"Faithen our Strength"

What?! Holy Weddings!!! I had no idea! I remembered you mentioned something about some of them. But I must not have remembered very well.....Everyone is getting married!!! Please send me pictures. or have them send me pictures. I would love to see their beautiful selves. Please tell them all congratulations for me! I hope Alana and Kristi wait up for me to get home before they go get themselves engaged too ha.

I am searching my brain to remember this story about Tommy in New York. I remember it was really good. but I can't remember what it was. I'll keep thinking. Hopefully by the end I'll remember.

This week has been busy. We had mission leadership conference...President Hawk's last one. The next one will be the same time he is boarding his plane to go home, and that will feel very strange I think. They are steady people. They try to find simple things that are important, and then they make patterns. And those patterns in their lives seemed to have really made them what they are. They are good examples of the scripture...Through small and simple things, are great things come to pass. It makes me want to think of a few things I want to make into patterns in my life. I bet it will help me with those thoughts on having good desires. Keep them improving.

This week we also had Zone Training. These weeks go by too fast. But we focused on Teaching and Finding. Cause that's really what we do. I am learning a lot about teaching on this mission. It is a heavenly skill I would like to develop throughout my life. But the Zone Leaders gave their training on teaching (they are great teachers), so we took finding. Not because we are necessarily good at it haha. I heard if we spend 10,000 hours at something, we will be an expert. So I'm almost an expert at it. Just kidding :) that's a lot of hours. I'm almost 1/3 expert at it haha. Our main focus was the idea of understanding and loving the Chinese people. We shared David O. Mckay's China dedicatory prayer, specifically the lines where he blesses the missionaries to have keen insight and ability to bring the gospel light to these people in a way that will make the proper appeal. It was a fun training. Helped remind us how much we love these people and the fun details of this city. It's getting HOT and missionaries are walking very crowded, hot streets for hours. Attitudes are sometimes hard to keep up. But we are so blessed to be here. And President Hawks was kind of enough to stop in and he shared a few minutes about attitude in finding. And then Dan Dan (remember her? That mandarin girl I love to death who went to med school in Russia and served in Salt Lake) she came in and shared 10 minutes on loving the people you serve. It's amazing how the spirit works. They had no idea what our trainings and discussions were, but they are in such great tune with the spirit. It was very neat.

This week started a little disappointing. We were supposed to have 2 baptisms earlier this month, but they both disappeared into mainland at the end of last week. We had some great appointments lined up, and decided to really try to strengthen our faith (or faithen our strength as Pres. Hawks puts it) and be pretty bold and challenging. Noel has been struggling with her faith in God. We have taught her the lessons, and she understands them well. If God exists, she says, she'll believe everything else. But she wouldn't find her answer. She is engaged to a less active member in Tung Chung, and she decided that she'll wait until after she's married to continue thinking about God. We met her on Sunday and she shared an experience about praying and feeling as though someone else was in the room with her. She felt like God was listening, and felt a great warmth. After sharing it, though, she continued to express that she wasn't really satisfied with that answer. We tried and tried to share how the spirit communicates with us. Shared scriptures, shared experiences....she wouldn't have it. She wanted more. But on Friday, we prepared a pretty bold lesson. It was funny...she walked in to the class room and after the opening prayer thanked us for still meeting with her. Said we were like her angels haha. I'll explain why I laugh at that later. We showed that hope of God's light video, and then we read in 3rd Nephi toward the end when an angel appeared to Laman and Lemuel and Nephi and Sam. We shared other scriptures about the consequences of how they accepted the angel. Compared Nephi to Laman and Lemuel a bit. And then we said, Noel, God will not send you an angel. He is sending you us. And we are telling you, as clear as this angel talked to Nephi and his brothers, that those feelings to that prayer was your answer. I know that you know that God exists, and you can choose to believe it or not. And you know the consequences of both. Now Noel, think back to that prayer you offered and the feelings you felt. Do you believe God exists? The spirit was incredibly strong. Yes, I do. Noel, will you be baptized? Yes, I will. We prayed about a date with her on the spot, and she just had this pure excitement in her voice the entire prayer. She cried through the entire prayer. It was very sweet. And this email doesn't do it justice. But it was sweet.

I love you very much. You all sound amazing. I hope you have such a great summer. Time is going way too fast.

Love hannah