Meeting Up with Nathan!!!

When Nathan got accepted to Arizona State University for graduate school he decided to go back to his mission in Malaysia before he heads off to Arizona in August. On his way back they stopped in Thailand and with permission from Landon's mission president they were able to see Elder Watkins on his p-day. An amazing day for all of them!

Josh, Nathan, and Elder Watkins

Josh and Nate on their first Elephant Ride

Feeding the Baby Leopard

The hippos love bananas

Elder Watkins and Josh feeding the Siberian Baby Tiger

Prayers, Miracles, and Seeing My Brother...

Elder Landon J Watkins Week 59

Week Fourteen in Samut Prakan

Monday, July 28, 2014

Hey Everyone!

How are you guys doing? I'm doing great just emailing with Nate sitting right next to me! Today has been pretty fun we met up with them and got their suits all worked out and ready to go and helped them with buying a couple other things that they saw they wanted. We headed to the mission office to pick up a bunch of things we needed since they can't send it to us so we figured we might as well go get it since we are close. I even took Nate and Josh on the Khlong Monster, that’s what we call it. It is the boat the cruises through the river in Bangkok; pretty fun.

Anyway for this last week it was pretty crazy. As you know we had two baptisms planned for Sunday and on Thursday I called our investigator; Way who is from Laos and he had a problem with his Visa and Passport and we were told he couldn't get baptized. I'm like well at least Em is still going to get baptized and I call him and he is says; I don't think I'm ready and actually I'm going to start working every Sunday so I won't be able to go to church on Sundays anymore. He is still Buddhist and wants to do something for his parents. So we are like no way, both baptisms fell through. We prayed so hard to find a way to help them still get baptized and then Friday night Elder Kris called and said Way can get baptized and I want to meet with Em. So sure enough Saturday, Way passed his interview and Brother Em passed his interview too, but he can't get baptized until Tuesday because he had to work after church Sunday so that was way good. So yesterday Way got baptized and Em is getting prepared to get baptized tomorrow! Definitely a miracle this week, that is for sure. We sent Em into the interview and I just closed the door and knelt down and prayed so hard and he came out and they had it all worked out! I'm way excited for tomorrow because he chose me to baptize him.

As for other investigators we have Sister Kung with her 3 kids. They are doing way good and have almost learned everything, but they didn't show up to church so they can't get baptized until they have come to church twice. We got another new investigator named Bung who is someone we invited and she came to church yesterday for the first time. She stayed all 3 hours and for the baptism after and then we taught her for about 30 minutes after that which was way good! She is 28 and works with computers. She has Saturday and Sundays off so that is good. We also have our investigator, Victor who is a Thai guy, but his English is so good now that his English is better than his Thai and we teach him in English so Elder Kettavong is kind of left out, but we have to do what is best for the investigator. Hopefully we can get Bung ready for baptism this next Sunday she just has to get her answer!

That's really all for this week not much time to email because we are going to go to the Crocodile Farm with Nate! Sorry, love you all though. Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Landon J Watkins

Happy 20th Birthday...Elder Watkins

This will be a special birthday in the mission field for Landon! One I am sure he will never forget. We miss having him here to share his day with, but he is happy doing the Lords work and we will be with him next year on his Birthday!!! A few mission moments...

Week Thirteen in Samut Prakan

Elder Landon J Watkins Week 58
Week Thirteen in Samut Prakan
Monday, July 21, 2015

Hey Everyone!

How are you guys all doing? I'm doing pretty good myself this week!

First I want to start off talking about our two main investigators really quick! So first I'll talk about Em; he is 23 years old and we met him like 2 weeks ago inviting and invited him to English he came a week ago Tuesday to English class and we invited him to church Sunday, but he was going out of town so he couldn't come. This last Tuesday he came to English class again. Once English class is over I'm collecting all the books, cleaning up and a member Brother Won comes up to me and he is like he wants to learn about the gospel. I'm like whoa; okay hold on one sec. So I just sit down and start teaching him. I taught him about prayer; explained baptism and extended him a date to get baptized on the 27th within 5 minutes ha-ha and believe it or not, he accepted. I gave him a BoM and told him to start reading it and taught him the word of wisdom and the law of chastity and that was it. He came to church Sunday and we taught him nearly everything after church. He has to just learn about the restoration and a couple more commandments and he is so good.

Our other investigator Brother Way is doing good also! We went to his house and taught him on Wednesday, he said he was coming to church Sunday and accepted a date to be baptized on the 27th also. He came to church and after church we also taught him almost everything, He just needs to learn a few things in Lesson 5. He is from Laos so as long as he gets his visa renewed this week he is good to go!

Our investigator Phing can't get baptized anymore... Stinks way bad, she was going to get baptized this week too, but she is only 17 and her parents won't let her so now she has to wait until she is 18 and her Birthday isn't for a few months. 

We have some other potential investigators, but they didn't come to church. We had 66 members in sacrament at church with 3 investigators and one of them was a transvestite. I saw it walking in and I was like oh no! It was way weird ha-ha just awkward and we honestly didn't know what to do. For the 3rd hour it really is a man and we tried to make him go to priesthood, but he is like no way I'm a woman and I'm going to Relief Society so we are just like uhhhhhhh; okay, whatever; a way weird situation..

Other than that on Thursday and Friday Elder Kettavong was way sick he just slept all day long except for when we went to teach Scripture Class on Thursday and then on Friday night we went to the Bishops house which was way awesome.

This leads me to my next story. So Saturday there was a funeral at the church in Bang Na the area just above us; it was a funeral for our ward, but they just did it there because it is nicer. They didn't have anyone to play the piano so I had to go. The meeting was supposed to start at 4:30 and end at 5:30, but we had a lesson at 6 at our church back in Samut Prakan. The thing started at 5:00 and at 5:30 my companions both just got up and left. I was just like uh, okay! Literally they left and went back to Samut Prakan without me! I was like; okay, luckily there were tons of other priesthood holders there, so no problems. After it all got said and done I ended up getting switched off with the Bishop and he took me home ha-ha! So I was companions with the Bishop and his wife for the whole time it was pretty fun! Luckily we have the coolest bishop ever; so it was awesome.

That is really it for this week! We are planning on two baptisms next Sunday so we will see what we can pull off! Hope you all have a great day!

Love,

Elder Landon J Watkins

Samut Prakan is Officially a Ward!

Elder Landon J Watkins Week 57

Week Twelve in Samut Prakan

Monday, July 14, 2014

Hey,What's up?

Well this week was pretty crazy for the most part! I'll first start off with church yesterday! I'm just camping out on the piano playing prelude music and I see someone walk in through the windows with someone that I have never seen before next thing you know 10 more people come in following her ha-ha! We invited this one person to church and she brought 10 friends; it was pretty crazy!  So this week we had 15 investigators at church ha-ha! Quite a bit, huh? Our investigator Phing came which was good, she is doing the best out of all our investigators. It was her second time at church, but because she is only 17 she has to come to church 4 times before she can get baptized. The next two weeks though she can't come because she has to work. I did teach her after church though which we was good she has almost everything down, she just needs to learn about a couple of more commandments and some parts of lesson 5, but she is doing way good! I kind of gave her a little baptismal interview afterwards, asking the questions without her really knowing it was a interview. Her faith is way good that is for sure! She says she believes in Joseph Smith and that he saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. If she knew about tithing and President Monson which I haven't taught her yet she would pass an interview for sure so that is all good! Hopefully we can baptize her when she comes back; that would be ideal. As for Guy and Mai both of them didn't show up and they were supposed to come we called them the night before and they said they were coming, but church rolled around and they show. Same with Brother Way, he is said he was coming and didn't; so that was too bad. But we had 2 new investigators to church just after inviting them this week! So a pretty decent week. Also the other big news was that the Stake President came to our meeting yesterday and Samut Prakan was officially changed into a ward WoooooHoooo! Pretty sweet we are a ward now, I think the main reason they did it was because they get more rights to getting a new building for the church and stuff like that because we really don't have enough qualify for a ward. We did have 87 people at church yesterday though; so that was way cool! 

As far as this week we have just still be going crazy with trying to find new investigators we got 45 new phone numbers this week! It is hard though because Savage and I are doing all the work while Elder Kettavong just sits and watches us not working very hard, but what can you do. He is complaining that we are doing the work of the Lord but there isn't anything we will change because we are just obeying the rules doing what we are supposed to do!

I did go on a switch off this week though and I went to Bang Na and went with Elder Reed; who is a greenie! He definitely has his greenie magic working, but I was his trainer for the day. I forgot how long it is to study until noon everyday instead of 10:30 ha-ha; but we got our inviting time in and got about 15 numbers in about 2 hour, so pretty dang good! We taught some lessons and switched back! It was interesting. I really missed my bed in Samut Prakan plus their house wasn't very clean so a bad nights rest which owned me for this week because I've been way tired ever since; but that's alright!

We had a good week, hopefully all this hard work will just bring a bunch of baptisms here soon; that is my hope and to just keep workin hard! That is really all for this week, nothing great happened! Anyways, love you all, have a great week!

Love,

Elder Landon J Watkins

Getting in the Groove of a Threesome!

Elder Landon J Watkins Week 56

Week Eleven in Samut Prakan

Monday, July 07, 2014

Hey Everyone!

Wow it is crazy to think that this transfer is almost 1/3 of the way over already and it seems I just barely got in this threesome! Well first I’ll talk about how this whole threesome is working it out! It is going pretty good for the most part. Sometimes it can be hard to please them both with what we do because they are both way different missionaries. Elder Savage just loves to invite all the time and Elder Kettavong doesn’t. I can understand why; no one will talk to him mostly because since we are white people they are more willing to talk to us. Other than that we are doing well, we did some good work this week!

As far as Sunday we got 4 investigators to church woohoo, lets goooo! As far as Tik goes we dropped her this week she just didn't really want to meet anymore because she never got an answer.

Phing our investigator from English class a few weeks ago is doing really good! We taught her on Tuesday and Friday and believe it or not we got her to church on Sunday; it was way awesome! She is coming to English class and Book of Mormon class every week. We just need to get her to church 1 more time and she can get baptized. I talked with her yesterday and she has accepted a date for the 20th of this month; so that is way awesome. 

We got two other new investigators this week, Guy and Mai; a mother and daughter. She also has another daughter, but she couldn't come to church. Her two kids are around 20 years old. We met them this week while we were inviting and they came to church and both accepted a date to get baptized next Sunday! The only problem is that the mom isn't legally married so we need her to get legally married and she is will be good. The daughter is also iffy because she may have some school thing next Sunday so she isn't sure if she can come, but it is way good though!

Our other new investigators name is, Way he is from Laos actually and he works at our 2nd counselors in the branch presidency's leather making shop. We visited him on Saturday and he gave us him as a referral and he came to church this week which was way sweet! He also accepted a date to be baptized on the 20th so we went from having no daters to 4 in just one day; so sweet!

This week we have just been inviting like crazy! Altogether we had 38 other lessons and I think we got 20 new phone numbers of potentials. I'm really not the biggest fan of inviting, but it helps us get investigators; so we have to do it!

That's really all I have for this week, hopefully we can get these investigators ready to go and get them baptized and also keep finding new ones! Anyways I love all you guys; have a great week!

Love,

Elder Landon J Watkins