New Haircut and New Investigators

Hello again!

So big news in the Cambodia world. It’s officially been announced so I guess I can tell it now. President Smedley has received revelation that by June 24th Cambodia could not only have a stake, but could have 2 stakes! This last Sunday was district conference and president Smedley announced that to all the members present. It’s so insane to me that this country could go from 0 to 2 in less than a year, almost half a year. So crazy.

I just read the Liahona story in my Khmae book of Mormon. I just want you to know how they described heed and diligence was this: taam seckdei camnua nung seckdei pyiayiam robah puak kee. camnua means belief, and pyiayiam means to try, and seckdei makes it a noun. So it means it was according to their belief and whether they would try. So something interesting for you guys. So next time you teach that lesson feel free to go ahead and through that in there. We need to have a belief, and we need to act on that belief.

As for this week funny stories are:
1st- Lookpuu Lii, who is the person asleep in this picture I think, tried to give me a kiss during the lesson the other day. He is so weird but he is so funny.
2nd- As you can tell from the pig picture I got a haircut. Elder Nico shaved my head. First time I’ve buzzed my hair forever, this country is so much colder now. But anyways the funny part is everything here loved it. This older lady we teach, who is a recent convert, said it was cool. It was so funny to hear it. It would be like hearing a 70 year old lady saying awesome haircut instead of nice haircut. I don’t know it was just funny. Lookpuu Lii liked it too because he said I looked like a monk.

Spiritual Story.
Chaandii, a guy we contacted who hadn't even learned a lesson yet, came to district conference on Sunday. He is the same guy who told us he couldn’t stop thinking about his conversation with us. When we met with him to teach him his first lesson he told us at first when he showed up it was super weird and he was nervous. But as he went in and listened, he didn’t really understand what they were talking about but he just felt really happy, like his body was super light. From there it went to him basically asking us where am I from, who am I, and where am I going. Which is soooooo rare to have a Cambodian with questions like that. We taught the whole 2nd lesson with him and he understood it all and it just makes sense to him. Oh did I mention he waited from 10-12 for us and just read a member's (sokhnaa the one who got baptized recently, they are cousins) copy of the Liahona. And he said I really like this magazine if I read this will I understand better? It so unbelievable how prepared he is for the gospel it’s so awesome.
ps. water festival starts today so no proselyting until Friday night at like 5, it technically got cancelled because lots of people died last year but I guess the people are doing it on their own or something. All I know is the whole country basically goes to Phnom Penh so it’s too dangerous for us to proselyte

Why hello again. So the water festival is officially over now. It was sooo fun. Last Thursday was cleaning the house day and CBR work. Friday was sports day. We biked all the way to northwest Phnom Penh to meet with all the Elders and play basketball and hang out. It was so fun to talk to all my MTC Elders and talk to them about what's going on in their areas. Sunday was really cool because Sokhnaa received the Gift of the Holy Ghost. Monday was zone conference. We went to 5th branch in the city and were taught/instructed from 8-2 with a 1 hour lunch break of course. It was awesome. Catered food, with ice cream and cake! But seriously the conference was really good. It was mostly good because they really broke down tithing for us, what we need to have a stake, what we need to do, and how we need to do it. So it was super good to just give us that focus to get what really needs to be done. They also did a little follow the rules session because it's gonna take so much focus to finally get Cambodia the stake it needs. It would just be so cool if this country had a patriarch. I just wish these people could experience a stake just so they would know how awesome it is.

So to exzplain the pictures, one is a picture of just some member's kids, one is me in front of our church. Yes that is our church out here in kian svaay, it's actually a pretty nice building, it's a rented church so its super weird, but it's nice. Plans are already undder way to get a church out here and once ther eis one its going to explode out here. The third picture is me and Elder Nico in Lookpuu Lii's tree house eating some grapefruit that he gave us for digging some dirt for him. He is so funny he was so excited that day becasue he just bought these 2 new orange trees to plant. I told him my dad grows oranges and then he just starts going off on like what kind of oranges, are they good, are the like Cambodia oranges, I dont even knoww hat he was saying, he talks fast and has a weird accent so it's super hard to understand.I think he is starting to like us though because he prayed for us to be rich when we grow up, have beautiful wives, smart kids, and an airplane so that we could visit him. Which is better than his usual prayer like, I know these elders taught me to forgive today but I'm sorry god I just can't do it I get too angry, amen.

So cool spiritual story this week, chaandii. The super awesome investigator we have. We taught him about Jesus's life, and he went off asking if it’s true that he was born in a manger, the three wise men, all that stuff. He asked us if that was true. He said he saw it in a movie a couple years ago. That was so insane that he knew all of that. I bet most of the members don’t even know about that part of Jesus life yet. He's just so smart and everything just makes sense to him, and he has such a desire to learn, he just has a good spirit about him that is just so rare out here in Cambodia. I can just feel it in him. He has a good heart. In fact when we told him we wouldn’t be able to come Monday because we are going to the city for Elder training he asked if he could come. Also when we told him we will be back on Friday at 11:00 he said he will start waiting at 7am. We told him we can’t leave earlier than 10:30 but he still is gonna wait "just in case". Haha he is so awesome.


 Not much this week because of all the festivities so that's all I got. I jsut want you all to know I know that this is the true church of Christ, and the only thing you have to do to know that too is to open the Book of Mormon and read it. It's amazing to see the sacrifices the people go through to be members and I know the only reason they do it is becaue they know it's true. Jesus is the Christ and our Savior. I love you all, Elder Rucker