Week 33 - Surin, Thailand (October 12, 2014)

Lilly and Daysie had a Roadrunner Fundraiser at their school this week. Took the morning off from the office to go watch them. Daysie's run was at 9:15 am in the morning. She did 13 laps and Lilly had hers at 11 am where she ran 15 laps. Needless to say, I owe each them some money this week.

Grandma Capps was visiting from Idaho and was able to see Lilly run but missed Daysie in the morning. It was hilarious when Daysie came walking out of school and saw Great Grandma at Lilly's run. She was so upset great-grandma wasn't at her run (Daysie has this walk where she lowers her shoulders, slump her back, and walks when she's upset. That's what she did when she saw great-grandma, from 50 yards away, as she stomped her feet). Great-Grandma asked "what's the matter honey?" That's when Daysie said, with a really upset voice, "you didn't come to mine but you came to Lilly!"

Little background, grandma didn't know about Lilly and Daysie's run, until I told her about Lilly. That's when she said to pick her up from aunt Melody so she can come to watch the run.  Then, in the evening, Daysie really let Wan, my wife, know how disappointed she was. She said, "grandma , you didn't come to my run" Wan responded by saying "Aww, I'm sorry, I had to work". Guess what Daysie said? She said, "well, grandpa worked, but he came". Here are some videos of Daysie and Lilly I sent to Elder Matt Boonmee. The following is Elder Matt Boonmee email response to us.

"...Holy cow, they are soooooo grown up! Tell them DON"T FORGET ME!!...Conference was awesome. This is my second conference out on the mission. I remember the last one like yesterday, I can't believe that I'm already almost at my year mark! I have only 2 more months until I'm there.

We went to the church for conference. Then we went into a different room for it in English.
Scripture studies has been great for me. I have learned so much. I also learned a little bit of the historical background of the sons of Mosiah. I will expound a little more in a later email. But I've been studying about temples as well. Going to the temple regularly is sooooo important. ...great reading in the "Preparing to enter the temple" And it goes really deep into all that kind of stuff.

I've also been reading in Jesus the Christ. It talks about almost every single thing that happened in Jesus' life, before, during, and after. It is a great one as well.

In the Book of Mormon, I've read it all before, but now I'm in the war chapters. Ever since I've studied about the background of it, the fact that at that point the Nephites are now in a democracy just barely changing from the monarchy, but that is for another email to talk about. But just a little taste, is that The Sons of Mosiah are Princes. I'll talk about that more.

Today we are going to Moo Baan Chaang (The Elephant Village) to go see elephants, so I hope the lack of photos this week will be made up by next weeks photos.

Anyways, I have to go, the bus is leaving soon!
Love Elder Boonmee"

Daysie's run

Lilly's run

Week 20 - Bangkhen, Thailand (A visit from Thailand side of the family)

วันนี้มี update เพราะมีญาติฝ่ายคุณแม่มาเยี่ยมน้องแม็ทที่บางเขน.

Just a little update. Today (Monday Bangkok), elder Matt Boonmee had a first visit from his aunts, uncle, and cousins who live near by, in Bangkhen and Nonthaburi area.

He hasn't seen them since he was three years old. So I'm sure he was very excited to see them all.

------------------------------------------

Last week we mentioned that elder Matt Boonmee has moved from Sakon Nakhon to Bangkhen district. This is the first place where he has his Thailand side of the family near by. His aunts and uncles just happened to live only a mile or two away (Bangkok time, it's about 45 minutes drive, depending on whether or not it's rush hour).  We gave him the information about them and ask that he give them a call. The following is his report.

"I tried calling aunt Noi and the phone isn't working. It keeps saying the phone isn't in service or hasn't been made yet. Is it the wrong number? can you give it to me again, maybe I wrote it wrong or something because I've been trying to call it for the past week.

This week we have some solid investigators coming to church. One said that she has been praying everyday and she has been receiving answers through her prayers. It's really cool to see how the spirit works through others. Today I'm planning on getting a suit cut. But not all too much again, just a lot of contacting and a lot of lessons. I had a cool experience a few weeks ago. I felt bad about something and I asked the Lord to forgive me and show me somehow that he has forgiven me. So the next day as I was studying the Book of Mormon, I came up in Mosiah 26 (โม​ไซยาห์ 26). 

It was very focused on forgiveness. It was a wonderful experience for me. It showed me the importance of the scriptures in my life. Well that's all I have. 

Love Elder Boonmee"

Week 11, Sakon Nakhon, Thailand

Week 11, Sakon Nakhon, Thailand

กรุณารอสักครู่สำหรับภาษาไทย

...something really cool I found out about the story of Jared.

Go to Ether 2 :22-23 Read it. So Ether is at a point where he feels he has done everything he can, but He doesn't know what else to do. So he studies the scriptures. Look at the footnote on the word "Windows" in verse 23. As you read in Genesis 6:16 Look at the Footnote on "Windows" again. Very interesting.
You really can have a direct revelation from the scriptures.

As I continue on as a missionary I will definitely see the Lord's hand in all of the work. The Missionaries really do almost little to nothing. We are only guiding them. Every commitment we make is for their own benefit and their own revelation. That is the only way they will know for themselves, that this is the true Church.

This week has been a little slow. But I know it is just a small bump in the road. Lately it has been raining super hard and we haven't been able to leave the house. This past week we had district conference with all of the areas in the Udorn district. We were eating after the meeting got out, and the members made Som Tam and Some type of Jerky. They told us that it was dog meat. I am not sure if they were joking or if they really did. They told us that they don't normally eat dog, but when visitors come in, they make dog haha. So I may have eaten Dog. Again.

My new companion is Elder Hogan. He is so similar to me. We have the same first name as well. But we are a good combo for a companionship. He has been out for a year now. So our district in Sakon is pretty young. We have two Elders that have been out for a year, then a greenie and me. So pretty fresh stuff.

I saw Elder Brown and he says hello as well.

So next week I will be calling you guys on skype. For your time in America, I will call around 8 p.m. on sunday. For my time in Thailand I will call at 9 a.m. on monday in Thailand.

So be ready to see my lovely face....

Week 6 (Finally caught up). Thai translation will follow later today.

กรุณารอสักครู่สำหรับภาษาไทย

Monday- We had a lesson fall through so we went out and invited and found a guy that we had taught last week and we didn't realize it was him! So we taught him but he hadn't kept his commitments because we later found out that he couldn't read. He said that he didn't understand the last lesson so we offered to help him read, as well as help me read, as always. Then we had a lesson with our investigator named Brother Liu. He came and was excited to say something. SO we started the lesson and went on and asked how the Book of Mormon has been. He said, OH! I have something to say. A few weeks ago he had been praying all day for multiple days. Whenever he had free time he said he would pray. So one night he had a dream that he was on top of a mountain and didn't know why. He then woke up and went to go read in the Book of Mormon. As brother Lui was relating his dream,  Elder Jex and I thought to ourselves, that sounds like Nephi's dream (of course we didn't know what each of us was thinking until the lesson was over). Anyway, brother Lui said, "As I turn the page to continue my reading, it was 1 Nephi 11:1 ("For it came to pass after I had desired to know the things that my father had seen, and believing that the Lord was able to make them known unto me, as I sat apondering in mine heart I was bcaught away in the Spirit of the Lord, yea, into an exceedingly high cmountain, which I never had before seen, and upon which I never had before set my foot.") and it was the exact verse that Nephi had his dream on top of a mountain. Needless to say, brother Lui was very happy to know it was an answer to his prayers. It is amazing. He is more than willing to follow the commandments.

Tuesday- We almost died. A members parents doesn't like us. So her parents came to the church to come get her but she had left already. So her mom was waiting by the church for some reason so Me and Elder Jex were about to leave and I felt that we needed to stay and wait for the other Elders. So I told them that we all need to get out of here and take a different alley way. When we got out of the alley, we found a member and said hello, and as soon as that happened the mom tried to run us over with her car and honked. So we all tried to get out of there as fast as we could....

Wednesday- One giant mistake I did was try to talk to a Farang. He was from Holland, and he was just interrogating me. He said what is different from your church, I said it is the true church and what not. Then he said, that's what everyone says. Then I talked about the restoration, and he just said, "......and?" I had no idea what else to say in English. We have got it easier here in Thailand for sure. The Khon Thai think it is either Buddhist or Christian. That's it.

...

Sunday- We had one of our investigators baptized. She is the Daughter of Mae Prayun. Who got baptized about two weeks ago.

It is amazing. They say the same things in their prayers as well, to have happiness. It's wonderful to see the gospel spreading through the members...

Anyways, love you all and hope to hear from you soon!

Joshua 1:9

Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the aLord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.