Book of Mormon Miracle

 Sept 5, 2023,

 

Hello Everyone, 

 

We are working hard. We are doing a lot of administrative work so a lot of sitting. We are working hard at getting well rounded in more ways than one! My ankles are often swollen at the end of the day because I sat too much. In last couple of weeks we have said good bye to 5 elders. It is hard to say good bye every time. I am proud of the hard work they did here and how they really wanted to bring people to the Savior. We welcomed 4 elders who have been serving in the states waiting for visas, 3 of them have been waiting a year. We also welcomed 3 local sisters after they went to the MTC in Manilla. I love seeing the joy of the new arrivals from America. They have waited to be here for so long. I know they had prayed many fervent prayers for their visas to go through. We are so happy to get more local missionaries in our mission. We need them! The three sisters who just arrived are incredible. 

Some facts about living here: the money is the Vietnam Dong (Pronounced like dome) the exchange rate is about 24,000 to $1. They no longer use coins. The smallest bill is a 1000 and the largest is a 500,000. So from less than 1/2 a cent to about $20. It is a cash society. If I order from Shopee or Lazada (Like Amazon) they want cash on delivery. You don’t pay with a card online. If I go to a souvenir shop they may take a credit card but they may not, so I need to always have enough cash. When I get my haircut or buy flowers I pay cash. Bigger stores will take a card. The water here treated. You can bathe, shower, brush your teeth or wash your dishes no problem. It is high in chlorine so everyone buys filtered water to drink. We all have the large office water dispensers in our homes and apartments. All churches are rented. Some are in commercial office spaces, some are converted homes. The mail system is very unreliable. Email, texting, messenger, and Marco Polo, are the best way to stay in touch. Our full compliment is 62 missionaries. We have never reached it. We have gotten into the 50’s but not 60. We do not know the language. When we interview, teach, train or give talks it is interpreted for us. This can be side by side, where we say one sentence and they translate it until the talk is done. So really a 10 minute talk is a 5 minute talk given twice. That is the most common. Or if we are speaking to a smaller group everyone wears a translation headset and a translator talks simultaneously while we talk. I try to give them my scriptures and quotes ahead of time if we are doing that. Larry loves to drive in the traffic. I never want to. I know I would wreck, scratch the car or something the first day. He has a good sense of distance, depth and flow of the traffic. It’s so crazy. Red lights do not mean anything to motorcycles. They do risky turns and moves all the time in front of cars. Most homes do not have hot water in the kitchen, only in the bathroom and sometimes only in the master bathroom. We had a 2 liter hot water tank for our kitchen sink and requested a bigger one so we could wash dishes in hot water. The maintenance guy wanted to know why. 90% of apartments do not have ovens. If they have an oven it is a large toaster oven. The mission home has a bigger oven, but it is smaller than an American oven it has one rack.. I have two units in my stove top. 

Miracle: “Wow BIG miracle for the Vietnam Hanoi Mission tonight!!

When we went finding today, we were a little nervous with the new guidelines, but determined to try our best to follow them! And wow we were so blessed for it! The first people we talked to were christian and invited us to their house nearby! When we got there, we found A BOOK OF MORMON already on their front shelf!! So crazy! One of the girls has almost read the whole thing, marking and highlighting it too. She has never met missionaries before but is so excited to finally learn more about this book she's been reading! She reads lots of other scriptures too but said that we only need the book of mormon, it is enough for our life. She go the book 5 years ago at a book exchange. It was actually a triple combination.” Sister Stobbe

Miracle: This is our miracle this week. We are safe, the mission home is safe after an electrical fire on the third floor. It started in a breaker box, when no one was around to put it out but it did not keep burning. God is watching over us.

 

Conversion story:  

August 27, 2023 Lê Hổng: Quan Sau Branch

Cô Hồng is the mother of 4 and grandmother of 4. She is the second member of her family. She found the gospel through the extraordinary example of her son, Tài (was baptized several months prior). She saw the added peace and safety the gospel had brought to her sons life and wanted that in hers. 

She quickly started to develop mighty faith in her Heavenly Father and her Savior Jesus Christ. Her faith, the faith of her son, and the faith of the missionaries led to her seeing the many miracles and blessings the gospel had in store for her. 

She is a visionary woman who had many dreams that helped to strengthen her faith and help her decide to be baptized. In one such dream, she saw a narrow path that led to an old and young person a far way off. A separate figure encouraged her to go down the path. But try as she might, she could not fit through the gate of the narrow path which she knew would led to joy. 

Another miracle in her conversation is her faith to follow the commandments of God. When we met with her to teach her about the word of wisdom, there was nothing to teach. She started sharing with us how she had seen a change in her son after he decided to quit tea and coffee. She decided to quit all tea, coffee, and alcohol too. She said she had never felt better and proceeded to teach and testify to the missionaries about the power of the word of wisdom before she ever knew what it was called.

Conversion story 2: Nguyễn Nhật Thăng

Thăng was referred to us from a social media ad about strengthening families. After that we called him and set up to meet him the next day. We met at the church, had a phenomenal first lesson with him and gave him a book of Mormon. He then later texted us the next day thanking us for meeting with him and saying that before meeting with us, he had a dream in which 2 missionaries in white shirts came to him, giving him a book and telling him to read it because of how important it is. He then later went on to take initiative and read the book of Mormon past our original invitation and already understood it so greatly. The second lesson, we had the most spirit filled lesson, teaching him the gospel and he accepted a baptismal date. He progressed so fast after this and developed early habits of reading and praying. He later faced troubles with the word of wisdom but by a miracle, faith, fervent prayer, and sheer desire to follow the savior he dropped it all in 2 weeks. After 5 weeks of learning, he was baptized and is doing so great. He truly has a light and is so happy. 

 

We have a mission motto; “In the Vietnam Hanoi Mission we live what we teach and we teach what we live.” In other words we teach the gospel and we live it. I am grateful for the gospel and for Jesus Christ. 

Love always, 

Sister Hughes