Called to Know the Richness of His Blessings

So... this week has been a pretty good one.  There have again been moments where I've felt like... overwhelmed with the blessings we receive as missionaries.  And I'm amazed that we're even allowed to be called to know the richness of His blessings!  Wow oh wow!  :) There have also been some harder moments... for example.  One of our investigators, his name is caycay (sorry... I forget what I say in previous emails... so if you get repeats.  ooops!) he is 17 years old... and his family has a couple of different beliefs (A buddhist parent and an Islamic parent), he is pretty quiet so it's hard to get a read on what he knows, what he needs, and all of that!  Buuuut.  On Friday we taught him, and it was another kind of iffy lesson, where we left wondering if he'd learned, if he'd felt the spirit, and sometimes... I feel frustrated because I felt good planning the lesson, but then it didn' turn out to be what it seemed like he needed.  I dunno!  It's a process I think, I'm learning how to trust in the Lord, how to listen to revelation, how to be patient!  We taught him again yesterday morning, and it was the first time I felt like he was more engaged, and he wanted to learn more!  Hooray!  I hope the spirit has been present in all of our lessons, but hopefully it was in this one too!  Sister Ference and I sat down and really really tried to think out this lesson.  We ended up teaching him the plan of salvation, we made him draw himself on the board... and we explained how Heavenly Father sent us here... and we explained what He wants for us!  I love the Plan of Salvation!  It's the BEST! :)  It really really is!  I wish I could feel like... a firey testimony for that always burning in my heart!  It is there... but I just love it when I see it more clearly and it just burns there!  I love it!  Our other investigator Phii Saamaad, is doing pretty well too :)  Haha... he is... so nice.  Sometimes he seems like he already knows the gospel ;) and he's teaching it to himself!  But he is a wonderful investigator! 

Oh!  This week was the 4th of July too :) we had a devotional where we listened to a speaker, and then watched 17 miracles.  And then we watched the fireworks!  Haha... and then we were all tired the next day because they went past 10:30.  :)

I'm not sure what else has happened this week that's notable.  Soooo.  I just decided to share a couple of... maybe more trivial things.  That are kind of fun!

So.  Things I am learning about Thailand from our teachers.  They have weird weird animals there.  Snakes, you can find them in your house sometimes (I'm fairly sure I remember reading the promise in D&C 84 and being like... okay... snakes won't poison missionaries.  Hooray.  Who would ever need that?  Little did I know...), and monkeys, obviously elephants, and other fun things like that!  They have spiders that are much bigger than tennis balls.  And this is the funniest one... they have these large lizards called "Dook yahhs" that say "dook yah" it sounds like... an animal in like... a pokemon game or something.  But they are like... BIG BIG lizards.  Like... unless my imagination is getting away from me, I'm pretty sure they said they were like 2 feet long sometimes.  And they seem scary to me :)  but apparently they're just annoying.  Because they say that all night long!

We're learning to read script some more.  Sometimes it takes me like an hour to decipher a quote... and then I'm not even sure what it says.  But we sing hymns now in script.  Which means... we all kinda... sing a generic vowel to the tune of the hymn... and sometimes we can pick out the beginning consonant... or if it's a familiar sylabble like "phra" is something you add to things to make it holy... then we know that.  So it's like... Phra... eeee oooo ja eaaeae deee? eiiiii maaaa. Beautiful.

Oh.  Also.  We learned how to tell time in thai.  Oh my goodness :) it's so confusing.  There is a different word for like... midnight, early morning, late morning, noon, early afternoon, late afternoon, early evening (or something!) and then you say the words in a different order for each of those times.  So like... in the morning you say.  morning (hour) in the late morning you say like (hour) the word for hour, and then late morning.  And THEN.  In the late evening... you start subtracting the time... It's CRAZY.  :D  Hooray for Thailand! :)  I do love it though!

And one more funny thing.  In a lesson with caycay... I wanted to say "Christ can heal our hearts" and I accidentally said... Christ can weakness our hearts.  Haha... That time it was because I just plain used the wrong word.  They aren't even similar.  Weakness is kaan ccn (backwards c's that make an aww noise) 33 (backwards 3s make an ayhhh noise) and heal is song yiawyaa.  Silly silly Sister Croft.  Haha... but...I can't imagine how many funny things we say because we use the wrong tones... probably a million.  And I'm sure that is just the beginning.  But luckily Heavenly Father can work through the imperfect, and the spirit can testify and teach even when we make mistakes, or when we have a lot to work on!  Which I do :)  this end of the week was like... enlightening as to how much I do not do correctly.  Hoo boy.  My planning, my language study, my everything could use work!  And also my selflessness could use work.  I've always been fairly self-centered.  But it is such a stumbling block here!  I'm trying to so hard to move that block out of the way!!! :)  So hard.  After the weekend... I realized I probably didn't think about my phuusccncay (investigators) at all during the weekend.  I was still spiritually fed.  But it was all for me.  That was like... a sickening realization.  Oh boy do I have so far to go!!!  But hopefully I'll get better!!!

:)

The church is SO true.  It's true.  So it's worth it... and I'm so lucky to be here!  I love you guys a lot a lot a lot! :) Go to the temple all the time.  I wish I could!  :)  Read your scriptures... luckily I do get to do that!  And Heavenly Father is SO ready to teach us I'm learning... I just have to really search! 

Rag mag mag mag mag mag,

Sister Croft