Dear Family
This last week has been full of ups and downs in many ways, but once again in sense that God's hand is in everything it has been good. God saves his toughest battles for the soldiers that want/need to learn the most.
Tuesday we had a very interesting lesson with Sister Mariana. She is on date for the end of this month and doing very well, so we were reviewing the Baptismal Interview questions with her, number 1 and 2. We asked her how she knew that the Gospel had been restored, and she said she felt she'd been asking and asking and had not yet received and answer. The soft prompting came to open to D&C 6:22-23. We asked her if she had ever felt peaceful whenever she prayed or read the Book of Mormon, and she responded that she did every time. We told her that the Spirit was testifying to her every time she felt that feeling, and she thought about that a long time before telling us she believed that was true.
Wednesday through Friday was a great Zone Conference trip. President and Sister Simmons did a fantastic job with their first one. I could go on for ours about the instruction and spiritual enlightenment, but some of the highlights included Darrel and Davidson, now Elders Patrick and Caroline, who just entered the Singapore Mission. They were both young men in Miri 1st branch, my first area, and now are Elders here. They both remembered when I was helping them with their papers, and I had given Elder Caroline the Aaronic Priesthood. Elder Patrick is my 'grandson' in the mission as well, as Elder Beliang is training him.
It was also my groups turn to give departing testimonies. It was so good to see so many of my friends there, and bittersweet since I am going home a day early, which means I won't be seeing any of them again in the field. Kasi kesyukuran kepada Allah atas Facebook!
President and Sister Simmons had also asked Elder Call and I to give one of the training segments about how to strengthen the branches in Sarawak. Our training was pretty simple: We first read Genesis 18:17-19 and talked about Trust, and how important it is that God trusts us and the branches before he will send prepared people to our door. We then used Mosiah 26 as a case study and drew from it this pattern: 1. Identify a need. 2. Ask your leaders for direction 3. Ask your God for direction. 4. Write revelation, ACT. The promised blessings in the last few verses are exactly what we hope to see in Sarawak.
Our departing flight was ridiculously early, so we got up at 3am the next day. Yish.
Still a lot of people were falling through this week, but Bro. Bangga made it to church. He was sustained in Sacrament Meeting to receive the Priesthood next week.
Bro. Jihap still wasn't able to come, but we used the pattern we taught in Zone Conference to get permission to do the Sacrament at his house next week if he still does not have transport.
We saw a lot of cool little miracles in guidance though, both in contacting and lessons. The day we got back from Zone Conference, we were talking about how using the part of the story where the devil seizes Joseph Smith would actually help many of the natives relate to the First Vision, as so many of them backgrounds filled with black magic and witchcraft. The next day, Sis. Mariana's husband, Bro. Ifan, asked us that very question, about how if that bomo magic was real. Because we had talked about it, we were able to testify that the reality of Satan is only a proof of the reality of Christ, and a further reason we need to trust in Him. He can't be baptised because we just found out he is technically not a legal citizen, but he came to sacrament with his wife the next day.
Today we are emailing late because we took the Zone to Wind and Fairy Caves, sorry about that! I actually broke my camera today, it fell on a rock, it's a miracle it lasted that long. With how short I have left, that's really not a problem.
-Love you so much!
-Elder Christensen
