Visa Run III

dear family,

wowee, that was unexpected. thanks for the words of advice dad. i really do appreciate it. if i said i didn't feel horrible, i'd be lying. but i'll pull through. i can confidently say that i know why i am here.

so this week was really good. we had 6 baptisms! holy smokes! and we're having five more this saturday. most of them are all from one huge family. they are amazing. i wish you could meet them. they're so happy to have the gospel. they're going to be referral machines.

i've learned a lot about how to do effective missionary work since i've been here. when i first got into the mission, i was all about just hard work. the more you sweat, the more success. that just isn't true. hard work is extremely important, but it's even more important to work smart. how do you work smart? through the members. it's really hard for missionaries to understand that they don't need to go out and knock doors 24-7. as you take your focus off of your hard work, and put that work into the members, not only do you create an army of missionaries, but you really strengthen the members at the same time. michael made a comment that he couldn't imagine trying to handle as many people as were coming into the church, but as they start doing missionary work and finding people, they take care of themselves. i wish i'd of learned this earlier in my mission!

sibu is completely flooded! elder watkins and i rode through about a two mile flood that was up to the top of our bike tires! it was so crazy! i got a really good video of it too, so you'll be able to see it soon. the bad thing about the floods though, is you can't see where the street ends and the monstrous open gutters begin... fortunately though, it wasn't me that fell in. it was elder semana :)

i forgot my debit card! dang it. that was the most important thing to bring (besides my passport) on this visa run! but i guess i'll just have to wait 3 months until my next one.

i want you all to know how much i love you and how much i love this work. in a time like this, it would be really easy to despair and lose sight of what's important, but i want everyone to know (especially mom) that absolutely know that this work is the Lord's work. i wouldn't dare lose focus. i know that it's true. I KNOW, and nothing could nor will it ever change that. is it poopy to get a dear john? 100% yes, but i'm not going to let it effect His work. i'll worry about things like that on my own time... in 14 months. so don't worry. i'm great. try not to say anything about it in the next email though, ok? thanks.

take care everybody! until next week.

love,
Elder Troxel