Giáo Hạt đang chia tay

In vietnamese, "chia tay" is a way you can say "breaking up". And our district (which is the smaller version of a stake) is BREAKING UP. We officially have 2 WHOLE DISTRICTS IN VIETNAM!! One in Hanoi, one in Saigon. SO EXCITING. The most exciting part is that now on our teaching records, we can actually write something different and not just write "Hanoi District" every time we get a new investigator. Now I can write "Saigon District", and that's the best part of it all. 


First Sunday in Hanoi (over 1 year ago)

The Saigon district today; so basically only half the missionaries

 

In addition to the new district, 3 new branches were created! So in total, we now have 10 BRANCHES in all of Vietnam! When i first started serving here in July 2016, we only had 3: One in Hanoi and 2 in Saigon. Now we have TEN. The growth of the church here in Vietnam has been amazing! In just a year I've seen so many changes. If we keep going at this rate, we'll have a temple here in no time!

This past saturday, we were able to have a lesson with one of our investigators who has been taught by almost all the sister missionaries in Vietnam (she just keeps moving houses). She asked one of the best questions ever: "Ý kiến đó là của mình hay là ý kiến đó đến từ Thượng Đế?" (Was that just my idea or did that come from God?) That is one of the questions that tons of members of the church ask themselves: Was that just me thinking or is God trying to tell me something? Our response to her? Pray about it. Pray about whatever it is, and then ACT. Heavenly Father is ready and willing to give us guidance and answers, but it requires some action on our part. We can't just sit there and think, "Ok Heavenly Father, I'm ready. What do I do?" SOMETIMES it works like that, but most of the time we have to take some action. We have to really study out our decisions, make some plans, and sometimes we even have to make a decision. And when we make that decision, we can come back and ask Heavenly Father if that decision was the right one. Heavenly Father won't withold answers and guidance from us, but He likes to see that we are willing and ready to try!

The quote of this week comes from a wonderful phone call we had the other night. We've been trying to contact some less-actives our area, but unfortunately we didn't have the right phone number for one of them. When we tried calling, a random man picked up the phone. My companion, chi Thu Hong, being the awesome missionary that she is, immediately started talking to him about the church and asked if he wanted to come to an activity with us. His response? "Umm.. Sẽ có đậu hủ ở đó không?" (Translation: will there be tofu?) Turns out he was buddhist and a vegetarian. But regardless. If you ever have to decide whether or not to go to an activity when random strangers invite you through the phone, just ask them if they'll have tofu there. That will help you make up your mind.

Thanks for all the emails, updates, and PICTURES (thanks Elder Duffy for all the pictures you just sent). Have a good week!

Family Home Evening



Celebrating our 16 months in the mission and Sister Nelson's 1st month.