Elder Ryan Woolley in Hong Kong!: Lots of Miracles

Hellooo Everybooddyy!

We had a great week in Kowloon this last week, a big improvement over the previous week which was really encouraging! We have had lots of miracles this week, and everyone in the district is just working so hard, our district is really killing it in the branch right now, Heavenly Father is moving the work in this area along and I'm excited for the future of this area for Mandarin work!

Quick updates, our recent convert Yang Kai will be getting the priesthood, yay! I'm so proud of him! He is great and really likes watching mormon messages, especially about love haha, he continues to wear the same suit as me to church every week, it's the best! Jason is working hard with his father to try and get his permission for baptism on April 3rd! I really hope it goes through! We have been praying and fasting hard for him, I really have faith that this is Jason's time! He really has huge desire to be baptized, the branch has done a really great job strengthening, fellow-shipping, and being understanding to him, it's been really great to see their help and love, the work here has come a long way! We were in church the other day when Jason leaned over and said, I've been thinking about it, and I want to serve a mission. Those words touched my heart, to see his desire and testimony grow, and desire to serve a mission too is just amazing, I can't explain how happy that makes me. I feel like I don't deserve such a great investigator sometimes, it is a privilege to teach the gospel. He still has a long way I know, but with his faith and his great goals, I know these obstacles will fall before him. I can't wait for his baptism! We also managed to give our buddy Chen Guo Wu a baptismal date which was also great, I'm not sure if any of you remember, but we started teaching him a month or so ago, he was taught long ago, and when we called him again it was a sign to him that God had not forgotten him. He went out of town and just got back recently. He has a very hard past, and I can see how the hope and love of God's light will bless him so much. He readily accepted a baptismal date, it will not be an easy process, but I know that Christ's atonement will heal him. I can't help but be overwhelmingly excited for him to feel that amazing feeling of the Atonement working in his life, and to help him experience the fulness that this change brings. It will change his life! Our other investigators are all man man lai but it's really picking up recently!

We had another great experience while we were finding, we were in an area that we hadn't been to before, but had felt prompted to go finding there that night. We had no idea really where we were going, so we just walked around, I kept praying to know where to go, but felt nothing really specific so we just kept walking, making turn after turn and talking to people, but nothing really special happened. Finally we were walking up a hill and saw this guy up ahead, I joked to Elder Grayam and said 'there he is' and we started talking to him, and to our surprise it really was him! It was amazing, he was a former investigator of awhile ago, and he recognized us right away as missionaries. We had a great conversation with him, and hope to be meeting with him again in the future! I was shocked, we had prayed the whole time, but had not felt any promptings, or even any small impressions, yet somehow we were guided by the Lord still! It reminded of two quotes, one by Utchdorf where he says something like we can't sit on the road to Damascus waiting for a Saul-Paul experience, we have to act, and another quote by maybe Marion G. Romney where he says "we have to move our feet in order for God to guide our steps." I think a lot of times we don't really notice how we are being guided by God to do his work. It doesn't have to be large obvious feelings, or even ones that we notice. As long as we are willing to walk, to act, and faithfully move forward He can guide and use us sometimes without us even knowing. That is why we have to have prayerful hearts and be worthy of the Holy Ghost, so that we, who bear the "vessels of the Lord", are pure and can be whatever means He needs us to be to administer to His children.

I am so grateful for this mission for teaching me a lifetime of lessons in just these months that I have been here for. I am so happy I have so much more time left to learn how to consecrate myself more, and to try my best to give Him my all! I wish I could write more but time today is short!

Thank you all for all you have done for me throughout my whole life!