GROUP EMAIL 10-01-2018 Popped tires!

Alright mom, I am going to try and write a longer email this time. I am putting some effort into it. 

Hello everyone! I hope you all had fantastic weeks. Mine was pretty good.

So one sad story. I don't remember which day it was, but we had 3 appointments and we were pretty excited for all of them. But then, all three of them except for one cancelled. However, the last one was pretty awesome. It was with a mom named Yuki and her daughter named Elena. So typically I guess we just normally give Yuki one on one English class (this was my first time teaching her), but this time, we moved it to gospel topics. It was really awesome. It was funny though because her daughter understands more about our church for some reason so she would take the words we were saying and expain it to her mom really fast cuz she could talk faster than us. It was really funny. The only problem is, she does it in a way that it seems like she is mocking her mom for not being able to understand the principles we are trying to teach! It sometimes would make her mom not want to ask more questions, so we are going to try and get an appointment without her daughter there, we are not sure how though. Her daughter is like 12 by the way.

The second thing that happened this week is we taught this guy named Jack for the first time. He is from China and doesn't have any background knowledge about God. So we taught him about prayer and how he can ask God if He exists. It was kind of funny though because Chinese people can be super private. If you give them a scripture and don't specifically ask them to read out loud, they will read it to themselves. During this visit, we said a prayer together, then we asked him, do you want to try? He then said a prayer to himself in his head. It was really funny. But we have another lesson with him coming up and we are super excited for that. 

Alright third thing, this one is really cool. So Friday night, the institute had like a game night. We were going to go, but then we almost didn't because all of the people we are teaching said they wouldn't come. However, we decided to stay because we wanted to see if a member came that has been having troubles. Well we stayed and then like five minutes later a guy walks in who speaks Chinese (went to taiwan). He said that there was a Chinese lady that just popped her tire and he didn't know how to change a tire. So we go out, change the tire, and then she is interested in learning more! It was super cool. She lives in a different mission though so we won't be teaching her, but it was so cool because there were a lot of coincidences that happened. Like, what were the odds a Chinese lady pops her tire right next to one of the only guys that speaks Chinese? It was so cool.

Next story. So Saturday we had lunch with a Chinese recent convert and his girlfriend. The entire lunch was in Chinese. It was so hard. I didn't understand a lot of what was going on because they talk so fast! I could understand probably half of it when I was trying and like none when I decided to zone out. It is okay though. We had hot pot which is so good and so filling. I ended up having a muffin for dinner because I was so full. But it was so cool.

Alright final story. So Sunday, Qianqian came! It was so awesome. It was funny though because during the Sacrament they ran out of water because there was a lot more people than they expected so they had to bless some more water during the Sacrament. But anyways, Qianqian. So in our lesson with her, these two members who just got married came and helped explain family history and temples (they are the family history consultants). We also explained the Law of Tithing and the Law of the Fast. So we have now taught her everything. Her baptism had to get moved to the 14th though because of General Conference, but she is awesome! It seems like she gets the gospel. We are super pumped for her baptism.

The spiritual thought I would like to leave you guys with is preparing for General Conference. General Conference is such an amazing experience and is so cool because we literally get direction from prophets of God. I invite you all to prepare for it, I promise if you do you will get so much more out of it. In church yesterday, they talked about a lot of different ways you can prepare. One that is talked about a lot is having a question, even if it is just, "What can I do to change?" But one thing I never thought about is putting three points beneath it and space to write what you can change or the answer to your question or even both. And then making sure that your heart reflects the space written on the page. One thing that I really liked that was said is sometimes it seems like a talk doesn't apply to you, but Ipromise every single one can. Even the women's conference for the men. And vise versa. In the MTC I learned about a talk given by Elder Uchtdorf that I had never heard about because it was in a women's conference, but it was so awesome! I invite all you guys to read every single talk and try to find how it can apply to you. Anyways, that's my week! Love you all!

Elder Vander Linden

PS

If you haven't sent out the group email yet. Can you add this last little bit on the end?

I just want to say to all of you, if you are considering serving a mission, do it! It is absolutely amazing and you guys will love it so much. You will learn so much and never regret it. So go and serve a mission if you are thinking about it. It's so worth it!