Last Email as a Missionary in Korea

Well folks, this is it. This will be the last letter you ever get from an Elder Stagg serving in Korea again! (Unless Jet gets called to Korea) I just wanted to thank you all for all of you support and for reading my weekly letters! 

This week we were able to confirm the 2 individuals who were recently baptized --in the same sacrament meeting. It was kinda scary because it was my first time confirming someone in Korean! haha But it was a neat experience that both me and my companion had! :) Also one of our investigators with a baptismal date was able to come to church for all 3 hours and seemed to really enjoy it! :) That was a little miracle that we were able to see! Hopefully he can stick to his baptismal date in September! :) 

I have  been serving here in the Haeundae Ward for the past 7 months, and I have come to love this ward so much! The people here are so nice and generous, they take awesome care of our investigators and they are just so fun! I have grown so close to them and it will be hard leaving them! Luckily they are throwing me a farewell party, Hawaiian BBQ style, because like 5 of them have lived in Hawaii while they attended BYU. So that should be a lot of fun! 
On Wednesday one of our investigators, David, is taking me out to an all you can eat Brazilian meat buffet for my last meal, and its... a little pricey... so I am excited for that! Also on Saturday I was able to go to the city Masan for my companions Choir performance with the mission Choir, and had the opportunity to spend time with my convert that I baptized a year and 3 months ago! I haven't been able to see him since then, so it was nice  to see him again before I return home :) I also was able to meet up with an investigator family from that area, and had a chance to say  good bye! It really meant a lot to them that I called them after I left the area and I was able to meet up with them again before I left!

Well now that its coming up to my last week, I am feeling lots of different emotions. I am excited to go home and see my family and start the next period of my life, I am excited to be in the glorious land of America again, but I am going to miss this country for many reasons. I am going to miss the people, food, music, and everything about it! I have grown so used and accustomed to this country that its going to be hard leaving it after 2 years! I am especially going to miss being able to talk about people right in front of their face and have them not know what I say because its in English! haha ...   I am going to miss all the friends I met here, all the amazing lives I helped change, all the people that changed my life, the members, investigators, converts, people that yell at me, just everything! I have been shown so much love here that it feels like my 2nd home! :) 

But the thing that I am most grateful for-- more than the people, more than the food, the awesome culture experiences I have had, the new language, my ward family, or any of that, is my Savior!  Some of you might be thinking that I  had Christ in my life before I left, and that is true, however I didn't understand then what I understand now! I didn't appreciate then what I appreciate now. I knew it was true but didn't understand the depth of what that meant for me. I have come to know not just "about" Jesus Christ, but I have come to KNOW Christ, I now can understand and feel why he is my Savior, my Redeemer, and Lord. It is only through Him and through His help that we can even start to TRY to live with our Heavenly Father again. He can help us in ANY problem that we have in our life. It doesn't have to be sin based, it can be any struggle and pain, any affliction, anything that we want help with, we have the creator of the Universe and his only Begotten son willing to help us in anything that we want, and all we need to do is ask in faith and humility. That knowledge and that gift is priceless, that is something I will treasure for the rest of my life! I am afraid that if I didn't come on this mission I might of never learned that, at least not on this kind of level.

I beg anyone who is considering to go on a mission, to just DO IT!! You will not regret it. No matter what your doubts or fears are just throw them away and TRUST GOD.  If you compared the reason why I left on a mission to the reason why I STAYED on a mission, it is night and day difference. Like Alma Chapter 32 explains about faith, we don't need a perfect knowledge, cause THAT IS NOT FAITH, faith is a hope for better things, faith is trust, faith is a believe with actions tied to that belief.  I promise if you just trust in God and then walk in that direction, if you have the intention of progressing, and exercise faith and hope in Christ, that you will come to know that He is there, guiding you! Let the Lord change you into who He wants you to become, be optimistic and look for opportunities to serve others.  
I love you all and I am so grateful for the opportunity I have had to serve here in the Korea Busan Mission! 

Love you tons!

-Elder Stagg

Farewell Korea

Almost there...

Hello everyone!  I just want to start of saying THIS IS WEIRD!! Time flies by way to fast, it doesn't feel real that I am going home already, this is my second to last email as a missionary.

Anyways this transfer has been so weird, missionary work has been to easy. Usually I work really hard and see no results, this past transfer we've been so busy we can't proselyte, but we still find new investigators weekly always have them coming to church and have had 2 baptisms. Just by the way, at least here in the Korea Busan Mission that's unheard of. It's even more strange because last transfer we had nothing whatsoever, and the beginning of this transfer everything just fell into place. God's hand has been involved so much. Ive come to realize that how successful we are as missionaries is not at all dependent on how hard we work, how obedient we are, or how good of a missionary we are. There is only one factor involved, that's God's will. All the success we get as missionaries is only cause God let's it happen. Now the harder we work and the more obedient we are, are important because the missions our "Zions Camp" and it helps God see who is willing to listen and follow him. On my mission I've been on the more successful side of missionaries, and it's always been weird to me cause I see other missionaries who are super amazing super hard working super obedient missionaries who are a ton better then me, but then they get like no baptism or anything. Its helped me recognize how dependent on our Heavenly Father that we really are and all the success we have in life is only cause God allows it!  I am so grateful for everything God has given me! 

Love you all

Elder Stagg 

July 2018

Hello family and friends--- it is me your favorite Elder!  I officially have 3 weeks left until I go home! So this is my 3rd to last email to y'all. This past transfer I have been so busy! It's weird but missionary work has come easy recently. As some of you might know, I posted some baptism pictures on Facebook this week. The lady I baptized is Sister 이세현 --- her English name is Sarah.  I first met Sarah about 5 months ago with Elder Kim. She came to our English class for about 3 weeks and then just randomly one day attended Sacrament meeting. Ever since then she has come to church almost weekly . We started meeting with her outside of church and talking to her about the gospel. We found out that she had been taught 10 years ago by Sister missionaries. 

 

Anyhow, when we started teaching her, her behaviors seemed kind of strange and a bit weird. She had lots of problems in her life but as she continued to attend Sacrament Meeting every week, it looked like she had genuine interest.  Her family was very against her coming to our church and her sister even texted me and told us not to meet with her again! (Yes, Sarah is a grown woman! haha!) 

However, over the past month-and-a-half we have been teaching her lessons and have been helping her overcome her problems through the Gospel. She loves coming to church and the members have done a very good job at fellowshipping her every time she comes. She has lots of new friends and she feels very happy and loved in our ward. She was a little nervous and scared to get baptized because she has issues with being under water, but I reassured her and told her that I would be holding on to her and promised that  she would not drowned! She is a very nice lady and very cute and innocent.

Next week we have another baptismal date planned for Sunday. Her  name is 정겨운 Jeong Gyo Oon  and she was taught by the sister missionaries about 1 year ago and had a baptism date set but when the day came, she got scared and never went to the church. Well she came back about a month later and said she wanted to get baptized and she was sorry for not getting baptized before. She ended up doing the same thing the second time and left the day of the baptism AGAIN! A 3rd time she said she wanted to get baptized, we told her that she had to wait about 5 weeks and if she attends church every week that she could get baptized. We have been meeting with her every  week and she's progressing very well. This Wednesday she will have a baptism interview with our Mission President and if he thinks she is ready,  she will be baptized this Sunday. Will you all please pray that she'll be able to overcome her concerns and fears and go through with the baptism on Sunday? She was able to see Sarah get baptized last week so hopefully that helped ease her  worries. 

This has been a great week! I love this gospel and it can bless and CHANGE everyone's life if they allow it!

Love you all

Elder Stagg

Hello everyone! 🏿 So this week was definitely a good week. Tuesday we decided to make a message card for one of our members and so we took time to make it and walked like 40 minutes up this mountain ⛰ to his house only to find out that he moved like 3 months ago... Haha so that was fun! Wednesday we had zone conference, which was weird because my trainer gave his last testimony at Zone Conference, he leaves this transfer! The reason why that is weird is because that means that I die next transfer... 

I did some exchanges with Elder Stephens who is in my MTC group but I have only seen him twice and never really talked to him. It .was fun to get to know him!  We had an appointment with an investigator at a members house for dinner, but then it got cancelled  BUT, we ended up meeting with the investigator on Friday with a different member right before FHE! 

On Saturday I went down to an area in my district which is about an hour away to do a baptism interview, the lady was super awesome and had lots of faith! It was cool to be able to talk with her and then I went down again on Sunday to watch the baptism!  Right after the baptism I met up with 3 of our investigators and went to Lexi Walkers concert---- that was so  fun! The missionaries went up and talked with her. She knows my MTC companion, Elder Vongsayo. They are neighbors! I will have to take my little sister to go meet her!

I am really enjoying missionary work and am learning a lot! Its weird thinking that I will be home soon, it doesn't seem real, but it will be fun to see you all Again! 

Love you all! 

스태그 장로

June 3rd:

So I got a package from my amazing family this week full of MERICA stuff! It was super sick so shout out to my awesome Mom!  I was reading the letters and they all were saying  see you 12 weeks ...so I turned to me companion and told him that my family sucks at counting because they all keep saying that I have 12 weeks left but I really have 16 left! He just gave me this puzzled look and said, "Elder you do have 12 weeks left..." I stopped and realized that I had "lost" 4 weeks of my mission somewhere in the last few months!  My mind was blown! 12 weeks!  that's not a lot of time left-- that is the same timing as my training in the MTC! SOOO crazy... the time flies by!

Last transfer we started a weekly soccer activity and at first there were not a lot of people who would attend.  We would do it with 3 other companionships but the others would not usually bring investigators. So we were trying to decide if we should cancel the weekly activity or not. Then last Saturday I was able to find 5-6 investigators and we met a bunch of people there so its starting to grow bigger and is a good way for our investigators to get to know other investigators! :) So that was an exciting turn around---- but know my feet HURT because I played for like 4 hours straight in the hot sun!

I love this area and I love this country! I am so grateful for the opportunity to be able to serve a mission! Since I have been out here I have learned one important thing and that is the principle of JOY.  The purpose of this life is mainly 2 things: 1. To learn how to live with God  again and 2. The pursuit of happiness and joy. Not many people know how can we find that happiness and joy. When we ask people on the street how to attain happiness and joy, these are the common answers that I get:  Partying, Games, Money, Family, Friends, Drinking, Girls, Nice cars, etc. Now if you notice, most of those are ways to have FUN for yourself, for the moment only! One thing I learned from my last companion, Elder Minson, is this,  I would see him frequently buy  snacks and treats when they were on sale, but then he would rarely eat them. One day I asked him why he did this and he told me "When I buy this candy I have 2 choices to (1) eat it and have maybe a minute of happiness and pleasure, or (2) I can write a note and give the note with this candy to someone else and then feel happiness and joy for a day or so! Wow! I was impressed. What a great way to look at things. So, with that perspective,  its always an easy choice for me---choose the one that makes me  happy for longer!  If we look at Christs life,  he didn't do anything for himself,  he did everything for others (same with all the  prophets of old). So I have came to the conclusion that in order to find  J.O.Y there is an order. 1. JESUS 2. OTHERS 3. YOURSELF.

 If we use that order in our lives then I promise you all that you can find Eternal and Everlasting Joy because when you are in the service our of fellow beings you are truly serving and acting as Christ himself would if he were here! Anytime you truly follow Christ and walk in His footsteps, you will have Joy in your life!

Love you so much! 

-Elder Stagg


Nathan is teaching English to this adorable little girl

Hello everyone! I am Elder Stagg, yes I am!

I feel like recently that everything has been about the same, not much change. This week we met with JIMMY! Jimmy is a member from Utah who served his mission in Ghana like 4 years ago. He is here for the next 6 months for a LONGGGG vacation. We met with him to help him learn Korean and then he helped us make a banner for our English Class because he is super good at Photoshop

We met a new investigator while playing soccer and he actually came to church the next day!   It is awesome to see some of the "fruit of our labor". He is super cool and apparently his uncle is a member of the church in Seoul so he has interest in our church. So sick!

Yesterday at 5 A.M my time (In Utah it was Saturday at 2 P,M) I had the opportunity to Skype in and witness my little sister, Arianna, get baptized! I also recorded a baptism talk for her, which my family was able to show at the baptism.  I am so grateful for technology which allows me to give a talk and to watch her get baptized even though I am across the world from her! It led me to think a little deeper about life. When she got baptized, she looked so bright and happy! We only get baptized once, yet we can enjoy that same happiness and renewal every week! IF we use our Saviors gift to our advantage and repent everyday and then partake of the Sacrament worthily. I want to share a short testimony that I know that living the Gospel of Jesus Christ will lead us to the greatest happiness in this life and in the life to come. I have seen that, experienced that, and have testified of that time after time! If you doubt that, try it out for a  bit. "By their fruits, he shall know them!"

Love you all,

Elder Stagg




P-Day at the Sand Festival:

 April 1st:

This week has been busy with lots of planning. We had a very successful and fun Easter activity last Sunday. I'll make a video of it this week and I will send it  next week. It will also probably be on Facebook.                             Last Saturday we had a missionary choir meeting for the Busan stake. We were able to get our investigator, Say Hyun, to be there. We taught her all of the commitments (however because she was very sleepy she struggled with paying attention during the lesson)  She is in line for getting baptized this Sunday. 

In Korea, we watch conference a week later, so  we will watch General Conference and then have her baptismal service.  She loves coming to church and has very good friendships with the ward members. I am very excited for her to get baptized!

Last Sunday we saw a huge miracle. I fasted that our investigators --the Soump family , Alex, and one other man, would come to church. They all have so much potential yet struggle with having time to meet with us. About 20 minutes into Sacrament Meeting, the Soump family walked in!.  All of our translation equipment was broken so 3 of us missionaries had to translate for them! The previous night they had prepared 300 Easter eggs for the kids to have a big Easter egg hunt.  It was very fun seeing them at church.

So this past week, elder Minson and I prepared an activity for our zone. We set up five basic activities. The first main one was Easter egg decorating. While they decorated the eggs we introduced them to our free English class and tried to get them to sign up to our Facebook page. Also we talked about Easter and if they had interest we would teach a little bit about our beliefs.

The next table was a simple game we called Pong. Kind of like the beer game you play with alcohol but instead we had a bunch of cups set up in a triangle formation and inside the cups were little papers with questions in English.  They would take a ball and they throw the ball into a cup and if it made it into the cup they had to answer the question.

 The next game was elder Martin's game. Elder Martin is a Navy Seal in training. he has the biggest arms I have ever seen! We had people try to arm wrestle him and if they won they would win a box of chocolate pies. Let's just say,  we have a lot of chocolate pies left!

 Next we had Eders walk around with a board that had a bunch of balloons taped to it. People would take a dart and throw a dart at a balloon.  Once it popped there was candy and a question in English on the inside.

The last was a big piece of paper on a table that had the question "What is Easter?" And a place for them to write the answer. It was a really fun activity and fun to put together!

 To end my email,  I would like to give a brief testimony about our Savior Jesus Christ. Yesterday was Easter and that helped me contemplate the reason why we celebrate this holiday. In Korea,  Easter is not a very big holiday. If you are not religious you barely even know it exists. If you translate "Easter" in Korean directly to English it translates to "Resurrection Day". Often times in America, we get so focused on Easter baskets and bunnies that we forget the true meaning of Easter.  It is because of our Savior Jesus Christ that we can all be resurrected and become perfect. This should bring hope and joy into our life. 

This time of year, as flowers and other plants are springing into new life we can center our thoughts on our Savior Jesus Christ and the "new life"  that he can bring to each one of us.  We need to be grateful for His amazing gift and in our prayers express that from our heart.

Love you all!

Elder Stagg 

Hayundai: Pulled from the brink of death

Hey family and friends I am so sorry I wasn't able to send an email last week! We were super busy. So our mission is doing this stupid mission choir thing and my companion is in it so every pday we need to go all the way to headquarters while he practices.. and we need to deal with all the exchanging of other missionaries and it makes my life suck... haha  so I was not able to do it last week.. this week I have to do it all on the phone.. which isn't bad but it is kinda hard to type a lot on the phone.. but that's k.  So this week we met a lot with our investigator his name is Chway Soo Chan...  we met him last week for the first time outside of the streets. And he is getting baptized this Sunday at 9! When we met him he was planning on committing suicide so he wasn't very nice to us but we gave him a name card, and the next day he texted us and said that he tried killing himself last night but before he was able to jump of the bridge someone grabbed him and called the cops. So he went to the hospital. He was there for a bought a month, so while he was there elder Beckett and Elder Kim visited him and gave him a book of Mormon with there testimony written on the inside. So he called us my first week in Hayundai and said he was out. So we met him and gave him a baptism date. We meet with him a lot and he takes it awesome! He is so prepared. He said he used to hate God but know he believes and loves him. We took him to institute and he takes notes in our lessons during church and all the time! He is super fun! He had his baptism interview last night and he passed! So please pray that all goes well! He is going to Seoul this week for the holiday so also pray that all goes well up there! 

Outside of that I went on exchanges with elder Golden (in my my MTC class) and we gave a baptism date to another one of our investigators. His name is Joo  young Ho, his isn't as sure because he not the best at Sunday and church! Haha but we are going to focus on that week and hopefully get him to church! 

Yesterday we had 2 investigators come to church! That was fun! One of them works in China for this person from Utah.. So yesterday that person and his 2 friends from Utah came to our ward. They came down for the Olympics and also one if the Americans had served his mission in Korea a long time ago.. but the other American didn't know Korean so I had to translate for him but one of the talks was about a heart transplant which sucked because I didn't know any of that vocabulary! Haha it was fun though. 

We are meeting a lot of other investigators nd that's fun, I will explain them once they have have baptism dates.. haha sorry no time.

My dad wanted to hear what I do as a Zone Leader.. So here you go .  Honestly I don't do anything... we don't really do much besides giving permissions and going on exchanges.. President Jeoung gave all the power to district leaders and the APs or him self... haha I feel so useless all the time!!🤣🤣 all I do is call me zone members and laugh with them and become friends with them and help motivate them and help them do their best! And I don't even have to do that it's just something I like doing. Or i just boss the district leaders around because they were both in the MTC with me and so we are good friends! But yeah not much outside of that! 

Well I love you all! This week I have been thinking a lot about General conference and how lucky we are to have that! I am making questions and getting ready to receive serious mad revelation! So that's gonna be awesome! We are so lucky to be able to hear the prophets words twice a year! I challenge you all to start preparing know, re-read last year's talks, prayerfully think of questions you want answered and prepare! 

I love you all! Talk to you next week! 

Elder Stagg 

Companions

Living the high life in the Hayundai House

Laborers in the Vineyard

Elder Stagg and Elder Hunch

Where's the second course?

Hayundai: No Time

Hey so this week I have no time! So baiscaly we met a cool guy! He is getting baptized on the 25th! He is cool! He has some depression but this gospel will bless his life alot! I will let you know more next week! Sorry! Love you all!  

Hayundai: Erik the African

Hello! How are you doing? So this week has been super busy. I was told the Zone Leader was a lot easier than being District Leader but so far this week has been super busy for us! Outside of the zone stuff that I have been doing we have also had to been doing work in our area. So let me explain.

On monday we met Erik. Erik is from Africa Rohyanda, and is super sick. He loves laughing and is a super nice guy! His whole family are pastors for other churches but he really like our church because of prophets and he thinks that it just makes sence. Right now he is reading the Book of Mormon and is loving it! We have invited him to get baptized but he sayed he doesnt see why he needs to get baptized again because his father baptized him when he was a kid, we had to be careful to answer that without offending him and his father. So he said he will pray about it and if he gets an answer about the Book of Mormon and Baptism he would love to be a member of our church! He really like how we respect other churches and just because they dont have our same views we don't think the are going to hell. He has lots of potential but right now because of his work he can't come to church. But he is in the middle of changing jobs so he says once he does that he want to come! So hopefully he gets that figured out soon! 

Next is 주영헌 (Joo Young Hun) He is 22 years old and a personal trainer. He loves excersizing and wants to move to England so he wants to learn english. We met with him and talked in English for a bit and then taught him the Restoration and invited him to come to church in which he said that he would. He also accepted to read the Book of Mormon. (He didnt come to church because he had to suddenly help his friend move late saturday night so he was super tired. But he will come next week he said. 

We have more investigators but nothing super special has happend yet so I will talk about them once that happens! 

Recently I have been studying alot about the spirit and Revelation. I have learned a lot about it but the thing that I have read about this week, is that we need to ask for revelation or we wont get it usually. But just because we ask doesnt mean we will get it. In the scriptures is says we need to ask seek and knock.. as I have studied this I think I have figured out why it uses these very similiar phrases all the time.

When we ASK well its pretty obvious we need to use our voices and ask a question or ask for something from someone else. --- So in this case we need to pray and ask our Father in Heaven. 

Next is SEEK. When we seek that is more of a long term thing. We need to do our part to find the answer and let revelation flow through to us. We need to gain knowledge.

And last is KNOCK. This is the one that I have always been the most confused with.. How does knocking have anything to do with revelation? I have always thought it was refering to the parable fo knocking on your neighbors door at night. But no matter what it is refering to the important thing is that it takes ACTION. The knocking part is where we need to trust god and do everything we can to do it and let god do the rest.

I think most people are really good at the first one.'

And then I would say Half make it to the second step.
But I think the 3rd step is the hardest step for most people. This is the one where it takes the most trust and faith, I would argue that this is the hardest step. This is the step that I have struggled the most with and this is the step that I am studying the most. And I have learned a lot about it. To sum up all of what I have learned is this. 

Most people think to hard, they think revelation is more complicated than it is, the expect some big answer to come but they usually dont come. Most of the time they are very small feelings that are usually very similiar to your own feelings, and maybe if you have had no experience with revelation they feel exactly the same to you. But as you follow the good ones and trust, you slowly get better at being able to tell them apart. You will make mistakes sometimes but you always progress. It is exactly like a language. You need to fail or make a mistake to grow, but the important part is the more you just act, trust and have faith the better you get at it!

Ok I love you all and I will talk to you all next week!

-스태그 장로! 

Hayundai: I'm a zone leader

Hey whatsup yall?! So another Transfer has flew by and I now am in my 12th transfer! I am playing with the big boys now! (name the movie) anyways I got transferred to Hayundai, it is the richest part of the mission! It is still in Busan but this place is so filthy rich haha there are so many nice cars and foreigners and huge buildings its crazy for a little country boy like me! I am excited to got spend the next couple months here! Also my companion is 김태훈 Kim Tae Hoon and I will be Zone Leader! So thats exciting mostly because Zone Leaders have more freedom then District Leaders but they have no responsibility! haha Zone Leaders really don't do anything but deal with stats and permissions! haha Also I will finally be in a 4 man house! I have wanted to be in a 4 man house for so long! And I finally have made it! Elder Birrell will stay here. 

So yesterday we were able to spend our last day together with a baptismal service for 2 people! First time I have had more than one person get baptized! These were some of the hardest most stressful baptisms that I have ever had! They are both 8 years old and one is our recent converts son and the other is one of our members nephews. I though they would be so easy because what could go wrong? But they were planned to get baptized 3 months ago but we had to keep pushing it off because they wouldn't come to church so we couldn't teach them or they would come and get in fights with each other so we couldn't teach them. Literally Satan threw everything he had at them and I was pretty sure I was going to leave before the got baptized but we made a hard push at the end and were able to get them baptized! Our recent convert Kim Jong Gook was able to baptize his son which was really cool to see! Its really fulfilling when you see someone you helped get baptized use there priesthood authority to do good to others! After the baptism they were both smiling so much and it makes one feel good! Then I had Elder Birrell baptize the other kid because its a cool experience to baptize someone and he has never done it before! haha But he had to do it 4 times and the branch  president said that it is a new record for youngdo! haha it was the most irreverent baptism I have ever seen! He did it the first time and the kids legs came out of the water, he pulled him up and the kid started screaming (just cause he is super hyper and thats the way he is) and then the other kid that was supposed to get baptized was laughing super hard and kicking his feet in the water, and so Elder Birrell had to do it again, but this time his head didn't go all the way under, and when the kid came out of the water he started running towards the starts but he had to come back and he was just screaming "WHY?!" "WHY?!" With a glare at elder Birrell he walked back over and finally after another try he was able to do it! haha but the whole congregation was laughing and the kids were screaming and laughing.. haha it was crazy! poor Elder Birrell! haha 

Anyways I am loving the mission, I love moments like those where you can see the good that you did in someones life! It makes one feel good! I am going to treasure these memories up for the rest of my life! I strongly urge everyone who is worthy to get there lazy butts up and go on a mission! It is the best thing in the World and you will not regret going!! It is super awesome!! 100% recommendation from me!

Well I will email you next week with an update on my new area companion and calling! 

I also want to start adding more spiritual stuff to my emails so I will work on that next week! Because of transfers I don't have much time to email today!

Love you all!

-Elder Stagg

Just needed something to warm me against the cold wind of communism

Breakfast

3 course dessert

Look mom, no brains.

Beach day

Rush hour

Yongdo: Baptizing my Korean Dad

Sunday I was able to go back to Goejeong (my old area) and perform the baptism of Yoo Jay Young--- My Korean Father! It was such a touching moment in my life that I will never forget it! I have met with this man at least once a week for the past 8 months, usually more than once a week, and the appointments usually lasted 2-3 hours. 85% of that time it involved him showing almost no interest in changing his life or really even even listening to our message yet there I was yesterday standing in my all white clothes and baptizing him a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints! As I was sitting up on the stand during the talks,  I couldn't help but have the biggest smile on my face.  I was in a branch that I loved,  with people that had loved me and been my friends for 5 months. When I came back to the church I had the biggest and nicest welcome ever! haha. When the 1st councilor saw me (a 70 year old man who is the funniest person ever) he had a look of surprise and ran over and gave me the biggest hug ever!       I was sitting next to a man who I had become so close to and  he was starting down down the path to true happiness! He used to smoke about 3/4 a pack of cigarettes a day, and it was so unhealthy for him, but before we even taught the Word of Wisdom again on Christmas he just decided to stop and hasn't smoked since! This man is super awesome!  I have so much respect for him. 

As I walked down into the water with him, he stopped and looked me in the eyes and in English whispered this to me "Because of you I can stand before God and be clean" and gave me a  firm hug, Holding back tears, I offered the baptism prayer and had the privilege of baptizing him.  It was such a sweet experience. After the baptism he kept saying the "It's been a long journey",  talking about not only the 8 months with me but about the missionaries  who first met him when he was a kid.

When I think about this whole situation and also my convert up in ToungYoung (he investigated the church for 9 months), I can't help but think that God has his timing in everything, and as missionaries we get caught up in stats and goals and numbers that sometimes we don't recognize that God is in charge! We need to be bold and help push them to the right place but we also need to keep in mind that they have their agency and their  timing ---we are just here to help them along the ride! I am going to remember this moment for the rest of my life! Thanks for all of your prayers in behave of Yoo Jay Young! I know it made a difference! 

I love you all and will talk to you next week! (Transfer Week) 

Just the two of us

He's a yankee doodle dandy

I'm too sexy for my badge

My Korean Dad.

Yongdo: Pretty Bomb Testimony

Hello Family and Friends Happy New Year!! It is always weird having to write a different year for the date.. I will still be writing 2017 for the next couple of months because that is just the person that I am! haha Well this week was super awesome! Lets dig into it shall we? 

So recently we have lots of investigators probably around 15. But the thing is most of them don't really have much gospel interest. A big problem here in Korea, is that lots of people will want to meet with us for English or just straight 외국인 (foreigner) Interest, and so sometimes we have lots of investigators but none of them are really progressing. But you can't drop them because in the case of my Korean Father (Yoo Jay Young) and my recent convert in Toung Young they both met with the missionaries for 8 or so months and had no interest for most of it. But as people are with the missionaries for that long of a time they start to change, so we have lots of investigators like that. They are seeds that will sprout later on for some-other missionary. So we have been praying a lot recently to find investigators who have more gospel interest and investigators that we can actually have like real lessons with! 

And this week we found 3 new investigators the first one is such a miracle and I am convinced he will probably get baptized next transfer! So this man about a month ago was walking down the street by our church the same time we were walking home, and he said hello to us( He was very drunk). So we stopped and talked to him and he straight up asked us for the book of Mormon. He said he has lived by the church for years and wants one of the Mormon Bibles. So we gave him one and he started going off about how he knows this book will bless his life and that in this book he can find truth and peace. He was straight up bearing a better testimony then I probably could of done, I felt the spirit so strong. This man has some serious faith. But then he showed us where he lived and said come visit later on. Well we forgot about him kind of until last week I just randomly remembered him and felt like we had to visit him. So we have tried about 8 times there was one time that he was home but was in the middle of a dinner with is sister so he said come back later but then he wasn't there. But finally yesterday, we visited him before church and he didn't answer, visited him after church and he answered! So we went in taught him about the restoration, and he said that he was into Alma already and that he loves the book! He has never before believed in god and he has been Buddhist his whole life, but recently he has been wanting to start to believe in god. So when I asked him if he believed in god he said a truth that I think is very important thing to understand. He said that he has a desire to believe in god but he can't just make a jump from no believe to instant, he said it takes small steps of blindness and trust until you can 100% believe. I was dumbfounded I told him he was exactly right and that he just described faith perfectly! I said it takes you take small steps of faith but soon I promised him that he would have that believe! He committed to read 3 Nephi 11 and pray about the book of Mormon tonight! He is a super awesome guy and just so humble! He has such a pure heart! He is about 50 years old and has a wife and 2 daughters but they live about an hour away from him because he needs to work in youngdo. So he doesn't see them very often. He works for a boating company and he said that he is gone for 1-2 months at a time and back for a month or so then back out on another voyage so it is hard for him to go to church. I told him that god understands and that when he is not on a boat he can go to church but when he is on a boat he can have a personal church, just keep reading the Book of Mormon and praying everyday and god will understand! I am excited for this man! His name is (Ma Gee Johng) 

Next is a man who has some interest, we met him and talked about the book of mormon also committed him to read and pray about it, he said he is going to go fishing and come back and make us some raw fish so I am hyped! He seems pretty cool but his interest levels are in the middle.

Last is a guy who met the missionaries like 20-30 years before. We met with him and he just star ted going off with questions about the  Book of Mormon. He has read the whole thing and was really curious with the actual geography of it and was asking where the first landed and then where was the land Southward and the Land Northward and where were they fighting at, and then he was trying to figure out which of the Indian tribes they were, after we answered his questions he just left.. haha so we are going to try and meet him this week and teach him lesson 3! haha funny guy.  

This week has been awesome!! I am really excited for this next week though, I get to baptize my Korean Father and I honestly never thought I would be able to see him get baptized but I know god has a plan for everything and I now know why I stayed in this same district for so long! It is really cool to see him talk about baptism so causal now and he is becoming really good friends with the investigators in Goejong and the members. Also since he is getting baptized in Goejoeng that means that I get to go back to my old area and baptize someone! haha Really weird! 

This week I interviewed one of the sister investigators and she is super awesome! She is only in 9th grade but she decided to leave her families religion (catholic) and join ours even though there is no one her age at there church! She had a pretty bomb testimony! This transfer our district will have 7 baptisms (if everything goes according to plans) and thats crazy because usually its around 0, but everyone of our teams has or will get at least 1 baptism! God is blessing this area so much! I love it so much! 

I have been studying a lot about revelation recently and I have been getting better at following the spirit! There is 2 things I want to share, First is that we doubt our selves to much, we think receiving revelation is harder then it is. It comes all the time but we doubt it or deny it, we just need to follow it. It is honestly like a language when we dont practice and try we wont get better. In  order to learn Korean I need to make lots of mistakes so I can progress if I don't just try then I will never progress, well it is the same with the spirit we just need to act on our feeling and follow them and as we recognize which ones tend to be of god and which ones are our own thoughts we will get more fluent in the language of the spirit. I want to bear testimony that as we trust god and just act on our feeling we will be lead in his path for us. And this applies to all aspects of live. God says seek ye first the kingdom of god and everything else will be added upon that. As we always seek gods will everything else will fall into place perfectly and better then before. So always be aware and listen to the spirit and practice following it! I love you all so very much! 

This gospel is the true Gospel 

The book of Mormon is super sick and full of crazy truths

I love being a missionary

I Love korea

And I love God!

-Elder Stagg

Making Kimchi on an Industrial Scale

The Kimchi Volunteers

Kimchi!  Kimchi!!  Kimchi!!!

Kimchi for all

Sister missionaries and the clowns

Yongdo: Happy New Years

Hello happy new YEARS!!! I have reached it way before you guys reached it! haha Today for the sunrise we went up to a mountain around Five O clock, and watched the first sunrise over Korea that is a very common culture among Koreans!! haha so that was cool, but now I am very tired! :(

So this week the only thing that I really want to talk about is a man named Yoo Jay Young, This man is super awesome and I have come to be really close with him! I would consider him to be my Korean Father~ haha So I first met this man in April of 2017 when I moved to Goejeong. Ever since then I have been meeting with him. At first I thought he was a lost cause because he never listened to our messages but always wanted to teach us his philosophies. I have taught him at least every lesson but he had no hope or desire to do anything with that, he just liked meeting with me. He said that when he was around 8 years old he had met another missionary and he loved him when he was a kid, but since then he has never met another missionary before. Then one day he said "I heard an american voice say Anyong Haseyo" and that was me! I got his number and met with him. Well long story short I have been meeting with this guy for the past 8 or so months and I don't know what has happened but about a month ago he started to change. He accepted my Church invitation for the first time and has came ever since, and the other day he accepted a baptism date! For January 14! I have been feeling like the reason I have stayed in this area for so long is for him, and that I needed to baptize him before I left, but I didn't know how cause he had no interest. But here I am going to baptize this man that I met 8 months ago! I have grown really close with him and I am super happy  that I have been able to help him come to this choice! 

Outside of that we picked up some awesome investigators and we have a really big pool right now! We are meeting with most of them regularly! A really cool one we got is named Elena. She is fluent in english and wanted to meet for english but we met her yesterday and had a really cool discussion about gospel. She has had a long hard search in her life for religion and has decided that Buddhism is best for her! But she is super nice and fluent in English! So its fun! She is about my moms age and has a daughter my age. 

This week I have been studying about revelation and its real, Super cool stuff! As members of the church we have been giving a gift that we take for granted.  That is the gift of the Holy Ghost! We literally have the power to receive revelation when we need it but most members either don't recognize that or don't use it! So just do it! haha I am trying to use that gift more recently and I have been seeing a bunch of cool miracles! So maybe this stuff is actually true?! who knows! haha 

Love you all!!

Happy New Year!

-스태그 장로

Nightscape

The Committee

Cat on a hot tin roof

Getting back to nature

No such thing as a small town in Korea

Like a bridge over troubled waters

So Beautiful