HELLO FAMILY!!
I am so sorry to hear that you are sick. That sounds miserable. Especially Jasons experience. I have heard the phrase *a family that prays together stays together*. But it seems like our family gets sick on vacations often, so I like to think that a family that vomits together stays together. Nonetheless, I hope you all recover quickly.
This week in Katsura was another week of blessings. Oh how wonderful the Lord is. I believe my favorite day of last week was Tuesday. So I will write about that day. So one of the first days in Katsura, we were exploring our way around this area and we ended up going up a big big big hill for about 45 minutes to an area with lots of houses and apartments. It was a pretty good area, but we figured it was far away and hard to get to, so people would probably not be interested in coming all the way to church and we would probably use our time better going to an area closer to our church, so we determined not to go there again. But one night as we were planning, we both thought that we should go to that place! That night as I was praying, I had one specific area in particular come to mind (it was up and over the hill and then up another even steeper hill!) We had never been there before, but we decided to just go for it and trust in the Lord. After about 15 minutes of housing, we came to a door and the people got really excited to see us. They said it was because we are cute Americans haha. BUT we jumped on that and talked about why we came to Japan, and they said they would listen to our message! The mom actually said she has interest in religion and she is listening to other peoples messages but she wants to hear ours! They were busy at that time, but they said to please come back! There is the mom, a 16 year old son, a 15 year old daughter, and then another 8 year old son...I am SO EXCITED to teach them! We went back on Saturday and the 16 year old was outside his door. He said he was locked out and he was waiting for them to come back, so we figured they would come home soon. We housed around the area for about an hour and then came back and he was still just standing there. It was a FREEZING DAY!! (the coldest one yet.) And he was shivering super bad, so we bought him some hot cocoa out of the vending machine and talked to him for a while. He likes music and running and ice cream. Me too! I really am so excited to teach this family. The Lord led us right to them!
Tuesday got even better with our lesson with Yamaguchi san that night. She is the *one who prayed*. (Ha mom I like the title you gave her.) She talked about how she prayed every night before going to bed but she also prayed in her heart at work, and how she felt like since then EVERY part of her life has become happier. That is the gospel right there. We actually taught her the Gospel of Jesus Christ lesson, and she caught on so well. She does not understand the message perfectly in her head (because who does understand sin and death and the atonement perfectly?) but she understands it so well in her heart. In her prayer at the end of the lesson (which was only 5 days after having first learned how to pray) she expressed her thanks for Jesus Christ and asked for help in following Him.) It was such a good prayer. The member in the lesson (who just returned from her mission last year) was crying at the end of the prayer. It was GOOD.
I was blown away by Yamaguchi san when we taught her again on Thursday. We had a CPR lesson prepared for her (church,reading,and prayer), but as we talked about prayer, she basically taught US how to pray and why it is important. She has it FIGURED out and she loves prayer! And then before we could even teach much about the scriptures, she told us about how she had been reading from the Book of Mormon (which we never even asked her to.) She said she only read a little bit, but she read through it three times, once for the story and twice for the teachings, and she loved it because of the thoughts and feelings she got as she read. So she taught herself that part of the CPR lesson too! I feel like she reads the Book of Mormon better than a lot of the members do! She did not know anything about church or sacrament, but she understood what we taught her so well and her desire to come to church and take the sacrament was strong. However, she works every Sunday. She asked us if there was any way we could do the sacrament on another day or later on on Sunday. She said she already asked her boss if she could get Sundays off and she did not get permission. She even tried to quit her job, but apparently if she quits the whole business will go under. She is really in a pickle! However, her desires are SO strong. She really really wants to go to church and to be baptized! We believe as we show our faith together with her, and as her desires grow even stronger, a way will be prepared for
her to find a way to come to church. This is really a situation where we are going to have to show our faith and put every last drop of trust in the Lord. I am excited to see how the Lord will help her.
As you can see, the Lord loves His children. He wants them all to return to Him, and He is preparing them and helping them. I have the sweet privilege to be involved in His work and assist Him in helping His children! Before coming on my mission, I was definitely excited, but I had no idea how wonderful it was going to be. I LOVE being a missionary!!
Also, I love you all so so so much! Thanks for your prayers and support. I love you I love you I love you!!!
With love :)
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