The pizza incident among other things...

 We tried to order a pizza in Saturday and that was somehow one of the most difficult things that happened this week, and it was a hard week!

The delivery man called me like a hour after we ordered and screamed with a thick accent "are you at church?" 

We explained we were sitting in the parking lot of the church. After waiting for so long we were getting anxious so we were all spread out on different corners of the church, still within sight and sound. A few minutes later he rolled in with his Tesla and handed us 2 pizzas that were the pure opposite of what we had ordered so were like "Brother, um, where's the third"

I watched his heart drop down to his feet, and we assured him it's ok. And he ran to his car and frantically yanked the tickets out of his car and just looked back and forth between the 2 and said, once again in his wonderful Chinese accent "I delivered wrong pizza! Maybe they not yet eat"

He hopped in his car and was gone.

That means somebody received 3 large pizzas when the lyrics ordered 2 small ones and upon delivery. . .noticed nothing wrong. I can see him with a crooked smile telling our delivery brother "ah, yes, these are the 3 large pizzas I have ordered, yes…"

Well, eventually he came back with some more pizzas for us and we destroyed all of them in just a few minutes. 

That evening we tested negative so that's good. Still have minor symptoms but I guess we're good to go shake hands with 100 people every day now.

Church was good, I mean of course it was. Some random Indian walked into our English ward and our friend Pugal came and took him in. They're completely different Indians but they both like curry so they're still united. After church we taught David, our new Indian friend, the restoration and he loved it! I'm excited to see him grow. 

Then on Monday we went to district council and we discussed 'Zion' . I had a list of topics to study and assigned them out and next week we're just gonna share what we each learned and then we're gonna build Zion here in Fremont.

Then interviews with President! Ok, so some of you know about Sons of Helaman…? This was the life-changing incredible group I went to every Thursday night before my mission. It was all about Jesus Christ and his atonement and how to be free from bad habits, you know, like pornography and masturbation. Lately I just have not been able to stop thinking about getting something like that out here for my fellow Elders. I am very open about my story and recovering from addiction. And because of that I have had SO MANY elders reach out to me asking me for help. And there's only so much I can really do as a missionary. I don't have time to send out texts and prepare lessons and stuff like that, however, if I had permission from president to DO stuff then I would. So I requested it. And he said he loves the idea and wants to meet up again soon and Make a real plan and get stuff going. Pornography is the plague of our day. It's affecting just about everything. It's in movies, music, books, advertisements, clothing, memes, it's everywhere. And it all is prompting bad thoughts and bad actions. The world's ideas related to Sex and the body are wrong and these ideas are influencing many people.

Anyways. I really want to get some kind of weekly zoom call or at least a group chat where the elders can be accountable and honest and have others to connect with and support them. I've seen how much it has helped me so I know for sure it will help.

Reading the scriptures every day, memorizing hymns, working out, cold showers- these are all truly great ideas…but it's just not enough. You need to learn how to rely on Jesus Christ, recognize when Satan starts lying to you, and you really need a team. It's possible but incredibly more difficult without a team. 

Anyways 

Only one more cool thing happened and that was Christie. Christie has been attending church with her older brother who is already a member for months now. She has always said no to missionaries because her husband doesn't like her going to church already. Until 2 days ago. She referred herself and started texting us right away asking if we could meet the very next day. So set everything up and sat down in a classroom and she just started going off! She already knows everything and has been watching general conferences, studying the Book of Mormon every day, reading church history, she's been doing everything. She has a few things that make it really hard to focus. She said "I constantly have 17 thoughts and 9 of them are crashing into each other" but she shared with us she went to the Oakland temple and got to sit up on the rooftop garden and it was the most peaceful experience she's had in her entire life. She told us she just started crying and didn't understand what was going on and just felt nothing but peace. Wow. What a powerful and special experience! 

And that was the first time meeting missionaries. Everything up to yesterday was all done by her brother, a legend and epitome of member missionary work. Everybody can do stuff like that. 

God is really preparing people all over the place, regardless of everything, He's helping everybody come closer to Him. This includes that guy with a beard who yelled at us when we knocked on his door. 

Love you all, have a most incredible week! 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/DYM8hzqfMfgxUFWZ7

We have covid, smell it in

 On Wednesday night we had dinner with our newest member, Emma. She made some amazing Filipino food and we were able to start teaching her husband! 

The next morning we had morning Devo and at the end PresidentLarson told us there's a 2nd wave of COVID going around so if you feel sick please stay home.

I had a sore throat. . .

Soooo we stayed home. And I just got more and more sick. Saturday morning was our dear friend Pugal's baptism. So we went to go fill up the font. The sisters in our district brought me a covid test. So AT the baptism I did the test and….it had 2 lines. Thus I officially had covid-19. So we left the baptism before it even started and watched our best friend Pugal get baptized over zoom. 

Mega oof. The rest of the week was quarantining. I have napped for probably around 20 hours this week, drank my cup hundreds of times, and studied around 20 hours too. I also beat everybody in Risk (I just put everything in India).

Please email me, I have never been this bored in my whole life and were gonna be stuck for at least another week.

And I started the Book of Mormon again. This time just studying "Faith" 

I started the Old Testament and have made it halfway through Exodus. It's very . . . Entertaining.

Elder Johnson found an 'Open' sign, like a neon one you see up in the window of an ice cream shop and so he put it up in our window. Then some indian woman came and knocked on our door asking to come in. So we tried to give her a Book of Mormon and I said some Hindi things. Then she left. I miss doing Hindi work. It's been too long. 

The only other cool things worth reporting are that members in the ward keep buying food for us, i have played everybody(all 4 elders) in othello (a minute to learn, a lifetime to master) multiple times and only lost twice, Elder Porter has been wearing his mask since we first got sick….he sleeps with it on, and the other day we were disinfecting everything with wipes and we put one on the fan and so it smelled like disinfectant and I said "smell it in" (on accident) and so now they make fun of me for it. (I was going for 'breath it in'). And I made brownies from a box (). 

I think the coolest thing I've learned so far from the Old Testament is, and bear with me because it may seem a little strange, is to marry somebody who will help you keep your covenants. I can explain! 

But first, I promise I'm learning a whole lot more than that! This is just one of my favorites as well as something I think a lot of people don't learn from the stories I'm reading, which makes me feel unique.

Basically in Exodus chapter 4 Moses forgot to do something for his son. This thing had covenantal importance and it was such a big deal he forgot to do it that the lord was gonna kill Moses. But the lord didn't kill Moses because his wife grabbed a rock and did the thing for their son. 

She then calls Moses something that seems rude but is actually significant because of the covenant and many other things that "blood" represents. 

Maybe I'm wrong. Idk. But to me, I think it's clear that I need to marry somebody who will help me keep my covenants. And if you're already married then you need to be the 'Zipporah' and help your spouse keep their covenants. So there's that…. 

Please email me, I have never been this bored in my whole life and we still have a week lol. 

Love you all! 

New Brothers

 Wednesday night we took our good friend Emma to a baptism in Spanish. Even though my English/Hindi brain didn't catch very much, the spirit still taught me the importance and truly cleansing effect of baptism. 

Emma was so happy and also we got pupusas after the baptism so that's good. So now she is as ready as you can get for her baptism. 

Thursday was a meme. We tried to get the apartment ready to occupy 5 elders. And then we drove to San Fran to give a Priesthood blessing to a Deaf Member from Utah who had to come to the hospital cuz she's pregnant and her gallbladder is breaking. So they can't do anything till the baby is born. 

I expirnced the gift of charity perhaps the strongest I ever have. We had to drive a hour to come to the hospital then search for 20 minutes to find their room, it's in the pregnant section so a nurse needs to check and make sure we can go in. We couldn't so we waited another 30 minutes to go meet them. 

It is pretty easy to be upset by this point. But, we weren't. 

They let us in and we saw Veronica and Fabian for the first time and- I was filled with love for them. A sweet sweet couple, overwhelmed with all of the problems coming up, trying to prepare to become good parents for their unborn son whom they already love so much. They hadn't even been baptized for a year yet but their faith is so strong. 

I was able to seal the blessing and with my minimal ASL skills I just kinda sat back and just let God operate through me. This wasn't a blessing from me at all. I had no plans for what to say. I just tried to listen to the spirit and letvit happen. 

After the blessing they asked us to teach them about temple marriages. They really want to be sealed in the temple but they can't yet. I got to testify about how I know my family will be together forever because of the choices my parents made so they could be sealed in the House of the Lord. She asked me if I was going to get sealed in the temple I told her proudly that I will. Then she asked if she could go, I said yes. So far they're the only ones officially invited to my wedding lol.

Well. Then we had to leave. We made sure they had a copy of the Book of Mormon and started the trek back home. So fun. 

Then we picked up our new Elders. And oh my. 3 new babies who still have everything to learn. Good thing Elder Searle and I are here. 

That was fun.

Then we went to Menlo Park and met Elder Bednar. He was just a few feet away from me. One thing I love about him is he just says what comes to his mind and is not afraid. He also loves to laugh- so he's so funny he makes himself laugh then has to ask somebody else to speak so he can laugh about whatever he said and then recover. 

The 2 big things I learned are that I can always trust the spirit to help me. And disciples of Jesus Christ and people that want to become disciples focus on sincere true repentance, which means turning to the lord and turning away from the world. 

Well, then we had Emma's baptism. And surprisingly, to me, it wasn't anything to incredibly spectacular. I felt the spirit for sure and I know it was beautiful and powerful. But part of me was expecting like…more….

I still don't know what to learn from that… maybe I needed to prepare more. Idk.

I also gave a talk on Sunday about scriptures and I had like 4 notes and just relied on the spirit. I guess it was good cuz everybody is saying it's what they needed. I also "spoke" in the ASL branch and that was a similar experience. 

It was still amazing and I'm amazed at the goodness of Emma and her example to the ward of selflessness and joy. 

Then we met with Pugal and he's like "bro. I want to be baptized this weekend"

So we're like "sure!"

Brother had his interview and passed with a 100% and will be baptized this weekend. 

Training has been kind of hard. I would be a little scared if it wasn't hard..i mean..there's 4 young Elders whom I am responsible for. I have to teach them everything I can. I know it's still up to them and I can only do so much. But so much is so much. I love them all individually and they all need different things and they all annoy me in different ways lol. So. I guess we'll figure it out. 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/DYM8hzqfMfgxUFWZ7

Temple miracles

 A week ago we had the special opportunity to attend the temple. In preparation I had been studying repentance and forgiveness because I really wanted to feel clean when I went through the temple. We had also been praying to know which session to attend. Elder Searle and I both felt like we should go for the earliest one available. 

This ended up teaching me about the power of prayer because…we got there and there was a Deaf couple that attends a hearing ward going to the exact same session. I knew them from a long time ago so it was amazing to see them again. PLUS, we sat with the Brother and watched the endowment in ASL. How absolutely incredible is that? I understood all of it, in fact I think I got more out of it! So amazing. It was a wonderful and beautiful experience and I'm glad we prayed about when to go so that we knew that was the session we needed to be in.

Then we started a Hindi Exchange. It was great to be with my brother, Elder Holladay. We were looking around his apartment and….it's pretty bad. So we committed to cleaning it the next day. We stayed up incredibly late just talking about everything. Elder Holladay is amazing and truly consecrated. 

We woke up and just started going at everything. Luckily, the Zone Leaders showed up to do their laundry and decided to help us. We literally changed the color of the floor. We took out so much garbage, reorganized his apartment, killed the bathroom. It's now probably one of the cleanest in the mission! We also did personal and comp study with the zone leaders which was wonderfully enlightening. Then the Hindi work began. It was going pretty tough most of the day. Our Hindi members who were gonna help us let us know their hindinis actually rusty and that we can read better than them. And one indian member whom we've been trying to contact, we finally found! And somehow he's simply just not interested in the gospel at all. So we'll keep working on him I suppose. 

Then we went to visit some of our friends- Balwinder, Balwinder, Baljinder, and Sonia.

We showed them our video of the first vision (it will be posted sometime soon I promise) and they were blown away. Absolutely amazed. We taught the restoration again with a big focus on if this is all true, that means this is the church which you must join! I hope it went in their minds. They committed to reading and praying!

The Hindi work is progressing and I am so excited for it to grow more.

We went to Bombay Garden on Thursday. It's an Indian buffet where every food looks pretty sus. Nevertheless, we did partake. I was amazed at how spicy it was. We also learned how to eat like a indian- with your hands and the flatbread. A few of the curries looked so nice and then they're actually the spiciest thing I've ever tasted. What an experience. 

We have a new Deaf friend named Matthew. And I don't know what to think of him. He signs in ways I'm not sure what he's saying. But he keeps texting us and calling us. So that's good. (His texts make little sense) we were trying to teach him the restoration when we found out he doesn't know who God is. So I tried to explain. Man, that's a hard concept to explain. We tried "he made all the animals" he doesn't know what animals are. "He made the Earth" he doesn't know what that is either. We also said he was Heavenly Father and he was confused and was like "my dad is over there."

Also we've been reaching out to Deaf people all over Facebook and recently we've received many wonderful responses telling us that the "Deaf Community is all Gay and it's not worth your time to try and help them" and "they are all so rude you won't have any luck with them" 

I love social media work. 

Elder Searle and I made a work-out plan. Now everyday we know exactly what To do. We went for a few runs and it was great! I'm certainly feeling it. 

Then the rest of the week, somehow, all we did was give priesthood blessings. Most of them were in ASL. It was my first time ever sealing a blessing in ASL, then my second time, then my third time. We also found Sione Fonua From the other side of heaven. The real man. He is in a care home in our area and we were able to give him a blessing as well and brother just cried the whole time and said he loves us a few times. I'd never met this man or even seen the movie but after I gave him a blessing I was full of love for him. 

Then our friend Emma had a baptismal interview with our mission president. We waited for almost an hour but they both came out glowing and smiling so bright I wished I had brought my sunglasses with me. Emma will be baptized this Sunday at 1:30. 

She told us, in her thick Tagolic accent "I have finally found the right restaurant" I know she is right. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the right restaurant.

Then we got official transfer news. I'm training 2 new ASL missionaries. Elder Searle is training 1 new ASL missionary. We will all be I'm the same apartment and same areas. We will interpret everything for our Deaf Missionary. Their 4 combined ages in the mission won't be older than mine for 3 months lol. 

So that's exciting. 

Also you'll be happy to know I finally brought my suit to the dry cleaners. First time ever. 

And I did because….ElderBednarIsVisitingOurMissionThisSarurday!!!

I'll tell you about it next week!

Always talk about Jesus

 The first vision in Hindi was filmed on Tuesday and we killed it. We did sooo good! It was incredible. It should be posted soon. 

We also mega cleaned the apartment and used a real-life mop, the kind people dance with. We had to open all the windows to get fresh air in and when we came back there was literal wind blowing through the apartment. It was amazing.

We had dinner with Bishop Winmill and I asked him "how can i know of I've been forgiven of my sins?" He talked alot about how parents punish their children even though they already forgave them. He talked about how God cares more about where we're headed then where we've been. It was powerful. 

On another day we met with our Deaf friend, Raymond, and the spirit said "baptism" so I signed "will u be baptized" and he signed "yes" so that was actually seriously epic. I love Raymond. He's so sweet.

We also helped at a few moves and each time I almost threw up fr fr. Just thinking about the sight and the smell and the state of such things causes my belly to spin and my hair to wrinkle. Oh man you guys, it was so bad. The whole time my mind was telling me "how can they permit themselves to suffer such conditions?" Everything had about 8 layers of filth, the walls were once white and now black as charcoal. The ground was a whole inch taller with build up from years past. Not a single thing was placed in any order. Everything down to the crumbs was in perfect chaos. 

Needless to say I showered and used all my exfoliators to scrape the "service layers" of skin off. Man it was so gross. I committed to myself and God my house will always be clean. I will never allow anything like that to happen to me. 

Then we had Sunday and ASL and English were combined. . .so I interpreted the meeting into ASL. Oof to my hands. Then I also taught 5th Sunday in ASL. All about missionary work ofc. 

That evening we went to some Indians, Navroop and Sandeep. Sandeep destroyed Navroop and was just like "he's depressed. . .failed marriage and no job. He's got depression and can't even find a job cuz failed marriage"

Navroop just sat there with a blank face. 

So sympathy oofs for him. But I promised him if he reads the Book of Mormon every day his depression will go away.

Then Sandeep said "he can read all day because he doesn't have a job because he's depressed"

Wow. Brutal Sandeep.

Then on Monday I gave a powerful training on 'Motivation' it was sooo goooood. We discussed how we receive motivation, how we lose it, and why we need it. I closed it all by talking about how Jesus Christ did the hardest thing ever done and so he needed a powerful motivator. What was it? Love. Love was the reason why He was able to go through with it and do the hardest thing that's ever been done. 

Whenever we do anything in the church, a lesson, a talk, a training, ANYTHING- we must end with Jesus Christ. I can testify it doesnt matter what you’ve been assigned to focus on in whatever it is- you can always bring it back to Jesus Christ. My favortie example right now is President nelson’s talk “Reverance for Life” a simple line of testimony, “Gratefully, we know the Lord will help all who are truly repentant.” his entire talk is focused on the evils of Abortion and in the end he wraps up be bearing testimony of Jesus Christ. Abortion and Jesus Christ seem quite unrelated, yet he still tied them together beautifully. ANYWAYS. Always end whatever you're doing by testifying of Jesus. Whether it's about cleaning the church, Child protection, a bbq, or basketball- always end with Jesus (you can't end with anything more important because there is nothing more important)

Then we started exchanges and I went to the Tongan area with my brother, Elder Polu. We had a non-stop blast. Up till 12:30 talking about our conversion stories, 100% vulnerable and open, woke up at 6 to go play cricket, did a disgusting service- but hey- they got us 6 little caesars pizzas, we taught a bunch of Tongas, invited a man (first lesson with him) to be baptized and he said yes. Also gave him a priesthood blessing and his family was just crying the whole time. One of the most powerful lessons either of us had ever had. Some tongan kept saying “It's so funny” and “I am a master chef” to me over and over again so he could practice English, ate 6 chicken legs, and got a bunch of Otai. man it was great. I love Elder Polu. 

Sorry, I’m out of time. If it wasn’t profound enough for you this week, Go Listen to “adventures of the Spirit” Robert Wells. Or read last weeks email lol. Love you all bye bye