We've had an ok week here in Zhang Hua. The work is moving quite slowly here, not just for us, but for the elders as well (makes me feel a little better). We talked to way more people this week than we did the week before, but our lessons were still down, and we didn't find any new investigators this past week. But we were able to set up 3 or 4 new investigators for this week, so we are hoping they will turn into progressing investigators!!
The three progressing investigators we do have are doing alright. We met with our older lady this week, who has a hard time hearing, and we convinced her to come to church! We confirmed her on Saturday by going to her house, but then she didn't come to church =[ I was really sad. I was so excited and I knew that having her come to church was going to help her out a lot and even though she might not be able to hear the message really well, she could still feel the spirit. I hope we can get her to come this week.
We weren't able to see our mom and daughter this week though. Because we only go to LuGang once a week, if they are busy that day, we don't have another day to go out there, so we are trying to find members who could go with us and meet her, and also have a car so they can drive us out there. Hopefully we will be able to see them twice this week!
This week youth from our stake have been going on mini-missions for the week. We didn't have one with us because my companion is being trained right now, but we did have one for a day while her companions were at a meeting. It was so fun to have her come with us. She is such a hard worker. Then that night, we had another young woman (who hadn't gone and done the mini-mission) come with us to visit a less-active young woman that we have been visiting for a while now. We were introducing her to Personal Progress, and it was so great to have the active young woman there and sharing her experiences with doing personal progress! It was just really neat. And even cooler was that it was raining and the young woman still went with us and biked in the rain!!
My companion is so great! She is progressing and learning so fast! New missionaries complete what is called "Phase 1" which is a language study program. Missionaries are to set a goal for when the want to finish it (there are 7 evaluations, one for the missionary lessons 1-5 and then a mid-evaluation and a final evaluation). My companion's goal is one move-call. I also finished it in one move-call, but I had language experience when I got here, and so it wasn't really too hard for me. When she set that goal, I knew she could do it. It is proving to be more difficult because she didn't have the language skills before hand, but she is doing so amazing! She is still on track to finish it by the end of the move-call! She is always studying and always doing her best to learn as much as she can! This week she was working on teaching the Plan of Salvation and we spent time going over it together and then teaching it to one of our recent converts. She did so good! I'm so proud of her and the hard work she is putting in.
Sunday our ward moved to 9 AM. Our ward is really big, geographically, and the church building isn't even in our ward, which makes it even further. I was really nervous that no one would be at church on time, or come at all. But, we had 97 people at sacrament meeting!!!! That was the highest we've had since last November!!! We normally average between 68-78, so I was so proud of our ward. We really have a great ward with fantastic members, and I do love serving with them!!
I can't really think of too much else. You all will only be getting 3 more emails after this, and that is just too crazy to think! I'm getting excited to see everyone, but I'm really trying to savor these last few weeks before they are gone forever.
Being a missionary has been a really neat experience. It hasn't been the easiest thing, but it has been worth every hardship, and I have grown so much. I keep wondering if I've really changed, but lately I've been going back through my mission journals and reading about where I was a year ago, and it's been really great to see how I have changed. My testimony of the gospel has grown so much. My faith in the Savior has grown so much. I know that this is His gospel, and that this is His work that I am doing. I am so grateful He has trusted me with His work, and I hope that I can continue to do what He wants me to do till the end.
Thank you all for your love and support! I am so excited to see you all again in a few short weeks!!
Lots of love!!! Enjoy the double rainbow we saw out our window last night!
Hi my name is Whitney Mangelson and I also got called to serve in the Taiwan Taichung mission and I leave October 2nd! I looked up your blog online and I read through some of your entries, especially the ones where you were at the MTC and it makes me feel not as nervous to leave :) because of this blog I know more of what to expect, and I am so thankful for that! Thank you for posting up entries I am so excited to serve my mission, and I can already tell you have been so blessed by yours:)
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