Alright everyone, so are you all ready to hear all the recent happenings/updates?!?!? This Saturday night, President Blickenstaff called and told me that I am TRAINING this next move call. (Starting this FRIDAY.) I'm meeting my trainee this Friday at the mission office and I have to go to the trainer's meeting this Wednesday morning in Taichung. I'll still be here in Yuanlin *(WAHOO!!!!). It's really a bitter-sweet moment. I'm super going to miss Sister Anderson because she's super RAD. Seriously, we're like really really really really really great friends, and we've learned so much together. I swear, we have so many inside jokes now. Anyway, we don't know where she's going yet, but we'll find out this weekend. She'll probably have to go live with the Zhanghua sisters on Friday up until next Monday when she'll go to her new area.
So, since I'm staying here in Yuanlin, I think there are going to be a couple of changes that go on. Because we have two wards that we've been covering for a while, we are always really busy, and we always have to split up for sacrament meetings (the wards meet at the same time, so we have to go on splits so one companion can cover one ward...) Anyway, we might just be covering the 1st ward or something. I'll let you know next week for sure. Changes are happening this week, and I'm super excited. It's going to be great.
Well anyway, I'll get right to the point this week. This is what I was really reminded and was able to apply this week of my mission: REMEMBER, If you're not happy on your mission, that means that you can be doing something different. Whenever I haven't been happy/whenever I've been trunky or a little down, it's because I wasn't focused. I wasn't consecrated. I wasn't truly purified and dedicated the Lord and His work.
Recently, our mission has invited us to truly consecrate ourselves to the Lord. It's a project called "PROJECT PURIFICATION", and this is what we do: We write down a whole list of things that are "poking" at our Spirit - anything at all that is distracting us from our missions. Then, for 40 days, we try to control our thoughts and our actions to avoid doing all these things that poke at our Spirits. Anyway, the most important thing is this: ACCOUNTING TO THE LORD. I know that God answers our prayers. Sometimes we forget to do the small and simple things that we tell our investigators to do every day. I have to always remind myself that in order to help others, I must help and change myself. I know that when we are doing our part, then God will help us extend our arms to help others.
So, today is DAY 6 of 40 of the purification process for me, and already, I have felt a huge change of heart. :) I really did write all the things that distract me from my purpose or my efforts here in Taiwan as a missionary, and every week, I am now fasting for the mission work specifically here in Yuanlin. OH MAN, though!!! Can you talk about the Spirit of God?!?! I seriously have transformed! I'm happy ALL THE TIME. I feel like there's a flame/fire constantly burning in my soul, and I'm always so determined to help our wards live and start moving forward with this work. :)
Alright, so I wanted this email to be a POWER email, so this is the main portion of what I sent to President this week. It really sums up this week in a nutshell, and so I wanted to share it with you all!!!
{This past week, I truly have felt a change not only in my mission work but in who I am as a person and individual. I have really found that I am happier when I put aside the things and the habits that really do poke away at my Spirit.
The call for me to be a trainer has really placed my mission work and my preparations into perspective. I have been preparing and am striving constantly to be a humble, faithful, and worthy servant of God. With the need for a new investigator pool here in Yuanlin, we have been working with individual ward leaders and members/members with missionary experience to help the work really progress. More than ever, I feel a fire burning within me now as I work with these members. I know that here in Yuanlin, we especially need to find more worthy priesthood holders. Sometimes, mission work is slow, and I am determined to keep this work going even if my companion and I have to do it ourselves.
With this new realization and this new fire burning within me, I have found a new love for contacting. I am no longer fearful of people on the roads/streets turning me down. I am actually happy even when they do refuse to listen. I know that when I need help, and when I need to find ways to help these people, I can always turn to the Lord. President, Yuanlin really is a blessed place. The members here are all amazing, and I KNOW we can bring this area to life. I know that with my whole heart, and I know that God is going to help me.}
Yeah!!! So, I hope that you can all kind of feel and get something from that first part, yeah?! OKAY, so this week, we seriously had the BEST member visits in the world. We visited members every single day of this week, and they ALL treated us out for dinner or lunch.
I can't tell you all HOW awesome our members here are. They are SO strong. They are SO amazing, and they are more willing to help with the work than ever!!! All I have to do is ask them, meet with them, be real with them, and show my genuine appreciate for them via notes/cards, and they are BAM - THE BEST MEMBERS A MISSIONARY WOULD WISH FOR.
So, our pool of investigators really needs to be washed out. There are seriously SO many eternal investigators that really need to be dropped, so I've been working on cleaning out the pool. Yesterday during the ward counsel for first ward, I shared with the ward leaders the vision that our mission has, and the vision that I have as their missionary in helping pull and push the work as much as possible. OH MAN!!! The fire started burning in every single one of the ward counsel, and they are working WITH us to really find and plant seeds here in Taiwan. More than ever, we really need to find those who have been prepared by the Lord to help support and lead our wards here in Yuanlin.
OH MAN, I wish all of you can feel how I feel now!! I'm so passionate for missionary work. Every day, I account to the Lord and ask Him to keep a constant prayer in my heart because I KNOW without a doubt that HIS help and HIS hand is VITAL in everything that we do as missionaries and as His children.
There is no way I could include every single event and tell you about every single member and their influence they have had on me because there are simply TOO MANY. All you need to know is this: GOD IS REAL. HE'S MERCIFUL, LOVING, AND KIND. Because He is real, He has answered my prayers. I love Him. I am grateful for Him. I am indebted to Him.
This whole week, I felt like all of my prayers really had been answered. I feel like my priorities in life have all been really found, and I am being purified more and more everyday. I know that the world is full of temptations and sadness. Our life has been polluted by the repulsive efforts of that pathetic Satan, but we CAN and we DO rise above that snake. WE have been blessed with the power and Spirit of God to overcome and live above that PATHETIC devil!!
Can you feel my love for the Lord?! Can you feel that this church IS true?! Do you feel God's love?!
If you don't, then I hope that you at least know that I CAN. I feel God's love. I KNOW of His love because He loves and answers my prayers. I KNOW of His love because He has sent me angels in my life who love me and shape me and pick me up when my hands hang low. I KNOW of His love because I feel the Spirit through living His gospel. I KNOW of His love because my eyes are wet with tears whenever I think of His mercy and His greatness. I KNOW of His love because I am His daughter. We are His children, and He will never forsake us.
Here's a quote that I have shared with all of the people we have seen this week. It's a quote that is included on the first page of the Liahona this month: "Some of us may feel that we can't rise above the polluted pond, that our circumstances are too difficult, our trials too hard, our temptations too great... Remember, the stalk of the water lily grows in adversity, and as the stalk lifts the water lily, your faith will support and lift you." - Mary N. Cook.
I hope you got something out of reading that. I know that if we have hope, we have faith, and faith really will allow us to be supported and lifted when we have no one else/no where else to turn.
Hhaha, I hope I'm not absolutely talking your ears off, because I totally am, but I just love all of you so much that I can't NOT share all this with you. I just love the Spirit. When I have the Spirit guiding God's lessons, God's work, when I have the Spirit guiding my life, then that is when I put my trust completely in God. That's when He DOES carry the message/the truth to the heart's of others.
So, are you a success?! Am I a success?! I told myself that no matter who my companion is, no matter if my key indicators are zero's across the board, no matter if people don't listen to me, no matter if I have a zit on my face, no matter if my apartment falls apart, no matter if the world falls apart, I still can be a successful missionary. Do you know why?!?! - It's because people like Abinadi are successful missionaries. It's because I have seen with my own eyes what real success/real happiness in life is, and it does NOT come from the world. None of the happiness/joy in life comes from any amount of silver, any amount of gold.
SO, next time you talk to a person, I hope you're not judging them based on their outward appearance, the amount of money they make, the language they speak, the muscles, the fat, the clothes, the titles, anything that may or may not be flaunted on the exterior. If there's anything that gets on my nerves, it is probably how superficial, how disrespectful, how shallow people are in their dealings with their fellow men.
Didn't the prophets testify of all this corruption, all the hatred and the sins that would exist in these modern days?! - WELL, I'm here to tell you that WE really can be better than this. WE CAN RISE ABOVE THE WORLD. Oh, and if you don't think you can make a decent cent of an influence on anyone in this world, you're wrong!!!!
I know that I'm one person in this world, but it's not going to stop me from trying to lift you- YES YOU- up to a higher level. So, let's raise our voices like angels and raise our standards. We can do it!!!!!!
Alright, that's basically all that I have to say this week. It really has been a great time in my mission. I hope you can tell from my email. :) I know this email is super overwhelming to some people, and it's super super cheesy, but I'm not going to apologize for all the cheese and all the intensity because I really do mean every single grinding-bit of this email.
2 Nephi 33:1
{And now I, [Sister Verina Chen] cannot write all the things which were taught among my people; neither am I mighty in writing, like unto speaking; for when a man speaketh by the power of the Holy Ghost, the power of the Holy Ghost carrieth it unto the hearts of the children of men.}
Love,
Sister Verina Chen
PPPS Sister Anderson and I are going bowling and going to eat at another cute restaurant. We are so in love with all the cute Taiwan cafes and restaurants. They are all so good and they taste divine!! :) We have been working super well with the members, and we have been treated out to the best places ever!! Oh man. I love my mission so much. Sometimes I don't ever want to leave Taiwan, but I'm also really looking forward to the future that every day brings. :)
LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!!! REMEMBER TO DO THE SMALL AND SIMPLE THINGS IN LIFE. Always prepare yourself to be worthy enough to serve as God's servant and be His tool when He needs leaders to raise and love those lamb who have gone astray and can't seem to find their way!!!!
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