ELDER BALLARD COMING, DEEP CLEANING APARTMENTS & NEW INVESTIGATOR

Hey! So, I don't know if I told you guys yet, but Elder Ballard is coming to Hong Kong next week, so we will be able to meet him and get taught by him on Wednesday or Thursday. That will be cool. It's funny because he's coming exactly 1 year after Elder Holland came back in 2014. We are pretty blessed because all the general authorities come through Hong Kong to get into Asia, so we get to see them. This week was good. We had a little bit of a rough start because everyone was celebrating New Years, so no one was free to meet with us. Every year in the second day of the New Years we do a deep clean of the apartments, so that was good. It takes all day, but it's fun and different, and there aren't very many people willing to talk on that day anyway. It's kind of like Christmas day in the states. 

The other Hung Shui Kiu elder's investigator, Tyler, finally got baptized on Sunday which was suppper cool. He has been really ready for a long time now, but he has had ridiculous family opposition, but he decided finally that his parents weren't going to change any time soon, so he just got baptized without them knowing. He's in the early 20's, so it's not like it was against the law or anything. President Hawks came all the way up to see the baptism, it was really cool. Also, the other newest recent convert, Ken, in our ward (he was baptized a week before I got to Hung Shui Kiu), introduced his girlfriend to the church, and she got baptized like a week or two ago as well, which was cool. She lives in Castle Peak Bay Ward. She also got a ton of anti from her mom and sister, but she's toughing it out. 

We were struggling to find a new investigator these past weeks until yesterday after church. We went out in the rain to find and ran into this young man named David. He's pretty cool. We taught him a lesson on the street, committed him to a baptismal date and rescheduled him! So that was awesome. I really hope he shows up. Sometimes people will listen and act interested and then never answer their phone or meet again, but he seemed pretty genuine. I've only given a baptismal date out on the street a few times, and it was cool that he accepted. Anyways, things are still going along. There is always opposition. We also ran into a guy the other day who kept telling us that our Bishop had 40 wives because he read it on the internet. Another time we were talking to a nice kid when some other guys, who he didn't even know freaked out when they saw us, grabbed him and told him that we were a cult from the devil. It gets absolutely ridiculously frustrating at times the ignorant, literal hatred I've felt from people who are "Christians". A lot of the times the Buddhist and Baai sahn people are nicer, but sometimes they will make fun of Christ, too. We will knock on doors and people will answer and not know who we are and be really nice until they realize that we are Christian missionaries and then say, "Go away Jesus, never come back!" Super sad. But, there are diamonds in the rough. It just takes a lot to get to them before their friends do. A missionary said, speaking of the "golden investigator", true gold will withstand the refiners fire. 

Keep up the good work guys, I love ya. Never quit, just keep swimming.

Love,

Elder Mak