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Week 72 - Season Greetings with a Miracle, and Making Boy Friends Jealous

Happy Thanksgiving!! It sounds like plans for Thanksgiving are set and they sound like a blast! We would like to celebrate a "full" Thanksgiving as missionaries here but to have the Turkey alone is equivalent to $800 UD. Turkey is very rare here, so it won't be a "full" Thanksgiving. We might settle for the regular chicken. :) I'm so grateful for the Gospel and the answers that can be learned from it. For example, if you want to become rich, read the book of Alma and it talks about people getting rich because of their care for the needy and their thoughts weren't on riches. Bam, the key to becoming rich. It is amazing to see how the Gospel can heal the temporal things of life and not a lot of people see that or understand that!

This past week has just been wonderful. I will focus on a miracle that happened on Friday that I will never forget. We had our whole day planned out when suddenly early in the morning a member called and wanted to eat dinner with us before having English class. What missionary is going to turn down dinner? We called our appointment that lived about 2 hours away and asked if we could move the appointment to earlier in the day and he said yes. We made it to the appointment and taught him. He really needs the Gospel in his life as he has kind of hit a road block in life and feels the challenges piling up. Well, after the lesson, we sprinted onto the bus that was about to take off because we didn't want to get stuck at the bus stop waiting for 30 minutes +. There was a man sitting next to my companion and right away asked what the Book of Mormon was (we carry them in our hands for people to see). I saw that and felt inspired to talk to the guy on my left. Turns out he has just arrived to Jakarta and is from Bali. He is going to work on an Australian Cruise line. We were in the middle of a great conversation when all of a sudden on my right I hear, "I didn't know the Mormon church was in Indonesia." Startled by the clear English accent I turned and said, "as a matter of fact, it is throughout the whole world, where you from?" It so happened to be that he is from Chicago. He is here because he got married in a Catholic church here and is actually getting a divorce which is sad. This man, went on to explain how for a few years now has been questioning his beliefs with his brother. One of his friends in Chicago who was a member recommended that he meet with the missionaries. He had no time because he was coming to Indonesia for a little while and kind of put it off. He then mentioned he didn't know what happened but of all places is sitting next to a missionary from the church, on a bus in Indonesia! That is what we call The Lord WORKING MIRACLES!! He had only been here for a day and a half since that moment. His plan is to be here for a little while so he didn't have a phone but hopefully will soon. He gave his email and that is the Lord's hand moving our day around so that we could be on that bus!

Besides him as an American, I have met other Americans and a German this past week. Elder Panjaitan and I are seriously opening our mouths with everybody...including the westerners! We are seeing more and more people interested as we talk to more. I used to get disappointed when asking if they are interested and them rejecting. Now, it is just a testimony that it isn't time but that the seed is planted and later they will have their time. Missionary work is AWESOME!!

On Monday, we got a bunch of missionaries together and went paint-balling! It was legit! It was pouring rain and had to wait the storm out because at one point the bolts of lightning were not even separated from the crashes of Thunder....that was a heart racer. We were patient and had a great muddy battle!! On Tuesday, we went on splits with the Zone leaders here in Jakarta and had a great day of finding. I actually met an Islamic missionary who was very interested in our church and asked for the Book of Mormon. Another miracle!! On Thursday, we had an appointment with a referral from the church website. We met with him and his friend. Turns out he is a Pastor for the Baptist church. He was very open in talking and actually the one and only Pastor I have met that did not want to debate with us. It was a great lesson and he wants to actually learn more, he was impressed with what we had to say and how we delivered our message.

As a mission we got new Sister missionaries. Two of them are actually from Indonesia serving in California and Australia but they are waiting visas so they started to serve here in Indonesia. Here is a funny story for the week. We were sitting on the bus talking when I get a poke in the leg. I look over and this girl shows me her phone, I was confused. She had written out a message on the messenger thing in English that said, "Sir, can I take a pic with you later? I want to make my boyfriend jealous." I'm not gonna lie I lost it laughing. Out of all the things that could of happened, that is one. The picture didn't happen and I'm glad because that wouldn't be very Christ like. It was pretty dang funny!

We are having great success with less-actives coming to church for the past two weeks. We are working on just building their testimony! This week happens to be stake conference so that should be exciting! I haven't been to a stake conference since exactly one year ago.

Thanksgiving sounds like it will be fun with Mark and Nicole and everyone. I take it they are there for work or what brought them to move to the East? Sounds like all is well. The Lord works miracles!!

 Posted by Chet Hayes at 11:00 PM