[ WHAT UP!!! ANOTHER WEEK ALREADY... ]

Dear Family and Friends: Hey guys!! How is everyone doing? Did you have a good week? From what I heard it sounds great! Our week was great...of course!!! Sorry I am on late by the way, we were helping a person in our ward with moving, well kinda. It's hard to explain. Anyways, I'm on now :)

We had a lot of success with our investigators. As you know, Lee-Say-Won has a baptismal date for this coming Saturday. She is doing well and I know she is ready, the only worry is that she is so scared to make the big step. She believes it all and is willing to follow the commandments, but is just scared. Also, her dad had surgery this last week so she has had to help with that a lot. Hopefully she will be having a baptismal interview this week though and that the next time I write home she will have had the courage to enter into the first covenant with our Heavenly Father.

 Another success we have had this week as far as investigators go is this 20 yr old girl Kim-So-Hee. She wants to learn English and at first she really knew nothing about religion at all, but now we have really been able to help her understand who God is and how He loves us. She is progressing slowly. Last time we met, we met with our ward mission leader, and after he told me that he has a really good feeling about her.

 An investigator we have really been working with is Charles. He has been meeting with us for about 2 1/2 months! When we started the whole first month was just english interest, and just put his head down for gospel time. Now we have in depth converstaions. His favorite one yet was about Adam and Eve and how is was for us to have joy!(2 Nephi 2:21-25) He just loved it. And last time we met we gave him the challenge to be baptized. He said he wasn't ready and needed time to think. He actually talked to his wife about it on saturday though and she completely opposed it. Not so good. But is shows that he has a desire if he would talk to her about it. We will meet him on friday and find out how to handle the situation.

 Church yesterday was one of the best 3 hours of church I have had in Korea. It was all very spiritual and well prepared. One of the ladies who spoke actually made reference to my talk last week and how she felt the Spirit so strongly. It really just made me feel so happy to know that people were able to feel the Spirit.

Next week is ward conference and I am 99.9% sure we are getting a new bishop. And we have a pretty good guess that is going to be our Ward Mission Leader. He is sooo cool so we are excited about that.

 Hmmm. Well my companion is doing sooo good. He is such a hard worker and I really got lucky. He is a way cool kid and I can see us being friends not only now but after the mission too. We're doin work!

Well family I love you guys and hope you have a great week. I am so grateful to be out here. I had no idea what a blessing this would be to me and my life. The more I sacrifice, the more I have to "pay back" becuase He just blesses me that much more. I am so grateful for our Savior. I know He lives. I love you guys so much. Be safe and have a good week! love, -- Elder Messick

[ SPRING HAS COME! ]

Another great week here in 송파! Really it was an extra good week for us here. We saw lots of progression with the work and things are just going really well.

To start, thank you so much for that package Mom, Dad, Grandma, and Grandpa! I was sooo happy to open that. It was full of sooo many goodies. Thanks again!

So yesterday on Sunday, I was asked to give a talk in Sacrament meeting! I felt a little nervous because we had some investigators there and i just wanted to help everyone feel the Spirit. I spoke on Moroni's promise and how we need to continually take his promise and strengthen our testimonies of The Book of Mormon. I think it went pretty well. You'll have a little surprise in a week or two in the mail that i think you'll like ;)

So I said we had people to church. Well 3 investigators came. Lee-Say-Won, Lee-Ju-Yun, and Kim-Chang-Nam (Charles). I was so happy that they were able to attend. Lee-Say Won is progressing a lot! In fact, we have set a baptismal date with her for the 28th of this month. I have spent a lot of time talking with her and settling concerns and helping her know that this really is the time. She is ready but just has to get over a few fears.

Lee-Ju-Yun. So basically everyone in our ward already thinks she is baptized haha. It is so funny. She has been 7 times now and just loves it. The only problem with her is her job at the Buddhist school. We are going to talk about it again this week and see how its going to work out. I feel like she is ready for baptism.

Lastly, Charles. He is the man who started out with just English interest but is really starting to grow faith in Jesus Christ. He has a ton of questions but we were working slowly with him.

Some more good news! Do you remember that lady I told you about that we met in the book store last transfer that had lotsss of interest in the family. Well we were going to meet her this last Tuesday but we had to cancel because we couldn't find a member to help. (Oh side note, in our mission we can't teach a female investigator without a male ward member present. Just a rule. and while on the subject, we aren't allowed to talk to women on the street unless they show interest and or talk to us. just if I never mentioned that now you know) So because we had to cancel she was sad and asked if I could call her and we could just talk about the Church on the phone. Anyways, she loved it!! she was taking notes over the phone and everything. I basically taught the whole restoration with parts of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and blessings of the family. It was an hour phone conversation. She is so prepared its incredible! I am so excited to meet with her this week.

We had a cool little experience on Friday. So my comp and i were really tired after a lot of walking and contacting that day and we were going to head home a little early, but we decided no we need to keep working. so we headed to visit a less-active with a little boy who she wants to be baptized. Anyways, on the way there we met this awesome lady with English interest and she is attending a church in English so she has religion in her life. then when we got to the little boy's house he was thrilled to see us. His mom moved to Australia for school so the boy and his sister are being watched by their grandma. This kid is such a stud and when we gave him a Book of Mormon he was just soo happy. When we left, we knocked the doors in his villa and found a little family and left them with 2 Book of Mormons. This is a real experience that shows how the Lord blesses us for our efforts. When we do that one thing, when we take that one step outside of our comfort zone, when we just sacrifice a little more, that is where the blessings come. That is when the Lord allows us to reap the rewards He so badly wants to give us. I know that this is true as i have seen it time and time again in my mission.

I love you all and I hope you have an awesome week. Be safe and be happy. 사랑해요.

love,
Elder Messick

These are pictures of a really cool cherry blossom tree festival we went to yesterday with an investigator. It was kinda weird haha. But there were sooo many people there! Unreal!!!!
A side note, when I look at this tree all I think of is how it looks like the Tree of Life in Lehi's vision. Pretty cool :)

[ WHATUPPPP ]

Whats up guys!! How was everyone's Easter??? I hope it was great! Easter here in Korea well, it wasn't too well known it seemed sadly. But we were able to do some missionary work and tell people of our Savior Jesus Christ.

This week was pretty fun! I got to watch General Conference this weekend!!! It was LEGIT! I loved it so much. I remember when when I used to think conference was just a break for us and an excuse to stay in pajamas all day, but now I love it! I feel like I can't write my notes down fast enough it's all just so good! Some of my favorite talks were Elder Bednar, Elder Holland, and Elder Ballard. They were very good and full of inspiration.

[ General Conference. Our room is tinyyyy haha ]

We had 3 investigators attend general conference! I was very happy with that. Sadly the korean translation isn't as powerful as hearing it from the mouths of the prophets themselves, but I am sure that they were able to feel a special spirit.

[ Our investigator Lee-Ju-Yun ]

I don't know if you already knew this but our new General Bishop was our former Area President. The one who came and spoke to us about a month or two ago. Kinda cool there is a little connection.

One thing I feel that was really stressed in conference was family and its importance. I feel like that is a perfect topic for what we are going though today throughout the world. The importance of family is dying. People are putting money before family and its just not the way to find happiness. I am so grateful for my family and our strong relationship. I am grateful that our foundation is in Jesus Christ and we understand that there is more to life than just here on this earth. There is all of Eternity to plan for and as we focus of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and enduring to the end we will reap the rewards of our actions here on Earth. I know that to be true.

A fun thing I got to do this week was inbetween sessions of conference on saturday we got some doubles ping pong going on and I got to play. It was super fun haha. I was playing with three koreans and me and our ward member, Sue, were doin work! haha. I love ping pong!

Mom, you asked about the weather and what springtime is like here. Well the weather is beginning to warm up! Our suit coats will be coming off on the 22nd. In korea, there is thing in the springtime where "yellow dust" comes through the winds and turns the sky all yellow. It's supposed to look super cool. It is starting a little bit and you could see it really well the other night with the full moon. The down side of it is that it makes it hard to breathe i guess. I donno I don't believe it hahah.

After our combined district meeting on wednesday we decided we were all going to go out to lunch for Elder Frei's birthday. We went to that amazing buffet called D'Maris. It was super delicious. I ate stake, fruit, ice cream, more beef, and I even tried chicken stomach haha.

[ Yoga on Elder Frei's b-day ]

Well family, I hope you are all doing well. I miss you guys, but honestly I would way rather be out here in the service of our Savior. I know this is where I need to be. I know that our Savior lives today. He leads this church. He has His hand in this work. He is here helping me every day.

Have a good week. I love you.

love,
Elder Messick

[ At the buffet ]

[ Overlooking my area :) ]

[ WOW! #7 ]

Hey guys!!!! Big news for me here in....same old SONG-PA! I am staying here for a guaranteed 2 more transfers because....I'm training!!! Can you believe it!? I sure can't. I was the youngest elder called to train by a long shot. So I got a ton on my shoulders. I am training an American too!! His name is Elder Clearwater. He is a superrr sick kid! In fact, get this. He knows McKenzie from college! How crazy is that! And he kinda like dated one of her best friends! I couldn't believe it. So ya we have connections. Elder Clearwater is going to be an awesome companion and we are going to work really hard here finding those ready to hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

My companion is from Provo Utah...of course hahah. We get along great! Obviously he doesn't know a whole lot of Korean which is kinda stressful for me, but this time in my mission I have really seen miracle after miracle of how true the Gift of Tongues is. I can testify to you that the scriptures where it says "just open your mouth and it will be filled" is true. There is no doubt about it. There has been times this week where I just didn't even know what I was saying. No like planned scripted anything. I just literally opened my mouth and it was just flowing out. The Spirit of God is just so strong right now and this week it has just been burning in my heart. I will share some experiences as some examples.

This week my companion wanted to see what knocking doors was like so, we hit up some apartment buildings. We were just about out of time when we decided to do one more set. We knew we couldn't get all of them, so my companion said, k we at least have to go to the 3rd floor. Well on the 3rd floor we met this really nice lady but was busy eating dinner so we asked if we could come back. Well this is were the story gets really good. We went back yesterday (2 days later) and knock at the door. She is home but just said sorry I can't when we asked to share our message. I don't know why, but I just had a prompting that I needed to not give up on getting in. I think I asked her in 15 ways if we could just talk with her for 5 minutes. I just felt like we needed to talk with her. So my comp had the idea of singing a hymn at the door becuase he has a great voice. So I told him to sing Joseph Smith's First prayer to a closed door. It was quite awkard, but at the same time this was totally led by the Spirit so it wasn't. All the sudden she turns on her little camera and starts watching us. We see her come over, turn her porch light on, walk up to the door and open it. CRAZY!!!! My comp got a little nervous so wanted me to talk. I just testified to her of the restoration of the gospel and how her family can be eternal. She loved it and we told her we will come back next week to share more. Quite an incredible experience. The Spirit was SOO Strong!

We ran into one of our investigators on the street this week and he took us out to dinner. He is such a nice man with the most sincere heart. He is progressing really well and really seeking for the truth. We taught a lesson with him this week and I felt promped to give a baptismal date. He didn't accept it but said when he knows its true he will pick a date. I am so excited about him and I know he will get an answer to his prayer as he commited to ponder about The Book Of Mormon for 15 min then pray about it.

We picked up a new investigator this week also which was awesome! I will update more about her as she progresses.

We visited a less active this week who told us that she wants us to come visit her kids every week. :)))))) She is moving to Australia for school, but her mother will take care of the kids. She really wants her son to be baptized so we are going to help with that.

Oh random thought, Pres. Obama came to Korea! He was only like 20 min away from me. THe closest I have ever been to the President of The United States was half way around the world hahah.

Well I am just about out of time. I hope you all have an amazing week! Keep me in your prayers this week and all of our investigators :) I love you guys. Stay safe please.

--
love,
Elder Messick

[ Closest i've been to seeing surfing!!!! hahahah ]