Hello family and others! Coming at you
from the winter wonderland of
Nagaoka. Actually it's not quite winter
yet but it is significantly
colder than anywhere else. I have to
wear sweaters and stuff. There
are a few good things about living here
though. Number 1, I get a real
bed and a real mattress. After a year of
sleeping on the floor that's
pretty nice. Number 2, I get to actually
dry my clothes in a dryer
instead of leaving them outside to dry.
The downside is I have one of
the biggest areas in the mission, again.
But we never leave the city
because anything outside is just
mountain or field.
This week was jam packed. Mostly because
I spent the first 3 days
preparing and in transit. I miss Abiko,
and feel cheated that I could
only spend 4 weeks there but the Lord
needs me here for a season, and
it looks like that season is winter. I'm
finishing the training of a
new missionary so I get to be a trainer
for like a week. Pretty
stressful job.
Other than that, I've just been doing
the thing missionaries do. We
had a really good lesson with an
investigator named Koki. The
missionaries found him while trying to
cost a less active. They go to
said less actives house, knock, and it
turns out that he moved and
Koki lived there now and has interest.
We taught him the Restoration.
Before he was saying that he really
wanted to know how we're different
from Protestantism and which church was
really true. He committed to
pray about the Book of Mormon after he
reads it. Pretty cool guy!
Right now I'm typing this on a train to
Niigata, the Zone Leaders
zone. On Tuesday we get to listen to
Elder Bednar speak to us and
because we're in the farthest zone in
our mission we have to go down a
day early. Everybody gathers together
and takes one long bus ride.
While I'm on the topic of Elder Bednar,
he gave a really great
devotional last night. Probably one of
the best on my mission/life. He
and others spoke a lot about joy and how
it's a gift off the spirit.
In order to receive joy from the gospel,
we need to do the things
we're supposed to be doing. But we
shouldn't be turning it into a
large list and checking things off.
That's not the point of the
gospel. We do the things we do in order
to have the Holy Ghost in our
lives. We pray to receive the Holy
Ghost. We read scriptures to
understand how the Holy Ghost speaks to
us. We go to church meetings
to feel the Holy Ghost. Once the Holy
Ghost is in our lives, joy flows
naturally. I also learned that when we
feel doubt and look for flaws
in the church, it's not the church's
fault. When you stop believing,
it's not because the church isn't true,
it's because you weren't true
to the church. All in all, I learned a
lot from Elder Bednar.
Well it's been one crazy week and I
don't have many pictures for you,
but the email was extra long this week
so I hope that makes up for it.
Have a nice week!
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| guitar class |
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| Hopping on the bus. Brings back memories. |
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