week #77 Monday, August 25, 2014

Well it's been another week everyone.

     Ya, so this week has been pretty awesome. Elder McCulloch is pretty cool. We get along really well actually. I feel like 80% of the time we are laughing our heads off. He's a super funny guy. He has been on his mission about 20 months. He heads back December 24th. He has a ton of personality. It's super fun on the streets we talk with everyone. We have been able to do a lot already and it's only been a week. 

     Last week our entire district changed....most of the zone changed. We gained a senior couple companionship in our district, and another Elder Companionship in our zone. Also an area on the southern tip of our zone just got a third companionship. So our zone now has 16 companionships, or 33 missionaries. So I became very busy very fast. Our english class was super great. We were able to have a great discussion on families and how to help our familes be better (through the gospel). 

     We were able to find some cool miracles this week. First was a family, Elder Mcculloch served in Fengshan (an area bordering ours) a long time ago (he was trained there). There him and his trainer found a family through English Class. The family was super cool, they met with them, shared all the lessons, then they realized they lived in a different area. qianzhen's area....well they reffered them over, Elder Mcculluch kept there info, and then got sent here (the area where they live). We went to go visit them. They were super excited to see him, they became too busy last year and stopped meeting with the missionaries, but now they are super willing. yay!

     Ya loving the mission. Sorry my letters lately have been lacking umph... But I do want to let everyone know that it really has been amazing. Every day I wake up, study, and go and contact, meet with people, and It is amazing. Every moment is a miracle. I wish everyone could experience this, because you can't get this growth, experiences, closeness with God anywhere else. This is the best time of my life. I love it

with love,

Elder Bean

week #76 Monday, August 18, 2014

Wow Another movecall blew bye,

     Hey everyone. It's been a crazy week. We started off the week going to a memorial for the Gaoxiong bomb explosion. A lot of religious leaders and representatives were there. We had 20 missionaries there and it was really interesting to see a bunch of other churches in their way of worship. They had Muslims, Presbyterians, Catholics, Budhists, Daoists. It was really cool.

     Then we went on exchanges, had a really good dtm (district training meeting). Wednesday came, we had a cool english class. We did an English party, the theme was game show. Elder Gummow and I had Jeopardy. It was fun, we had an awesome spritual share. It was on leap of faith. We had a student stand on a board (she was blindfolded) we had a missionary stand near her, as elders lifted the table, the sister missionary squated. Even though the board was only 2 inches off the ground, The student felt like she was super high up in the air. Then we asked her if she would believe us and do what we said. She said ok. We told her to jump and she did it to her suprise found the ground was only an inch away and she survived ok. 

     This weekend we worked a lot. Elder Gummow wanted to be as busy as possible. So it was a great week. Although there was a crazy moment. On Thursday we were at an investigator's house. In the middle of the lesson, Elder Gummow get's a call from his RC (recent convert) who was waiting for us on the other side of our area. We end the lesson. Head out, booked it for 20 minutes, Then Elder Gummow turns to me and asks, "hey do you have the phone?"........"no..."We search ourselves, then realize we left the phone at that investigator's house. So we booked it back, then re rode back to where we met Elder Gummow's RC. It was a busy day. Other than that the week was pretty normal. Elder Tolman is training someone named "Elder Coleman" So that's pretty funny. Last night we got movecall. My new companion is an Elder MCCulloch. He's from Canada he's like a movecall and half older than me. I don't know him that well yet. I'm gonna pick him up in a few hours. Elder Lieske is in this zone, he's out in Gangshan, I'm trying to make plans to go on exchanges with him this week. We'll see. 

 

with Love,

Elder Bean

week # 74 Monday, Aug. 4, 2014

Answers to the general public. No I'm not dead. Yes there was an explosion Thursday night. Just so family at home can all be at peace, I'll start with this story. Thursday Night Elder Gummow and I just got back from MLC (Mission Leadership Council) and spent half the day dragging a broken suitcase weighing about 60+ lbs. So we were exhausted and went to bed, only to be woken up around midnight by a call.  We ignored it and we heard a few text messages ring on our phones (we are in a 4 man and both phones were getting messages). We continued to sleep. We wake up the next morning to have a few calls/txts from the YSA members in the ward/stake. One saying something like "there's been explosions, it's like the movies, super scary, it's hit the city's main streets, stay inside!" and then we called a member to find out that the night previous in our area there was some gas explosions down near the dream mall, yixing road, and sanduo road. He had been evacuated from his house, that entire area's gas has been shut off (so Bishop cancelled having us over that night, I'll say he had a good excuse). Then I call Shizhong elders to double check they are ok (their area borders ours) then I called Elder Sumsion (the assistant) asked him what he knew, he knew nothing, so he told me we should be fine. Then in the middle of personal study, Elder Sumsion calls me back to tell us President has recieved a lot of calls asking about it. So they had us call each companionship and ask if they were ok (which was kinda mafan, we were in the area it happened in and we were fine, we called anyways.)Fun conversation:Elder____are you and your companion alive" "...yes.....is everything ok?" "Well last night there was an explosion you'll probably hear about it today."

 

Then president called us and asked us to stay in our apartment until 1:30.....most boring time ever!!!! we just wanted to leave, but we stayed inside. Then we got the call we could leave, went and ate then went on exchanges. 

 

Cool rest of the week. So we have been having a hard time meeting with our investigators with baptismal dates, please pray for them. This week on Thursday we had Mission Leadership Council and it was such an inpiring day. Even though we had to wake up at 4:30 in the morning. We headed over, we discussed how our zone was doing, what we could do to do more. It was interesting as we discussed the way our zone was headed. Lately our zone has increased in a lot of the key indicators. This month we ended with a low amount of baptisms. But as we talked to each companionship, there were a lot of people who were looking good to baptize. So we set a reasonably high goal. But the cool thing was other zone leaders also set reasonably high goals. The zone is looking to double last months numbers. President gave us a lot of cool trainings on finding, the way us zone leaders can be better leaders. It helped me feel a lot more prepared to go and serve my zone down here in Gaoxiong west. Elder Gummow started calling our zone "The New Gaoxiong West" it's been catching on and everything. Ya it was pretty good. We've been finding quite a bit, found some really solid people this last week. I'm excited for this upcoming week, Elder Gummow and I get to lead a Zone Training Meeting. It'll be good, we are gonna show the new Mormon message. 

 

That's really all for now. Love you all.

 

Elder Bean