A great week. Potentially my last couple weeks in the most terpilih tanah yang pernah dibuat oleh tangan Tuhan. Saya akan habis kuat di kota ini. Saya sangat bersyukur untuk bandar ini. Sejak saya pindah ke sini saya pernah lihat banyak keajaiban betul.
Monday- bused up to Malacca for P-day and P-night exchange. P-day was great. Met people from all over world as usual and walked around historical UNESCO heritage city Malacca. So awesome. Malacca was controlled by the Portuguese, Dutch, British, and now the Melayus. Super awesome and has a ton of history. Malacca feels more like Singapore than Johor Bahru does, and Johor Bahru is literally a 30-minute drive over the bridge from Singapore. I can literally see Singapore from the Masai Elders' apartment. Singapore is coming up real soon. Sangat terujahku memang. Anyways, me and Elder Broadhead went out for our exchange and did some riverwalk finding. We stopped a ton of tourists and even found this one couple from Spain. They told me they were from Basque region and I was like oh yeah I've been up to Barcelona and my dad used to live in Spain for 2 years so near there (just trying to build trust for the contact) and dude was just like, "That's not Basque" with the grossest smirk; dude was probably like, "This American student has no idea what he's talking about." I was like, "Okay, well do you know who we are (just trying to state the purpose not even being prideful) and he just gives the hand. Once that hand goes up, just keep walking. Contact is done. Like, "Okay brother WHEN you see volunteers like us in Spain, feel free to say hi. (Mosiah 3:20-21) God isn't gonna allow the little one-timer contacts to stop him from talking to you through his chosen foreordained Latter-day servants. And again, I'm not trying to sound too prideful right now. I've been rejected exactly like that the amount of times only the Lord knows. But picking even one example to tie in the fact that God is always reaching out. He's always trying. He does and we try. I love it. I'll go over all this peninsula and try. From Penang to Johor Bahru and everywhere in between.
Shoutout Malacca though. Yes, if you serve here, you're very isolated and banished Sikit from other missionaries, but Malacca is awesome. I'd love to serve here. Anyways it was a great exchange. The Melayu (Muslim) people here are ELECT I SAY. They're all awesome. We were walking back home right next to a call to prayer going on in this massive mosque and this one Muslim family was asking us questions and stuff and yeah, it's just awesome speaking with them in Malay, we just have to tell them we're volunteers (sukarelawan) and not missionaries (penginjil) unless they know themselves. And then even then it's chill honestly. People don't even realize the amount of similarities that this church (the true and original Christian Church that Jesus Christ sudah established and then restored himself) is similar to another Abrahamic religion. Anyways river walk was great and then the rest of the night was whatever. Just walked and walked--not a lot of people. My crocs at this point are just absolutely thrashed. Holes all in the bottom. They've lasted a good 6 months in field so I'll take it, but next time in Singapore for Zone conference it'll be time for new ones😪
Anyways
Tuesday- had our DCM as a district and then went out with Elder Overly on our SEVENTH tukaran (exchange). We're getting our 8th exchange by the end of this transfer. Then we'll have slightly more than a year to get to 10. Wow. As always, he's a spiritual giant. Great grandson of Bruce R McConkie. He just carries that Spirit with him. Like I've said before, we don't have much of anything in common, but the Lord pretty clearly sees we need to work together every single transfer of our mission so far. He's great. Throughout the day we just have so much healthy and consecrated conversations just about the mission, extending, and our thoughts on it (no mom, jangan risau, don't worry I will not be extending) our MTC district, and the other six Elders that we came out with, even though I haven't seen my MTC comp in four months (Shoutout Elder Stevens in Sibujaya) Regardless, we still have that brother's keepers mindset for our fellow MTC district missionaries that we came out with that will extend past the mission, which is so nice. Anyways, yeah just talked about areas in the mission, just everything and everyone mission talk. I love it. Elder Overly is just so locked. I've been saying future AP in this mission. I'll campaign for him at this point. We'll see lah.
Wednesday- woke up and said goodbye to the Malacca Elders. They'll be coming down for transfer calls here in a couple weeks so that'll be fun. Bused back down to Johor Bahru and had half a day-ish. We missed our original bus at 10 so we bought new tickets and got back to JB a little late. When we got back to JB, we totally forgot my back tire was completely popped so we had to walk the bikes all the way 45 minutes to the nearest bike shop. Me and Elder Page had a good conversation about leadership and what accountability is like and why he thinks he's in a leadership position. I'm not gonna lie. I'm the only Elder from my MTC district who didn't train a couple transfers ago. In fact, I've been with companions with someone in leadership my whole mission. Sometimes it's easy to look on the negative side and ask what I'm doing wrong and if I'm being baby sat by Zone leaders and District leaders. Neither my dad nor my older brother was in leadership. Not saying it matters too much because it doesn't, but man I'm just hoping to show President Ho through accountability I can be in some form of leadership at a point. We'll see lah. Elder Page brought up how some people need it on their missions to learn hard work and accountability and that some people just don't need it. It's so interesting. Anyways, did some gate knocking and some shoplot finding when we got back though. I've been telling Elder Page we're getting the nasi lemak as much as humanly possible before I leave Johor Bahru. So of course we got the Nasi lemak. Ended off the night with a call with our recent convert and his wife who's preparing for baptism. We put her on date and they were super happy. It was great.
Thursday- weekly planning day and of course we went to Carls Jr. Where else would we go? Tiada tempat yang sepertinya. Bought some new crocs, too, clutch. Did all of our studies and then went exploring a little bit more of Johor Bahru and went a little bit more towards the city part of it. We found a whole new shoplot area which was absolutely bustling with people. Me and Elder Page were pumped for sure. At the end of our finding block, the last guy we talked to, his name was Vito who was Japanese and super awesome. Instantly was pretty interested in who we were and what we were doing. We told him about the church presence all throughout Japan and if he's ever seen missionaries like us in Japan. He said no but regardless we ended up teaching him a little bit and that this church is the restored Church of Jesus Christ. We asked to pray with him and instantly he said yes. He said his friend was having trouble getting a work pass. Right before I prayed for him, I was heavily prompted to tell him that yes, we will pray for you brother, but you need to have faith in Jesus Christ that he will deliver you two through this trial. That you need to know that he exists and that he isn't just some made-up good guy figure. As I started the prayer, I literally felt physically the Spirit move through my mouth and literally carry my words to his heart. Like my mouth was like physically vibrating. I don't even know, but it was wild. We passed him off to the Elders in Newton to my guy Elder Gabbitas. Should go well. He said he would go to church, and we sent him the church address in Singapore. Great night. Of course, we went back to Taman Molek and ate some Nasi Lemak. (I've chosen to include a full breakdown of the Nasi Lemak to not leave you in the darkness of not having a knowledge of such a dish, please see below to be enlightened)
Friday- Friday was great. Went and did some shoplot Johor Jaya morning finding. Did some studies. Went to Pizza Hut because Elder Page had to do a baptismal interview and he wanted to switch spots so got to makan some Pizza Hut. Clutch. Did some more shoplots in Taman mount Austin. SO MANY Singaporeans, it was crazy. All crossing the border from Singapore into Malaysia (legally of course) in like an hour drive (only cause of traffic it takes that long) and coming and just throwing their money at hot pot and what not. Just straight materialism out here with all the Chinese New Year barang barang dan mereka blanjang sangat kuat memang. Some of the Singaporeans get mad or put off if you call them Malaysian. Funnily enough they're all just Chinese anyways and Singapore literally wanted to be a part of Malaysia anyways. They all speak Mandarin as well, same dialect of Chinese😭 So funny. Singaporeans can get so high and mighty like memang mereka perlu rendah hati sometimes. Ini kenapa Malaysia lebih terpilih oleh Tuhan. Tidapalah.
Anyways.
Saturday- of course to start Saturday we did more public contacting. Stopping people as they shopped/walked and walked into medan selera (food court) in this area of the mission for Johor Bahru, if we're knocking doors, we're simply being ineffective. You're just not doing your job if you're knocking gates and yelling at doors here in Johor Bahru. Public contacting in shoplots is king here. Anyways we invited every single person on our WhatsApp (our message app, like iMessage, but it's big outside of the US) to church. Then since the next day was Fast Sunday. we went and ate at Domino's. Ate a ton right before we prayed into our fast. I'm telling y'all the strategy is to just not eat Saturday night and then skip Sunday morning breakfast and then just eat lunch Sunday afternoon. Elder Page put me onto it, it's actually great. Obviously for missionary work and life it's different because we don't get to take any Sunday naps😪 memang susah. Anyways we found a new shoplot area and it was great. Once again everyone was Singaporean spending their night eating and shopping, just 3.5x their money, then they just drive back across the border. We don't even bother to stop them really, there's no point. We just say, "Hey there's volunteers like us in Singapore and our church is in Singapore as well. If you ever see white guys with white shirts and a black tag make sure to say hi" and then we try and give them the address to the church building in Singapore, leave with a "you're always invited" and keep it pushing. Keep 'em short. Great seed planting and we're literally finding for all the Singapore Elders and for Singapore. Planting seeds yang besar memang. Happy to help🫡 Anyways, taught our on-date and she was super happy to learn from us. I probably won't be here for her baptism, but it's all good.
Sunday- great day at church. It was testimony meeting and I shared my testimony from Elder Mark E. Peterson from April 1978 titled, "Moroni's Last Words" such a good talk. Moroni is the man. It is beyond my comprehension that anyone could read the Book of Mormon and not believe of its true. That's why people don't want to read it because once they do, they'll know of its truth. A prayerful actual read through. Not just some skim. It was one of the days we met with this Indian bro, and he was a Catholic and I shared the classic 2 Nephi 29:8-9. By far and away my favorite scriptures to share during finding. Just always so powerful and when you combine it with a sure tone, when you look them in the eye and tell them this is Firman dari Tuhan man you KNOW THIS IS THE WORD OF GOD. I KNOW IT. I KNOW I KMOW IT. I'M CONVINCED. Moroni wouldn't Buang a singular SECOND if he didn't know every single etch and scratch from his bleeding hands and heavy heart, after watching all of his friends and family get absolutely destroyed and scattered and taken advantage of if it weren't true.
Just like Moroni, I would recommend you all to God and to this book. I'd travel all the way here to Malaysia again. To this elect land, 50 (fifty, lima puluh) STRAIGHT HOURS of travel with the Kitab Mormon in hand to change one person's life.
If you read it, read it more. I've been sangat slacking and actually need to lock in so unbelievably hard. This is for me not for y'all. I needed to write this down and it's going on here. As always. I'm not mad I'm disappointed at myself. Repent and be better. Become. That's what disciples do. That's what Elder Buckner told us, and it was also towards me and I'll second it towards anyone who reads these.
As I journal at night now, I sporadically put in different entries into different days on different mornings or nights and I'll just start typing no matter how I feel at that moment. So, forgive me, I get into it. I hope it can show how much I care. Writing this Sunday night and we had a great ministering night, hot pot dinner with our recent convert who is still going through a tough time. She feels pressure and it's great to bring her the message of the beatitudes from 3 Nephi 12. We also did service for her Indonesian helper. We couldn't enter the house yet because some guests didn't show up and we have a mission rule where we weren't allowed to enter the house yet, so we stayed outside and just watered all of her plants. The sweet Indonesian maid lady was yelling at me in Indonesian to stop but I was like, "bukan sister ini tujuan kami, kami selalu mahu tolong kamu" then washed the dishes for her and this 4-foot-tall lady almost pushed me out of the kitchen. Like Sister "kami cuci memang" anyways I'm grateful for the service of just sitting there and watering plants. It was so peaceful. In this mission if you serve in Malaysia you never do organized service. If you serve in Singapore you do it a couple times a transfer as a zone. Since I've never served in Singapore. it's great to just have sporadic service and to be able to lighten this lady's load even just a little. And trust me us as missionaries we constantly ask to do little acts of service, but they always say no. Anyways, apparently this girl back home from my school district just got called to Indonesia and I've never met her in my life, but I used it as a conversation starter with this lady. I loved what Elder Wilde said about smiling. I'm legally not even allowed to mention the name Jesus Christ to her but does that stop me from doing what Jesus would do? Plus I'll take any excuse to speak Malay where all the members here in Johor Bahru speak English/Chinese. Anyways I'll stop yipping and yapping. This was a great week for sure. Doesn't mean I don't face temptation, doesn't mean problems go away. Doesn't mean I don't have hard days. But we maju saja. We just go forward. Anyways just like Moroni, I'll make an end to my speaking. Kept it real as always, I hope. See y'all next week.
Go, Patriots also. Such a random Superbowl, to be honest, but aye I love America so much more after being out here in Malaysia.
Love y'all🫡♥️
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