Whatsup? Hope lots of good stuff:)
Hey this week has been pretty good,
I feel that things are starting to pick up more. We made goals for
different people we wanted to focus on this transfer in 4 categories; baptisms,
integrating recent converts into branch, rescuing less actives, and
strengthening members and helping prepare them for the temple; along
with all of our other investigators and finding of course! This
week we went and visited some less actives that have been ones on our list of
people to rescue during this transfer. It was very exciting because at
church almost all of the less actives who we had visited had come to church
which was so great to see! We had a couple that didn't but it was very
satisfying to see many who did come. I guess the trick now is to
strengthen them and help them have spiritual experiences so they will come
consistently and stay active:)
Ming Siinaa is an investigator who
is has a baptismal date on May 12, this week it came up that she
doesn't have her marriage certificate, so her and her husband are
not legally married, therefore she cannot be baptized without the said
document. When we told her this she seemed to lose a lot of desire to receive
baptism. She says that it is too expensive and so maybe she'll just
"wait a year" to be baptized.. However, we feel that they could
definitely get the paper if they really made it a goal and tried. But she
still came to church on Sunday and we feel that we have to strengthen her faith
and show her the importance of baptism and the eternal blessings that stem from
it. We feel that she maybe still thinks it's just "something you
do" and doesn't recognize how truly important it is. We
have an investigator, Puu Sokciat that we taught the Word of Wisdom and we are
now helping to overcome some of his addictions.
We have a recent convert named,
Riit(probably one of my favorite Cambodians:) i love this guy.), who was really
sick with a bad cough and had to go to the hospital because he didn't have
enough blood in his system and had to get more. We went and visited him at
the hospital. Which compared to an American hospital was not very
sanitary at all, one more thing that I am so grateful for back at home.
My gratitude for things is really growing seeing how little many people here in
Cambodia have. We are indeed so blessed! Wow! It really is so crazy how
good we have it. Anywho, it was great visiting him and showing our love for him
and we thought it would be good for his older brother Petkdei to give him a
blessing. So we had the opportunity to participate in the blessing with
Petkdei. Afterwards Petkdei said he felt like the Spirit was guiding him
on what to say and the blessing just flowed. It was a real neat
experience! Something we are working on is helping members and investigators
have spiritual experiences, which come naturally as we do those basics of
sincere prayer, scripture study, church attendance, and living true to the
gospel always.
Anyways, this week was good and now
that the Khmer New Year is over things are coming back to normal and I feel
that things are going to continue to go great! Oh and this was easily the
hottest week of my life. haha, it's insane:)
I am so grateful for my mission and
for all of the experiences that I am blessed to have every day. Indeed,
everyday is precious!
I hope you know that I love you and
that I pray for you. I hope you have a great week and stay safe!
Soom srolan,
Elder Tanner Garlick
Some pics: Elder Decker and Me; We
had a Specialized Training conference thing up in Siem Reap and we met with
some of the Elders from a couple of other kites(areas away from the city of
Phnom Penh) and Elder Decker was there, he was one of my buddies in the MTC and
the first member of my group I've seen since for like the past 7 or 8 weeks;
that is one of the bumbers of being in a faraway kite-you don't really get to
bump into anyone else-oh well I love it here!, A river, Cover for the next
issue of National Geo. haha. Jk. But seriously!, a cute little frog.
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