Taiwan 16

I'm glad that he sounds upbeat even though it gets rough periodically. That's one of the endearing things about Colby--his positive approach on life. I pray he'll always keep that wonderful trait! (You'll see my interjections/interruptions in periwinkle-ish.)

Hey!

YEAH to Sara (our good friend and ceramics teacher at Provo High School) for having a baby. WHOO! So cool!

This week, I relied on the Lord. It started out pretty rough actually. Like what was recently said in Conference, trials are pin pointed right to you. BUt I know that the Lord would not give people trials that do not need to grow. So I did my best to apply what else I learned from conference last weekend and go forward BEING a missionary and not just DOING missionary things. (reference to Lynn G. Robbins' talk) It is an interesting transition. They have recently gotten rid of "Nightly Follow-Ups" to be more in line with what it says in Preach My Gospel and only have Weekly Follow Ups. That means that the numbers of lessons, new investigators for the day and that kind of thing is only done on a weekly basis instead of a daily basis. Alot of people are scarred (pretty sure he meant "scared") that the numbers will drop because missionaries will not be as motivated to work as hard. But I love it. I have found that the things that we do each day are more focused on our investigators as a person and not as a number. It does cause us to need to plan out and have a weekly perspective to hit our weekly goals, but it tears away any titles of "Week A" (people to be baptised in the coming week) and lets us focus on our investigators as a person with a goal to be baptised in the coming week. I love the way that Shan said it in a letter to me: "You have to have a genuine love for the people with only the idea to help them, not increase your baptismal count".

Yes, so this week, we have a goal to particularly fellowship Zhang Hong Xuen's family. His sister is already baptized and his mother will get baptized as soon as she stops drinking tea, but the older brother and the father both need some work. Some things that we're planning on doing are putting notes with scriptures of encouragement in their mailbox each day and praying for them specifically. we'll see what else we can come up with. It will be a good week either way and I'm excited to help them gain the wonderful blessing of ETERNAL FAMILIES!!

Well, time's pretty much gone.

I have loved reading the Book of Mormon this week and seeing how the Lord sends his servants to help his people. I'm trying to focus on following Nephi's example and work in accordance with the will of the Lord. Always looking for what the Lord would have me do.

Thank-you for all of the letters and prayers from home. I hope everybody has a good week!

Love Ya All,

ELder Sanford