I like to look for rainbows whenever there is rain.

Oh my sweet family.  It has been an incredible week.  Wow! :)  I wish you could be here and talk to these people.  It's amazing!!

I wrote a little list of things to tell you.  We'll start from worst to best.

First.  Missionaries in Thailand are now allowed to have a facebook.  I still have a little bit of a hate for facebook (I really don't like it...) but... it is a way that we can effectively contact recent converts after we leave an area.  We have very strict usage rules :) which is good!  We can only be friends with people in the areas that we have served in.  Maybe good will come out of facebook... :)

Second.  This week I taught my first piano class in Thai.  :)  Oh my goodness... it made me so happy... while lots of people expressed interest in coming to a piano class... a grand total of... 2. people actually came! :)  It was so fun.  A sweet sister and an investigator (who you'll hear about further down) named Brother Noy came.  It was really fun to teach them!  I love it so much.  The next day Brother Noy came to an appointment and told me he was even practicing the piano in his dreams.  It made me laugh a lot.

Third.  Wow.  Do you remember Brother Gop who I told you about last week?  He said that he wanted to help other people come to church and know about God's plan.  Well... he followed through with his desires!  It was so funny... he was kind of late to an appointment one day... and when he came we found out why!  He brought his girlfriend!  The poor thing... she didn't know where they were going... and then they showed up at a church.  Where she read in the Book of Mormon and said her first prayer.  She was so nervous.  But... oh my goodness!  I am so thrilled for her... the next day the two of them came to a baptism.  They met members and had a great experience.  She stayed even after Brother Gop left, and then she came back a few hours later and met with us again.  She learned all of the commandments, eagerly underlined them in her copy of the Book of Mormon, and confidently closed the lesson with a prayer.  What a change in literally less than 24 hours.  She asks us questions like "Can I pray all of the time?" Yes.  Yes you can.   I am so happy for these two incredible people.  They are such a joy to teach.

And finally... I want to tell you about Brother Noy's baptism.  Wow.  You guys... Brother Noy is so amazing.  He is a very funny man with quite the personality!  He's... probably in his 60s.  He was a soccer coach.  The first time he saw us... he was exercising at the park.  He wanted to stop and talk to us... but he couldn't... because he has to run his 20 laps.  No exceptions :) When he was down with his 20 laps we were already gone from the park.  But... probably close to the next day... I met him!  He agreed to meet with us at the church, and... oh man... he is just great.  I can't adequately describe him to you!  He's kind of a funny man.  But he is so willing to keep the commandments and as he said when he bore his testimony yesterday he feels like God has prepared him to come here.  I am sure that is the case.  When we taught him the commandments...we would say "Brother Noy will you live this commandment?" and he said something like "why do you even ask me that?  You already know I will!"

Anyway.  I am so proud of him!  And so happy for him.  Yesterday after his baptism... Sister Hughes was talking to him as I finished some postlude.  She asked him how he felt and he said that he felt like... the beauty of a rainbow after the rain.  I don't know where he got that comparison from... but needless to say it was perfect.  Then later as Sister Hughes and I were riding our bikes to go visit a member after a small rainstorm... we saw the most strange and incredible sky.  It was honestly like a rainbow painted across the sky.  What a wonderful day!

I love you all so much!  I am so grateful to be a missionary.  I don't even know... what I did to deserve to be here in Thailand.  :) But I love it so much.  There really are miracles.  God really does prepare the elect.  Repentance really does bring so much happiness.  Christ is our Savior!  

I hope you have a wonderful week this week!!! :)  I love each of you so much!

Love,

Sister Croft

P.S. Brother Noy is the thumbs up man in the middle.  There were two other people baptized.  So wonderful!

Hooray.  Oh my goodness.  I am so proud of my beautiful beautiful family :)  Thanks for listening to me jibber jabber for an entire hour!  I am so proud of everything you are doing.  You look beautiful and handsome :) annnnnnnd I LOVE YOU!

As for this week.  Our incredible incredible investigators.  Wow.  Teaching them is incredible.  This morning I was reading about gathering the elect... and bringing them back to the knowledge of their Redeemer.  And I feel that way about two (and all :)) of our investigators.  Oh man.  These two investigators especially though are a joy to teach.  I told you a little bit about them.  One of them prayed that he could have a chance to help other people come into the gospel.  In Gop's last lesson he was so stunned that God helped HIM to find the church out of anyone else.  Why did you come and talk to me?  Why do I get to learn this?  He said he feels like he's already a member of the church.  Like he's already a part of God's family and a part of our family!  Wow. He has so much faith!  And I am so happy to teach him!  

And then our other investigator that is such a joy to teach.  He is so sincere in the way he studies.  Last lesson he asked me about the tree of life... what does the iron rod mean?  The tree of life?  And as I explained it a little bit... he was like... finishing my sentences... excited to learn and willing to keep the commandments.

Oh man :) they are so awesome.  It was a miraculous week teaching these investigators!!

I wish I could explain it better.  :) I hope you have an incredible week this week!!  The gospel is TRUE! :)  

Loooove,

Sister Croft 

 The spider... in all of it's glory.  That's after it's curled up.

Elephant Hug

So... as you may have noticed... I didn't email at the regular time.  Today we went somewhere special for P-Day.  And so... I don't have very much time to write to you!  Sorrrrrrry.

As for the work here... this week we got some new training which was very clear and helpful.  I feel like I have a clear idea of what it is that I can do to help more people come unto Christ!  We've been trying to apply it... and it's been working!  We're getting more and more investigators.  Which is exciting!  We had several people at church, and I'm really excited to be teaching them!

The members are still SO wonderful here.  Sisaket is just such a loving branch!  

This email is unfortunately probably just going to be a lot of pictures from today.  We went to an elephant place.  Watched an elephant talent show.  An elephant hugged me.  I rode on an elephant.  I saw a little ruin :) and it was a really fun day!  Here is our district at the ruin!  You can tell... our district has a lot of personality!

I'm sorry this email is super awful... I'll talk to you more next week!  I love you all!  And I'm so grateful to be a missionary!  It's the BEST! :)  I love it, struggles and all!  I love it a lot when people ask me what I'm doing here... who sent me... how much I'm getting paid.  And then I get to tell them I'm here because I know it's true!  And I do!  I know it's true and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else! 

I hope that you have a wonderful week!!

Much love,

Sister Croft