Simple Prayers

Friends and Family, 

While I was on exchanges this past week, we had one of the coolest experiences ever as we taught an investigator about prayer and really focused on helping him turn toward God. There are these two young men named Jonny and Jason who are here from China working at the factory in here in town. When we first contacted Jonny, he showed us a Chinese Book of Mormon that he somehow got back when he was in China. He asked us for an English Book of Mormon so that he could read both and practice his English. We went back to follow up on his reading and Jonny wasn't home but his roommate Jason was. It's been pretty difficult to teach Jason in the past, because his English isn't the best, but when we knocked on the door he invited us right in and had us sit down to talk with him. We asked if he had read any in the Book of Mormon since we had last visited them, and he confessed that he hasn't gotten around to it because he has been pretty busy. Our plan was to teach him about prayer, and it just seemed like exactly what he needed. We explained the basics of prayer and had to teach super super simple to make sure he could understand. He wasn't entirely sure how it worked, and we asked him about his belief in God and he explained that he didn't know much and he has never prayed before. We taught the essential truths of our Heavenly Father, how he is our Father and has a body of flesh and bone and wants to hear from us, and as we taught I could see on his face how it all started to piece together for him. He told us that he didn't have much more time because he had to Skype his wife, so we asked him to say the closing prayer. It was one of the most humble prayers I have heard. He started out, "Dear Heavenly Father, Hello. I am Jason. From China." and continued to thank God for his family and his job and all the blessings he has in his life. After he closed he thanked us and told us how he felt so much peace and happiness inside his heart, and promised us that he would continue to pray. 

On Monday we have an FHE for the Young Single Adult Ward and last Monday it was at the house of Clark, one of the guys in the YSA. He had a trampoline in his backyard, and everybody was doing jumps and tricks on this thing. Some of the members asked Elder Roe to get on, so he did and started jumping and doing flips and landed kind of funny and ripped the trampoline in half. It was hilarious, and he just laid there all casual and acted like nothing happened as everybody clapped for him. That same night the sisters in our zone made us this giant care package full of candy and cookies, which we thought was pretty nice until one of them confessed that they gave it to us because they didn't want to eat all the stuff and get fat. Missionary problems. 

We had a pretty rough beginning of the week. We got a call from President Lewis Tuesday night asking if we could bring an Elder from our zone down with us to a meeting we had in Yakima the next day. Both Elder Roe and I were a little puzzled, but took this Elder down with us the next morning. We found out that this Elder's father had passed away the night before unexpectedly. It was heartbreaking. Elder Roe and I tried our best to comfort this Elder, and all we could do was just hug him. Later that night, we gave him a blessing and testified to him of the power of the Plan of Salvation. As tragic as this all was, I am so grateful to know that there is something after death and that we will see our loved ones again. Please please please keep this Elder and his family in your prayers this week. 

I love you all and I'm grateful for each and every one of you. Don't pass up an opportunity to tell a loved one how grateful you are for them this week. 

"To express gratitude is gracious and honorable, to enact gratitude is generous and noble, but to live with gratitude ever in our hearts is to touch heaven." -Thomas S. Monson

Con Mucho Amor, 

Elder King

Note from the editor:  these crazy elders have added "shots" of apple cider vinegar to their daily health regimen.

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