Elder Ogden in Taipei: Week 5- Diligent and Persistent Work

Ni3men Hao3!

I realized that I screwed up a lot of the tone numbers on the Chinese I typed last week, so for those of you who care...sorry.

This has been another tough but spiritually filling week. We got to hear Elder Stevenson talk to us about Preach My Gospel and specifically the attributes of humility, diligence, obedience, and virtue, and it was really good but there wasn't a ton of mind blowing things I feel impressed to tell you guys.

Our lessons have been going pretty well. Peng2 Jye3mei4 is still apprehensive about telling her family she's been meeting with us and accepting baptism, but her faith and love of the gospel has really grown. After we taught her about the sabbath and church, she asked US when church was and if she could come, so that was exciting. I have faith that as she learns more, she will have the strength and courage to conquer her fears.

Yang2 Di4xiong1 is pretty eager to learn, and we extended a baptismal invite and he accepted! There's a ways to go before he knows everything he needs, but for now he knows that the gospel is awesome and can really help him in his life, and is excited to learn more about the how!

Li3 Di4xiong1 has enjoyed the lessons, but is still kind of confused by the ideas of prayer and prophets and all these things we take for granted growing up in a Judeo-Christian society. It's been an education for me to figure out how to help him understand better. He has had good experiences for sure so I'm excited to see him start to run with it.

Last night we were going to go to a pioneer movie called Legacy, but someone told us that they were only playing it in Chinese and we didn't want that kind of stress yet, so we ended up going to then-Elder Uchtdorf's talk. That was really good, and it was fun to hear the story of how he met his wife. He essentially owes his marriage, and by extension his family, to the persistence of missionaries who knocked on every door up until the 4th floor last door, until they finally found a family that was willing to listen, whose daughter would later become President Uchtdorf's wife. That was a big theme for me this week: diligently and persistently working.

President Shumway (our branch president) told us yesterday that as missionaries, we don't become perfect by never having shortcomings or screwing up. We become perfect enough by diligently working and continuously repenting and through the Savior's grace, we become enough.

I also learned the value of forgetting myself and reaching out to others. This week we all felt pretty crappy and sick and a lot of people were struggling with the language, but I found that as I ignored my own sickness and reached out and lifted up the people who were struggling more than I was, I felt better than I would have if I had been healthy but selfish. I wasn't perfect about it, but it was a good lesson that motivated me to be better at it.

I know our Heavenly Father takes an interest in our lives. He loves us and watches out for us and puts people and opportunities in our way that will bless and strengthen us; all we have to do is notice them.

It's such a privilege to bear the name of our Savior on my chest, and I can only hope to one day be worthy of it.

I love you all!

Elder Ogden