Note 17 from My Daughter's Chinese-speaking Mission in Vancouver: Spaghetti! 意大利面！

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a great week!

This week wasn't the most busy because me and Sister Hill both were a little sick this week and we didn't want to get anyone else sick.

After we got feeling better we visited our mission office - and I had: earrings from my Mom, chocolates from my favorite uncles, Encourage-mints and Empower-mints and two postcards from Rome where my Dad wrote:

He also sent this hilarious 1943 US Military Guide to speaking Chinese!

We only had a few lessons this week because a lot of lessons got canceled this week but it was still a good week!

I was thinking about faith (xìnxīn 信心) a lot this week, specifically faith unto miracles (qíjī yǒu xìnxīn 奇蹟有信心). How to have faith like that, and how to increase my faith. We've had so many little and big miracles these past few weeks and it's been SO COOL to see how when we have greater faith, miracles will come no matter what.

One of those miracles we had this week was that we saw our friend at church and he said we're good to keep meeting every Thursday afternoon! Which was SUCH a miracle because he's been hard to contact and we didn't know if he actually wanted to meet with us again or liked meeting with us at all. It was spirit-lifting to hear that he wants to meet every week!

At church 2 other people that have been taught by missionaries but kinda fell off the face of the earth came and talked with us! It was such an awesome day! Hopefully we'll be able to have lessons with them soon! Some blessings and miracles only come after working hard throughout the week.

We had lunch at a super fancy restaurant with a member and it was soooo gooood!

On Saturday we made homemade pasta and it was so fancy and I felt so classy - ha, ha!

On Monday me and my companion did our weekly planning and we started by reading some scriptures in Mark 2. Specifically verses 1-4: 

1 And again he entered into Capernaum after some days; and it was noised that he was in the house.

2 And straightway many were gathered together, insomuch that there was no room to receive them, no, not so much as about the door: and he preached the word unto them.

3 And they come unto him, bringing one sick of the palsy, which was borne of four.

4 And when they could not come nigh unto him for the press, they uncovered the roof where he was: and when they had broken it up, they let down the bed wherein the sick of the palsy lay.

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This is the story of the man with palsy that Jesus healed. In verse 4, the man's friends break up the roof in order to let their friend down for him to be healed. The thing that struck me about this story is that Jesus would have seen them taking the roof apart, and He knew why they were doing what they were doing, but He let them serve their friend, even though He could have said "stop, I'll come up there, it'll be faster." But He stopped and waited and was patient with the friends as they broke up the roof, and probably very slowly lowered Him down. He gave the friends the opportunity to serve and didn't stop them even though it may have been faster and much more efficient.

Christ shows the same patience with us as we are here on the earth. We are not perfect - sometimes we're quite selfish beings and not very good at thinking about other people. But this life is full of opportunities for us to serve others and to learn how to serve others. While Jesus is a much better missionary than I am, He has given me this opportunity to serve and to become better. It's quite a selfish thing to serve a mission, because it helps me so much, and it benefits me and my personal growth so much. 

Serving others will always bless us more than them, because no matter what we give to them, because who we are as a person is becoming better by serving them. This whole life is an opportunity to become better and to eventually become perfect by serving others. Jesus Christ makes this possible for us by giving us the opportunity to serve people imperfectly and ongoingly as he magnifies our efforts and magnifies us.

我爱你们！

Love you all!