[Title references this clip from Mulan.]
February 12, 2024
农历新年快乐！HAPPY LUNAR NEW YEAR!
Congrats everyone, We’ve now made it to the Year of the Dragon! If you haven’t already, go treat yourself to some good Asian cuisine
and celebrate!
Great news everyone…
RODA WAS BAPTIZED!!!! Boy, it was stressful and chaotic, but
it turned out really well! She was SO cheerful yesterday! We’re so proud of her
and her great faith in the savior Jesus Christ.
We had a pretty epic Chinese New Year party on Saturday! There was a ton of cool random food as always, and a bunch of people came, which was really cool to see. Our district was in charge of doing the Dragon Dance, a great Lunar New Year tradition that the branch always has the missionaries do. This year, however, the dragon was slain by a mighty warrior, one with great skill for being 1 foot tall and 3 years of age. The dragon finished the dance despite its wounds. Most definitely one of the funniest experiences I’ve ever had!
God manifests his love in so many ways! I was able to see quite a few of those this week! For example, on Wednesday I was having kind of a rough morning where I felt really alone and overwhelmed. We were driving to a market to hand out some English class fliers, and suddenly I heard a piece of music I recognized from a BYU music festival this summer! (Edvard Grieg’s string quartet.) I don’t know what it was about hearing this, but it felt like just a helpful nudge to keep going and know that things would be okay.
We also found a new favorite spot for donair/döner that’s
right by our house! There’s a little hole in the wall place where this really
nice guy makes a wrap for you!
Remember my challenge to look closely at art and scriptures? Well, unfortunately, I don’t have many insights from the scriptures this week (oops), but I do have one from some art! I checked out “The Great Wave off Kanagawa” this week, and I found some cool new symbols in there. Somehow this was the first time I noticed the boats in that painting, carrying some very frightened and distraught looking faces as the wave in the foreground is looming over them with claw-like sea foam curling over the top. Far in the background, however, there's a mountain that's calm, the one place of familiarity and stability in contrast to the boisterous ocean. This made me think a lot about Christ calming the storms of Galilee, and about the storms in our life. They sometimes feel so overwhelming, as if we’re going to drown for certain. But the gospel of Jesus Christ is always visible for us as a sure place to rely on in the midst of the storms. Times may get gloomy, but so long as we, like Peter, keep our eyes fixed on Christ, we’ll make it okay.
I’ll be sure to get some more scripture references next
time. That’s it for this week! Happy New Year!
爱你们!
–熊长老
Photos (yikes I need to take more photos):
Roda's Baptism
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