3 exchanges in a week!

Hi all,

 

Having a Sister Training Leader as your companion means you need to go on a couple exchange every transfer which is pretty fun. My companion is in charge of 3 sets of sisters. At the beginning of the transfer, she scheduled to have 1 exchange every week. But 2 sets of sisters had to reschedule the date, so we ended up having 3 exchanges this past week, which means I wasn't with my companion for half of the week. Besides the packing and unpacking part, I really do like exchanges as I enjoy getting to know other sister missionaries and to learn from them.

 

The BEST exchange of the week was the one with Sister Prows! She was my Sister Training Leader for the first 6 months on my mission. On our very first exchange, she helped me overcome my fear of knocking on doors in less than two hours. She is amazing! I really look up to her a lot. I had been excited for this exchange since the first week of this transfer. We exchanged on Thursday night, and I went to downtown Seattle to stay with Sister Prows for a day. We started talking as soon as we got in the car. We were both very excited to have our 4th exchange together. During companion study, we discussed how to bring up baptism in the first minute of contact and what to say when people say that they have already been baptized. After study, we did service - picking up trash at a parking lot close to Chinatown. It was pretty fun. Traffic in downtown Seattle is always crazy, and it's really hard to find a parking spot, so we pretty much street contacted for the whole afternoon. We had lots of fun talking to people. In the past exchanges, I would always just stand next to Sister Prows when she was talking to people as I was so scared. But this time we finally could just talk to people on the street together! It made me feel really good. We talked with a guy who was holding a bottle of alcohol. We had set a goal that morning to bring up BAPTISM with everyone we came in contact with that day. So we talked with him about how he could improve his life through following Jesus Christ. He expressed a desire to change, so both of us told him that he first had to throw away his alcohol! We were really bold and persistent. I told him he could find much more strength from the Book of Mormon. He accepted the Book of Mormon but wouldn't throw away the alcohol. He said he wouldn't buy anymore after finished drinking this bottle. We told him again alcohol wouldn't be good to his health at anytime. He still wouldn't throw it away. Well, at least we did try. People still have their agency. That evening, we visited a potential investigator named Mark (name changed). Sister Prows told me beforehand that Mark sometimes would make some pretty offensive comments, and his wife was quite rude when they stopped by last week. She always prepares me before a visit. I can't even imagine Mark's wife was rude to them last time as she was so friendly this time. She actually sat on the lesson and said that she would want to read the Book of Mormon also! People change. Miracles always happen on exchanges! I can't ask for a better exchange than this one. I have learned a lot from Sister Prows ever since I came out. She could always teach me something no matter we were studying, teaching a lesson, street contacting, or knocking on doors. Most importantly, she could help me be MOTIVATED and BOLD. She is awesome.

 

Yesterday was a really really rough day for my companion and I. We tried really hard to invite everyone we could think of to the New Member Fireside, but nobody could come. We couldn't go unless we had an investigator to bring, so we went tracting. People were soooooo rude to us. I felt so defeated. My companion and I always took turn to start the conversation on doorstep. It was my turn to start the conversation at the last door we knocked on, but thank goodness she started it because that person was so rude! I thanked her for doing that door as I knew I would have said something that a disciple of Christ wouldn't say. I was just so frustrated. Both of us have been working hard and are obedient, but the number of lessons or baptisms we have doesn't reflect how hard we have tried. We had an interview with President Choi last week. He told me that he could see me baptize lots of people on my mission. I honestly can't see it happen yet as I have had only 1 baptism and am already halfway done of my mission. But I'll still be working hard because after all these trials I still know that the Church is true:)

 

Love,

Sister Leung

Where did the time go?

Hi all,

 

I can't believe that we are already halfway into this transfer and I will be in Hong Kong 9 months from now. Time goes by really fast when you are having fun. I still really miss my last two areas but at the same time love my current area. Lots of members have told us that they hadn't had sister missionaries in their ward for over 20 years so they are really excited that we are here. And the fact that I am from Hong Kong helps also!:) Whenever I tell people I am from Hong Kong, they will be like "That's sooooo cool!", and lots of people here have been to Hong Kong and all of them enjoyed it. This past week, we received 16 referrals from members! Lots of members in this ward are missionary minded. They really know their neighbors well and want them to find greater peace and happiness in their lives.

 

Of course, we still had lots of finding time during the week. Believe it or not, it rained throughout the whole week. But I know that we are the creator of the circumstances, so we can still be happy if we choose to. We have been praying really hard to be cheerful and to have charity towards people that we come in contact with. We tracted into a man named Bill (name changed). He didn't seem interested at all at the beginning but didn't shut the door, so we kept talking. We testified to him that the Church that Christ set up when He was on the earth was restored to the Prophet Joesph Smith. We also told him that we had a living prophet. He then told us that he actually had been to one of our Church services. But he told us he didn't understand why members of the Church would devote that much time to serving in the Church. It was a great question. I told him that many members were willing to devote their time to serving in the Church only because they knew that the Church was true. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the only true Church, and that is why I'm willing to give up 18 months of my life to serve as a full-time missionary. Missionary work is super hard, and the reason I'm still cheerfully serving a mission after getting a million door-slams is that I know the Church is true. I don't understand everything in the Bible or the Book of Mormon, but I know this much - The Book of Mormon is the word of God, Joseph Smith is a true prophet, and Jesus Christ died for each one of us. Learning the Gospel is a lifelong process, and we don't need to know everything to share the gospel. There were times that I just needed to tell people that I didn't know the answer to their question and led them back to the basics. Our message is either true or not, and it is all based on if the Book of Mormon is true, and I know it is! If you already have a testimony of the Book of Mormon, please pray for missionary opportunities and the courage you need. If you haven't gained a testimony, I would invited you to start reading the Book of Mormon and to pray sincerely to Heavenly Father to find it out for yourself. I know He does answer our prayers.

 

Hope you all have a good week.

 

Love,

Sister Leung

With all the sister missionaries in the Bellevue zone. Yes, I'm still the only Asian:)

With Hermana Hale. She met my friend in the Mexico MTC. Small world!

I'm in love with Washington! It's such a pretty place.

With my companion, Sister Capener

I have no idea where these DUCKS came from.

 

MIRACLES on a rainy day

Hi all,

 

Last week was a WONDERFUL week. My companion and I are getting along and are loving the area. Since my companion is a Sister Training Leader, she had to attend leadership council last Friday, so I went on an exchange with Sister Monks and Sister Lee, whose companions are also Sister Training Leaders. We all stayed in my area as it is close to the mission office. We street contacted on the way to the bus transit center. The bus transit center is an amazing place to meet people. We were there for less than an hour but got to teach 7 lessons! When we were about to have lunch, a member of the ward called us and told us that he was helping a lady who had investigated the Church before to move some furniture in. He thought it would be a great chance for us to meet her as we never caught her home. So we drove there and helped her to move the couch in. We got to share a scripture with her and set up a return appointment! :) MIRACLE!

 

Our District set a goal to contact 500 people on Saturday. We prayed that it would be a sunny day so that more people would be out, but it didn't happen. It rained for the whole day. I mean pouring rain. But we tried really hard to stay cheerful as we knew that the Lord could still create miracles under the rain. We went street contacting all day. We were soaking wet that we had to change during lunch time and dinner time. It was fun though. My companion and I used 3 languages (Russian, English, Mandarin) to contact. It was pretty awesome. Two of us together can actually street contact in 6 languages - English, Cantonese (I can still speak some even though I really have lost a lot), Mandarin, Spanish, French, and Russian. :D We didn't get to have any lesson during street contacting, but the Lord blessed us to have some awesome miracles. When we were at the bus transit center, we talked with a young man named Alan (name changed) who had been less active forever. He said that he wanted to come back to Church. While we were talking to him, I noticed that behind him there was a girl sitting on the bench waiting for the bus. I looked at her, and it was a familiar face! It was Kori (name changed). She was someone from the first area that I served in. She saw me also, and I ran up to give her a hug. We were so excited to see each other again. Her mom was investigating the Church so we visited them pretty often. Kori sometimes would sit on the lesson. She moved to Bellevue not long after I got transferred out of that area. I got her address and phone number so that we could visit her! I was sooooooo happy! It was definitely a miracle that I got to see her again after 5 months. Another miracle. That evening, we had a wonderful doorstep lesson with a teenager named Ben (name changed). I guess he was about 17, but he was really mature. He was really open to listen to our message and asked some really good questions. We got to share the whole Restoration with him and committed him to read the Book of Mormon. I know that the Lord will bless us when we have done our part. At the end of that day, our District with only 3 sets of missionaries had contacted 584 people.

 

I used to be terrified of street contacting, but I'm totally comfortable doing it now. I know that we don't need to be afraid when we are declaring the words of God. I would like to invite you all to share the gospel with those around you. The Lord has promised us that words will be given to us by the Holy Ghost if we first open our mouth to share His gospel.

 

Love,

Sister Leung

Street contacting in the rain can still be FUN if you choose to stay cheerful:)



Whitewashi​ng is FUN!

Hi all,

 

This past week has been wonderful. Whitewashing is not as scary as I thought it would be. It has been pretty FUN so far. I think one of the reasons is because I'm companions with a Sister Training Leader who knows how to handle different situations.

 

Even though I haven't even been in this area for a week, I have already talked with lots of Chinese people. I use Mandarin every day. We visited a Chinese family that had investigated the Church before. The mom could speak pretty good English, so we just kept talking with her in English until she didn't know how to express some of her feelings. Her 10 year old son was next to her, so she spoke to him in Mandarin and asked him to tell us in English. Of course I could fully understand what she was saying, so I started talking to her in Mandarin, and she became more open to us because of it. She started asking lots of questions. I was surprised by her misunderstandings about the Church. I'm glad that I got to clarify her misunderstandings in her native language. I can be quite bold when I talk to people now, especially to Asians. I explained to her the role of the Book of Mormon in our conversion and testified to her that the fullness of the Gospel could only be found The Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints. We committed to her to pray about the Book of Mormon. Hopefully we will see some progress.

 

I don't think I mentioned in my email last week that we are serving with the Elders and the senior couple in the same ward. I served with Elders in my first area, and it was fun. But this time the Elders we serve with are the Assistants to the President! Both my companion and I were really nervous about it. I'm now surrounded by missionaries who are in leadership positions. I studied about HUMILITY the other day during personal study and understood that my fear of serving with the assistants to the President came from my pride. I should see this opportunity as a blessing as I know that I'm going to learn a lot this transfer. And I know that the more humble I am, the more I am going to learn.

 

We were tracting the whole afternoon in the rain. Lots of people were wondering why we would be out in the rain, so we took the chance to tell them it was because we had a wonderful message to share. No many people were willing to listen but two. We talked with a Chinese teenage girl who didn't have any religious background. My companion asked her if we could come back another time to share a message with her whole family. She said maybe not as she was always busy with school. She told us that she cared a lot about her grades. It was a perfect time for me to bear testimony of how the Gospel could help us with school work. I shared with her 3 Nephi 13:33 "But seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." and bore testimony of how prayers and scripture study helped me survive in college. She then shared with us her experience of prayer when she was little. We then got to talk with her a bit about the Plan of Salvation and our purpose of life.There is definitely some potential there. We then talked with another lady named Liz (name changed). At first she wasn't interested at all and told us "Mormon is not for me". I then asked her if she already knew something about our Church. She started telling us things that she had heard about our Church, and all of them weren't true. Luckily, she gave my companion the chance to clarify those misunderstandings. She then asked us why there were so many churches then. Perfect question! My companion told her briefly but clearly about the Great Apostasy and how the Restoration was needed. Her attitude completely changed after that. She told us that she had asked many people that question, but no one could even give her the answer. She then asked us for the Church address and even grabbed the Book of Mormon from my hand! She said that she would love to learn more about what we believed. My companion gave her an overview of the Book of Mormon and committed her to read it.My mind was full of people from the North Creek ward yesterday when I was sitting at Church. I'm grateful to have met lots of wonderful people in that ward: Crandall's, Jackson's, Farley's, Roll's, McDonald's, Dingle's. Ivie's, Cain's, Gardner's...I can't name them all. My companion also served in that ward before (I actually took her plate), so we often talk about members in that ward and how awesome they are. And I still miss my first area Somerset even though it has been 5 months since I left. But that's alright, I know that I will see them again when I come back to visit. I know that I will meet lots of amazing people in this area also and am very excited to be serving here!

 

Love,

Sister Leung