Letter Home: English Class, Christmas Lights & Japanese Plums

Every week we teach English. I get to teach the beginner's class, for some of the students this is their 1st time with English. 

Last transfer (the day missionaries switch to new areas and new missionaries arrive) Sister M and I took the English class students on base to see the tree lightening. We got there late and missed the tree lighting, but we still got free hot cocoa and cookies and saw the tree with lights. 

As we waited one of the students slipped in to speaking Japanese. We talked a little bit about umeboshi, a sour Japanese plum. He and his wife and children came to the Yanai branch (a smaller congregation than a ward) Christmas party. There I spent most of the time talking to his wife in Japanese. One thing we talked about was umeboshi. 

Well, last Saturday at English class he gave me a small package of umeboshi from his wife! She really enjoyed talking with me and thanked me for spending that time with her.  I plan to have my companion take a picture of me trying one and pasting it in a thank you card for them. :)

http://www.axiommagazine.jp/2011/12/16/supai-man/

Letter Home: Work and Faith

We have been doing a lot of finding [people to teach]. We have no progressing investigators right now. But we will. Just got to keep on working with the spirit and have faith. 

Work


I gave a way a pamphlet today. Someone is walking quickly by, 




"Excuse me, do you have a moment?"


"I am very busy."


"OK. As volunteers for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for one and a half years we would like to share a message that God lives and that we have 100% of His teachings.  Could we meet another time?"


"I'm not sure. I'll read this pamphlet and then if I'm interested I'll call."


"Thank you. Have a great day."

Faith



Once while talking to people I felt impressed to share a certain scripture, however I could not remember exactly where it was. But I thought, "I will act on this prompting to the best of my ability and the Lord will make up the rest." 

Letter Home: To youngest brother

How are you?  I am doing great.

Guess what! We have a boy who is about 9 years old who was baptized in November. On January the 4th Sister J and I met with him for his last after baptism lesson.  We focused on the temple. But we also had some time to play with some of his Legos at the kitchen table (it was a lesson and lunch) and he made the folded raccoon.  When he was showing me the *origami he made I saw the raccoon and thought, "[you] would like one." I asked him to teach me how to make the raccoon.  He tried but then gave up hope and just did it for me. It's included for you. I drew the face, though :)

*Origami (折り紙, from ori meaning "folding", and kami meaning "paper" is the traditional Japanese art of paper folding, which started in the 17th century AD at the latest and was popularized outside of Japan in the mid-1900s.  from Wikipedia

Sermon on the Mount. Still photo from The Life of Christ Bible Videos produced by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
http://www.lds.org/bible-videos/?lang=eng

Last Saturday (January 25, 2014) in the Tabernacle on Temple Square, Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, told an audience of evangelicals and Mormons that "in an increasingly secular world and facing the attack on religious faith and religious freedom that we see all around us, it is imperative for the extended Christian community to acknowledge that what we have in common is so far-reaching and so potentially powerful in addressing the ills of society and of the soul that the very least we can do is know and understand each other better than we do."

Email Home: 26 January 2014

Photo of Iwakuni

This week we contacted 94 people. We taught 30 short lessons and gave 12 copies of the Book of Mormon away. We invited 20 people to be baptized.

What Sister Breksa teaches about God

"God is Our Loving Heavenly Father.

"God is our Heavenly Father.  We are His children. He has a body of flesh and bone that is glorified and perfected. He loves us. He weeps with us when we suffer and rejoices when we do what is right.  He wants to communicate with us, and we can communicate with Him through sincere prayer.

"He has given us this experience on earth so we can learn and grow.  We can show our love for Him through our choices and our obedience to His commandments.

"Heavenly Father has provided us, His children, with a way to be successful in this life and to return to live in His presence.  However, we must be pure and clean through obedience in order to do so. Disobedience moves us away from Him. Central to our Father's plan is Jesus Christ's atonement. The Atonement included Christ's suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane as well as His suffering and death on the cross. Through the Atonement we can be freed from the burden of our sins and develop faith and strength to face our trails."

Preach My Gospel: A Guide to Missionary Service (LDS Church 2004)

and a part of the above written in Japanese,

神は愛にあふれた天の御父です

神はあなたの天の御父です。神はあなたのことをよく御存じで,人には想像もできないくらい,あなたのことを愛して おられます。神は,この世でも永遠の世界でも,あなたが幸 せになることを願っておられます。 あなたが幸せになるために,神 は一つの計画を立てられました。 その計画は「イエス・キリストの 福音*」と呼ばれています。イエ ス・キリストは神の御子です。イエス・キリストの生涯と教えは, この世で平安を得,永遠の世で喜 びを得る方法を示しています。