It's a Beautiful Day in Jade Neighborhood (Mr. Rogers Anyone?)

     

      Hey everyone, just a beautiful, sunny/cloudy day down here in the South in Yuli, Jade Neighborhood. The colder the winter, the warmer the spring.  So it's been pretty warm down here, I love it! It hasn't been a super cold winter like I thought it would be, probably because I'm down here in the sunny south, yay! 

     Transfers are next week. I have been in Yuli since last October, so I will most likely move. So for today, my companion and I will try to send off packages and get ready so that next pday we can go to the famous Talaluca National Park, which is a Buddhist temple in the mountains with waterfalls coming down from the temple (you can see pics when you google Hualian or search Hualian under Wikipedia). I am so excited! 

     This week has been full of miracles, visited some people, awesome English class in Reisui and Yuli and contacted some awesome potential investigators. We just need to set up with them and see how it goes! Please pray that it will work out!

     I was talking with my companion the other day, and we figured out that being a missionary is pretty much like being a:

Detective - figuring out why people are or aren't meeting with you, why they have the problems they have, and asking others what they know about them

Doctor - helping people with problems in life which pretty much all comes down to obeying the commandments.solution for Every. Single. Problem. Works every single time.

Psychologist - figuring out people; their thoughts and their different backgrounds and why they act the way they do (the Spirit being in charge of course)

Spy - seeing people you know walking down the street or seeing them at a store, and knowing where some people live, go to school or work, just pretty much knowing their lives.

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     In our Chinese tract, there are questions there that give references in the Book of Mormon to solve problems. One of our investigator picked was, "How to balance work and family," in the English one, it refers to 3 Nephi 13. There was a misprint in the Chinese tract, so it said 3 Nephi 12. Our investigator read it, and then texted us and asked for our help. 

     It read, "But I say unto you, that whosoever is angry with his brother shall be in danger of his judgment. And whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council; and whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire." We figured out the word she was trying to understand was "Raca."  We eventually got her to read 3 Nephi 13 which answers her question, which pretty much is: put God first in life and He will take care of everything else. 

     Last week we were at a family mart and I was texting a scripture. For some reason, I couldn't find the character for Yong in Yong Heng (eternal), and after 10 minutes, I asked a girl who was sitting at a table nearby how to text it. She then showed me how to find it, and then I started asking her some questions about Chinese. It led to me asking her questions, which then resulted to her asking about me. My district leader has told us lots of times that a great way to get to know people is first ask questions about that person (because people like to talk about themselves), and then naturally they will ask questions about you. We then explained our purpose and our message. It was so cool, she didn't have a religion but the more we explained, the more the Spirit touched her. It was like it said in Preach My Gospel, how she was finding something that she didn't know she was looking for. We invited her and her boyfriend to English class, and we hope to start teaching them soon. 

     Also, the Spirit guiding us to a former English class students house. We talked with him and he came back to English class. 

     Last Saturday (my parent's 22nd wedding anniversary), was full of miracles! We kept on finding families (four out of the seven live in our area the rest were tourists)! The more I'm on a mission, the more I realize strong, stable families are harder and harder to find, especially in the gospel. It is most rare and the most valuable thing for a whole family to join the

church, which is why they are the most prized possessions in the church. They are literally the backbone, we have relied heavily on our three strong families in the branch. The branch is desperate for a new family, we are working hard. Please pray we do so. 

     I am blessed with a companion who is really good at finding families. A few days ago I asked how she first contacted a mom who later got baptized in her last area. She said that she and her companions came up to her one day in the park while her little boy was playing. They went up to the little boy to say hi to him, telling the mom how cute he was, and gushing over him. Just pretty much giving him a lot of attention, treating him like their own cute little brother. The mom really liked that, and started to meet with the missionaries. She later told them one of the reasons why she was willing to meet with them was because she saw how happy the missionaries were, and in that time of her life she wasn't happy. She wanted that happiness as well, which resulted in having a desire to meet with the missionaries which ended up with baptism. 

      Last Saturday morning my companion read the scripture about if we ask, we shall receive, seek and we shall find, knock, and it shall be opened up to us. So we prayed to find families, and we saw miracles like crazy.   For example, we met a single mom from Taipei, her smart four-year-old son who speaks really good English, and her older sister at a 7/11. He was so cute, we kept speaking English to him. The mom wasn't interested, so we just invited her to English class and gave her our number in case she changed her mind. Later on that night, we saw them again walking back to their hotel. The boy ran up to us speaking English, and she asked us to take pictures with her and her son, which we did on her phone and my companion's camera. She texted us later that night asking my companion for her email to send her the pictures. 

     My companion and I would take pictures with families we contacted on the street, and we would gush over their small children, and compliment them on the English of the older children. Parents really like that, as well as when we take

pictures with them. Even if they aren't interested in our message, we would still take pictures and exchange emails and phone numbers so that we could send the pictures to them. We think it's a great way if people aren't interested in our message to at least leave them with a good impression of missionaries, and they are

still at least in contact with us. I remember reading somewhere that it takes between on average 6-8 contacts with the missionaries before someone becomes interested in their message. If the people aren't interested in the moment, they may be years later when they had at least great experiences with them. 

     In our mission, there are a lot of American missionaries, mostly from Utah. It is literally a little Utah here in our mission. We have some Taiwanese missionaries as well, and everyone including me wants to be companions with them because they help improve our Chinese, and they are all so nice and they know the culture well. They just make mission life better. 

     I have really learned the most on my mission on how Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, and their gospel has really impacted our lives for the better, and how imperative it is to always stay faithful and true to them no matter what. And the importance of developing relationships with them, because if you think about it, relationships with them and with people are the only things that we will have that carry throughout eternity. 

     I have really learned the importance of taking the time to getting to know Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and help others get to know Them too. It has been a privilege and an honor to have been Called to Serve Our King to the Taiwanese people.

     Love you all! Have a great week!

-Sister Brinkerhoff