MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!! :)

Heyoo whats up yall. I hope you all are enjoying Christmas time and the snow! I'm certainly enjoying Christmas in a Muslim country! :) It's really interesting how Christmas works here. Malaysia is a Muslim country and the government is ran by Muslims. But the Chinese and Indians all celebrate Christmas (kind of). Actually, I don't think anyone really celebrates Christmas or even knows why we have Christmas. They just do it because America does it haha. When we're on the streets talking to people we ask them all about Christmas and if they know what it is. I think we've had like two people actually know that its celebrating Jesus Christs birth. Its so cool though, when we are walking through the malls they are blasting Christmas music like, "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" and all the ones that talk about Jesus Christ and we're in a Muslim country! Like... that's so cool! If you don't think that's cool then you're crazy! Muslims hate Jesus! Also, at the dimensia center that we do service at, we sing Christmas carols with them and all the Muslim college students that are doing research there sing along! It's so cool to hear a Muslim sing "Chriiist the Savior is booorn" Haha I love it. The Chinese people here don't know what Christmas is they just like the trees and shopping. The Indians usually celebrate dipo vali. An indian holiday. But all the Christians know what Christmas is, so that's good. All the members here are stinking awesome!! I've never been anywhere but Ipoh but I'm sure that there's no better place in Malaysia to celebrate then Ipoh. All the members feed us so good and give us presents! Yesterday after church we walked into the chapel and there was a huge stack of presents that the relief society put together for the missionary's! It was awesome and a pleasant surprise! The members here are legit yo. Haha me and Elder Perritt always have a blast when we're on our bikes. We both ride through the streets with no hands singing Christmas hymns as loud as we can and yell Merry Christmas to everybody. Everybody looks at us like we're crazy haha but its way fun I love it. I got a ton of Christmas presents to open this year. Thank you so much to everyone who sent them to me! I'm sorry you had to pay so much for shipping haha.

Last week me and Elder Perritt were out talking to people when we see this white guy. We're like oh that's unusual lets go talk to him! So he's walking towards us and he goes "Hey Elders" Woah, what? You know who we are?! Haha me and Elder Perritt were shocked. This guy was actually a member. He was from Texas. He actually served a mission in Peru but sadly we found out that he has left the church :( Me and Elder Perritt were shocked so we didn't really say anything to him about coming to church or anything and we left. Well about 10 minutes later we were locking up our bikes and we hear "HEY ELDERS!" so we turn around and this time its some dude in his car. We walk up to the window and its this big south american guy with ear gages, a bull nose ring and tattoos and all that good stuff. We got talking to him and he was actually a member as well! And he also served a mission as well! He is from Venezuela and served in Barcelona. This time we actually got his phone number and invited him to church. I think God was telling us we messed up by not inviting the first guy we met so he sent us another one haha. But this guy is so cool! The other night we had dinner with him and he told us his life story. Man, he has had a hard life. He is the only member in his family and is currently traveling around the world. He doesn't know where he's going ever. He will go to some random city and somehow find work for the month that he stays there and just lives in random city's all around the world. Way cool! He told us his mission experience and life story and I was way inspired! It was way cool! He is one of the most inspiring people I have ever met. His story and the things we were talking about were answers to my prayers. I have had some questions about things and his life story answered those. Way cool. We brought him to church on Sunday and he loved it.

This Sunday I was getting ready for the day and about 30 minutes before our first church meeting was when I remembered I had to give a talk in church! So I started freaking out and prepared a talk really quickly haha. The talk looked really good on paper and sounded good in my head but when I gave it at church which was the first time I practiced giving it, it kind of sucked haha. Oh well, everyone was asleep anyways lol.

Well I wish you all a Merry Christmas. I invite you all to take time to ponder the true meaning of Christmas. I also invite you all to turn outwards this Christmas rather than inwards. These past few weeks we have been working really hard giving as much service as we possibly could. And it has led me to have one of the best Christmas seasons I've ever had. And this week we are going to go even harder. Christmas day is going to be the busiest day of the year and it's going to be awesome! There really is so much more joy in giving then in getting. I love Christmas and am so thankful that Jesus Christ loved us enough to come down to earth and pay all debts. To give us all the opportunity to become like him if we are wise enough to do so. To pay for all our sins and mistakes and to sacrifice himself for all of us. I hope you all can give a little this week and experience the joy that comes in that because I for sure have felt that this year. It is amazing and I wouldn't trade it for anything! I love you all! MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

-Elder Schwemmer