Elder Bradley Paul Warner

Date: Mon, 8 Feb 2010 04:30:54 
 
Well not a whole lot of anything to report this week. Work was super slow because of the upcoming holiday and because we are white washing our area. It is a really difficult area, but has a lot of promise because the members here are sooo strong.
 
We had two baptisms in our branch and I got to baptize one. I did her baptismal interview, and was very excited that she asked me to baptize her. Her name is Narantsatsrath. Give that one a pronunciation try if you are daring.
 
I’m getting the hang of the paperwork side of being a district leader. It’s just another service opportunity. We had a service project this week making buuz (Mongolian dumplings) for the holiday. I think I made about 400. I washed my hands 6-7 times to get the raw meat and onion smell off of my hands.
 
I got back one of my old English classes this week and took the opportunity to take a picture with some sweet Ray ban knock off sunglasses. If any one can tell the white jump suit I’m wearing in the photo was pretty small. She also kinda floated a bit so I had to hold her under the water a little longer to get her 100% in. She got a little scared because Mongolians can’t swim.
 
We made a pineapple carrot cake for a birthday in my district this week. It was really, really good. I don’t think I have had any other flavors than chocolate or vanilla for a year and 4 months. 
 
I have 8 missionaries in my district, and every senior companion is an American. Sister lofgran from my group is in my district. Going on exchanges is a lot of fun. I went on an exchange with Elder Swaap from the group before me and we had a relly good time going out and working together. One good thing about this mountainous area is that it is pretty.
 
Elder Swaaps companion is a Mongolian who we are pretty sure has some form of Autism. Psychological medicine is practically non existant in Mongolia. Elder Munkhnar is a pretty good kid, he just requires a lot of patience, and a lot of help. He has only been on his mission for six weeks. I have a feeling we will have a lot of interesting experiences working with him this transfer. I have a hard time understanding him because he switches in and out of Russian, Mongolian, and English, and I’m never sure which one he is talking in. Good times right?
 
Well that’s about it. Sorry that I don’t have anything exciting to write about.
 
Much love to all,
Elder Warner

Date: Mon, 1 Feb 2010 04:30:22 
 
Hey everyone,
 
I hope everyone is doing very well. There are a lot of things to write about, but not enough time to write about any of them in detail. 
 
This last week’s transfer call was a big one. I’m now training, white washing, and serving as the district leader in the Haithast branch in the northern part of the city. It is safe to call it “serving in the mountains.” I’ll have to get some pictures this week. I guess I flew under the radar as long as possible.
 
I’m serving in a very small branch, about 70-90 come to church on Sundays. I’m also coming into an area where the previous elders hardly did anything. There are 17 investigators and none have received more than 1-2 lessons, and several haven’t been met with in several months, so I’m pretty much starting from scratch. I do have a wonderful district. Every companionship in my district is an American- Mongolian companionship. I conducted two baptismal interviews last Saturday and they were both wonderful. I’m looking forward to conducting more. They will give me many opportunities for spiritual experiences. 
 
It was really hard to leave Songino again, but I was so lucky that I got to go back and serve there again. One of my friends left for the Philippine MTC this week. She has been a member just over a year and is already serving a mission. Maybe if I’m lucky she will be in my district some time.
 
I got bit by a dog this week. It turned it’s head sideways and bit my shin. I felt the pressure of it’s teeth, but it didn’t pierce my pants or go through the thermal garments grandma ordered for me.  My 9 year old investigator kicked his dog in the head for me. It was funny.
 
My new apartment is really small, old, and Russian. It was built in the 50’s, and you can tell. It’s ok though. Please enjoy the pictures from this week. Sorry for the lack of time today. I have a bunch of DL stuff to do in the office.
 
Much love to all.
 -Elder Warner
 
About the pictures—
 my area in Songino
 little Aissa
 spicy southern fried chicken on my last day
 My friend Herthlen in pink who left on her mission
 and Battolog, Anon, Hortz, Aisa, and Naransetseg

Date: Mon, 25 Jan 2010 07:54:42 
 
All righty then. Well nothing super new or exciting to really speak of. We had another good week of work, despite some scheduling problems. I got handed the short end of the stick with English, My companion had 2 dentist appointments, and we had an open house at the Church that took a big chunk out of Saturday (our biggest work day of the week). It was still really good though. School was on break this week so some of our investigators were out visiting grandparents and relatives in the countryside. We squeezed in 22 lessons though.
 I didn’t like that 2 of my new English classes guessed that my age was between 27 and 30, but other than that my English classes were ok. I made the first Lewis family recipe chicken pie in Mongolia. It was really tasty but I didn’t quite have enough butter so the biscuit topping came out a little on the butter milk tasting side. None the less it was awesome.
 We had a lot of good things happen this week. We had a baptism, Balthdandorj who is 16. It was great. His older brother is planning on being baptized on the 5th of February. His cousin who is a return missionary baptized him. We also had another great thing happen this week. Anon’s dad gave permission for her to be baptized. She should be baptized the 5th of February as well. When I came back to Songino, we talked with her, her grandma and her cousin Battolthag about asking for permission again, and said that we should all pray and fast about it before asking. We did just that and on Wednesday when we asked again he gave permission. So I’m super stoked since she has been waiting about 7 months.
 Two of our investigator families have split up, as in the mom and the dad have split. That has been pretty difficult. My new member’s mom (who is a member) split from her 2nd husband (our investigator) because he has started pounding the liquor the past week and a half since he lost his job. His youngest son was also our investigator and a super awesome little guy for just being 14 years old. Hopefully things will work out. We are doing our best to stay out of the middle, but it’s difficult when you are so involved with the family. 
I have an ALA (assigned less active) family I have been working with here in Songino for about 6 months. They came to church once when I was here before, and I almost fell out of my chair when they did. They are the ones that fed us horse ribs if you remember that story. Any ways, we met with them a week ago, and we laid the spiritual smack down in our lesson. Hansathmaa stopped coming to church because she got offended. We meet with her every week and always have really awesome experiences teaching the family. They have a great understanding and testimony of the Gospel. My companion shared his experience of becoming inactive after his mothers death, and his return to activity last year and deciding he needed to serve a mission. I did some fancy foot work and side stepped in after receiving the pass from the Holy Ghost and scored big points with you “You made baptismal covenants with god, and he is the only person at church that you should worry about pleasing.” It was a great lesson, and she promised to come back to church and receive a calling and everything. She gave a talk on the Holy Ghost Friday night at the baptism, and came to work at the open house on Saturday, but missed Sunday because her brother’s wife gave birth Saturday night. All in all super good. Her family still has a few months of steady church activity before they will be fully reactivated, but I’m pretty confident everything will turn out ok.
 One of our new member’s children received Christmas shoe boxes from Samaritans purse this week. Her daughters are 2 and 4. It reminded me of how many times we had made those boxes, or gone to the service center as a youth group to help around Christmas time. If anyone deserves a Christmas present the Children of Mongolia do. I felt bad that a big chunk of one of the boxes was a tub of sidewalk chalk, and there is no sidewalk or paved road close enough for them to draw on. The 4 year old shared her candy with us (some German sweet tart like suckers). She is a sweet little girl.
 Well that’s about it. Transfers are this Saturday, not sure what will happen. We have really good work, so that gives me the hint that we might be staying together, but who knows. Lots of crazy things happening in the mission these days. Ill just have to go where they need me.
 Here are a few pictures from Battuya’s and Balthdandorj’s baptisms, the chicken pie, and a few traditional clothing pictures with my last two districts. They won’t give you the file, so I had to take a picture of a picture to get it to you all.
 
Much Love-Elder Warner

Hello Everybody!

 Well there isn’t a whole lot to really report this week. We stayed really busy, and taught 27 lessons this week, and didn’t even get to go out to work on Saturday or Sunday. I went on an exchange with My Zone leader, Elder Avila, and he was feeling really sick. The next morning he was worse, and we didn’t make it out of the house till about 5 o’clock to teach one lesson for the day. That one outing was almost enough to do him in, and like I predicted, he has pneumonia. It is ok since our work was blessed early in the week, so we didn’t really get slowed down. Since he was too sick to go back out he stayed at my house again Saturday night. His companion needed to be at Church for his Zone leader Duties and the doctor didn’t want Elder Avila to go to Church or to be around anyone, so I stayed with him again Sunday since I had already been exposed to him, and was already sick before we started our exchange.
 We have an investigator being baptized this Friday named Balthdandorj. He is 17 years old. I’m really excited for this upcoming baptism.
 We instituted the home teaching program in the ward this last week and had some great experiences. I went with a member name Ganbold, and we taught 4 home teaching lessons. The really fun part was he picked us up, and his driver drove us around. His boss is a Church member as well who gave us use of the company vehicle and driver for the day. It was really cool, and a strange experience to drive between all the appointments instead of walking and taking meekers. We also went on another companionship exchange the day before because we have so many people to meet with. The work here is just wonderful!
 Well here is the basic story of what happened with the theft. I changed clothes in the bathroom, and gave my camera, phone, and money to my companion. I forgot and left my keys in my pant’s pocket. Ariunbayar was in the bathroom and waited till I left, and then stole my key, and replaced it with a fake one. He knows where the missionaries live because he is the ward mission leader for the Unur Ward and has done a lot of work with the missionaries. He also happens to be a thief. I saw him in the bathroom as well as my companion, Elder Avila, and the church Security guard. No one had warned me he was a multi time thief. Anyways, he didn’t show up for his interview with the Stake President about it that last week, but they caught him yesterday. We had a meeting today with him and all the other missionaries he has stolen from and presented evidence, etc. The outcome was basically this, if he doesn’t make monthly payments to pay the missionaries back, he is going to be given to the police. President Odgerel wanted to give him a chance to make restitution and to repent. Since my things had already been sold, there was really no reason to oppose the decision. Hopefully, he will take the opportunity to repent and change his lifestyle, but I’m still not very confident that anything will come from this. It is ok though.
 The worth of souls is great in the sight of the Lord, and if I need to give up an IPod and some other things, I guess I’ll have to do so willingly won’t I?
 I do have a funny story Ganbold shared with me. Back in 2000, he went to the temple. He had his interview with the Mission President at the time and received his temple recommend. The Mission President told him to not lose his recommend, that it was super important, not to let it be messed up, lost, stolen etc. So in order to keep it safe, Ganbold locked it in his safe. He happened to leave it in the safe and get all the way to the temple in Utah before remembering. Of course, after a few international phone calls, he was able to get over the phone approval from his Branch President to attend the temple, but he still thought for a brief period that he was perhaps the most unlucky Mongolian Saint in the world.
 
Love,
Elder Warner

Date: Mon, 11 Jan 2010 10:23:46 +0000
 
Hey Family
 Well I had a wonderful week and really wish I had a little more time to write about it. To Start I sent out some Christmas thank you cards, so some are in the mail, but of course I didn’t have everyone’s address or time to mail everyone so a big thanks to everyone who sent Christmas gifts including the Mullins, The Naeta’s, The Ramey’s, the Squires, and the Deleplaines. I received Donna’s package today, and look forward to opening it tonight.
 We have had some wonderful experiences this week. We had another great week of work with 21 lessons/6 with a member present, and 6 new investigators. We had a theme of priesthood blessings this week. Last week we gave our new members Grandma a Priesthood blessing because she was sick. The next day her Migraine of 2 weeks was gone and she was up and walking around, and is now meeting with the sister missionaries that work in that part of the city. Last Sunday my sweet Dolthma grandma with one eye and one tooth didn’t come to church. We went to her house on Tuesday, and she was sick in bed and apologetic for not making it to Church. She asked for a blessing as well, and when we came back on Friday to cut wood for her she was feeling wonderful, and told us she had been feeling well since Wednesday night. Friday night I baptized the sisters investigator Battuya. She shared in her testimony after her baptism that when she first started meeting with the sisters she couldn’t come to Church because she was sick. She said she had been sick for 2 months, and hadn’t left the house in a month and a half. She said two elders Came and gave her a priesthood blessing and that she was better in a week. She then began seriously investigating the church and praying about it. She asked me to baptize her because I was the one who helped give her a priesthood blessing. Of course the power of the priesthood is all weighted upon the faith of the individual, but the power of the priesthood is truly undeniable. I’m so happy I was able to take part in so many Priesthood blessings these past few weeks, and that the faith of the members and investigators here is so strong.
 Several months ago I wrote about a Less active Return missionary Elder Romney and I met on the street and helped reactivate. Since I have been back in Songino I have seen him every Sunday at Church although he attends the Unur ward. Yesterday he told me he had past the Michigan test and will be attending BYU Hawaii this summer. I was soooo stoked when he told me that.
 One unfortunate thing did happen. During the baptism a member stole the keys I left in my pants pocket and went to my apartment and stole my IPod, Portable vcd/dvd player (no screen- for showing the restoration movie to investigators), and my Joseph Smith Ring. I know who it is, so actions are being taken with the police and the stake president tomorrow. Please pray for a positive outcome, because I don’t have the money to replace those things, and I know it was a sacrifice for my family to buy and send me that iPod last Christmas.
 Well I have to get to work-much love to all
 Elder Warner

Date: Mon, 4 Jan 2010 04:06:07 
 
Howdy Everyone!

 I hope your New Years was fantastic. Mine was great! Not a ton of exciting things happened this week, but it was ok. We had a good week of work despite the New Year’s holiday slowing us down Thursday and Fri. We still taught 20 lessons, and found 6 new investigators. We had 10 lessons with a member present! So work was awesome. I sent some pictures to mom showing some of the events of the week, and some Christmas pictures.
 On New Year’s we had a potluck with the other missionaries in our zone, and I made a big pot of dad’s chili. I snapped a picture before they scraped the pot clean. It was a big hit. I also made a meatloaf this week. 
We have a wonderful investigator family. The Mother and son on the right are both members, and the father and two other sons are our investigators. The one on the far right is Bazraa, and he received the Gift of the Holy Ghost my first week back in Songino. He was my investigator a transfer ago with Elder Sainbayar. This week he went out to teach with us several times. After one of the lessons, he said “Teaching the gospel is so awesome, I feel so good.” He is planning to serve a mission when he has been a member for a year. He is really awesome.
 The other highlight of my week was fast and testimony meeting yesterday at Church. I thought I’d share some of the testimonies. Bazraa got up and bore his testimony, which is already sooo strong. My new member Battolog has a cousin who lives with him named Hortz. He is 6. He is Anons little brother who some of you may remember was unable to be baptized back in July because her father wouldn’t give permission. Any ways, Hortz always says amazingly cute prayers every time we invite him to pray. He said “Hello brothers and sisters, my name is Hortz. I’m 6. I’d like to bear my testimony…..hello brothers and sisters….. (Everyone laughed a little). I know this church is true, and that God lives, and that this is the only true Church. In the name of Jesus Christ I pray….amen.” It was so cute. Another little girl got up and said “Hello, my name is Enkchimeg, I love god, amen.” An investigator sister got up and bore her testimony that besides her 4 sons, the Church is the only thing that brings happiness to her life. She expressed her desire for her 2 oldest sons to learn the gospel. Another new member about 16 years old bore her testimony that 2009 was the best year of her life because she discovered the restored Church of Jesus Christ. I love the faith and strength of the Mongolian Saints sooo much.
 Well that’s about it for the week, much love to all!
 -Elder Warner

Date: Mon, 28 Dec 2009 05:21:05 
 
Hello Family!

  Well we had a super busy week, but a wonderful Christmas for sure. We had a mission wide conference on Thursday that lasted from about 8am to 630pm, and Then a devotional Christmas morning followed by a missionary lunch and talent show from 1130-4. It was sooo much fun. I played an original song that mom really likes, and received wonderful responses from everyone. They loved it so much, and President Anderson said “That is a wonderful talent that i didn’t know you had Elder Warner.” I also played in a trio with Elder Bigler and Elder Bodain playing a medley of two songs, one by the band Incubus,and the other by the Band Brand New. The internet cafe I’m sitting at doesn’t have USB inputs on any of the computers if you can believe that mess. I had a bunch of photos to send to day, but it doesn’t look like I will have much of an opportunity to send them. 
  I really enjoyed talking to everyone in the family that I got to talk to on Christmas. It was very nice. I’m very appreciative of all the thoughtful items sent in the Christmas packages. My companion loved his ties and pens, and has been enjoying all the candy very much. 
We have had a super busy week, and only had time to teach 12 lessons, but we still found 3 new investigators. One of our investigators is named Damdinsuren. He is the grandpa of one of our Investigators who will be baptized in a few weeks. We were going over the baptismal interview questions and going over the importance of the priesthood in performing sacred ordinances like baptism with his Grandson Uka, and he asked to see the restoration pamphlet. He looked at it while we were talking, and after our lesson was finished I started talking to him while My companion made plans for the baptism with Uka. He was very interested and continually complemented my mongolian and asked how many years I had studied. He was a really funny old guy. He said things along the lines, of “I just want to figure out what is really true, what is the best way to worship God”, and “the monks, the pastors, the tribal buuh shamans, and everyone always says, my religion is true, so if you listen to them your head starts spinning.” I told him he was exactly correct, and that what we do as missionaries is teach the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and then invite others to ask god for them selves. I told him “God knows how you should worship him, and if you ask him directly he will tell you through his holy spirit.” It was a really awesome lesson, and my companion joined me to finish off the lesson.
 My companion met with him again last night on an exchange with one of our Zone leaders, and said they had an awesome lesson about the plan of salvation. He said that if he found this Church to be true, he was going to bear witness to his 8 children so they could have an opportunity to find out for themselves too. I was at home with a massive headache and a fever, but I’m feeling some better after some rest yesterday, and a good nights sleep last night.
 My Companions is from Old Darkhan where i started my mission. At the time he wasn’t active, but since I left Darkhan he returned to activity in the Church and decided he wanted to serve a mission. He is a wonderful missionary already, and his desire to serve and to work hard is very refreshing. I’m hoping for a very productive transfer with lots of growth on both our parts, and many wonderful new investigators. He also really likes Chili, and really enjoyed the pot of dads Chili I cooked up on Christmas eve.
 Well our time is up, and business calls. Much love to everyone and a special happy birthday to Mike. In Mongolia it is his birthday already.
 
Love-Elder Warner

 PS-This computer also doesn’t have spell check, so could you throw this through spell check before you send it out mom?

Date: Mon, 21 Dec 2009 10:47:18 +0000
 
Hello Friends and Family, Sorry to disappoint with a short letter this week, but at least I get to talk to mom and pops on Christmas right?
 Today was super busy! Im training a brand new missionary named Altansuhk. His name means Golden Axe. He is from Darkhan. We spent the majority of the day supplying his clothing needs, and have really run out of time for anything else today. I also of course received a ton of emails from everyone in the family.
 I am back in my area from last transfer, back in Songino. Im pretty excited about that, but wasn’t really expecting the change right before Christmas. Its all good though.
 This week was pretty crazy, its really getting cold. Tomorrow starts the Nine nines, the coldest period of Mongolian winter. It is 81 days of freeze your face off Siberian weather. This week it has been down around -25 degrees celcius, pretty cold.
 No worries though, I think I have enough clothes to wear to keep from losing fingers and toes. We will pray for the best. 
Sorry got to go, talk to some of you on Christmas
 Elder Warner
 PS – the Gospel is true, and this Christmas season is a wonderful time to remember the birth of our savior and his atoning sacrifice for us.

Date: Mon, 14 Dec 2009 03:40:03 
  
Манай сайхан гэр бyл-д (to my beautiful family)
 
Alrighty! Well our week really wasn’t all that exciting at all. In truth it was pretty uneventful. About the only excited thing that 
happened was actually kind of not a good thing. The church has really been involved a lot with the government over the visa issues. There are now 18 American missionaries waiting on visas to Mongolia. Thirteen have been waiting a little over three months, and five are finishing up the MTC this week. If their visas had come through they would be arriving this Thursday.
 
Anyway, the government withdrew our permission to ask ITL’s (invitations to learn). We received a fax Wednesday that all foreign missionaries and Mongolians with an American companion must stop doing ITL’s immediately, and that we could not contact people over the phone etc.
 
I wasn’t exactly crying over the ITL part, but the other parts are kind of annoying. ITL’s are about the equivalent of tracting in America and usually show about the same results. You can find good people to teach, but it is not the most effective use of time, and the majority of the referrals are lies. I’m kind of happy though, because this pushes us to use our part member families, to find new people to teach through the help of our members. That is where I have been trying to focus all along. All of my investigators are from part member families and member referrals. Hopefully, this will make more time for lessons. We’ll just have to work a little harder to find people to teach. Not a bad trade at all.
 
People are pretty busy this time of year in America and in Mongolia. Christmas isn’t a huge celebration here outside of the 
church, but the New Year is. The “Шинэ Жил” (sheen jith) is a really popular celebration. Many of our new members and investigators are pretty busy at their jobs in preparation for the New Year. This time of the year is pretty hard for missionary work since everyone is so busy. After the New Year is the lunar New Year “Цагаан Сар” (tsagaan sar). After that, things should go back to normal. I’m pretty excited for my first Christmas in Mongolia.
 
On Saturday, we made and ate three pizzas. We had two for lunch which we shared with Elder Bigler, and then we came home and made another before we went to bed. I think it was the best day of my mission. As you can see in the pictures, they came out pretty professionally.
 
Well, all the Christmas stuff is ready and I’ll hopefully get it put in the mail today. I have serious doubts it will be even close to making it before Christmas, but that is ok. The important part is that it arrives at all. Transfers are this week, so I may have a new companion for Christmas, who knows.

Last night was the fireside for the Missionaries going home this week. As I said before, they include two of my previous companions, Elder Morrison (The tall one), and Elder Michie (The blonde one). The one with the goofy expression is Elder Henson also leaving. Now there are only about 35 American missionaries in the mission.

Much love to all.
Elder Warner

Date: Mon, 7 Dec 2009 02:56:17 +0000

Hey family & friends:

  After a successful shopping trip to the zahk, Christmas presents are in the works and hopefully on the way in the next couple of weeks. Tiny Tim [Elder Munkhbayar] kind of makes everything slow as you can imagine, but he is usually a lot of fun. 
  Last P-day I went to the zahk with Elder Bigler on a couple hour exchange so Elder Munkhbayar didn’t have to walk so much. For some reason the zahk is super cold! It is right down in the lowest part of the valley, so I assume all the cold air just settles down there. Also a good bit of it is shaded so that makes it colder too. While we were there we each bought another pair of socks to wear because our feet were so cold. Pretty crazy huh?
  The coldest part of winter comes up right at the end if December and lasts through January. We can feel the cold coming for sure. We have seen plenty of snow already, usually once a week or so. Mongolia is a pretty dry place so what moisture does come is never very much in the winter. There is a decent amount of moisture in the summer time though. Anyways, snow is usually a dusting of a few inches or so. I’m not quite sure if blizzards happen here, I will have to ask. I can’t remember what it is called, but the thing where solids skip turning into a liquid and turn strait into a gas happens here with the snow.
  We sat in institute class for a few minutes with one of our ALA’s on Tuesday. President Odgerel was teaching from the New Testament. They read the story of when Mary and Joseph left Jerusalem and a few days down the road they found that Jesus was missing. Anywho, of course they go back and find him teaching the scribes and rabbis in the temple. He posed the question “When you were twelve years old, if you went missing would your parents have thought to look for you in the Church?” He then posed another question, “If the church had never been allowed to enter Mongolia, where would the 300 young adults sitting in institute classes across Ulaanbaatar be tonight?”
  We looked over one of our new members’ English assignments this week. She is doing some type of debate, paper, oral English competition thing. Anywho, one topic was about what values and morals do we share as a global community, and another section talked about alcoholism in Mongolia. Mongolia has the highest number of liquor vendors to population in the world, 1 liquor store to every 240 people. That is ridiculous! All I know is that there are little grocery stores everywhere, and I have never been in a grocery store that didn’t sell hard liquor.
  Well the church opened up this week on Thursday. It was a big relief after nearly a month of being closed. Last week some small meetings were allowed to go on in the church like institute and seminary. Now every thing is going full swing again including baptisms! We had two in our ward, and hopefully we will have some from our work right around new year. I’m pretty sure Elder Munhkbayar and I will be staying put. I, of course, know the decision is not in my hands, but I just have that feeling.
 
  Three new couples arrived this week. Hopefully the delayed American group will make it in soon as well. In two weeks the next group of Mongolian missionaries is arriving, and with them the next group of American missionaries as well. They, of course, won’t be in on time, so there will be two groups of American missionaries waiting for visas in America. Next week, two of my companions, Elder Michie and Morrison, will be going home. My old District leaders and good friends, Elder Henson and McMurtrey are also going home. That means my group is dead in about 4 transfers. That is a crazy thought. 
  Every investigator lesson we had this week was with a member present. That was very nice. We also picked up a new investigator family. Work is going pretty well. We have 3 baptisms scheduled for the 8th of January. Sorry for the recent string of short letters, there is never enough time for all you have to get done as a missionary. Today, we have plenty to do as well, hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas season, and enjoying all the wonderful things that this season brings. Don’t forget to reflect on the atonement of Jesus Christ as we celebrate the birth of the Savior into this world. With the gift of His son also came the gift of eternal life. Mongolia isn’t much for celebrating Christmas, and all they really know is adopted from Russian traditions of Santa Clause etc, etc, but I’m sure this will be a very memorable Christmas.
 
Much love
 - Elder Warner