Golden Investigator and "Why is it when you're not suppose to laugh...."

Another week has gone by.... I love the copy.com thing!  The pictures are sick!!  The one of Dad and Troy is so sweet!!!! I was soooo jealous!!! haha I can't wait to go hunting!  I know that after I serve with all my heart, might, mind, and strength, that God will bless me with a world record Bull.(; How has the hunts been so far?  Also, I responded to the past 3 p days emails in a letter, so I will be sending that with the couples tomorrow at our Zone Conference, which by the way, Elder Vincent from the Seventy will be speaking at.  Totally stoked to listen to him!  We also got told that he will be randomly interviewing a few missionaries... Yeah that's one interview I don't want to have.  My heart will beat out of my chest if he says that he wants to interview me.  Having President Wayment stare me down in my interview was bad enough!  Now a member from the Quorum of the Seventy possibly....  pray that I don't get picked (;  Be looking for a letter in the next couple of weeks.  I put the emails in there to, so you know which ones I'm responding to.  There's like 10 papers in there.....  hopefully it gets to you.

Only a few stories for today.  The first is about a book I started to read on mission.  It is called The Miracle of Forgiveness.  Mom, you probably have read it.  But, this book talks about sexual sins and marriage a lot! When I was reading it, I was like.. oh this is a really good book, until you get to the middle.... Then you feel chastized for everything. It doesn't only talk about sexual sins, but that's the main one that gets repeated a lot.  It mentions things on anger, lust, bearing false witness, murder and a bunch of other things.  The whole time you read it, you feel like you are the worst person in the entire world.  I do wish that I would have read this a lot sooner though! If you have not read it mom, This is a book you guys as a family should read every Sunday or something.  It really makes you look at your life and helps you to become a better person.  The Lord Chastises who he loves.  So, we all need a little in our lives (;  Really though, read this book if you haven't read it. 

Now, a story that happened during proselyting on Wednesday I believe.  We were teaching two girls named Princess (common name in Liberia) and Annie about the Restoration.  I had just got done talking about what Jesus Christ had done on the earth, so my companion was getting ready to speak on the Apostasy.  He goes into telling more, and begins to expound a scripture to them.  Amos 8:11-12 to be exact.  It mentions that there will not be a famine of Bread or water but of hearing the words of the Lord.  As he was explaining this, he said, "We can see that there won't be a famine of Breasts......." then it got silent.  I had my attention on these girls making sure they were understanding everything, listening to my companion, and when I heard this, I was stunned.  I looked at my companion and he was already starring at me with wide eyes.  I am a horrible missionary for what happened next, and I have sincerely repented for it, but I couldn't hold in my laughter anymore.  I was crying I was laughing so hard.  He tried to continue with the lesson and I had my head down trying not to make it obvious, when out of no where he says, "and I'll let my companion explain the rest" He did this because he couldn't stop laughing either!! now what am I suppose to do?? I tried my all keeping it together, and I told them that we will just start from here next time.  The spirit was totally gone and we couldn't even stay focused.  The funny part was that the girls we were teaching didn't hear what he said, and they just started laughing along with us.  Oh man.... Once we closed we were walking away, and I looked at him and said, "Why is it that when you're not suppose to laugh, you laugh the hardest?"  we just kept laughing.  Memories for life!!!  I love Liberia! You never know what will happen next!

Another story about an investigator.  His name is Brian.  We first started talking to him while we were conversing with another Investigator named Albert on broadstreet. While we were talking, this man, later known as Brian, pulled us over to him and asked if we had something  he could read.  I didn't think much of it since we get this a lot, and especially since we're two white people, they just want free stuff from us.  We give him a The Restoration pamphlet and then leave.  As we passed the next day, he pulled us into his shop and wanted to learn.  We began teaching him and this guy started to unload the questions on us.  He was wanting to learn!  The thing I love about the Church, is that it has the only true Gospel, so whatever question you have, it can be resolved. All of his questions we're resolved during this first lesson.  The next day we pass by and he asks if he can have a copy of the Book of Mormon.  Maybe this guy actually has interest... I thought. We were in a rush so we told him we would come back and talk more on it, but that we would let him have a copy.  We came back, and he wasn't there... We called him, and he had gone out and said we should come back tomorrow.  Alright, maybe he's not that interested...  The next day, we are passing to a lesson and he says he has read the Book of Mormon and has questions for us, so he wants us to come talk with him. We came back in an hour and sat down.  This guy had read the first couple of pages in the Book of Mormon from the introduction all the way to the 2nd chapter in 1Nephi.  He had questions on it all!  He even told us that he has been looking for a church and wants to become a member of the Latter Day Saint church....  Sweet (;  we invited him to attend a baptismal service on Saturday and guess what....  He showed up!  He even called at 7:30 in the morning to tell us that he was getting ready.  How cool is that? We went there and met him and he loved the service.  We told him we'd come by in the evening to talk and he said okay.  We went back around 4 and started talking.  The response he was giving to lesson 2 (The plan of Salvation) was incredible!  He made statements that I absolutely loved! and one of the statements I loved the most was, "I'm just waiting for the right time, that I can baptize and become a member of the Latter Day Saint church."  Let me just tell you, the spirit was STRONG in this lesson!  I had JOY after hearing him say this!  All I did after that was prayed that the spirit would stay in the lesson so he'd continue to feel it.  We invited him to church and he came!  Golden investigator right here!!!(; He loves the church and wants to be a member.  From this experience, I have learned that I need to give everyone a chance even if they seem just like another person who wants something free.  I love being on mission in Liberia and love the knowledge I have acquired about the church. I know that this Church literally is the only true church on this earth.  People say that if they teach from the Bible that its a true church. False. I tell people that they need to pray about the church their in and when I ask them if they have, most of them say "um... no" Prayer is the only way to find the truth.  After you have studied the scriptures, you need to pray, and you need to pray to know which church is true.  Don't just be apart of a religion just because your parents are apart of it.  Your parents won't be taking you to Heaven, it's yourself that will have to go there. No one will take you with them.  Find out for yourself.  I love the church and am SOOOO glad I had the opportunity to come on a mission.  I keep learning and growing in the church and I love it.  I hope that you all will find out for yourself if it's true and I hope you continue to study the scriptures on your own, as well as a family.  I LOVE THE CHURCH!!!

D&C 130:20-21 obedience brings blessings
I believe its also in this same section that makes reference to something really cool that if you have gone to the temple, you'll understand.  So read the whole thing.

Only one thing that I would like... WHITE CHOCOLATE! I had some white chocolate m&ms yesterday and I miss white chocolate.  so if you could maybe for Christmas or my birthday send some, I would LOVE you even more than I already do!! (;

Have a great week and remember who you are. A child of God.
Love your Brother/Son Elder Garrett Zaugg

 

Elder Bowring celebrating his 1 month mark and Elder Zaugg celebrating 6 months!

This is serious deep dish pizza!  Elder Zaugg's last package contained pizza dough, pepperonis, and sauce. Looks like it was a success!

These boys can cook!

YOSO = You Only Serve Once!

How is everything back home? Work? School? The Garden? Boys? Anything? I hope it is all going well!!! And that God is blessing you! I'M 6 MONTHS!!!!!! Any sister missionary that leaves now will get home AFTER me!!  That is an exciting thought!  Time on mission is running out very fast.  Time literally slips away while proselyting.  We never have enough time to see all the people we have to see.  I wish you could be in a missionaries shoes for one day.  When they say mission goes by fast, they aren't lying.   I love being in Liberia! I'm breaking my new companion in well.  Feeding him all this delicious African food.  Its funny because you can tell he's new, he doesn't know how to eat the native cuisine...  Theirs a technique to eating rice here.  You don't pour all the soup on the rice at once, you take it small small and then do a back and forth motion with your spoon to mix the rice around. I will demonstrate in 18 months, no worries.  But he likes to pour the soup and skip out on the whole spoon motion.... Amateurs... (;   To answer a few questions from the last email.  I use my back pack on pdays, but I don't wear it out because it stains my shirt and I don't like washing that many shirts. So, I stopped wearing it during the week.  We haven't had a change for the dress code or anything... what got changed?  I don't know if Elder Avornu got his package yet.  It would be really cool if you could send them one for Christmas. I think they'd really love it and it'd make their mission.  Elder Osayi was so excited to get his.  He kept asking me every week if our packages had been sent so he kept looking for it.  He loved it!  And he loved the personalized Journal to!  Speaking of journals... I need one pronto!!!! I'm running out of room haha so maybe you could send 2 if thats alright, then I'll ask for one when I finish the third one.   My hair has grown out now so I hope you were able to see how short it was.  Couldn't believe thats what the barber gave me haha I have learned not to get specific here.  Just close your eyes and pray with faith!  It worked this time...   He gave me a good one.

  I have run out of time and want to send at least one picture home.  So I love you all!!!!  And if you could send a journal or two, that would be greatly appreciated! 

3 Nephi 12:21-24, 34-37
Hope you have a good week. Until next time.
Elder Zaugg
P.S. The Zone has come up with a motto. YOSO....You only serve once.

I LOVE LIBERIA!!!!!!!!!!! and rice.



The Kitchen....Look! The dishes are done! :)



6 month celebration!

Yummy!

The Bedroom

Elder Bowring studying. I got him hooked on the 2 for 1 stale frosted flakes. :)

Pictures, and My New Area

Y'ello!

So, the picture of Brooklyn......  that girl has some serious attitude.  I'm pretty sure she has 5 boyfriends already and its the second week of school..  Tell her boys have cooties and she should stay away from them.  I honestly can't believe how grown up she looks!  I'll have to beat off all those boys when I get home.  She looks like she was ready to start school!  How'd she do with leaving mom?  Doesn't look like she had to hard a time leaving ha  which is good!  The watermelon pictures are sweet!  I'm sad I'm not there to enjoy the first watermelon from the garden....  make sure you write down what you did so it actually was ripe! Then when I get home I'll be able to try some!  and dad... you are killin that blue v neck.  I love it!  I leave for 6 months and everyone's style changes.... what'll it be like at 1 year?? haha  Then you have the picture of my sistas....  I really like it for 2 reasons, 

1. You guys look beautiful.  2.  There are no boyfriends in it. 

 so lets keep it that way yeah?(;  



"The Sistas"  sending their love to their brother in Africa!

 

 

 I'll respond to this email and last weeks email in a letter home so don't worry.  Maybe you could even send a silver paged bible and BOM if that's alright.  I want to put crocodile skin on them and then put them away until I get home! But I saw a missionary do it and it looks sweet! 

Now what you all have been waiting for!!  My new companion and Area!  We'll start with my companion.  His name is Elder Bowring from Blanding Utah.  We went by where he lives when we went hunting last October so we were talking about that!  We get along great and he is doing good with learning the lessons.  It's weird having an American companion because I've only had African ones my whole mission, so it was a change.  I was shocked when I found out that I was training again and going to a whitewashed area..  no pressure Elder Zaugg.  The area is nice. We are on the far end while Elder Osayi and his companion are on the other.  But let me tell you about the area.  The first day I get there, I go on exchange with Elder Osayi and his companion so they can show me the area.  They started taking me to some of my investigators and showing me around, and then we went to see some of theirs.  The interesting part about it, was that our investigators didn't live to far from each other.....  I asked Osayi where my boundaries were and he responded with, "This area doesn't have any boundaries..."    What area has 2 companionships working in it intermingling investigators.... Not True!  Come to find out on Sunday,  we weren't even in my area.    Needless to say, the area was horrible. Our area book didn't help like it should have.  We just started fresh and started contacting our own investigators.  We'll see how things go now.  Oh yeah, and when it rains over here, we proselyte in about 2 to 10 inches of water, depending on what part we go into.   What an adventure right?  Sorry if the writing doesn't make sense, I'm rushing to get all this information out, so its not organized,  but you can kind of get an Idea of what the past 2 weeks have been like. 

The apartment we live in has Electricity all through the night so we get to have a fan, which will be good with dry season coming up.  Its crazy having light for such a long period of time.  I feel spoiled and like I'm living too good for the mission.  Even having Electricity back, I don't use it that much.  I have learned to live without it, so I don't need it as bad.  It definitely helps for sure, but If I didn't have power I could be content.  On to the room situation now.  We have our own bathroom hooked to our room with running water, but our toilet doesn't flush.  Our room constantly smells like poop from the bathroom.     On the same poop topic, our balcony looks off into an industrial park with a ditch right below us.  So whenever it rains and the wind blows, the ditch fills with water and blows the smell into our apartment.  I'm really thinking, the ditch behind our apartment is where all the poops go too... but I'm not sure.  You know when its windy though, that's for sure!!   Scriptures to read Helaman 12:2-4      Being rich is not a bad thing, but what I have learned from studying the scriptures, is that we need to know who's providing our wealth for us.  Don't ever forget God, and don't just turn to worldly things.  Help others and help the church.

James 1:1-4,8,12,19-20 and 5:20      You can read all of James 1 but look at these versus specifically.

After 5 months of living here its Transfer Day.....sad day.

My MTC brother and me, Elder Smith got split up.

The other Elder Smith that goes home on the 30th of this month.

Elder Zaugg teasing the children

Traffic at night...Liberians are impatient. A two lane road becomes a five lane road with any open space occupied with a bike man.

Make sure you are taking time out of your day to sit down and just look over a few chapters or a few versus.  The scriptures tell us that if we rest them, it will be to our own destruction.  Dont ever stop studying the scriptures.  you need to make time for God so that he can make time for you.  Go to church with the desire to participate and to gain something from each lesson.  Don't go to just go.  You'll be wasting your time by doing so.  Make life count by doing what Mosiah 2:41 says and obey the commandments.  Then we'll be able to receive those spiritual blessings of having a stronger testimony and also we will receive those temporal blessings.  If God makes us rich, don't let pride sink in.  Why money is the root to all evil, is because people don't know how to use their money the right way.  They end up putting themselves in a worse place in life then if they would have been poor.  When you're poor, you  actually learn something from your trials.  Don't feel like your life is rough if you have a trial.  The scriptures tell us that we should rejoice if we have trials!  We will grow and become those people who God wants us to be if we go through them.  I know that this is the only true Church on this earth.  I love having this testimony and I want everyone I meet to have this same testimony.  Find out for yourself if this church is really the true church.  PRAY to know!  Don't just listen to everyone say its true.  Me telling you its true, won't get you a place in heaven.  So find out for yourself and reserve yourself a place in heaven.  I love you all and can't wait to hear from you next week!

Love Elder Zaugg

I Clothes Lined Myself

Another exciting week in LIB! First off.... I can't believe that Brook is starting school today!!!!!  BROOK! Have fun on your first day and make sure to tease all those nasty boys with cooties.  You can tell them if they mess with you your uncle Garrett will come beat them up for you.  Make lots of friends so that you can have sleep overs with them(;  Crazy its already time for her to start school! Make sure to send pictures of her first day next week! Braden looks like a stud at the MTC!! I'm so glad he has made it out now!  He'll love serving the Lord with all the energy he has.  It is the most rewarding thing you could do.  The picture of my sisters and Grandma is a good one.  I don't know how they aren't married yet.  Actually I do... I pray that they won't get married until after March 2015...  see the power of Faith?  (; kidding, God just knows what's best and he is on my side with having you all get married in 2015(: 

 

 My first son didn't receive a package before I left, but I think you could still send him one.  It made Elder Osayis day when he got his.  He would always talk about it, so it really brightens their day when they get stuff like that.  My other companions name I just had was Elder Avornu.  So maybe if you guys have time, you could send one his way.  He would appreciate it.  I love that kid so much! We had a great time together, I'm sad that we got separated but I know that Logan Town needs me now.
 

I will need a nice shampoo and cut from Kendra when I get home.  I currently only wash my hair once a week so that I will have enough shampoo to last me a good chunk of my mission.  Every pday is when I spoil myself with a nice shower and good food.  When I mean nice shower, I mean a cold bucket of water with a cup to pour over my body with some shampoo.  That's Liberian enjoyment right there.  And good food is a boiled egg with a cucumber on a 25-30LD bread.  This is a high quality day for me. So, The Frosties are still made by Kellogg's but they call them Frosties... I don't know why.  But the Nido milk is so nice! The Best they have in LIB.  I think its manufactured in a middle eastern country.  That's where majority of our products we buy come from.  They have a ketchup that's made by the Lebanese people and its not too bad actually.  Not the greatest but it still tastes some what like ketchup. I got 5 packages by the way!!! And yes I got all the stuff you have mentioned except 4 pens from the package that you had the sticky note in.  I guess they needed them more than me.  And they also ate one of my delicious protein snickers bars....  How rude.  I eat lots of egg sandwiches and rice.  Sometimes I'll throw in some frosted/corn flakes with sliced up bananas.  If we have some extra money, we'll buy some French fries or a cake and make it.  So we do enjoy some of the time, but most of the time its the same.  I will explain some food details if you write a letter and ask about it.  I'm trying to reply to last weeks email and still write more stories. 

Time just slips away!!  And studying... I don't have enough time to study in one hour.  I wish they would let us have 2 hours personal study and 1 hour companion study.  I love reading and learning about the Book of Mormon and Bible stories.  I am now just learning about all those stories that I heard people talking about growing up.... (;  Thank you for sending all that food and pens and everything!! And the pizza stuff! We will be making it sometime this week or next pday!! I love getting stuff like this!  Different meals are fun to make!  I am in desperate need of a journal!! If you could send me another one in the next package I would appreciate it! I write too much detail so I take up 4 pages a day.  So I need another one.  Maybe you could send 2 and then I will have back ups. 

Okay, so the first story this week.  I had just moved into my new apartment and was trying to figure out how to hang my clothes up, because we don't have a closet to put our clothes in.  I remembered the clothes lines that I had with me. I tied one to a nail on one side of the room and then tied it to the other nail on the other side.  I then hung my clothes up and it worked perfectly!  The only problem was that it hung a little low.  I didn't think anything of it, so I went to bed.  In the middle of the night I had to go to the bathroom, so I got out of bed and went. On my way back to my bed I was half asleep and then I felt something start choking me.  Yeah...  I clothes lined myself.  It was actually pretty scary because I didn't know what it was until I realized it was my clothes line. haha  yeah, I took it down in the morning.  It was a good idea while it lasted!

Now last one, I'm almost out of time. While I was on exchange waiting for my companion to come, we were in the other Logan Town area teaching.  As we were teaching Elder Osayi told me to turn around, and just as I turned around, I saw a little boy going to the bathroom.  No big deal, we see it all the time.  But he told me that the little boy had got it on himself.  The next thing I see is, his mom going over to a dried up palm leaf, rips off some leaves, goes back, and wipes this little boy. I always thought it was funny when people would joke about using a leaf in the wild.  well, I actually saw it happen... and it doesn't look comfortable.  especially with the dried part of the leaf... why couldn't she have grabbed a green leaf?  Probably would have been a lot softer then dried.

Well I'll try to tell more stories next time and more about my companion and area.  This new area is confusing.  I'll explain next week.  I'm training Elder Bowring from Blanding Utah!  He's awesome!  My first American companion and let me tell you, it is pretty sweet watching an American go through what I went through. So many new experiences!  I love it here!! 

Read all of Helaman 6:39-40 but read the whole chapter  as well.  I hope you all have a great week and I love you all!!  Until next week.
Elder Zaugg

Elder Zaugg with his new companion Elder Bowring

 

Transfer News

I GOT ALL OF MY PACKAGES FINALLY!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!

First off, I love the pictures!!!.  All my memories of these things have faded away, so when I see them its really weird!  I love it though.   That's cool we have players from RSL playing on the US Men's team.  That's all these people talk about here is football.  The World Cup is always on their minds and when the teams were qualifying for it, everyone was at the video clubs watching the games.  Lets hope USA can do work yeah?   Now the cute African children are just that. Cute. They get so attracted to our skin that they come running up with their slobbery hands and start rubbing your arms or grabbing your hands.  I have learned not to touch any part of my body until I can get to the apartment and sanitize myself.  :)

Some exciting news this week in the mission field.  TRANSFER NEWS!!!!  and guess what... Elder Zaugg's son is training! yay! I will have a grandson on mission now.  That means I'm leaving for the first time!  I will miss Banjor.  I got transferred to Logan Town! I'm living in the same apartment complex as Elder Erickson.  We will enjoy (;    I'm training again.  COOL.  

Also, in this last week as we were proselyting, we were walking on a new road coming from a less active members compound, when we saw this lady begging on the side of the road.  When I looked at her, I realized that this lady had no eyeballs.  It was sad to see it, it was probably from the war.  These people have been through a lot.

Some scriptures to study.  

Alma 13:20  

Alma 62:46-51

Helaman 5: 2     I was thinking about America on this one

I hope you all have a good week and I will keep praying for you!  Sorry I didn't have plenty of stories this week, but I'm sure next week in my new area I will have some!  I love you all so much! 

Until next week.
Love, Elder Zaugg



This is only half of the 44 packages that the Royal Liberian Post Office had. 
Missionaries had not received packages since May.

WHERE HAS THE MAIL BEEN?

Post taken from the Official Liberia Mission Website. The senior couple wrote:
On Wednesday as I walked into the office I was greeted by 2 Royal Liberian Mail employee's asking me why I had not been to pick up our packages.  I told them that Brother Sayon went 2-3 times a week.  They then gave me a bag of 22 packages for missionaries!  They informed me that they could not store them and that we needed to pick them up more often.  When Brother Sayon got to the office he said that he had gotten a call saying that there were packages for the missionaries.  On Thursday he went to the post office to see what had happened.  He was given another 22 packages!!!  These were packages from June, July and August.  Some of them had been eaten into by rats and mice and others were fine.  There was one package that was so badly eaten we  had to open (what was left of the box) and transfer the contents into another box.  The only thing that had been eaten (besides the box) was a whole package of Twizzlers - we have discriminating rats at the post office!

New Washing Machines for the Missionaries!



PICTURES

First things first.  Thank you for those mentos you sent in the last package I received back in the day.  They just finished and they were nice! Another thing, make sure to save my emails and letters so that we can make a book of them when I get home.

Now, let me tell you about my incident at the barber shop or barber shack, whichever one you prefer. The last time he cut my hair, he cut it flat on top so I looked like I was getting ready for basic training or something. So this time, I told him to leave it a little long in the center.  Simple enough right? I got EXACTLY what I asked for.  Home boy takes the clippers and takes a chunk out of the side of my hair and it basically went bald...  At this point I was like, well, theres no going back now.  I let him do his thing thinking he'd make it look good.  He ended up leaving a nice thick bush of hair on top of my head and bald on the side..... not completely bald, it kind of looks like my head has 5 o clock shadow. Yeah, picture this on me... haha I'll take a picture and hopefully send it next week.  It definitely is a African hair cut for sure.  Im trying to rock this style the best I can for a white man, but its not doing so hot... good thing it grows back and we can try again next time right?
Oh how I love AFRICA!! Doesn't get better than this!

So this past week, we were in a part of our area called Banjor market.  We have some investigators over in this area we teach.  As we were coming back from teaching them, there was some little kids who saw us and started screaming "white man! white man! white man!" I took this as an opportunity to get my uncle mind set back for a little bit.  When they got the right distance away, I did a studder step/ jump towards them. You can only imagine what a small liberians face looks like as a white man jumps towards them... These kids face went from being excited to say hi, to complete horror.  I couldn't help but laugh... They went running around the house, and me and my companion just kept walking.  When we were coming to the other side of the house, You could hear them again, "white man! white man! white man!" When we were almost to the edge of the house, I saw a bush that they were going to have to pass around before they could see us... so, I took off running towards the bush and hid until I saw them.  When I saw the first kid come around, I jumped out and ran towards them. These kids will have the best agility after I leave the area though.  They can turn around quick! After this we didn't see them again.  When we got through the market and were trying to get on a bike, guess what we heard again....  "white man! white man! white man!"  and across the street were the 10 kids emerging from the market across the street.  They followed us until we got on a bike.   I was enjoying myself for sure!  I couldn't believe they were still wanting to say hi even though I was scaring them...  Liberia is fun!

This next week is the end of the transfer, so I might be in a new area the next time I email, but no one knows.



I like my cereal!



My new progressing investigator that we are teaching the Book of Mormon.

Don't worry, I don't hold all of my investigators....this one is an exception

The Monkey's name is Bush....because he came from the bush.  Clever right?!

Excerpts from a letter Elder Zaugg wrote to the Priests Quorum in his home ward.

  What a privilege it is that we young men and young women have to serve a mission. With the age change almost a year ago, you are now able to leave once you graduate. That means you need to prepare yourself so you can be ready and able. Seminary is one of the best places to begin. I wish I would have listened better so that I would have known more of the Bible and Book of Mormon stories. Becoming familiar with the scriptures is a great help. They become your best friend once you hit the mission field. As you prepare now, make sure you "study" the scriptures every night. we hear it all the time, but I promise you, that as you study each day you will obtain more knowledge about the church, and you will have a stronger testimony. people can deny the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith and the church, but they can not deny a testimony. It is something you know to be true, and as you share your testimony with your investigators, it will bring the spirit with more power. As you are sharing it, The spirit is so strong and testifies to them what you are saying is true. make sure that as part of your preparation to serve, you gain that strong testimony. Even if its small, it will continue to grow as you study and pray.
     A mission will never be a bad decision. So far on my mission, I have had experiences that I never would have had if I would of chose to stay home. Even being in the mission field my testimony has grown. Every day I become more aware of how true the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is. Anyone I meet, I can stand and tell them that I know its the only true church upon the face of the earth. Helping people know for themselves that its the only true church brings so much joy and happiness. Seeing people repent and change their lives to follow Christ is amazing. As they feel the spirit they begin to gain a strong testimony for themselves. Bringing others unto Christ is one of the best things you could do in this life. Imagine the blessings that will come from serving 2 years. The rest of your life will be a lot easier if you dedicate only these 2 years of your time to the Lord. mission goes by WAY fast, and you will be wanting it not to go by as fast. With how fast time goes, you need to make sure that you make EVERY second count in your day. You don't want to have any regrets after. Pday comes quick and it seems like I just wrote my family yesterday.  This is why I say make EVERY second count. Every day, week, month that goes by is one less day you have to make an impact on someone's life, and one more day, week, month you won't EVER get back. 
     Make sure to go over the lessons in Preach My Gospel. Looking them over and becoming aware and familiar with them will be a great help to you. During your training, those are the things you will learn. If you understand them now the smoother training will be. Last thing to help you prepare is to pray. Prayer is the key to EVERYTHING. As you pray and ask our Heavenly Father to give you the strength to serve, he will answer you. He will give you the strength you need, if you have that desire to serve. I know this church is true. One of the simplest things to say, but it means a lot to me. No one will ever be able to tell me other wise. I have found out for myself the truth, and it is this church. Joseph Smith sealed his testimony with his blood, by dying for this church. He was and is a prophet called of God. I love you all and hope you all will have the desire to bring souls unto Christ. A mission will never be a bad thing. You will be blessed. 

Love Elder Zaugg

 

This is Terry. I love this guy!

 

5 months on Thursday

I'M 5 MONTHS OUT ON THURSDAY!!!

Things are changing at home it sounds like. Its sweet hearing all of your stories!! So Curtis coming home is crazy.  (Curtis is a young man from Elder Zaugg's home ward) I remember when He was leaving and we were going to youth conference the same day.  Weird to think how fast time flies. I can relate to him with the whole African teaching and not being able to understand thing... Not easy!  You have to live with them and be apart of their lives if you want to fully understand them.  Now that I have been out 5 MONTHS this week, I can understand them Most all of the time.  Until they get mad and start yelling... that's where they lose me. That's when I tell them they're speaking series....  (Series is what they call our language when they don't understand us Americans..) What fun it is trying to understand an angry Liberian.

I want to answer some questions from the past emails. so get ready... Your personal studying will be good if you use Preach My Gospel.  Especially if your trying to gain these Christ like attributes.  Even if you read a few pages in your Bible or BOM and mark things down and study the stories, you will learn so many things.  As I go through and mark things, new ideas or thoughts come to mind on how I can become better.  As far as the eggs smelling like fish... they smell and TASTE like fish, but they haven't for awhile.  I think it was just a bad batch for a good couple of weeks.  They probably do get fed that fish stuff as well.  

 Keep my name in the temple for sure! The more prayers the better!! Thank you for the scriptures as well.  They are great.   The language is weird.  You can't really call it a language because all they do is chop the last half of the word off of some of the words.  So understanding it now is fine, and I can speak some of it, but it isn't really a language.  You don't have to learn any words, its just how they mush and subtract different letters.  It sounds like a completely different language though. When you know what they are saying, you get used to it. 

I don't have much to say this week sorry... I will write more next time, but life in LIB is going great! Missionary work is moving along like always! I want to send pictures but I run out of time every time. so next week I will try!  If you could send a new journal then I will be able to have it here just in case I run out of room in this one.  I love to write a lot of details so I take up a few pages.

Some scriptures I found this week for you all...

all of Proverbs 13

Alma 34:32-35

Mark 13:32-37

I have not received anymore of your packages that you said you have sent. I hope that none of the Liberian post men have taken them.  I may be getting transferred this next transfer.

I love you all so much and keep you in my prayers.

Elder Zaugg