Transfer week transfer week transfer week! I'm so glad that it isover! And I'm glad that... Deschamps choro and I are staying here foranother transfer!! Woohoo! It's been fun to work with him, and I'mgrateful that we get one more together! Inaba choro took off toMatsuyama to be a zone leader, which was really sad. But I'm excitedhim for him and his next part of his mission, and I'm grateful for the6 months that I had to work with him and learn so much from him!! This week we were literally all over the place helping withdifferent things. It was a blast. We also saw a couple miracles in thelittle bit of time that we had to work in our area. We were able tomeet with a lady again who we found a little bit back and she acceptedto take the lessons, and she gave us all of her information. It wascool to have someone to be so willing to meet with us. On Sundaynight, we were walking down the street and a guy named taguchi that wehad contacted and gave a Book of Mormon to 2 months ago passed by us.2 months ago, When we first contacted him, we weren't able to get hisinformation so we never were able to follow up with him. This time ashe passed by, I failed to stop him, and I was way mad at myself forletting him pass without saying anything. Deschamps choro and I lookedat each other and said "let's repent and never let anything like thathappen again." Well, about a half and hour or so later, as we were walking bythe train station to meet up with a less active member, I was on thephone with one of our friends, when out of no where, taguchi walkedby. I literally grabbed Deschamps choro and threw him at taguchi so wewouldn't miss a SECOND CHANCE to talk to him. (Smooth elder Evans)-Deschamps choro, being the stud that he is, picked him self back up,and started up a conversation with taguchi and we were able to followup with him, and get his information... There were 2 things I learned from this. 1... there are bettermethods to handle situations like these, rather than panicking andthrowing your companion at someone. And 2. The lord gives us secondchances. No matter what happens in our lives, if we are prepare, andready, and commit to the lord, he will show us miracles and give usanother chance. When that chance comes, we better take it, becausethat's when true miracles happen. I'm grateful for this opportunity to serve here in Japan. I'mgrateful for all the learning experiences that I've had. -Both thegood ones and the bad ones.- I'm grateful for the priesthood and forthe power it has. As we were called on to give priesthood blessingsthis week, I've thought a lot about how important it is to ALWAYS be aready and worthy priesthood holder. I'm grateful for the Japanesepeople, and for my family, and for my friends. I'm grateful foreveryone's love and support. And most importantly, I'm grateful forthe savior, who i feel out here helping us with the work everyday. Ilove this gospel and I love the happiness it brings. I hope you allhave a wonderful week, full of turkey, mashed potatoes, and all ofthat good stuff. I'll stick to my sushi over here in Okayama japan.I hope you all have a good week! Love you all so much!!Ebanzu choro
Hey hey!I don't have much time to write today, but I just wanted to telleveryone I love them! Transfer week is here, which means my 9thtransfer is now over. Here comes the double digits! 10! I can'tbelieve time. It's something I will never understand. Anyways! Thispast week Deschamps choro and I have decided that we are going tostart over here in Okayama with investigators. Sadly, the Nishiyamamom and daughter didn't keep our "make it or break it" commitment, sowe made the hard decision of giving them sometime. We will see howthey are doing later on, but for now we are going to try and find somenew investigators. It'll be fun to start some finding! Because we aregoing to be doing a lot of it from now on! I'm excited for this nextchallenge.In order to find new investigators, we have been trying to do newthings. We drove with a member and her boyfriend down to a city in thevery bottom of our area, to see what we could do down there. We hadtwo less actives that we could visit, and then we figured we would dosome housing. Yeah... long story short, THERE WAS NO ONE IN THE ENTIRECITY! Haha! But it was a good chance to work with one of ourinvestigators and his member girlfriend.Other than that, we did an iron rod activity on Saturday and it wentwell. We did it with the other Okayama Ward and there missionaries. Wewere all inside tempting people and guiding people through the course.It turned out to be a good learning experience for everyone involved.It's fun to try new things as a missionary.Anyways, we are taking off so that's about it for this week! I loveyou all and hope you have a good week.Evans choro
Hello hello!Not too much to talk about from this past week due to getting sick! Mycompanion and I have both caught colds which kept us inside a littlebit (which we were not happy about). And other than that, it's been ahard week as far as the work has gone. Here is a bit of the update...Jay: was progressing super super well. It was looking like he wasgoing to hit his baptismal date for this coming week, November 13th.As he was preparing, he talked to his family (back in China) to tellthem about his decision to get baptized, and he ran into a fewproblems. His dad won't let him be baptized right now, and doesn'twant Jay coming to church. Jay and I talked on the phone for a whileon Saturday. He was frustrated, but he told me that he is going tokeep reading and praying and if he feels like he should still getbaptized in a few months, he will let us know. I still feel like Jaywill get baptized eventually. Please keep him and his family in yourprayers!! It's just a minor set back!This area is FULL of less actives. So we have really been working tohelp get all of them back to church. We aren't just going to theirhouses and saying "hey get your butt back to church!" We are trying tohelp each of them build their testimony and find the reason,personally, why going to church is so important. But with that, we had4 less actives who said they were going to come to church this week,not show up. Not one of them came. Which was a bit of adisappointment. But now we are just going to switch our mindset alittle bit, and try something new working with our active members toget the less actives back to church!On a better note, we had a great ZTM this last week! I learned a lotabout the importance of bringing the spirit into our teaching. I'vethought a lot about that as well. Looking back at Jessica shimai andher baptism, it was the spirit that did everything in her conversion.As missionaries, and as members, it is our job to make an atmospherewhere the spirit can be welcomed. The spirit is doing the teaching, weare the tools it is using.That's it for this week! Love you all!! And congrats to Drew on theengagement!! Wooh wooh!!I love you more than Deschamps choro loves Halloween 👻Evans Elder