Miracles in Pangnaa

 Me and sis Adams at the Christmas devo!

I hope every one had a great Christmas! My Christmas was fantastic. I got to skype my family, then Sis Adams and I went to a mall and ate Japanese food and bought ourselves a blender (And then two days later discovered that the apartment already had one. Oops). 

Christmas dinner at a Japanese restaurant.
I decided to be a walrus for this picture for some reason.

After our P-day ended we met up with the Elders in our district and went caroling at the sky train station! We took turns talking to people while the others sang. We found a few people who were interested, but then we got told that we couldn't carol there so we decided to go caroling outside of Sis Adams' and my favorite 7/11. We found even more people there. hahahahah We ended the night with visiting a member family. The wife is inactive, so we shared a message about Christmas and why it's important that Christ was born. It was awesome!!!!!!!!!! It was an excellent Christmas. 

Soooooo cold!

Supposedly the week of Christmas is rough on missions because every one gets homesick and productivity decreases, but Sis Adams and I went even harder after Christmas. We had sooooo much  to do! And we really reaped the blessings from our hard work. At church on Sunday we had four investigators at church, one of which is a girl who is preparing to be baptized next Sunday! We found her mom outside of a supermarket, and her mom brought her to the church on Saturday. The mom isn't so interested, but her daughter, Noon, is SO excited!!! She's adorable. We're way excited about her! Our Elders had a lot of people at church too. We had a total of 9 investigators, which was the second highest total in the zone (after Saphaansung) and we're the smallest district in the zone with only two companionships! Awesome.

So that was a miracle.

My little chancho!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And his uncle.

Yesterday my investigator Les from Saphaansung was baptized. Sis Steele, the sister training leader who took my place in Saphaasung took such good care of him. :))) We talk to her a lot so I've been so blessed to get to hear about my little chancho (Sis Hughes and I nicknamed him chancho... you know... like from Nacho Libre...). He was such a miracle!! On that day when we met him, we had randomly decided to take a song thew instead of a bus to get to the church... if we hadn't had taken the song thew we wouldn't have met him! And then he wouldn't have followed us to the church, and then he wouldn't have gotten a Book of Mormon and left his church orphanage and moved into his Islam family's home and gotten baptized!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Apparently he brought his uncle to his baptism. There is no way that that was all just a coincidence. He was so ready.

 After the baptism he went contacting with the Elders. :))))) SO MUCH HAPPINESS.

My first bug!

Not so bad.

Random baby elephant walking down our street.

So we've been trying to do some exploring and trying different places to contact, but we've found that the area around the church is just filled with people ready for the Gospel. One night we spent an hour in front of a big mall and got rejected up the whazoo! NO ONE wanted to talk to us (well.... a few people did... but not many), and then in the last 30 minutes of the night we went to our favorite 7/11 and got two new investigators who agreed to baptism!!! We've vowed never to contact anywhere else. lol

 How many trash dogs can you count?

Speaking of that 7/11, yesterday Sis Adams and I had planned out like 4 hours of contacting and had just tried to do some neighborhood contacting which did not bring any fruit... so we were really hoping that our 7/11 would pull through for us. It was just way hard because New Years is a HUGE holiday in Thailand and everyone has literally gone back to their home towns so no one was out!! While I was trying to get to know the food vendors (it's kind of awkward when they just watch us talk to people for an hour and judge us... it's more fun when we're friends with them and they just expect us to be there, lol) Sis Adams tried to talk to this deaf guy... so she gave up on that. But we both noticed that he was watching us, so we showed him a picture of baptism and he got really excited. He communicated to us that he'd seen it before and was going to a church the next day (don't ask how.... I don't even know myself). We pulled out a restoration pamphlet and he said that he has one. His friends wanted him to learn. He showed us on a bus card where he was going... wayyy far away! We told him that there was a church around the corner. He got way excited! So we set up an appointment to meet on Sunday because this week he's busy.

So basically we had a deaf Thai conversation.... I don't know how it happened but it did. So he's wayyyyyyy excited to learn! And we're wayyyyy excited to teach him! How are we gonna do it? I HAVE NO IDEA! But it's going to be sooooo sweet. I can't wait!

So that was another miracle.

So many miracles are happening! Pangnaa is so ready to change. The Lord is hastening His work. :DDDDDDDDD

Happy New Years! Or: Sawatdii bii mai!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't believe it's 2014 already!!!!! What the heck?

Love,

Sis Zaugg

Thus ends my training....

What a week! It was the last week of this transfer, AND the end of my training. I'm no longer a greenie anymore!! I still feel like a greenie in a lot of ways, but Sis Reedy did a great job of forcing me to do uncomfortable things and learn how to lead and be a missionary! I feel fairly confident that I could do whatever the Lord asked me to do at this point. :) Speaking of which, on Saturday during companionship study I was like, "Hey, on Monday we're probably gonna find out if we're training" ('cause on Tuesday there's a big new trainers meeting). And she was like, "Oh yeah :O" And then I went to call a less active to make an appointment, but before I could press the call button, boop! Got an incoming call from President Senior!

This is basically how the conversation went:

"Hey President Senior! What a surprise to hear from you!"

"Hello! How's your training going?"

"It's great!"

"Great! You feel like you could train someone else?"

"Yeah, I could do it."

"Good, 'cause I'm, asking you to do it."

"Uhhh.... I accept!"

"Haha. Good. :)"

Yup! I'm training! I KNEW IT!! You know, 6 weeks ago I was way freaked out at the prospect of getting a greenie after JUST being a greenie, but I've grown a lot since then! My Thai is fair, my teaching is better, I have more confidence in the Lord and myself. It's great! But most of all, I just know that the Lord qualifies whom He calls, so I know that I can do it (it also helps that I'm staying in Don Muang). I'm only a month younger than Sis Reedy was when she got me! 

Speaking of Sis Reedy, she's training too!!! Again! And she's white washing! AGAIN!! Hahahahahahahhahaha When she found out she basically just screamed for 20 minutes. lol I know she can do it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The Lord thinks so highly of her. Seriously. Every transfer he like.... turns up the heat on her a little bit. She keeps doing well, so he keeps giving her more!! hahah I'm so proud of her! My mee is awesome!

The new missionaries get here on Wednesday and transfer meeting is on Thursday, so next Monday I'll be a mom! YEAHH!!! I have a big 'ol list of things I want to be as a trainer and what I want to do as a trainer and how I want to improve and do better. :D It's gonna be great! I'm excited to stay in Don Muang. There was a week or two where I didn't want to stay 'cause I was way stressed out and sad about investigators and LA's, but I had an experience this week that really changed my views and my thoughts on missionary work and now I'm fine staying here for at least another 9 weeks!

Me and Sister Pannida!

That experience was going on switch-offs with the sisters from Pankheen. It was kind of random, but the sister training leaders asked us to do it. So I stayed in Don Muang and Sister Pannida, a khon thai from the Issan came and we were companions for a day! I learned SO much from her! She taught me to just love the people. Sometimes I get really caught up in worrying about the branch as a whole and wanting to get people to go to church to build up the branch so there can be a stake, so there can be a temple.... but after spending a day with Sister Pannida, I was reminded that this work is about individual's happiness and salvation. I just gotta love 'em and listen to them and the Spirit. If I love them sincerely and serve them sincerely, the Spirit will be able to touch them. I'm not here to convert them, the Spirit is! (Thanks Carrie :) ) She also taught me to not get too stressed out or have too many expectations. I can have the hope that these people will accept my message, but I can't like.... have all my happiness depend on whether or not this person who I think will change their lives is going to actually do it or not. It's a fine balance that I'm still trying to find. haha Anyway, I think the world of Sister Pannida! She dies in October, so we're not ever going to have a chance to be real companions! I'm sad. :( I want to learn more from her! 

Earlier this month Sis Reedy and I did NOT know who our baptism was gonna be!! But we knew we had to get one 'cause the AP's committed us to getting one, the Zone Leader's committed us, AND our District Leader committed us... so we knew we had to get it.... but all of our investigators were and are..... stuck. :I One day I was studying in the Book of Mormon... just trying to find out what we needed to do to, and I kept opening it up randomly and kept finding scriptures that said, "pray in faith". I was like... ".....oooookayyyyyyyyy....." So I did just that! I just prayed in faith. I just chose to believe that it would happen.

A few days later during long planning a member called us and asked if we were free to go teach her daughter. We paused planning and went and saw her and she accepted a date to be baptized this month!!!!!!!! She wants to change and is eager to learn. Basically she's free every day to meet, she's free every Sunday to go to church, and she loves reading the Book of Mormon!!!!!!!

I know that if we have a righteous desire and pray in faith Heavenly Father will answer our prayers. :)

Saturday was the kind of day that every missionary dreams of having. We taught ALL day! We only had 15 minutes to eat dinner IT WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And then Sunday was great too! We got balanced key indicators again! AND there was a baptism! His name is Stephen. He's from Africa and plays football! ...Err.. I mean soccer. He's sooooo great! I had to interpret for some of the khon thais that attended.... It was SO HARD! Sis Reedy made me do it! I was so mad. I did ok. Anyway... Myheart was gonna try to make it to the baptism but got stuck in traffic. :( He totally missed it! But we taught him about the Word of Wisdom, and even thought he's way addicted to tea he said he'd quit!!! Yayyyyy : D He still isn't sure if the Book of Mormon is true or if the church is true 'cause he hasn't gotten an answer to his prayers yet, but I think part of it is cause he cant really feel the spirit ever cause of his snooker. :/ Plus he drinks an inordinate amount of tea, so we said that keeping the word of wisdom would help him feel the spirit more and get an answer easier!! 

So yeah. Things are good. Much better than last week. I was way stressed out last week. haha But I chose faith and things worked out alright!

Love,

Sister Zaugg

Hi everyone! Again!

This week FLEW BY!! Like, I almost feel like nothing even happened between last P-Day and today! ....But then I think about it... and A LOT HAPPENED.

OK So on Tuesday we were pretty much stuck at the church allllllllllllllllllllllllll day 'cause we had District Meeting at 1, English meeting at 5 and then English class at 6:30, and it's not like Sis Reedy and I can just go home and come back like all the other missionaries in our district 'cause Don Mueang is so far away from the church. Anyway. So in the time between District Meeting and English meeting, we were calling members and investigators to set up appointments for the week. We ran out of people to call, so we decided to call Udomdet again. Udomdet is that taxi driver who we met my veeeeeeeeeeeery first week in Thailand who gave us a free ride because he was so happy to hear our message. His phone has been off ever since then, but we've been calling him every day. :P Anyway, HE ANSWERED!!!!!!!!!!! We were so excited!!!!! Turns out he lives in the apartment complex that our investigator Ben lives, which is right next to where we live!!! Whaaaaat. Anyway. We set up an appointment to meet the next day. 

I was wayyyyy nervous, 'cause for the last 9 weeks I'd been building this guy up in my head. I was afraid that when we finally got to teach him he wouldn't be interested or as great as I thought, and I didn't know if I was prepared for him to reject us. :( Well, we finally got to sit down with him and he's still interested in learning! He's always had questions about who created the Earth and why are we all here. Just things he's just knew had answers ever since he was a kid. He wanted to read a Bible 'cause he knew it talked about the creation, so when he read the BoM he was disappointed that it didn't explain it right off the bat, so we had to show him where it does. He isn't what I expected, which threw me off a little, but he's searching for truth, which we have! And if he keeps searching, he'll find it.

OK But the craziness with Udom doesn't end there. He asked us why Christ died for him, so I asked him about how much he loves his kids, and that Christ's love for him is greater than that, and that's why he died for him. But when I asked if he had kids he was like, "Yeah, they know you."

...

Sis Reedy and I were like, "Uh..... we've never met your kids."

And he was like, "Yeah you do. My daughter says she meets with you."

....

We asked what her name was.

"Ben."

.......................................................................................................................

WHAT

Udomdet is Ben's FATHERRRRRRRRRRRR

We met this guy randomly my first week and then he disappeared. Then Sis Reedy and Sis Steele met Ben randomly at a 7/11 on the big companion exchanges day and have been teaching her ever since then. THEY'RE FAMILY. Also- Ben has a brother who saw the BoM on her table once and started taking it to work to read. They take turns with it. Yesterday she said that they actually fought over whose turn it was to read. YEAH. THAT REALLY HAPPENED. We're trying to find a way to teach her brother... he's only free in the early morning. :/

Whoa. When I think about this family, and how God has prepared them.... I feel so... small. I also feel comforted by the idea that I know that I can't really mess this up for Ben's family. Obviously Heavenly Father has a plan for them. They're so ready for the Gospel. It's a miracle!!

Also- we got BALANCED KEY INDICATORS!!!! It was a miracle, really. We needed an extra investigator at church, and a guy form the other branch brought his friend who wants to change religions. So now she's our new investigator too!!! It was so great. :DDD

Things are so amazing here. Sis Reedy and I have seen so many miracles with the people we serve and with us. The Lord has really put us through the fire here in some occasions, but he's also brought us to the highest mountain tops and shown us great things. I can't believe there are only two weeks left of this transfer. :(

I don't have much time to talk this week 'cause we're going to Ayutthiya (I dunno how to spell it)- an ancient buddhist place... thing... I dunno. Every one raves about it. Our whole district is going! 

Love y'all!

Sis Zaugg

One More Week in Thailand

Hellllllooooooooo!!

Per usual, MUCH has happened this week. It was a great week! Even if Sis Reedy and I have both been feeling really sick through it all. I think it was a mixture of icecream and some bad Thai food that we had last Monday. haha

This week we got two new investigators! One of them is a referral from a recent convert in the branch. He's in the army and she's his captain. LOL So cool! Her name is Ammy. She's been buddhist her whole life, but has always wondered why there are so many Christians in the world, so she wants to try it out. We're a little bit confused about her, because she's really willing to learn, but when she came to church yesterday she was sooooo attached to her phone, it was a little ridiculous. She was treating church the way a farang (white person) would treat a Buddhist wad. She was taking pictures of EVERYTHING, including the speakers during sacrament meeting and posting them on facebook. Uhhhhhh Yeah. She was feeling sick, too, so she went home before the 3rd hour.   She seemed to like it, though... just for the wrong reasons. lol Next time we teach her we'll suggest turning the phone off and listening to the spirit next time instead. :)

The next investigator is named Ben. Sis Reedy and Steele found her during the last companion exchanges at a 7/11. Sis Reedy and I gave her a call a week later and she was up to meet with us. We met her at a park near our house. 

A little detour for a second: this park by our house is hilarious. At first glance it looks like a normal kiddy park with colorful play structures and stuff, but REALLY it's like... a geriatric exercise park!! LOL If you look closer the play structures are actually exercise machines in disguise. hahahahaha In the evening a bunch of old people gather there and use the structures, flail around and/or lay about and don't actually do anything. 

Anyyyyyway. So we met up with Ben at the park. She's our age and has a real desire to learn about God and Christ! After we prayed, she was like, "Hey... you like, asked for blessings in your prayer.... can you do that?? Do you ever get them??" ANd we were like, "YEAH!" She's amazed by the fact that God and Christ love everybody and that you can have a personal relationship with them. She's a normal personal with normal person concerns, and she really wants to feel like there's someone who loves her no matter what! She's great.

Ew hasn't progressed much since last week, mainly because she works sooooo much, we only got to meet with her once this week. However, she still really wants to learn. She feels guilt for some things in her past and wants to have a better family life and get help with her financial situation, so she wants to know how God can help her with those things. She prays every day. :) Turns out that the random member that we took with us to help teach her sells across from her so they already knew each other! Perfect! So yeah, we won't get to teach her this week 'cause she has to sell out of town, so she wont make her baptismal date. haha Slowly but surely.

Sis Mali is doing GREAT! We have seen maaaaany miracles with her. First, we taught her tithing and she was super excited about it!! She said she would pay it! A couple days later as we were riding to a less active member's house, I felt like we should go say hi to Mali, so we stopped by her little sausage stand. She was super happy to see us and had us sit down so that she could tell us something important. She said that that day she had been really stressed out and depressed, because she was thinking about her debt and the fact that she wasn't going to have enough money to pay it that day and buy supplies to sell the next day, and that she really wanted to go to church, but her debt was making it impossible for her! She was justing praying her heart out and after she finished her prayer, ten minutes later her younger sister called and asked her how she was doing. She told her about her problems, and later that day her sis came over and gave her 10,000 baht!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That's almost all of her debt!!!!!!!!!! WHOA. She was SO happy and astounded. She told us, "God really DOES help us! He saw my faith and blessed me!!" She said that she had already bought 3 new skirts for church that day, 'cause she's never owned one before. :)))))))))))))) 

Wow. What a miracle. I think the thing that astounds me the most is just the truth that God truly does love ALL His children. Like, I didn't even know about Mali until 5 weeks ago, but God did. He's been taking care of her all this time, loving her and preparing her for the Gospel. I can feel His love for her and it's so amazing. Makes me love her even more! Not exactly sure when she'll be baptized, maybe the end of next month, it really just depends on if she can get the last bit of her debt payed off. If she keeps paying her tithing she will. :)

We had another random miracle happen this week, too! One night we were teaching Sis Lek, and we had to go to a meeting 'cause we were going to be late, she offered to let us leave our bikes at her house so we could get there on time. It ended up working out that we had to leave them there over night so we could get home on time, so the next morning we went to pick them up. Well, we got there and went to unlock them, but the combination wouldn't work! Somehow when I was locking the bikes up I changed the combination, and we had noooooo idea what it was!! We spent like, 10 minutes just trying random combinations, but nothing was working!!!!! We were about to give up and call someone when Sis Lek randomly is like, "Hey, isn't there a 6 in it?" And we were like, "What?" And she was like, "Yeah, I think I remember seeing a 6 in it yesterday!" So SIs Reedy just randomly switched one of the numbers to 6, and CLICK! IT UNLOCKED!!!!!! All the numbers were totally random, and she just happened to choose the right one to switch to some random number that Sis Lek thought she remembered seeing. Hahahahhahaha WHAT?!?! We were soooooooo grateful!!! God does take care of His little missionaries. :,) That seems like a small thing, but really, when you think about it, THAT WAS A BIG MIRACLE. How many possible combinations are there for a 4 number lock? A looooooot. Wow. Every time I think about it I just can't even believe it. haha

So those are the big things that happened this week. I'm still a greenie, and I'm awkward 'cause I cant understand any one still and no one understands me. lolll It's hard, too, something I've learned about Thai people in general is that they looooooooove to talk! You ask someone a question and they just launch into this monologue about everything but the question you asked that goes for ages and agesssss. And they never seem to notice that no one is listening either! hahahahah Oh dear.

Sis Reedy and I have started naming all the dogs that live on our street. So far we have Scooter, who is the crazy one. He's my favorite, but I try to keep my distance from him. Most dogs in Thailand are super lazy and just lay around all day, but he's always running around doing stuff, I'm not sure what. Sometimes he gets scared by his tail and just starts wigging out. Sometimes we pass by him and he's sitting with just one hind leg raised for no reason. Yeahh... Then there's King James, who is this dog with a really long dreaded tail. We think he looks kind of regal in a sad stinky dog kind of way. Then there's this short little torpedo of a dog who we just come up with a new Mexican name for him every time we see him. Yesterday he was Francisco.

Yup! This transfer is coming to a close. One more week! Pres Senior called us and asked how we  feel about trios..... euuuuhhhhggggg....... I'm not really sure what's going to happen. :S 

Anyway, the work is really picking up here finally! White washing is such a lam baag (burden) but finally we're starting to get somewhere here! Haha took 5 weeks! But we made it!! Yeahhhh

Love you all!

Sis Zaugg