"I am never lonely"

  

  

Hello people! 

Glad to hear the wedding went well and the knot is finally tied! Shout out to Lucy and Eli FALK!

A very interesting thing happened this week. After asking President multiple times, he finally found the means to put Sisters in our area! We just have a lot of female RC's (recent converts) and investigators, and it would just be a lot better if there were Sisters to teach them, instead of having us Elders do it and always having to find member help. That being said in the short term vision it put things into a spin, to say the least. The Sisters already have another area that they are busy in and don't have a lot of time to meet with our female investigators and RC's as of right now. 

We had transfers on Wednesday and a service project on Saturday that ended up being an hour and a half bike ride. We also helped a member fill out his mission papers so it was hard to get a lot of work down but here are two pretty cool/ humbling things that happened this week:

1. We have this extremely old member in our ward that we just call "grandmother" and she is unable to go to church, but we occasionally go and visit her at her pharmacy that she lives at. She is one of the most awesome people I have ever met in my life. She always reads the Book of Mormon, and when I first got to the area she was just starting Alma and now she is close to finishing Ether! An absolute baller! She has to read with the big Book of Mormon and she even uses a magnifying glass haha. Super funny and so awesome to see her faith. Every time we visit her I ask her what her favorite scripture is and she just always responds, "They are all my favorite!" 

I also say that we wanted to come visit her so she didn't feel lonely, but she simply responds "I am never lonely! I have God and the scriptures with me." She is one of the happiest and optimistic people I have ever met, and this week we were able to ask a little bit about her past. Without getting into too many details because of lack of time, she shared about the dark days of the Khmer Rouge, that had haunting effect on her family. She and all her relatives (more than 80) (including her 10 children) were forced to go to the province Pursat. They had nothing there and as the days went on the food supply became less and less until ultimately they would each only get one spoonful of rice soup (not sure what else to call it) for every meal. That is all the food they had. All but one of her children starved to death. Of the 80+ that went only 4 returned to the city. Her husband was taken from her and killed. Tragedy. And yet, here was this old lady, "grandma" sitting in front of us with no worries or fear on her face. No bitterness or resentment toward God, or the trials that she suffered through. Simply hope, love, and the perfect knowledge that one day she would be able to see her children again. That is what the gospel of Jesus Christ is all about. That is why this message is so glorious and perfect. Because of hope and happiness that comes from the healing of our Savior, Jesus Christ.

2. Wow, that took way too long to type. The other story is about our old investigator who is the miracle man. Long story short he has no money and no job and didn't eat for three days. We are helping him out and the bishop is amazing to help take care of him. Pretty cool miracles have been manifest through his humble faith. More to update next week.

Anyway, love you all!  I was reading in Jacob 4 today and it says in verse 3, "Now in this thing we do rejoice; and we labor diligently to engrave these words upon plates, hoping that our beloved brethren and our children will receive them with thankful hearts, and look upon them that they may learn with joy and not with sorrow, neither with contempt, concerning their first parents."

We must rejoice over the Book of Mormon and learn with joy from its precious pages! I know that that Book is true and you all should be reading it every single day!

Go Tiger, Utes, Jazz, and sports!~

Love,

Elder Gochnour