Dear FOB (family/friends of Becca),
Rebecca's birthday is October 1st. I know that she would love getting a card or note from you! Considering that it takes nearly 2 weeks for a letter to arrive from the US to the mission home, another 5-7 days until they mail it out, and she can only open mail on preparation day, that date is rapidly approaching! If you have a moment and $1.05 to spare, please consider dropping her a letter and wishing her well on her 22nd birthday.
Thank you so much!
The Editor
Sister Rebecca Winters
106-42
Taiwan Taipei Mission
4 Fl, #24, Lane 183 Chin-hua St.
Taipei Taiwan, ROC
Dear family,
Um, apparently Happy Labor Day! No, they do not have that holiday here in Taiwan. They do celebrate three different Valentine's Days each year here though, so maybe that makes up for it...
It's been a monster of a week - one of those "refiner's fires" ones. :) It started out a little rough, but we really saw some miracles and came out on top by the end. So lately with the change in our mission president we've had a lot of changes in the mission - not only the rules, but in the way that we do missionary work, such as working with members and even with finding. It's been a little hard at the beginning to adjust to having the things you've done for the past nine months of your life being changed suddenly... and have somebody who isn't quite as familiar with the work to be your companion to boot. So these past few weeks have included a lot of struggling, and a lot of prayer. I think the "struggling" took its toll this week - I got sick. But not quite sick enough that I felt okay about staying inside, so I've been just "sick" and not "very sick" all week long. It's okay, though, because 1. there were some miracles associated with that, and 2. it's P-day today and I have told Sister Marler (the district's "P-day planner") that I need a nap today on the schedule and she's willing to accomodate my needs. :) So even though I'm not quite well today, sleep should help and I should be in tip-top shape soon. :)
Okay, onto the miracles, because there were a lot. First, the sick miracle. There were a couple of days where my voice was gone. Completely gone. Like, I would croak at someone and then they'd say, "I don't understand you," and walk away. A little tough on me, but also more tough on Sister Marler. Poor thing - she wasn't used to having to have to be in charge of everything, but with my voice being gone, she suddenly was in charge of about 80% of the talking in lessons, calling our investigators, etc. I think it might have been a little stressful at the beginning for her, but we were able to clearly identify from my voice being gone specifically what she needed to work on. And so when my voice came back more, we could work on it together. And now our lessons have more unity, and are getting closer to that 50/50 balance. It's great!
As you can probably guess, the days where my voice was gone weren't the most "successful" as far as statistics go in missionary work. We were low on lessons and on finding. And we had to go to Hualian on exchanges later that week, so there was another day gone. So you can imagine when we came back to Taidong on Saturday and had only had one investigator that week that we needed a miracle - and we needed the faith to do it. So Sister Marler and I the night before planned out where we would find. Well, I say that, but I actually askedSister Marler where she thought we should go. She said a specific place. I asked her if we should contact on the way there or just ride straight to the place and contact there (we only had about a half an hour and the place was five minutes away). She said that she'd feel more comfortable contacting there, so we wrote it down. The next day when we got back, we prayed and said that we knew that there were prepared people at the place we had planned to go, but we just needed to find them. So we went. When we got there, we were surprised to see this normally crowded area with only a few people in it. We looked around to see whom we could talk to, and we saw a mom and her daughter. So we walked after them, but then I saw a girl walking in the distance and told Sister Marler that she could decide whom she wanted to talk to. She changed her direction and walked towards the girl. She made the right choice - the girl was prepared to hear the Gospel. It turns out that the day that we invited her to be baptized on (October 6) is her birthday. We said if she had a party or something like that we could change it to Friday, but she said, "No, I think that I want to be baptized on that day." So cool. As we walked back to our bikes, I turned to Sister Marler and said, "That, my friend, was a miracle."
There was also a miracle at church as well. We'd been praying all week long that we could reach our goal in having people come to church. We did. A few people that we had planned on hadn't come, but then there were a couple people who surprised us and came. One of them was Meg, Eva's little sister who used to live in China but came back and then was going to move away but surprisingly didn't (long story). I was so surprised and happy to see her! She's really prepapred. Another was a girl named Ling Zhun, who had come last week but we didn't get a chance to meet with her or even get her phone number because she disappeared before Sister Marler could talk to her. Anyway, she came yesterday and I had a chance to meet her. She is SO PREPARED for the Gospel! She's felt the Spirit before, and she likes church - not only because of friends there, but because of the testimonies that were born. Plus her dad thinks our church is awesome, so no opposition there. It was so great, and I was so happy.
There really are so many prepared people that we're teaching right now. We dropped quite a few investigators this week, but we put a star next to all of the people we thought could get baptized, and there were so many! Please pray that we will start seeing the fruits of our labors in baptism. It's so possible. We just need faith and miracles - they're already happening, so I know they can happen again!
Last spiritual thought for today - I know that God knows us and answers our questions. I tell my investigators that all the time, but it was neat to have it happen to me this week. I'd been thinking about a couple of things this week that I wanted resolved, so I asked in prayer for help. And then I studied, and then I got answers! Just a little miracle that can happen every day. :) I know that Heavenly Father loves me enough to answer my prayers, and I also know He loves you enough, too. Try Him.
Alright, that is it for this week. Thanks for your patience with me and these super-long emails. Sorry that there aren't too many funny things in this week's edition, but hey, I'm a missionary - it's in the job description to have some super-spiritual editions every now and then, right?
I love you all. Thank you for your prayers, and have a great week!
Love,
Sister Winters
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