Sunday, April 2, 2017

4-2-2017 Bangkok Thailand












Hey hey there Dad!
Conference is exciting, no? Breaks from early morning meetings, and an opportunity to hear from the apostles, and most of all, the prophet. The love, the advice, the revelation we receive, it truly scripture. I haven't heard it yet, but I will soon! This weekend, I will!
It's been hot, for sure here! But I woke up to a wicked thunderstorm Friday, about 4 in the morning! I got a glimpse of it in the video I took, but it got more intense from there. Just reflecting on what I saw there, that was amazing. How crazy seeing a thunderstorm like that actually was. How often did the sky light up, yet not have any sun! That is not something we see everyday. At one point, just at one moment. We saw the light of a lightning strike, and heard the thunder simultaneously. It really was like a gunshot, more shocking (hahaha) than I could have expected. At that point, I realized that thunderstorms are a little scary. Thunderstorms do not care what or what isn't there. It just goes. It was a cool experience for sure! I must have been up another 30 minutes listening to the rumbles and the watching the light in the sky.
Other than that, it has been a pretty good week as well! As far as April Fools Day goes, we did... nothing. But the Assistants to the President decided to play a good prank. To explain a little, next week is SongKhran, the big Water Festival that lasts over 3 days. It has always been a tradition to move P-Day that week so we could participate in it. (Speaking of which, next week I'll be emailing on the 14th that week, so don't be worried, and mark it!) However, the Assistants sent a mission-wide text, saying "We have decided that participation in the Songkran festival was in opposition to the standards set forth by the Missionary Handbook. Therefore, participation has been banned, and missionary work should proceed as normal on those days." Or something to that effect. Elder Bastian was super sad. But I honestly felt pretty ok about it. It wasn't even sad... I was just wondering how we were going to be able to proselyte over this amount of time because most people are out and about... and really eager to splash us. Oh well. But, turns out it was an April Fools joke, so it all worked out! It was more funny to see Elder Bastian's face. But we'll be playing, so who knows what is going to happen!
Haha ants? Ants are so common. Cockroaches, aren't common in the house. They die quickly. Not so much in the house, haven't seen one yet, but other places... yep. Including the church.
Just ping pong! That's how it goes. It's all good fun, especially at the church!
We did end up getting the 3 baptisms! The work is great here! But there are so many miracles here! So one of the baptisms was performed by one of our recent converts who just received the Priesthood, who then proceeded to baptize his daughter that same day. It was great! That family is great and we're going to be working with them closely for a long while too!
As for other miracles, we had this: So we when we were walking along the street, looking for the homes of L.A's that we could go visit. Then, I prayed that I might be led in the direction that Heavenly Father would have me go. So I acted on just a feeling, a prompting that I received to go down this one street. I felt nothing more than a light suggestion, but I knew it was the Spirit. So I went, straight away, with Elder Bastian following behind. After that prompting, I didn't receive any revelation in particular, but I knew what the Lord has called us to do: preach to everyone who was willing to listen. So I did, we did. Talked to everyone who would listen on this street. We eventually made it down to the very last house on the street, and then the nice old lady invited us into the house to go talk with her child named Benz. As it turns out, she was an old investigator that we couldn't find for a while, and she was still willing to learn! So that was definitely a miracle! Seeing the Spirit work is truly miraculous!
The language is still difficult. I feel like I've hit one of those walls, but I'll get through it! I'll keep trying, putting in my best effort!
Love you lots Dad! Talk to you soon!
- Elder Collin Decker

No comments:

Post a Comment