
week who was a walk-in, she came into church kinda randomly on Sunday and said
she wanted to learn so that was sweet. Her name is sister Fish- she is a nice
little lady. She’s excited to get
baptized this week! Oh we also did
our first like service type activity for one of our investigators earlier this
week on probably the hottest day this week but it was so worth it! Service is like addicting! Super
rewarding.
So our guy Paa Noy (his name means
little) was progressing super well this last week but on Friday he told us
about this dream he had and he had like some demon tell him that he can learn
and get baptized but he CAN NOT receive the laying on of hands and receive the
gift of the Holy Ghost. And so he
was like, "I’m just really confused and don’t know what to do the whole
time," and he wouldn’t accept any advice from us, and then he didn’t want
to come to church and a bunch of stuff, so were gonna visit him one more time
to try and help him out, but otherwise he's getting dropped which is sad-- He
would've been so awesome and its sad to see how small things and small
decisions are gonna affect him so much for the rest of his life. There’s always a super freaky zombie
looking dog that roams around literally like a zombie and has bugs eating at
its flesh in front of Paa Noy's house so it’ll be nice to not have to be riding
and dodging that scary thing anymore I guess. I’ll try to get a picture of it this week haha. There’s a lot of super nasty mutty dogs
here with like tumors and all sorts of weird things going on.
I was checking out at the grocery
store and someone said something to me in Thai I didn’t understand, so I just
smiled and took my change after paying for the goods, and after my companion
told me that this person called me cute. Very weird- I wasn’t sure how to
react.
We went way hard on inviting and
finding people this week and its been super fun inviting people to be baptized
like just as passing on the sidewalk or stopped together at a stop light. Surprisingly or not surprisingly, I guess we have found a lot of new
people to teach so that’s been super cool this week and a testimony of the
importance of talking to EVERYONE- its been cool following Christ's example and
command to invite all to come unto him "and ye see that I have commanded
that none of you should go away, but rather have commanded that ye should come
unto me, that ye might feel and see; even so shall ye do unto the
world..." (3 Nephi 18:25)
OH! we also found this aweeesommme
investigator named Gang. He is a
cool 30 or 40 yr old dude who investigated for a while in the past but never
got baptized bc he couldn’t quit smoking.
We found him while calling thru random numbers on our phone and asking
people to come to church haha and he was stoked that we called and was way
excited to meet with the missionaries again. He still has a super bad addiction, but our lesson went
really well. My comps dad quit
smoking after being addicted for 30+ years and was able to give Gang a lot of
hope and so I think he’s been sober for a little over 24 hours right now. Stoked to see him really change through
Christ. He has a beautiful little
family and it was a tender mercy bc his wife wasn’t at all interested in
learning about Christ the last time the missionaries taught this family- but
they have a baptismal date for this Sunday, and have been praying and reading
the scriptures together as a family so if things go as planned this cute little
family will be getting baptized and be sealed in the temple which we're tryna
get here in Thailand.
Alright last miracle in finding
investigators this week: so after inviting foreverrr at Big C we had gotten the
numbers for two people who seemed slightly interested and I was starting to get
frustrated bc so many people were saying no to the golden question of "do
you want to be clean from sin?" and how could anyone say no to that?!?!?!
so anyways we got a call from missionaries in Bangkok who told us they had just
met a guy who actually lives in Phitsanulok and wants to go to church that
Sunday. So we were stoked, we met
him Sunday morning before church to take him over to the church, and he is this
black guy from Africa, speaks mainly English not much Thai, and is honestly
wayyyy sick. So it was testimony
meeting this Sunday and I sat next to him to translate while my comp sat on the
stand bc he’s the counselor in the branch presidency (and i barely understand
anything in church anywaays hahaha) so my companion told me who cares if I
understand what’s being said... its a great opportunity to just testify to him
and teach him all the lessons hahahahah. So I just taught him just about everything through the
slightly accurate translating of the testimonies hahahaha. It actually went really well and we
teach him for the first real time tonight. My comp said it would be dope if my first baptism that i
actually have in Thailand is from Africa, and I agreed. His name’s Barney. Such a stud. Stoked for him.
So last p-day we didn’t end up
going to do anything too adventurous but we are going to apparently the coolest
waterfall in Thailand today so that should be a good time.
So stats for the branch I’m serving
in: we have about an average of 60 people at church each week (10 or so recent
converts, 5 or so investigators) on average. Our goal is to get the number hovering around 85 by the end
of the transfer through baptisms, strengthening recent converts, and rescuing
less actives. Our zone goal is to
focus on unity, obedience, and repentance. President Senior has challenged the
mission for this month of February to be absolutely 100% obedient and to see
the miracles that come from it.
All in all this week has been
awesome and it went by pretty fast. I can’t believe I’ve been a missionary for over 2 months. It’s like whatttt? So exciting being out here though.
As for investigators with
baptismal dates this month dad: My
comp and I have 6 and I think the district has close to 12. Our goal for the transfer is 20.
Last thing- we went to visit a less
active member with brother Gap (a stud 19 yr old kid in our branch who I think
we are trying to get called as the branch mission leader bc we don’t have
one. He comes to help us teach a
lot.) and sister Nancy. Anyways we went driving out to her house
while we were sitting in the back of sister Nancy’s super cool little truck
haha i think i might have a pic of it. and we had to drive WAYYY out of the
city and i felt like i was really in a jungly crazy tropical country for the
first time. it was wayyy cool and so beautiful. so stoked on that.
alright well this is the end. love
you all! its been a great week im doing good and it sounds like everyone is
awesome at home! much love from thailand!
elder chamberlin<3
ps. favorite scripture for the
week: either alma 26:35-37 bc its just dope and gets me pumped to do missionary
work or mosiah 16:9 "he is the light and the life of the world; yea,
a light that is endless that can never be darkened; yea, and also a life which
is endless, that there can be no more death" and connected with it 3 nephi
18:24 "therefore, hold up your light that it may shine unto the world.
Behold i am the light which ye shall hold up-- that which ye have seen me
do..."
สู้ๆน่ะ! (suu suu na) fight on boiii thai people love the saying
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