It’s been a great week. I’ve had many more opportunities to get outside my comfort zone. One example is we trained 40 missionaries on the Peach My Gospel teaching fundamentals. President Bishop trained on 4 of the 8 topics and me and my companion trained on the other 4. It was a little stressful but in the end it turned out alright; in fact, I think it went pretty well.
This last week on Monday we had a chance to go visit a member and his college roommate who was from Utah. It was an awkward feeling using English to share the gospel. In hind sight I think we could have done a much better job.
Recently we have had the special experience of teaching the Huang family. The reason this is so special is because they do not live on Taiwan. They live on an island called Jinmen. It is very close to China but independent from China. The island is a part of our mission, but there are no missionaries there. There is only a small band of about 10 members and a few investigators that meet every week out there.
The goal is to baptize the investigators who have been attending church for a while, but have not yet had the chance to hear the discussions or be baptized. The plan is for us to teach them by webcam. It is different from teaching face to face, but the spirit is still present. We have only met with one of the investigators so far — the Huang dad. His wife is a member, and they have a daughter who is currently 7 years old. He has a baptismal goal for 7-30-11. We believe that he will make it. I’ll keep you posted.
Aside from training, this week I got to go on an exchange to Gangshan, my former area. It was fun to see some of the members and recent converts there and see that the area is in good condition. President Bishop attended the latter half of this exchange. It was fun to see his zeal and excitement for the work.
Another exchange took us to the bottom of the island where I got to meet a new missionary. He is great! He is bold, willing to speak up, not afraid of work, very smart, diligent on the streets contacting, and every good thing a missionary should be. He asked me if I knew his cousins and I did. They live just 3 houses down from us.
On Saturday, we had a preparation day. We were in Hengcun so we took a ride down to Kenting and walked around a beautiful park which included a lighthouse. At the park we saw a very long centipede (over 6 inches long) and a lizard jumped from a tree and landed on my companion causing him to scream…haha. After that we went to an aquarium, it is one of the biggest in the world. It was fun to see.
I love being a missionary. I miss having my own area to work in though. It is a little harder in the office to have time to find and teach people. This is one reason I’m so glad we’ve been given this Jinmen island project. I hope we can see some baptisms in the near future.
I am so grateful for God. I’m grateful for his awareness of me and those I serve with. His tender mercies are evident everywhere. I’m grateful for this restored gospel that will allow us a clear view of our relationship to God and many other precious doctrines that are lost to this world.
Until next week,
Elder Spencer Harris
