Hey dad! Wow, that's awesome! He [Alec] is going to be great. That's a ton of
rainfall. I don't know how much we get here, but it feels like a lot. I
email with Paul, and he said that it's a super nice place, cooler than
most in the Philippines. We have a ton of Filipinos here that come for
work, and I always tell them that my brother is going there. Yeah, he
won't be very far at all! I can't wait to be able to email back and
forth with him since we are in the same time zone. He'll have a ton of
success. The work is exploding there. We had a bunch
of Filipino missionaries in our zone in the MTC, and right after they
left we got 54 new ones. They can't throw them in fast enough. That's so awesome. Haha, I know it's funny cuz one of my best friends here
in the Hong Kong mission is Elder Ward, and his older brother served in Japan, and his
younger brother is serving in Taiwan, haha. I hope Chase goes Mandarin
speaking, that would be awesome!
Yeah, I can get pictures from email but only a few at a time I think.. I'll send you a couple over email, but I'm copying a lot of pictures from my card and putting them on the card Kelly gave me and then sending it back with a letter, so you'll have a lot more. My investigators are doing okay. D came to church 2 weeks in a row which is awesome. The only reason she came this week is because it was raining, so she couldn't go on a hike like she wanted to. I told her God did that so she could come to church, haha. I'm still really worried about her though because she still goes to her other church, and she's still not for sure about here date yet, so we keep doing our best and praying. Leaving it up to the Lord after all we can do.. The other one is a construction worker and and can't come to church, so it's really hard, but he really has a desire to learn more, so I'm hoping we can progress with him. New investigators are hard to come by, but we are making it a priority this week. We have to find 1 new investigator.
The language is the language. I probably understand 40-60 percent of words spoken of a really basic conversation. 80 percent of a gospel discussion. But now the hard part is processing the words that I've learned, fast enough that I can keep up and understand the meaning of the sentences/ discussion. I'll know the subject of what's being talked about a lot of times but not the details. But, yeah I have good days where I think maybe I actually can do this... then I get humbled really quickly.. My companion and I are doing well. He has a desire for the work, so it's going well. I will write Alec for sure, and Chase. That's so awesome he works for Baskin Robbins. I'd kill to eat ice cream, haha.
Well this week for me hasn't been too crazy. We've been doing a lot of service; moving people, visiting old peoples homes, stuff like that. We had one of yeun 2's investigators stuff get damaged from the typhoon, so we helped her clean it up.
We also helped a less active's
brother move.. It was awful. I won't lie. He was moving from one broken
down, ripped apart shed to another down the street. The condition of living was just unnecessarily horrible. You know that show hoarders? They got nothing on this dude. I was
trying to move a table, the one he eats off of, and a ton of maggots and
spiders came out of it, and then when I freaked out he was like, "Oh you
don't have to worry about the spiders, it's that snake over there that
is the problem." IN THE MAN'S HOUSE" well kinda, there really is only 3
walls so i think the snake comes and goes as he pleases. Anyways.
Oh, also I got the package from the Activity Day Girls!!! Thank you so much!! It was awesome, I loved it.
Yeah, I can get pictures from email but only a few at a time I think.. I'll send you a couple over email, but I'm copying a lot of pictures from my card and putting them on the card Kelly gave me and then sending it back with a letter, so you'll have a lot more. My investigators are doing okay. D came to church 2 weeks in a row which is awesome. The only reason she came this week is because it was raining, so she couldn't go on a hike like she wanted to. I told her God did that so she could come to church, haha. I'm still really worried about her though because she still goes to her other church, and she's still not for sure about here date yet, so we keep doing our best and praying. Leaving it up to the Lord after all we can do.. The other one is a construction worker and and can't come to church, so it's really hard, but he really has a desire to learn more, so I'm hoping we can progress with him. New investigators are hard to come by, but we are making it a priority this week. We have to find 1 new investigator.
The language is the language. I probably understand 40-60 percent of words spoken of a really basic conversation. 80 percent of a gospel discussion. But now the hard part is processing the words that I've learned, fast enough that I can keep up and understand the meaning of the sentences/ discussion. I'll know the subject of what's being talked about a lot of times but not the details. But, yeah I have good days where I think maybe I actually can do this... then I get humbled really quickly.. My companion and I are doing well. He has a desire for the work, so it's going well. I will write Alec for sure, and Chase. That's so awesome he works for Baskin Robbins. I'd kill to eat ice cream, haha.
Well this week for me hasn't been too crazy. We've been doing a lot of service; moving people, visiting old peoples homes, stuff like that. We had one of yeun 2's investigators stuff get damaged from the typhoon, so we helped her clean it up.
We also helped a less active's
brother move.. It was awful. I won't lie. He was moving from one broken
down, ripped apart shed to another down the street. The condition of living was just unnecessarily horrible. You know that show hoarders? They got nothing on this dude. I was
trying to move a table, the one he eats off of, and a ton of maggots and
spiders came out of it, and then when I freaked out he was like, "Oh you
don't have to worry about the spiders, it's that snake over there that
is the problem." IN THE MAN'S HOUSE" well kinda, there really is only 3
walls so i think the snake comes and goes as he pleases. Anyways. Oh, also I got the package from the Activity Day Girls!!! Thank you so much!! It was awesome, I loved it.
 |
| The Los Prados Activity Day Girls sent Elder Mikesell a package with candy and a letter! |
Oh and also last Friday we had zone 24's, and I was put with my MTC companion, haha. It was cool and kinda weird at the same time. We had a talk the other night about the mission, kinda about how it is like life. A lot of times we see only a super small perspective of this weeks goals or whatever, but if you step back you can draw parallels between the mission as a whole and life as a whole. Not just this life but eternal life. We lived with our parents before the mission. We chose to come out to learn and grow and share the gospel, we start out getting babied in the MTC, learning how to be a good missionary but with no real responsibility, kinda like when we grow up and are living with our parents, then we get kicked out and have to do stuff on our own, and it is really hard. There are ups and downs, you learn and grow, and it may seem like a long time. Sometimes more than others, but in actuality it's so short. Which is the same perspective God has of our mortal life. We are separated from our parents. We can communicate, but we are not in their presence. We grow old (in the mission we normally say that when you start your mission your just being born or you are a baby, then you are middle aged at a year and then you die at 2) you have kids (we call trainers dads, trainees sons) then die and go back to live with your family. And if you do well, you will not be ashamed about being in their presence. I learned something that I guess I had thought of before but not really deeply. Elder Walter pointed out that we go to whatever kingdom we are assigned due to our desires and actions. Simple doctrine, but what he said was that if someone doesn't make it to the Celestial kingdom it's not just because God forced him to go to a lower kingdom. If he is an unrepentant sinner he will want to be as far from God, from the guilt and shame as he can be (i.e. terrestrial/ telestial kingdom.) so we really do choose literally where we go. It says in the Book of Mormon that they would feel worse living in the presence of God knowing that they are unworthy, than going to hell.. crazy thought. Anyways that was kinda deep, but something cool to think about.
Anyways, I love you all! One thing you can do to help me if you want is to offer your services to the missionaries in your area. We've been having a really hard time getting member presence in our lessons. It's YOUR ward people, not the missionaries. They are here to help you, but yeah. Love you miss you, talk you you next week!
Elder Mikesell
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