Letter #61

Hello my friends!

 

This was a very interesting week. I am loving my new companion! His Chinese is so good and he is really helping me a lot! He is somebody that really understands the language! The grammar the characters, everything! We have been doing twenty minutes of grammar and reading the book of Mormon every night together! It is really helping me a lot! I am so grateful for his patience and willingness to help me out. It is so cool though because I am starting to understand why I have been saying things the way that I have been saying them. Does that make sense? I hope so.

As far as finding and teaching this week, it was a little rough. We had a lot of people stand us up because of the recent weather! We had a random snowstorm hit New York City, it was very unusual. And of course, it hit on a Saturday which is always our best day for teaching. We had many lessons planned out and none of them came. That is never a fun feeling! But we got to go walk around in the storm which is always fun! I am not being sarcastic, it is actually really fun! The winds in New York City this time of year are very strong and come at you from all angles. So because I am not the biggest guy, the wind is constantly causing me to change course. Last year, I was wearing this big rain jacket that buttons up in the front. I was walking with a foreword lean pressing my way through heavy winds. When all of the sudden, my jacket was unbuttoned from the force of the wind and my large rain jacket turned into a large parachute! I literally was pulled backwards! I was laughing so hard, I could not breath! Luckily this year I got a new jacket that does not have those kinds of buttons! It really makes things much more pleasant. So it was actually really fun!

We got two new sisters in our district this week and they are so cool! One of them is from Taiwan and the other is from main land China! It is really amazing to me how many missionaries we get here from main land China! Even though we don’t have missionaries over there right now, it is still spreading! It really is like a huge stone that will cover every corner of the earth. Daniel really knew what he was talking about when he said that. The stone is just so big that even if people set up large barriers and people with their hands held high ready to stop it from rolling, they fail. They are smashed and the stone keeps on rolling! The missionaries that come here from china are always such special people. I know that sounds kind of weird but think about it. It talks about in d&c how the lord will prepare his elect to receive his gospel. Now think about china, and how big it is! I don’t think that there are more than 200 native members of the church in the whole entire country! 200 is even pushing it a little bit. From what I have heard, there are like 3 or 4 small branches in the whole entire country! Those people have been chosen to accomplish great things! And you can definitely feel it when you are in their presence. You can even feel it with the ones in our branch! They all moved here from china, and found the church! And now they will go back to china and share it with their friends! It is really a beautiful thing!

I found something in the scriptures that I really liked this week! It answered one of my questions that I have had for a while! When I was in the MTC this guy got up and shared this whole lesson on how missionaries do not plant seeds or even water the seeds. He said that missionaries go on missions to baptize and that is it! Our purpose is not to do anything else other than baptize! At the time I remember feeling like that made sense until I got into the mission field. I realized how hard it is! And I realized how out of “our control” it is sometimes! I also met great members when I went to the English program that did not have one baptism on their mission. It does not make sense to say that missionary’s purpose is only to baptize and not plant seeds. I think about my mission and all of the people that I have talked to!  Have I baptized all of them? No but I have for sure planted seeds! Every time we help a struggling mother with a large stroller down the steep stairs of the subway, shovel somebody’s car out of the snow, or help someone clean up from the aftermath of a hurricane; it is planting seeds! Some of the seeds I have planted on my mission are my most precious memories. The scripture that supports this theory is in 1 Corinthians, I think it was chapter 4 but I am not sure. It is Paul talking, one of the greatest missionaries ever. He says that as missionaries, we do not decide when the harvest comes. That is all done in god’s time! We just plant the seeds and give them water, and then god will do the rest!

My Halloween was so interesting! Being in china town, we have no idea what is going on! To be honest, I did not even know that Halloween was coming up until the day of! China town did not have any pumpkins.. So, we carved bell peppers! I made a really cool one that I was very proud of! We decided that we are going to leave them up for the rest of the cycle! We also had a couple cute little kids running around going trick or treating to each restaurant in china town! I was happy to see some good celebrating going on!

Well guys, I love you! Hope you are having a great week! And I will talk to you next time!

Elder Barton!