Letter #73 - Week of 24 June 2009 - Very Slow Week

Hello,

Well, this last week was very slow. We didn't get out of the house much. On Saturday, Elder Hall had an appointment with the doctor, who told him he was healing well but needed to continue to take things easy. for a while. I'll admit, I've struggled a lot over the past week. You would think it would be nice to have a little time to get physically rested. You would think you would be itching to get back out to work even harder. The opposite is true. But I know this is a test every bit as much as any other missionary work would be. I've just got to continue to work hard and use time the best I can figure out how to.

Cathleene is absolutely loving life right now. She's taking to the gospel amazingly. She's been following the word of wisdom ever since we mentioned it. She prays and studies the scriptures and loves it. She is looking for ways to get her daughters interested in the church right now, and will be trying to hold family scripture study and prayer every day. Actually, her oldest daughter has been reading from the Book of Mormon (at first she tried to do it secretly, but Cathleene noticed the bookmark kept going missing). The other two daughters are Hindu, but have been warming up to Christianity lately, and might be interested in coming to church. I sure hope so. The branch structure is amazing here, especially the youth, so they would really feel comfortable.

The members have continued to show their kindness toward us, in unprecedented ways. Sister Loh has been calling at least 3 times a day to give Elder Hall tips on recovering from surgery that she learns throughout the day. She has also bought a couple cans of meal replacement drink powder, as well as some chinese herbal fish oil to drink. Sister Chris arranged on Monday for someone to bring us lunch and dinner every day this week. They are so wonderful.

I don't know if I ever told you about Isaac, so here goes. One day during the week we were having all the trouble with the bikes, Elder Hall got a flat tire in a residential section of the city, where we weren't sure where we could get it fixed. We found our way to a phone and were in the process of calling Elder and Sister Spanos, when someone tapped me on the shoulder and told me not to worry about it. He introduced himself as Isaac, someone who had learned from the Elders in the past and had helped them a lot. He said he was driving down the road, saw a couple of bikes abandoned, knew it was the Elders and knew that we had some sort of problem. He started searching for us, and luckily found us very quickly. Then he helped us get to a bike shop, gave us phone number, and sent us away.

Fast forward a couple of weeks. We taught him once or twice (and also wasted a few hours waiting to teach him when he didn't come once or twice), and were pretty much done teaching him, considering he was interested in moving to nearby Butterworth for a job as an engineer with Honda. Anyway, he came to sacrament meeting the day we were in the hospital, and came for a couple more lessons here at the church. He wants to be baptized, and has seen the blessings of following what we say. He described a really peaceful feeling he felt in the church that he has never felt in any other place. Isaac also said that a job offer he has fasted and prayed for has finally come through. He's not sure which job to take. He still has the Honda offer in Butterworth, but now he also has the chance to work in the immigration office here in Ipoh. We didn't give him advice on the matter, told him to pray and choose himself, but I know I could use a friend in the immigration office.

Love,
Elder Muffler