"HOW AWESOME IS THAT!?!?:):)"

Hello everyone!! Well this week was a super good week for me over here!! I hope you were all able to have a nice week as well over there in the good old USA!! :) This week was a very busy week! It's also a weird type of the season right now where we are not quite past the hot season, but we are also not yet in the rainy season either! So usually in the early morning at like 3:00 a.m. or so it will rain until like 5 or 6 and then it stops, but the only problem with that is when it gets done raining it’s super humid and then the sun comes out so it's very VERY hot and humid right now!! Haha needless to say I have been doing my fair share of sweating here!! The locals always give me crap for how much I sweat, but I just tell them I feel bad that they don't sweat at all so I sweat for them as well as for myself! haha :)

This week we had a lot of success, which was super awesome!! We have an investigator who has been an investigator since before I got here, but this next week she is planning on getting baptized!! She has an interview later this week and then after that she is good to go! So we are super excited about that and just trying to get in as many lessons as possible with her because she is an older lady and so her memory is really not that good. She has such a strong desire to follow though and is always 15 minutes early to church every week, which is seriously like unheard of in Cambodia, so she is super awesome! So we're meeting her lots right now so she will feel comfortable going into the interview! I don't know why, but people here freak out when they hear that they have to get interviewed! Ha it's literally the easiest interview they will probably ever have! They all find that out afterwards, but before they are always nervous! Ha so we just go over the questions that they will be asking them so they will be able to think of what they want to say before they go into the interview! Anyway, please everyone keep her in your prayers that she will be able to remember everything that we have taught her and that she will not be nervous for the interview!! :) Her name is Oum Nuuan!

Easily the most exciting news of this week though happened on Sunday! So every Sunday morning my comp and I go to literally almost every single member and investigator’s houses and remind them that we have church and invite them to come! So this Sunday we went to all of our investigators’ houses (we have 6 now:)) and we reminded them all to come to church! Then went to the members’ houses and we also went to this member’s house that has not been to church in a year and a half, but we have been going to his house the last couple weeks and teaching his family! It's actually the same guy that was in a motorcycle accident a few weeks ago! Anyway, so we invited them to come to church as well. Pretty much everyone at the houses we went to told us that they would be able to come, so we were pretty excited!! Well, when we got to church and 2 o'clock rolled around we only had about 15ish members at the church! We were kind of bumming a little bit, but we were praying super hard that more people would show up and sure enough, they all slowly one by one started showing up!! I was smiling from ear to ear watching them all slowly make their way to the church!! And guess what!? We had 40 people at church!! :) My comp has been here for almost 4 and a half months now and he has never seen that many people show up to church!! Usually there are just like 25 or so people that show up, but we have really been giving it our absolute all to be able to help the area grow and we are now being able to see the results of all our hard work!!:) Also, all 6 of our investigators showed up, as well as the less active member that had not been to church in over a year and a half!! HOW AWESOME IS THAT!?!?:):) I love Sunday's:):)

This Sunday I was also asked to give a talk! So there were four speakers that were assigned to speak, including me, and I was the last speaker and the three speakers that spoke before me all finished their talks within about 7 minutes!! Haha when it was my turn to stand up, I looked at my watch and saw that there was still 35 minutes left in the first hour! haha I kind of laughed to myself a little bit and stood up to go and give my talk and when I got up to the pulpit, the group leader whispered to me, "I don't have anyone else to give a talk… you gotta speak for 30 minutes...sorry" hahahaha Well, I realized that my two verses that I had prepared were probably not going to be long enough to get me through 30 minutes of talking haha:) I got up to start speaking and as I started to speak, I felt things come to my mind of stories that I could share or things that I could say to try and help all of the members stay focused while I was speaking! Surprisingly, it was so quiet the entire time that I was speaking!! Usually people here just get into little groups and talk to each other during the whole hour, but as I was talking they were all listening so intently! It made me even more nervous! Haha usually you can say whatever you want and they will not remember a single word you said haha, but for some reason this time all eyes were on me! But I was able to fill the time that was allotted to me and then when I sat back down I had a sore throat because for some reason when I speak Khmer for a long time, I get a sore throat haha:) I think it's because it's just a whole bunch a weird sounds that I have not had to make my whole entire life until now! Anyway, the talk went good I felt like and there were some members that complimented me afterwards so that felt good!

Other than that, nothing too big happened this week! Sunday was a super fulfilling day that's for sure!! :) Things are really starting to pick up here in this area and the members are getting excited about the growth as well, so that's super good because when you have the members behind you to help you progress, things go about 1000 times faster than if it was just the missionaries!!:) So yeah, that's pretty much all that I have for you all this week! I hope you all have an amazing week! Don't forget to pray for your boy over here in Cambodia!! He sure hasn't forgotten about you all!!:) Much love headed your way from the Kingdom!!:)

Love, Elder Steadman

Does this mean his wrist is better?

Prayers please

Hello everyone!!:) So this week has gone by especially fast!! I cannot believe we are already to another Monday!! Time is flying people!!! :):) So this week was definitely a weird week!! Ha one of the main reasons was because this week we had New Year’s here in Cambodia! Here they have 2! The first one is the regular one that we all celebrate where we enter into a new year, but then here they have another one that is based off of Buddhist religion and it's 3 days long! It was Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday!! So on those days this week it was next to impossible to find lessons because all of the members were with all of their families! And not just their families that they live with!! This is the biggest holiday in Cambodia and so even extended family comes out for a week and they all live together and get super super drunk for like 5 days solid and then they have a 2 day hang over and then they get back to work!! That's the tradition for the people who are not members at least!! Haha the members just dance and play cards and do other fun things that they will actually remember afterwards rather than being so drunk you forget that New Year’s already happened!! Haha so even though technically it's just a three-day holiday, really it's more like a full week holiday!! So on Wednesday we actually were asked to stay in our house for the day because it's not safe to be out on the streets because there are A TON of drunk people trying to drive their moto's. They did not want us out riding our bikes in those conditions ha so instead we just cleaned up our house and then they also gave us a movie to watch!! We watched Ephraim's Rescue!! It was super good! For those who have not seen it, it's a must watch!!:) But I'm not gonna lie, it felt suuuupppperrrr weird being in the house for a full day not doing anything really important! Haha I did not really like it to be honest!! But then Thursday we went to the city to go to the Physical Therapist so that was fun, and then Friday we got back to our area in the afternoon and for like the first time this week, we were actually able to go out and proselyte!! It felt good! Even though it was blazing hot this week, I felt like I was back to doing what I was comfortable doing!:) Then Saturday was a super good day! We were able to meet and have 5 lessons!! Usually in some of my old areas that would be very average but in this area, taking into consideration we only have like 35 members, I was super pumped!! Our new investigator is doing super good… she is really trying to understand what we are teaching her and always repeats what we say right after we say something so we know that she is trying haha :) It's super cute!!:)

On Sunday we spent our entire morning going to literally everyone’s houses to remind them that we had church that afternoon at 2:00 and telling them we hoped to be able to see them there!! We had high hopes going to the church and when 2 o'clock came around we were a little bummed to only see 10 members that had made their way to church! I kept praying super hard that more of our members would try to come and be able to take the sacrament and sure enough, as Heavenly Father always does, my prayer was answered!! By 2:20 we had 30 people at church! I was super pumped!! We had one of our investigators there, as well as a potential investigator, and at the end of church that potential investigator told us that she has gotten permission from her parents to start learning with us!!:) We were so excited when she told us!! So we now have another new investigator!!:) During church we watched one of the sessions of conference! None of our members here were able to watch it last week because the place that we watched it was super far away from our area, so today they had the opportunity to watch one of the sessions! It was super good, but the church over here does not have AC so needless to say by then end of church I was soaked in my own sweat...it was an extra hot day on Sunday!! But it's ok! I was just happy that we had so many of our members show up to church this week!!

Let's see… other than that I did not really have a whole lot happen to me!! Oh, but I do need a small favor from all of you back at home though!! So on Saturday we were out teaching and we decided to go to a house of one of our less-active members randomly and when we got there I was shocked to see that half of the husbands face was super badly cut up! Cut up would definitely be an understatement though! He was on his moto and for some reason he fell (he doesn't remember the experience) and he was going pretty fast and not wearing a helmet. Anyway, he had a huge gash where he had torn open the side of his mouth and probably like 50 stitches above his eye; he had literally skidded on the road on that side of his face! I just wanted to cry when I saw him! If it happened in America he would still be in the hospital, but here he was back at his house and didn't even have any medicine! Luckily he said that whole side of his face was completely numb so he couldn't really feel anything, but I'm just worried for the day when it stops being numb!! He had a gift bag that the church had given all the members a few years back and in that there was some liquid that he can use to clean his face everyday so he will not get any infections! Anyway, what I need from all of you are your prayers!! His name is Pu Teang! When I was there we gave him a blessing that he would be able to quickly heal from this injury, but we really could use all of your faith and prayers as well so that he will be able to have a quick and full recovery!! I never like having stuff like that happen to people that I care about so much!! But I also think that this is something that could turn out to be a blessing as well because before this accident, he was not the biggest fan of the Elders and would not really talk to us, but we would try to just go over and make him feel loved. However, since this accident has happened, he has called us over to his house and also allowed us to give him a blessing, so I think that he is also finding a lot of humility and realizing some of the things that he has been missing out on for the last year of his life! I know that all of the things in this life happen to us for a reason, but sometimes we are just too close to the situation at the time to be able to understand right at that moment, but if we are not able to figure it out at that time, Heavenly Father always reveals it to us at a later time in our life and we can look back and give thanks to Him for the trials that He has given to us!! That is because they are only given to us for growth and for our own spiritual benefit! Anyway, I'm sorry to leave this letter on a down note!! Just so you all know, he is full of smiles and does not complain about what has happened to him! As a matter of fact, he kept on telling us how lucky he was because while he was at the hospital he saw people a lot worse off than he was, so he really does have great perspective on the situation!! Just keep him in your prayers if you wouldn't mind!! I think for this week that's pretty much all I have got for you guys! This week will probably be a week full of regular, normal missionary work, which is what I love most so that will be awesome!:) Hopefully I will have a cool crazy story to tell you all next week!!:) But for now know that the Elder from Cambodia loves you all and hopes you all have a very happy and safe week!!:)

Much love!
Elder Steadman:)
អ៊ែលឌេីរ ស្តេតមិន

So grateful to be "wearing His name every day!"

Wow this week was seriously so amazing!! For those of you who do not know already, this week was General Conference so we had the opportunity to listen to the leaders of our church stand up and speak to all of the members of the church!! It was such a spiritually uplifting and truly inspiring experience! This General Conference I felt like the main theme was on families! Luckily, if you guys don't already know, I have been blessed with the very best family that this world has to offer!! One of my favorite talks was by Larry M. Gibson and he spoke on fatherhood and the attributes of becoming a good father!! I could not help but think of my dad and the amazing and wonderful man that he is and the unbelievable example that he has set forth for me to try and follow after!! I have to brag for a second when I say that my dad is easily the best example and most Christlike father I have ever met! My entire life I have always felt loved and adored by my dad! He has always been there during the good times and during the hard times as well!! One thing that I remember from my childhood is how my dad and I would always go to sporting events with each other! It's something that we have done since I was just a little boy and the tradition has carried on all the way up into my older ages as well! I sure do miss that part of being away from home! It would be impossible for me to put into words how much my dad means to me! He has shown me exactly what an amazing father should do to show his kids that he loves them, as well as treat his wife with the upmost respect… always tending to her every care and treating her truly like she is his Queen! I am proud to say that I truly have never heard my parents argue or bicker with each other with me in the same room!! Who can say that!? Like honestly, that's as cool as it gets!! I want to treat my future wife in the exact way that he treats my mom! They truly love each other with all of their hearts and show it each and every day in their actions towards each other! I am truly blessed to be in such a setting and to be blessed with all of these amazing examples around me!! I only hope that I can obtain a small fraction of the attributes that my Dad has and apply them to my future family as well! Anyway, sorry if I embarrassed you Dadio!! Just had to brag for a second about how amazing your are!!:)

Conference was such an amazing experience!! There were a lot of things that I learned from Conference that were amazing insights on what I can be doing out here as a missionary to be able to better spread the work and be able to become a more effective messenger of God's message! I also learned a lot about what I can do when I get home as well!! What I can do better as a member of the Church when I am no longer a missionary, as well as how I can always magnify the calling that has been given to me, no matter what calling it is!! Over all, Conference was just amazing!! It is impossible to express all of the emotion and inspiration that comes from watching General Conference, but for those of you that did not have the opportunity to be able to watch General Conference I invite you all to go onto our Church’s website (http://www.lds.org) and there you can find all of the talks that were given! All people are invited to watch this conference! They do not just limit it to the members of our church! That's why it's called "General" Conference! They want all to come and hear the message that they have to share! I think for those of you who have not yet had the opportunity to watch, you will be filled with a spirit of hope and love that your Heavenly Father has for each and every one of us!! That's really what this conference is all about! To remind us that we have a Father in heaven and He loves us so very much, and also that we have a Savior and he came to earth and died for all of us so that we can live with Him again someday. This conference there was a special focus on the importance of families and how truly families can be together forever!! As President Uchtdorf said, "Because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ, death has no sting." I know that what he said is true and how grateful I am for that knowledge!! I am so grateful for the wonderful family that my Heavenly Father has given to me in this life and to know that I will be able to be with them again in the next life is a joy that is impossible to explain!! I look forward to the day where I will be able to have my own family and take the person who I love very most to the beautiful house of the Lord and there be married with her for time and all eternity!! I could not think of a better gift that Heavenly Father could give to me! A promise that through Him, I can live with the people I love the very most forever and ever!! He does quite truly want us all to receive our own Happily Ever After.

I love this gospel and I am so very grateful that Heavenly Father has given me the knowledge of it!! I could never deny the things that I have done and seen here on my mission!! I KNOW that this work is the work of God! There is no way in this world a whole bunch of punk 20-year-old kids could go out and do this work and actually have people believe us unless it was true, unless it really did come from God! I testify to you all that it does! This is God's work and this is His church that he has once again established on the earth through modern day prophets! I know that the Gospel of Jesus Christ that has been given to us is perfect! I know that Heavenly Father’s plan for all of us is eternally perfect and he has trusted all of this perfectness into the hands of an imperfect people! We all fall short of the glory of God, but I know that through His mercy and His grace that we can become like him through the everlasting power of repentance! Just like a hospital helps sick people heal, so is the church a place of healing! Not of the body, but of the spirit! Our own spiritual hospital to heal from the wounds that we have caused to come upon ourselves… we can use the gift of the Atonement to repent of those sins and be spiritually healed through him! I am so very grateful for the gift of repentance and for the knowledge that for every time that I fall down and then try to get back up, I always have a loving Heavenly Father that helps me back up and brushes me off and through his Son's Atonement for all of us, He will forgive me for my wrong doings and help me get back on the right path, the path of God, the only path to eternal happiness. I love Him with all of my heart! I am so grateful to be out serving a mission, wearing His name every day on my chest! It's an experience that I will never be able to forget! And something I will hold dear to me until my last breath here on this earth!! I am so grateful for all of you at home! For your examples and your prayers that you have sent to me! You are the reason why I am here and you are the reason why I can keep moving forward every single day with a skip in my step! :) I love you all so much and hope you know that you are all in my prayers as well!

With all the love I possess!
Elder Steadman

City adventures and a "blonde" moment

Hey everyone!! Well another week down!! This week was a lot of fun as well!! This week I was able to go down to the city in Phnom Penh on Tuesday because I had to go to the physical therapist for my wrist. So while we were down there we had about 4 hours and we did not have anything to do so we decided to go this famous market because my companion had never been to the city. He was “born” (started his mission) in the area that we are in right now and he has not yet left this area so he has not had the chance to go to all of the markets in Phnom Penh, so I took him to the big famous one called Phsaa Thmei. We went in and looked around and then he just went on a buying spree haha and so while he was buying, I was contacting… because if you’re buying their stuff and want to share a small message with them, they pretty much have to listen, so we were hitting two birds with one stone! haha 

After the market I went to the doctor and that was boring ha, then after that we went to the mission home to wait to go to the Assistants’ house because we had to sleep there for the night. Well we had like 3 hours to just be bored in the mission home and so after like 20 minutes I could not take it anymore!! Ha we got some bikes and went out to contact!! So super cool story! We were contacting in this area and then we were thirsty so we went into this gas station to grab a drink and then we sat down next to this guy in the gas station to drink our drinks and he started to ask us some questions. By the way he was asking the questions I knew that he was already Christian! He was super nice and just asked some basic questions to my companion to help him practice his Khmer, and then he started to talk to me. He started asking me some very deep questions regarding our church and some things that he had heard from other people and also things that he believed as well, and we started to have a really deep doctrinal conversation with each other! I was really nervous because he was asking lots of very hard questions and some of them he would ask me and I would not even know how to answer his question, but then I would just start talking and then it would come to me what I was supposed to say to him! It was pretty cool and another confirmation that the gift of tongues is real! So that was awesome and he went from not liking out church and saying that we were people who worshipped Joseph Smith all the way to accepting the Book of Mormon and accepting the challenge to read it and ask God if it was true or not! It was so cool to see how quickly things changed and to watch his face start to light up as I spoke to him! I could tell that he was feeling the Spirit and the light of Christ truly shone in his countenance!! I really hope he will read it and schedule a meeting with the elders in his area!! 

Other than that nothing really happened this week. This Sunday we went to church in the city because every 4th Sunday our group goes to the church in Kampong Cham to worship so they can see all of the members as well as pay their tithing and share their testimonies! It was good, but after the first hour my companion came down with a super bad stomachache so we had to go back home and I played mom for him! Ha I tried cooking...yaaaa lets just say he will be doing the cooking from here on out!! Haha I really did try my best and luckily it was edible, but compared to the great meals he has been making us every evening it definitely did not add up to what we have been having! Haha but now he is all better so maybe there was a little magic in that food I served up!! Ha probably love!!:) 

Elder Xiong: new companion/sushi chef :)

Oh, and one last story I forgot to tell you all last week! So last week was my first week at church and when we went to church I told my companion what hymns we should sing so he could write it up on the board so everyone could know. When the sacrament time came around, we all opened up our hymn books and to my surprise the song was, "The Spirit of God.” Well, I didn't notice until everyone had already started singing so it was too late to change it haha, so we all had very vibrant and excited spirits as we partook of the sacrament haha, and then the closing song was, "He died the Great Redeemer Died" haha :) So even us missionaries still can have our blonde moments!! :) It was a good laugh! Anyway, that's all I have for you this week! I love you all so much! Please keep me in your prayers! Especially my stupid wrist that it will stop being dumb and heal up! Can't wait to talk to you all next week! Much love headed your way!!

Elder Steadman:)

A rest stop... Cambodian style

Livin' it up in the jungles of Cambodia

Hello everyone!! :) Well another week in the books!! This week was a little different from the regular though as far as new areas go! Ha so I’m not going to lie, the goodbyes this week were super hard! I love the members of Stung Meanchey sooooo much and cannot wait to be able to see them all again next year when I come back to visit with my parents! So there were some hard goodbyes, but I went onto the bus to my new area with a positive attitude and ready for another amazing adventure! I think that adventure is the perfect word to describe the next couple of months that I am going to be spending here! Haha so it turns out that I am not really serving in Kampong Cham! I am about 20 miles out from the city, literally in the middle of nowhere!! Haha I'm not kidding when I say that either!! There is literally nothing here… it’s so crazy! The closest market to our house to buy any kind of food is about 25 minutes away, and in our area there are only a few shops including a bike shop, a shop that sells bamboo juice, a small gas station, and 1 factory where lots of the people in this area work! Ha it’s so sick! I literally feel like I am just living in the jungles of Cambodia!! Our house is super nice though! It's just me and my companion here and all of the other missionaries are in the city super far away from us so that's kinda cool that we’re just out here all alone livin’ it up! :) haha Our house does not have a shower, so I finally get to have the pot and bucket experience for showering! Truly I think that I would have been disappointed if I did not have the chance to experience that in one area while I was here! And come to find out, I think that I like it better than a regular shower!! Once you pour that first bucket on your head and you get over the initial shock of how cold the water is, it’s awesome!! :) Honestly, I kinda like the cold water because it cools me off after a long hard and hot day in the sun!!

Anyway, so in the area that I am in now they do not even have enough members to have a branch yet, so all that we have down here is a small group! And we also have a group leader here and he is so awesome!! Literally the nicest guy you have ever met in your entire life! So we also do not yet have an official church building here to worship in either, but luckily we have rented out a nice little house that we have made into a small sacrament room! Unfortunately, they do not have ac in that house, but it’s ok because we got permission from president so that we do not have to wear our suits on Sunday at all, so that's pretty tight! :) Anyway, this week was super good! We just went around on Saturday and Sunday and my comp, Elder Xiong, showed me all of the members and our investigators as well! We have tried to do lots of contacting since I got here and luckily we already have a new investigator, so that's exciting! :) On Sunday there was a power outage so we did not have any electricity to turn on the fans in the Church building, so needless to say it was an extremely hot Sunday! Haha, but luckily the electricity came back on in the evening so we had ac to sleep in at our houses! :) We had 23 people at church which from what I understand is pretty average, but we are hoping this next week we will be able to have a lot more members who are inactive come back to the church so that they can take the sacrament and meet some of the new members that we have here as well! This area is going to be a lot of fun! I can tell that this area is going to stretch and pull me in a lot of ways, but I can also see that this area has an incredible amount of potential! It just needs two missionaries who are willing to put in the work and effort... and luckily it does! :) I am excited for this next transfer!

My comp is a total stud! Before he came on his mission he was a cook so as you can imagine I am just in jungle paradise!! Every night we always have an amazing meal! This Sunday he made egg rolls that were seriously to die for!! And I must say that I am VERY happy to do ALL the dishes every night with no argument at all! :) haha Man I don't know how I get so lucky with everything in my life, but I sure do feel blessed and know 100% that my Heavenly Father is looking out for me over here and loves me very much!!:)

Well for this week that's pretty much all that I've got for you!! I will let you know how this next week goes! Love you all! Keep me in your prayers and pray that the people here will have a willing heart to learn about Jesus! They strongly believe in Buddha here and so lots of people don't want to learn, but I know that through the power of prayer that Heavenly Father can and will soften their hearts and lead my footsteps towards those who are currently being prepared to hear the message that we have to share with them! Thank you all so much for all of your love that you are sending me each and every day through your prayers! I truly can feel it every single day! Being a missionary is the greatest blessing I have ever received in my entire life! :)

Love you all so much! :) Until next week! :)
Elder Steadman:)

P.S. A note from the missionary mom: Austin is playing it down, but he hurt his wrist in his bike accident a few weeks back and has been in quite a bit of pain. They are sending him to physical therapy to try to help it heal so he can stay on his mission. Please keep him in your prayers that his wrist will heal properly. Thanks so much! Love, Mindy

New adventures ahead

Hello everyone! Well another week down already! This was another great week here in Cambodia! So this week I did some fun things and some things that I thought would be fun that turned out different than I expected! Ha anyway, so first of all this week I was able to go on an exchange with Elder Lauritzen! It was super fun! At the beginning of the day we decided that we were going to work as hard as we possibly could! And we did!!:) We had lots of lessons and were able to visit lots of members, as well as have some good contacts in between the lessons! It was a blast!! By the end of the day, we both smelled soooo terrible, but we felt proud of the stench that we gave off!!:) haha He is a hard worker and I'm pretty sure he is way further ahead of where I was when I was his age in the mission as far as the language goes!

Another thing that I did this week was I had the chance to be able to go and be a translator for this organization called Operation Smile! When I heard about it, I was super pumped because I have not yet had the chance to be able to go and be a translator for someone else… especially for a doctor who helps people for free! So I was super stoked! They told me I was to go on Thursday from 12:00-4:00 and so when Thursday came around, I was at the hospital by about 11:45!! It took me a while to find them because they didn't tell me where to meet and I was trying to explain to the front desk lady what I was there for, but she did not seem to know where they were either. Then this guy just came out of nowhere and asked me if I was there for Operation Smile and I told him yes, and then he told me to follow him...so I did! Haha Anyway, we found them and they gave us these plastic chairs (that were too small for me) and just told us to hang out in this big room and when they needed a translator they would just call me over! So do you all want to guess how many times I translated that day? It wasn't easy, but I managed to keep track of how many times I translated for the doctors that day!! A whopping 1 time!!! I was so ticked! We just sat on those plastic chairs for 4 hours and waited and then the one time I translated she called me over and asked me to ask the patient if there was anywhere on him that hurt....yeah... I looked at her to make sure she was serious because this dude had literally just got out of surgery from his mouth getting completely redone, but she just looked at me like, "Well, go ahead and ask him." So I did! He looked at me kind of weird and I kind of gave him the "it's not me… it’s the crazy doctor" look and then he just pointed at his mouth and I figured there was no need for me to translate that back to her haha… so yeah, that was the extent of my translating! I really feel like that experience was a huge help in really stretching me in the language...NOT!! So yeah, it kinda sucked and I would have much rather been out proselyting and helping my investigators, but I guess looking back now it's kind of funny how big of a joke it was!!! Ha the only thing that was cool that came out of it was that I met a doctor who was actually Mormon as well and she took down my mom’s number and told me that she was going to call my mom and let her know that I was happy and healthy! Ha she was a really nice lady so that was pretty lucky that I got to meet her!!

Hmm… I think the only other funny thing that happened to me this week was I finally convinced my companion to get rid of his unibrow! I have been trying to convince him to get rid of it since we started being companions and he finally agreed to let me pluck a gap in between his two eyebrows!! Haha that probably sounds really rude that I told my companion that he has a unibrow haha, but here they like to speak EXTREMELY straightforward when it comes to things like that so I guess I have become kind of numb to whether or not that would be offensive to a white person or not! Haha anyway, it took me like an hour to pluck all of his hairs, which is understandable considering that there literally used to be no gap haha, but now he is looking super sharp and all of the American Elders have been complimenting him on his new and improved look!! Haha I must say that he really is much better looking with that baby out of the way!!:) haha

Church was super good this week! We had investigators show up to church, which was awesome!! The lady that I talked about last week is still progressing and yesterday we watched the Joseph Smith video with her and at the end when Joseph Smith's father gets baptized she just smiled and told me that soon she would get to do that too!:) She is so amazing!! Another really cool thing that happened at church this week was there is this kid in my ward and he is super cool and he is around 19 years old! When I first got into the area I kind of made friends with him and when I first got here I asked him if he had a desire to go and serve a mission and he told me that he did not really want to go on a mission. Well, as I have been serving here, I have been trying to teach him and show him just how amazing and fun and spiritual missionary work is and I have tried to take him with me to lots of investigator’s houses so he can practice teaching as well. So this week at church we were talking and out of the blue he just told me that he wanted to turn his papers in this year!! I was sooooo pumped!! There was another story exactly like this a couple weeks ago! I don't know if I told you guys or not… I forgot already! Anyway, when he told me that, I was so pumped! And now he has tons of time to help us go out and teach our investigators because he is on a break from school! I was so pumped to be able to talk to him and be able to show him how amazing this work is, and through the convincing power of the Holy Ghost he has changed his mind and decided to go and serve the Lord!! Oh so sick!!:) I love this work!! I love my mission!!:) So after church this week we usually have that Preach My Gospel class, but this week Elder Lauritzen and his companion had a baptism, so we invited all of the student that usually go to the Preach My Gospel class to go to the baptism instead so there could be a lot of people there to support him!! It was a good baptism and the Spirit was super strong as well!! Overall this week was a lot of fun!!

Oh and one more thing happened this week… I almost forgot to tell you....TRANSFER CALLS!!! So the Zone Leaders called and told me that this transfer I am leaving Stung Meanchey!! I am not going to lie, when they told me that my heart sank a little bit because I just love this area so much and I have had so many amazing things happen here so I was a little bummed to be leaving so soon!! But I know that this new area is right where Heavenly Father wants me to be!! I am going to serve in Kampong Cham!! Literally everyone that I have talked to says that it is a super cool place to be serving!! It's a province, so that's going to be sick!! Another cool think is that my area is actually like 25 miles out from Kampong Cham! So I live with just my companion in our own house! The other Elders live in the city, but we live at a place called Skun! And that's our proselyting area! Where I am going to serve, we actually don't even have a church building! It's just a rental house, but then apparently every 3 weeks all of the members take the long ride to Kampong Cham to worship at the church building that we have there! So yeah, I am going to be in the middle of nowhere so that will be sweet!!:) ha It's a really new area so apparently there are not really any less active members so we just will be trying to find new investigators and people to teach, so that's pretty cool!!:) Honestly I am super excited, but it's just super hard saying goodbye to such an amazing ward like this one here in Stung Meanchey!! It really is just as hard as saying goodbye to family! I just don't know when I will be able to see them all again and I just love them all so much!! It's so hard saying goodbye!! That's literally the worst and hardest part about missions!! Becoming so close to all these amazing members and then having to say goodbye and not knowing when you might see them all again! Plus I have already served here twice, so the chances of my coming back and serving here again are like slim to none! Dang it man!! Haha I already feel homesick!! Not homesick like from America, but homesick as in my home here in Stung Meanchey!! I have been here for so long and could easily fill out the rest of my mission here with great pleasure!! But I know that Skun has great things in store for me as well and I am excited to go and have a sweet adventure over there!! :) Oh yeah, and my companion’s name is Elder Xiong haha… he is American! I know- I was surprised too!! Ha he came out in the same group as Elder Lauritzen and he said that he is just the sweetest guy ever and super easy to get along with, so that's super good news to hear considering it will just be the two of us posted up out in the middle of nowhere!! Haha how cool!! Just gonna go live in the boondocks in Cambodia for a couple months!!:) Can't wait for the adventures that lay ahead!! Well, that's all that I have got for you this week! I am sure that I will have lots to tell you all when I get into my new area!! Well, I have to get going! I have got to go say a lot of sad goodbyes!! Not fun!! Haha wish me luck!! Much love to you all!!:)

Elder Steadman:)

This is what a mission is all about...

Sup peeps!! That phrase is still popular right? Man I feel like I have been on my mission forever!:) haha Well it was another great week here in Cambodia!! Nothing out of the ordinary really! Just some sweaty lessons, crazy food, sweaty bike rides, naked babies everywhere, sweaty contacting, talking with a lot of drunk people, sweating while thinking about how much I'm sweating, topless old women, wondering why my companion does not sweat nearly as much as I do, half-naked middle-aged men yelling at me to come and drink with them, oh and have I mentioned that I have been sweating a lot lately? Haha for some reason people love being naked here in Stung Meanchey!! Haha I think I really would have enjoyed this place before my mission as well, considering that I was not all that big of a shirt fan before my mission either!! :) ha No but seriously, this week was soooo awesome!! So I have like a super cool story for you all this week!! But before I tell you that, this week has also been crazy because we got 9 new investigators just this week!! Haha so nuts!!! And 7 of them came to church!! So that's super awesome!!

Anyway, so the cool story! So this week on Saturday we went to go meet with one of these families that had 3 new investigators that we had found earlier in the week! We met with them on Thursday and then planned to meet them again on Saturday night. When we came back over on Saturday, we were bummed because they had left for the evening to go out and party or do whatever normal people do on weekends...totally forgot!! Ha anyway, so we were sitting outside of their house and then their neighbors came out and they were talking to us and asking us some questions and then the topic came up of why we were trying to find them and what we wanted with them. I told them that we were missionaries and we teach people about Jesus Christ! As soon as I said this the wife started to laugh at me and make fun of me a little bit! Well this just made me want her to listen to our message even more because I knew that it could bless her life so much!! Anyway, we kept on talking about Jesus and then we got to the subject of prayer and she really started to gain an interest! It was so cool to literally watch her whole countenance change! To go from someone who thought we were crazy to eventually inviting is into her house to continue to teach her! Yeah...she invited us into her house!:) So then we began to teach her and her husband about prayer and the power of prayer! She had told us about how busy she is and how she does not have enough time to even breathe during each day! She told us when we first started to talk to her she had absolutely no free time to meet with us, but as we continued to teach her, her heart was more and more softened! She told us she could learn on Wednesday evening, Saturday, and Sunday!! We were so pumped! We continued to teach on prayer and taught them how they could pray on their own at any time they wanted to and that they could pray for blessings that they wanted to see in their lives! I promised her that if she prayed with all of her heart, that Heavenly Father would help her have more time in each of her days and help her still be able to have enough money to support her family! As I said that promise to her, I knew that it was direct inspiration given to me from God! We then asked them if we could come again on Sunday evening and they immediately accepted!

So the next day was Sunday and we went back to their house to meet with them! They could not come to church because right now she still has to work on Sundays. Anyway, we went back over and we felt very inspired to share the Plan of Salvation with her! It was so awesome! She could not keep her eyes off of us and she and her husband listened to every word that we said! Also, a neighbor came and joined in as well! The coolest part of this whole experience, and one of the coolest things that has happened to me on my whole mission, was at the end of the lesson I asked her to say the closing prayer. She was nervous, but still agreed to say it! She asked me what she could say or ask for and I told her that she could ask for good health or for safety or for more time off or work or even if she wanted to she could ask about the lesson that we just taught! I told her that she could pray and ask Heavenly Father if everything that we had just taught her was true and if it really came from God or not. Right as I finished saying that she looked up at me and stared me right in the eyes and said, "I know it's true. I can feel that it's true already." I could not wipe the smile off of my face for the next hour after that lesson! I felt like I was on cloud 9 all the way back to my apartment! How amazing!! To watch someone go from making fun of you for believing in Jesus to looking up at you with such a strong hope and desire and faith in her eyes, and have her tell you that she knows that what you’re telling her is true… that's just about the greatest gift that any missionary could ask for!! Not to mention this all happened in a matter of 2 days! It's amazing the miracles that you are able to see out here on your mission!! I know that this was not at all because of me!! God placed her in our path because He knew that she was ready to receive this gospel and as long as we were a little persistent, He knew that afterwards she would know that what we were saying was true! It just reconfirmed my testimony that God knows each and every one of us perfectly! He loves us all so very much! I felt so lucky that God trusted me with this wonderful young couple! I am so grateful that He gave me the right words to say at the right time so that we could help these 2 lost sheep come back into the fold!

I am here to tell you all there is not a greater or happier service to be doing on this earth than serving a mission for the Lord! And on top of that, I get to be doing that service in the very best place that this whole world has to offer!! I would not change these experiences for anything! I don't know why I am so lucky as to see and feel and do all of these amazing things, but I am eternally grateful for every experience that I have had so far out here on my mission and can't wait for another year ahead of doing the exact same thing, but just enjoying it slightly more because I don't have to worry as hard trying to learn a completely new language:) haha Anyway, that was my amazing story for you all this week! I will definitely keep you updated on how they are doing! If you ever are lacking in things to pray about in your daily prayers, please feel free to put her (Bong Srey) in your prayers that she will be able to get some work off so that she can come and worship on Sundays and also not feel so overwhelmed with life!!

So yeah, that's pretty much it for this week! We have a lot of new investigators, which is super good because a week ago we did not really have a lot at all, but now we are going to be a lot more busy which is good!:) It's not that fun when you’re not busy!! Haha but when you’re busy, you sweat a lot...it’s a love/hate relationship!:) People would always tell me you would get used to the heat and now I'm beginning to think that what they wanted to say is that you get used to sweating your guts out for 2 years, rather than your body adjusts to the climate here...that makes a lot more sense I feel like!:) haha Well, I think for this week that's all I’ve got for you guys!! Just want you all to know that I know that what I am doing out here is absolutely 100% true!! I know that this is God's work! I feel and see His hand in it every single day! I have learned so much more about love while I have been out here really truly trying to gain a love for the people here in Cambodia like my Heavenly Father has a love for them! Which really has not been that hard because they are the greatest people in the whole world! I am so grateful for all of the hard trials that I have had out here on the mission as well! A mission has been the most spiritually and physically exhausting thing that I have ever done in my whole life and yet somehow, everyday I have the strength to be able to wake up and do it again and again! I'm grateful to Heavenly Father that he gives me that strength everyday! I know that without Him I am nothing! I am so grateful for the Atonement! Man, am I grateful for the Atonement! Without it, I would be soooooo very lost in this life! I know that it's something that needs to be used by all of us every day! Not just the times that we do something terribly wrong! As we use it every day it will be easier and easier not to run in to any of those big mistakes! I love my Savior and am so grateful that he died for me and also lives again for me as well! I know that through him and through his Atonement, we can all be saved!! All he wants us to do is trust in him and follow him to the end! I know that this church has the fullness of the gospel once again restored on the earth and I am so grateful that I have this time to be a full-time representative for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints! I love you all and hope you have a great week!! Many prayers headed your way from the Kingdom!!

Love,
Elder Steadman

Zone Conference

With President & Sister Moon and Elder & Sister Gong

Engulfed by the Spirit

Hello everybody!:) Well this was another week that's gone by in the blink of an eye!! So this week was a super good week!!:) This week we had the amazing opportunity to go to Zone Conference and Elder Gong from the Quorum of the Seventy came and taught us, which was so awesome!!:) Zone conference was so awesome and I learned so much about what I can be doing to become a better missionary each and every day! The focus of Zone Conference was on the Restoration of the Church of Jesus Christ!! Elder Gong really related the importance of helping all of our recent converts, as well as our investigators, have a strong testimony in our first Prophet of the dispensation, Joseph Smith, as well as a strong testimony in the Book of Mormon. The importance of having faith in both of those things is important because really those are the only two things that set us apart from any other church in this world! Everything that we have been taught that differs from other churches comes through modern day revelation and has also been given to us through the olden day prophets in the Book of Mormon! He told us that they had recently done a poll and that only 5% of the recent converts in Cambodia said that they actually had a strong testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith as well as the Book of Mormon! Obviously as a missionary serving here in Cambodia, this was quite an alarming statistic to hear and definitely woke us all up to the seriousness of helping our investigators understand the importance of these two crucial factors of our church BEFORE they are baptized! Elder Gong helped us know what we could do and ways that we could teach that would really help our investigators understand the importance of these two things! Sometimes as missionaries we can give them the Book of Mormon and because we read it every single day and we know how to read it and how to use it, we assume that our investigators will automatically know how to read it as well!! Well it turns out that this is almost never the case!! Haha If we give a new investigator a Book of Mormon, we need to do more than just hand it to them and commit them to read it! We need to help them know how to read it! We need to show them what a chapter is and what a verse is and what the first book is called and show them how there’s a small summary of what they are going to be reading and then commit them to read after we have thoroughly explained what we want them to read! And then most importantly, when we go back to visit with them again, we need to read it with them! Honestly this is something that I have definitely been lacking at doing! In the past when investigators have told me that they have been too busy to read, I have testified of the importance of reading the Book of Mormon and that it truly will bless there lives and then recommitted them to read it, but one thing I have not been good at is actually just taking the time right at that moment to actually read with them and ask them questions and get them thinking! It is something that I have committed myself to do better at for the rest of my mission and I truly believe that if I do this I will be able to help all of my investigators have stronger faith in the Book of Mormon and know with all of their hearts that the Book of Mormon comes from God! 

My favorite thing that I heard in Zone Conference was when President Moon got up and spoke. When he stood up and spoke he started out by saying, "I am here because of a book." I just loved that comment so much!! To someone who does not know our religion or what we believe in, that comment may sound like we are insane! And to someone who does know our religion and what we believe in, that still might sound insane!! Haha but I loved that comment because that is the exact reason why I am here in Cambodia right now. I am here because of a book! That comment is rich with meaning!! That book has changed my life forever and has given me more happiness than I could have ever possibly imagined! It has helped me through hard times and has taught me each and every day how I can become a better person!! It teaches me every day that I can do just a little bit better than the day before so that each and every day I can do my very best to become what my Heavenly Father sees in me! With His help, I know that I can reach the person that He wants me to be in this life! I have also seen that book change other people's lives completely! I have seen people who have been constantly drunk or who beat their wives, repent and become a wonderful man of God worthy to hold His holy Priesthood because of the power of that book! I know with all of my heart that the Book of Mormon is a book from God! I know it with every fiber of my being and I am so happy that I have this time that I can go and share that message with the wonderful people here in Cambodia!! How blessed I am to have this opportunity!! I will never be able to repay my Heavenly Father for the gifts and miracles that he has given me since I have been out here on my mission!! My only goal in life right now is to go and tell as many other people as I possibly can about this wonderful Book so that they can receive all the blessings that I have been lucky enough to receive in my life! I love the Book of Mormon and I love our beloved prophet Joseph Smith for opening this last dispensation and enduring terrible amounts of trials and afflictions he did so that we all could have this wonderful book and receive all the blessings that it can bring to us! I cannot wait to thank him personally in the life after this for everything that he did for everyone in the world during his short time period here on the earth! He is one of my greatest heroes and I know that he truly was a Prophet of God!! Anyway, there were quite a few other things that I also plan on applying to my teaching that I was taught in Zone Conference, but if I wrote them all down we would be here all day so I will save you all the boredom and stop right here!:) 

Another thing that was cool that happened this week was that we had a baptism!! :) His name is Bong Bros and he is just the coolest kid ever!! He is 22 years old and has just been a total rock star investigator!! He has always accepted every invitation that we have given him with faith that Heavenly Father will help him obey all of the commandments that He has laid forth for us, and he has been able to obey all of the commandments!!:) I felt super honored because he asked me if I would be willing to baptize him and of course I happily accepted!! It was a beautiful ceremony and I was so happy for him knowing that he had just entered into one of the most important covenants of his life with his Heavenly Father! Now we are just going to try to get him to go on a mission because I know that if he did, he would just be a rock star of a missionary!! :) So yeah, Sunday was a good day! I will send some pictures of the baptism so you all can see as well!! :) 

We also had a Preach My Gospel class that we taught and it was so amazing!! This week’s class was an opportunity for the members to share their testimonies of the Book of Mormon, but for most of the class it was just the members joking around with each other and then us trying to get them to focus. Finally, there was only about 15 minutes left to teach and Elder Lauritzen stood up and started to speak. So he is a brand new missionary… he has only been out here for 2 months, but he has the courage of a lion and is always trying to speak! Anyway, he got up and started to share his testimony about the importance of what we are teaching and even though he was not speaking perfect Khmer, the Spirit was so strong! As he sat down, I felt prompted to stand up and share some thoughts with them as well! I got up and told them that we had 9 minutes left in class and that I wanted those last 9 minutes to be filled with the Spirit! I was pretty straightforward in telling them that during the last 50 minutes that we had been teaching, the Spirit had not been with us, but I told them that if they were willing to maintain reverence for the last 9 minutes and pray that the Holy Ghost would enter, I promised that those last 9 minutes would be an amazing spiritual experience. After that I reopened the class to share their testimonies of the Book of Mormon and immediately a member, whose name is Dom, offered to get up and share his testimony. Just 20 minutes before, he had shared his testimony of the Book of Mormon, but this time as he bore his testimony, he spoke from his heart! It was not known facts that he had memorized, but what he knew to be true with all of his heart! As he shared, he began to cry (and he is not the crying type) and testified that as he was getting ready to go out and serve his mission; he said he knew that this was something that was absolutely essential for him in his life and would forever bless him, as well as many others, and he said that he knew that while he would be gone God would protect his family. There was not a dry eye in the whole room and it felt as though almost the whole room was literally on fire with the Spirit of God!! As he sat down another person got up to share their testimony as well, and the Spirit was still as strong as ever! Then we were all out of time and I got up and told all of the members that this feeling could happen every week for a full hour, not just 9 minutes, if we came into this meeting with a spirit of reverence! I told them I love to joke around as much as the next guy, but I also love feeling the Spirit so strong like we were just able to feel and I testified that it can happen every week if we allow it to! We had a closing prayer and all kneeled as we prayed and the girl that prayed began to cry as she was praying as well as!! The Spirit was literally engulfing all of us during the entire prayer as well!! To date on my mission, it was probably one of the most spiritual experiences that I have had!! I am so grateful for Elder Lauritzen to have the courage to stand up and say something so that we could end on such a spiritual high! It was a great way to end a Sunday!

That's pretty much it for my week this week! I feel so lucky every single day to be serving here and to be sharing all of these wonderful spiritual experiences with the people here in Stung Meanchey!! :) I am so lucky… it's not even fair!!:) I love my mission!!!!!:):) I hope you all have a great week this week! I'm always sending prayers your way!

Love always,
Elder Steadman

Miracles

Hello family :) Well, I hope you have all had a good week this week! It has definitely been one of the best weeks of my mission! Definitely a week filled with lots of emotions!! Ha anyways so this week church was awesome! We were hoping to have some investigators come to church this Sunday because like I said a little bit in my last letter and the one before that, our investigators have not really been coming to church, which has been kind of hard. But this week I felt pretty good about them coming to church and when we got there all but 2 of them were there!! I was super excited and felt like a lot of our hard work these last couple weeks had paid off!! Not only that, but when we got to the church, there was also a person who came who was not yet an investigator! He showed up because he wanted to learn more about Jesus and so now we have another new investigator!! Then we had a Preach My Gospel class after church ended and I was the teacher! It was super fun! We memorized the first vision! It took us forever and a year but we did it! I think we must have said it 200 times in all, but it was pretty cool by the end of the class to hear 12 of our young members recite such a sacred experience, not to mention probably one of the greatest and most significant moments in all of history!! Pretty cool stuff we are accomplishing over here in Cambodia! Also, after church one of my investigators had some pretty good news for me!! He has 3 friends that he goes to school with who also want to learn about Jesus, so today we are going to be going and teaching them in the evening… so that's awesome as well!! Overall this Sunday was an awesome day!!:)

I have one more story for you guys this week! This is not going to be a terribly long letter!! Sorry! So this week I called one of my investigators to meet with her and when she answered the phone and I asked her if she could make some time to learn with us that evening, she told me that she was going to have to stop learning with us because her husband did not want to learn with us anymore. I guess after we taught him about the Word of Wisdom he was positive that he would not be able to stop drinking coffee and tea so he told his wife to tell us that they were not going to be learning with us anymore! When she told me that my heart just dropped! I begged her to just let us come over one more time and she finally accepted! When we went over that night we met with her and her husband. When we got there, he immediately started to express his concerns with not being able to obey the Word of Wisdom. He said and that he believed in God already and that is all that’s important is that he believes in God in his heart and that is good enough! As he was talking, I was trying my very best to just listen to him speak and not worry about what I was going to say and just have the faith that whatever I needed to say, Heavenly Father would give it to me in the time that I needed it! Well, when he finished talking I thought for just a second and then I looked at him and I asked him if he had prayed about Joseph Smith. I didn't address anything that he had just recently shared with me; for some reason I felt like that was not what I needed to ask him! Rather I asked him if he had prayed and asked if Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. He told me that he had not yet done this. I then went on to explain to him that the Word of Wisdom will be something that is next to impossible to obey and will be something that is frustrating and annoying in his life if he does not yet have faith in Joseph Smith… because he is the reason why we have the Word of Wisdom! Through the prophet Joseph Smith we received the Word of Wisdom from God, but if he had not prayed to know if Joseph Smith was a true prophet then it would be impossible to have faith that the Word of Wisdom comes from God as well! I asked him if we could come to his house again the next day and bring the movie of Joseph Smith and his life so he could see himself in a story-like mode, the history of Joseph Smith. Reluctantly he agreed! We went over the next day and watched the movie with him and the Spirit was definitely present! I testified to him after that I was a representative of Jesus Christ and that I knew that everything that Joseph Smith said he saw he really did see! The Spirit was so strong and I could tell that both of them were feeling the Spirit as well!! He still has some fears with obeying the Word of Wisdom, but he has agreed that he will continue to learn with us! When he said this, I was so glad that he was willing to open his heart back up and keep on learning! It truly was a miracle! It was so cool! I felt so lucky that Heavenly Father also gave me the words to speak that would touch him in a way that he would want to keep on learning!

This week has been such a good week! I feel better than I have in a really long time and I love that I feel like I have the Spirit with me all of the time and it feels so very good!! I don't know what the future holds for me as well as I did before, but I feel so at peace with where I stand with my Heavenly Father this week!! I ask this week especially that you all keep me in your prayers!! I can feel all of your prayers each week lifting me up and helping me keep on going! Thank you all so much for your support! You will never know just how much it means to me!!

All the love I possess!!
Elder Steadman:)

Happy 1 year anniversary Elder Steadman!

Hello everybody!!:) Well this was just another week that went by as fast as ever!! So this week I was lucky enough to get a package in the mail from my amazing parents!!:) It could not have been any better! There were a whole bunch of letters from some of the youth in my home ward included in the package and it was so fun to be able to read their cute little notes that they sent to me! It definitely was one of the highlights of my week!:) Thanks Mom and Dad!! I love you so much! :) So this week was another really good week! One small surprise that we had was on Monday night… I was calling the sisters because every night I have to call them to make sure that they are home safe and so when I called them one of the sisters picked up the phone, but when they answered the person talking was not the voice that I was used to talking to every night, but it sounded so familiar!! Finally I asked who it was that I was talking to and she replied Sister Jepson! Ha I was surprised and asked her what she was doing in Stung Meanchey and she told me there was a small emergency transfer for the sisters because there was a problem in another area and now she was going to be serving here as well...in my same area!! I was super pumped when I heard about that! It's been so fun to see each other around so much! It's super weird as well because the last time that we were with each other was in the MTC and we did not know the language at all! Haha and now we are able to speak and listen to the people without hardly any difficulty...most of the time! (Keep praying for me!) So yeah, she is in my district so I am able to see her all of the time!! Now we just need to get Elder Quirante over here and I think I will be the happiest Elder on this entire planet!!:) So that was the surprise that happened this week!:)

Reunited with an old friend :)

As far as other news goes, this week was a little bit hard to get lessons! Ha mainly because this week was Chinese New Year and so everyone and their dog does not go to work… they will just go back to their hometown and so most of the time Phnom Penh is kind of a ghost town because most people are from a Province! The people that did not go to a Province would gather together and drink their faces off!! Haha so contacting was kind of funny this week!! I think we got invited to a house like every 10 yards we walked because everybody wanted to have a drink with the random white guy! Haha but once I told them that I didn't drink and actually wanted to teach them about Jesus instead they lost interest in the random white guy quite quickly!! Hahaha it was ok though because even though I did not get any potential investigators this week, I was giving it my all and also had some dang good laughs along the way! :) Drunk people in Cambodia are different than like any drunk person in the world! One job that lots of men here have is called driving a Tuk Tuk! It's a motorcycle with like a small carriage thing attached onto the back of it so that they can take people places! Anyway so it's kind of notorious that if you have this job, you also enjoy drinking a lot haha because you have a lot of down time so lots of them will just get together and drink with each other! So we had to go to the mission home this last week for my companion because he is in the process of getting his visa and stuff so when we went we decided to take a Tuk Tuk to get there. So we went up to this guy and asked him how much it was and he was absolutely plastered! Haha he could not really put a complete sentence together so we started to walk away, but then he offered us a price that was literally half the price that it usually costs to go to Phnom Penh! I turned around and made sure that I heard him right and he nodded his head (kind of in a circle motion) and so I hopped in! Ha it was a price that I could not let go! Plus the permanent driving speed here is like 10 mph cause there is always traffic so it is literally impossible to go any faster than that! So in my mind I was thinking, “What is the worst that could happen!?” Haha but before my mom kills me for telling this story, here is the craziest part! Cambodians are amazing drivers! This guy could not complete a sentence to save his life, but he was an unbelievable driver! He avoided all the bumps and was able to snake through traffic no problem! It made me kind of laugh a little bit! So I guess it's not true what they say! There actually are some good Asian drivers!;) Man I love Cambodia:) Anyway, we offered him a pamphlet and asked him if he wanted to learn, but he was not interested at all! Maybe one day though he will remember that pamphlet and give the Elders a call!:)

Let's see, other than that nothing exciting really happened to me this week! We had some investigators show up to church this week, which is always an amazing blessing!:) There was one investigator who called us and told us that he was not going to be able to come because he was going to one of his friend’s wedding, but then when we got to church we saw him walk in and he had also brought his sister, who we had never met before! He told us that he left a little bit early from the wedding so that he could come and worship! I was so pumped!! After first hour we asked him if he was going to continue to stay and he kind of hesitated for a second because he was originally planning on just coming for that hour and then going back, but then he decided that he wanted to stay for the other hours as well and he stayed for all three hours! Not only that, but his sister ended up staying even longer than that! At the end of third hour they were practicing singing for an upcoming Sunday and she stayed to sing with the members! It was super cool to see the members just instantly welcome her into the group! The Church here in Cambodia truly is amazing! Everyone is just best friends… it does not matter how long you have known each other or how old you are, as soon as you walk into the church building you are family!! It's amazing to watch! I think it's exactly how Heavenly Father would want things!:) Anyway, so we talked to him after third hour and he expressed how glad he was that he had stayed for all three hours and really enjoyed getting to know people better because usually he ends up leaving after first hour, but he told us that because he stayed longer he was able to make more friends and feel a lot more comfortable! :) He is going to be getting baptized in a couple of weeks and he is very excited!:) Anyway, that pretty much sums up what happened in my life this last week! I am so grateful to be out here serving in Cambodia! I already feel like I do not have sufficient time left here to do everything that I want to do and be everything that I want to be, but I am so grateful that I still have the time that I do left! :) Which to some may seem like a very long time, but the way that my mission has been going so far, I am very scared it's going to go by way faster than I want it to! Ha I love my mission and would not want to be with any other people in the entire world right now than the people of Cambodia! This place has filled a spot in my heart and will forever fill that special spot for as long as I live! I know that this church is the church of God and that He is the leader behind this Gospel! I know He loves each and every one one of us so very much and through His wonderful plan, we can live with Him again someday! If you don't know of this plan, I invite you to learn with Elders or Sisters close to you and find out for yourself just a little bit more about how much your Heavenly Father truly loves you! I promise that this message will bring more happiness and blessings to your life than any other thing this world could possibly give to you! I love you all and am always and forever thankful for your love and support! Thank you for those who have not forgotten about Elder Steadman way over here in Cambodia!!:) I hope you all have a great week! Much love coming to you from the Kingdom!!:)

Elder Steadman

Dead lizard... time for a prank...