September 14, 2015--And I think to myself, what a wonderful world

Dearest darlingest momsy terkasih,

The work is great! Let me tell you. We are enjoying things and some awesome happenings took place this week. Please allow me to tell you the first one on my mind. This sister from our ward said that she wanted to meet us at mcdonalds and she was being pretty mysterious about it. She said she wanted to bring a "saudara" (relation) but wasn't any more specific than that. So we got a penemanan and met them there, not sure what was going on, and it turns out the saudara is her cousin/niece or some type of relation who just moved here to Tangerang to go to college. And, about one year ago this saudara had learned with the sister missionaries in Jakarta, and gone to church there, so she already knows a little bit about the church. Her name is KW. She is originally from a set of islands near Manado. She is really nice, wants to learn, and she came to church this week too!! So we are super excited to teach her more this week and she is absolutely golden. Just a really sweet, soft-spoken person, humble. And she already has a friend from the ward. What a miracle :)

Our other investigators are doing well, we didn't have a lot of time this week because we had to go to Jakarta and go to Bogor for some meetings. Ibu L is really busy right now and she told us that she can't meet yet because she is too busy and she really wants to be able to focus all her attention on learning about the Book of Mormon. So, it's disappointing that she can't meet yet, but it's good that she really wants to focus. Hopefully this next week we can meet with her. Pak R is doing good, the struggle is just with helping him come to church. I know if he comes he will be able to taste the fruit of the restored gospel and it will help him a lot, but it hasn't happened yet. Hopefully some members can help us out with him.

All the kids at the orphanage helping us out.  

They were really excited to help :)

We heard about Timor Leste (I'm not sure of spelling either) and the word on the street is that they have already sent a mission couple there!! Everyone is so excited because that place has a majority of Christians so there is huuge potensial for the church there. I've only ever met one man who was originally from there, he was Catholic, awesome guy. We're hoping there can be even more missionaries there soon. And in answer to your question, there are no other languages that the Jakarta mission takes in, just Indonesian. (The people here all speak other languages too, but Indonesian is spoken universally-enough). So I don't know how it'll work for people learning Portuguese to go there, if they'll just learn Portuguese or also learn Indonesian. Who knows? :)

Me and my friend H at a service project repainting his orphanage

One great opportunity we had this week was to do some service. We painted the wall of this orphanage. It was the eagle scout project for a member from the Jakarta English-speaking ward. The orphanage happens to be in our area so he asked for our help. We had a good time gettin down and dirty sanding, plastering and painting. It was luar biasa! (fantastic)  And also weird because there were a lot of bule's there and so we had to try making small talk with white people and using English which I am not used to doing. But we had a lot of fun and I made a friend with this kid who is from Kalimantan, his name's H.

Also, a side note, we went on a cockroach-killing-spree this morning. For some reason the gutters got fogged (to kill all the bugs inside) but instead of dying they starting running into our house!! I screamed in terror, but my companion Elder Green jumped to the rescue! Using his handy-dandy can of hit bug-killing spray, he managed to kill 63 and save the day. What a great, but simultaneously disgusting memory that will be 10 years down the road :)

Elder Green with his victims...63 cockroaches (yes, we counted)

This week in our meeting in Jakarta we talked a lot about planning. It was cool to discuss how making plans and goals that will make us stretch and help us work hard increase our chances of receiving revelation. One cool insight that Elder Green and I discussed was the story with the Brother of Jared. He didn't want his people to be in darkness, so he asked the Lord how he could have light on the ships. The Lord said it was up to him. And then he goes through this really long process of smelting 16 clear stones. I don't know what that process entails exactly, but I feel it could not have been easy, and it must have been pretty repetitive (he had to do it 16 times at least). I imagine that would have taken days of work, if not weeks. Then, he carried those stones into an "exceedingly" high mountain. He must have been exhausted! That was a ton of work, and at that point he wouldn't have even known for sure if the Lord was going to approve of His idea. He was just going on faith that whole time. But after doing all this work, he presents his idea to the Lord. And the Lord approved. And gave the light, so that his people would not have to cross the great waters in darkness. When we, as missionaries, do the work and show the faith by planning (even when it's "exceedingly" exhausting, "exceedingly" repetitive--I mean, I've gone through this daily planning process literally every night for the past year, and still have a year to go) the Lord gives us light. So that these people will not have to cross this life in darkness, but so that they can have the light of the gospel. He expects us to work out the details, but if our effort is sincere, He will bless it. I really have a testimony of that and love to see how the Lord is blessing Elder Green and I in Tangerang. We're doing great and we're just trying every day to be better. We may plant, other missionaries may water, but God gives the increase. We're here, as President Donald explained, to "Glorify the Father". We want to get out of the way and let all the glory be to Him. I love my Father in heaven and I am grateful for how He has helped me :) I am grateful for the family He has given me and especially for you, Mom :) I love you a lot!

My awesome companion sticking stuff on his head 

during weekly planning. Silly goose.

And maybe that is all there is time for, so until next week! I love you so so much :)

Elder Paskett