August 17 - Hey Lincoln

So I'm causing trouble in the middle of the night again. This time Elder Gibbons got up in the middle of the night to adjust his mat and apparently I sat up, looked and just started yelling Korean at him. He thought I was mad that I woke him up and about halfway into it he realized I wasn't awake and that I was just sleep-sitting-up/babbling in Korean. I really wish I could have seen it 3rd person. We had a good week this week! We saw tons of miracles and were able to see good progress in our investigator, Brother Lee. I feel it was yesterday that I was typing the last one of these. I can't even keep straight what happened this week! Recently, we started giving service at an old folks home in our area. Both Elder Gibbons and I are loving it just because we love interacting with old people here so much. We both decided that Korea has the top class of elderly people in the world. They're so active always going to market, going to exercise or just playing with other old people. What we usually do at the old folks home is basic cleaning of beds and wheelchairs and floors, and also help out with meal time. So, we were sitting in the little living area visiting with them when one of the nurses yelled 식사! (meal time!) They all kind of looked at each other all excited, but at the same time didn't know what to do immediately. They all got up one at a time and slowly started making their way down the long hall towards the tables. They were all moving at different rates so from my perspective at the end of the hall it sort of looked like a race to lunch, hah. We haven't been able to do service for quite a long time before this so it has been really good to do this.

I was reminded of exactly how long I've been in this area this week. We were standing on a street corner when a man ran up to us and said, "hi" as if he knew us well and I didn't recognize him at all! The first thing he said to me was "Hey Lincoln!!" I gave him a super confused looked and then he said "Oh wait no I mean Nixon!!!, Nixon thats right..." I asked him when we met and he said a while ago but he showed me that I was still saved in his phone (under the name 닉슨대통령/President Nixon). Sure enough, he was in our phone! That just goes to show you how long I've been here. I run into people on a weekly basis who say that they've met me before and I recognize them about half the time.

Like I said, Brother Lee made good progress this week! He was talking in ways like "if I get baptized, what kind of lifestyle would it be?" He also listed off the things he needs to do in order to get baptized (finish the Book of Mormon, quit smoking/coffee, have strong experience recognizing the holy ghost) So it seems to be in his plans. I invited him to be baptized on the 21st of September, but he said that was too soon and that this is a really serious promise with God and takes lots of preparation. Because he told me what he intends to do, I trusted him that he make steady progress towards these goals. We've only been meeting for 3 weeks and and he has already read from 1 Nephi to Alma!! He is the kind of investigator that just loves to research all religion. He told us that he spends lots of time on the internet reading about it and that actually it was him reading about the celestial kingdom on the internet that cause him to come to church and start meeting with us. I think it is so amazing to actually see positive results of people researching us on the internet because the negativity always seems to severely out weigh the truth. He came to church yesterday as well! Right now, we are focusing on helping him pray. Because he is taking things from a research prospective, it's hard for him, but he understands the need for it and is making good progress.

We also had a really amazing miracle last Monday night. We were handing out free english flyers in a busy part of our area and had planned on going to confirm a less actives address after. Right when we finished, I realized I had forgotten to write down the address and only knew the general area that it was in. I figured it wouldn't even be worth it to go and try and find it without the address, but something in me said that we should still go try. I almost ignored it, but figured if nothing else we can go talk to people in that area. So we made our way over there. Just before we were about to get there, this American lady, named Jennifer, came up and said "Hey Elders!" We found out that she was a member and had lived here as an English teacher for almost 2 years. She was so excited to see us and said that she had been looking for missionaries in Korea and we were the first time she'd seen missionaries. She was really open with us in saying that she doesn't really go to church here in Korea and that she'd fallen off, but that she still had a testimony. She expressed her concerns and we had pretty much a full lesson right there on the street. We were able to testify that she could return and that it would help here so much. I saw that she felt the spirit with what we said and was glad that she met us that night. It's so amazing to look at times like that and think of the role the spirit has in our work. I'm so grateful I get to do this full time.

Love you all peacenblessins From 금천,with love. Elder Nixon