Letter # 17

Hey Family,
I am trying to get a Quick message out. I don't have much time this week But things have been going great. My Native companion and I are doing good now. The first little while we weren't really seeing eye to eye in everything but we both realized it was just an issue of pride. We are doing really good now and seeing a lot of success.

Anyway, sweet miracle happened. I am not sure if I already told this but about 3 weeks ago my companion and I were at a stop light in the morning on the way to the chapel. It was super early so we were both way tired. Anyway this kid pulled up on a scooter about 20 feet away from us. I didn't think much of it. But I had this urgent feeling to go talk to him. I just kept feeling in my head I am way to tired I just want to get to church that is all. But this urgent feeling kept bugging me to go up to him and talk to him. Anyway long story short I told Satan to zip it and I rode up to this guy and asked if he would pull over so we could talk to him. He has met with us constantly for the last three weeks and is getting baptized on my Birthday. I am so stoked! I love this gospel. One of the things I discovered this past week has completely changed my mission, and yet it is one of the most simple doctrine's of the church.

The Love of Jesus Christ.

We were in a meeting discussing why we had so many less active members. Our leader said something that I will never forget. "Because they have not met Jesus Christ" It completely changed my outlook on this work and how to truly find the success we are looking for. It all lies
in the love of Jesus Christ. I have made it a point in my mission, no matter what lesson or principle I am teaching I must always testify of the love of Jesus Christ. That is where the true conversion comes, especially in myself. I am so thankful for the opportunity to do this. Most the time I do not think I deserve this opportunity to be out here. I am just way thankful for everything. Especially my family. Thanks so much for always standing by me, even in my rough patches of being a complete idiot. Ha ha. I love you all so so much.

Scripture this week is one of my favorites:
1 Nephi 19:9.

Wei Zhang Lao

Letter # 16

Hey Family.

So when we email here on preparation day we go to these internet cafes and you pay for the time and then your computer stays on as long as you have payed for enough time. So last week right as I am sending my email I ran out of time on my computer. Ya that was really frustrating.
Yup, that is why no one heard from me last week.
Things are going well I am still alive besides the Taiwanese summer. I am still living with my native companion. My Chinese has shot up really fast in the last 3 weeks from living with my new compainion so I am really stoked about that.

WE had a baptism last week. It was someone who my companion and I contacted about 2 months ago. It was awesome. It was my first chance to actually baptize the person so that was amazing. I will admit I was scared, but the service went really smoothly.

So Last week I survived a huge earthquake... Ya, I woke up at 2:00 in the morning to my bed shaking and stuff falling on the ground. I really thought I was going to die. (All this while you are half asleep).

Anyway, we went up to the mountains last week. They were on the Northern Coast of Taiwan.
It was unbelievable. Up there is this shopping market and I had my first try at eating Chicken feet. NASTY!!!!

We had our first zone conference with the new mission president last Monday. He is a really awesome guy. I am way excited to have him.

Oh ya, I almost forgot. Last weeks crazy story:
We were on our way to an appointment and my tire went flat in the middle of this food market. If you have been to an Asian food market they are crazy.... Thousands of people and tons of nasty food and meat hanging everywhere. (Not the best place to have bike problems.)
We walked around for about an hour trying to find a bike place. No luck.
...Long story short we had to take a taxi everywhere that night. Then when we get home I reach for my wallet to pay the taxi driver and its not there. My companion payed but we had to get out in the middle of this market where my bike was and start looking for a bike store. As we start
walking we made it about 3 minutes before it started raining. After walking for a half an hour in the rain we came to a bike store, got fixed and got home pretty late. That night was easily one of the worst of my life. Luckily the next day we got a call from one of the taxi drivers that they had my wallet. That was a relief. I would have been done for if I lost it.

The work is still going great. We are seeing so much progression in our investigators. The Lin family is still doing amazing. We went and had family home evening last week with them. We
played UNO for the activity. It was hilarious with little kids. Well I really get going my companion is done emailing and we have tons of stuff to do today.

The scripture this week is the Title page and introduction of the Book Of Mormon. I want everyone to pay close attention to the promise and testimony given, and as it directs to pray
about it. That is everyone's homework for this week.

LOVE YOU ALL
Wei Zhang Lao

Letter # 15

Well, I just finished my first week living with someone from another country.
It was interesting...

Elder Yo.
He is just a little Chinese kid from Taizhong, which is in the middle of Taiwan.
I really like him. He is super nice and has a really good heart. But let’s just say there are a few cultural differences. For example when we go out to lunch I will get the typical rice and meat, you know normal stuff to us Americans. But somehow he finds this little food stand somewhere that is selling something I didn't even know humans could eat. Also reminding him to brush his teeth. Ha ha just a few cultural differences ya know. But besides the differences I think we work pretty well together.

Things are going great with our investigators. We have a baptism scheduled for next Saturday with Brother Zhu. He has changed a lot since we started meeting with him it’s been amazing. The Lin family is still doing really well. The Dad and the daughter are looking to be baptized on the 25th. We have also been out a lot this last week. Finding people that is. It gets a little draining being outside in the Taiwanese summer. But its kind of fun.....I guess. Maybe I shouldn’t say fun. Rewarding is a better word.

Oh ya, I will say the 4th of July is not too crazy in the Far East. We celebrated by going to Burger King. It was the closest thing we could get to America. Anyway I want to quickly share an experience I had this week. We were able to sit down with a members little brother and teach him. The story behind that is that we were visiting a member who is about our age and the little brother was home. The little brother is 17 and does nothing all day. He sits at home all day every day, and never goes outside. So he is already a little weird. Luckily we were able to get him to sit down with us but he did not want to hear what we had to say at all. Long story short we starting teaching and bearing testimony that he has a loving heavenly father who cares for him and who loves him. I don’t know what came over me but I starting tearing up. I knew that what we said was true. That his Heavenly Father did love him and wanted him to be happy. This was the first time in my life that I could feel the smallest bit of love that God has for all his children. I knew it was true and I knew that he loved this person.
It was a feeling I could never deny.

The scripture for this week is 1Nephi 4:6
It talks about being led by the spirit. We all have road blocks in our lives and sometimes we don’t know where to turn or the next step to take. From this scripture I have learned that sometimes you just have to keep moving and know that the spirit will guide you. Just have to keep moving. Okay love you all so so so so much. Gotta go. Until next week

Wei Zhang Lao

Letter # 14 with 20 new pics!

Hey, Ni hao Family

Transfers came around and I am still in the huge city Banqiao. I have a new companion. He is native Chinese who doesn't speak any English. (This could be an interesting transfer.)
His name is Elder Yo. He seems like a really cool guy so I am more excited than worried.

Well I don't have like any time today so I will just share an experience I had from this week. For the last few months I have been praying a lot asking to love the people we serve. I feel like my prayer was answered with a specific experience.
We were on our way to a lesson and we stopped at a traffic light. I started talking to a guy on a
scooter next to me. I only had the chance to talk to him for maybe 15 seconds. But he rejected everything I told him. He quickly drove off as soon as he could. Now we do this every day all day so I should be pretty used to this by now but for some reason this one was different. For the
first time I felt true sorrow that he was not going to have a chance to be blessed by this gospel. I know that sounds like a pretty normal feeling but it was something I have never felt before. It was a really weird feeling I had. It was a good experience because it gave me a really good vision of purpose. These people need to hear this, and they need this gospel. This is where true happiness is.

The scripture for this week is one of my favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon. Moroni 7.
It has an amazing statement at in the last verse. It talks about praying with all the energy of heart to be filled with the love of Charity.

Okay gotta run sorry this week was a short letter. Love you all!

Letter # 13

Well another week in the Taiwanese summer down! The work is going fantastic right now. Our area is totally exploding. All of our investigators are progressing and we see miracles in finding people everyday on the street. We are looking to be having 4 baptisms next month. That will be huge for our ward. I found out big news as far as our companionship goes. I found out my companion will not be extending so he is going home next week. This transfer was only five weeks because of the whole new mission president thing. So I will be emailing this coming Monday, and getting my new companion. So it looks I will be staying in Banqiao for another transfer, and doing the same thing I did last transfer with showing someone around a new area and pretty much all that stuff. I am exhausted from last transfer. But I am totally up for it, I
kinda hope I get a native Chinese companion. One because I think the area really needs it and second my Chinese will get better a lot faster.

Well funny story from last week. One of our investigators (30 years old) took us to his house. He wanted his parents to warm up to us and trust the church before he told them he wants to be baptized. His parents made us a completely vegetarian meal. Come to find out they are like vegetarian missionaries and go about preaching against eating meat. They went on to tell us it was like an abominable sin or something. Things were kind of awkward for the first little bit.
But the funniest thing she said was that she believed in Jesus Christ but believes that he was a vegan. She went on to talk about when Christ performed the miracle of feeding the thousands. She said that when no one was looking he turned it all into vegetarian fake fish. I was trying so hard not to laugh. I just put my head down and bit my lip. Anyway things are going really good.

The language is still getting there. I feel like things have progressed fast with it but my grammar and the way I speak needs a lot of work. There is one thing I have gained my testimony of out here. That is that boys are called to exactly where they are supposed to be. There have been certain things for me personally that I needed to see and to face to start becoming the person the Lord wants me to be. I love TAIWAN. Best mission in the world.

Okay scripture for this week is Moroni 10:5. It is a scripture we probably use everyday. But it has been on my mind a lot this week. That promise is amazing. That by the power of the Holy Ghost we can know the truth of all things, especially receiving our own personal answers to things.

Okay love you all so much.
God be with you.

Wei Zhang

Lao

Letter # 12

...And another week has gone by. They are just flying now like its nothing. The last week was fantastic. We are seeing so much success. We have three people with baptismal dates planning to get baptized in July. There should also be two more people added on to that number by the end of this week. I am really hoping to see 5 Baptisms in the month of July. I know that is a really big goal. But all of our investigators are progressing really fast and keeping commitments.
One of the people I told you about two weeks ago is the Father of the Lin family. The one I met at the convenience store. He has completely given up drinking. Things are so much better for the family. He is planning on getting baptized in July. The Wife is a little more difficult because her Chinese is not so good. She is Filipino so we have to go get a translator for her and then teach the lessons. But that family has two kids. One is Ten and the other Four. We taught the ten year old girl last night. That was a little difficult but we used a lot of pictures to help her pay attention. They are the cutest kids. Right behind my nieces and nephews of course!

I know I say this every week but it is getting hotter and hotter. If there is any point in the day where I am not completely drenched with sweat, there is a serious problem. I am almost just getting used to being hot and miserable. ha ha. Seriously, the weather here is so weird. Yesterday we were dying of heat and then it got dark all the sudden and got hit with this huge rain storm with tons of wind and stuff. It was bad. But an hour later it cleared completely
up and went back to being blistering hot. The two pictures of me in the rain are from yesterday in that storm. Its not a joke either, the first picture there wasn't any wind and then the second one I was yelling at him to take the picture. It was so funny. Well there is one plus to all the hot weather. Every single house we go to they give us cold fruit. Pineapples mangos papya. Awww the fruit here is unbelievable.

So the scripture for this week is Moroni 10:7. I have shared it a lot this week. It talks about how all things are possible by faith. According to our faith we can do all things.

Well I love you all so much things are going really well.
Your in my prayers.

Wei Zhang Lao