Hangin' Out July 25, 2016

This has been the easiest move call of my mission. I believe that the only way for missionary work to be easy is 1. Have the spirit 2. Be diligent 3. Have good companionship unity. Right now all of those things seem to be in abundance. Elder Storey and I have been working super hard and have been prayerful and thoughtful about our investigators and our area. But besides that we're great friends. It honestly feels like although we are working hard that we're also kinda just hanging out all day. We've seen miracles and things have been coming together in incredible ways, but it's easy to see that Elder Storey and I haven't done anything special and the Lord is just doing his own work. 

Elder Storey and I were amazed as this week two of our investigators made great strides in their conversion process. Two investigators that are honest seekers of truth and that are already beginning to repent and change through the power of the Atonement. Our friend Zheng Di Xiong realized this week that he is ready to be baptized even though he was feeling really hesitant before. Our friend Zhan Di Xiong said, "I'm beginning to feel like there is actually someone there.", the feelings as we learned that these two brothers are experiencing a mighty change in heart manifested to me that there really is hardly anything better than knowing that you played a part, even a tiny tiny part, in helping someone come unto Christ.

As great as the movecall has been I know that personally there are still many things that I can and need to improve in order to be a more effective missionary and disciple of Christ. I need to be more consecrated. I also need to keep myself from getting discouraged by the call to be consecrated. As Tad R. Callister says, "The Lord does not require immediate perfection, but he does require immediate progress. Progress comes from consecration". I know that as I consecrate myself more I can progress more and become perfected in Christ.

Taiwanese Captain America

Friends from my first area, Taiping, came to Zhang Hua and stopped to see Elder Bradford and I because we both served there before. The girl next to me was the girl that got baptized just 3 weeks after I got to Taiwan. Wow!

The Man Has Arrived July 18, 2016

President Teh is the man. Fun fact: He is still a General Authority and member of the quorum of the seventy. He is just on a 2 year (that's right, 2) assignment here in Taiwan. Speculations and rumors have been flying around the mission. For a seventy to be called as a mission president, something super big has to be happening.... right?? There are some members in my district that think China is gonna open up soon and they're just going to take all the missionaries in Taiwan and send them over there. Who knows. We had the opportunity to go meet President Teh and his wife this week. Hearing that man speak is just like watching general conference it's so cool! He speaks as though he has all of Preach My Gospel memorized in his head. Many of us were anticipating that he would make the rules more strict. However, he has taken away 'The Taiwan Taichung Mission Rules & Clarifications' and has simply left us with the white hand book. In a way this does put more responsibility on us to know the letter and spirit of the rules. On the other hand, it's been nice being able to do some of the things that we weren't allowed to do before such as using the elevator in the church, being able to eat meals in the church, listening to stuff other than EFY/Mo Tab, and ordering pizza. I also had the super cool opportunity to have my first interview with President Teh. He is such a kind and loving guy! He asked one question to begin the interview and that was, "If you're mom would describe you, what would she say?". A master question! I came away from the interview thinking that it felt short but also feeling like President Teh had already learned a lot about me in that short time. General authorities are cool. In other news, there is a lady that lives in the 3rd ward's apartment building named Pan Jie Mei which translates to....... Sister Poon! She is awesome. Not just because we have the same last name. She owns a Nike factory!!!! Long story short she game me a free pair of Nike's yesterday and they're sweet. Other than that, we continue to see miracles on the daily here in Zhang Hua. Our lessons have been getting really bold lately which is awesome because that is a sign that our lessons have also had more love! It has been easy to see lately the Lord is directing the work here in Zhang Hua.

Root beer is rare in Taiwan. We found it at a random grocery store and I had my first root beer float in a year!

Super sweet ward activity. Pretty much just a 2 hour long water balloon/water gun fight with food.

'Merica

I've actually had 3 companions this move call. Raymond (the short term missionary) and because there is an odd amount of Elders in the mission right now, Elder Kunz (on the far right) was our companion for a few days last week. #brothasinthepriesthood

The Perfect Storm June 11, 2016

Zhang Hua is catching fire. Everything is just coming together right now! Elder Storey and I have only been together for a total of two weeks now, but we are already great friends and a unified companionship. We have been blessed beyond belief this week. We have seen a plethora of righteous miracles! We were also blessed this week to have a short-term missionary come and serve with us! His name is Brother Xu and is from a place called Dou Liu. He just graduated high school and wanted to get a taste of missionary work so he got sent over here to Zhang Hua! My first tripanionship! It was awesome. We were able to be REALLY effective having an extra companion (and cause he's Taiwanese). Also, a typhoon hit Taiwan this week!!! We were told on Thursday night to not leave our apartments the next day due to the typhoon. However, in Zhang Hua it was WEAK. Honestly, it was like another normal rainy day. However, because we were still supposed to be in our apartment. Elder Storey and I made the goal to call 1,000 people that day. It was legendary. We didn't quite get there because we were told at 12:00 that we could go outside, but those calls set up a lot of people. So many miracles happened I don't have time to describe them but the best part is that Elder Storey and I know that we didn't do anything special, the Lord is just preparing a way for his work to come to pass! Tomorrow we get to meet President Teh for the first time so that'll be cool! Oh, and turns out that the Blickenstaffs home ward is where my friend Landon is serving right now! Crazy! Miracles!

-Elder Poon