God's will is not always our will

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a great week!

My companion goes back to America this week, and strange enough, so do I!

I have a cyst on my lower back that now requires some surgery, so I will leave to America tomorrow to get it fixed. The recovery should take about 6 weeks, so if all goes well I should be able to return to Korea at that time.

I Had really be hoping that it wouldn't hinder or disrupt my missionary service, but it looks like that won't exactly be the case. I will receive surgery in Utah this Thursday, and then recover there for about a week, followed by a 4 or so week recovery back in California. So if you're in the neighborhood, make sure to stop by! I should be able to be reached at this email during my time in America, although I am not completely sure.

If there's one thing that I've learned so far during this ordeal is that God's will is not always our will. I prayed quite a bit to be able to stay in Korea without interruption, and I was confused at first as to why I wasn't getting better. But it was then that I learned that Heavenly Father had a different plan for me. I don't know exactly whether there is something for me to do in America for the next weeks or for an extra 6 weeks at the end of my time in Korea, but I am confident that there really is a reason for all of this happening. And thank you to all of those who have given me encouragement and words of comfort, they have definitely made a difference.

I don't know if I will keep writing this email every week, but I'll make sure to let you all know once I'm back out here.

Have a great week all of you!

Love, Elder Bigelow

Now I just need to find a living Koran to baptize

Hello everyone!

Today is the last  full week with my companion Elder Karlson, next week I'll know who I will be serving next. So I'm trying to soak in as much information as I can before he leaves, I have a feeling that no amount of preparation is going to be enough..

Some news for this week:

We had about 4 or 5 people that we were teaching up to this week, but now we currently have zero. We aren't able to teach these people for various reasons, but now we are going to focus on finding a lot more people that we can teach.

I did get to help lots of other missionaries teach this week though. Whether for sickness of other reasons, we exchanged with several other missionaries and I got to meet lots of great people.

Probably the highlight of the week was being able to go to the temple in Seoul. In our church, we build sacred buildings called temples where we perform ordinances, both for those that are living and for those that passed away before they were able to hear the gospel. And this time, I was able to perform those ordinances for some of my distant ancestors, it was truly an amazing experience. Following that, I performed a baptism for the first time in my life. My companion from the missionary training center, Elder Young, and I were able to baptize each other for Koreans that had passed away, also a really special experience.There was actually a mixup so other missionaries actually got baptized for my ancestors, but I got to do the confirmations and I didn't have to change twice so as long as it gets done that's all good. But since I didn't get to do my own, Elder Young and I baptized each other in the font for Korean people, and we even did it in Korean. It was super cool, and even my first time performing the ordinance of baptism. Then we still had time to go to a temple session, it was in Korean and I decided to do it without headphones this time. The movie part of it was actually really easy to understand because I've seen it a bunch but the non movie part was pretty hard. They still have us do the veil part in English, thank goodness..  It was all a really great experience, the veil was thin in the temple last week. Now I just need to find a living Korean to baptize. But now we have 0 investigators, I think the Lord is emptying the bucket before he fills it up..

Following that, all of the missionaries in our area went to a giant park by the Han river where we rode bikes and played sports for a little while, which was a blast-  

I don't have a ton of time today, but I hope you all have a great week and that you can notice the blessings from Heavenly Father in your life!

-Elder Bigelow

P.S. Does this building ring a bell?   #Avengers2

God's true church is here on the Earth

Hello Everyone!

For those in America, I wish you a happy Mother's Day and a happy Cinco de mayo! And for all of those in Korea, I wish you a happy Children's day and a happy Parent's day! Korea actually made a holiday up this year, on may 6th they just decided to tell everyone not to work so that they would go on vacation and spend money to help the economy. So happy "don't work on May 6th" day as well!

Some highlights this week:

MY first Zone Training as Zone Leader. Once a month, all 25 or so members of a zone meet to work together and receive training on how we can be better missionaries, all led my the zone leaders. Luckily I have a companion who has been at it for a while, but unfortunately he goes home in 2 weeks so I''ve got to figure out how to do it next month with someone that is also new to it..

Also this week, I got to Skype with my family for Mother's Day! It was super fun, it was good to see that they're all just as crazy as when I left.. Good to know that some things never change...

Also this week, the other missionaries in our ward baptized someone yesterday, it's been 5 months or so since I was able to attend a baptism, but it really is a special experience. Being able to attend is always a witness to me that God's true church is here on the Earth, and that it is being led by those who hold the priesthood and are authorized to act in his name. Right now, we are working to have every missionary companionship baptize at least one person by the end of June, we haven't found anyone as a companionship yet but we are looking forward and praying to meeting the person that will be an answer to our prayers.

Things are really going great here, the work here is definitely not easy and I'm not great at it, but I am happy and Heavenly Father makes up for my insufficiency. And I love being a missionary!

Love you all, have a great week!

A reminder that I'm not in Seoul anymore....

The warm and rather humid Republic of Korea

Greetings from the warm and rather humid Republic of Korea! It's not quite suicidal to go outside with a long-sleeve yet, but it's definitely uncomfortable. 

 

Anyways, this week has been pretty good! I did several more exchanges with other missionaries this week, I'm starting to forget who my real companion is.. And among those I exchanged with, I got to serve with Korean missionary for the first time in my mission. I can definitely describe the experience as humbling... When you talk to somebody on the street, it is a whole lot harder to keep up with the conversation when you're the only one that isn't fluent in the language being used더라고요. Korean missionaries are seriously the best though, I hope I get to serve with more of them in the future.

 

This week, I also got to be part of a badminton tournament that someone we are teaching invited us to. I saw lots of badminton players that were on a whole different level than me, and I also got to see the missionary in our zone that was a professional badminton player play for the first time. The people at the tournament basically worshipped him, and he just made badminton look beautiful. The most admirable thing about him though is that he would have been in the Olympics this year if he had not come on a mission, but he gave it all up to serve the Lord, he is such great guy.

 

As far as missionary work goes, we weren't able to teach a whole lot this week, but we were able to meet with some great people. One of the things I have been focusing on is helping others to understand why this message is so important. Because I know the importance of following Jesus Christ on this Earth, but those who are learning about it for the first time seem to have a harder time doing so. But when they do understand, it is truly amazing. The other missionaries living with us have been teaching someone really great that will be baptized next Sunday. So for the first time, I was able to conduct a baptismal interview with him, which is a meeting with another missionary that allows the person to declare before a representative of God that they have repented and are ready to follow Jesus Christ by being baptized. I definitely felt insufficient at first because I couldn't understand every single word he said, but the Spirit of the Lord was present, and that is what is really important.

 

 

Have a great week everyone, and have a Happy Mother's Day!

 

-Elder Bigelow