Week 7

Hi Family!!!!

 

So I had the greatest surprise today! it was awesome! I saw mom in the temple! how cool is that? Sorry I couldn't talk to you too much.  They encourage us to just say Hello and then goodbye.  Mom, thank you so much for being such a good example and going to the temple so often.  I love the temple so much now.  It''s the best part of the week.  Kind of haha.  You''ve helped me become a much more effective missionary by making me work hard at home and being such a wonderful example. Oh by the way... did I look fat to you?hahaha, be honest mom!!! :) I''ve gained SEVEN pounds! hahaha

 

Ok, well, the MTC really isn''t that exciting of a place.  I'm pretty sure I''ve told you all the fun stuff so far. other than gaining 7 pounds and seeing mom at the temple, not much has happened since Tuesday... Wait! We had another apostle speak to us for the devotional! Elder Ballard was such an inspirational talk! He said: "Get up, and go on! Everything will be ok!" And it definitely went along with my personal study for the past week! I've been studying how to recognize the spirit, how to teach, and how to find people.  All of these things supported what he said.  He just added a few really cool insights.  He said that most people worry too much about getting the inspiration when what they need to do is make their own decisions and follow through with it.  God can work in any way!  He can influence your thoughts WHILE your planning as well as when you're out in the field.  He taught us that we plan so that God knows where we are.  If we pray and don't have a strong feeling that we should be in a specific place, we write down where we're going so God knows where to send the investigator.  "If God doesn't send you to them, he will send them to you."  He love us all and will provide a way for us to get His work done!

 

We welcomed in the new elders just this last week and they seem super young.  I've been trying to help them out with learning their chinese and letting them know what they should be doing.  They're all such awesome people.  We've been told by so many people that they call the smartest and the hardest working people to the mandarin speaking missions.  I was kinda tentative about that at first, but we have a joke about spanish and english elders.  Everytime somebody does something bad we always say: "those spanish elders" and usually, we're right.  hahaha.  Just kidding.  All the missionaries here are great people.

 

One of the new missionaries is a flute player and she wanted to do a musical number, so she talked to the branch president and he told her that I could play the cello really well (I don't know where he heard that).  anyway.  I'm now practicing Joseph Smith's First Prayer (the violin duet by Beebe) in treble... on the cello... :) hahaha.  It'll be a lot of fun.. Hopefully I'll be able to do it.  So I might perform for a devotional, fireside or something.  I'm really excited! And once again, I have to thank you mom and dad for teaching me so much! I now regret not listening to you more often.  Thank-you for making me learn the cello.  It's definitely already blessed me so much.

 

We were interviewed by our teacher (because they want to make sure we're doing ok) last class period which was a lot of fun.  When I went in to talk to him, he said that our district was learning chinese faster than any of the districts he had ever taught.  he said it was because we had Sister Kang, Sister Fitzpatrick, and I to help people.  he also said that most of the people with this much chinese background were usually advanced into the other district which leaves in 6 weeks instead of 12, and the ones that weren't we usually less willing to teach the other missionaries in the district. (wow, this is a really weird paragraph hahahaha, bear with me :)) FINALLY, he said that he's thankful that we were humble enough to stay and learn the vocabulary and how to teach and share our experience with the other missionaries.  Thanks for teaching me to be humble and chinese.

 

I feel like I should thank you for a lot of things right now.  I know that without your example and tiger-mom (and dragon-dad? hehe, alliteration) ways, I wouldn't have been as prepared as I am.  I wish I had listened to mom and dad more so I'd be more prepared, but no regrets right?

 

Oh yeah, fun story.  When we were playing soccer, one of the elders missed the goal and it went out into the street (north temple drive) so he had to go retrieve it. Well, he caught up to the ball and started dribbling it back then tried kicking it to us.  I guess he didn't realize that the curb was higher than the road because it hit it and then bounced back.  By this time, several cars had started to come up and down the road.  He waited for one car to pass, then started coming back to the field with the ball.  Half-way through, another car turned the corner and started flooring it.  we were all laughing so hard because the elder had a look of horror on his face and started screaming till he crossed the sidewalk onto the field where he just fell down and started hyperventilating.  We were all worried for him until he started laughing.  It was a lot of fun.  I had never seen anybody move that fast so suddenly.

 

Also, the other day, we were waiting to teach our investigator and the sisters had gone over their allowed time with the investigator (which cuts down on the time we have to teach) so my companion looked into the peep hole to see what they were doing.  As soon as he got up to the door, he kind of exploded away from the door, ran over to a chair, threw open his scriptures and sat down.  Right when he sat down, the door opened and the sisters came out.  I was laughing so hard, they were so confused.

 

Anyway, somethings in the MTC seem funny to missionaries.  But they really aren't that funny.  I just wanted to share with you a little sunshine from my soul. :)

 

Well, I love you all, miss you and hope you're all doing great!

 

Last piece of inspiring cheese: "Live Worthily, Pray Constantly, Listen Diligently, Do Accordingly" I'll explain because I'm looking at it and it makes no sense out of context: Live worthy of the spirit.  Pray constantly for His presence, Listen diligently for his voice, Do according to His will.

 

See you soon!

 

Elder Chen