Nihao!!!!!!
I can't believe in about 19 hours I will be on a plane going to TAIWAN! AH! The wait has been sooo long and sooo hard. BUT IT'S FINALLY HERE! In President Day's email today, he said 9 other visa waiters got their visas last week, too! So they'll be coming out with us this transfer too! I'm so so so excited! District 39-A will be reunited! <3 But the sad thing is that Sister Facer, who I talked about last week, still doesn't have hers! :( I don't get this visa process. I do know she's going to continue to be AWESOME out here, though, and the Lord has a plan for all of us!
We also got Transfer news this morning! Sister Taylor and Smith will be companions and be the only sisters in the Fayetteville ward now! Also the Elders are all getting moved out except one. He'll get a new companion and they'll be the only elders in this ward now! It's gonna be a crazy transfer meeting on Wednesday!!
Yesterday was sad because I had to say bye to everyone at church. It made me realize how much I've grown and learned here. Sometimes I'd feel like I didn't know anyone and I haven't done anything here. But I really have made a lot of friends and great relationships with the people here. Luckily TX isn't too far away, so I'm already planning my trip back here after the mission! The south is so great. GA is officially the 2nd best state. ;)
Yesterday we also went out on one last team up with one of my favorite Laurels, Rebecca Stoker. We went to this one house where the lady answered the door and told us about how they were just about to go to church and that they were Jehovah's Witnesses. She told us we could come back another time and talk. She was actually pretty friendly! Sometimes people try to tell us what Mormons believe and they're super ignorant and rude, but she was somewhat nice! Just as we were leaving Rebecca said, "Happy Sabbath!", you know, just to be friendly. Then the lady stopped and said, "Oh you still believe in the Sabbath?" and we said, "Ummm we always have?" and she went off on this tangent about how the Sabbath day was part of the Mosaic law and that Christ did away with the Mosaic law when he came to earth. It was really funny! She was just trying to be nice and this lady totally got off on this rant about how everyday is the day to serve the Lord and how we still followed the old laws. We were super confused though because the 10 Commandments still exist... so that was weird. We laughed about it all day!
Last Monday we had dinner at a member's house. When we go to member's homes for dinner we always share a thought with them at the end. We have one message we like to share the most. I have the First Vision memorized in Mandarin, so I'll tell it to them. We tell them to pay attention to the spirit that they feel as I say it. Sometimes we'll tell them it's the First Vision and sometimes we don't. But anyways we then teach them that Heavenly Father speaks to us in a way that we understand and in our own language. This applies not only to spoken language, like Chinese and English, we can always feel the spirit no matter what language. It also applies to how the spirit talks to us individually. We'll all understand the spirit and the promptings we get differently. SO. The member's kid had a nonmember friend over! Me and Sister Smith both individually when we were eating dinner got a little bit nervous about this. We weren't sure how well it would work to share the First Vision with her. But we both felt like we should still share it and it would all work out. So we both went with it, without even telling each other! So we went through it and also had Sister Smith say it in English so the girl would understand. The girl was really interested! She said she'd heard the First Vision before. She's been interested in lots of different religions and loves researching them. Her parents are devout Catholic though, and confiscate anything she brings home from other churches. :( We taught her a little bit about the restoration and Joseph Smith. Hopefully when she goes off to college in 5-6 years she'll remember this and the great member friends that she had and find the missionaries and get baptized! So we weren't able to get a "new investigator" out of the experience, but we know there was a huge seed planted. Heavenly Father is definitely preparing her heart to receive the gospel in the future. I love being a part of this great work! I can't wait to go to Taiwan and share the gospel and my testimony of Christ with them! It will be SO different teaching out there, but I'll get it someday(;
Well I've got lots of packing to do so I'll talk to you next week!
Thank you everyone for the support and prayers throughout this looong process(:
Zaijian!
-Ou Jiemei
