Its a boy!

So, big changes are coming to the mission.. we lost 14 missionaries, all of which held leadership positions, and now our mission went from old and very experience, to young and semi experienced haha. Speaking of semi experienced.. I got a call from President Smith on tuesday morning... i may have been taking care of some business and lets just say that when i heard the phone ring, business was cut short. Ive been called to serve as a District Leader for Buriram and Surin.... and as a trainer! Ive got a kid! Hes fresh out of the MTC but no it is not that Elder Clark that Josh mentioned.. His name is Elder Revelli and hes from... Guess? You got it, Highland Utah.. you guys are so smart! Its crazy to see the growth from a year ago to today.. President Smith said it perfectly about their tones.. which i wont repeat, but suffice it to say, i laughed. Anyway, out week was cut significantly short what with travel to Bangkok, travel back, and then we had District Conference up in Ubon (yeah, visited again already) on sunday. We had an area Asia Seventy speak, and for the life of me i cant remember his name.. He was from the Philiphines and i cant remember his name. His talk was epic. Ill get to that later.

Anyway, before Elder Gambanat peace out, to Chiang Rai as a District Leader by the way, we tried to find some new investigators for the area, and found just a few. Nobody really stuck, but what'er. The overall highlight of the week is 2 referrals from a member.. she referred them a couple weeks ago but we had just began teaching them last week. They are super legit holy crap! They are seriously a God send (literally.. i was being serious! God sent them.) and they have a date for the 30th. They are named "A" and "M" and they are a very sweet couple.. very young too. They have incredible faith and they are the ones that i told you about- christian already. He did not go to the Protestant church to get married but instead told that guy he wasnt ready. After that, they comitted, by themselves(!) that they would go ALL THE WAY UP TO UBON for the District Conference.. both days! Long story short, they got their answers. Basically, it came from the Asia area Elder who talked about the answers to our questions being in the scriptures.. "A" always has a lot of questions and we keep telling him to simply read the Book of mormon and he will find them... he of course believed us, but has yet to find the answer. It was just the whole idea that we had told him that the previous week, and then the following week he heard it again from this Elder that made it hit him to the heart. Like Corinthians says, "in the mouth of 2 or 3 witnesses" will everything be established. The conference was way moving (and a little painful im sure) for everyone because they focused on things that are problems for the district. We know em already.. but speaking repetition? Its good. And its the method of Christ too.
So we hit the ground running when we hit Buriram (figurative.. it was night time so we went to sleep) and weve found some pretty sweet investigators... Workin on getting my greenie out there and calling people to repentance and baptism! Hes amped to do the work and a way better greenie than i was back in the day.. i was a stubborn little... yeah. Anyway, the highlight during inviting was that we found a really nice family! The father is a halfy - americane and thai- and speaks way good. He is catholic by birth and his 2 kids and wife are buddhist, by birth. The Mom and the daughter are particularly interested and we placed 2 books of Mormon in their house for them to read. We have yet to meet them again, but they are very nice and very willing to study and learn more.
My greenie is discovering that i cant speak english.. we were inviting and as I called from the gate, in thai of course, a foreigner came to the door.. and i FORGOT english.. everything i said came out in thai... i had to literally force myself to remember what to say! Ive never had it that bad! We walked away and Elder Revelli was like, "here, how bout this. ill take the English from now on." "Yeah that sounds good.".

So in the district conference... the Elder (and president Smith) talked about tithing and reading the scriptures. The Elder spoke very straightforward, and it was awesome! He said, "often times i got to visit homes and i see the TV is almost always on.. to that i say STOP. Stop watching TV where our habits are that when we wake up, we immediately turn it on. It is not that you cannot watch it at all.. you enjoy it, but the answers to your prayers are NOT in the TV and the answers for your brothers and sisters around you, are NOT in the TV either. Read, your, Scriptures.". I like that. Even better than the talk (not really) was the fact that his translater was BROTHER SAKHA! Yeah, hes totallyt back in the T-land and was visiting Ubon. I gave him a very large hug. Hes doing great and hes in Thailand for good. I have pictures, but im out of time.. ill send em next week. So yea.. lets read our scriptures!

All i got this week... i hit the year mark and now things are going faster than ever.. .like high gear.. its blatantly obvious too. Like the past 4 days have been the fastest of my mission by far. Kinda crazy... As a District Leader and a Trainer, we have a lot of interviews and a lot of meetings and a lot of exchanges and a lot of talking on phones! holy... night times? Yeah, like 1 second and its time for bed. No time to do anything.. its pretty sweet actually. Love it. Congratulations to everyone that had anything of some kind of significance this past weekend that i was not able to be a part of... which sounded like everyone haha. Sup Stinko... hows being a regualar joe? Love ya all. Church is true.. im scared.. ill be dead in no time!

Elder Gudmundsen!