May 11, 2007 - Teaching the Gospel

Demchig is getting baptized today!!! I’ve been waiting for this ever since I got to Sukhbaatar branch almost three months ago. Demchig is great. It has taken him a little bit longer to get ready, but he’s really prepared now. I want to come back to Mongolia ten years from now and find he’s become branch president or something.

We had a really great experience teaching one of our newer investigators this week. His name is Bold, which is unfortunate because we already have an investigator named Bold so now we have to call them “New Bold” and “Old Bold.” Anyway, he’s a smart guy, but he kind of struggled to understand the lessons the first few times we met with him. He wants to understand everything well before moving on, so we’ve been taking our time.

This past week we started teaching the plan of salvation. We dove right in, talking about the pre-earth life, the Fall, and the Atonement. He was asking questions left and right: why did we need bodies? Why did Adam and Eve have to sin? What is the purpose of this life? As we finished the lesson he was just sitting there with his head in his hands. We asked if he had any more questions. After a while he said, “Ugui…Bi zuuger l…gaikhaj baina.” (“No…I’m just…amazed.”---grrr, it sounds cooler in Mongolian). It’s true, isn’t it? The plan is just amazing.

These past couple of days have been a little bit cold and rainy. Yesterday when we met with Bold he said “I always used to wonder what in the world you missionaries were doing when I saw you walking on the street. Now that I know what you do and just how long you guys are out every day, I’m worried about you! You shouldn’t be outside in this weather!” Don’t I know it! But to quote Grandma Muir: “Sometimes you just have to do things you’re not supposed to!”

We teach a lot of lessons at our branch president’s house. Some of our investigators haven’t told their family that they are investigating the church or they’re family doesn’t want the missionaries coming over, so it’s really great of the branch president to let us come over pretty much whenever and use their home. Yesterday we had scheduled two lessons in a row at their house, first with Bold and then with Demchig. The lesson with Bold went over a little bit, and Demchig came in just after the closing prayer. They had met each other at church before, and Bold asked if he could stay for Demchig’s lesson.

It was really cool to go from teaching the basics to a new investigator to sharing a thought from the Ensign with an investigator preparing to be baptized the next day. The two of them are both 24 year old guys, one is a student and one fixes cars for a living, but they both somehow found the missionaries and are trying to find out just what God wants for them to do in this life. After the lessons, we were going to walk with Bold to the bus station but as we went to say goodbye to Demchig, Bold said, “Oh…uh, I think I’m going to go over to Degii’s house instead.” I think this is the start of a beautiful friendship!

That’s all for now!