September 9, 2014 Letter

Sept. 9, 2014
 
Hello!!
 
I am one year older and wiser too this week!!  Hopefully!!!
 
We don't have a ton planned for the day of my birthday because it's a Saturday and we are only interested in building up the Kingdom of God on Saturdays!!  But we are buying a cake and going to get a nice steak dinner!
 
So, this week has been wonderful!!  It's funny how talents that we develop in our lives come in handy when sharing the gospel!!  So, thank you very much for teaching me chess because I have contacted a lot of people because of how god I am at it!  In Indonesia, there are people playing chess everywhere!!!!!!  Like no joke!!  So what my companion and I do is while I am playing the game and trying my best to win, my companion is getting all the information of the nice Indonesians that think it is so funny that a Bule (white person) is playing cantor (chess) with them.  And, yes, they are very good!!  My last game, I played got down to both of us having two rooks and I had one pawn so, of course, I used my great end game skills and queened the pawn and won, but let's just say that one was TOO close for comfort!!!
 
Sunday was the highlight of the week!!  President Donald came to Sacrament with an Area Seventy!!  And the greatest part was that this week we had three investigators at church!  Not that it matters but...it's nice to look good!  So after having some awesome spiritual meetings with everyone giving great testimonies, I am sure that these people will be staying at church!
 
After that though, I had some hardship...because it was hot...I was tired and hungry (Fast Sunday) and my body was kind of sick of this everyday riding crazy distances.  Then 5 people were not at their homes that we went to, and all our appointments fell through, and at that moment my faith and attitude is put to the test!  I pressed forward, but it was hard!  But the Lord gave me tender mercy after tender mercy after tender mercy!!
 
We finally taught someone that we met the week before, and after he talked to us for about an hour, we taught him about the restoration and he said he wants to read the Book of Mormon!!  Yay!!  The church is true!!!
 
But that doesn't compare to Jeff!  We met Jeff in a weird way...well, the Lord works in mysterious ways!!  So, we met Jeff's brother outside of his house while he was leaving.  We lonely had 30 seconds so we couldn't get his number, but he said just come back next week.  So, we came back this week and knocked on the gate...everyone has gates, and Jeff comes out.  Now Jeff speaks perfect English and is a bit bigger.  He was super confused why we were there and who these two white guys are.  He informed us that his brother was at work and that he doesn't believe in God (awkward).  Well, he still invited us in because that is what they do here, so we came in and he was so confused why his brother would invite us to come back!  We learned that Jeff is Christian and his brother doesn't believe in anything.  He asked us how we got his brother wanting to know about God...well, we didn't know...but we told him that we have the restored gospel and the Book of Mormon, and he wanted to know about that BOOK!!  After we taught him, he said he is coming to our church and if he gets an answer he wants to join and be baptized...umm what...hahaha!  IT WAS SO COOL!!!!!!! So, I hope that goes perfectly because the Lord is leading this work and I know that on my own I could really do nothing!!!
 
Things that made me smile:
 
1) We killed all the bugs in our house!!!  Like 15 cockroaches and yeah...there still there though....
 
2) Oreos!!  Frozen a little...SO GOOD!!!
 
3)  People that don't think I know what they are saying...haha so many funny conversations that I do understand and they don't know until I start speaking to them!!  haha
 
4)  Oatmeal with some apples and yogurt...living the high life!!!
 
Mom, it is so cool that you got to go to Nauvoo and Carthage and see all those awesome thing!!!  I remember how much my testimony was strengthened when I saw the Sacred Grove.  Tell Kayden congrats and I brag about him so much here!!
 
I love you!!
 
HURRAH FOR INDONESIA FOR INDONESIA HURRAH!!!!