This past week was a week full of 'stuff.' On Wednesday
we had interviews with President Toone. He came over to visit the zone.
As he did those privately with each missionary, Elder Gaspar and I did
trained on some aspects of missionary work. It was a lot of fun.
For part of my training I was going to address how
we can be more excited about what we're sharing. I had everyone tell me
their favorite hobbies and asked for someone to volunteer who was the
most passionate about his/her hobby. One of the Elders raised his hand
and volunteered. He was way into dungeons and dragons so I had him teach
me the basics in about three minutes and try to get me interested. It
was a really effective way to demonstrate the difference between being
excited and energetic about something as you teach it and being rote and
emotionless. It taught the principle pretty well and everyone got a
good laugh. By the end of the practice he had convinced me that I should
be a halfling named grapling hook hahaha.
President Toone does his interviews a little
differently than President Howes did them. He interviews each
companionship together and then each missionary individually. This
shortens the available time for personal interviews but allows him to
address some important things for the individual companionship. The
interviews were around 5-15 minutes.
My one-on-one interview with President Toone was
awesome. It turns out he knows Grandpa Johnson! That came up as we were
walking out the door haha. These interviews are always very uplifting
and inspiring times. It's amazing what you can learn in 5-15 minutes.
If you'll remember, last week we did a zone fast.
Our zone saw many miracles. One of the miracles we didn't even realize
until later that week when we got a phone call from newly weds (as of a
week or so) who both returned from their missions within the last
two-six months (they knew eachother before hand). They had moved into
the ward the day before we fasted. They are SO excited for missionary
work, it is AWESOME! Their first sunday
they invited us and one of our investigators over for dinner. That's
tomorrow. We're pumped. I went out with them on splits last week while
Elder Gaspar was supposed to go out with someone else (more on that
later.)
That was probably one of the best evenings of my entire mission. And I think it was all because of one lesson...
No
one we were visiting was home. No one wanted to listen to us outside.
We went over to one of our appointments and managed to find her home.
That single lesson was the best one I've ever taught in my entire
mission. That night was the culmination of howevermanymonths of practice
and study. I felt like the spirit was guiding everything I was saying.
It was really cool to hear her comment, "I really feel the spirit..."
The members did a perfect job with their insights and the spirit was
super powerful.
I walked out of that lesson on cloud 9 haha. That
was an extremely uplifting experience. As we pulled into the church we
noticed Elder Gaspar was still there. His member had never shown up so
he had sat on the stage making phone calls for an hour and a half while
the spanish ward played soccer hahahaha. He wasn't too happy
hahahahaha.
We are both convinced that them showing up when they did was a miracle of fasting.
Another unique thing that happened this week was Skyping home.
It
wasn't a normal skype call. Nah, not really. My Dad had the idea to
Skype me in to his lesson in church about hastening the work of
salvation. So, projecting me onto the wall, I was able to talk and share
some experiences with the members of the local congregation I went to
in Virginia! That was cool!
 | |
| Sunday School at the Arlington 2nd Ward, Virginia |
I was thinking about that this morning...that was
probably the first time in the history of the church that that has
happened. There is a lot of hype from other missionaries about that
experience as well - the picture was almost perfect for it - Dad was
just out of the screen though.
The exciting week culminated with a hectic night
last night. We had forgotten that they were planning on us to translate
at the mission president's fireside. So, with an hour or so to go before
it started, we made some phone calls and arranged for the lesson we had
to just go to the fireside and hear the talks.
Elder Gaspar and I were asked to accompany the ward
choir in the spanish ward with our violins so we had, the day before,
found two violins that we borrowed.
And then
the musical number for the MPF cancelled. We volunteered to play a
violin duet and were accompanied by Elder Myler on piano. It came
together really really well, especially considering we had an hour to
practice and only went through it twice with Elder Myler.
The piece wasn't hard - Beautiful Savior - but
having not really played for three years, I was surprised! It was almost
flawless.
Our names were on the program for translating and for the musical number haha.
If you'll look at the picture, you on the Wolthuis
side of the family recognize some familiar faces! We made the healthy
decision to go to Wendys for lunch last week. After we had ordered, this
family walked in and said, "Hi, missionaries!"
 |
| Elder Paul Johnson, from Arlington, VA (son of Rene Wolthuis Johnson, grandson of Henry B. Wolthuis) with Darrell and Christy Burnette of Tuscon, AZ (son of Ivan and Leone Burnette, family friends of Henry Wolthuis and family from 1968 onward, originally from Sweet Home, Oregon. It's a small world!) meeting at a Wendy's in Mesa, AZ |
We exchanged pleasantries and answered the
traditional, 'so where are you from?' questions. They said they were
from Oregon, I said, "Oh cool! My Mom is from Oregon but it's a small
place you probably won't know."
They said, "Try us."
"Sweet Home."
"What! Wait...what is your Mom's last name?"
..."Wolthuis?"
"Oh myyy!"
The rest is
history. Turns out the Burnetts (spelling?) are very close family
friends of Grandpa and Grandma Wolthuis and my mom and all her siblings
and have known them for decades! Small world! If I remember, they're in
Tucson now. They are both retired and are putting in mission papers!
Twice a month we have the opportunity to meet with
the stake presidents in the two stakes our zone covers. These are always
wonderful experiences. The Gilbert side of Mesa zone has those meetings
at 7am and invites all the missionaries in the stake over.
Some of the wards there are struggling and the missionaries weren't so happy. They expressed their concerns.
I sat intently waiting to see how the stake president would respond. He is a friendly man, very kind, probably in his late 40s.
I can't remember everything he said, but what he
said was so perfect. I was blown away by his answers and advice he gave
to the missionaries in his stake and knew that he was an inspired man. I
hope they all apply what he said!
Anyway, this has been an exciting week! More than
half of our teaching pool dropped us or got dropped. Our number of
lessons dropped from 55 to 35 but the quality sky rocketed. We are
expecting a baptism this next Saturday
and President Toone will likely be the one baptizing her - they've met a
few times and he is the momentum behind a miracle in her life! Pray for
her, she's going through some hard times right now overcoming some
challenges.
The church is true!
Thanks for the letters Mom, Eric, Will, and Grandpa and Grandma!
Cuidense!
Elder Johnson
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