Hello!
This p-day marks roughly my second month in Korea. Time seems to go by pretty fast here, though people tell me it goes by even faster later.
Didn't get a letter from home this week. :(
Oh, and General Conference is coming up! I'm kind of excited, which is strange since I've never been all that pumped for it ("10 hours of hearing people speak...!?"). I'm not sure if I'll get to hear it in English, which means trying to stay awake will be quite the challenge. I'll get to read the talks eventually in English though (all missionaries get the "Liahona").
Not sure what to write about, but here's a couple of snapshots of this week I guess...!
Met one Robert on a bus. He's from Malawi (somewhere in Africa...). He saw us, asked us what we were doing, where we were from, etc. We told him we were missionaries, and he started asking us about the Gospel, what we need to do to be saved, basically asking us what we believe in. We were excited - finally, someone interested (and he doesn't speak Korean, so we got to talk to him in English!)! We got his number, and agreed to meet again later.
It turns out that he's some kind of minister or preacher at a nearby church (He's Presbyterian, I think), and he's here in Korea to finish up some kind of degree in religion. So the lesson didn't go as we had thought it woudl.
Haha, we wanted to teach him about the Restoration, but we were surprised to find out that he wanted to teach us! He totally led the discussion, which was kind of funny (we met at a nearby park, and he opened with "Well, to get to know each other a little better, I would like to hear about you. Where are you from? What do you like to do? Tell me about your family, that sort of thing."). He even offered to say a prayer to start!
Teaching him was a little frustrating, just because he wasn't there to be taught - oh boy, was he ever there to teach. I guess basically, he doesn't believe that prophets are needed after Christ came to the Earth, and he also believes that the Bible is the only book we need to learn about God. He knew the Bible really well, which was impressive - he used a lot of scriptures to explain what he believes, and lay down some serious doctrines on us.
We didn't really get anywhere, but it was still kind of fun. He gave us a commitment to read the entire Bible -_-. I don't know how much he learned about us, and I think he just concluded that we were sincere but confused. He was a really nice man though; he said he was concerned because we didn't study the Bible enough.
We met for like an hour and a half, with him speaking like 80% of the time. Towards the end, I gave up on teaching, and just tried to focus on bearing testimony and telling him what I know. I felt good about it afterwards, and I'm glad that I didn't try to "Bible-bash" or outsmart him or whatever (not that I would have won anyways!).
Not sure if we're going to every try and meet with him again... we want to help him, but I'm not sure if we wants our help. We'll see!
Met another man who speaks English (yes!). We were at a local college, and met a guy named Amin. He's from Iran, and when Elder Jo asked him about his religion, he said that he believes that there's one God, and that he's looking for Him so he can worship Him. What!?
So we ended up teaching him a little bit, talked about Joseph Smith, how God answered his prayers, and how God can and will answer Amin's prayers. It seemed like Amin wanted to learn more about Christianity in general, rather than our church specifically, but hey. We gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon (an English copy that Elder Jo just "happened" to bring along!), and he promised to read every line of it.
We haven't been able to contact him, and we know he has to go back to Iran sometime, so we're a little bit worried, since there's obviously no missionaries there. If nothing else, he's got a copy of the Book of Mormon, but we really want to help him in his search for God.
I guess then to conclude...
I'd like to challenge you all to study your scriptures more! Before I came on my mission, I never really studied them - I'd read sometimes, and if I had to prepare to teach or something, I would study, but other than that, pretty much never studied scriptures. But now as a missionary, I've realized how much I don't know about the Gospel. Sure, I tend to know the facts, but the hard questions - the whys, the hows - those I sometimes can't answer.
I feel like there's never enough time to study scriptures out here in Korea. There's always a more that I could understand better, or more that I'm not really sure about. I kind of regret not being more diligent back home, but I guess I didn't really need to study as much and/or I just didn't know any better.
Praying before and during study for understanding helps, as does really wanting to find an answer to your question. It takes a lot of effort and time to study, but really knowing and understanding doctrines plays an important role in being able to testify, I think.
Thank you all for all your love and prayers! I'll keep trying at always working hard.
Love,
- Elder Luke
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