Week 48: Brother มีน (min) got baptized!!

Another GREAT week in Thailand.

This week has truly been one for the books.  About 2 months ago I was told that I would be training and opening up a new area, meaning that my companion and I had nobody that we were teaching. And now, this week, we got to see our good friend, brother Min, be baptized and change his life around. He bore such a strong testimony after he was baptized. He talked about how he used to be a bad kid, he smoked, broke so many laws, and way more. However, he woke up one day and wanted a change in his life so he came to the church! I'm so glad that we met Brother Min and helped him to "be born again." 

Robert, ?, Min, and Elder Gantt and Min's baptism

Those that came to support Min

Robert, Min and Elder Gantt

We have more and more people on baptismal dates every week, however some of the people we had been teaching were just not progressing. We have been teaching this family, Nuna and Tad (หนูนา and ทัต), but lately they have not had any time to meet with us. We were able to meet with them this week and we learned that they had so many problems going on - work problems, money problems, and Nuna was extremely sick (she can't even leave the house). We were able to get tad to church and we gave Nuna a blessing, and the spirit was so strong I can't explain it. They want to be baptized so bad next month!! I'm so excited for them!

กิตติ(Giti) is being difficult as usual. He believes the Book of Mormon to be 100% true. He also believes that Joseph Smith is a true Prophet, however he won't come to our church. He told us that the Baptist and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints are the only true churches in the world. He is so close, he just needs to open his heart a little more. 

We have been teaching Ratchani for some time now and she will be getting baptized next week!! She has asked so many questions that she has really converted herself. She knows almost as much stuff as I know because she reads the book of mormon, prays, and asks questions all the time! She is so fire!!

Over the period of this week, my companion and I visited this one particular family with another member multiple times. To say the least, this family is a little crazy for several reasons. It was a great opportunity to build them up and invite them to church because they have lost their faith in Jesus Christ. 

Miracle:

Sorry this is a little long but there is one more person we are teaching. Her name is Rose and her story is incredible. About 2 months ago we were inviting and having no success. As we continued to try to talk to as many people we could, we found someone that was only a little bit interested. I sat down on this bench to put in that person's information, however at that moment I felt prompted to talk to the person next to me on the bench. When I started talking they were like "no no I can't speak Thai." She was a Filipino and after we started talking for a little bit she opened up so much. We shared the message of the restoration which left her in tears. She loved it and she knew it had to be true. At the end of our conversation I had asked her if we could meet again but she told me she was moving back to the Philippines the next day. I couldn't understand why we would have an experience like this and then after that we would never see her again. That was so disappointing until I got a text from her this week saying that she is back in Thailand and she wanted us to call her. Miracles are real - let me tell you. We called her and she told us how much she feels the spirit when we talk with her. She has such a strong testimony it is incredible; words can't describe it!

Well that's about it for this week! I love you all so much!

Love,

Elder Lowe 

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Elder Gantt and his trainer, Robert!

Week 45: Songkran and General Conference

Subject: Week 45: Songkran and General Conference

This has been a week like no other let me tell you! To start there is this amazing festival called สงกรานต์ (Songkran) and it is basically a weekend of water. There are water fights with buckets, water guns, and water balloons. I don't know why we don't have it in America!! It's honestly so fun. Ok moving on from that, this week was also filled with miracles and awesome experiences. 

We have continued to see brother Min progress so much. He has almost stopped smoking entirely and he brought his girlfriend to church this last Sunday.

This week we also got two more people on a baptismal date (Tad and Nuna). Tad approached us about a 2 weeks ago telling us he wanted us to learn and we then began to teach his wife too. They believe the Restoration to be true and have accepted to be baptized on the 26th of May! 

กิตติ is gradually getting closer and closer but is still too scared to come to church. He has been a Baptist for over 60 years and is scared that if he goes to our church he might believe it to be true. 

A funny experience was while we were teaching 2 of our investigators in a lesson, one of their friends joined in the lesson and seemed maybe more interested than the other 2  He was reading the entire pamphlet and then he grabbed a Book of Mormon and began to read it as well. I got a call from him saying that he loved what we said and that he would be coming to church!!

So many things happened this week I can't put them all in this one email. But I was so grateful for this general conference! I got to watch it throughout this week in Thai and in English. I loved so many things and just want to say that Christ is our light in this world! As we look to him and "have Christ in our homes" we will be protected in these last days! I'm so grateful for the words of the apostles and prophet. I know they are called by God to teach the fullness of his gospel!!

Love 

Elder Lowe 

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Week 42: Elect will come to us!!!

Hey everyone! It's been a long week filled with awesome miracles. I feel so blessed to be here serving the Lord and deepening my relationship with my Heavenly Father. This week we had a zone conference centered on how to develop a stronger relationship with our Heavenly Father and how to help the people we teach understand Heavenly Father's true nature.

This week I got to interview another person to be baptized and she was way awesome. I actually had met her for the first time when I interviewed her and she asked me to baptize her! She has so much faith and knows everything good in her life is a gift from God. 

Ok so we have a more solid group of people that we are teaching now and I just want to talk about a couple of them. 

First, we have ป๊อก (pawg) and กี้ (gee) who are married and have a desire to learn more. They are searching for truth and had so many questions. Even though we had to switch our lesson plan, I know helping people really understand the Godhead first is crucial. It's so cool to see the reaction of people's faces when we let them know that they have a loving Father in Heaven that cares for them so much!!

One of the recent concerts here has been going through a hard time. His name is เกมส์ (game) and he said that his house is possessed and that he can't sleep. We were able to give him a blessing and bless his house and strengthen him.

We also are teaching this lady named บัวทอง (bua tong) and she believes everything we have told her. We are also teaching her niece and they want to come to church but they aren't able to. They told me it's not that she doesn't believe, it's just that she isn't able to. We are working on her hahaha. 

Lastly, if you have made it this far in the email than you are about to hear the true miracle of the transfer. This one guy named มิน (meen) went to church last week just because he wanted to. We didn't invite him and no other missionaries did either. He just walked into the church and wanted a change in his life. We taught him the plan of salvation and he accepted a baptismal date. He is by far one of the most fire people I have ever met. I'm so excited for his progression!! 

I love you all so much and I hope you all have a wonderful week! 

Love 

Elder Lowe 

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1,7) inviting

2) Dinner with the sisters

3) New profile pic

4,6) Baptism of sister Jane

Sister Jane with Robert and Elder Gantt

5) Elder Gantt (my trainee)

Week 41: Thai slang and ส้มตำ

Well this week has been pretty cool. To start off I want to wish a happy birthday to my brother (Devon), sister (Marissa), and my mom. Love you guys!! 

Today I went to a วัด or a Thai temple, which was way cool. The Thai culture is so interesting and amazes me. I live with the zone leaders and one of them is a คนไทย (Thai person)...and he is so funny! He talks to me with English slang, so I respond with Thai slang all the time. 

This week my companion and I had a good amount of time to go out and find people. We got a lot more people that we are teaching and I just want to share a couple of those experiences. First, on Monday night we were out finding and having no success until we started talking to this lady and she happened to be Filipino. She said that her whole entire family was Catholic and that she wanted to search and study other things. She told us she has been looking for more truth and answers and that's when we brought up prayer and Joseph Smith's experience. We committed her to pray and just ask all of her questions to God.  She loved it so much and believes that the Restoration is true! 

Another experience just happened last night. My companion and I were out finding late and we had about 20 minutes until we needed to be back home. We both were exhausted but continued to press on and consequently we met these two people that were way fire. We bore testimony of the Book of Mormon and the Restoration and he asked us for the 5 reasons why he needed to read the Book of Mormon. I told him 1) It testifies of Jesus Christ and how we can become better in this life, 2) It describes how we can overcome problems in our life through the Gospel and Jesus Christ's Atonement, 3) It is evidence of a living day prophet and that Joseph Smith is the prophet of the dispensation, 4) We can feel of God's love for us, 5) It explains how we can become clean from our sins and transgressions. On top of that we invited them to begin to read and find out for themselves. They replied saying that they don't truly believe in Buddhism and had been waiting for something like this in their life!! So many crazy miracles and so many people prepared that are right in front of us. 

This week we were able to incorporate the members into our work. They helped us go find LAs, RCs, and they taught with us. The members here rock and buy us tons of ส้มตำ (somtam). So much ส้มตำ! 

In the Thailand Bangkok mission we are making a lot of efforts to improve to quality of our English classes. As a result, we are teaching twice each week as well as passing out free lemonade. It's so awesome to serve the people here and open their hearts! I love my mission so much and I love you all! 

Love, 

Elder Lowe

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At Wat Pho

Huge gold lounging statue of Buddah

Gold Buddah

Elder Lowe and Elder Gantt at Wat Pho

Robert is training Elder Gantt

Free Lemonade at English classes

What a great trainer - Go Elder Lowe, but get new shoes!!!

Week 40: Whitewash, training, and DL in Don Muang

So this week was a bit of a shorter week, but basically I picked up my grand new missionary and took him to Don Muang. At the transfer meeting I was told that I will be a District Leader as well. Anyways, his name is Elder Gant and he is straight out of the MTC. We both were assigned to Don Muang and because neither of us have been there, we are whitewashing the area, (we didn't know the area at all). This week we started with 0 investigators, so we had the opportunity to go out and find. Another difference is that I'm used to having a bike to ride around, but now it is just my comp and I walking up and down streets talking to anyone we see. 

I live in the zone leaders house which is way fun. This is the first time I get to see other missionaries in my area because I was in Chiang Rai and then Phuket. Chaing Rai is the farthest and most remote area in the North, and Phuket is the farthest and most remote area in the South.  

Overall, I love the change and I love being a trainer. It's been great week being a DL as well. I had the opportunity to interview someone to be baptized and they were awesome. It is so cool the changes the gospel had made on this man's life. He used to smoke, drink, and drink coffee all the time, but through the gospel he has been able to quit for over a month and be baptized yesterday. 

I love this mission and the opportunity to learn so much every day. As we look to the Lord our burdens will be light. 

Alma 38:5

"As much as ye shall put your trust in God even so much ye shall be delivered out of your trials, and your troubles, and your afflictions, and ye shall be lifted up at the last day."

We truly all have trials, little or small, but though our faith and trust in God we can overcome any trial that is placed in our path. I love this gospel and the opportunity to be a missionary! 

Elder Lowe 

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1. Me and my ลูก (trainee)

2. Finally in Bangkok...the city!!

Week 74

Happy Oaks day!!!! (Kentucky holiday in may for those of you not from Kentucky)!!!

... Just kidding though but Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the 12 Apostles came to our mission and spoke to us!!! I got to shake his hand and everything!! It was really amazing to be in the presence of an apostle. He has such a powerful testimony of the gospel and missionary work. Lots to say about it but not much time to write it. I had a lot of exchanges this week again. I feel like I rarely get to be in my area with this STL stuff. But the exchanges were great and I am so impressed with these new sisters who just came out this transfer that I've gotten to work with. In both full day exchanges I went on, we got to invite two people to be baptized that we weren't planning on doing before the lesson but then the spirit told us to, so we did and they said yes! Exchanges always bring miracles. While I was gone Sister Coakley found 3 new investigators!!! Whoot!!! she's doing so great, and we work super well together.

Funny story: We knocked this one house and when the little girl answered the door she yelled "THE MORMONS ARE HERE!!" I think the whole neighborhood heard. Well her parents (who aren't members) came to the door and we began to teach them. The parents weren't to interested but the 3 teenagers who haven't been baptized were interested in the lessons! Whoot!! We are excited to teach them.

To describe this week in one word it would be:

Rough.

We had a lot of lessons planned this week but Every. Single. One. Of. Them. Cancelled. It's like when we first meet these people they seem so interested and want us back and then we come back and they aren’t there:/ I call them flakey investigators. But as this has happened this week I reflected on how Heavenly Father feels when we let him down or turn away from him. And it is the worst feeling. I know I have been one of his flakey investigators before and now I know how he feels. But the thing is, he still loves us and is patient with us. And I am starting to feel that same Christ like love for these people even when they frustrate me or bring me heart ache. All of it is worth it because we are bringing souls unto him.

One of my favorite quotes from two conferences ago pretty much sums it up, it's by Elder Palmer, he says: "My dear brothers and sisters, now anytime you feel you are being asked to do something hard--think of the Lord beholding you, loving you, and inviting you to let it go and follow Him. And thank Him for loving you enough to invite you to do more."

I thank Heavenly Father everyday for loving me enough to invite me to do more.

Sister Lowe

1-2 exchanges with Sister Spotten

3 I GOT TO HOLD A CHICKEN
Marissa with baby chicks

4 raking leaves for service

5 Halloween parties

6 service in Huntsville when on exchanges with Sister Feeney

7 pretty sky:)

Week 73 - Corn Maze

First and foremost... HAPPY BAPTISM ANNIVERSARY TO DEVAN!!! She got baptized a whole year ago today:)) and she is the greatest! I'm so proud and happy for her!

I'm not gonna lie this week was a bit slow. All of investigators were either gone hunting, having surgery, or just wouldn't meet with us… yeah we spent most of our time tracting which is good but sometimes can be tiring.

So highlights of the week:

We met with Jospeh this week and we asked him to read and pray about the Book and he answered and said "what if I already feel it's true, do I still have to pray about it?" YEAH that was cool! He said he just feels the spirit as he reads it, so that's awesome. The only thing is that he has lots of problems with the word of wisdom. He chews tobacco, drinks alcohol, coffee, and tea... so he's a work in progress.

We had a mission conference on Friday and so I got to see all my friends in the mission! President Allred called up companionships to do 4-minute resto and of course he picked Sister Coakley and I. We did it in front of the whole mission... yeah it was nerve wrecking but I think it went over well.

I went on a bunch of exchanges this week... yay STL life! Exchanges are fun but I miss my area and comp but it's fun to be with other sisters, I always learn a lot.

This  week has been tiring for me. I just am so exhausted every night. 

We had stake conference this week and one of the talks talked about being tired. They talked about how Jesus was probably tired but he never stopped. He would go from fasting for 40 days, to teaching and preaching sermons, to being Beaton, scouraged, and stricken, to dying on the cross, to being resurrected, to preaching, teaching, and healing again.... He never stopped. He never was too tired to do anything. He pressed forward to do his fathers will. So I am going to press forward with a steadfastness in Christ and do my fathers will as will.

Love you all, have a great week!

Sister Lowe

1. Pday corn maze with my zone

2-3. Mission conference got to see Davis and Schultz

4. Fall - Halloween in UTAH

5-7 stake conference

Sister Coakley and Marissa

8-9. The valley

10. Baptism anniversary pic

Week 72 - AJ, CJ and TJ get Baptized - Tyler gets Baptized

Exciting things this week!

First and for most... TYLER WAS BAPTIZED!! Whoot whoot! It was such an amazing baptism. We found Tyler only two weeks ago but he has been prepared by the Holy Ghost and is now the newest member of Jesus Christ's church:)

Also.... AJ, CJ, and TJ were baptized!!! Hallelujah! I've been teaching them for 7 months straight when I was in Nibley and they finally were baptized this week!! I got to go back and speak at their baptism and it was just so great. My heart is full.

Okay so other awesome miracles. We met with Jospeh this week (new investigator) and taught him and he is now on date for baptism for November 4th! Yeet! His daughter passed away last week and we helped serve at the funeral and that's when we first met Joseph and he asked us to teach him more about what we believe about the after life. He seems super interested!

We also met this guy named Gary who came to church with his return missionary best friend and he wants to learn and take the lessons from us. We also tracted into a girl named Hailey who is 17 and she was interested in the missionary lessons and is open to baptism! MIRACLES PEOPLE! The Lord is just blessing us so much! Ahhh it's just so wonderful.

I'm starting to really like the area. Still trying to learn it all… it's HUGE! The thing is about down here is the people are really nice but they talk your ear off. People just love to talk. We will be walking and then stop someone on the street and they will just talk forever... like we talked to this non-member this week who literally talked to us for an hour on the street about stories in his life. He would not get to the point. My feet were dying and My legs were real tired after that conversation... and he wasn't interested...sadly:(

Okay so over the course of my mission I meet a lot of people who ask "has your mission changed you. Are you a changed person because of the mission?" And the answer is no. My mission hasn't changed me. I'm not a changed person because of my mission. On my mission I have come to know how to draw unto Christ. Am I changed? Yes. But it is Christ who has changed me. Christ has changed my life not my mission. Christ has made me want to become more like him and change for the better. In the scriptures it says "Behold, he changed their hearts; yea, he awakened them out of a deep sleep, and they awoke unto God. Behold, they were in the midst of darkness; nevertheless, their souls were illuminated by the light of the everlasting word" Alma 5:7

Mighty change comes from living the gospel of Jesus Christ - Simple obedience to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Change is about becoming. It is what we have become not who we were. We need to become one with Christ, have his doctrine embedded in our hearts, and live the gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ changes us for the better:)

Love you all!!

Sister Lowe

Lots of pics!

1-3. Tyler's baptism

 4-5. AJ, CJ, TJs baptism

 6. Got to see Jackie and Bryan!!! Oh how I miss them!!!

7-8. Zone service project

Holy Cow - look at the size of that fallen tree

9-11. On our way back from the baptism we got to see the Brigham city temple!

 12. District meeting pic with Sister Coakley