April 29, 2012

This week was an awesome week for us. We found a new investigator named Sun (that is his English name, we still don't know his Korean name). He has all sorts of questions about our church and has a genuine desire to learn. My companion met him on the bus a couple of weeks ago and began talking to him. He is really good at English and teaches English down here in Mokpo. He is an alcoholic, but really wants to stop drinking so we're trying to help him through it. He has been looking all over the internet about our church and we just answer all his questions and concerns and he seems to be understanding more now. He asked us how we can believe that Joseph Smith truly did restore the church and not make any of it up and we responded that it is through the Book of Mormon that we know these things. We had a great lesson on the Book of Mormon being convincing evidence that the true church was restored to the earth because if the Book of Mormon is true (and it is) then all other aspects of our church must be true. We gave him a copy and we hope he begins to read out of it. We also had 3 baptisms this week which was so special for the family. The mom used to hate churches, but through the example of the members here in Mokpo gained a desire to learn about our church and she recognized it as truth so she was baptized with her two sons. I had the privilege to baptize her two sons and it was a lot different because I've never done it before. I've always been on the receiving end so to baptize someone was a really special experience, especially when you say the baptismal prayer in Korean! We're excited for their further progression in the church and we're hoping that the ward will fellowship them well.

April 22, 2012

This week was a pretty good one for us here in Mokpo. We unfortunately had to move our investigator's baptismal date to next Sunday 4/29 because the mother had to go up to Seoul this past Saturday. They'll have their interview tomorrow and with no unforeseen complications they'll be baptized on Sunday. They are such an awesome family, it's a mother and her two sons and they've really progressed since first meeting the missionaries. We also saw some other success with a young man named Kim Ta Bin. He is 14 years old and we met him on the street last week and were able to get his phone number so we called him and met him and we were able to set a baptismal date with him for the 27th of May. We're kind of concerned though because he hasn't been responding to calls recently so we think his parents saw the Book of Mormon that we gave him and told him not to meet with us anymore. We're hoping for the best right now though.

April 8, 2012

We met with our investigator with a baptismal date. Her name is Lee Gyu Ok and she is so ready to be baptized. We taught her about the word of wisdom and she loves drinking coffee so she knew it would be hard, but she committed to live it so we're super excited. We met her again last night though with her two sons and taught them the plan of salvation and the gospel of Jesus Christ and they accepted it pretty well. They are 9 and 11, so they're really young right now and will rely on the testimony of their mother so we're not too worried about them, mostly the mom. She cut back her coffee drinking significantly to only 1 cup a day last week so we were so proud of her, she's really making an effort to change and she came out to General Conference yesterday so it was really good. We watched conference as a zone down in Gwangju on Saturday because they weren't showing it at our church building on Saturday so we watched it there. Conference is always a wonderful time of year and it was so much more special to watch it as a missionary. I hope that you got an opportunity to watch all the sessions of General Conference as well. They do it a little differently in my ward here in Mokpo, they only watched Sunday morning session together which was a little different, but at least they were able to hear the prophet's words. We were able to watch all the sessions in English which was awesome because I would have no idea what they were saying if it was in Korean. 

April 1, 2012

The first half of the week I said goodbyes to some of the members and investigators out in Chungju and we ended up eating dinner with our favorite members of the ward. They took us out to eat the Korean version of bacon called Samgyupsar, and it was so delicious. On Wednesday we went down to Cheongju (where the rest of my district is serving at) and we ate dinner together as a district because it was our District Leader's last day as a missionary. We then spent the night in my greenie house as part of my travel plans and then the next day I took a series of trains and buses to get all the way down to Mokpo. The area here is absolutely beautiful, it is not too hot and not too cold right now and it is spring time so all the trees and flowers are blooming. We are right on the coast of the ocean so it is really awesome. We spent the last couple of days getting to know the area more since my companion Elder Wixom has only been here for 1 transfer and our area is huge. We've been walking around and talking to people so it's been good. The area here is doing really well, we have 3 baptismal dates for the 21st of this month, so we're looking forward to it. We have General conference this weekend as well due to the delay, so I'm excited to watch it this weekend.

Mar. 25, 2012

Last week, we were able to meet with a couple of our investigators, but none of them really made any steps towards coming unto Christ unfortunately. We saw a really cool miracle though while we were looking for former investigators. We knocked on the door of one man and he was like really angry and yelled through the door asking who we were, we responded that we were looking for him and that we were missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was then really quiet and then came to the door and invited us into his house. We were kind of puzzled, but we accepted and went into his house. We talked with him for a little bit and he seemed really lonely. He told us that he's been really lonely recently and that he was so thankful that we came and visited him. He asked us to say a prayer with him so we all knelt down and prayed and at the end he was crying which was really special. We got his number so we're hoping that we can meet him in the future, but right now his health isn't the best so it is kind of hard to meet with him. Today we received our transfer calls and I'm getting transferred again! This is my 4th area in 5 transfers. My new companion's name is Elder Wixom and he was companions with my last companion Elder Williams for 2 transfers so I have heard nothing but good about him so I'm excited. I'll be going to the very southern tip of our mission to Mokpo, so now I will have been in the very northern tip of our mission and the very southern tip as well.

Mar. 11, 2012

This past week was a pretty good for us. I went on a split with my District leader after district meeting on Tuesday and he gave me some good advice and tips on what I can do and how to be a better missionary so I really appreciated his advice. Other than the split our week was a little slower, we did see a lot of success on the weekend in one of our Eternal Investigators accepting a baptismal date for 4/1!! We're really excited about that. We taught him about the blessings we can receive from going to the temple, but how we need to be baptized first before enjoying those blessings and he accepted it and said yes so we were really happy. As of right now the date is kind of subject to change because he wants to do it with his family, but it was the first time he has said yes to baptism so that was a big step forward for him so we are ecstatic. That was pretty much it though, we're still working with our other investigators to get them progressing so we hope to see some more miracles this next week.

Mar. 4, 2012

This week was a kind of slower week for us, we had Zone Conference on Tuesday so it was really fun to get together with missionaries that I have served around and have a nice sort of relaxing day filled with training and food. Other than that though nothing really happened this week, we met with our investigators and unfortunately we haven't really seen any progression with them so far, but we're continuing to work with them and try and get them closer Christ. One kind of cool thing that I didn't realize is that one of our investigators is pretty famous. I had heard from my comp before that he was famous and he was a Beatles prodigy, but I kind of dismissed it because I had never seen his Youtube videos or anything but when I was talking with my trainer he was so shocked to hear that we were teaching that kid. His name is Hero and since he was 3 he's been playing guitar and singing and apparently he's pretty famous in America. Anyways, we're teaching him and he's a really nice kid. You should all look up his Youtube video if you haven't yet, I'll be sure to get a picture with him this week as a reminder that I met somebody famous!!! We also had Stake Conference this week and Gary E. Stephenson from the Area Presidency came and spoke so it was nice because I could actually understand his talk. Usually I just sit there and catch words and phrases, but it was nice to actually understand a full talk.