Summer Swells of Stokage

The mission children with the uncle on the far right.

​Heard that the first summer swell came in. Stoked.

Went to Bangkok to See Elder Cook. SO AMAZING. SO much inspiration and guidance. Went into the meeting so prepared to learn and the more you prepare the more you get out of these meetings. I've got a ton more motivation to work until the very moments of my mission here in Thailand.

A baptism almost 4 years in the making. Mother on the left, sister on the right.

His mother used to drop off another member at the church for a year and while she brought this member she had begun to learn with the missionaries. Almost a year later from her first encounter with the church her and her daughter were both baptized. They were full of excitement and wanted to share the gospel with him, Brother Anon. He was stubborn. Learned with the missionaries for over a year, and then went off the radar. Went to a different city, lived with a relative and just got into a bunch of bad stuff. At the end of last transfer, we had an idea that we needed to find him. But we had no idea where he was. The next week he shows up to sports night with his sister, we play some basketball, and then invite him to church. He comes, and we ask him when he wants to get baptized. He takes a date for the end of the month and yeah. Comes to church, keeps commitments, and passes his interview.

Jacob 5:75

"And it came to pass that when the Lord of the vineyard saw that his fruit was good, and that his vineyard was no more corrupt, he called up his servants, and said unto them: Behold, for this last time have we nourished my vineyard; and thou beholdest that I have done according to my will; and I have preserved the natural fruit, that it is good, even like as it was in the beginning. And blessed art thou; for because ye have been diligent in laboring with me in my vineyard, and have kept my commandments, and have brought unto me again the natural fruit, that my vineyard is no more corrupted, and the bad is cast away, behold ye shall have joy with me because of the fruit of my vineyard."

When we went to the conference in Bangkok, had the opportunity to meet with a bunch of members and friends. So full of joy seeing people that I haven't seen in a long time. So full of joy cause these are lives being changed for the better. It's such a real work with a great reward of joy and happiness.

It's the end of the month.

Aloha,

Elder แอลลิส

Forward Ever. Stopping Never.

BKK

We got our whole zone to fly down to Bangkok together for a meeting to see Elder Cook. 22 missionaries on a plane. Good times. Even funnier is that for our trip back we bought 11 of the 21 seats on the bus!

Parties.

Went to go teach some members and an investigator, so we park our bikes on the side of the pathway. 25 minutes later as we are getting ready to leave, this thing was on my seat. I'm not too sure what it is exactly. Just a bit random to be chilling on my bike seat.

There's been a lot of stuff happening this week but honestly it just feels like everything has blended together cause I haven't emailed in like 2 weeks. Also barely took any photos so I'm not too sure what happened. Yeah we have flown back and forth a ton these past two weeks. Met a bunch of people. Taught one of the older brothers of a member, he's 20 years old. He always talks about how strong he used to be, so every time we go and teach him we start our lesson off with 25 pushups and then end the lesson with another 25. Just a little something to get the blood flowing.

It's been super rainy. Flooding and muddy. Basically means that all the shirts I have left needed to get washed as soon as I get home for the day. In this rush, I forgot to take a black pen out from my pocket and ran a load in the laundry. Lo and behold I check the washing machine 30 minutes later and the black pen exploded over two shirts (coincidentally neither of those shirts had any mud/dirt marks). The countdown for shirts is now at three, two short sleeves and one long sleeve shirt. Which is also ironic cause someone just reminded me that 3 weeks from today I'll be in Bangkok again having my last day as a missionary. HAHAHHA wow.

Yeah. I don't feel old. But then again....who knows.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1976/10/to-die-well?lang=eng

"And it has been said that the most important event in life is death. We live to die and then we die to live. Death is a kind of graduation day for life. It is our only means of entrance to our eternal lives. And it seems to me to be a very helpful procedure to spend a little time preliving our death. That is, what kind of person would you like to be when the last hour of your life arrives?

The last hour is the key hour. That is the hour that judges all of the other hours. No one can tell whether or not his life has been successful until his last hour. As Sophocles said, “We must wait till evening to know how pleasant the day has been.”"

"To Die Well" -Sterling W. Sill

Went on another companion exchange with an elder that had shared this talk with me. Yes, it is a bit old, but wow. It really summarizes how to just live and ease transitions of our life. Many times people think about their mission and stress out about their "Death Date" aka the day in which they stop being missionaries. In these final weeks this is the last hour of my two years. A great time of reflection and a time to keep on working hard until the last minute. So yes, my mission may be coming to a close soon, but that is no reason to let things go out of control. Things will still be the same, the work effort will never leave me, and the love and attributes I have developed will remain. I want to get down to those last few moments being satisfied with the things that I have done and the person I have become. 

Companion Exchanges with Elder Morris Ft. 10 baht Coke from our investigators

Also...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD! Pretty sure you're somewhere in the Pacific ocean atm, but I'll see you in a few weeks so it'll be chill.

Aloha,

Elder แอลลิส

Forward Ever. Stopping Never.

Happy Mother's Day! and I killed a snake

It's been a busy week.

Killed a snake.  It was way small but the members kept on yelling and saying
that it was poisonous. They said if it wasn't it would run away, but because it
wasn't slithering away and it was getting ready to strike it must be poisonous.
Pretty interesting experience. That day a member had told us "Elders, free your
schedule for two hours, we are going to go find people." So we hopped into her
little three wheeled tuk tuk and we went all around the countryside. Super fun!

Weekday baptisms.

Sister Ming is Chinese! She's come a long way. From knowing nothing to
having faith grown step by step. It's been amazing to see her change and
quit drinking tea. There have been many things happening in her life that
has truly prepared her for the gospel. Her mother always supported her
going to church because the mother loves Christianity. Then her husband
also supports her because he loves to read and said that the Book of Mormon
is an amazing book full of wonderful truths. And then the big speed bump that

had held her back was tea. She always noticed one of her work associates only
drank water and never drank tea. One day she decided to ask him why he doesn't
drink tea and it turns out that he's a member from Bangkok! So many signs
just supporting her to be baptized.

B.Choke was invited by a missionary outside of a 7-11 convenience store. He was
always interested in changing religions, just didn't know what we had to do. Luckily
we found him, taught him, and helped him be baptized. He humbly accepted all
the things he needed to change and then did so. He changed. He repented. pretty
awesome. The members also found this dog walking around and we had to get it
off the church property.....

That's the week wrapped up. I know this work is real. I've got a monthish left to go
and dedicate myself. 

Time is running out!

Aloha,

Elder แอลลิส

Forward Ever. Stopping Never.

Trackers.

"When you confirm to go to church but you don't show up. We go and find you."

Another one of those weird weeks because I had just emailed on Wednesday. So really there was only 4 days since the last time that I had emailed.

Elder Rawlinson is out, coming in to replace him is this awesome guy. Elder Dugquem is way young...ish. Don't have pics this week because I forgot to charge the camera. So these will have to do.

On Thursday had a companion exchange and I gotta to interview an investigator that I had met while I was in Samut Prakan over a year ago. He's come a long way, and although missionaries haven't always kept in contact with him, he never gave up reading or praying. There is a plan and the door will be opened for these people.

"Give me a sec. Gotta ponder on how to approach this."

Not much to write this week. Pretty amazing opportunity to be serving with Elder Dugquem. He's a convert, similar story to my first companion Elder Sayavong. I love serving with converts, their testimony is so strong and it really gets to our investigators.

We've got amazing potential coming up for Udon. But also because we both are a little OCD when it comes to planning ahead, we have planned every switchoff and meeting/conference that we have to plan. Turns out our days in our area our limited. That doesn't mean that the miracles will stop. Miracles will never stop, because our faith will never be out. 

This past Saturday, had a sports night activity. We've been working with some youth to get the basketball court pumping on Saturday night. We finish our meetings and then go outside STOKED to play sports and just see this girl and a guy she brought...So we were like, chill. Go and start playing with them and the guy is looking a bit rough but he's way nice and pretty good at basketball. We joke around and play some, then invite him to church and he says "Yeah probably." Sunday, he shows up to church with his sister. Turns out this was the former investigator that Elder Rawlinson and me have been tracking down. He's way chill and is just loving church. We joke around and then his sister asks him "When are you gonna get baptized?" He laughs, then I ask him straight up "Do you want to get baptized soon?" His answer was money. He said, "Elders, a year ago my mom forced me to come to church every week. Today I came on my own without anyone telling me to get ready. I wouldn't be coming to church if I didn't want to change my life and get baptized."

So yeah. We can help him out.

"I call them on the phone and then he listens to see if he can hear the phone ringing. We could."

“It isn’t as bad as you sometimes think it is. It all works out. Don’t worry. I say that to myself every morning. It will all work out. If you do your best, it will all work out. Put your trust in God, and move forward with faith and confidence in the future. The Lord will not forsake us. He will not forsake us. … If we will put our trust in Him, if we will pray to Him, if we will live worthy of His blessings, He will hear our prayers”-Gordon B. Hinckley

The stoke has never stopped. So many blessings, from working in some of the most amazing areas to being with the best companions in the world. I know everything will work out. Whatever happens. Wherever you are. Whenever it goes down. It will work out.

Prayer and Patience.

Aloha,

Elder แอลลิส

Forward Ever. Stopping Never.

Winding down.

Some members asked if we were free on Monday to help them. So we said yeah. They told us they just needed help planting bananas. We assumed it literally meant just planting some little plants, in the shade. Nothing too hot....Well that wasn't what happened.

The sister missionaries that came planted some bananas. We dug around 60 holes around 2 x 1 ft and around 2 ft deep. We worked for two hours in the sun and our hands were pretty wrecked. So as I type this email I try not to screech in pain because of all the blisters, both popped and unpopped that cover my hands. But it was totally worth the experience. I'll get some of the pics from Elder Rawlinson up later.​

​Yeah. After two hours in the sun we had to rush back from the middle of nowhere 30kms outside of the city back into the city to keep on teaching.

​She's actually a referral from another investigator. The other guy pretty much disappeared off the face of the earth but she stuck around. Sis Mimi is pretty chill. She's also Vietnamese. But speaks Thai! The guy baptizing her has been a member for only like 5 months, and literally the day after he baptized Sis Mimi he had to go into army basic training. So accepting and willing to act upon all the commandments that we teach her. What's up. Miracles are still happening everywhere.

Studying in the bible, finally finished the New Testament. Found some way amazing things from Thessalonians. As I look and understand the New Testament more, many of these books are the apostles letters back to those people that they love the most. Their converts and the people that they helped learn about the gospel.

1 Thessalonians 2:8, 17, 20

"So being affectionately desirous of you, we were willing to have imparted unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because ye were dear unto us...But we, brethren, being taken from you for a short time in presence, not in heart, endeavoured the more abundantly to see your face with great desire...For ye are our glory and joy."

Looking back on my mission. I've seen miracles every day, seeing these people literally change their lives and come unto Christ. It has been an amazing blessing and I wouldn't trade in my time here for anything. Time is running out, I've got a few more weeks left. It's gonna be so much fun and so much hard work. I literally do the things I do and work with all my heart, might, mind, and strength because of all the lives that we have helped change. I love these people, this is literally my joy seeing these people who have converted unto the love of God.

Dude. 6 weeks.

Aloha,

Elder แอลลิส

Forward Ever. Stopping Never.