Next Transfer I Will Be In

Jeon-Ju!

 

Yup im staying her for another transfer. 5 trandfers in your greenie area is EXTREMELY rare. People usually only stay for 2. But that just means theres more work for me to do here. I just have to find out what it is.

We were able to set a baptismal date with Sister Oh this week and we think this one is the one that she will actually get baptized! Its for July 20th. We had FHE with their family on Monday and we taught about the plan of savlation with the elders and Elder Jeong asked if we could set a date and both her son and her agreed to July 20th! And since I'm not transferring I will be able to be here for it! Her husband, brother Park, wasn't able to sit in at FHE with us but the elders set a date with him for September. However yesterday during church our ward mission leader found out that Brother Park didn't have the same date as the family so he talked to him for 20 mins during the third hour of church and got him to see why he should get baptised on the 20th so now we have a whole family! IM SO EXCITED! MY FIRST BAPTISM IS A FAMILY! And I love them so much. We visited them twice this week. We are so close to them that they expect us to come over almost everyday which is hard because they live a 45 min bus ride away and its more expensive but its totally worth it. When we show up at their house Sister Oh just makes us food and we play with her kids. Their youngest daughter, Na-Yeon who is 6 korean age, played play kitchen with me for a good 15 mins. I had no idea what she was saying to me but I just pretended to drink everything she gave me. Shes adorable. I think they are part of the reason I need to stay in Jeon ju. I love that family. They are definetly one of the people I want you to meet when you come pick me up.

 

The Twins

The bishops twins also got baptised this week! And they looked BEAUTIFUL! Earlier in the week we made invitations with them for their friends and two of their nonmember friends came. The baptism was great. even though there were a TON of kids there and it was kinda loud. The spririt was still SO strong when they were actually baptised and when their parents bore their testimonies. It was precious.

 

I love Jeon Ju and im excited to be staying here for another tranfer.

 

Our gift to the twins for their baptism.

Us with the twins and their friends

Me with the twins and our gift and a few other kids in the ward and their friends

I love you all and hope you have a great week!

- Sister Collyer 콜리여 자매 (kol-lee-yeo ja-mae)

Hard week her in Jeon Ju

The first sad news is we might have gotten dropped by Eun Sook (Jani) we arent sure. We went to go give her banana bread this week and she mom and aswered the door and told her that her daughter feels uncomfortable about our visits. She feels to much pressure from us to be baptised and go to church. Shes scared of water (like everyother korean in Korea) and she says that church takes up to much time on Sunday that she should be studying (like every other korean in Korea thinks.) so her mom told us that her daughter is just interested un English. We wanted to talk to Jani about it so we still tried to go to her house on Saturday but they didn't answer the door even though we knew they were home and they aren't answering out text messages. So we arent quite sure what to do about that....

 

but on a lighter note: Sister Oh came to church yesterday! And she said that she feels like the missionaries are like angels sent to her family! We are having FHE with them and the elders tonight and we are hoping to give her a baptismal date so sent many prayers her way!

 

I also ate this soup called pe-soon-dae...it is literally pig intestine soup with pigs blood....I have never had so much trouble downing food before. about half way thought I literally didn't think I could finisih it. Our ward mission leader took us out to get it and there were so many points where i had to hold back gagging and do everything I could not to throw up. I have NEVER had so much trouble eating something as I did that. There were pig intestine and hearts and liver and grossness. Just thinking about it makes me sick. But afterwards we got ice cream because sister son was so proud of me for finishing it because it was even hard for her. But I ate it! And I never want to again...

 

Also i went on a splits this week and I meet the other sisters' investigator who is an older asain lady who when she speaks english sounds like a balck person. It's hilarious. She lived in Geroriga for 30 years. I guess she saw them walking down the street and said, "Are you them Mormons?" It's the weirdest thing ever because she Asian but sounds black. Anyways fun story.

 

We also had a really cool experience on Saturday. So Saturday was really rough. No one wanted to meet with us so we pretty much just walked aimlessly around all day. Then at night we went and visited our member Sister Ha without calling her first. She let us in and we talked and such then right before we left she told us that the misisonaries always come by when their family needs them the most because they are having a hard time and that day was one of those time. Missionaries really are angels! Anyways I thought that was cool

 

Hopefully this week goes better. I hope all is well at home! I love and miss you all!

--

- Sister Collyer 콜리여 자매 (kol-lee-yeo ja-mae)

Happy Father's Day and a Baptismal Date!

아버지의 날 축하합니다!!!! 사랑해요 아빠!!!!

Thats my secret note to dad :) I love you dad! thanks for always being such a good example to me :) I hope you are having a great Fathers Day.

This is my zone! from the one zone activity we will probably ever be able to do

Here's the bishops twins again they posed trying to make two hearts the yare adorable

This week was pretty good. :) On Thursday we were able to have dinner with one of Sister Son's dad's coworkers. He took us to a REALLY fancy restaurant. It was $25 a plate and because he's a man so the elders had to come too so it was really nice of him. It was this traditional Korean food place and guess what the majority of the food was? Sea food. To bad I don't like seafood very much....they had like three waves of side dishes come in it was insane how much food there was. I ate abolony! That's how fancy it was. I didn't like it but I ate it. I wanted to enjoy the food more but seafood just isn't my favorite.

Another exciting thing that happened this week was we set a baptismal date with Eun Sook! (Jani) it is for July 6th. She said shes scared of water (like most Koreans. They cant swim) but she said that she will come to the bishops twins baptism to see what its like and the twins are getting baptized in a week or two. But yesterday we picked her up and she came to church! She said she was sleepy but she enjoyed it. We have high hopes for her and we hope that Satan doesn't work to hard on her.

Another really cool thing happend this week: on Saturday our ward mission leader, brother Park, called us and asked us to invited sister Oh and her family over to his house for dinner and the bishoip and a few other families would be there. So we did and she came! It was so good to see how much the people in our ward just embraced their family :) now if she could just be a little less busy with her funeral home busniess so we could just actually meet with her that would be great :) But she came to church yesterday so thats a start :)

I was so proud of the members of out ward yesterday at church. They have always introduced themselves to our investigators but that's really about it then they just walked away but yesterday they made both of them who came to church feel so welcome :) My ward is changing for the better and I love it :)

I also bought a Hanbuk this week! Its a traditional Korean dress people wear at weddings and such. I got it at a thrift store so it was really cheap. That was exciting.

Heres my hanbuk!

Sister Son taught me how to properly bow in it haha

Anyways that's it for the week! I love you all and happy fathers day!

- Sister Collyer 콜리여 자매 (kol-lee-yeo ja-mae)

Me with the young women in my ward.

Not a super eventful week out in Jeon Ju, but there are some noteworthy things.

First, on Tuesday after district meeting we had a less active, Sister Kim, call us and ask us to come to the church. So we did and when we got there Sister Son found her collapsed on the floor of the chapel crying. He husband had a brain hemorrhage a few months ago and he has just been getting worse since and he needs another surgery and she doesn’t want him to have to go through it again. So we sat with her for a few hours and read the Book of Mormon and Sister Son played hymns and I sang them to her with my arm around her. At one point I had my arm around her and I said I loved her in Korean and she put her head on my shoulder. It was really touching. But that experience made me realize that the church really is a safe haven for the downtrodden. There is a certain spirit in the chapel that you can’t find anywhere else.

I got a hair cut! So we got smoothies.

We also had a lesson with Jani! Her Korean name is 문은숙  in case you were curious. And it went really well! She read five more chapters in the Book of Mormon! And she asked if Nephi was writing more on the brass plates or if he started a new record and so we explained that he was writing the Book of Mormon and she asked who the Lamb of God was. Then when she prayed she said that she was diligently studying the Book of Mormon and she prayed to better understand the hard vocabulary. It was adorable. She said she couldn’t come to church because she had to study (story of Korean high school students lives) but we are hoping when we teach keep the Sabbath day holy she will have a change of heart.

This is our members little boy who loves me. He's adorable.

We were able to just say hello of Sister Oh this week. She is starting a new funeral home business so she is really busy but it was supposed to open today so hopefully she will have a little more time. But her husband has come to church the past two weeks in a row so we have high hopes for them as well :)

I don’t remember if I told you but we tried to pick Amanda back up again but she is really just using us for our English so we had to drop her again. :( I hate dropping people...but it’s okay as Elder Christofferson told us "she’s just not ready yet."

We also had dinner at the relief society president’s house last night for her husband’s birthday with four other families in our ward. It was great. His birthday cake was a watermelon, proof that Koreans are healthier than Americans. But it was great. And when we taught, we taught about faith and it was a really cool experience to just have four or five families worth of people just listening to us. I loved it

 

Watermelon Birthday Cake

Anyways i hope everything is good at home! Happy late birthday mom! And happy birthday Amy and Eric! I love you all!

Elder Christofferson Came!

We used these face mask things that moisturize your face but they look creepy.

The big news from this week: Christofferson came! And it was so good :)

We were all gathered waiting in a chapel in Daejeon waiting for him singing hymns on Saturday morning. And let me tell you: there is a really strong power that comes from the room when there are over 150 missionaries of the Lord in it.

We are teaching the Bishop's twins before they get baptized. 
They are adorable.

Before he started talking to us he wanted to shake everyone’s hand. So one by one we went up to him and shook his hand. Now I can say I shook Elder Christofferson’s hand! I was so nervous that the only thing I could say when I shook his hand was hello in Korean. It just kinda came out. But that’s okay :) I got to shake his hand :)

His talk was fantastic! Right when he got up the first thing he said was he walked into the room and thought "What is the delightful aroma? Ah...Kimchi." So sorry mom and dad apparently I already smell like kimchi.

They are so Cute I can't handle it!

The first part of his talk he focused on how mission calls get assigned and he talked about how we were called to this mission for a reason. Mainly he focused on because we were supposed to meet Pres. Shin so we should look up to him and always watch his example. Then he opened it up for a question and answer session. The first question that was asked was about how to overcome trials. He talked about how one time his family suffered financially for years. And as much as he wanted the trial to end instantly, sometimes the answer is no. But he was grateful because "it made me come close to him and stay next to him day by day." I definitely felt that about when I got diagnosed with MS. At the time I hated it but now I wouldn’t give it up for anything because it brought me so much closer to my Father in Heaven.

We visited a less active and she had us help crack fruit so this is me cracking fruit.

The next question was about the boat accident that happened a month ago and why so many people have to suffer young death.  He talked about how sometimes the only comfort we can give people is to weep with them. I felt that was really strong because it’s true sometimes people just need us to cry with them. He also said a quote I really liked talking about missionaries "we bring hope to replace anguish, we bring peace to replace despair, we bring the sprit to comfort." missionaries truly are messengers from God.

Those are the parts that stood out the most to me about his talk.

Me and Sister Son at Mc Donalds.

Then he said he felt impressed to give us an apostolic blessing! How cool is that??? The spirit was so strong in the room. I was bawling like a baby. He blessed us with three things:

1. He blessed us to receive greater light and knowledge about the gospel

2. He blessed us with the power of the convincing of men

3. He blessed us with the gift to know that Heavenly Father accepts the sacrifices we make with our missionary work.

Us with sister Pappa

There is just such a power that comes from men who are called of God. It was a really good experience. He kept repeating the phrase "you are his." and it’s true. We owe everything to Christ and to God and as long as we do our best they will help us with the rest.

Also did you know that Richard GScott was Christofferson’s mission president? Christoffereon said "he’s still watching over me." It was hilarious.

Anyways as for other things that happened this week. Sister Oh canceled on us again. Apparently she is started a funeral home business so she’s busy but we are planning on going out and visiting her sometime this week to help her so hopefully that will be good.

And we met with Jani on Saturday, we talked more about the Book of Mormon because she had questions because she had read the first 5 chapters in 1st Nephi, and they were good questions too she asked why they had to go back and get the plates and why Laban had them in the first place. We challenged her to pray about the truthfulness of the book and whether or not God loves her and when she said the closing prayer she prayed for both of those things! We have high hopes for her. :) She truly is prepared to accept this gospel :)

Well that’s all for this week! I love you all! Have a fantastic week!