Sister Pao in the North Star State: The Final Countdown!

It's been another week my dear friends and family. Where has it gone, do you ask yourself? because I ask myself that everyday! I know we always hear people talk about how time flies in the MTC BUT, now I can say it for myself, IT REALLY DOES DISAPPEAR BEFORE YOUR EYES.

In five days, I will be flying out to the Icebox of the Nation, otherwise known as the Twin Cities, or the Northern Star State, OR MINNESOTA MINNEAPOLIS!

You want to know the reason behind why time flies so fast? Let me tell you, it is exactly because I am using every minute and every second of the day to the best of my abilities, and no time is being wasted! I love that feeling, because naturally, I am not a very organized planner, and I believe I often waste time in my "normal" life, but because I know that I am now using the Lord's time and serving him, I am using every ounce of my might, mind, and strength to work my hardest.

Let me tell you all a little bit about the excitements of this week. But before I say so, I want you all to know how humbling my experiences here at the MTC has been, and I owe it all to my Savior who has entrusted me to serve in all these leadership roles.

To answer Sharon's questions: A Sister Training Leader is the girl equivalent version of a Zone Leader, except i mostly only oversee the Sisters. (Robby can probably explain this more to you)
But basically I make sure that each companionship in my zone are doing well, and whenever they have questions or concerns, they usually come to me to try to resolve them. If problems do arise, I am the one that reports it to our bishop.

This past week, to my own surprise, three sisters actually came to me with some concerns and problems that they had been having within their companionship. I honestly was very surprised that i was being summoned to to help, but because they did come to me, I also felt confident in myself that I have been loving and obedient to have them trust me. Thanks to the help of the Savior and my goal to strive to be like him more and more in my life and mission, I was able to help them in a way that my Savior would approve. (Honestly, if i wasn't aware of my responsibilities and my potentials, i would have definitely taken their situation in a completely different approach and the results would have definitely been harmful to both parties. This scripture has been circling around me quite a lot recently, and with that, I want to share it with all you lovelies back home.
Alma 37:36-37 "...Counsel with the Lord in all thy doings, and he will direct thee for good, yea, when thou liest down at night lie down unto the Lord, that he may watch over you in your sleep..."

Being a missionary is the best thing because we are all promised an individual angel that watches over us. There really will be no other time in this life where I will have the chance to devote 24/7 of my time to serving the Lord, and to moving his work along.

I am glad that before I came on my mission, I was inspired with the knowledge that serving a mission will require a lot of love. and seriously, it means A LOT AND A LOT OF LOVE! I have seen how me judging investigators' ignorance to our message has already gotten in the way of me feeling the Spirit and my purpose of INVITING them to come unto Christ.
I am not out here to force anyone, but to love and to plant seeds. I will definitely keep reminding myself about that.

This past Tuesday, we had the chance as missionaries to go listen to a member of the seventy speak to us at our devotional. Elder Clark visited us and shared an extremely powerful message directed at helping us missionaries prepare to be better teachers of the Gospel.

He encouraged us to write home about spiritual messages and not to waste our time on talking about what we ate or what we wore, or what we drank here at the Mtc. ALTHOUGH I DO KNOW THAT SOMETIMES, THOSE FUNNY THINGS ARE THE FUN PARTS TO READING MISSIONARY EMAILS. HAHA I WILL STRIVE TO FIND BALANCE!

During his talk, he emphasized a lot on how as missionaries, we need not worry about our families, because no matter what, they will be watched over. I have every faith that LIFECHANGING events will begin to happen among my very own family and friends. I feel it in my GUTS GUTS GUTS (get what I'm quoting Shar and Cynthia?? haha)
Read D&C 100:1-2 fam and friends if you don't believe me! Challenge taken??

Another important message from the devotional was a lesson on fishing. Learn to be good fisherman, then you will become a good missionary. Like the story from Matthew 4:19. Look in the right places, sometimes they are just in front of you, the people who are most ready for the Gospel. HINT HINT MOM: WEI WEI JIE JIE! and Cyn and Shar, I will make y'all proud and "REEL MY INVESTIGATORS IN LIKE A SEA BASS" (another quote from our favorite movie eh Cyn?)

Fam bam, recently, I have setting goals and working extra hard on memorizing scriptures. I have the worst memory for these type of things, but I have seen how knowing scriptures by heart can be a true blessing to not only the mission world, but for my future. I invite you all to study with me this week the blessings of 1 Nephi 13 and 14. (cyn or mom, invite grandma to do so as well. tell her it's my deathbed wish...haha jokes, i'm not dying, but really, tell her that i am not messing around, and that it won't hurt her. also, i pray for her, so she WILL DO IT!)

Be insightful, dive deeper into the messages contained in those chapters because from reading and studying the words of those chapters, my heart has been filled with joy and gratitude for how lucky we really are to have our very OWN, TANGIBLE COPY OF THE BOOK OF MORMON. it truly contains plain and precious gospel that go hand in hand with the bible. it doesn't deny the bible in any way, but instead, it gives you greater knowledge of the Bible.

And MOM AND CYNTHIA! i have truly found the answer to that question you had for me back when you were pretending to be my investigators. Why wasn't the Gospel spread to China, why don't we have a BOOK OF JACKIE CHAN, OR A BOOK OF JET LEE? ( JUST KIDDING, HOPE THAT WASN'T CROSSING THE LINES.) HAHA BUT read 2 Nephi 29:6-7 and let me know what you find! I invite you all to study with me!

This is a ridiculously long email, but each day here in the MTC is simply filled with so much new knowledge and I there is no other joy than sharing it with my own family and loved ones.

Mom: let Songshan ward know that I love them very much. Tell Bishop that I often think back to the advices he gave me before leaving on my mission. I use it often here and share my new found knowledge with my peers. It will be so important for us to get to know the Bishop of any new district or ward we attend when we are out in the field. Members are soooo important in our success as missionaries. I will definitely be putting his advice into practice and I will report back on my results. haha (PLEASE TRANSLATE THESE THINGS FOR THEM)

My prayers go out to them always and I can't wait for the day when we are reunited.

But for now, I have lots more to learn and do.

God be with you all and until next week...when I'll be in Minnesota!!!

Love love lovesss to all you poppets!

Sister Pao