Feb. 15 From Grandma

Last night as I was getting ready for bed, I had such a wonderful feeling. It was a feeling as though it had been the best day of our mission so far! We had been planning on using the morning as a P-day to do wash, cleaning, & shopping, but a phone call from Bro. Sophornn on Friday evening quickly changed our plans. He had been in a moto accident. Other than sustaining some scratches & bruises, he was unharmed. His moto however was no longer running. He said he needed Saturday to get his moto repaired and would like Elder Nelson to teach his Church History class at noon. Therefore, Saturday morning at 8 AM we went to the South District Building to our office to get the Church History manual and do some preparation. At 11 AM we had Reveit pick us up from the South District building and take us to the North District Building where the class is held.We have taught that class about 3 times before so we know the students who are in it. They are very dedicated young single adults and will be the future leaders of the church in Cambodia. The lesson was on the last 4 years of the church in Nauvoo. We talked about the Wentworth Letters (eight full pages) that were sent to John Wentworth, the editor of the Chicago Democrat, and how the papers were not ever published in Chicago nor used in the history book of Vermont, where both Mr. Wentworth and Joseph Smith were from and was the reason that he had asked Joseph Smith to write about the church. Besides us having the Articles of Faith from those letters, they were of great value to the saints of Nauvoo because a little was published each week in the Times and Seasons (Nauvoo's newspaper) and the members eagerly read those teachings and studied them with diligence, looking forward to every edition! We also talked about the Books of Abraham that were translated from the papyrus that came from the catacombs of Egypt. I always learn from my precious husband when I sit in his classroom, things that I didn't know before, like how the mummy's were purchased by the church and how Mother Smith had them on display and made a few cents by showing them to people who would come to see them!We talked about how apostasy weakened the church membership and how some men who were once very close to the Prophet Joseph, turned against him, left the church, and were excommunicated. Although they left the church, they couldn't leave the church alone. They aroused and excited non-Mormons to mob mentality and tried a few times to kill the prophet during the last year & a half of his life. My precious companion likened the lesson to the saints in Cambodia today! There are over 7,800 people on the records of the church here in Phnom Penh between the ages of 14-30! Many who were baptized between 1996 and 2003 are now inactive. He cautioned these 11 students to never allow that to happen to them. The church is new and young in Cambodia, just like it was in Nauvoo. They must be on their guard at all times to keep their own covenants with the Lord that they made at the time of their baptism!The lesson concluded with some powerful doctrine that Joseph Smith received just 2 months before his martyrdom. He shared them with the Saints at the funeral of one of his very close friends, King Follett, who had died in an accident while working on the Nauvoo temple. The funeral fell on the same day as the April general conference and Joseph spoke for 2 hours at the funeral/general conference wherein he expounded on 32 different doctrinal themes. A precious part of that sermon included the doctrinal statement, "as man now is, God once was, and as God is, man may become". As we discussed that in class someone asked if Jesus Christ was ever married. One young man said, "Some say yes and some say no, but we don't know the answer." My precious husband shared his feelings that Christ is certainly married, but "So people don't leave class saying false doctrine is being taught", he had the class turn to section 131 of the D&C and we read the first 4 verses together. "I will leave it up to you to decide for yourselves, you have the scriptures and you have the gift of the Holy Ghost to help you as you study and pray." It was very powerful to me, especially when you read in II Nephi 31:5-12 about why the Savior was baptized even though He is perfect!After we left the North District Building, we had our tuk-tuk driver take us to Thai Hout market to pick up some groceries (items that can't be found at Lucky's or Pencils), and then to our apartment. We quickly put away the food and then decided that we must go shopping at Lucky's so we could break the $50 bill in Dad's wallet so we would have some smaller bill for our tuk-tuk driver (we went to Kean Svay today for church and that is 8kilometers away). That was OK as Lucky's has a better brand of shelf milk and we had forgotten to by syrup. A quick walk to Lucky's and we were back home in 65 minutes. That gave us only 3 minutes to get a drink and leave for the apartment of Elder Ormumsby & Elder Porter. We were to meet them at 4:45 so we could meet with an investigator that they are teaching in English. They had told us previously that this well-read man doesn't believe in God, but wants to learn about our church. We had gone with them the previous Saturday, but the man was away traveling on business. His wife had invited us in for a drink of water. The Elders called the man and he apologized for not being able to be there but invited us back. It was a difficult but good discussion for an hour. The man is a military general (he mentioned to us that he is the youngest man in Cambodia to be made a General). We talked about the plan of salvation. It was hard to keep Jeneric (that is the closest I can come to the pronunciation of his name, I shall refer to him as "the General" until I can get his name right). The Elders wisely had us turn to the Introduction page of the Book of Mormon and read the sixth paragraph. (Here I want to interject an interesting note about this man. He has many books in his home which is highly unusual for a Cambodian and even better, he loves to read. But he was very truthful in saying that he had not had any time to read what the Elders had asked him to read two weeks ago.) They tried to encourage the General to pray about what he reads. "But how can I pray when I don't know anything about this book?" was his question. The Elders gave him a half sheet of paper with the five basic steps of prayer written in Khmer and talked about prayer for a few minutes. "But how do I start? Isn't there some way to address this being who they say is so powerful?" I felt the promptings of the Spirit very strongly as I asked him what he likes his little children to call him. "Well---Daddy." I then bore testimony of us being spirit children of our Heavenly Father and because he loves each one of us so much, he likes us to call him Heavenly Father even though He is a God. Dad bore testimony of prayer and mentioned that he and I pray together every night. Dad went on to say that the church is a "family oriented church" and encouraged him to discuss the things he reads in the Book of Mormon with his wife and pray together about them. The Elders closed the discussion and asked the General who he would like to have give the closing prayer. He was quite surprised that he was asked to call on someone so Elder Porter explained that because this was the General's home and we acknowledge him as the head of this home, he may choose anyone he would like to give the closing prayer. The General looked at me and asked if I would say it. I had a feeling that he would call on me so I had been praying silently that the spirit would attend me as I prayed. The discussion ended and we have been invited to return next Saturday at 5 PM. I just pray that the General will read and pray. If he does I know he will find the truth. If he doesn't pray, he will never know, but "will always be seeking but never finding" the truth!