December 15 Email

Well wouldn't you know it, they are keeping me here in Bong Choen for another 6 weeks! If you can remember Elder Jensen, who was my companion when I first came here in the summer, he came here to Bong Choen last January; so we have combined for a whole year in Bong Choen! (6 transfers each). crazy! I'm excited I get to stay, because I love it here so much. I also was made District Leader this transfer so we'll see how that goes. I'm excited for it!

This week finally brought the snow! I think it snowed three different days this week. Elder Veerothai currently loves the snow and loathes the cold. Saturday was the best day for weather because it was snowing huge flakes but not really a snowstorm and it wasn't too cold. Everywhere we go outside, he just grabs snow on the ground makes a snowball and then throws it as me, hah. We had tons of snowball fights going from place to place! It's so fun to talk to people on the street and tell them he's from Thailand and that this is the first time he has ever seen snow.

So last week, we met this guy on the street who sells car batteries. He said that he was really impressed with us being missionaries and said that we must have a really hard time here because people don't seem to have interest. People actually tell me that a lot here. So, I said yea it can seem that way sometimes but hey I guess you have interest! He then said that we can come by his shop anytime and talk about the gospel. We went two days later and lo and behold not only is he a car battery salesmen, he's also a preacher for a church! Uhh, I didn't see that one coming at all! He is super nice though and doesn't want to bible bash with us because he knows from the bible that God commanded us not to contend with each other. That being said, he does love to teach us about the bible. It's funny how most of the verbal persecution we receive as missionaries is hardly ever from leaders of the different churches. It almost always comes from people who just go to a different church. Anyway, he offered us part time jobs at his car battery shop. I told him I'd think about it but to not get his hopes up. He has some interest in the Book of Mormon. He accepted it when we offered it to him and he set it on his shelf in his shop right next to his 6 different copies of the bible which he has apparently read hundreds of times. So, I'll let you know how it goes this week.

Our ward Christmas party is on Christmas eve. I think I've mentioned before that the one thing the Bong Choen ward is really lacking is youth. There are 2 young men who are both seniors in high school and a 16 year old girl. So our members decided to focus member missionary efforts on bring more youth into the ward by starting a new youth english class. We started it about 2 months ago. It got off to a bit of a slow start trying to find nonmember kids to come but it's really picked up now. Because of youth english class, we had 5 non member youth in sacrament meeting yesterday. Relating this back to the Christmas party, the Young Womens' president decided the youth would put on a simple skit in English about the spirit of Christmas. She made the skit for about 9 different parts but at the time she made it we only had about 4 youth coming to english class. I was pretty nervous we wouldn't have enough youth to do it, but the members found enough youth to come to youth english and agree to be part of the Christmas skit. I gained a strong belief this week in the power of making people feel that they are needed and the effect it can have on them. The truth is we need so many people and their talents and skill in order to keep the church running and to keep building the kingdom of God. When we made these kids feel they were needed for this skit, they responded really well! I'm so excited I get to stay here and keep working with the people I get to work with! I hope everyone continues to have a good Christmas season! Thank you for all the support!

From 봉천 with love. Elder Nixon