ELDER STEVENSEN VISIT

February 28, 2016

Family,

Dad - no real imput for where to live for Sadie. Both places are good. Just different environments. Helaman is more dorm like. More convienent location in my opinion. Not too much of an imput in classes, just look at my map and the majors you might be going into so you can start to fulfill some of the prereqs, just be smart in the GE's you pick, so you don't cause yourself more work than you have to.

Mom - Thanks for the letter. Also, thanks for your awesome example as a missionary back at home. That's amazing. We need more members like you. 

Thanks for the letters. I can't believe Sadie is already going to BYU and Katie is taking the ACT and abby is in 6th grade. I felt like I just did those same things. crazy. 

The mission is speeding up faster and faster. Time just really flys. I felt like yesterday, I was here emailing. Absolutely crazy.

Also, the weather is absolutely amazing lately. 

I apologize for the recordings. I will make sure to do it tonight. 

Our investigators are doing well, i'll share come cool tender mercies in the recordings because i am out of time, but we had a turnover with an amazing sister named Chen who has alreadly read the book of mormon through once and is in alma again. She got the book of mormon 2 months ago. She came to church this week with us even though she only had a few hours of sleep. Other investigators are about the same.

Apparently Elder Stevensen  and his wife are moving to Summerwood in North Salt Lake. We shook hands with him and his wife and his wife asked me where I was from so I found out. 

We got to the meeting with Elder Stevensen a little early so I could sit close to the front. I got front row right in the middle seat. It was sweet. Elder Darrington wasn't thrilled to sit there, but he was fine. 

Elder Stevensen reviewed a little from the mission broadcast last month and reminded us about our purpose in Doctrine and Covenants 29:7 (i believe, might be wrong scriptuere) about the elect of God. He taught us that the elect of God are around the elect of God. This is one of the reasons member missionary work is the most effective way to find people to teach, because the members have the elect of God around them, and those who they know and associate with are often elect of God. We have had some miracles with this as we have been working closer with the ward. I'll share some in the recordings.

It reminded me of a quote from President Monson (i think) when he said something like -- the people we are around and associate with are that portion of God's children He has given us to love and to serve.

Elder Stevensen had me stand up and read some passages from PMG for him. He had me read from Chapter 11, the second paragraph, 1st, 2nd and last sentances as he was reminding us about the importance of commitments. A s we extend commitments as part of our teaching we are inviting people to repent. 

Elder Stevensen reminded us of the importance of bearing testimony. He said, while you are teaching it is fine to explain that you will close with your testimony, to sit up straighter and move forward in your seat and take a few seconds for the spirit to come into the room and you bear your testimony. It was a good reminder. Actually, just this morning I read a quote from Elder Benson about testimony that I really like. He said, "a testimony is to have current inspiration to know the work is true, not something we receive only once." 

As Elder Stevensen closed, he bore a powerful testimony as he shared his witness of the Savior. The spirit was very strong. He stared right into my eyes as he said, "I testify of Jesus Christ as our Savior and Redeemer." 

I also know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer. The Spirit repeadetly testifies of this truth to me as it is now while I am writing this letter. What a wonderful blessing to know this truth.

Love,

Elder Stratford

apartment leave pic

KEEP THE SABBATH DAY HOLY

February 21, 2016

Family,

Thanks for your letters. 

Dad - We have been getting trained on very similar stuff lately. At the missionwide broadcast, one of the speakers talked about 1 Kings 17 as well. Also at our most recent Zone Training, a lot of it focused on the Sabbath Day and preparing ourselves for it.  I gave a talk on that exact subject using 3 Nephi 17:3. Quite an important principle. Thank you for reminding me. I'm glad the knee is getting better. I'll have to shoot Bajo an email, although I only know his mission one.

Nice work Sadie!! That's sweet! You're going to love it there. Biggest tip is to get homework done early and right after classes in the morning. Try to get it done before dinner, usually that is no problem. Don't expect anything to ever get done after dinner, it doesn't really work, I've tried. I don't have too many suggestings for classes. Just look at MyMap and don't be dumb in your selections. Make sure what you are doing will be helping your GE or major and try to get double counters for the GE, unless it is a horrible class. That made no sense, sorry.  If you give some classes, I might be able to recommend some teachers, problem is they often switch every semester.

Mom - BYU Jerusalem would be sweet. I have no real preferences right now. I'd maybe like to go during the spring or summer if that is possible. I have no idea on when our next temple day will be. 

Our investigators are doing great. A-zhen has been coming to church and is progressing. We are having dinner with her at a members house this week. Also Chen DX is doing great. He also came to church, which was amazing especially since church is at 9 and he works everyday from 7 at night till 7 in the morning. Not too much else happened, but we have a ton scheduled for next week. We should have some new investigators.

We were able to go to Kam Tin for a few hours and to some street contacting. It was great. We ran into this dude that we met a few days earlier on the MTR and a bunch of other awesome people, we should be meeting with this week. In those 2 hours we met a man from Fiji, Gambia, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and Hong Kong. 

One of our goals this week was to pray more sincerely and in faith to find new prepared investigators. The Lord definitely answered our prayers. We are excited for this week. Hopefully I don't move this week. We'll see. I probobly shouldn't have said that out loud. We're ok though, cause I just wrote it out loud. Nevermind. I don't know what I am saying.

I know that the Lord answers our prayers when we ask with a sincere heart, with real intent and with faith that we will receive an answer.

I'm excited for Elder Stevensen today. I'll let you know how it goes.

Love,

Elder Stratford

us singing into comp study

few weeks ago at monkey mountain

Li Family in Yuen Long 1st ward. They just got married 2 months ago. She is from Taiwan and he is from Hong Kong.

ward talent show

Me and Jonah

me playing the piano with River at a members house.

Here is their family.

Here is A-zhen at the ward party.

here are our muslim friends

MY BRAIN COULDN'T HANDLE ALL THE LANGUAGES AT ONCE

February 14, 2016

Family,

Investigators are still in Mainland. Chinese New Years usually lasts a few weeks up in Mainland. They should be back this week though. Thanks for all the updates from home.

Not much to report from the last 4 days. 

We had a cool little miracle while traveling on the light rail. We walked on and a Filipino says, Hey Elders. Turns out she is a member and hasn't been to  church since moving to Hong Kong since she doesn't know where to go and she left her scriptures in the Phillipines. So we were able to meet up with her Sunday morning, give her an English Book of Mormon and tell her about where she can go to church here. She was so happy to get a Book of Mormon. We gave it to her and she hugged it and said how much she missed it. We also showed her that she can just download all the scriptures on her phone, which she obviously didn't know about.

This random lady and her husband showed up to our English class on Saturday. She was from Venezuela and her husband was from Hong Kong. It was so weird. She spoke a little bit of Cantonese and spanish, so we had like 4 languges going on. It was weird. We were speaking Mandarin and a little Cantonese and trying to use some spanish to help her undersand and learn english.  Then pretty soon, while I was helping others in the class, I was talking in Mandarin and started throwing random spanish words in for no reason. My brain couldn't quite handle it. Anyway, they should be coming to church next Sunday.

Also, Elder Darrington got caught by a member this week while we were having dinner at her house. She put a huge mushroom in his bowl for him and he hates mushrooms

One thing that I liked in personal study was in Alma 36 when Alma is counseling his son Helaman. He is telling him of his conversion and how he was racked with torment when in v17 he remembers something his father had said about one Jesus Christ.  Because of this, he is able to be forgiven, and have those feeling taken away replaced with joy. Then he goes on to be one of the greatest missionaries and prophets in the Book of Mormon. I think that v17 is a good reminder to each of us to make sure that our lower lights are burning, because there are struggling seaman out there that are watching longing for the lights on the shore and we can be those lights for them. 

Love,

Elder Josh Stratford

start of the hike.

at the top. kind of cloudy.

Elder Darrington was kind of tired after the hike.

got a simplified name tag.

i don't know what this is.

funny trail head sign.

Elder Darrington bought an orange tree.

Elder VanDyke trying to pay for part of the orange tree. Elder Darrington didn't take it.

from our apartment window. some people banging drums and dancing with a dragon

BEING A CONDUIT FOR THE SPIRIT

Family,

Happy Chinese New Year!! Go bang some drums and a cowbell or something.

I do know that Sister Hansen that just came back. I saw her pic in some member records from the Tin Shui Wai ward. 

All our investigators are in Mainland for the New Year and nobody really wants to talk on their equivilent of Christmas, but that is ok. We were able to meet with a former investigator that we haven't been able to meet with for over 2 months. That was awesome. He got a new job and works everyday from 7 at night to 7 in the morning. He will be coming to church on Sunday. He and his son are doing great.

We had a lot of trainings recently. We had Zone training last Friday. The focus was on the Sabbath Day and inviting people to church. They have a goal this month to invite 2842 people to church as a zone. We also had Zone Conference yesterday and watched a missionary broadcast. It was good. Learned more about the role the spirit plays and how important listening is as we teach. We also have Mission Conference on the 22nd or 23 and Elder Stevensen is coming. I'm excited for that.

I recently read a talk, The Balm of Gilead, by President Packer. Great talk that reminds us of the importance of your thoughts and making sure that we do not keep anything that is not edifying.

At the end of Zone Conference, they had the 3 sisters that will be leaving this transfer bear their testimonies. As the first sister got up and bore her testimony, the spirit filled the room and tears were brought to my eyes as I heard her powerful testimony of the Savior. It made me want to be better and to serve Him more. Then, the other 2 sisters came up, but I had no such feelings. Their words were similar, but it was much different. That was a testimony builder to me on the importance of the spirit and a reminder to always strive to be worthy and exactly obedient so I can be a conduit for the Spirit to teach the Lord's investigators here in Hong Kong.

Love,

Elder Stratford

PRAYING WITH FATIH

January 31, 2016

Family,

Let me know how the recovery continues to go. It sounds brutal. One quick question for dad. What ways worked well for you in helping your investigators keep commitments? I am trying to see how I can better implement Preach My Gospel to have a better success rate to help the people I teach progess in the gospel.

Our investigators this week are good. I don't know if I told you, but Zheng is off to mainland for most of the month for Chinese New Year.

A-zheng came to church and had a great experience. We were at HSK for a few other investigators, one of which showed up.

Liu DX is progessing. He is willing to keep commitments and has a lot of great questions.

Everyone else is the same.

I gained a stronger testimony this week about praying with faith. I know that God will answer our prayers and we will be more guided in our work as we pray in faith. When we give serious thought and consider out attitude of our prayers and ask for the Holy Ghost to guide our prayers, the spirit is there in greater abundance and our prayers become a lot more meaningful.

Love,

Elder Josh Stratford

looking out a window of a tsuen.

Temple Day

Hong Sui Kiu Chapel lobby