Elder Ryan Woolley in Hong Kong!: Victoria 3rd Splits week 84

Helloo Everybody!!

It's been a very exciting week! Biggest news first, Victoria 3rd branch is splitting! We are founding the Kowloon Mandarin branch! It is so exciting, we have been working on laying the foundation and preparing the area for the branch for soo long, it is good to see all the work I did in Kowloon paying off, I know so many good saints over there who will be blessed with a church closer to home. I am sad I won't be at their meetings, but I know it is going to flourish! I am happy to be helping out here on the Hong Kong Island side to continue to build up the new Wan Chai branch. It reminds me of when the church was formed, there was like less than 20 members at the time, amazing to see how He moves the work forward! I am excited to see where these branches go over the next few years. I love seeing all the members and especially the recent converts grown and contribute to the work, I love them all so much!

We also had moves calls last night, we will be in a tri-panionship with a little trainee! I'm happy to stay with Elder Garcia, and we're excited to have a new buddy with us! The island is doing really well right now, Zhao jm will be getting baptized this Sunday! I am so excited for her, she is an amazing person, and has been prepared for this day for a long time. Her full story is amazing, just shows us how much God prepares his children. When she lived in Shen Zhen one of her friends joined the church and moved to Utah. She then took a month trip through America, and stayed with the friend in Utah for a period and toured Temple Square, then went back to China, moved to Hong Kong, and met the missionaries. She has been given small things here a little there a little until she has finally made the decision! I am really excited for her baptism. It has been a long time coming!

Having dim sum with Zhao jm

In a really sad turn of events, our friend May has to go to Shang Hai for work for a time, it was sad to say goodbye though she should be returning here and there over the next few months. She has gone through a very complicated stage in her life, she shared with us all the things she has learned and all the ways she has changed in our short 6 weeks of sharing the gospel with her, and it was very touching. Truly the gospel has power to change behavior and nature more than anything else. We know helping her form this relationship with God in this hard time of her life has helped her be more stable, and really believe him. She used to question how God could exist and let all the bad things happen to her even though she asked for Him to not let them happen, but now she has learned to really trust him, and seek to learn and find His will throughout the situations of life. It is an important lesson to learn and I have enjoyed seeing her grow spiritually. I hope she will attend church in Shang Hai, and still believe she will be baptized in the future!

Elders Woolley and Garcia with May

I went through a sort of weird stage for the first half of this week, this week started off really slow with a lot of disappointments, and for some reason it threw me into a weird mindset, and for a day or two I experienced one of the few times on my mission where I found myself tiring of 'doing good' for lack of a better way to say it. And the grind of the work seemed to really wear on me, I was praying at the beginning of that week for the passion to come back, because for some reason it was down a bit. But it didn't seem to comeback, and I was confused! I was in this state when we went to a meeting with the District President Holyoak for the International District, and we had a very inspiring discussion about pushing the work forward, how we are already given everything we need to succeed in the work, we just have to be humble and use it and not always ask for more. Then he paused, and went on to share some thoughts about the mission, told us to not go through the missions, but let the motions go through us, to really always be serving a mission, and really ponder on all our experiences and conversations with leadership and learn and grow in such a way that our natures are changed, so that when we go home and take off the tags we don't revert back to our old selves, but continue progressing along the path of service, because we are the future of the church! I was hit right in the core and felt a big boost, and just thought don't be complacent and stop thinking about yourself! Again I had been thinking too much about myself. I reflected a lot on what he said and pondered on the many amazing blessings and people I have met on the mission, and pondered upon the teachings we received in a recent Zone Conference, and again felt that fire of gratitude and passion to work hard and push the work forward came flooding right back! I am grateful that I received an answer to my prayers right away, and such clear counsel and a bit of personal chastisement from the Spirit. I really pondered a lot about what he said, and then we went out and just went right back to work, we went out finding and ran into an awesome guy right away on the pier at night, and gratitude and excitement just filled me up and I now know a cleared direction for myself, area, zone etc. Very grateful He pulled right back after a brief stumble.

I thought about something that we discussed in Zone Conference about repentance, sin is anything that estranges us from God. Any feelings of guilt estrange us from God, and we have to go through Christ's atonement to be brought back to being one with God, and to be able to standing his presence with confidence. I thought about the story of Nephi getting the plates from Laban, how the first two times failed because they went after it the worlds way, relying on chance, and on material possessions to get them. It wasn't only until Nephi relied on the Spirit, did it God's way that he was able to succeed. But the path of following Christ is not easy, Nephi had to do something that made him uncomfortable, he had to kill Laban to continue on the path and in order to allow the people to have the word of God. Of course as we walk the Lord's path we won't have to kill anyone, but I believe and have experienced on my mission the Lord bringing me upon my own 'Laban's' lying in front of me, that I have to get rid of so that I can continue and grow and not 'dwindle' in unbelief. It is the same for our investigators who encounter their personal Laban's on the path of discipleship, where they must do something they have never done before, something that scares them like quitting smoking, praying, telling their family that they want to join a church etc. But we know the result of overcoming those things is worth the difficult moment of decision with Laban lying in the path. I am grateful that we have those moments of decision and growth, and know that as we rely on the Spirit which leadeth to do good we will be ok! I am grateful that the Spirit helped me get over a little Laban of complacency this last week, and I am so excited for the future in this area, it is such a bright future!

Love you all!

Elder Woolley