Listening to the Spirit

October 18, 2009

Hey family! Sounds like all is well. Olivia! Chet Eh! Hope you had fun. Happy early birthday! Lenzi sounds happy and ready to get married. Rudy, your westy looks sweet! That is funny about the YMCA! Good luck. Hopefully Butch doesn't fix everything but the problem,LoL. He is such a good guy. Well dad to answer your question, the family unit in Japan is very strong but the fathers work so much. The grandparents usually take care of the kids and the grandparents usually hate Christians. These are all generalizations but pretty true. I like talking to families but there just aren't very many walking around when we are streeting. The younger generation is more open to new ideas so we focus on them but the spirit really tells us who to talk to. K ill answer the rest of the questions. Friday needs English ones. I think he is coming to church next week! And I don"t need Peanut butter or cds, Thanks though. It would be nice to have those stickers with my address on them. I lost the ones you sent me. Thanks My companion is great! I was transferred last Thursday! To the other room. My apartment has 4 elders in it. I am now companions with elder Nicerio. He was in the same apartment last transfer with a different companion. He is Phillipino but grew up in Australia. Ill send pics. He is very nice and a good guy. This is his last transfer. I was a little disappointed because I wont really be seeing my old investigators anymore. This will be my third time starting from scratch pretty much. I am very excited to find more people to teach. My old companion Elder Budge is training a new missionary in Abeno too. His companion is from L.A., Elder Escalante. He adds a little Spanish flavor. My prayers really have been answered this week. We need people to teach and that is exactly what the Lord gave us. We met Anthony last Friday. He is from Nigeria and very large. We met him outside his apartment and he wanted to be taught right then. It was the smallest apartment I have ever been in. It was a little bigger than a queen sized bed. I know this because he had one in there! All three of us sat on his bed and talked about the Restoration. He understood very well and he accepted to be baptized on Nov. 1st! He is a great guy and I am excited to see how his life will change. Other than Anthony we found a couple other new investigators. God really does answer out prayers. I just hope that through my words these people will feel the spirit and know that they are children of God. I can honestly tell you guys that I haven't had a bad day. Last night was a little rough though. During streeting to stop people I say "sumi masen" It is like excuse me in English. Sometimes the people will say "Kekko desu"　which means like im not interested. We were by a crowded train station with tons of people and like 20 people Kekkoed me in a row. It was like bam, bam, bam, bam. I feel so bad because they really don't know how important the message of the Restoration is. When little things like this happen I know that there is someone out there that is ready to here. I love it here. The people are so nice and are willing to listen. Remember how I told that I have been trying to follow the promptings of the spirit but it seemed like everyone I was prompted to speak to wasn't interested? Well I have seen just the opposite lately. Last transfer me and elder Budge talked to a man named Takao san last transfer but we didn't get his contact info or set up an appointment. after he left we felt prompted to go find him. We looked and looked but couldn't find him. I felt awful but went on. As we were talking to another guy Takao san came out of nowhere. We got his contact info and a return appointment and now he has a baptismal date. Anthony was the same way. We were riding our bikes home and I was behind elder Nicerio. It was dark so I couldn't see well and it didn't help that Anthony blended in. He is way dark. again I felt prompted to turn around and now he is getting baptized. Miracles happen everyday. It really is a miracle that we receive guidance from something that we have never seen. The Holy Ghost is very powerful. The mission is great and I love it! It really is the most important thing I could be doing right now. Thanks again for everything! You are so nice to send that quad for Friday. Love you all and see you later!