Week 75: Trust in the Lord and good things will come

Hey everyone!!! I have hit my 75th week on my mission it's so crazy! I can't believe it's going so fast! This week was transfer week and I will be staying with my companion, Elder Despain. Not too much changed which I'm happy about because the other Elders in my house are all way chill. 

On p day last week we got to ride elephants!!! Last time I rode elephants was last year on my first transfer so yeah it's been a while. This time the elephants went in the water and started spraying water everywhere. How sick is that!!

This week I switched off with the Assistants to the President. We left for Bangkok on Wednesday night and switched off on Thursday. I switched off with Elder Butnon, who is Thai. He is so so good and we taught a lot of cool people. We taught this one person who was an investigator about a year and a half ago, but then was dropped due to a lack of interest. However, she showed up at church 3 weeks ago and the Assistants began teaching her again. Her name is Sister See (ศิ) and she is about 45 years old. We taught her the restoration and bore powerful witness about revelation and authority from God in these latter days. She wanted to know if we had that authority from God. We told her we did so she immediately asked if we could give a blessing to her daughter because she has been pretty sick lately, and so we set up an appointment for Saturday. She said that I had to be the one that gave the blessing, but we told her I'm actually from a different area. She then told us that she would wait for me to come back to Asoke so I could give the blessing. 

Elder Butnon and I could both feel the spirit as we were teaching the lesson, and its obvious that she felt it too. I love having the Spirit with me at all time; it is such a blessing! 

Our zone did so great this transfer and we saw a ton of miracles. I got the opportunity to do a lot of baptismal interviews this week and the people I interviewed were so fire! They are so prepared to be baptized. I actually got to teach one of them about a month ago on a switch off and they have changed so much. I am amazed how much the gospel changes people and how it blesses people's lives in tremendous ways!

I love working with the members and that has been a huge focus in my mission lately. We have worked with our ward mission leader, brother ปอ (paw), who is so fire. He loves serving the Lord and is always excited to go visit his brothers and sisters who have walked off the path just a little. Brother paw walks a path of discipleship and is an example to me of what true charity means. He sacrifices so much of his time to the Lord to work with us. On Monday, we bought a ton of Sarapao (a Thai snack - meat or cream wrapped in dough) that everyone loves. We took all of the Sarapaos around to a bunch of members and we got to see their faces light up. It's almost Christmas time and we want to light the world and serve everyone we can! I just love the people and the members here. They are honestly the best. 

I love you all so much. Oh yeah! We had the opportunity to visit a member pretty far away this week and they are having some hardships in their life. I got to share from Proverbs 3:5-6 that we just need to trust in the Lord with all our hearts and he will direct our paths. She started crying and realized that she just needs to have more faith and remember all that the Lord has given her already. I love the pure and understanding heart of these people. They are incredible examples to me of what a Christian or true disciple of Christ really is. 

Alright have a good week everybody! You are in my prayers.

Love, 

Elder Lowe

เอ็ลเดอร์โลว์

Week 11: ทำงานหนักให้มีความสำเร็จ

This week has been such a grind! We go out every single day and just talk and teach people! Literally, all day every day just working and working! Also, I didn't realize how much it rains here in Thailand until this week. It honestly rains about 5 times everyday and every time it rains I just get soaked! All of my shirts are so dirty and muddy - I love it. 

On Tuesday I got the opportunity to give part of a blessing in Thai, or the anointing of the oil, which was super cool. Also, we  teach English to the Thai people every Tuesday night and we taught them about weather. It's funny to see other people struggle just like me at learning the language, haha!

The next day we taught so many people and prepared sister หล้า for baptism by asking her the baptismal interview questions. She passed! 

Well, later that night, I had to go all the way back to Bangkok on another 12 hour bus ride; we arrived in Bangkok around 6 in the morning. It was all good because I got to see all my buds from the MTC. Love you all!! I came pretty much 12 hours just to sign a piece of paper and then go straight back. But it was worth it because I was able to talk with this Thai person on a train in Bangkok. He was Buddhist and I asked him what he knew about God. He didn't know very much so I taught him about what I believe and I taught him the restoration of the gospel. He loved it and I ended up giving him a Book of Mormon and getting his phone number and Facebook. It was sweet. 

I took a flight for the way back to Chiang Rai. In the airport I got to eat McDonald's, which was expensive, but totally worth it because I haven't had any American food in like a week and a half. Everything in Thailand is like soooo cheap it's insane. Once we got back we immediately went out and gave some lessons and committed two more of our investigators to baptism! The work here is awesome!. The key is just making sure people are reading the Book of Mormon everyday. 

Friday just poured all day and we went inviting and knocking doors. Super hard day with everyone rejecting us and not being able to understand what people are saying. It is super tough to understand some people because they don't speak very clear! In the end the key is to have more faith, to not worry, stay focused, try my best, have a good attitude, have fun, and rely on the Lord!

The good stuff:

Saturday was sweet! The day was all centered around sister หล้า because it was her baptism day. She is about a 50 year old woman who was born into Christianity and then married a Muslim. And now is coming back to Christianity. I was asked to be the one who baptize her which was super cool cause it was my first baptism. Her name was like 10 syllables long so that was hard to remember Haha. We taught her like everyday and I became pretty close with her. It's awesome the amount of lives we can change here by helping others draw nearer to God. 

Church was much better this week and I understood a lot more. Not gonna lie, it's been a tough week not being able to speak that much or understand, but I know I just have to be patient cause I've only been here a week! Good thing I got today to relax and ride elephants...that's right I'm gonna go ride elephants today!!! Its gonna be so fun! I'll let you all know how it is next week!

Love you all and miss you!!

ประเทศไทยสนุกมากๆครับ ด้วยอาหารอยู่ที่นี่อร่อยเลย. ผมชอบเชียงรายและประสบการฌ์นี้สุดยอดเลย. ผมคิดถึงทุกฯคน! โชคดีนะครับ

Love

Elder Lowe 

Also this week I got to eat some bees lol. They were not good!!! Too mushy

5) me eating some bees  

4) mural of the soccer team that got stuck in the cave here in Chiang Rai  

3) sister หล้า baptism   

2) flooding from all the rain  

1) flying back to Chiang Rai from Bangkok   

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Three days in Chiang Mai, Thailand

We arrived in Chaing Mai mid day and took a taxi to the hotel, Makkachiva.  It was a museum that had been converted into a hotel (or something like that).  It had beautiful and magnificent pieces of art on the walls.

Mark with Linda, his sister - she lives in Chaing Mai

We found the church

Tuk Tuk

Ancient Temple

Monks at the west gate

Linda met as at the hotel after we got settled in and took us on a tour of the city before we secured fantastic seats at the Thai dancing dinner theater.

We were sat at Table 1 - the very best seats at the theater!

Dinner was delicious

After the show, we went back to the hotel, but we wanted to find the "night market" so Mark and I walked around the market.  HE found all sorts of items from his mission that he still remembered.  He loves THAILAND!!!

The next morning we enjoyed breakfast before heading out to go ride the Elephants!!!

In the jungle

All the beautiful elephant

With the baby elephant

Where's the food???

getting a ride from the elephants

Bamboo ride down the river

After our adventure at the elephant park, we went to a tiger park.

11/17/17 Betsy  was BRAVE or CRAZY, or both.  We walked into an enclosure with two live tigers and decided to pet them both.  Look at the size of them!!!

It was the most exhilarating and scariest thing Betsy's ever done!!!

That night we had a delicious dinner out with Linda. Most of the restaurants have open areas because the weather is so nice in Thailand.

Next morning in hotel

The next day we went up to Wat Phra That Doi Suthep, then toured more temples before having dinner with Linda and touring the HUGE night market.

 Linda took us to the grocery store - I found that I could survive nicely in Thailand.

From there we toured another Wat.  This one was both ancient and modern

We met up with Linda for dinner, the night market and foot and leg massages.  Mark didn't like his because the guy pressed too hard.