10 December 2012

Dear Family and Friends,

So this month, the Yuma zone set a baptismal goal of 22 baptisms for the month of December. To put things in perspective, there were 4 in September, 8 in October, 0 in November, and 0 so far in December for this month. Usually Yuma baptizes the least in the mission so 22 is a pretty lofty goal. As of today, there are 25 people on date to be baptized in Yuma. If that's not a miracle, I don't know what is. Everyone is working hard and pushing hard and we're starting to see results. At the Spanish branch yesterady, there were about 50 people there, 10 of them being our (the Sis Drake/Thompson, Elders Lanier/Sawyer, and Valdez and my) investigators. The branch was ecstatic to see everyone working hard. Hopefully we can get some referrals out of it. We got a text from the AP's this morning saying that our zone was carrying the mission in new investigators and people on date. Represent!

Elder Valdez and my goal for this month is 3 baptisms. We're going to be getting two this week, one on Wednesday and one on Saturday. Originally both were scheduled for Saturday but we got a call from one of them saying, "guys...I don't want to be baptized on that day. Can we move it up so I can go on the temple trip?" Sweet! So that's happening on Wednesday. He asked me to confirm him which will be my first spanish blessing. Nervous doesn't really cover it but I'm working no subjuntive tense right now so I can at least conjugate some of the verbs correctly.

There's an elementary school that is having snow made for a day and they're going to dump a couple truckloads of fake snow on their grass. We are definitely going to be there. Not to play, of course, but to talk to people...right?

We spent two hours in the Emergency Room this week. We got a phone call asking to go give a blessing so we headed over and got our ER passes and went inside. The first one took a little while since the guy was pretty hurt so once he was all, well, fixed up, we gave him a blessing. On the way out, we got called over by an elderly coulpe to give another one. That one took a lot longer since he was in there for a stroke. The hospital had a pretty cool system for stroke patients. They wheel'd in a monitor with a video camera and started a video chat between the hospital ni Yuma and the stroke response squad in some other city far north by show low. Through the video chat, the nurse that was 4 hours away diagnosed him, prescribed him, and sent him to get some treatment. It was a pretty cool example of modern technology in hospitals (obviously everything in hospitals is modern, but this was just cool).

While passing past a room in the hospital we heard an elderly man say, "grrghghhh, not dying before my wife was a big mistake."

One of the investigators we're teaching lives in San Luis, a 70 mile round trip. Our Engilsh ward goes from Yuma to the border. But the missionaries in San Luis have been teaching him even though he'll be baptized for our ward and technically be our baptism because of the inconvenience of going down there. Anyway, we went down last week to talk to him and taught him the first lesson, about the restoration, all over again to reinforce it. He didn't have a very good grasp of it. Anyway, at the end we told him we were usually in Yuma and made the trip down here just to see him. He said, "Oh man, I wish I'd paid more attention!" Haha, I couldn't decide to laugh or slap him haha. He was involved in the lesson and when we asked him questions while we taught he answered them mostly correctly. But at the end when we asked the same questions, he couldn't respond to any of them. He has a slight mental condition so that probably played a role. Good guy though.

I just remembered that Elder Cook of the Quorum of the 12 came and spoke to the mission this week. Probably should have written about that first. But anyway, he came last Friday. He also brought Bishop Stephenson (Presiding Bishop), Elder Gonzalez (Bishopric of the Seventy), and Elder Wright (don't remember). I was expecting a big change in the mission but nothing of that sort. But before I get to what he said I'll rewind a little bit. Since Yuma is so far away from, well, anything, the trip to Gilbert was an all day thing. We left at 10 am on Friday and stopped for lunch at 11:30. It was a place in Dateland (lots of date farms) which sells Date shakes and Cactus shakes. Not a fan of date shakes. Nope nope nope. Cactus wasn't too bad though. Anyway, we spent too long at lunch and got on the road a little later. We were supposed to be seated by 2pm at the stake center. To preface the next part, Yuma has a reputation has the outcast. We don't get invited to any mission activities other than the christmas parties, we don't get to go to the temple, and we don't know anyone since we don't get invited to Mission Presidents Firesides. Well, all of Yuma zone walks into the chapel at 2:15 and see everyone sitting down and the chapel of the stake center full. Everyone watched us walk the walk of shame. President gave us an unhappy look. So we pull up some fold up chairs right in front of the overflow section and sit. Then the whole zone gets up to use the restroom since we didn't get a chance en route so 12 missionaries get up and walk out after already being late. Right after we sat down, Elder Cook walked in the back doors and I looked at him. First to see him! And also the one to not stand up when  I should have. Bishop Stephenson was walking in behind him and motioned to us to stand up to show respect haha. Que oso. Anyway, I'll be sending copies of the notes I took home but suffice it to say, they spoke a lot on, well, being better missionaries. Elder Gonzalez talked about establishing the church, Elder Stephenson spoke on invitations rather than assignments, and Elder Cook spoke on testifying and getting rid of all our childesh habbits to prepare for the huge influx of missionarise next transfer since the mission is going from 170 missionaries to 250. Threw down on immaturity. It was a good meeting though.

They all finished speaking at 5pm. We had the chance to visit with other missionarise for 30 minutes after and I got to see Elder Myler (he's training), Elder Jacobsen, Sister White, and Sister Crawford, all of whom were in my MTC district. It was nice since I haven't seen any of them since September. They're all doing well and having much success. Kind of thought of when Alma ran into the sons of Mosiah.

So we left Gilbert at 6pm and headed to Chandler to eat as a zone at some place callde Barros. Elder Mackay told me I needed to eat the medium sauce'd wings which I did. If that sauce was medium, I don't want to know what hot was. We then left dinner at ~6:45 to drive home. And then at 8 we realized we were lost and still 2hours from Yuma. Fast forward to 8:45 and someone tries to call President to tell him we'll be late but doesn't leave a message. Actually, I'm not even going to try to explain the situation. Lots of misscomunications and we didn't get home till way after curfew and President didn't know until the next day and we had to get a ride home with a member and we didn't have our house key because someone had our keys and more and more. Just a crazy confusing night. He comes on Tuesday for interviews and we're all expecting a throwdown on how we should have been more responsible. Which we should have.

But back to the meteor! So at a certain time later in the evening when we were still waiting for our house keys to get to us we saw another large meteor go across the sky. It went straight down, lasted for abuot 3 seconds, dissapeared behind an apartment and then the sky lit up. Either it exploded in the atmosphere or hit the ground, all I know is that it got really light really quick. Pretty cool thing to see.

We spoke to some Jehovah's Witnesses this week on the street. They were going door to door and were only like 16 years old. We asked them what they believed and they showered us with pamphlets and information. Now I've got some stuff to study (since it's all in spanish). When we offered them a Book of Mormon, their mom came walking over and pulled them away. Next time.

We also spoke to an less active part member family this week. The wife answered the door and told us she was never going back to Church since someone their offended her. She said that she told her husband about it and he stopped going as well. It was a pretty ridiculous reason. I tried to tell her the importance of church but when she wouldn't listen I was just bold with her and told her that she couldn't expect God to forgive her if she couldn't forgive others. She said she knew and then left. What a silly excuse to stop going to church.

 Some of our investigators tried to put money in the sacrament tray at church yesterday haha. Guess we didn't explain that one well enough.

This morning at 7:30, a kid showed up at our door and gave us a plate of sugar cookies. He's not in any of our wards. We also had a member give us well over $200 of candy and fruit this week. See pictures.

And before I forget, I almost went to Mexico on accident this week! We were driving in San Luis and got in the Mexico line on accident. Well, we got to the sign that says, "no turn backs" and freaked out and barely got out... But don't worry, we're still here!

"One of the sins that most of us will be accountable for is ingratitude."

Gas prices have dropped close to 40 cents in a month, what's happening?

I made the mistake of buying premade cookie dough from the grocery store last week. Never again. I ate half of it before I realized it was only Wednesday.  

I'm 85% sure I saw the F35 flying last Tuesday. My only concern would be the nose looked pretty pointy and it was quiet and relatively low.

How do vending machines count cash?

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa Johnson, Annie, Katie, Mom, Eric, Will, Sister Hines, Sister Hauer, the Hall family, and Natalia for the letters! Everything sounds great for you guys! I'm running behnid on responding so hopefully I can get back to you all soon but thank you so much for writing!

Merry Christmas,

A favorite sign

Missionary Christmas decorations

Where shall we start?

A generous gift

Elder Johnson

12 November 2012

Dear Family and Friends,

I'm pretty sure I'm getting transferred out of Yuma this transfer. I still have two more weeks here which I will be sure to enjoy. It's too bad that it is happening now that we have turned Yuma around and miracles are happening. Rumors have me off to Mesa to whitewash in (again...), whitewashing into the Sisters area in Yuma, or off somewhere else. It would be different being in the valley for Christmas time. There's a slim chance I stay but again these are all rumors.

This was kind of an interesting week. As far as work goes, it was awesome. We got seven new investigators this week with 23 teaching opportunities - almost half of the total teaching opportunities for all missionaries in Yuma. Things are going really well and it looks like we could get four more baptisms this month which would be half of all Yuma zones goal for monthly baptisms. It's all falling into place now.

This last week was zone conference. I was going to type up my notes and email them home but I forgot them so this will mostly be from memory. President Howes came down and gave a great training on extending commitments, following up, and addressing concerns. There has been  a lot of emphasis recently on 15-20 minute lessons and stopping by about everyday for a little bit of time. Since Sawyer and I started doing that we have had a lot more success. There was also a training given by the Assistants to the President (APs) on how to do street contacting, or OYMing, better. They emphasized bringing up the restoration asap and focusing it around that and the Book of Mormon. Sawyer and I have changed how we OYM'd too to fit that and we have gotten 7 new investigators from them. 

One of the APs came on exchanges with Sawyer and me this week. We were a trio for the evening and ran into an interesting man right off the bat. His view was that the authority was never lost from the Earth after Christ died and that he was working on finding his own apostles. We tried to get him to understand what we were trying to say but he wouldn't listen. We gave some good apostasy scriptures but he actually had some impressive rebuttals. When we got back in the car, the AP was pretty upset at him for being so stubborn. I chimed in and said that's like what we're like as missionaries; trying to help someone understand a different point of view and getting angry doesn't really accomplish anything in the eternal scheme of things. It also drives away the spirit. That is something I've seen a lot on exchanges that if someone we talk to disagrees the missionary gets angry and calls them anti and whatnot. I put myself in their (the person on the street) and that helps me understand how we seem to them. We come across just as stubborn even if we don't mean to. They say contention is of the devil. Doesn't accomplish much.

I got to go on exchanges with Elder Mackay this week. He's an English missionary here in Yuma - a really good guy. We went over to a dinner appointment the other night and, well, it was interesting to say the least. Elder Mackay said it was the weirdest dinner of his life. We walked in and heard screaming. Really, really, REALLY loud screaming. Turns out they were Mackaws (spelling? The big tropical birds?). She had three of them in a giant cage that was directly adjacent the dinner table. As we walked closer, the wife said, "that may look like Lasagna, but it isn't. It's spaghetti and (something else I don't remember...a weird fruit) and cheese on top. It kind of fell over in the oven so it looks weird." I dished myself a serving first and she said, "oh no, more more!" I said, "I'll start with this then go up." I took about a 3x3" serving which was already a lot. Saying it tasted funky doesn't do it justice. She spent the entire dinner complaining about the election and how she is broke now (two days after the election) and how the country is ruined. I sat silently. But then I got her talking about missionary work and she had a good time there. After some time the Mackaw got out of the cage and started running around on top making one of the loudest sounds I've ever heard. The woman started talking to it and calling it one of her kids. Hm. Well, we got up to carry our dishes over before dessert (you get those in english work) and one of the other Mackaws jumped over to the wall and reached its talon out and grabbed Elder Mackay by the shirt and tried to, from where I was sitting, eat him alive. It was hilarious and he got scared and jumped past. Hilarious.

There has been a ton of dust in the air these last week. I was hoping for a dust storm, like a wall 300 feet high of dust, but it just came in with wind and was spread out enough to make it not impressive, just annoying. Our car is disgusting and our bikes are pretty dirty now. 

We learned this week that an apostle is coming to the mission! Elder Cook is coming on December 7th as well as some other relatively important people. It should be exciting. We're pretty sure he is going to come and bash the mission for not having as good results as we should. We are down 70 baptisms from last year and not living up to our reputation as the highest baptizing in the southwest with the highest retention rate. So I'm bracing myself for getting (more) humbled.

The weather has started to drop in Yuma. It's actually unbelievably nice. It has been in the 60s all week. While I'm in heaven, the 'natives' are starting to bundle up in coats and hats and walk around the house in blankets. We ran into an incredibly drunk man stumbling around and he was going off and off about how cold it was. He called us his angels because we came out of nowhere to him in his time of need. He didn't talk to us anymore because he started running the opposite direction yelling, "no mercy, no mercy, San Antonio!" but it was pretty cool to show up just as someone needed us even if we didn't really do anything other than testify.

We ran into the nicest woman in Yuma this week too. She was ~50 years old and from Mexicali, Mexico. We talked to her on the street for about 15 minutes and she asked how long we had been speaking spanish. Sawyer said 18 months (as of yesterday) and I said more or less 4. She was super nice and complimented my spanish. I could understand almost everything she was saying - she spoke really clearly. That was a cool experience.

One of our ward missionaries, Brother Borgerson, volunteered to drive down to San Luis to pick up an English investigator we have down there. It's about a one hour roundtrip drive. That family is awesome. We taught our recent convert into the Yuma Valley ward at their house every time and they have an amazing spirit in the house. Just a great family.

Elder Sawyer and I started walking into a trailer park this week and found a woman who has since said that she wanted to get baptized. When we walked into her trailer, her daughter was there, about 26 yrs old, and we talked to them about baptism and authority. We found out that the 26 year old works with the above-mentioned recent convert and has noticed her completely change her life around and is so much happier. What are the chances! We find someone in a small spanish trailer park who works with someone who lives 15 minutes away in a house on a farm who has noticed her life change since baptism. It was a cool experience and when we told the recent convert about it she was thrilled. 

Two nights ago at about 5 am a really loud beeping sound went off in the house. It went off about once a minute for an hour and a half and was probably the most annoying thing I've heard in a long time. Neither Sawyer nor I wanted to get out of bed so we just dealt with it. Apparently he fell back to sleep but I couldn't. At 6:30 when we got up, it was still going off and I hadn't slept since it started. Dang I'm lazy in the mornings. Once I got out of bed I went to find what it was and noticed it was the fire alarm. Apparently the battery is running low. So I grabbed a chair and pulled the batter out. but it kept going off.... I tried to unplug the wire but it was glued on for some insane reason so I had Sawyer grab me a knife and we cut around the wire to get it off. Who needs a fire alarm anyway? 

Carne Asada is amazing.

I called the election. How much did he win by?

We were talking to our recent convert into the Rio Colorado branch yesterday and he was telling us about when he went to pick up food stamps from DES and they made him wait 7 hours. He said that when he was called, "I got up, started yelling, and ran over to grab them! It was like I won the lottery!" Hilarious. He's so funny. His daughters and wife are now taking discussions since they've seen him change so much. They're going to pull me out of Yuma before we baptize his family of 5! Bah!! Oh well, I guess it only matters that they get baptized. 

We actually had breakfast with him this morning. It was Menudo. So much for getting through my mission without having it. The LeRoy family invited us over and his family and we went and talked for a bit and ate. It was a great time and the LeRoy's are amazing cooks. I think if I were to have had Menudo anywhere, their house was the place to have it. Cow stomach lining soup with bones and corn and who knows what else. Apparently sucking the bone marrow out gives good flavor too. Let me tell you, it doesn't. The actual cow stomach lining meat(?) has the weirdest most uncomfortable texture in the world. 

That was the last week. For time's sake I'll quit there but it was a great week. Hopefully they'll continue to get this way. The Stake President said he wants to split the stake for the first time since its creation in 1954. I joke that it will be because we baptize an entire spanish stake down here.

Thanks Mom, Eric, Will, Doug, Cami, Jamie, Arlington 2nd ward primary!, Aunt Andra (penne and chocolate milk, they don't sell penne down here), Sister Hines, and Katie! Thank you for the great letters this week! It's fun to hear what's going on in all your lives!

How do copy machines work?

Can someone send me the wikipedia article on Jehovah's Witnesses? We find their literature all over the place and read it. Interesting stuff, I guess. They all hate us.

How specifically were the first 12 apostles martyred?

Love you all, thanks for the support!

Elder Johnson