December 9th

AHHHH. Sister G and I have a new companion! Her name is Sister H! She is from Taiwan! We found out Wednesday that she got her visa early and was coming over the next day! We barely had time to clean our flat and move the beds (we have bunk beds and they are pretty low to the ground and so Sister H's bed is now a total cave that she has to climb over my bed to get into...super funny!). It has been a complete blessing to have her! She is really easy to get along with and has been helping us with Chinese a lot! Love her! 

Here is a prolonged miracle I wanted to update you all on! 

We have Family Home Evening in our branch, which consists of a spiritual message and a game prepared by some of the members. One of the missionary rules about attending FHE is that missionaries can only come if an investigator also attends. So, the first Monday after Sister G came into the area, I called referral we had received, whose name was Alex, and asked him if he would like to come to FHE. He accepted and we scheduled him in. That night at FHE, a guy entered and introduced himself as Alex. He was a big guy from Malaysia with tatoos, piercing, and smelled really strongly of cigarette smoke. He came into the activity room and sat down for the hour without talking to anyone around him or saying anything, or smiling. The game for the night was Mafia and, until the very end, he did not participate at all. After the activity Sister G and I asked him if he could meet after to talk with us. He agreed and came into one of the chapel room with us and one of the ward members. He said that he was really confused, because he thought it was a service activity, not a game night, and told us he was Buddhist and definitely not interested in joining a Christian church. It was a very confusing lesson, because none of his concerns fit the description on the referral we had received and we could not understand some of what he said because he spoke Chinese with a Malaysian accent. By the end of the lesson, we explained briefly about God and prayer, gave him a Restoration pamphlet, and asked him if he would be willing to meet next week to attend FHE and talk more about our message. To our surprise, he accepted. As we headed home, we got a text from "Alex" saying that he was sorry he missed FHE and promising to come next week. I guess what happened was that referral Alex was not actually the Alex that met with us. We later found out that the Alex that came was a random guy on the street that Sister Z had invited to FHE the week before she left and forgot to tell us. 

We have since met with Malaysian Alex the next Monday. He had read the Restoration pamphlet all the way through and said that he felt really happy at FHE and wanted to learn more. He has come to FHE every week since then. He came to church for the first time yesterday and accepted an invitation to be baptized in around a month. He still has a long way to go (We taught him the Word of Wisdom yesterday and he drink alcohol, smokes, and loves coffee), but he now believes in Jesus Christ and is ready to make a change in his life! So insane! 

I love you all so much! Thank you for the emails and prayers! I can definitely feel your love and it has really helped me not feel at all homesick this holiday season! I know this is where I am suppose to be and am happy to be serving the Lord at such a special time of year! 

-Sister Sarah Bennion