Too Many Investigators?

Hai!

Thanks for your emairs! Pretty good this week. You know, since I rate them every week. This week, on a scale of 1 to pretty good, I'd say they were about a 29.54... or so...

Had a pretty good week here. We are adding new investigators like crazy, and I don't think I'd ever say this, but I think we're kind of getting too many investigators in our teaching pool and it's getting really hard to think about all of them and have enough time to really consider and address their needs. However, I'm sure that as I just take it one at a time and rely on the Lord, things will work out.

Yesterday, quite the opposite of flaking out and getting dropped, Sister Ying was baptized (by me!) which was probably the best baptism I have ever attended. She was so prepared and just so excited the whole time. Throughout the whole service, the Spirit was really really strong and I know Sister Ying's three friends really felt it. Her boyfriend, brother Zhou, who we are also teaching and had a baptismal date for next month (past tense only because he's having trouble quitting smoking), told me when I called him last night that he felt the whole thing was really moving and really felt good about it. He says his faith is increasing everyday and going to the service yesterday really helped him have a confirming witness of the spirit that what we are teaching him is true. Now the only problem is helping him to quit smoking. He really has a desire to quit and has really reduced his smoking to about 1 or 2 cigarettes a day which is good, but not enough; which he knows as well. This week when we teach him we're really going to try to concentrate on building his faith in the Savior and helping him know how to rely on the Lord to help him through this process.

Last week, we added 9 new investigators which was pretty crazy. 2 of them were actually taught by the chinese elders in Sunset who only found out they lived in our area after they taught them so that was nice haha and we added 5 others all at once on Saturday night which was probably one of the most challenging lessons I've taught on my mission so far since I've never really had to teach 5 people at once before. All 5 of them are students at Golden Gate University studying English and we first met two of them on the street in Chinatown and told them to invite anyone who wanted to come to our lesson we set up with them later that night (i.e. "the more the merrier"). Anyways, they really took that to heart I guess and brought along three of their friends. The lesson went fairly well, as far as lessons with 5 people go. It was pretty tough though because there were one or two friends who just came along we think because they had nothing else to do and weren't really focused during the lesson, and another friend kept asking questions like "so what's the difference between this and just an emotional crutch?" and was not very willing to accept commitments and since he was the most outspoken, it was hard to get any of his friends to commit to anything. Anyways, we set up an appointment with them for next week and Elder Wu and I are considering trying to split them up to teach or doing more planning to try and accommodate teaching 5 people at a time.

Whatever the case, it was an interesting experience. Lately, I've been reading a chapter of Jesus the Christ a day in my personal study which I really think is helping me to come to a more complete understanding of the Savior and his life. One line I read today which I found really profound was when Talmage is talking about John the Baptist and mentions how his teachings were that of a "practical religion, the only religion of any worth." When I read this line, I really came to realize how practical the teachings of Jesus Christ truly are. An experience that really helped me to realize this even more clearly was our first lesson with brother Zhou, which I think was one of the better lessons I've taught, and we really set clear expectations and helped him to see us as representatives of Jesus Christ who weren't there to discuss some really deep points of doctrine and show off how much we know, but really to help him change his life and help him to become better, starting with his smoking addiction. I like it just cause it seems like the Mormon church is a way of life. I remember my first or second week here, Elder Luo and I contacted this guy on the street who was playing the trumpet but then just started talking to us and was talking about how other christians say they're christian just like something like they play basketball or they like soccer or they play the piano but it doesn't really affect their behavior which he didn't think was right and which really isn't. I love how being in our church truly is a lifestyle.

I'm really loving the work here in downtown San Francisco, and I would really love to stay here at least another transfer. We're adding tons of new investigators and it really is just the start. When I first got to this area, Elder Luo and I worked really hard but we really didn't see all that much success and I was beginning to think that this area just is like that; but as Elder Wu and I have come into the area and have kind of moved away from the Chinatown population and more into the younger students attending university, we've been seeing tons of success and I really would love to continue in this area helping those we've found progress in this gospel towards baptism. Unfortunately, that's all up to President Wade and the Lord and whatnot. But if it was up to me, I'd definitely be staying here in downtown for a while yet. Hopefully, we'll all just agree.

I remember learning about that super great ploy in IB History last year actually dad haha. Operation Bodyfloat, as I believe it was called, or maybe Operation Floppyfish... whatever the case, pretty ingenious. I did actually know the real name at one point but have since forgotten it. That's pretty annoying about the oil prices, good thing I don't have a car, nor do I really want one since I think it'd just be kind of a mafan and you'd drive past all kinds of people you could otherwise be talking to... just overall lame. And yeah, I agree with the psycho church members. I guess we can probably do without more psycho converts. Since there seem to be a lot of normal people around here these days who are interested (i.e. Sis. Ying, Ding, Bro. Zhou et al.)
Anyways, with respect to Elder Wu: He's from the New Territories, his family is LDS, he came out 4 weeks after me (we were at the same new missionary orientation haha), he's getting along fabulously. Yesterday, he shared a talk on the holy ghost at Sister Ying's baptism that made everyone cry. It was pretty powerful. It was funny at the beginning of his talk, he was like "I'm so grateful for the success the Lord has blessed Elder Christensen and I in this area, my last area wasn't so successful since it was an English area and my English isn't that good, except now i'm in a mandarin area and my mandarin is pretty bad too so..." And yeah, pretty accurate, although I'd say his english pronunciation might be a little better than his mandarin, I think his mandarin vocabulary just more expansive just cause if you can speak cantonese, you can basically understand mandarin. Elder Wu is pretty cool and we get along really well for the most part.
Anyways, good luck on your garden mom. I remember last week in your email you were writing about how you jsut kind of idled away the afternoon on the porch enjoying the sunshine and I told Elder Lee and we were like "oh yeah I wouldn't want to do that anyways...... ......." But like... sarcastically... so basically, just tell me all the hard stuff that you do that I wouldn't enjoy doing. I guess once you get your garden started it can be about how much yard work you'd be making me do if I was there and stuff...

Anyways, gtg. but I love you guys and thanks for all your support and emairs and stuff!... despite the fact michelle and joel HATE me! And didn't email me this week... but that's ok... i'll just hate them forever... or maybe just for the next minute or so...

Love you!

-Ian