Another fantastic week!! And it has been WARM! So warm. Even hot the last few days. Winter ended and spring started, then spring ended and summer started, all this week. I broke out the short sleeve shirts and my watch tan line is coming back out after months of hiding.
The Sakura bloomed, and people are outside enjoying the good weather, the city feels so much more alive now. We have been able to step outside the box of knocking on doors all day, we went street contacting and volunteering, and even when we tract the people are in better moods.
We have had a couple lessons with S san, honestly it’s been a little rough. He gets very distracted every time we ask him a question, and it’s hard to bring it back on topic. He keeps saying that since he has never believed in any religions before, it will take a very long time for him to understand what we teach. We are trying to help him see that it’s ok if it takes a long time, we can teach little by little—but if he doesn’t let us teach at all, even baby steps are impossible. He is great though, a really smart guy! We tried to start into the restoration lesson, we asked him what he thinks of when he hears the word “God,” and he got very distracted talking about all sorts of things. But one thing he talked about was how it’s impossible to know what religious leaders like Jesus actually taught, because he taught his followers who taught others who taught others, and he said it’s like a long game of telephone and lots of information will be lost. We were like, you are describing apostasy. And that’s exactly what happened after Christ and the Apostles died! We taught about the Great Apostasy and he was like , yeah! That’s what I was talking about! And proceeded to teach us, again, about what apostasy is and why religions have different ideas even if they have the same origin. We just kept following his train of though and explained how God provided a solution for apostasy—modern revelation and the Book of Mormon. He called a living prophet who has direct communication with God, and brought forth the Book of Mormon to clarify and support what the Bible truly teaches. We explained to him that that is how we know that what we teach is exactly what Christ taught, and that this is His same church. He understood it all really well, but he keeps telling himself that it will take a long time for him to understand because he has never believed in religions before. We will keep working with him though.
S san tracked his smoking! Except he didn't read the Book of Mormon at all. And he said tracking how much he smokes makes him think about tobacco more and then he wants to smoke, so he told us he would stop tracking how much he smokes. But he agreed to start reading the Book of Mormon and track which days he reads! He kept saying that he needs to smoke because it allows him to de-stress and focus. I shared with him how the Book of Mormon always helped me to de-stress and focus in high school and college. I read to him from Alma 7 about how Christ felt all of our sicknesses and pains—I testified to him that I now Christ understands all of his stresses and pains, even his desire to smoke, and that through the Book of Mormon he will be able to feel that! He said, “NOW I want to read that book...yeah, I’ll read. What page was that part you read?”
I felt impressed yesterday to go finding by the college—which was kind of a silly idea since all of the students are back home for golden week. But we went anyway, we knocked on a good number of doors and a grand total of 4 people answered. But, 2 of those 4 became investigators! One was a guy from Okinawa who has some Mormon friends, but he said he has never really heard about what they actually believe. We gave him a pamphlet and exchanged phone numbers, and he wants to stay in touch after he gets back from Okinawa!
Probably the best part of the week was last night, we did a family home evening activity with M san and her family! She is an Eikaiwa student with 2 super cute kids, R and Y. We explained to her about family home evening, and invited her to do it with us this week! We made some delicious tacos with her family and one of her friends, who also brought her daughter. It was such a fun time! We played some games and shared a message about the Good Samaritan. We asked the kids if they would commit to be kind and show love to others, even those they don't know, and 5-year old Yshouted out, “YES!!!” We are still trying to figure out the best way to invite them to do Gospel lessons with us, but for now they are comfortable with missionaries and the church and they understand some basic good things that the church teaches, so we are making progress.
Love you so much Mommy!!! Please pray for us and our investigators :)
XOXoxoOXOXXOOXOXxooxOXOXOXOxoX
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パスケット長老
Elder Paskett
Photos:
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| Photos 1-5: Sakura! |
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| 6--Hirosaki Castle |
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| 7-8--More Sakura |
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| 9--I tried making some katsudon curry |
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| 10--Katei no yuube with an Eikaiwa student and her family |
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