A full and humble heart

Hello family and friends,                                                                         July 29, 2015

Wow what a week and a half. There is always a lot that happens within the week but then when we have temple week and we have to report on a week and a half, it is like impossible. So much information. I wish that I could express what I learned these past couple of days but I don't know if I really can. I feel like I learned the most about myself, missionary work, and the whole reason we are out here this week.

A mission is a really funny thing. For people like me who grow up in the Church, by the time you are ready to go out you think you have a pretty good understanding of what a mission 大概 is. Well let me first bear a little testimony about that. YOU DON'T! If you want to have the slightest  idea of what missionary work really is, feels like, etc. you have to do it. It's not saying that if you didn't go or don't go you are bad. But you might not fully understand. Everyday is a learning process, every week a growth spurt, and every year a complete change in yourself. Here I am after a year feeling like I am just starting to scrape the surface of the big picture.

This confused me....non Christian country with a display of Noah's Arc ;)

One of the big things that happened this week was a very humbling experience. For starters I think that sometimes we lose sight of the "big picture". Key indicators, baptismal statistics, number of members, etc. these are all important; but sometimes if your not careful can rob from you from seeing the big picture. You're here to help people find the gospel so that it can make a difference in their lives. This week we went to visit a single Mom. She is the definition of having a rough life. She has two adorable children, they unfortunately are fatherless due to their Father committing suicide with relation to depression.

 This single mom doesn't have a job, is living in a government provided house. When we walked into the small home, which the front room is about 4x6 ft., no kitchen, a bucket and hose for a shower, and a small mattress on the ground where all three of them sleep, and possibly worse of all no A/C. For those who don't know, Taiwan averages high 90's with the past week averaging 80% humidity. (that's hot) Out of her generosity she provided some fruit and we sat in the small room and began to share our message. Our message was that of focusing on the small and little things that God gives us. I felt a little like a hypocrite, if anyone knew what small and little things were, she did. It was really emotional as she expressed her thanks to God for giving her "so many great and beautiful blessings." She expressed her thanks for her beautiful children, the Church, the missionaries and her Savior. Most of all the talked about how this Church is what has made the difference in her life; that when she needed help, Christ knew what to do to help her.

Christ knows how to heal us

As we biked back to our apartment I couldn't help but cry. (cheesy right) I felt so humbled, God showed me that no matter what, coming from America and the circumstances I grew up in, no matter what I do I will never really know what some of His Children feel like. But I know the Savior does, the whole reason I am here is to give to these people peace and comfort. I can't really help them, but the perfect gospel of Christ can.

 It made me really think of the past year, what have I learned? Through the blistering heat, typhoons, learning the hardest language ever, biking hundreds of miles in some of the most populated places on earth, to walking through the bamboo and rice patties. What has it all been for? I think the simple answer is to understand and know that regardless of who we are, who we were, where we live and our circumstances, God Knows Us. And he knows how to heal us. Even in the darkest of hours, or smallest homes, or worst situation he knows how to help. I feel bad. My mission I feel like was suppose to be all about helping others, but in reality it's me who has been helped. This has given me a lot of motivation to pay it all back as much as I can this next year. I would say I love my mission but I think that might be a little shallow, what I should say is: I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which allows me a full and humble heart.

The snails here are giant size

Spiders are 5-6" long. Freaky!

I love you all,

Elder Roe

A Fantastic Surprise

Hello Western Hemisphere!                                                                     July 20, 2015

How was everyone's week!? Mine was super great! I actually think that this week was the fastest one on my mission. I just didn't even notice the time and then it was gone! It also may have been because my watch broke so I didn't know the time... that would explain it. ;)

The best night!!! They surprised me!

The start of the week started off with a little bit of a disappointment though. We had a lesson set up for our investigator on Monday, it was actually our investigator who was suppose to be baptized two days ago. Brother Wu.

 But we had a great member there to help us and we were waiting on him but he didn't come. I called him and he told me he decided that he will just read and study on his own and doesn't want to meet with the missionaries. So being on a mission I have learned so much on how to be patient, loving, kind and understanding. But when you tel me you don't want to meet with me I am still the hot headed devil that I have always been. I was like "Excuse me?" Yeah I wasn't happy, but I very straightforward and lovingly shared with him that if he wanted all of the blessings our Heavenly Father WANTS to give to him we need to continue meeting and preparing for baptism. But if he doesn't have a desire to meet with us we couldn't continue and if he had interest  he could contact us.  So basically we... are done for now. Sometimes people need some time but it is really sad that he is going to wait to get the blessings when he could start right now! Keep him in your prayers.

Cool Security Guard

After that we had a week full of seeing lots of people, potentials, etc. The best part of my week was probably on Sat. night. I had one of my RC's coming to eat dinner with me and Elder Loke but what I didn't know is they surprised me and brought some more of my favorite people from 香山! It was so great to see them and catch up! I was so stoked to see them I wanted to hug them all but there were some sisters so that would have been 不行. But I loved it!

Then last night we had our missionary fireside for our ward. They have them once ever two months what is weird is that I have been there for all of them since they started cause I have been here so long haha. But I can say in that time I have seen a HUGE change in the ward and there outlook towards missionary work! The Stake Pres. and Bishop have made plans for some places in our areas where the ward is going to go finding with us. Like everyone. I love the Stake President he told me yesterday that finding is the wards responsibility, our responsibility is to teach. I know that if he can fulfill this vision the ward/stake with grow and be so fruitful! 

Well that's about it for now. I love you all so much and hope you have a great week!

Elder Roe

I LOVE THIS PICTURE. (if you don't read Chinese you wont get it though...;))

All you Chinese Readers will have to tell me what this means....

Typhoon made for a slow week but faith wins out in the end

Hello dear family and friends!                                                                July 12, 2015

This week was a roller coaster ride! Oh, also full of rain seeing as the typhoon came. Now, can I just say, it was super duper 還好. Like we have had worse storms in Utah and there isn't any ocean over there. But that did cause for a lot of people to not want to meet with us or go outside because they thought they would die or something. So I am hoping that there are no more typhoons because it's really 不方便. The day of the typhoon was super rough. So the next day we set lots of time aside to find and work really hard.

 

 My companion looked a little skeptical about finding which makes sense since the entire day we hadn't talked to anyone but I promised him we would see miracles the next day. And guess what? WE DID! The best part was that we got 4 New Investigators! :) In one day. :) Yeah that was awesome! And all the lessons we had and Book of Mormons placed we barely had to do anything for! Literally it was almost like the people started talking to us! So that was super awesome! I hope that everyday can be like that. :)

Other than that, our investigators have seemed to just be in a rutt. Not really 退步ing but also not 進步ing. We are really trying find the prepared people but lately it seems we have only really been able to find those that are prepared only to meet again but not quite for baptism. A little frustrating. But I have learned that we don't really get to control where they are at in life. We invite and sometimes all they can do at that time is make it through one lesson, accept a book of Mormon and then they aren't ready to go further. But later on, down the road the have the tools necessary to continue. So it's a process. 

Also I was very kindly reminded from a few people that I passed the year mark. Yeah... I don't really even want to think about that. Time has gone way way way too fast! I think I will just extend to a 3 year mission 就好了.

This week we were also able to meet the Jergensen Family a little bit more. They are all so great! I am really excited for them to be in Taiwan and I know that they are going to work miracles in this mission! So awesome! 

Well that's all I got for now. They Church is true. Jesus is the Christ. The Gospel is the key! Sending much love your way!!! 

Elder Roe 

PS Pres Jergensen invites you all to check out the website taiwantaipeimission.com

Looking for 'good fruit' and not just fancy foilage

Hello everyone,                                                                                         July 6, 2015

Hey sorry this week is gonna be a bit short! Time is of the essence and it's not something that I have a lot of haha.

Something that I learned this week that I would like to share with you was while I was reading in the New Testament. I was reading Jesus' entrance to Jerusalem and he comes across a fig tree which was bearing no fruit. He then proceeds to curse the fruit tree to where it whithers away. I have always wondered about this incident. Why would he do that? I went to Jesus the Christ in search of a answer where I found Brother Talmage's answer. He said that Jesus was showing his supreme power, just as much power as he had over life he also had over death. He then continues to give countless examples of him commanding the elements as well as raising the dead. Then he concludes this portion by saying it was made completely clear to the apostles in just a few days later how voluntary his sacrifice really was. From this experience we learn that if he wanted, he could have killed all of the evil Pharisees with one word. Yet he let them practice their agency though it hurt him. 

Monster Ice outing with Sister Jergensen's famiy...what a treat!

I really learned from this that I cannot control the outcome of some of my Investigators choices. Sometimes I want them to just hurry up and be baptized instead of postponing. But I realized that regardless of what we want everyone gets a choice. Even the Son of Man who really could get whatever he wanted, let them have their choice event though it was the wrong one.

 I really need to learn to follow His example in this aspect.

Pretty view from the canal

delicious dragon fruit

 The second part of this that I learned a lot from is that the tree itself was all leaves and had no fruit. If it was mortal we would say it is a "hypocrite." It was all for show. I have been thinking about this a lot lately and I hope it doesn't come across the wrong way. I have had baptisms and they were all very prepared and are doing well in the church but I have never had tons of investigators at one time. I feel like my style is really trying to make my fig tree have fruit! Not just lots of foliage on the outside. My area to others on the outside may not look insanely great. But its not because of a  lack of effort. The effort is all focused on trying to get those fruits. I think the most important part is the fruit. Of course we want the best of both worlds and that is the goal so I will be working diligently on getting fruit and foliage. I hope that makes sense, it was just something I have been thinking about this week. 

Anyway I hope that you all have a incredible day and week I love you all! 

Elder Roe

Lessons learned from President and Sister Day

Hey Everyone,                                                                                        June 29, 1015


Alrighty, so for starters: I am still in 木柵! Yeah I know crazy right!? But my son left me! Elder S was the one that moved. luckily he didn't move too far he is still in Taipei so that is okay I will still be able to see him :) But I have a great new companion. His name is Elder Afrom Stansbury Park. He is a perfect example of what a missionary should be. He is quiet but has a great spirit about him, I am really excited to work with him. He is actually the same mission age as Elder S so he just finished training so still pretty young. It'll be a really fun transfer though. Basically after last week we set everything to base zero. Except for those that were really progressing we dropped. So that means lots of time to find etc. Poor Elder A, like his first day in 木柵 we had about 4 hours of contacting. But it was a blast! And we found some prepared people so that was good. That is the whole goal, find PREPARED people not just people. There is a huge difference.

The real Capt. America

This last transfer meeting was AWFUL!!!!!!!!! So many missionaries who I love so much went home. I cried. Okay not totally but I may or may not have been teary eyed. Along with it being Pres. and Sis. Day's last transfer meeting, It was pretty heart wrenching. I have learned so much from them. It is hard to really explain in words but their example has helped me so much. Something that they really had a knack for was a catch phrase principle. Just a few are: Rip off the roof, you have beautiful feet, bring honor to the family name, are there giants in the land? and will you go!? Yeah I think the saying, "guess you had to be there" really has to be taken into account here cause unless you were here, you have no idea what most of those mean. So since that is the case I will say this, they have taught me, never give up, never give in, and never go home. I am so grateful to them and all they have taught me. I love them to pieces. This is their last day and President J will arrive tomorrow. Lots of craziness!

Elder A; my new companion! He is an awesome missionary!

Something that I learned from this week was from a street contact. It was the end of a night and I saw a guy sitting on his scooter. We rode over to talk to him and right from the get go he was not really wanting to talk. I felt like I should give him a few opportunities though, so I kept asking him some questions and like most Taiwanese people after 3 minutes they start to open up. He told me he didn't have a religion, and didn't believe in God. I asked him why that was and he responded that it was because he couldn't see or hear God. 

The cool part came after that though, the thought came into my mind to use this little comparison. I asked him if in this world there is love? He responded: "Yeah, but very little!" (very pessimistic) I told him while that may be true, it does exist and that is the point for what I wanted to share. I then asked if he could see love (this part makes mores sense it Chinese since they way it is asked clearly distinguishes it as a object) He said: "Well... no." I said," that is right we cannot see love but we can see the result (結果) of love". For example if I bought some food for someone to eat, it would be because I love them which is a form of love.

Mango as big as my face! Booyah!

" So can you see my actual love"? No. But you can see the result of it for sure. I then told him that God is the same. While we might not be able to see or hear him we can see the results of him existing. (If this doesn't make sense I am sorry translating is rough sometimes) For example we have: religion, scriptures, leaders etc. Just like you cannot deny love, neither can you deny God. This seemed to catch his interest and he was at least willing to give me his cell phone number so we will give him a call and see where it goes. But it was a great learning experience. 

Other than that? I had to 突然 give a talk in Church yesterday. It was a good experience. But I have to admit I never thought I would be able to talk for 15 minutes in Chinese. God is a God of miracles! :) 

That about sums up my week. We are working hard and I am stoked to still be in 木柵! I hope you all have a wonderful week! I love you all!!!!!

Elder Roe

Opposition in All Things...rough week

Hello all,                                                                                     June 22, 2015

This week was a week. A week that is actually a little bit hard to describe. It was a little bit crazy and a little bit rough haha. We really worked our tails of but things just didn't quite work out as planned. So yeah, but it's alright we have a plan! So this next week will be awesome no worries!

Lunch with my old friend! What a great surprise.

 Brother Wu did not get baptized this last Saturday, which was a bit disappointing. It was a rough day since we had a few investigators with a goal for last Saturday and none of them pulled through. So we are back to the drawing board. Resetting goals, and seeing what needs to take place to help them progress and answer their questions. We are also going back to the very basics and trying to implement two hours of finding a day into our missionary work. We really hope that by doing this we will be able to find those who are prepared! Keep us in your prayers ok!

 The upside to the week was that we had 4 investigators come to church! HUGE tender mercy! Of those that came two are really progressing we hope that we can help all of them continue to have a good uplifting experience so that can build a relationship with God.

Pres Day has done so much good for our mission and for me!

I cannot believe that the transfers are already here! I can't believe that I have already been in MuZha for 3! The transfer is this Friday and basically the whole mission will be there since it is Pres. and Sister Day's last  one before Pres. Jergensen arrives. It will be a crazy day! There are so many great missionaries going home it will be a day full of tears haha. 

Sorry this week wasn't very eventful. We are just trying to focus on the little things and crank things up in our area. I love you all and hope that you have a incredible week!

Happy Father's Day Dad....miss you. Hope to be just like you someday.

Elder Roe

Picture: My RC Jason was in Taipei so he came and ate lunch with us! :)

An Unforgettable 19th Birthday in Taiwan!!!

Hello family and friend,                                                                     June 15, 2015

Thank you all so much for the Birthday wishes! It was a great day full of happiness and mangoes!!!!! So obviously it was awesome haha! So the big question of the week is: Is W baptism still on for this Saturday? And the answer is: I cannot answer the question cause I don't know. It is pretty common after you share the commandments to find one that will be a little bit of a trial to overcome. And we got to the part about tithing.... and then we hit a snag. He is really just feeling that there is no way he will be able to live off of his salary and pay the tithing with it. We talked a lot about it and did everything we could think of to help him understand the importance and blessings of tithing. We even threw in a good object lesson. But he didn't really budge. I learned a pretty important lesson from that. No matter what you do, say, to make something to look good, in the end they have to make the decision for themselves. Even though tithing really is a good thing and there is nothing deceptive about it he has to make the decision and receive his own answer that is really is from God. And that if he decides to follow it he will be blessed and receive God's help. I just hope he can come to the conclusion soon and still make his goal! Keep him in your prayers. I know that he will for sure get baptized one day and reap the blessings!

This great lady took us out for hot pot to celebrate my Birthday

Other than that our investigators have been really 不穩定 the past couple of weeks. We keep trying to find the prepared ones. We did have one really neat experience this past week that I would like to share though. One day we had set apart the entire afternoon for finding. We went into it with a lot of prayers, believe me... a lot of prayers. But when the time came I really had no idea where to go. We really wanted to follow the spirit and be guided. I asked my companion and he wasn't sure either. So we started biking and just did our best to listen.

Awesome view of my beloved City. Great hike!

 

 My poor companion was so 辛苦, he had no idea what I was doing. Luckily he is the best guy ever and doesn't complain. We biked and biked and biked. And let me tell you, the humidity here is unlike anything you have ever seen, felt, or can imagine. We went up the mountain, down the mountain, back up the mountain, down the highway, through the park. But every person that we talked about just... wasn't feeling it. They weren't prepared yet. So we just kept moving. The whole afternoon was like that. I though, "oh no, we aren't going to see any success and we were so hopeful! We had about 20 minutes left. We were riding down the rode and I saw a 同學 aged kid walking down the side walk. We rounded the corner and I slammed on my breaks! The impression to talk to him came stronger than I can describe! Poor Elder Scovel was a little startled by my abrupt stop haha. But I told him what I had felt.

He gave me pineapple for my Birthday

 

 The only bad thing was we looked a little ridiculous standing there around the corner waiting for him. So I tried to make it look as normal as I could.. probably wasn't very successful though. We stopped and started to talk to him. He had great questions about prayer and God. We started to share about who God is and how we can pray and talk to him about anything! He was super willing to hear more. The even better part is that he lives next door to the Church. Yup, talk about convenient. God provides miracles! And the spirit really can lead and guide us. It was a neat experience. Sometimes we might stop them and all the needed was that simple message for now and there isn't much of a 結果. But regardless it helps those we talk to. You can feel it. A mission is so great! 

Another bday gift from a friend

My favorite: Mango smoothies!

Hope that you all have a fantastic week, and go swimming or something. Summer is the best time for swimming :) I love you all! 

Elder Roe

pic. love taibei! Another  awesome hike (Also, Porter said he would be getting his bday pkgs from the mission home today.....so thanks Grandma Linda and Mom and to thank everyone who sent him a bday wish ...it was awesome to read all of them and it made his day!)

Rollerskating

大家好!                                                                                            June 8, 2015

How are you all doing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!? Today is a BEAUTIFUL day here in Taiwan! So hopefully it's the same for you and ya'll can go outside and enjoy summer. Oh yeah, HAPPY SUMMER! Congrats to making it out of school! That in itself is a accomplishment so sure! We had a great week this week full of awesomeness! We are having lots of improvement in our area and our investigators are doing really awesome! Especially W, he came to Church this week and even came to the New Member/Investigator fireside last night. He has his date set for the 20th of June so we are getting everything prepared for that. I am really praying that it all goes smoothly, 1. because I want him to be happy and not have any problems, and 2. because that is most likely my last Sat. in MuZha and I would LOVE to see him get baptized. Tonight we are sharing the Commandments with him so please pray for him that everything will go really smoothly! 

What an incredible hike

Something was shared by our member in Church yesterday that I thought was really awesome that I want to tell ya'll about. Mostly cause I think it really relates to us as missionaries and people. He has a adorable little daughter named Sonny, and she loves to roller skate. During here roller skating class (Since this is Taiwan they have classes for roller skating,  don't ask questions) he noticed something that he thought was really interesting. The teacher would randomly out of the blue yell 跌掉! (trip) And all the little kids would just fall to the ground. at first he was just like what they heck are they doing? Why is the teacher making my daughter purposefully fall to the ground. But upon further observance he learned the 原因.  1. They would practice falling so that when they did fall they would now how to fall without getting injured. 2. They would fall, so that they would practice how to get back up.

This one looks a little crazy to Mom!

We practice falling so that we can't get injured.  We don't know when we'll fall but when it hits, it hurts. BAD. But God has provided us the tools we need to not get injured. We have the teachings of prophets, scriptures, church leaders, and most importantly prayer. We might hurt, and get scraped up a little bit but we don't have to get injured to where we need drastic measures to heal. When the trials come the faith you have is what will determine whether or not break or endure.

We can't always control when we fall, sometimes we pick up so much speed and we get going so fast that we lose control and fall. Or other times there is unseen gravel, or debris that cause our wheels to jam and send us to the ground. Regardless of the reason the most important part is that we get back up. Each time we get back up after a trial or hardship we are just practicing for the next piece of unseen gravel. 

The lush landscape of Taiwan, what a view!

And just like when I child falls and gets back up, perhaps with a few scrapes and tears, the parent is there in a flash with loving open arms. I am so grateful that, that parent understands everything he is the creator of my spirit. So I think it's fair to say if anyone knows how to help me heal it is Him. 

I hope that when we all fall we will use our preparation, fall with grace and be sure to get back up.

I love you all have a great week!

Elder Roe

MC alum turned missionaries in Taiwan together again

Hello,                                                                                                          June 1, 2015

This week was so great! And full of adventures! Monday through Friday had every afternoon packed full of meetings! So that was a little bit rough. But this week was our trainer trainee follow-up meeting. It was the biggest meeting ever! So many people. But it was such a blast to see so many missionaries. It's crazy how many people you get to know on a mission but then when you get transferred you basically never see them again except for meetings like this. But everyone was doing really well and we learned a lot on how we can improve.

MC alum serving in Taiwan! Great to meet  up with these friends!

 

This weekend was also our Stake Conference! It was really good and really long. They do things a little bit different here in Taiwan and have about 20 speakers for stake conference. Which was little fun to here everyone's different point of view and such but man, it made me tired. You really gotta focus during those meetings. Because when they are nervous they talk as fast as they can and not very clearly so you have to pay attention. I think I got more out of it than any other conference since I had to be so engaged haha. I guess God has a sense of humor. 

Anyway this week was rough when it came to meeting with our investigators. They were busy and so were we. But that left a lot of time for us to find. We met some really great people with potential. But I think the one that I am most excited for is Huang Li's mom! We went to their house to eat this week and as it turned out Huang Li wasn't even there, he was at work. I thought that was significant because she wanted to feed us even though the member wouldn't be there. So that shows she at least likes having us there.

 

 

My friend Gan ...love this guy!

 

 When I first came into the house she told me that she had been reading the BoM a little bit. She said since she had no religion, she was doing her research so that she could pick one! What!?!?!? Yeah that's what I like to hear! At the end of the night we talked to her about the book. And told her about what we need to do in order to know the truthfulness of the message. She was really interested, and she was really willing to do what she could to know for herself that the Church and what we share is true. I was so excited for her. I think she will really progress because before when I had brought up anything about the Church she would just kind of blow it off. But now it is her who wants to talk about it! What a miracle. 

Well I hope that you all have a great week. Keep the smiles on your faces and remember that God Loves you! 

Love Elder Roe