Week 77: End of the Week Miracles in Tao Yuan

Hello!

This week was pretty.....good? Haha I don't know. Taoyuan is pretty great. Different then Yonghe and I'm still adjusting but also not. I feel like I've been here forever. Except that I still don't know the ward. The weather has been a little strange. It's chilly in the shade but hot in the sun, so I'm not sure what clothes I'm supposed to wear. It also rains more here than in Taibei. Probably just because it's getting closer to rainy season. 沒關係吧! 

I absolutely love Taiwan and I love being a missionary. We've just been working hard to find the prepared and working hard to find people to teach. We haven't had much success in terms of finding people to teach, but we've seen miracles. Last week we called formers and nothing came of it. But then on Friday, after getting a set up with someone, and another person walking up to us randomely asking for a BOM, we got a call from someone random. I jokingly was like "Sister Weaver, this is gonna be a miracle" And guess what? It was. He said who he was then said that we had called his wife earlier and that they didn't have time. But now they had time. They asked if we had time on Friday or Sunday. I invited them to church and then THEY CAME!!!!!! Mr. Lin and Mrs. Su. SOOOOOO incredible. Then they set up with us!! :D 

Then at church we also had a super cool miracle. We didn't have anyone coming to church except for these two people, but we were praying for it all week. Just to get three people to church, and do you know what happened? 5 came! We got in touch with Myrium this super cute Philippino girl who is a member last week, and she asked where the church was. So we explained it to her, and her friend was with her. Well we called her and she said she was coming to church and her friend. BUT THEN THREE OF HER FRIENDS SHOWED UP!!! SOOOOOO amazing! I spent the sacrament meeting translating for them. But it was really hard. I realized the gift of tongues is real. I understand what they are saying but I can't translate it.....awkward. I felt bad for them. But I hope they liked it. I just know that prayer works and that God is there. Even though we didn't find many new people to teach this week, we still were blessed. 

Sister Weaver and I are having a lot of fun. Kinda gets us through you know? Haha, We laugh a lot. Mostly she just laughs at me being weird but that's ok :) I like making others laugh even if it's just cause I'm super strange haha. 

I am slowly loving Taoyuan more and more. I think I'm just feeling stressed right now. But I'm really trying to just not fear and have faith. I've never prayed harder then I have this last week. I just have this feeling of "I know that what I do isn't enough, and that I just can't do it alone". I'm just trying to focus on what God wants. But it's so hard. It's hard to completely change the way I feel and think. Anyway. Hope that made sense. 

I know that God loves us. I know that this is His work and that His hand is in our lives everyday. Even if I don't always recognize it. This week I want to focus more on the positive. I think I've been focusing too much on what isn't happening, then what is. I'm going to focus on the blessings and being grateful. And I invite everyone else to do the same. If you're having a hard day, hard week, just focus on the good for a little. Focus on the things that make you happy, and just remember that everything good in our life has come from God. He loves us so much and He is doing everything that He can to help us become who He wants us to be. I love you all so much. I’m scared about how fast time is going. I haven't told anyone around me that I'm dying yet (on my last transfer). Maybe they know and just don't talk about it. If so that's fine. But I'm just trying to focus completely on what I'm doing now, and enjoying every last second. 

I love you all and hope you all have a good week!!!

Love,

Sister Roberts

羅姐妹

Sister Weaver

English class ... we went from 21 in Yong He to 3 in Tao Yuan

Picture of Chase Toronto in Australia! His companion is from Tao Yuan.  This was on our ward bulletin board!

Elder Toronto!

The Toronto's

Strange things we see while out finding

Nothing like a fresh box of the Word of God!!!

Week 76: MOVED to Taoyuan

Well, 

I've been moved. It was super funny cause Sister Yee and I were sitting at a starbucks doing studies and everyone was telling us that they were getting moved and we both started freaking out because we hadn't received the text yet.... but then we got it hah. We were both like "Man, could we go together for a third transfer? I don't know if we could haha" It was funny. Anyway, I found out I was moving to TaoYuan 2nd ward, and that I was going to be companions with Sister Weaver. Well she was in MuZha before, and I was her STL before. FUN :) Sister Yee's new companion is also one of the Sisters that we were over. FUN. This sister actually has followed me. She was moved to Songshan after I moved out, then she moved to YongHe. :) 

My week was nuts. The week of transfers is always the longest. But , Monday I sent a package home....I will be home before it :) Ha. Then Tuesday was district meeting, then Wednesday we found out where we were going! Actually, before that we had met a super cute mom the day before and then Wednesday we met with her. She was super cool. She cried after we prayed for her then another time when we were in the chapel. Super incredible ! It's funny because I really think that we find the prepared people when we aren't planning to find them ... AKA we're always finding !  

Wednesday we found out I was moving to Taoyuan and we had a qingke right after we found out with a bunch of members so I got to tell the members where I was going and Wang DX and Zhang JM offered to drive me to TaoYuan. AMAZING. It ended up Huang JM (my RC) took me. So I didn't have to drag my luggage!!! YAY! 

Thursday, was good. We got there and then walked all day. I didn't have a bike, so we just walked and found...all day haha. Talked to a couple cool people. My new companion is Sister Weaver. I was her STL for a transfer. :) She's pretty cool. She's from Utah. A little bit quie t , but I love her a lot :) She's been patient with my stress and I'm so grateful for her. 

Thursday night we also met with the Lin Family. They are incredible. It's a mom, dad, and 2 daughters. One is 9 and the other is 2? The mom and dad b oth speak really good English and Brother Lin's family is in Utah right now , right by Sister Weaver's home haha. And they set baptismal dates for the 6th of may!!! Y AY!!!! I'm so excited and really hope that this whole family can get baptized!!! The daughter didn't set a date because we didn't ask her haha and she wasn't really in the lesson, but next time :) They committed to reading the BOM and praying about it. Church will be a little more rough. The mom is kinda stubborn and tired from being a mom but they said this next week they will come!!! Pray for them!!! 

Friday, we had WPS then a qingke. Super delicious and fun. As we were biking there, I turned and talked to this lady on her scooter, and I was completely lost for words. So I just asked if we could pull over and talk. She said "Ok" So we talked and found out that she is a LA and that her husband is a member, and so is her son, but that they don't attend. I don't know why , but it was amazing to meet her . She offered to qing us but we had a dinner already. So we set up with her for next week and she said that she's going to come next week. :D YAY! MIRACLES! We talked to the RS president the next day and told her about it and she was sooooo excited. I'm so grateful. It was just so crazy because before that we were studying Chinese, but I felt like we needed to go to this place earlier, and that if we did we would meet someone. And then we did. And it's just so crazy that God put us at that exact place at that exact time, and right next to her! How else would we have found her??? So cool.

Saturday and Sunday we just did more missionary work :) Had a couple lessons, and just working on finding more people. It's different here ... t here's not a bunch of people everywhere like there were in YongHe so I'm still adjusting. I've been really stressed out and worried this week but I'm just tr y ing to focus and trying to work as hard as I can. I want more than anything to have a successful area by the time I leave it and/or a baptism. And I am trying not to worry. I know that if I just have faith and work hard, that God will send the prepared people our way. 

I love you all and am so grateful to be on a mission. It means the absolute world to me and I know that this is God's work. We see His hand in our life every day, and am so grateful. I'm excited to be with Sister Weaver! And excited to see the miracles of this transfer!!!!!

Love,

Sister Roberts

羅姐妹

My Last Pictures in Yong He.  I love these members and friends so much!

Arriving in Taoyuan

Week 75: Baptisms!!!

大家好！

Well just to start off I just have to tell you that the highlight of my day was HUANG JM AND XIE DX WERE BAPTIZED!!!!!!!!!!! And it was incredible!!!!!!!!!! It went soooo smooth and it was just wonderful!!!! I can't explain how much I love them!!! The Elder's helped baptize them. Huang JM was soooo sweet in her testimony. She just talked about how grateful she was for us. And how much we helped her. She told me one thing that really stood out to me, she said "No matter where you go, whoever you teach, and whether or not they get baptized, they are grateful for you. And if they get baptized they are even more grateful" It was really sweet. She's incredible... OH but did I ever tell you that they were a referral from BanQiao sisters?  And do you know who are the Banqiao sisters? SIster DeWitt (my trainee)!! Sister DeWitt found her!!! :D So so awesome. I love her!

Oh we also had zone conference! So that was pretty cool. Elder and Sister Funk were there and it was super cool. Elder Funk talked a lot about what he talked about in MLC. But President and Sister Jergensen also had incredible lessons and I'm just so amazed by their ability to teach from the scriptures. I also had the opportunity to do a special musical number at zone conference. I sang with Sister Austad, and Elder Walters (who is like a legendary pianist), Sister Clawson (on violin), and Elder Thompson (on cello). We sang Beautiful Savior! Soooo incredible. I'm so grateful to have had the chance to sing on my mission!

This week was just full of great lessons and cool little miracles. We've really been trying to find new people but using all kinds of methods to find. We street contact, we also have been visiting LA and part member families, and we are also asking referrals from everyone we can! We now have two 9 year old investigator boys who are gonna get baptized:) Both in different families! So awesome!

OH MY GOODNESS I ALMOST FORGOT TO TELL YOU ALL, SATURDAY I HAD 4 INVESTIGATORS BAPTIZED!!!!! So I don't know if I said much about Li JM but she was a member's friend in the zhong he second ward. We passed her off to the SongShan sisters because Li Jm moved to Neihu. Well she got baptized on Saturday morning!!! And we got to go!!! Then I get there and Sister Reinhard and Sister Kim were like "Hey did anyone tell you that Chen Yeye is getting baptized today at 3"? And of course I freaked out! Chen Yeye was the grandpa who is like 80 but that understood pretty well. And he really really wanted to get baptized but couldn't because of his living situation. Well I don't know what happened but I think because of health issues and stuff he was cleared to be baptized! Don't know how that worked out but he was baptized!!!!!!!! AHHHHHH and then Huang JM and Leo were baptized Saturday night!!!!!!!!!! Oh my goodness how incredible right???? Miracles!!

That was basically our week. We just teach a lot. We've dropped a couple investigators. But yea. 

Our most progressing investigators right now are Wang JM. I found her on the street with my old companion, Sister Wang's little sister on exchanges. She's sooo awesome. She really wants to get baptized and is just golden. I love her :)

The other one is Qiu JM. Or Ruby. She selt contacted herself. She walked in the church last last week. She went to the Jinhua ward (the biggest chapel, by the temple). And she came because of a friend from Canada who had introduced the church to her. Well she said that she has been so happy since she's come to church, and without us telling her, she told her boss that she wasn't going to work on Sunday. And just like that, she isn't working on Sunday. She's been reading the BOM, and has a baptismal date, and everything!!! Incredible. 

I have loved my time in 永和 so much. I love this place. I love the ward. I love my companion, the apartment. The location (it's only 20 min away from the mission office), it really just couldn't get any better. I am so grateful for this time that we have had success and have baptized. Sister Yee and I had 4 baptisms together! 5 counting Li JM (we taught her together before she moved to Neihu). And I just can't express how grateful I am. And now coming down to my last 6 weeks as a missionary, I'm excited to go somewhere else. I don't know where I'm going yet. I'm a little bummed to be in another place for only a transfer because 6 weeks isn't a long time to get to know the area, but I just hope and pray that we can baptize someone, or a family:) But whatever happens, I just am going to try my best. I want to live every last minute and every last second of being a missionary. I think my absolute favorite part of being a missionary is just having the confidence that I am doing exactly what God wants me to be doing. I am serving Him, and I am doing exactly what the Savior would be doing if He were here. He would be finding, and He would be teaching repentance, and baptizing converts :)

I just want to finish by sharing a scripture that I studied this week. I was looking for scriptures about the Atonement for a lesson. It's in 3 Nephi 27:14-15.

"14 And my Father sent me that I might be lifted up upon the cross; and after that I had been lifted up upon the cross, that I might draw all men unto me, that as I have been lifted up by men even so should men be lifted up by the Father, to stand before me, to be judged of their works, whether they be good or whether they be evil—

15 And for this cause have I been lifted up; therefore, according to the power of the Father I will draw all men unto me, that they may be judged according to their works."

Christ was lifted up upon the cross. He suffered that pain, so that we wouldn't have to. So that we would be lifted up from our burdens, and our grief, and our sorrow. We was lifted up so that He might draw all men unto Him, so that we could be lifted up to the Father. That is the joy of the Atonement. We come  unto Jesus, to become free from out sorrows and pains and sins, and so that we can be clean and stand before the Father to be judged and rewarded. I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer. I don't think I understand completely how great He is, or how amazing He is, but I know that what He did was real. I feel it, and I've seen it change and bless others lives. I know that this gospel is real. This is God's plan for us, and each of us have a unique and divine identity. I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week! 

I'll have a new companion and new area next week....wish me luck. Haha just kidding :) 

加油

Love,

Sister Roberts

羅姐妹