Investigators & Ping Pong

Well hello, it's another beautiful day in Sokcho.

This week has been great! Sokcho is great, I know you wish you had the weather we do up here :)

We have been talking, me and Elder Ghergori, and it seems like a lot of the investigators we have aren't progressing. Do they even want to learn about this gospel? So the past few people we have met with has been what, admittedly, we should have been doing all along, but we really tried to find out if they really want to learn about this gospel or not. It seems a few don't have interest, just English, and a few are merely curious, not willing to act. Dropping people is hard, but we might have to drop a few people. But these meetings have been good, because it's where we invited to act a lot, and bore strong testimony of this gospel.

Also, we have been focusing on reading the book of Mormon, so I feel like a lot more of our investigators will start reading more. And even if they don't have gospel interest yet, we can still continue serving them and showing our love for them. You don't have to stop being someone's friend just because they go to a different church! That's crazy!

One investigator is doing good, she admits she doesn't have a strong belief in her church, and she seems sad, because she thinks God won't hear her prayers. We taught well and bore our testimony, and she seems to like what we tell her and what she finds in the Book of Mormon. The cookie guy is doing alright, he said if he didn't have to work, the first thing he would do is come to church. He's trying to find someone to cover his store so he can go to church on Sundays, so that's really good! The rest of our investigators have been invited to read and pray, and we're praying hard they follow through!

We have also been trying to work more with less actives, as I may have mentioned last time. We are going to spend an hour or two once a week visiting less actives with Elder 안 경일, our branch president, and bring them cookies or something with a spiritual message and an invitation to come back to church. We meet with a less-active about once a week, and he REALLY likes us, and I think that will help him come back to church. We gave him a present, an excerpt from the Liahona (church magazine) about coming back to church, and we both wrote a little note on it, and colored it to make it look nice. He loved it. After we left, he sent us a text message: '영원히 사랑할거에요.' "I'll love you forever!" Awh. What a nice guy. Hopefully at church, he'll realize what he's been missing, particularly the presence of the spirit and the friends he has there, and will continue to come after both Elder Ghergori and I are gone.

We also did exchanges last week, and I learned so much from Elder Lee. He's a great missionary, and he taught me a lot about talking to people on the street and teaching. I'm trying to get to know them, even in just a 2 minute street-conversation on the street.

We played ping pong with our branch president last week, and I FINALLY WON!! We played three games and I won the last one. I could tell by the end he was really trying, but I finally beat him! He was really proud and said, 'Don't transfer!' Haha ~ he's hilarious. I really like him.

Speaking of which, we get our calls next Saturday so next week I'll let you know where I'm going, if I go! I hope I don't, but I know I'll like wherever I go. Sokcho, according to other missionaries, is one of the worst places to serve, because it's just so incredibly hard to serve out here, in every aspect of missionary work. I find it absolutely wonderful, and if that's the case, that it's hard, it can only get better from here!

I love the ward here, and I absolutely love Korean people. Missionary work is awesome and I wouldn't rather be anywhere else!

Love you all and hope you have a good week.

Elder Franchina