6/27 Korean BBQ with Guinn

Guinn, my good friend and companion from the MTC
We had a PDay together and got to have Korean BBQ

6/27 Shell Shock

Baptism of Brother T.  With Elder D President and Sister Lam

Bishop and the Crew

Goodbye to the Holbrook's

Goodbye Elder C, the other ZL, we will miss you

The two chums

Dinner with Brother Y's family after his funeral

zone leadership after last zone conference

Well where to begin! This was very possibly the biggest week so far of my mission. Miracles left and right, and above us and behind, as well. This week was great fun. A made it to the English Branch in Wan Chai on his own accord on Friday.  He said it was didactic (not sure what that means)! Also, come to find out, his girlfriend is a LA from Tsuen Wan, so hopefully we can help them both get things going and get them turned over this week. Aa (20) is just amazing, several members thought he was just from another ward visiting these past two weeks. He also set a very strong baptismal date for the beginning of August. Him and A-C doing well together. Joey is doing great, made a great scene leaving sacrament that I would have to act out to give justice. Brother C Y H is also making good ground, much of it being in his personal life, giving him the opportunity to do more on the gospel side. As well, he informed us that he is reading and praying every day! M and her husband Brother C came to church for the second time, as well, and brought a friend and her daughter. All four of them are just so prepared! The daughter T (10) asked questions all Primary and then the Primary President came up to me and asked about her and begged to let her stay. Brother C's previous gospel knowledge is immense and is quite powerful at explaining the Atonement. All four will need to be turned over to Sham Shui Po, and Tsim Sha Tsui in the coming week. A-Y also pulled an amazing miracle! From the day we met him, even though he is 30, his biggest problem has been his mother. He has been too scared to tell her much about the church and so he never would come, only here and there. However, this second time around seeing him, and after a powerful lesson last week with Brother L where we set a baptismal date, he brought his mom to church today! I couldn't believe it. I was so happy for him. She doesn't necessarily have any interest yet, but this should help him be able to come to church much easier now. Then the powerful Brother T. He and his best buddy fellow-shipper, unfortunately, slept through the last 15-20 minutes of sacrament meeting (snoring moderately loud at that), but he is doing so well. His baptism was such a success, and it was just as great to have his wife there who is progressing as well, though it be slowly. I was kind of nervous to be honest. The night before we met to discuss the baptism and teach about the temple, and Brother Y (the fellow-shipper) just unloaded all of Doctrine and Covenants sections 130-134 on him. I mean everything, things that maybe shouldn't be talked about outside the temple, the levels of the Celestial kingdom, all 9 yards. We tried to stop him several times, but he just kept plowing over. Brother Y is very passionate about the temple, but Brother Ting seemed to handle it all ok. Things are well. 

It has really been so much fun and felt so good to see the other members just pick on to the spirit and envelop these people. So many have talked to me about how good they feel the ward is doing and about how amazing it is to have so many new friends at church. Many have mentioned in our small time how much they love having missionaries that are more people, not robots. They can see, or at least feel, the push in the work for missionaries to become part of the ward and not just an entity. So much time here is really coming to pay off with members letting us meet family, and other investigators being able to transition more smoothly. I have loved my time here so much. I  love the members here. With the up coming moves calls, I will admit I am trying not to think about it, but I am so grateful for my time here in one of the most blessed places on earth. I wish never to leave. 

As far as our companionship is doing, things are well. We have continued to discuss how we can improve ourselves and the area. I love Elder Da so much. He is so loving and caring. Tough and hardworking. I have been a blessed Elder to get to live with him for 6 months. Maybe I will get lucky and get some more. 

I love being a missionary! 

Love Elder Sargent

Ever Stalwart 

6/20 Father's Day

Happy Fathers Day! To Dad, Thank you for being such a great role model for me. You are such a great father to me in my life. I love your caring hand so much. You support, you teach, and you love. You really have taught me so much that I will carry through out my life. I have really come to be so much more grateful for all the role models in my life. The men I truly look up to. I love my Dad so much. I have so much respect for all the things he has done for me and my family. I wish to at least be a speck on his shirt as to the kind of man he is. Words cannot describe the love and devotion I have to him. Those words go out to my Father in Heaven as well. On my mission I have truly seen what He has done for me. All the time nurturing and helping me along, so many of the times that I didn't even know He was there. I feel like the most blessed individual.

The area is flourishing. Things are going so well. Brother C (The Fisherman) is still not back from Thailand, but we are looking forward to having him back this week and getting things back on the road again. Brother Ting is doing amazing! So powerful and dedicated. We had him ready before his baptismal interview, and were still having some issues about Prophets. He was having some issues with President Thomas S. Monson.  He believes all the others are prophets for sure, however, President Monson looks to him like a CEO money kind of guy (louhsaai... not sure english translation). Mainlanders are that way.  He had a really hard time, but we thought things were doing better then had the interview scheduled. After an hour, he and Elder C emerged, they didn't get past the prophet question. Lesson learned, make sure they are completely ready before you send them in. Luckily it was the all powerful Brother T, and it didn't faze him. In fact, the miracle of the week, came on Sunday, when after church we were talking about prophets (even Joseph Smiths murder at Carthage), and he told us he knew. He watched two conference talks and (even though it's some other mans voice) he knew through the power of the Holy Ghost that he is a prophet. Then we went back through the questions to make sure no other problems had come up. We are so happy for him! As well, Brother P has his interview on Wednesday and has voiced a lot that he really just wants to get baptized. So we will see how it goes this week. A, another 19 year old investigator is making good progress, and hopefully we can get things moving to a date and such. 

As a Zone, things are getting figured out. Oh, that was this week! Our Zones got split up to the new stake boundaries. So my zone grabbed 3 parts of other zones. and now down to 20 people. Pretty nice. Elder P (new ZL comp) is so powerful, fun, and hardworking. It should be fun working with him. As well, it will be nice being able to do Language Evaluations every week with the zone. Get to know the missionaries better. Should be great. Glad to grab parts of three previous zones, kind of get a chance to start new. 

My thought recently as I have read and listened to several quite powerful talks that have basically just smashed me, Lessons Learned at Liberty Jail, and The Bitter Cup and Bloody Baptism, both by Elder Holland. I have really learned to try and see the eternal view of life. What is the eternal view? I think a lot of missionaries see the short time view of the baptismal font, but that's not success. I feel like we as missionaries need a much stronger view of the long term vision to be able to incorporate and more capably conduct the work that has to be done before the temple. So that is one of the goals I have that I would love to start getting into the work in the Lions Rock Zone. 

I end how I started. I am so grateful for my Father on this Earth and the one in Heaven. I am so grateful for both my Grand-dads as well. They have been so good to me. I love you all!

My Favorite quote from the week. Think about it.

Mans Extremity is Gods Opportunity.

Love from CHKM Elder Sargent

6/13 Still a special couple of weeks

Still been a special couple of weeks. Last week was amazing! Met 5 new people, and hopefully will continue to be able to meet them. Brother NT is doing great, things are looking good for the 26th. He has had some change in getting over his traditional Chinese way of thinking, and had some good time spent with a member who is very familiar with Buddhism. Brother C "The Fisherman" is doing well, we had to move his date to the 3rd of July due to his traveling to Thailand these next two weeks. However, he is doing very well. Good progression and things are clicking. Brother P, doing ok, was not at church on Sunday, not sure why, he didn't answer his phone. I think he just might need some more time. As well picked up a lot of younger adult investigators this week. A is a very solid member referral that has very large interest and is looking for faith. J is a very religious younger guy who is very interested in what we have to offer. Perhaps some of my favorites are M, S, and F. One of our young men that I am pretty good friends with brought them to the church last week, and so we taught them English for a while, then had another lesson, then went back and taught them the Restoration and prayer. Two of them prayed that night! J (the member) said it was fun. I think this came to be more of a miracle that I thought. Sister L (his mom) talked to me about it after church. She said he has been struggling and really needs some help. We talked about how this can help him and she was so grateful. I hope things can turn out for these boys (15-17). It has been amazing. We are looking forward to a new Bishop this week, because right now we aren't sure who to talk to for these upcoming baptisms and some reactivations. So that will be nice. We, as an area, are doing well.

The Zone is kind of leveled out in some areas right now. Doing good, but we could be doing better. The Kwai Chung area is a little disheartened to be losing Elders (Elder S is moving to Tsing Yi and Elder Ch is going to the MTC) There are too many miracles to report! Elders Ts. W got a couple loved investigators back which has boosted their spirits, the Sisters KLC have just kicked it off this week and there is good work going on in the TST area as usual! It's been a fun summer so far and it's looking up. Kind of a small tidbit of the Zone for ya.

There is no adequate replacement for hard work. So let's just get down and do it. :)

Love, Elder Sargent

6/06 The work is progressing in Hong Kong!

My buddy J from Beijing that got married in Kowloon this week, got to know him pretty good seeing him for a few days! haha He doesn't know cantonese, but does know english from his mission in New York a few years back.

Another good week! I have been so happy and beyond grateful for what the Lord has bestowed upon our little ward in Cheung Sha Wan. I really have pondered hard as to the why and how it's happened. Why now? Why all the sudden has all this come up? We all of the sudden have more people to work with than we can handle. We have been working hard for almost 6 months together. The more I have pondered and thought  about it, the more I have come to realize why, or maybe why I think. I firmly don't believe its anything I did, and to me I think it's the ward. After really thinking and praying and studying member work recently, it often talks about how the Lord won't send His children to unprepared wards, Pres. Hinckley talked about that often. There is no point in sending them somewhere that they can't be used or to someone unready. Our ward recently is just bursting at the seams, ready to go to serve and do the work. On Sunday I felt just so overwhelmed with 6 investigators we are teaching at church, and then 3 more people that just showed up that needed help, one of them is rescheduled and lives in our area. The other two live in Kowloom Bay, but don't want to go there, so we will meet with them to explain more thoroughly. It was interesting to hear a member tell another member from another ward, "We didn't use to have any investigators, but now all the sudden we have SO MANY!" Makes me so happy that they are excited. Honestly, we were teaching the same amount 4 months ago, just everyone we are teaching now is progressing and there are people we could be working with, we just don't have time. So we talked to Bro. F and some of the members who are fellowshipping these people, and worked out that they will just be their missionary pretty much. Schedule and follow up on commitments and we as the missionaries will just do the teaching, which is how it should be, really. We are just seeing so many miracles every day, it's amazing. I rejoice in my God. So grateful He is blessing our ward so. 

As well is was a good meeting with the Stake Split! Sad to hear we lost our Bishop Kwok to the Stake Presidency, but glad we get Pres. Tsang back to the ward and are excited to see who the new Bishop is. The work is progressing in Hong Kong and no one can stop it. Our 4 Canto Stakes got split into 6 yesterday. We are in the new Lions Rock Stake! Cheung Sha Wan, Sham Shui Po, Sha Tin, Dai Wai, and Ngau Tau Kok. As well, Kowloon is the stake center now. :) China is doing well.

I love this work. I love my area, my companion. I love being a missionary.

 Love Elder Sargent

On another note, after some prodding from President L at MLC, I went to accupuncture. I had to go twice, and I will never go back in this lifetime. Needles in my lower back, rear end, thigh, back of knee, and calf. Followed by a most painful and violating massage of all covered regions. To all who have considered it, I would challenge you to reconsider. haha not worth it.

Love,

   Elder Sargent

5/30 Loving Cheung Sha Wan

views from previous hike to Lion's rock

Still feeling like the most blessed person on this planet. Elder Da and I are feeling great, working hard, and continuing to see miracles everyday. This last week has continued to be miracles. Brother Ting is making great progress, loves everything (especially Elder McS's old suit we gave him). He is still looking for a full time job, but is dedicated to church! It has been so much fun to watch. Brother P passed his baptismal interview on Saturday and then didn't come to church on Sunday. So that was disheartening. I think we will have to wait some more time for him.  Brother C and Brother C are doing great, Brother C has pretty much scheduled us to meet every Tuesday and Thursday till he is baptized. Things are well there also. We are seeing a lot of new opportunities with member families, several have opened up and we are getting settled down into teaching a couple of them. Hopefully we can see them at church now. I love this work and it makes me happy beyond words to see the miracles and blessing that the Lord is bestowing upon the area of Cheung Sha Wan. I wish I could stay here my whole mission. The ward is amazing and they are so willing to help out, the views of the work I feel like are beginning to change, it is all just a dream come true. There isn't much more I could ask for, just Elder Da and I to continue to work harder and to do more! 

The Zone is doing great! Our apartment has had another problem... the kitchen is falling apart, but we are getting it figured out with Elder C. I hope that all the missionaries and apartments took Elder K and my challenge from Zone Conference to have an apartment family home evening and discussion. I absolutely loved ours last night. Elder S did a great job, we had a good thought, talked about what we need to do better and how to support each other. It was great, I can already tell it is going to help a lot. So thankful for the opportunity. There is nothing I love more than doing what I can to serve the other missionaries I love so much. I hope they were able to receive some personal revelation. 

I love my mission, my time right now can be summarized up in not my words, but in the words of Ammon and Alma. That has been a chapter that has opened up to me recently, in chapter 26, I just feel as Ammon with my joy taking me away almost to my body and spirit being separated. I feel like I am walking on air seeing so many of the other missionaries happy and enjoying the work and having success. 

Ever Stalwart folks. I hear the grass is green and the summer is out. Enjoy it!!

Shout out to my best friend who is having a birthday this week! Whit is the best. Congrats on Graduation as well. I love you sis.

Mom and Dad I didn't forget you two either. ;) Happy anniversary. i hope you enjoy it! Thanks for being the best example of a loving couple I know. Love you both as well.

-- 

Love,

   Elder Sargent