"Ask to Receive"

Dear Family,

 

This week we met with Miura san. It was a pretty interesting lesson. He told us that he had been searching his whole life to find out who God is. We simply asked him, "Have you ever asked God himself who he is?", He just looked at us like we were dumb. We explained to him that it is super simple, and that is all Joseph Smith did. Joseph was confused and didn't know. He had been searching for most of his life for truth and he asked God himself to find out. 

 

So I think that once Miura san realizes that that is the smartest method, he will gain a testimony. He just needs to have his heart softened a little bit more.

This week I got hit on by a five year old girl missing her two front teeth. She asked me if I had a girlfriend, and I asked her how old she thought I was. She said 7. She was trying really hard to flatter me. But don't worry, I didn't take the bait.

Oh hey, this week we finally got new students to come to Eikaiwa! Yay! It started out with zero now we have about 4. I am hoping that it will go up a lot more. There is a branch in our zone that is a lot smaller and they have about 20 students and 4 of them have been baptized recently. So I think it would be cool to get Ichinoseki's numbers up too.

On Thursday we were able to meet with our Less Active Sister Makiko. She is doing awesome. She would come to church if she didn't have to work every Sunday. But she will probably retire in the next few years so then she can start coming back to church. She still keeps in contact with the missionaries who baptized her 30 years ago, so that is pretty awesome. We went to a glass warehouse with her and made and molded our own cups and stuff. That was pretty cool. When I get it back I will send a picture.

The next day we had Zone training Meeting where we talked about revelation and self conversion, It was really good. On the way home, a guy on the train came and talked to us.  He spoke perfect English and he figured out who we were really fast without us having to tell him.  He was really nice. He does tours through a temple that we are near, so we might go see him in the future. We noticed a kid sitting next to us was reading the Bible, which you never see - like never. So we talked to him and he was super nice. He is from Sapporo, so we won't be able to meet with him again. He is Protestant and took the Book of Mormon so fast he was actually really intrigued by it. 

The next day we had more meetings in Morioka. It was good.  We talked about all the branches in the zone and the struggles there. So it was good because it got my mind thinking on ways I can try to help and seek for that revelation. They also introduced a new program into the mission called the Monitor program where members invite there friends to assess the missionary lessons and give us a feed back. They listen to 3 lessons that are 20 minutes long, no longer.  At the end of the lessons they assess our skills and take a survey that asks if they want to continue to listen and receive baptism and when they would want to receive baptism. It is kind of weird to me, but we will see how it work out!

Oh also, we will get transfer calls this week on Saturday, but we won't transfer until the following Saturday because we are having a big conference where they will introduce Ipads into our mission. I think they will give us the option to buy one or rent one. Elder Thayne's companion is going home at the end of this transfer so me Elder Drenk and Elder Thayne will become a tripanionship for about a week. That will be pretty fun.

Well that was my week. Love you!

Elder Nebeker

Rumbles but no Tumbles

This was another pretty good week, and to answer your question mother, yes there has been more earthquakes.  Currently we have about one a day.  I was talking to some members who told me they are expected to have another earthquake like they had in 2011. They said it's supposed to be closer to Tokyo but it is going to be a lot bigger. So yipee! Adventure! Just kidding, it actually sounds terrifying. They said that the 30 foot wall of water that came in was going as fast as a bullet train here in Japan (Shinkansen) You should look at how fast that is, because I am pretty sure it is ridiculously fast. 

So funny story - I was showing my pictures to the Japanese Elder in my apartment, Elder Tsushima. We were in Aizuwakamatsu with each other so we are pretty good friends. Anyway, he saw a picture of the weiner dogs and said, "I wanna pet dog so bad"... and then he started crying. It was hilarious! He was like why I am I crying!? What is happening? It was really funny, but it's weird because there are a lot of times like that when you are a missionary. 

So, This week we were able to meet with 2 less actives and start teaching them lessons. They are both really cool. The one less active invested in the Japan Stock Market when he was in his 20's and made millions of dollars. He built himself a really nice house here in Japan, but then somehow was burned down. He built it again because he still had a lot of money and it was burned down again. This happened four times. He said he thinks it is his old friend who was very envious of him that burned his house down. He is actually pretty poor now and works as a taxi driver. It is really sad. But he has a very humble spirit.

 

The other less active is super nice! She has so much light about her. She just can't come to church because of work. She has to travel to Sendai every single day and usually to Tokyo about once a week where she stays for about 2 days. Coming to church is really hard so it's a miracle that we can even visit her. She usually calls us to tell us when she has time, which is quite nice. 

We also met with several members this week and taught member lessons. One of the Members who lives by himself said something I thought was very interesting. He said when you live alone for a long time you start to think of weird things. And i realized that every mentally ill person I have met here in Japan has lived alone for a long time. I think you'll remember me telling you there is a high incidence of schizophrenia. We actually had a meeting with the branch presidency and they instructed us to be careful with the schizophrenic people because the changing weather can cause issues with their illnesses. 

There was a guy last week that we housed into with the Mowers who knew a lot about the church. He said when he was in high school he would come every single week. So I asked the members if they knew him and apparently one of the members recieved lessons with him at the same time.  He was baptized but for some reason his friend never was baptized but they are still friends to this day. It has been 30 years since that time. So we are going to see if we can pick him up as an investigator this week and get the member to joint in lessons with us. I think that should be really fun.

This week we played basketball a lot.  I found out when I play, my calf goes crazy and and my leg becomes powerless and feels like I have a gnarly charlie horse in my leg. It usually goes away in about 2 days, but my back feels fine which is good. There were two investigators found through basketball this week! yay!

I was also able to go back to Kitakami and introduce the elders to some investigators that my companion and I had taught. Only one was home but that was still really fun to reconnect. I think that they should be able to start teaching them again because they seemed really happy. 

But that was pretty much my week. 

Anyways love you!

 

Elder Nebeker