Aug 25th-2010-bangna

Sabaay dii

1. This week it rained a lot. That probably doesn't mean very much to you, so I will describe what raining "a lot" means. On Friday we headed out of the house at around 11:30 to go eat and teach an appointment at 1:00. As we were teaching this appointment it started to rain. Thailand rain storms typically last for a very short duration but the rain is very hard. We waited in this guys house for about an hour before it cleared up and biked to a nearby mall. Over there we proceeded to contact some people. As we started to contact it started to rain again. This time it rained for about 3 hours. After all was said and done, the streets were flooded. Once the sewers fill up with water, the roads just flood like crazy. All of the main roads were flooded with about two feet of water. Bangkok traffic + two feet of water = problems, yes lots of problems. We had two appointments at the church that night, so we proceeded to bike to the church. At this point it wasn't raining anymore so at first I attempted to try to stay on my bike and stay dry. But after biking I realized that the task of staying dry would be impossible. While biking the water from the road would reach up my shin almost to my knee at times. Yeah, dress pants and leather dress shoes. I'm sure we looked ridiculous as everyone looked on at us wearing their shorts and flip-flops.

2. Zone Conference was this last week. The topic was the Book of Mormon. It is a good book, you should read it or if you are too lazy to read it at least watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkKblIMfmjI - I know this book to be a true book.
This is Jesus Christ's book. Jesus Christ commissioned it, wrote it, and preserved it for thousands of years. There is no other book that can give you more faith and hope than the Book of Mormon. The Bible has confused people for thousands of years. Their misinterpretations of the law caused the Jews to miss their Messiah. The Bible still confuses people in the present and has caused many devout Christians to miss their Messiah again in these last days. The Book of Mormon is a rock. It plainly testifies to the divinity of Jesus Christ and the restoration of his church through his prophet Joseph Smith. Through reading it we will know the truth of all things.

Elder Brown

Aug 16th- 2010- Bangna

Well today I am a little bit tired.

Last night right as we were turning off the light to go to bed we noticed that there was a rat in the house. (this happens way more than you might think, pretty sure this is part of Satan's plan to make me more tired and keep me from working as hard as I could with a full nights rest) So Elder Hardy and I went through the regular procedures of catching this rat. We got our trusty broom and our trusty bucket. The strategy is to close off all the exits and to sweep it into the bucket so that we can throw it out of the house. So as we were doing this, this rat was fairly resilient. It manages to escape all of our efforts for nearly 20 minutes. After repeated attempts we trapped it back behind a cabinet with two exits. I was on one side with my broom and Elder Hardy was on the other with his broom. The rat was trapped. It was scared. It had nothing else to do. It finally made a break for it across the ground towards the bathroom, but on the way it suddenly stopped and fell over. It had a heart attack and was on its back with all its limbs pulsing in and out. After about 5 minutes it finally threw up and died. Not a pretty sight. Well it is still in my head. No animal cruelty or anything intended here, it just died!

So yeah. Pretty good week here in Bangna. Things are going really great. I feel that my understanding of missionary work and teaching has grown amazingly in the last few months. In the last six weeks as I have been focusing all of my efforts on finding families, we have 4-5 progressing families that are very serious investigators. This is such an obvious change from how missionary work was done when I arrived in Thailand. I am very excited for the future of Thailand, especially for the future of Bangna. I have been here a long time. Six months is a really long time. I love the place, but to say that I'm not area-trunky would be a lie. Bangna has been a special place for me simply because I have seen growth and progression here. In my other areas I always felt that the work and the area was heading in a backwards trend, but in Bangna I have seen remarkable improvements in the ward mission program and in the priesthood organization. I am grateful to have been a part of the progression in this ward.

Yesterday evening we had a couple of hours in the evening free to go out and contact. This was wonderful because we are almost always busy in the evenings, especially on the weekend. We went over to an area that I thought that I had invited every street. (after being in the area for 6 months, I have been down every street and know pretty much every shortcut in the entire city, Elder Hardy is always amazed how I can navigate through small alleyways and shortcuts to get us to a destination in half the time) We got to the end of a little soi, that is the Thai word for street, and I started to talk with a couple of people at the end. They wondered if I had come to give them money. They had us confused with the last christian group that came through. This soi was next to a Lutheran Church/School. After talking with these people, I learned that this soi was MUCH bigger than I thought. What I thought was a dead end actually was a tiny alleyway back into a giant ghetto. I didn't really want to back there, but my curiosity got the best of me. We decided to take a walk back there. We were met with mobs of begging children, adults, and elderly people that just wanted us to give them money. It was fairly depressing. The lack of misunderstanding was impossible to breach; all they wanted was money. (which we aren't allowed to give) They did not want to listen to us. God really wants to help these people. God wants to help all of His children, but sometimes they refuse to let Him help.

Being on a mission is a very unique experience simply because it gives you such an opportunity to gain experience without having to face any of the usual consequences of experience. The transition from childhood to adulthood has to happen for everyone, but typically it is a painful experience resulting in addictions, debt, unexpected children, pain, etc.. However, on a mission the transition takes place in an artificial reality; it is completely outside of the realm of my past and the realm of my future. In the last month I have learned so much about parenting. After making a focus on teaching families, I have been able to see the inter working of families, lots of them. I go up and talk to a 20 year old couple on the street with a baby on the way and ask them if they are scared to be parents. The typical answer is no. They just say they are going to "go with it." No plans, no preparation. If they even had the slightest clue that one day they are going to be accountable for the individual stewardship of each one of their children, they would be scared silly. Punishing and beating children is looked very down upon here in Thailand. I challenge anyone who is against punishing their children to come look at the family situation in Thailand, you will be convinced. Justice is a law that must be satisfied. Mercy cannot be applicable in all cases and in all situations; look at the Plan of Salvation, if everyone received absolute mercy, would there be a point?

So we accidentally ran into Jesus-Shirt man again this week. He was less drunk this time, but just as crazy as ever. He asked me to say a prayer for him, so I did. In the prayer I attempted to cast the demons out of him. It may have worked, afterwards I committed him to pray about Joseph Smith being a prophet. We will see if he shows up to church.


Love, peace, and rainbows,

Elder Brown

Aug 2010- Bangna

Hi.

More interesting things.


1.

This week I was out inviting and I found a guy who was pretty interested. I offered to give him a ten minute message about the Book of Mormon and he accepted. We went up and talked on his porch. I told him that I wanted to start with a prayer so we prayed and after we prayed I opened my eyes and there was this big African man standing in front of me with his wife. He said, “Hey! Were you just praying?” This kinda took me off my guard. He was way excited to see that people were teaching about Jesus in Thailand. He pushed his wife over to try to learn with us. In the end I got his number and handed it off to the international Elders. It is really fun talking to people from Africa. All I have to do is go up to them and say in a really excited voice, “We teach about JESUS!” and then their eyes light up and get way excited.


2.

Last week we were biking towards the church and I hear someone shout at me “Hey Elders, whats up?” This was a little bit strange so I turn to see this really muscular white guy talking to us. I thought that this was very strange. I examined the man; about forty years-old, maybe 300 pounds, looks American, his entire body covered in tattoos and his head and eyebrows were shaven meaning that he was just a monk. I start talking to him and find out that he is from Philadelphia and is friends with the Elders over there. He is Buddhist and comes to Thailand like once a year. This was pretty weird but then this situation was interrupted as this crazy crazy old Thai man comes in. I quickly examine him; about 60 years old, looks like he hasn't bathed in AT LEAST 60 years, and he is wearing a T-shirt with a giant picture of Jesus on the cross. He started talking crazy stuff. He was telling us that he used to go to our church a number of years ago, but then he found a new church that gave him three new T-shirts, so he changed religions. At this point there was just too much weirdness for one contact so we said bye and biked away. I guess the moral of the story is: the church that gives you the most free T-shirts is the best church.


3.

Well I got a new greenie this moves. After training Elder Tibbetts for 3 months I guess that God decided to give me another chance to do better. Hopefully this time I won't fail or else I might end up training again! My new companion is a guy named Elder Hardy. He is 23 years-old and was just in the Air Force for 4 years. He is a really good worker and should be really easy to work with. To this point in my mission, I still have never had a companion that is younger than me. He is doing what your average greenie always does. Falls on his bike a lot, says funny/inappropriate things to locals on accident, and is confused when members call him a “greenie” in Thai. I guess that is one word they don't teach you in the MTC.


4.

So last week Niwad was confirmed a member of the church and was given the priesthood. The Bishop chose me to be the one to confer the priesthood to him. This was an interesting experience. This was the first time I had ever done it, typically recent converts are given the priesthood by the bishopric without the involvement of the missionaries, but I was happy to do it. I have ministered a confirmation, a confirment of the priesthood, priesthood blessings, etc. but I still have never baptized anyone. I have a goal to never baptize someone on my mission. Baptizing people isn't very good in terms of the long run. The person who baptizes them creates a unique bond that they will always remember. I would much rather have that be a member than have it be me. This week at church Niwad showed up in his newly purchased white shirt and tie to be able to minister in the sacrament. It was really cool to see just because of how quickly he progressed. I invited him just over 2 months ago and he already is administering the sacrament. It made me feel really good to see him glow like that.


5.

For the last month or so a phrase has been going through my mind a lot. The phrase is “A hope for a better world.” It has just been ringing in my head for a very long time now. I actually ended up writing a song based off of that phrase. Interestingly enough this week I was reading the scriptures in Ether(I haven't read Ether in about three months) and found the phrase in Ether chapter 12 verse 4. I am positive that I didn't read the phrase in the last several months, but it was just floating in my head. When I saw this scripture it really shocked me. I really think this scripture might be my very favorite scripture in all of the standard works. “Wherefore, whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led to glorify God.” I really like this scripture because the Thai people have no hope. None at all. They have no goal for today, tomorrow, or next week. They just wake up and go with it. This is because of their belief system rooted in reincarnation. They have no focal point were they can focus their efforts towards. But when we believe in God when we believe in His plan of happiness this gives us a hope for today, a hope for tomorrow, a hope for next week. Through our faith our life is held strong and we are filled with light. I know this to be true.




Love,


Elder Brown

June 28th, 2010-Bangnaa

LDS Chapel-Bangnaa


Hola.

Couple of interesting things from the last two weeks.

1. Well last Sunday started out pretty normal. We woke up at 6:00 A.M. like we usually do. We got ready and studied like we usually do. We walked into church 30 minutes early like we usually do. But as I walked into the sacrament room last week there was something unusual. Elder Pratt from the Seventy decided to drop in on our Sunday meetings. I received the opportunity to pass the sacrament to him, which was a good experience; however, through that he noticed how unpolished my shoes were. He talked to us afterwards and gave us some advice. He told Elder Tibbetts that he needs to polish his companions shoes more often. Oops.

2. This passed week I had the opportunity to teach one of the funnest lessons of my life. Unfortunately I am a bad missionary for doing it. The whole lesson was over three hours long. (which in case you are unfamiliar with missionary work, that is an absolutely ludicrous amount of time to waste on one person) The lesson was with a man named Brichaa. Brichaa is a man I've been teaching about once every other week for the passed two months. He is in his early fifties and is extremely intelligent. He has degrees in law and in business. He has been a devote Christian for the passed 33 years and knows the Bible. The man REALLY knows the Bible. The Old Testament and the New. He has read them in Thai and in English more times than I could even imagine to ever read them. I met him and introduced him to the restored gospel and the Book of Mormon. The first few times I met him, he was very quiet. He wouldn't ask or say much, he would only listen. He is about to finish the Book of Mormon, and he has a goal to read it again. This last time I met with him we talked about so many things, he had so many questions and I just gave him the answers. This experience really impressed me. This learned man... very intelligent... very studied could come to me, a twenty year-old kid and I could tell him things that I learned in primary in my youth and he is absolutely dumbstruck with how much I know. Sometimes I forget how much we have that most people don't have. He asks me about translation, transfiguration, angels, Zion, temples in Jerusalem, resurrections, etc. and I can answer. Multiple times in that lesson his mouth and his eyes were left wide-open. We have these answers, all of the answers he has ever wanted. At the end of the lesson he finally hit an epiphany and was convinced that the Book of Mormon was not written by Joseph. He says he is not sure who wrote it, but he said it was either God or someone who was very very learned and intelligent. He told me that if God answers his prayers he will change religions and do everything he can to convince all of his friends to do the same thing too. At the end he just wanted to hug me and tell me how much he loved me. He told me that when I get transferred to a new area that he will drive and come and find me so that he can learn with me still. I hope God answers his prayers and he can have the chance to be baptized.

3. Yesterday two of our investigators got confirmed members of the church during sacrament meeting. This was all fine and dandy until the Bishop called me over and told me I was going to be the one administering the ordinance. I was kind of shocked because I've never seen anyone besides the Bishop or a councilor confirm new members. I was willing to do it, but I wish I would've had some time to prepare! I was unprepared because I thought missionaries were not involved. I did well, the Spirit gave me utterance and overall it was a very good experience for me. I like being put on the spot in high pressure situations, especially when it is in a strange language that sounds like throwing pots and pans down the stairs.

4. I washed the dishes.


Love,

Elder Brown

Mon. June 14-2010

Hello! Well today I don't have much to say and I don't have much time to say it, so I will just entertain you all with a couple of stories that happened this week.

1. Almost all of my efforts in inviting have been changed to finding families. So when I see a nice family walking down the street I will go interrupt them and invite them to receive salvation. So I was doing this, just as I do every day and I set my eyes upon a nice looking family: a mom, a dad, and a little girl that was about five years old. They were walking down the street towards me, all carrying parasols as most people like to do in Asia. I went up and talked to them, and oddly enough they didn't try to run away like most families usually do when they are approached by a scary white person. I asked them how they were and they said great, they said they just got done with a meeting. I asked them what kind of meeting, but I didn't understand their answer. That was when I realized they weren't Thai, they were Korean. They said they had been in Thailand for about eight months. I asked them what they were doing here and they proceeded to pull out a pamphlet about the great message that is "really" contained within the Bible; my bubble was bursted. I invited the Jehovah's Witnesses missionaries to learn about Joseph Smith anyways. Hope they give me a call!

2. We were sitting down by a bus stop making calls and talking about our plans for the night and we saw a nice, clean-cut man about to walk by so we stopped him and talked to him. We started to talk to him and he wanted to learn more about our message. We met him and we taught a pretty good lesson, he was fairly interested. The lesson was interrupted a few times from someone calling him and asking when he would be home. I asked jokingly if his girlfriend was mad he was getting home late, he laughed pretty hard and said no. We set up a return appointment for the next week. Before he left, he asked to get a picture with us. This was an unusual request, but we decided it couldn't hurt... figured he was just sentimental. Later that night we got a call from his boyfriend asking if we wanted to go hangout later. Needless to say, I don't think we will be keeping that return appointment...

3. Invited a guy the other day, he invited me to go teach him and his family at his house the next day. We showed up and inside the house, there were a lot of people, about 8 or 9 middle-aged people, with lots of kids outside the house. It is always intimidating to teach large groups of people. I have to use all the charisma I can muster up to try to get all of them to pay attention and to receive my message. This particular instance was fairly difficult because there was one man in the back that was drunk as a skunk and very openly out-spoken against Christianity. Any chance he could get to speak he would go on about how every religion was good and then the next sentence he would say how Christianity was bad. Throughout the course of the lesson I managed to get all of his 8 friends onto my "side." I told him that if he didn't want to change his life and progress that he didn't have to listen. I asked him if he wanted to change, he said no. I asked him if he wanted to change for his family, he said his family already left him because he wouldn't change. In the end, having that guy in the lesson actually helped me. He was living evidence that what I was teaching could help them avoid unhappiness and be closer as a family. It was fairly amusing, I kinda felt bad using him as an example of what not to do, but I think he was too drunk to notice anyways.

4. The church was robbed. Yeah, I think someone hid themselves and a crowbar inside of the church after English Class on Tuesday. They stole everything. Oh well, maybe if I am lucky I will find him and invite him and teach him about repentance!

5. I interviewed another baptismal candidate this week. On the cab ride over I was hoping I was going to have the Spirit during the interview just because taking a cab through Bangkok you have to "swim through a sea of filth." When I got to the church, I knelt down and asked for the Spirit. Not only was I blessed with the Spirit but I was also told that the guy that I was going to be interviewed was ready for baptism. Before I met the guy I already knew he was good to go! I met him and interviewed him and he was great just as anticipated. Just goes to show that the Spirit knows all, regardless of how sick and gross Bangkok is.
Hello! Well today I don't have much to say and I don't have much time to say it, so I will just entertain you all with a couple of stories that happened this week.


Well have a great week,

over and out. (as well as under and in)
Love,
Elder Brown

Monday-June 7th 2010

Hi All,

This past week was great. We are teaching a lot of serious investigators. Unfortunately, almost all of them are single. We don't really have any families. This next week(and month and year) I will be focusing all of my efforts on finding families. It was something that really hit me hard. I only want to teach families. It is the most efficient thing we can ever do.

I don't have much to say today, but I will share a couple of thoughts that I had this week.

I remember a number of years ago... probably about 15 years ago. I was in a primary class at church. We were asked the question, "If you were being broadcasted on international television and you only had enough time to say one sentence, what would you say?"

Yeah, it was kind of a deep question to be asking 5 year-olds, but that is ok. At 5 years-old, we however were smart enough to infer the teachers motives. We had learned to automatically answer any question the teacher asked us with "Book of Mormon, God loves us, go to church, etc." 99% of the time that was the correct answer.

I think I finally figured out what I would say. Yeah, I know.. 15 years later. I am a very slow thinker. My sentence would be: Jesus Christ is our Savior and this is His church.

I feel quite a bit like Nephi in his closing chapter in verse six when he says “I glory in plainness; I glory in truth; I glory in my Jesus, for he hath redeemed my soul from hell.”

This really is the only thing that matters at all. We come to this world in order to figure out how to overcome this world. We need to figure out how to overcome death and sin. As we try to figure this out, we will realize that it is impossible. This will cause us to look for a way out. That way out is Jesus Christ.

I have received a personal witness that Jesus Christ is my Savior.

The next step is to find His path, or find out how to follow Him. I prayed and received a personal witness that this is Jesus Christ's church. He established it and He is at the head of it.

Everything else in life is simply a footnote, a secondary point. It doesn't matter where Kolob is, it doesn't matter where we are going when we die, it doesn't matter how many wives Joseph Smith has. All that matters is we found Jesus and are living our lives the way He has told us to.

Jesus Christ is our Savior and this is His church. I know that with absolute certainty.


Love you all,

Elder Brown

Monday-May 31st 2010

Hello All,
The end of another week here in Bangnaa. Things are going so great! This is the most I've been blessed on my mission.

Over my mission my perspective has really changed a lot. The first few months of my mission, I was concerned about myself. In the MTC and the first month or two in country, my concerns were focused on trying to keep myself alive. After a few months, my perspective changed. I had a rough couple of months that removed all of my focuses on myself and my own abilities and focused entirely on my companion. After awhile, when I became more experienced and more capable, my focus changed to my investigators and my area. As a district leader my focus has become bigger, instead of my own area, my focus has really been changed to the whole district. I really feel a sense of responsibility of the work that gets done in all the areas that I oversee. I am also really glad to report that everything is going great. Numbers are way up and attitude is way up. Every companionship in the district will be seeing baptisms in June and July.

Our vision as a district has really been focused towards what I call a "realbie", as opposed to a "fakebie." All of our efforts have been focused towards finding investigators that WANT to investigate, not that we WANT to investigate. There is a very important difference. This week is my one-year milestone as a missionary. I have seen a lot of stuff; I have worked with a lot of missionaries. I have decided that I don't want to waste anymore time teaching people that won't ever go anywhere. There are thousands of people in Bangnaa that have been prepared, that have been hand-selected by the Lord to hear and accept the gospel. I want to find those people. Through my desire to find people like that, we have been finding them! Simply wanting to "learn about Christianity" is not enough. If people aren't serious from the start, I won't teach them. Spending months and months trying to convince someone to keep commitments is not only a waste of time but it is a disaster waiting to happen. If they have trouble keeping commitments before baptism, then they won't be able to keep covenants after baptism.

There are lots of "key-indicators" as a missionary. We track our work in various ways. The mission keeps track of daily results such as: lessons taught with members present, other lessons, referrals, new investigators, and new potential investigators. The mission also keeps track of various other statistical indicators weekly. This is to help find out how many "potentials" it takes to turn into a baptism. The mission has calculated that 90 new phone numbers or "potentials" will turn into a baptism. While there is a brute-force, quantitative method... I think it is much easier to sort the wheat from the tares since the moment I open up my mouth and talk to them on the street. Working closely with the Spirit really is the key. There is no substitute to working with the Spirit. Anyone who is preparing to serve a mission or who is serving a mission now, I will repeat myself: learn to work with the Spirit.

As a missionary we are called servants of God. I fully believe that a missionary can go two years as a missionary and NEVER have a single day where he was a servant of God. Waking up on time, teaching lessons, even baptizing people does not make someone a servant of God. Studying the scriptures, being a good person, and not drinking coffee also does not make someone a servant of God. These may be good indicators of a servant of God, but they do not define servitude. A servant of God is someone who has a personal relationship with God; someone who knows God's will at any given moment and is willing to do it. The only way we can know God's will is through the Spirit. It is amazing what God will tell us if we ask! I really think most people would be amazed as to how much revelation is waiting for them if they simply asked. It is because of our lack of faith. We fear that we wouldn't receive an answer, so we don't try. I see many missionaries who are teaching investigators and they say "Oh, I don't know if we should keep teaching him. I'm not sure he is progressing." Why not pray to God and ask him! If I want to know if Max is interested, I ask God. If I want to know if I should see Joe today, I ask God! He really answers. This is how we find the elect. God has chosen them, we ask God who they are.

With one year behind me as a missionary and only one year left. I wonder where I will be in another year. I feel like I have changed a lot in the last year. I feel like I have gained a lot of confidence. I have gained a lot of happiness. I am always smiling nowadays for no reason. I really hope that in the next year I can accomplish everything that God has for me and that I can become the person that He wants me to be. Serving a mission is the best thing anyone can do. I have gained so much insight about myself, about people, and about life.

Love,

Elder Brown