Missionary Moments

My week was kind of flat out, but really quite good. Recently we have not been able to meet with many of our current investigators,..... but we used the time we had to do a few new things and try some new areas, with some alright results. 

On Tuesday we went all the way out to a city (country town) called Takashima. There are several less active members out there that no one has been able to check on yet, because it is so far away. We had time, and felt it was right, so went. We managed to check on a few. The last one was a less active mother of a mostly active family, we managed to share a message with her and she fed us hot chocolate and biscuits, as it was pretty cold outside. You should have seen the look on her face when we came to the door! Imagine if the missionaries in Launceston took it into their minds to ride out to Bridport or St. Marys or somewhere really far out with maybe one or two members and LAs. Anyway, the spirit was good and hopefully will be a little bit of a boost for her struggling testimony. The other LAs we visited weren't home,..... it has been a long time, almost 20 years or so I reckon, since they were checked up on.

Anyway, the ride was 140KM in total. It was a long and tiring day. We are crazy.

Wednesday was pretty good too. I seem to have become the only teacher at Eikaiwa, while the rest of the missionaries sit with the students and help them out individually. It's okay though, because I like it. K. came too, even though he speaks English, and he is now unofficially our teachers aid in helping out the students. Wednesday was also Zone Training Meeting, where the mission President comes and trains us directly. We got to watch Meet the Mormons!! Which is a movie about Mormons and what they are like in cinemas right now in the USA. It was pretty good and really well done. I recommend getting a copy when it is available and watching it for home evening or something. It was so nice to sit back and watch a movie!

This week we have been visiting members a lot too. We bring a blank copy of the Book of Mormon and ask them to write a testimony inside for us to give to someone. Previously I have not visited members much, but I am finding it is actually very fruitful for us to be doing that. The members like it too. We find around their houses, and it works.

On Friday we taught an old man on the street on a park bench, and he was actually interested. We also had a whole lot more luck talking to people that we met. In the evening the Sisters invited us to sing at the Kusatsu train station with them. As a joke I got K. to come too, because he likes to hang out, but he actually was missionary number 5! He handed out Eikaiwa flyers for us when we sang, and also sang with us. Then he was explaining about us and the Church to friends and work mates that were asking him,..... he did better dendou than us that night. We went out to eat afterwards to reward ourselves for a hard night of work.

On Saturday we took K. to do Soccer and hang out with the Omihachiman crowd. That was pretty fun too. Then in the evening Murakami and I rode out to Katata, which is kinda far (about a 50km round trip) to try another less active family that we felt we should visit. It had pretty amazing results, the mother had been thinking a lot lately about the Church and the teachings she learnt a long time ago (maybe 25 years or so) and the husband a bit too, and she said she was barely even surprised that the missionaries would turn up just when they were needed. We were able to give them a new Book of Mormon and commit to start learning again. We couldn't be bothered riding back that night, so took the train home, as soon as we got on a guy from Myanmar sat with us, made friends and gave us his number.

Sunday was cool too. We got K. to come along and he enjoyed his Church experience, even though he doesn't really speak Japanese. I tried to translate for him in Sacrament meeting and realised I cannot do Japanese to English very well, I sufficed by simply explaining the topics of the talks and the Church words he may not know. The members were really good, it ends up most of them have some grasp of English.

After Church we had a Nabe party with the YSA. We have three 20-25 y. o investigators who that party would be perfect for, and they all had time to come after two weeks of almost no contact. It was way good and fun, the YSA fellowshipped them well, and I can literally see all of them baptised without too much hassle now. The good thing is they all made friends with each other too, lots of foundations being laid. K. came too. I have become really quite good friends with him, as the other missionaries are teaching him, I am in the role of his bro, and it's pretty fun.

Well, lots of blessings from God this week, it was successful, I hope this next week is more of the same!

Riding over Biwa Lake - you can see how cold it is getting

Elder M.