December 29, 2015

 Christmas Loot!

Hello Family!

Christmas was good but I'm glad its over.  This week was so slow.  It was amazing to be able to Skype with you and Emily though.  We got to spend a lot of time with the members and got a fair number of presents.  I got a home decorated plate from one family and an entire Christmas stocking full of stuff from another family.  Got a tie and a ton of candy.  I also received the package from Emily with a bunch of Korean snacks.

You could certainly send the videos from the primary on a flashdrive.  I've been meaning to put some videos together that we can use for lessons to bring the Spirit.

I know very little about Jinju (Emily's new area).  One of the sisters in my donggi (now you know what that word means) was trained there but I don't remember a lot of what she said about it.  I never went there myself.

I'm running out of time.  We weren't able to email yesterday because we got snowed in. Sorry. I love you. Thank you for the encouragement and prayers.

Elder Stapley 

December 21, 2015

Hey Parents,

I got the card. And the spicy shrimp chips. Thank you. They taste amazing.  I haven't opened the other Amazon packages I received yet.  I just guessed what was in the shrimp package and figured that didn't count as a Christmas present.

Were you ever going to send me your notes from Elder Stevenson's Stake Conference talk?  You mentioned it but I never got anything.  The proper answering of questions is something that missionaries struggle with.

We met with Sue this week.  She is the mom from the Catholic referrals we got.  She was very nice but very Catholic.  She knows a lot about the church but isn't very interested in changing.  I think there is still potential though. She was certainly a thinker and I felt like she had some questions that modern revelation could answer.

We are still not finding a lot of good new investigators.  Our most promising just vanished. We think her boyfriend probably kicked her out and we have no contact info for her now.  

That quote from the Ensign that Mom mentioned is fantastic. (The quote is “I pray at this Christmas season that you might have some sense of the Lord’s regard for your offering, some sense of how you stand in His eyes, some sense of the beloved status you occupy as His son or His daughter. And I pray that knowledge of that status may give you a great deal of comfort, reassurance, and confidence that you are approved in His eyes.  (Elder D Todd Christofferson,  Be At Peace, December 2015 Ensign).   I have actually been studying something very similar.  One of the things Christ promised His disciples was His peace.  In addition to the peace that we feel as a fruit of the Spirit in our lives, we can have confidence and peace that stems from our faith and hope in Christ.  That confidence makes such a colossal difference in our everyday lives.  It is an incredible tender mercy.  Wanting to have that confidence, that God is pleased with me, is one of the great motivating factors in my life.  I want to one day be comfortable in His presence.

Talk to you later,

Elder Stapley