Ahhh, I see you've played knify spoony before!

Dear Family,
Wow. I am very excited for Scott and Sue! Awesome.

This Saturday and Sunday we will be able to view conference. The main screen will be prepared with the Thai translation playing while us foreigners will get to wear headphones and enjoy conference in our native language. I am very excited. Elder Olinger somehow got a copy of the last conference and we have listened to almost all eight hours as we have traveled around in Taxis to zone meetings and such.

Mother mentioned that they talked about being a member missionary in conference. I must say that my understanding and my approach to being a member missionary has changed as I have become a full time missionary. Back home I hardly knew the missionaries. I was unfamiliar with the extent of all of their tasks and responsibilities. I didn't have a very good view of their influence on our ward. And especially here in Thailand where their are mostly branches that haven't yet grown into wards, I have come to learn of a missionaries role.

One of our jobs is to help train and establish the leadership in our branch. We work closely with the Branch President, honoring his requests and encouraging him to make goals. Together we coordinate the vision of our Branch.

Member Referrals are Gold. As I look at our branch it is easy to see that the majority of our members originally were introduced to the missionaries as member referrals, and they are mostly families too.

Teaching with members is one of our "key indicators." We try to have a member with us at each of our lessons. Having a friend and some one to help fellowship and answer questions is vitally important for our investigators.

We also have the opportunity to go and fellowship members, teach "referral lessons," and visit those who are struggling or less active. In this activity, namely helping less active members, I have found a lot of success. There are a lot of reasons/concerns that these people have that prevent them from coming to church. Many of them are simple. But in each of these cases I find that these people have stopped reading scriptures and praying regularly and personally/with a family. As I teach these people, many times I don't focus on church at all. I simply help them to recognize the strength that comes from reading and praying, and remind them of the power of the atonement of God and the feeling of joy, renewal, and love that come from obeying the commandments. As they commit to these tasks of reading and praying usually they end up coming to church on their own accord.

If feel like if everyone was being nourished and strengthened from service, powerful prayer, and studying and pondering the scriptures that everyone would start to be a missionary naturally. And usually it's the little things that make the biggest difference.

I know that when I get home I don't want to stop serving and sharing the gospel. And I think that I will be much more involved in helping friends to meet the missionaries, and to be right there with them when they do it.

Then there's always the power of bringing friends to church.

Missionary work is most efficient when the missionaries are the teachers and members are the finders.
I never really understood what exactly the missionaries were looking for as they asked for referrals from me. But I wouldn't suggest giving a referral of a friend that you have never talked to about the gospel before. The missionaries are looking for the "elect." For those who are interested and prepared to receive the Gospel.

Recently I have been memorizing and translating hymns. As it turns out there are a lot of awesome words in the hymns which are organized into the simplest form of sentences. And I can sing them! It's great.

There are 150 missionaries in Thailand, but the number will steadily reduce to about 130.

As we leave the house and especially as we set time apart for "inviting," we review our goals in prayer with our Father in Heaven and then we proceed to our intended destination, talking to everyone. Yes, we talk to everyone. Some people don't want to talk, usually these people get a hello and they don't care to respond, sometimes they don't even look at us. This would be the least amount that we say to people. Those who respond and especially those who are interested get a lot more than a hello.

well, I have to leave now. Congratulations to Scott, Sue, Fawn, Kevin, Dad, Justin, and everyone who I missed.

I love you all!

Elder Lilly