Jesus the Christ

My dear family and friends! 

FIRST OF ALL, and most importantly, HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALEXA!!!!!!!!!!!!! I can't believe you are 10 years old!!!! Where has the time gone by??!?! You are growing up WAYYYY to fast! I sure love you though!! 

This week I finished the book Jesus the Christ! I absolutely LOVED reading it over the past several months slowing learning and reading more about our Savior, Jesus Christ, His teachings on the earth, how to apply the parables He taught, His death, His birth, the prophesies before his birth, the Resurrection, Apostasy, Restoration, The Second Coming, etc. I love the very last sentence in the entire book where it is talking about the Second Coming and after the Millennium, it says, "Then shall he (Jesus Christ) be crowned with he crown of his glory to sit on the throne of his power to reign for ever and ever. The earth shall pass to its glorified and celestialized condition, an eternal abode for the exalted sons and daughters of god. Forever shall they reign, kings and priests to the Most High, redeemed, sanctified, and exalted through their Lord and God, Jesus the Christ."

 I know we all have the potential to be these exalted sons and daughters of God. He loves us. He wants us to be there and live with Him forever and ever. I know only in and through the Savior, Jesus Christ is this possible. By us, applying His Atonement to our lives, repenting daily for our sins and mistakes, and trying our best everyday to become better. I am so grateful for this gospel and the opportunity I have to share it with all the world--well, right now all the people of Taiwan! 

As I was studying for someone we were planning on meeting with this week, I came across these scriptures when Aaron was teaching Lamoni's father the gospel:

 15 And it came to pass that after Aaron had expounded these things unto him, the king said: What shall I do that I may have this eternal life of which thou hast spoken? Yea,what shall I do that I may be born of God, having this wicked spirit rooted out of my breast, and receive his Spirit, that I may be filled with joy, that I may not be cast off at the last day? Behold, said he, I will give up all that I possess, yea, I will forsake my kingdom, that I may receive this great joy.

 16 But Aaron said unto him: If thou desirest this thing, if thou wilt bow down before God, yea, if thou wilt repent of all thy sins, and will bow down before God, and call on his name in faith, believing that ye shall receive, then shalt thou receive the hope which thou desirest.

After Aaron had taught Lamoni's father some of the gospel about the plan of Salvation and how through this Plan, we can receive our Salvation-Eternal Life, exaltation, he wanted to take part of this JOY and HAPPINESS. Lamoni's father went and asked Heavenly Father for himself if the things he were taught were true and he got his answer. Like him, we through this gospel, can find TRUE joy and happiness. Follow the gospels teachings. Live the commandments and we will be blessed, we will prosper, and we will be saved at the last day!!

As for missionary work, we met with someone we met on the street last week. Her English name is Joy. 陳巧珮 is so cute.. We met with her, taught her the Plan of Salvation. She told us that ever since she was little, she has loved crosses and she hasn't ever really known why. Joy comes from a Buddhism background but she is really open to learning and expanding her knowledge of Christ. She has thought a lot about the questions that the Plan of Salvation has answered and she said that she has actually thought it was really similar to what we taught but without the resurrection part. She is really neat. She is in her 20's and currently looking for a new job so has quite a lot of time to meet. During the lesson, our member, Lu JieMei, invited her to be baptized and we set a goal for April 2nd! We are hoping to meet with her again for the second time tomorrow! 

The Temple was absolutely phenomenal last week. President and Sister Jergensen attended with us.  I was able to sit next to Sister Jergensen during the session. I look up to her so much. She is such an amazing woman. Just like my mom :) And then they made some waffles for us after in which we enjoyed eating and chatting with other missionaries. 

I hope you all have a great week! I can't believe how fast time is going! The snow is melting away and spring is going to be here and gone before we know it!! 

I love you all!! 

Love, 

Sister Haacke

 Before the temple last week, we went to the great Chang Kai Shek Memorial Hall and watch the changing of the guards. It never gets old! I love it!
  

 

 

 This is 蘇姐妹 (Su JieMei). She is in our ward and was companions with Erica Lindley when she served in TaiZhong! There are actually two members from my ward that served as companions with her!

 Going home last night after meeting with a member and her two daughters. :)  Elder Payne, Sister Wong and I.

Temple Tours

My Dear Family and Friends, 

It's really early in the morning right now but I am extremely EXCITED because TODAY we get to go to the TEMPLE! I feel like I haven't been forever and I am so looking forward to being able to go. This week was a bit of a challenging one. But, I don't want to dwell on that too long, so I'll share some tender mercies and miracles we saw! 

On Thursday, Sister Wong and I got to go spend the day doing temple tours in the chapel next to the temple. When we got there, there was a man sitting inside the chapel. We started talking to him and he is from China. He came to Taiwan to have a more 'peaceful' Chinese New Year and to just take a break. Well, he came in contact with the church in Hualian and wants to be baptized so bad. He had been studying with the Jehovah Witnesses for a while but he didn't really like their concepts on family. Well, he met our church and LOVES every aspect of it and wants to be apart of it. He has talked to one of the Elders in the mission office about it and they are trying to figure out plans for him to schedule a time to go to Hong Kong and be baptized there. He was telling us about how all his family thinks he is crazy for wanting to join a Christian church and they oppose, but he doesn't care. He knows this is what he needs to do!!

We also gave a tour to an investigator some other Elders brought in who is getting baptized in a week. When we were in front of the picture of Christ being baptized, we asked her why she has the desire to be baptized. She said, "Because that is what Heavenly Father wants me to do and I want to follow His council." What a pure, simple, and true statement. 

We also had a neat experience where some other Elders brought in one of their new investigators. Her husband is about to pass away from Parkinson's Disease. She is so calm about it though and knows this is what is best for him. She herself has had some near death experiences. When we shared Joseph Smith's first Vision with her, the Spirit was so special. After I recited it, she breathed in really deep and said she really knows what it means when Joseph was explaining the brightness of the light. God has been preparing her and now is her time to come and learn and accept the gospel. 

The temple grounds are so so sacred! I am so grateful for the temple we have in Taiwan!

Last Monday we met with our investigator, Zhu DX. We had a great lesson explaining more about the Book of Mormon and answering his questions. He is a man who is very afraid of people and it really stresses him out. It stresses him out meeting with us because he is really afraid to go to church and be around so many people. We talked more about his concerns and then after his lesson, we went all together to our Bishop's house for FHE and Elder Payne made us all hamburgers. There wasn't a ton of people there, but after we sat for a while outside talking to him and going through his stress. Heavenly Father has blessed me with some experiences like what he is going through when I was younger. It took me this long though to figure out why I would get so nervous in junior high and part of high school. But, I was able to connect to him and share what I have done to overcome these fears. We continue to encourage him and we will see what happens over the next few weeks. 

We had a few neat lessons with some new investigators which we will see what happens with them this week. Sadly, no one came to church but we are hoping we will be able to get some investigators to come with us this next week. We are continuing to find and be more inspired while finding. We met a really neat lady in a park on Sunday afternoon who has no understanding of Christ but wants to learn! 

Another neat miracle is we were finding on Saturday afternoon and I went and talked to a man waiting for his bus. We first invited him to English class and then gave him a restoration tract. His bus came and as he was going to get on his bus, I asked for his number, as he was walking and getting on the bus he said his number really fast and I hoped that I wrote it down correctly. Well, we were at the chapel Saturday night about to watch a short movie with some RC's and LA's and guess who walked in?! This man we met. He said on the bus he looked through our tract. He wants to learn more. We taught him how to pray, gave him a book of Mormon, and set him up for tonight. He has yet to confirm his appointment as of right now but we are hoping we can get a hold of him!

I continue to learn more and more everyday. I am grateful for this challenge Heavenly Father has given me. I often think why I am experiencing the things I am everyday but I know it is because only through these experiences am I going to learn the things that Heavenly Father wants me to learn.  An RC shared this scripture in Sacrament meeting on Sunday:

"And now, O my son Helaman, behold, thou art in thy youth, and therefore, I beseech of thee that thou wilt hear my words and learn of me; for I do know that whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day." Alma 36:3

It is really similar to one of my favorite versus in Alma 38:5...Alma is just talking to one of his other sons. :) I know when we trust in Heavenly Father's plan and try our very hardest to continue moving forward and learning from every experience, we will become who Heavenly Father wants us to come. 

Family, It is hard to hear of the passing away of Buddy. I am so sad to hear that he left this earth before I had the opportunity to meet this adorable dog. I know we will be able to see him again though! Know I am praying for you all!! 

LOVE YOU ALL!! 

Thank you so much for your support and all your prayers. I can feel them. You all give me so much strength. I love you all so much! 

Love,

Sister Haacke

Hamburger making.

 

 I saw Jenson from Tao4 at JinHuaJie on Thursday!!
   

 This little boy is absolutely adorable.

 

 AMY! She leaves on her mission soon!! I miss her so much!!
  

 The man from China who wants to get baptized.
  

 Sister Wong makes us lunch and it is SO good! I am so grateful for her!!!!!!!

 This family we ate with has a Noah's Ark just like home! I told them I felt like home when I saw it and they all laughed and convinced me to take a picture by it and send it home :)

 

 Also, I remember Dad sending me a picture like this when he ate with some missionaries when he was in Taiwan! We went to 101 (but not to the top last week because of the weather).

 FHE last night at Bishop's house. It was the Lantern Festival yesterday and so we made TangYuan's.
 

 

 

 

 

 We ate lunch yesterday with Bishop's wife.

 

Celebrating Chinese New Year

FAMILY AND FRIENDS! 

This week was pretty crazy. Chinese New Year. Sun. Food. More Food. Firecrackers. Even more Food. Sickness...and the list can go on and on. 

Chinese New Year: Everything shuts down for the entire week and everyone leaves to go back to their home towns and spends the week with their families. But, with that being said, we ate at a members home everyday for lunch and dinner. Every meal, there was so much food prepared. There is a saying here that during Chinese New Year there has to be leftovers because it means that the home and family will have enough food for this year and they won't go hungry. So, with that being said, 15 lunch/dinner appointments later...we all ate SO much and I am going away from the week about 2.5 kilograms heavier than I was going in :) 

Most of this week will be described though all the pictures. Bear with me on all the emails.  Sorry in advance.

The week's weather was also absolutely AMAZING!! SO WARM! But, yesterday evening, it started to get colder and a cold front came in with rain :(

Sister Wong had a bug at the beginning of this week so we had to take a few hours inside so that she could rest. It was a good time to get caught up on some things: organizing our area book, contacts, etc. But, despite the sickness, we went a way this week with some neat experiences. 

We met with Zhu DiXiong again this week and read 1 Nephi 1 with him. He struggles pretty seriously with depression and coming to church makes him really nervous. He is a great man though and I know the gospel can help him. As we called him this morning, he told us he is really nervous to meet with us and doesn't really want to meet anymore because church gives him too much stress. Please pray for us tonight as we meet with him for possibly the last time that the Spirit can comfort him and know that he is loved. 

This past week, we also had the opportunity to meet with a referral. He went on his own to church last week at the chapel next to the temple because he was really curious! We met with him and had a great lesson about the Restoration. He seemed really into it and is really curious about learning more. He also came to church with us yesterday and wants to come to some activities if he has time! He is really great but just doesn't want to sit down and meet with us. We are praying for him in hopes he has the desire to prepare to join the church. 

We continue to spend a lot of time on the street building up our investigator pool. It was somewhat more challenging this week with a lot of people being out of the city but there were still many to talk to! On this street, we met a 20 year old girl. She is currently a college student and is super sweet. We talked to her for a while about God's love for her and she was willing to set up for two weeks out when she returns home from her vacation to Malaysia! Right after talking to her, we met a mom with two girls. They were waiting for their dad to come and pick them up. They occasionally attend church. The dad's family is somewhat Christian and the mom isn't at all, we couldn't share too much because their dad got there pretty quickly with the car but we got their phone numbers and they seems like great potentials! I am really looking forward to this next week being able to follow up with a lot of the people we have met before Chinese New Year who told us to call them after the holiday.

Now, just for some laughs.  I literally had the most blonde day on my mission this week. To make a long story short, we had a dinner appointment in the town over from SanChong called LuZhou. We were to meet all the missionaries there.  Well...we took the wrong road and got extremely lost. We biked for an hour and 10 minutes. I felt so bad for my poor trainee.  She was just following me around. We ended up making a HUGE circle around SanChong and then hooked up with the SanChong Elders who were going to be 45 minutes late to dinner due to an appointment and followed them. Then after dinner, the LuZhou elders asked us to set up with an investigator who was at this dinner who doesn't want to meet with Elders and we accidentally set up with their RC instead of the investigator...and many more things occurred...long story short, we went home Saturday night with smiles on our faces excited for a new day ahead of us :) 

As I have been pondering this week about the comfort we can receive from our Heavenly Father and Our Savior, Jesus Christ, I came across a scripture found in D&C 68:6. This Scripture was given to some Elders of the church:

"Wherefore, be of good cheer, and do not fear, for I the Lord am with you, and will stand by you; and ye shall bear record of me, even Jesus Christ, that I am the Son of the living God, that I was, that I am, and that I am to come."

I love this verse. The Lord will constantly be by our side. No matter what! We need not fear. The Lord also has commanded and asked us that we, here on this earth, have the great and sacred calling to teach all people. To bring them unto Him. We are to bear testimony of Him frequently. I know my Savior Lives. I know He sacrificed for you and me. I know He knows us and is aware of our every action. He is there during the happy and the sad times. He is there to lift us up and to carry us. He is also there to rejoice with us in our happy and exciting times during our lives. I am grateful for my Savior. I love my Savior! 

I hope you all have a great week! I love you all!! 

AND, I totally forgot yesterday was Valentine's Day until our Bishop wished us a Happy Valentine's Day yesterday! SO, Happy Valentine's day! Sure love you all! 

Love, 

Sister Haacke

 We went to XiMenDing last preparation Day.

A member's nonmember Mom. Who I LOVE. We met this week. She calls me Barbie. :)

 More of XiMenDing

 

 At Lulu's house.

Sushi Express

 We saw some members at the park and they have pet turtles they were taking on a walk!

 

 Dumpling making!

Pan JieMei. I LOVE HER! She is coming to America in December and is going to come visit us! 

 Going to Zone Meeting Sister Wong was not feeling that great!

 

 We did a skit for our share at lulu's house. We acted out when Nephi's bow broken bow.

So Sunny and beautiful!!

Chinese New Year

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!!! Celebrating the Chinese New Year has started! Celebrating lasts about a week and our schedule is full eating lunch and dinners with members in our ward!! I am looking forward to all the food and being able to get to know the members here in SanChong! 

So, I don't have much time because we are going to eat at a members home soon. Here are a few miracles from this last week. 

EARTHQUAKE: Yes, the 6.4 earthquake did hit Taiwan in the middle of the night--early Saturday morning. Yes, I did feel it. It was pretty long. Sister Wong didn't feel it though. :) We live on the 9th floor of our 24 Floor apartment building and it literally felt like we were swaying back and forth. Nothing fell in our apartment. Everything is okay up here in the North. :) The South got hit pretty bad and we have heard a little bit about the disaster down there. Please keep the missing and their family members in your prayers! 

We met with one of our new investigators we found on the street last week: Zhu Di Xiong. Zhu DX is in his 40's, not married and is preparing to try and test into a Religious Institute School to study different religions. We didn't know this till we met with him but he was baptized when he was young but then hasn't been to church for many many years. He lives alone here in SanChong and is looking for more peace and comfort in his life. In our first lesson with him, he asked some really deep good questions about the Restoration. Long story short, we ended up talking about the Priesthood--Aaronic and Melchizedek and the roles of it all in our lives. He seemed fascinated by the fact we have another book--The Book of Mormon--that we can read from. We invited him to baptism, he didn't accept a certain date but is really willing to continue learning. He committed to coming to church with us on Sunday--until Saturday night, when we were making daily follow-up with him, he told us he couldn't come anymore because some things came up in his family. We talked to him a little bit more about it and turns out, he is really nervous to come because of how many people are going to be there. I believe Zhu DX suffers from depression. Over the phone, we bore powerful testimony that this gospel can help him be happy and find peace in his life. He replied by saying, "Really?" We promised him and he said then, can I meet with you again? We set up for Tuesday night. He made sure it would only be us, him, and one other person (a female member since he is a male)  and he said he will read the Book of Mormon every day until then. I am so grateful for the opportunity I have to teach this man and watch how the gospel will be able to change his life. 

Sister Wong and I filled this week with finding again. Probably one of the most neatest, spiritual contacts of my life occurred this week. We were waiting for the Elders and our Mission Leader to eat dinner together and we decided to contact around the area. We started talking to a Du JieMei. She is the cutest thing. We started talking to her about Jesus Christ and she really wants to know more. She told us she has been thinking recently about trying to start going to a church but then just hasn't put in the effort to go look for a church to start attending. As we started talking to her more, she lives literally right behind the building that our church is in! There on the street, we set a baptismal date with her for March 12th. We have to wait until the end of this week to meet with her again (due to Chinese New Year) but we are all really excited! 

I just want to bear my testimony that I know this work is true! I am so grateful for the gospel in my life. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ. I know that He lives and loves everyone of us so dearly. He sacrificed for us so that we can overcome our weaknesses and sins and to also overcome death. Our Heavenly Father has prepared a perfect plan for every single one of us. When we seek His guidance, He is more than willing to reach out and help us! I love representing Jesus Christ. It is honestly and honor to put His name on my chest everyday. I know this work is a work of miracles. I have truly seen the Lord's hand in my everyday life. Especially this last week as we have been striving to build up our investigator pool. 

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH! 

Have a great week! HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!!

Sister Haacke 

 

 Du JieMei, a member, and Sister Wong and I eating dinner.

 

 Sister Wong and I

 

 The start of 過年！！！

 

 王家庭. Lunch #1.

 

 Annie and her mom. Annie is a member who got baptized while she was going to school in America. This is her mom, Zhu JieMei. From China. She came to Taiwan for the Chinese New Year. Annie asked that we teach her about the Plan of Salvation so that she could know more about what Annie believes. We did and we had a great lesson. China better be opening up soon! The people there are so prepared!

 

 So, I forgot to mention, the SanChong missionaries moved right before Sister Wong and I whitewashed this area. We now live in literally the nicest apartment. This is the few from the roof going over to Taipei.

 

 Our District 

 

 Sunday night Dinner #1

李姐妹 (a member) and her daughter.