How Are Your Prayers

This week I learned so much! So first off I learned a lot about prayer.  I’ll share some of my insights . . .

1) Have your prayers become natural and instinctive?

If so, then you understand you are a beloved daughter or son of God

2) Do you have any so called "difficulties" with prayer?

If so then perhpas you have forgotten your relationship with your Father in Heaven

3) Are you praying with ALL your energy of heart?   i.e.  when you're tired, in  a rush, don’t want to pray, eating your food, in the mornings when you wake up, etc..

If you’re not praying with all your heart, figure out what your so called "difficulties" are, put them aside and turn to your Father in Heaven.  Realize the relationship you have with Him and he will help you put aside your difficulties so you can pray to Him with all the energy of heart. He has bucket loads of blessing to pour out upon you.  You just have to be ready and will to receive them!

4) Do your prayers ever spring from the selfishness of your heart?

 We can learn a lot about prayer in the Bible dictionary so check it out!  That's my short message for you today (:

This week our investigators were killing it! We set a goal with Tracy to get her to the temple by her birthday on  June 11^th, so we changed her baptismal date to May 11^th! She is the funniest thing in the world!  She and I bond over makeup, Justin Beiber and pretty boysJ hahaha!

Leo is getting baptized this Sunday! He passed all his interviews! He’s doing great!

Well I love you all. I have officially run out of time. I have a lot more to say.. mouh baahn faaht.

Work on your prayers this week and read Prayer in Bible Dictionary!

Love,  Sister Webb

We spent P-day with two of our investigators . . . Tracy & Leo

Dinner with Lau and Leo

This pic and the one below are our efforts to find creative places to study and be more visible!!

We woke up this morning to see the sunrise and explore the 1000 Buddah's.  We also spent time at a beautiful park on our morning jog!!

Feeling Overwhelmed Can Be A Good Sign

This week I was so overwhelmed.  In Cantonese we have a phrase . . . we say "I'm feeling buhngaausih."  This week I totally buhn gaau sih'ed my life away. Let me tell you my story.

We had an incredible district/zone meeting. Sister Chan & I are the only Sisters in our zone of about 14 Elders, so we pretty much anything we say goes. (: In our meeting I was asked to teach.  I had been thinking about pride and how we often forget that we are simply instruments for the Lord.  I thought about how everything is given to us from the Lord.  We need to be careful not to think WE are doing the work as missionaries.  What instrument has ever taken credit for the beautiful music or art it produces?  NONE.  The artist takes credit and our true artist is the Lord.  I then shared my thoughts about how the Lord needs competent and fine tuned instruments, so we are needed in this work, but we need to work together in unity and remember who the true artist is.  I know Heavenly Father loves us and needs us.  If we listen to the Spirit, He will guide us individually.  Sometimes I feel that He is more willing to help us than we are willing to be helped!

As missionaries we REALLY want His help, but sometimes we ignore or make excuses to not listen to Him.  As a zone, we all decided to humble ourselves and then we talked about our goals.  We decided to be out working hard and looking for people to talk to from 9am-9pm each day. We also committed to only say prayers of gratitude and we set a goal to get a certain number of investigators.  Ready for the results . . .

Tuesday - we went to find a LA's (less active’s) apartment and when we finally got to the building, we pressed the button for the 10th floor.  Some people got off at the 5th then the 9th. When the 9th floor door closed, the elevator went back down to ground floor!  We pushed it 5 times and it finally went back up, got to the 9th floor and shut down. We were so confused, so we hesitantly pushed it and went to the 10th floor.  The second we walked out, something was not right. We said a prayer, opened the Book of Mormon and came across a scripture that said, "In dangerous circumstances" We knew we needed to leave ASAP!  We left some banana bread the door and a note and took off.   On the way out we ran into a girl named Andrea who recognized us from McDonalds. We told her about the love God has for her and invited her to learn more.  She said yes and we got her number. Then after that we needed to get back to our apartment quickly.  We got walking and saw a bus stop that had a bus that goes straight to our apartment. We flagged down the bus driver, but he 100% ignored us and drove right passed us!! RUDE!   There was a reason though . . .Sister Chan turned around and started walking and said, "Maybe there's someone God wants us to meet!"  Off we went, still a 30 min walk from home. Pretty soon we saw a boy and his shirt said Wesley.  I started saying his name and making weird pronunciations out of it until he turned around with a cute little smile on his face. This kid is the definition of prepared. We walked home with him and shared the restoration, said a prayer with him, and invited him to meet with us the next day and pray that night.

Wednesday- Met Kitty!  We had been out all afternoon, and we were finally walking back to the house. We stopped to buy some chocolate milk because it sounded good, and on the way out we saw Kitty and ran right over to her. She gave us her number and said she was willing to meet to learn more. Then a lady on the bus that afternoon leaned over and asked if we could exchange numbers. What!? Never happens.

Thursday - taught a LOT of lessons, and had dinner with an amazing family.  We also met Paul on the bus.  He told us he is having troubles getting over feelings of revenge that he has towards his father, and he knows that it was not a coincidence that we met and asked for his number.  Then he told us he knows we can help him and he wants our help. We also met Bob in KFC and taught him the restoration, and he wanted to learn more!!  You'll see a picture of him below.  He SERIOUSLY looks just the KFC Colonel!

Friday- Ella.  We met Ella. She is 19 and also was ready to hear the gospel.  We found Ella and her friend, Rita, on the street just standing on some stairs. The Spirit prompted us to talk with them. We first talked about how acquainted they are with the Spirit. Ella and Rita both have felt it and they described it as a feeling of peace that will sometimes lead them to tears for no reason. So we took advantage of the peaceful feeling right then and there and shared the restoration with them. They were astounded. They wanted to meet again and scheduled us for the next day.   They promised to pray that night.  Then that night we got 4 different referrals! FOUR!! God PROVIDES!!!

Saturday and Sunday... my buh gaau sih or overwhelment . . . EVERTHING FELL THROUGH!  Wesley, Kitty, Rita, Reno, Ku, Kenneth, Paul, Bob . . . GONE! They all cancelled.  Some blocked our numbers and we were left empty handed. Everything we had in our hands was taken in one day! God gave gave gave gave and then in one second, the people exercised agency and boom! GONE! I didn’t understand! I think it was the first time in my life I knelt in prayer and cried to God with pain and doubt and complete confusion! Why why why why!!!??? I didn’t get it! I felt so overwhelmed that all the potential just slipped right out of our hands!! For a split second I blamed God. My comp had the idea to open up to the conference talk "Walk With Me" from May 2017. This talk will explain the weight I felt on my shoulders and the answer to my prayer, so read that when you finish reading my email. It’s by Elder Eyring.  It goes hand in hand with my email today. Everything has a purpose. Everything has a place and time, and I think God tested me to the brink.  It was really overwhelming . . .  

I love being a missionary, as hard as it is sometimes. But God has a purpose for everything under the heavens, so stay strong.  Trust in God’s will.  He loves us and is more willing to bless us than we are to receive his blessings!! Let heaven open up and pour blessings upon you, and when they close, keep saying prayers of gratitude for what you have! Love you all!!

Love, Sister Webb

My MTC group!!

Love my comp!

Dinner with the Bishop

Teaching the youth to dance

Beautiful HK

Time for a haircut . . . 

Pretty good eh?

Our friend, Stanley 

Subject to Change

If you come on a mission and do not expect to change, you will go and return in vain.  This is my own adaptation of a line in the white handbook.  A mission is meant to change you and if we don’t let it change us, then we literally have gone and will return in vain. We had a really powerful mission leadership conference this last week and the main focus was on repentance.  Then TODAY we have a conference with Elder Stevenson from the Quorum of the Twelve!  It is also going to be focusing on REPENTANCE! *hint taken...

So as I've been saying this transfer has been really hard so far. But my companion has been really supportive and very patient and loving with all my many faults. Love ya Sister Chan!

So our investigator, Tracy, told us this week that she has been thinking about baptism  As we were walking home one night she said, “Guys, I want to go on a mission.." Me and Sister Chan just froze in our steps!  We hadn’t brought up baptism all night because we didn’t want to stress her out about it, but then I put my arm around her and said, “That’s amazing Tracy.. but first, you need to be baptized. She takes a deep breath in and says, "Fine. I'll pick a date this week." So now Tracy is in Thailand on a school trip building houses and teaching English, but we met one of her good friends going with her and told him to remind her to pray every night! He laughed and promised he'd do his best (friend is not a member #refferalwaitingtobebaptized)

Then we have Leo. Leo totally stood us up this week.  In Chinese it’s called "fong" when this happens.  This didn’t stop us though! We hunted down his location and we found him! He was actually at a restaurant with a man in our ward! I love members who take the first step to fellowship our investigators!  We met with him and encouraged him to really start thinking more about his baptismal date for April 1st and really try to prepare himself.  Then we had calls with President Lam.   It turns out the YSA in HK rented out a clubhouse over on the island Cheung Jau.  They are going there to play from March 30 to April 1st, and Leo's baptismal date is April 1st. President tells us in this call that if Leo is ready, “organize it with the YSA  council and get him baptized in the ocean!"  We pulled Leo aside after church and told him the exciting news! (He's 19 by the way).  He freaked out and said, "I’m not ready, no! No way! I’m soooo not ready!!" We calmed him down and promised him with the help of the ward and with our help, the Holy Ghost and Jesus Christ, he can be ready! He puffed out his chest and said, “Okay, ya, let’s do this!!" haha (: Keep him in your prayers!!

So anyway, as I’m seeing these people progress and repent it is changing my life. I found the most amazing scripture this week.  It’s1 Corinthians 9:19:  "For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more" This is a mission and repentance in a nutshell. As President Hinckley’s dad told him on his mission, "Loose yourself and get to work!" This requires you to "Come unto Christ" and to "be perfected in Christ".  These were just phrases to me until I came on a mission and really started to learn the nature of Christ. When President Monson came out with the 2013 initiative to "Come unto Christ", he had the hope of changing all the lives of the youth in the Church.  I remember being 13 and didn’t really understand what this meant.  As I have been studying these words, "Come unto Christ", they have had a much more profound influence on me.  I’ve learned that this can mean "come unto faith, come unto repentance, come into, love, kindness, charity, patience, diligence."

Anyway, I love you all! Really try to repent and change your nature this week.  The Sacrament is the only ordinance of salvation that you take over and over for yourself, so cherish those 10 minutes you have to come unto Christ, and commit to change and be better this week than you were the week before!

Love you all!

Love, Sister Webb

Cheese cake factory with the Sisters!

Cheng out with Tracy and Gam Family

I exploded the washer!

Sister Chan & I

Misison Leader Council

Getting ready for dance class . . . 

Dinner at Bishop's Home

Teaching the youth how to dance

kap hei fu hei.. kap hei fu hei..

This week was a bit more smooth transitioning into the new area. It's a lot harder than I thought it would be.  Whatever the reason I have had a hard time being excited for the next day haha. Happens sometimes.. (:

This week has been quite interesting though. My companion is a dance major and started a dance class as part of a missionary outreach effort.  For those of you who know me, I really don’t dance very well . . . occasional spastic movements and usually nothing very coordinated!  While she has been preparing for this class, I’ve been able to study conference talks!

When I read these talks I feel like the world just stops for a minute.. that is my breath in breath out moment of every day  (kap hei fu hei.. kap hei fu hei... is how we say it in Cantonese). I have literally fallen in love with General Conference talks! I remember when I was in high school my mom loved to listen to general conference talks almost daily!  I was more the Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift, One Direction kinda girl.  I remember she always had these talks going and I would get so annoyed that she wouldn’t just turn on some music or something!  You know that song from Tangled, "Mother Knows Best"?  In Cantonese we say it like this:  TIU KAP JANSAHT GE WOH!!! SO TRUE!! My mom always had it right!  She always had her heart in the right place. wise wise wise. Haha!  As I was reading General Confine talks this week, I felt like I was turning into her! haha (: love ya mom (:

So we taught a really good lesson this week to one of our investigators, Tracy. I am amazed at the desire this girl has to change. She is only 17 and she knows that she needs to change. I think the fact that this gospel is actually true hasn’t quite seeped into every part of her yet, but she is sensing the goodness of it.  That’s a step in the right direction, so now we just have to narrow the gate a little for her.

Hope you all have a great week!  Remember to listen to the amazing talks from General Conference, think specifically how they apply to you, and then act on what you hear!!

Love you all!

Love, Sister Webb

Yummy lunch date with our investigator, Tracy!

Loved meeting with Tracy . . . 

Sis. Chan is quite the baker!

Here we are with the Kowloon City Elders

Dance Class

Another investigator, Leo

I dropped the remote to our A/C out the window accidentally, and somehow IT SURVIVED!!  MIRACLES!