Seoul Chaser: Nokbeon Week 22

Dear Wonderful Family and Friends,

Happy Thanksgiving! This week was awesome in general, especially because we spent so much time eating. On Wednesday we got taken out to an American style buffet by one of the members while I was on exchanges with the Zone Leader, Elder Ashby. The member helped us with a lesson right before, and then we headed to the place on a super crowded bus. During rush hour here in Seoul, the bus and subway systems are just packed with people. On one hand, it makes it easy to talk with everyone, but on the other hand, it can be slightly awkward haha. As for Thursday, we headed down to our ward mission leader's house which is pretty far away, but we ate well and shared some great conversation. Our ward mission leader used to run an Antares here in Korea, so he's basically a master at cooking Korean food. Luckily, he's given me a couple of recipes and some good tips. On Friday, we headed over to a part American family's home who live in our ward boundaries, but they attend the English branch in Seoul. Unfortunately, the wife's mother turned off the gas while the turkey was cooking, which delayed the dinner for about an hour. Despite the delay though, we had a super good time eating the American style Thanksgiving and talking with the caring members.

We experienced quite a few miracles this week. On Monday we went to go visit a less active ward member and bring him some tangerines, but we were struggling to find his house, so we decided to call him. Well, he came outside his house and we had a good conversation with him. His wife and child aren't members of the church, so I was hoping for the chance to talk with them when his wife just walked out of the house. It was super cool to talk with her and she kept telling her husband to buy us dinner some time. Hopefully, we can start teaching her about the gospel. We also met another member's non-member family on a short visit to their home. Although we just went to give him an invitation for the Christmas party, they insisted on us eating fruit and provided us with delicious beverages. The culture here is so great. Plus, his wife and kids are super nice, and hopefully they'll come to our sweet Christmas Party.

As for our investigators this week, Gyeong-Min seems to have lost some interest for the time-being, but he is still insistent that he will come to church every week. We all still struggling with getting him friends at church. But our ward leaders here are great and they are doing everything they can to help out. We weren't able to meet with our other investigator this week, but he is doing well and tried to read and pray.

The biggest event this week was probably our leadership training with our mission president, President Sonksen, and our implementation on the "Christmas Initiative." Basically, we are brainstorming new ideas for how to share the Christmas Spirit with other people her in Seoul. One thing we are doing is trying to have 100% member participation in this program. Since we can't use computers, we are trying to do as much as we can to help the members use the internet to share the gospel. This past Sunday, Elder Jeong and I got up in front of the members during Sunday School and shared the initiative. It looks like we are going to be visiting quite a few members in the upcoming weeks. The one thing we hope everyone shares this Christmas season is the joy of Christ. #ASaviorIsBorn (http://www.christmas.mormon.org/)

Thanks for all the love and support. If you have any questions, please e-mail me at chase.wheeler@myldsmail.net.

Your Favorite Missionary,

Elder Wheeler