Every Missionary needs a Jia

Elder Nelson doesn't always put a title on his letter so I sometimes read his letter and come up with a tittle.  This week after one of our family friends read this letter she replied back to me and said "Everyone needs a Jia".  I thought that was perfect for the title of this email. Thanks Karen!



Dear Family and Friends:

This week was all zone conferences! and then Mission Leadership conference at the BEACH! 

Leadership Conference pictures!

The Assistants often host various missionaries in their apartment during the week and they go proselyting in downtown Tampa.  These are some of the missionaries from this past week that they hosted.

It was honestly a very fun, busy week. But, by the end of the week we realized we haven't really had time to proselyte in a long time! So it took a little mental toughness to get back on the grind and do some finding and inviting through members again, took some good planning and back to stage one. BUT! One thing that keeps us going, and really makes every day worth it is teaching Jia. If Jia was the only person I taught or baptized here for the entire 2 years it would be worth it. She is absolutely amazing. She has scheduled a baptism date, and cant wait. 

At the church with Jia Zhang

(-having fun taking pictures!)

This week she committed to read the Book of Mormon before November 15th ( her b day, and her baptism is the next day ). She started on wednesday and is already in 2nd Nephi. She keeps a notebook of all of her thoughts, and questions! she is asking about the olive tree and the tribes of Isreal, and all this crazy stuff. AND SHE DIDN'T BELIEVE IN GOD 6 WEEKS AGO! It is the most incredible conversion I have ever seen. She is on fire. Friday night she got invited to a party. She also had 5 essays to write. and she was planning to see Meet the Mormons on saturday. So as she contemplated on going to the party, the thought came to her, "If I have time to go to a party, I have time to see meet the Mormons" so she told her friends she cant go to teh party. She told us later, that she chose her Father and Savior first and decided to honor them" 

We read the texts and couldn't stop talking about her all day. well Sunday she blew us away again. 

A new investigator came to church. He doesn't want to be taught anything but likes to come church. So, right after sacrament meeting Elder Hawkes started chatting with him. And Jia chimed in and told him why it's so important he take a lesson from us. Well, he was very close minded...BUT JIA IS MORE STUBBORN THAN THOUGHT! She walked with him all the way outside the church building and for 30 mins talked with him, and would not let him leave until he scheduled a lesson. She opened the Book of Mormon with him, and threw all kinds of questions at him.... we were just watching her from inside with our jaws on the floor. 

She came in and was like " you guys busy on wednesday?" ummm no Jia, we are not busy... Ha! She is kind of really sassy and is studying business so she is pretty bold ha. You will love her when you meet her. 

So, yea it was amazing. And our investigator Thai, who dropped us last week picked us back up again. We are meeting with him right now. What a week full of miracles!

For zone conference we met with all the zones, 3 conferences and 2 zones at each one. We gave them each a training and then watched Meet the Mormons. I gave a training on how to work more effectively with members.

We are having missionaries pull members out of class for a few minutes and have private interviews with them! We are being bold! We even have the members pull out their phones and go through their contacts! Sunday is not a time to sit back and relax for us missionaries. It's game day. 

This is the only way we are going to hasten the work! So buckle up. I encourage all you members to just be more BOLD! If this is the most important work on earth, why is it not first priority for us? We have to be different and do different things if we want different results. So please, come and see.

There is no growth in the comfort zone, and growth out of the comfort zone.

If we do nothing, we are not keeping our covenants. I know you will be blessed if you light a fire, and join us!

Be not afraid;Only Believe

Elder Nelson