Joshua's Song of Singapore: Week 24: Butterworth, Malaysia

The Ballad of Butterworth

Good morning! I hope that everyone is doing well and is having a great week!

My week was really great; we left for Singapore on Monday, and when we got in Elder Anglin and I went exploring a little bit. We went and explored the famous hotel that has a boat/swimming pool on top and took some really pretty pictures. Oh boy, Singapore is so different than Butterworth haha. Then, we had our first session of Zone Conference that night, and then all of the Elders stayed in a big house that some senior couples live in. It was so fun, it was like a big sleep over!

On Tuesday, we had our next sessions of zone conference. We even had a Christmas program, and our zone (8 missionaries) sang Silent Night in English, Chinese, and Malay. It was super fun! Zone Conference was technically over on Tuesday night, but Elder Anglin and I stayed in Singapore for one more day. So, on Wednesday we went on splits with some of the Singapore Elders. I went with Elder Boris, who was in his second week in the field! It was so fun; Singapore has so many people from China, which I absolutely loved haha! Their Chinese sounded so weird to me though, I am definitely used to the Malaysian accent now. That night we stayed at their house (it also had the Elders who serve in the Chinese ward in Singapore, so we had ANOTHER sleep over), and then woke up early to fly back to Butterworth.

When we got back to Butterworth (Thursday night), we had a pretty normal week. We met with lots of the people we are teaching, and had a good time at church. One of the people we are teaching (Benson) has to work on Sunday, and so we fasted with him, and this week we found out that he found enough workers for his company so that now he can hopefully start coming to church! Woo hoo!

There were also a couple emergency transfers, and so Elder Anglin and I may go over to Penang from time to time and teach some of the investigators over there.

I love you all so much! I hope that you are all doing super swell. I think the world of each and every one of you, and I cannot wait to give you all big big hugs in a year and a half! Have a great week, and don't forget to smile :)

Spiritual Experiences

I think one of the biggest spiritual experiences I had this week was finding out that Benson will be able to start coming to church. It was so cool to me to see the power of fasting!

This week, I have also thought a lot about falling short of things. Throughout my life, I have always been a really big perfectionist, but there is nothing quite like a mission to make you realize how many things there are that you could be doing better. For a long time, I let those things get to me, and I got really discouraged when I wasn't doing everything perfect. But this week, it finally settled in that what the fruits of our labors end up being is not the most important part; what is most important is what we learn from the labors. As I try my best and feel stress to be better, I turn to God, and that is what is matters at the end of the day. Don't look around, look up!

I love you all so much!