U-Turns

Dear Friends and Family,

At a casino buffet for lunch

Another week down here in Taipa. The weather has made a turn for the better and we didn't really have any storms of significance. We did have a day where the skies just couldn't decide if they wanted to rain or not. Consequently it rained for 2 minutes and stopped for just enough time to dry (10 minutes) and then it rained again. On our way to one appointment it rained and cleared 3 or 4 times! 

Over the last month or so Elder M and I have walked every inch on the roads in Taipa and so we decided to go out and explore the south-eastern part of the Taipa Island. From all we knew there was a hospital, prison, and beach in the vicinity. We were happily surprised to see that besides beach-side restaurants and pubs there were also a few places to knock. We taught a simple lesson to an 81 year old man, we contacted a tourist-y looking grandmother and were able to share our testimonies of family with her, and we knocked the door of a heart-diseased European with no interest, and homes where Vietnamese maids were home. Obviously we didn't go into those homes. It was pretty sunny that day and since we hadn't packed water we were about to turn around and look for a restaurant but as we were walking down the street a car pulled up right next to us. Kinda freaked me out honestly; I thought someone was going to yell at us. Instead, we were greeted by a friendly, "Hey missionaries!". Turns out we were contacting near the apartment of some members from the Macau 2nd Branch (2nd branch is for non-Chinese speakers). Really nice mom and her 3 daughters asked us where we were headed and invited us to dinner. We politely declined since we had an appointment at that same time. But before she left she told us all the codes to get into the fancy apartment buildings down there! We'll see if we ever get the courage to go knock on Westerner apartments.

In companionship right now we have 4 pretty solid investigators. 3 of them have baptismal dates, and the 4th one is praying about whether he needs to be baptized or not. He's got a lot of sincerity so I'm not too worried that he won't get an answer. John continues to make progress and says that he knows that the Book of Mormon is true and will continue to work towards being baptized in June. A-Fan is doing OK. We are trying to find a time that we can meet with her and introduce her to the sister missionaries. She still has her baptismal date for the middle of June but she struggles finding time for reading, praying and church since college finals are right around the corner for her. Tyler is another one of our solid investigators. We met with him twice this week and were blessed to have members at both lessons. He is making great progress, however, we also need to turn him over since his Mandarin is better than his Cantonese. We're looking to do that this week. The last investigator is Rex. We haven't seen him for a little over a week but that is because of work and he's also preparing for finals. He's also coming along well.

This week Elder M and I were blessed to have a number of lessons scheduled. We were able to get some members to come along which will go a long way for helping these investigators, and of course we did some finding:) The irony of the situation is that it took miracles for us to find the investigators we have, but they don't do much for our companionship since we keep having to turn them over to other missionaries. Since we have been able to get into the apartments, we have taught 2 lessons. One was a Mandarin who respectfully listened but then didn't have time to reschedule, and the other was a Filipino father that we've rescheduled for this next week and hope to be able to meet him and his wife. Great lessons but they will need to be turned over to the appropriate companionships. It's all the same work so I don't mind too much. 

This past Saturday marked 30 days for me in Macau and with my visa I had to leave the island. Saturday morning Elder M and I went into Hong Kong to renew my visa, get his HK ID and then pick up supplies at the mission home. Since American's can only stay in Macau a total of 60 days unless they have special permission, I will have to leave Macau in 20 days time and then again 10 days later, at which point I will have to leave for good. Since transfers are 64 days, I'm praying that as we continue on down the road I will be able to get a special "Black Stamp" that would allow me to stay until I finish my mission. So that's all on the horizon right now.

This past Sunday was a great day for us. We had 2 investigators in church and it was Branch Conference. President Hawks and the mission presidency came out and each of the three of them took a different hour of the 3-hour block. President Hawks started us off in Sacrament Meeting and really powerfully invited the members to grasp onto the idea of "Zion" being both a place and a people. With President Holland having been in Macau about 3 months ago and dedicating the land for missionary work he quoted some of those promises in regards to the growth and potential of Macau. There are 2 small branches right now but with the vision that an Apostle of the Lord has for this place, there will one day be stakes in Macau and a temple. It's all very exciting and being a missionary and sitting in the midst of the members and investigators it really impacted me. He finished his thoughts by encouraging investigators to hold on to the gospel and build their foundations. I think it was really good for those that were in attendance.

After church there was a baptismal service for Tomson C. He is a power-house. The whole ceremony went exactly as it should and afterwards he shared his testimony. He talked about learning the gospel once before but turning from it. Then recently having a strong desire to know the truth and so he called the missionaries up. Through meeting with the missionaries he found that his questions were resolved. However, much like Joseph Smith he wanted to investigate other churches and see if there was something more. He talked about the peace that he found in the Book of Mormon and that regardless of what his friends and family said about this church being a cult he had a witness from the Spirit that it was truth and that it was good. So prepared! I was so impressed by his comments and the insights that he has. Even before being baptized he was with the missionaries almost daily and would attend "less-active finding" activities with the missionaries where he would share his testimony and invite these members to come back. He'll be a powerful influence in Macau for good if he will continue to endure! And all this from a mere 16 year old boy!

It's been a great week and really highlighted by the events of this past weekend. We're looking forward to another week full of miracles! Best of luck to all of you in your missionary efforts!

Love,
Elder Siebach

BTW, today for P-Day we went to one of the buffets in the Sands Casino. Super good. Super stuffed, but the food I ate that was new and exotic was snails--yum!

Slamming Doors? Slamming Tim-Tams!

Dear Friends and Family,

First of all, Happy Mother's Day! Love you Mom! Things have been a whirlwind this past week. The days just seemed like they took care of themselves. I haven't really formulated any thoughts for this week's letter since yesterday I called home and shared an hour's worth of thoughts. It was so great to talk to the family!! Ya'll sound great. Good luck to Sterling in these last couple weeks of pre-mission preparations! 

One of the other real high-lights of the week was the rain! A blessing and a curse. I personally really enjoy rain. Pre-mission, I loved to work in it and to fall asleep to it. As a missionary I only like to fall asleep to it :) It's hard to keep a maintained look in monsoon rains. Thankfully we got haircuts last week so as our hair flattened to our foreheads it wasn't in our eyes or over our ears. Since this is my last transfer and I left about 1/2 my clothes in the mission home. I somehow forgot both my umbrella and raincoat in that suitcase. Hmm--not sure what I was thinking there! Elder M has been really good to me, loaning me his umbrella on a number of occasions while he uses a raincoat. He also has a waterproof bag, and so he often carries our copies of the Book of Mormon and weekly planners so that we don't ruin them. The rain was so torrential on some days that when we went outside there was no one for blocks and so we turned back around and went inside and made calls to potential and former investigators until the rain slowed down. Other days we went out anyway and made our way down covered alleyways and under trees to get some relief and attempt a contact. The Lord saw us working and blessed us, and if nothing else, we were able to talk to these people and bear testimony.

Sharing the gospel on the street:)

On Friday the rain was going as hard as I've ever seen it, and with so few covered places we decided to try our luck at "tracting" in apartment buildings. That was quite the experience. Despite that everyone told me, getting into apartments is easier in Macau than it is in Hong Kong! I was a little apprehensive and worried at how the apartment guards would treat us. We smiled at them, and walked through as if we had an appointment or something. They didn't stop us. That was the first tracting miracle. The 2nd was that from the 21st floor (the top) to the 3rd floor (where we stopped that evening) none of the residents complained about our presence and knocking. (Essentially if anyone calls the guards for anything they come up and escort missionaries out. It's typically an unpleasant experience with unfavorable consequences like being banned from housing estates, etc...) So we knocked at each door of those apartments, got a couple of numbers, had a few doors slammed on us, met some Filipina workers who had been previous investigators, and almost taught a man in his apartment doorway. Then on the 4th floor we knocked on the door of some Mainland Construction workers. He opened to us and beckoned us in. In my incredibly poor Mandarin I tried to explain who we were and what we did. He nodded in some sort of approval and then rummaged through his bags to pull out his passport. I'm not sure if he thought the 2 white foreigners were policemen or what. A minute or so later 3 or 4 of his apartment mates come through the door and miraculously one of them spoke some Cantonese. We sat him down and taught a 5-minute Restoration message. Because of the nature of Christian Missionaries and Mainlanders we were unable to get their Mainland cellphone numbers and had to call it at that. We're hoping to go back in a few days and see if we can't find him again.

Speaking of Mainlanders. On Tuesday night we were finding in the rain and came to a park which had a slightly protected area. We approached someone who we could tell was most likely from Mainland and sure enough he was. Although he couldn't speak a lick of Cantonese he spoke fluent English and was once an exchange student in Denmark. Really nice guy named Tyler who lives in Taipa to work in the construction business and build casinos (any Mainlander living in Taipa is employed doing the same thing). He had already done a ton of research on the LDS faith and wanted to schedule to meet with us. We got to teach him Friday evening and then he was at church with us just last night for the English services.

In the middle of the week we were really happy that we were able to meet with a guy named Rex whom we met last week. He is a 21 year old college student and has a lot of interest in the gospel as well as learning English. Really nice guy. We met at the church and he had already read the first couple pages of the Book of Mormon and was looking to learn more about Joseph Smith. We had planned on reading 1 Nephi 1 with him but switched gears and had a really great lesson reading portions on 2 Nephi 3 and talking about how Joseph of Egypt had seen and prophesied of Joseph Smith. He thought that was really cool and we've got him scheduled for church this week!

Wednesday morning we met with John. He's had some challenges in his family for the last month or so and it's been hard to really see him. We've felt pretty helpless ourselves. This past week though we were able to share the Plan of Salvation with him and it went really well. He said he feels that this knowledge will help him and that he feels that as he has been praying for help he has received answers on how to help his family! We just need to get him to pray and get answers about the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith too! 

Besides these investigators we are also teaching a girl named A-Fan. She's 21 and also a college student, so we are trying to turn her over to the sister missionaries (don't worry!) She's a very logical thinker but is interested and feels like God is leading her to learn more about Christianity. She came to us this morning with some concerns about whether or not we believe in the Bible, why people are punished for disobedience to God, and what our thoughts towards other Christians are.  We had a really good lesson and I was really grateful for her questions and insights. As we were teaching and answering these questions I had an example come to me that I thought was pretty related to her as well as to all of us. Here it is:

When someone applies for a position of any sort or entrance into a University, for instance, there are requirements. We have to be at a certain level before we are granted admission. If we aren't granted admission it is like a penalty of sorts. There isn't much of an outward struggle, but internally we might be a little bothered. Following the Gospel of Jesus Christ is like trying to get into college where the only admissions exam question is to write your name. It's that simple. Anyone can do it. But people choose not to. So God, in his infinite wisdom and justice doesn't just show them in. When we don't enlist in His army we can't have the full blessings that we would have otherwise received (there are a lot of scriptures along this line in D&C 88:32-33). Nothing earth-shattering, but a simple example that I've been mulling over ever since. Maybe it will help someone understand a little better. We have A-Fan rescheduled for this coming Friday where we hope to be able to read with her, turn her over to the Sister missionaries, and teach her more about the Plan of Salvation.

Good times in Macau!

Now for Friday--my birthday!!! It was good but relatively mundane for the first 16 hours. We knocked doors as I mentioned earlier, it rained, we made some potential calls, and then at 6:30 we went to a Thai restaurant for dinner. We got some Green Curry and Pad Thai. Super tasty! Then we went to the local Dairy Queen (yes they have those here in Macau but not Hong Kong) and got milkshakes. At 7:30 we taught Tyler for the 2nd time and that evening we came home made calls, planned, and at 10 pm the other elders in my apartment had pulled together some money and bought 3 dessert wafer things and then we TimTam slammed! It would take me too long to explain what that is, so I'll have to tell you later, but it was great. And that's how we ushered in my 21st birthday, Macau-Missionary style! Now our apartment has one Elder each who is 21, 20, 19, and 18.

Can you Tim-Tam Slam?

Things are well. We're working hard; probably will continue to find and teach and get people ready for baptism despite the stifling heat/humidity and rain/humidity (notice how no matter what the weather is doing, it is humid!) It's bad here. Some of our clothes, even though they get hung up, stay a little wet and in two days' time start growing a little bit of white mold.

Keep the faith! Work, pray, and seek for missionary moments!

Love,

Elder Siebach

P.S. Pictures to come eventually. Not this week though, sorry.

Working Hard, Seeing Results

Dear Mom, Happy Mother's Day!

It's hard to believe that another half a year has gone by! Just yesterday was Christmas, I swear. Things have been going well in Taipa. Elder M and I are getting along great, and besides the British English versus American English language barrier (haha!) we are completely united in the work. Which there seems to be plenty of that! We end each of our days with thanks to God for the miracles that we witness each day and then crash. It's been a long time since I've been as tired as I am now. I wouldn't want it any other way though. If anything I just want to work harder.

This past week we had a great opportunity to meet with President Hawks as he went around and conducted interviews with each of the missionaries in the mission. We each got about 10 minutes and it was more of a chat than anything else. We talked about the area, the branch, the apartment, and other such things. And as I talked about how it was I just had an overwhelming impression that this is exactly where I am supposed to be. I don't know for whom; whether that is an investigator, my companion, or just for myself. But I know that Taipa is absolutely the right area for me. I expressed a little bit of concern to President Hawks over the fact that I felt that we worked so hard but that we weren't seeing new people in Taipa and he just reassured me by saying, "Elder, I didn't think it would be easy." Which to me was a bit of a relief. If he thought this would have been easy I would have started to question every missionary tactic I've learned in the last 23 months. He said one other thing that really pushed me to want to do even better. And that was that he knows that I am obedient and that I will work hard until the end of my mission. I thought that was quite a compliment. There are 139 other missionaries who would die to be in the position I'm in right now, but, he and the Lord chose me. I don't want to let any of them down and slow down even one bit!

This week we started with lots of finding and were blessed to have a lot of lessons within the first 3/4 days. They didn't all transfer into new investigators though and so that kept us on our feet as we looked for people who would continue to meet with us. By Thursday/Friday we started to really see some things happen. Thursday we spent some time doing our weekly planning and spent a fair amount of time talking about how obedient we were and if we could be even more so. We came up with 2 or 3 things that we are going to work on to stay even more exactly obedient (i.e. not singing anything besides Church music, and not talking about anything that could even remotely construed as post-mission talk.) We also went to the Lord and asked him to bless us as we work to accomplish some of the goals that we have for our companionship this month and this transfer. Friday morning we had Zone Training Meeting and were reminded of the importance of boldly declaring our message when we first interact with potential investigators. With these things in mind we hit the streets and felt that even though we had fewer lessons, they were better lessons in the long-run. It also gave us an opportunity to try these same things on two investigators that we had scheduled, as well as on a potential whom we were able to reschedule and teach at the church.

With our new focuses we felt that we were even more productive and that it helped invite the Spirit in quicker and more powerfully. It was really exciting to be able to work with Elder M that way.

Saturday we had a street display and met a guy named L who wants to meet with us. He's looking for answers to some rather bizarre questions, but also has a spark of interest. Sunday we scheduled R and found out that he had investigated the church 3 years prior. For some reason he had dropped off, but now would like to learn some more and so we will be working with him too. J is still coming along and doing great.

For the time being we're doing well. Working hard, seeing results. We just wish that all the above mentioned people lived in Taipa and not in Macau :P  Ah well, the Lord will provide. Thanks everyone for the birthday messages! I'm looking forward to a good 21st year!

 

Love,

Elder Siebach

Finding, Finding, and More Finding

Dear Friends and Family,

Things are going. Not sure in which direction, but time is ticking and Elder M and I have been working hard. We probably did between 20 and 25 hours of street contacting this past week. Certainly not a mission record but a lot when I consider that for the last 1.5 years of my mission we've had people to teach. I find myself often reflecting on my first few months in the mission when my trainer and I also opened a companionship. I wish that I would have paid a little more attention to what he did and see if there were any things that I could magnify now.

Taipa is a wonderful place to serve. It's an interesting place to serve as well. Macau in and of itself is very separate from the rest of the mission; and considering it's a separate "Special Administrative Region" we can't keep contact through phones with any of the missionaries on that side of the mission. Then throw in that Elder M and I serve the Southern of 2 islands. We are completely isolated from even Macau missionaries who spend all their time on the Macau side. It's a little bit like an undercover mission for me.

We worked and we worked and we worked this week. We were blessed though. We taught 13 street lessons in 4 languages--kind of:) -- Cantonese, English, British English, and broken Mandarin/Cantonese. We contacted about 1000 I would guess (meaning we spoke with them for a minute or more), and got about 50 phone numbers. It could have been really monotonous to be doing so much finding all week but we've been making it fun by finding with a topic scripture in mind. During each companionship study we've looked over what we read during personal study and found one verse or passage that we plan on sharing in any contact we have that day. It's been working well and a good way for us to use the Book of Mormon and make sure that we stay on the same page since, as expected, Elder M doesn't understand everything that we talk about on the street.

Being tourists in Macau--Thanks to Elder M's mom:)

The other thing we did to break up the monotony was to try a few different finding methods. We knocked a few doors, we found in parks, on buses, on streets and side walks, we contacted a guy while he was waiting in a parking lot, and we try to squeeze taking pictures during the water breaks we have. We also did some University finding. We were forewarned by the Mandarin Elders that the 2 Universities in Taipa were a little bit harder for Cantonese contacting. They said that Macau University of Science and Technology is about 90% Mandarin speakers, and that the University of Macau is about 50%. So with those odds we spent 3 hours one day proselyting at UM. They proved to be prophetic. Of the people we contacted, a little over 50% of them were mandarin speakers. Just as we were about to end for that portion of the afternoon though we stopped one girl. She was really willing to talk with us and curious about our message. We shared the Restoration with her, gave her a BoM and rescheduled her for this week. She's Cantonese which is awesome! However, she lives on the Macau side and since she's 21 we'll have to turn her over to the sister missionaries.

That kind of was our week in a nut shell though. We were really blessed to find people to teach but they either live in Mainland and just come down here to work, they live on the Macau side, or they aren't native Cantonese speakers. We haven't struck gold yet... Certainly a learning experience.

During one of the lessons we had this week (it was in English since the guy was from Nepal) we had a girl come up to us and actually ask if she could have our number since she wants to learn more about Christ! We were pretty floored. We're pretty sure she lives in Taipa, but she'll still have to get turned over eventually is our thought. Great story though. I think that's the first time on my mission where someone has come up to me seeking to learn.

One opportunity that we had this week was to go and teach a less-active lesson. Our mission correlator, Brother H, is a fireball. He has so much enthusiasm and really gets missionary work. Every Tuesday evening he has the missionaries come together and tries to get as many members as willing to participate, and sends them off on splits to go teach lessons to members that he has scheduled for us! Because members were short this week, Elder M and I went with one of our Zone Leaders, Elder F, and visited twin 16 year old boys. We had a good conversation with them, but it's sad to see boys that are Grace's age not in the church. I think we did pretty well building a friendship with them and maybe we can help them come back!

This past week we thought we were going to get some member-present lessons, but unfortunately John left Macau this past week because he had some family things come up that he had to take care of. And the only other person that we had scheduled for this week confirmed the morning of the appointment and so we went to the church and she was a no-show. We had a member and everything with us. We eventually were able to get hold of her, (her name is Leslie believe it or not) but she said that her mother-in-law forbade her from coming to meet with us and said many other things that probably shouldn't be written out in a mass letter... sufficeth to say, we probably won't be able to see her for the time being.

We're still working hard. Hopefully I can come back with a nice tan face and pasty white neckline :)

That's all for now folks. Keep us and all other missionaries in your prayers! We need them! I love you all.

Love,

Elder Siebach

-I'll send some pics if the computer will be fast...

P.S.-- By the way I finally got the Easter package this week that you guys sent out! It's delicious! Thanks:)