12 May 2014

THERE IS NOTHING MORE DISGUSTING IN THE ENTIRE WORLD THAN BED BUGS.

Good thing they haven't found my bed yet. Poor Elder Myler is getting eaten alive. We tore the house apart this morning and somehow did not find them. Three apartments in the Phoenix South zone are infested now.

...South Phoenix is under attack! 

This was a week of success on Facebook. I committed two people to get baptized in Africa, sent three referrals to local missions, two were contacted, two have a Book of Mormon, two are reading it, and one is meeting with missionaries later in the week.

The people of Africa are prepared.

This past week I was able to go on an exchange with Elder Nelson  He, totally by chance, was traveling through the Arlington 2 ward when I gave my farewell talk. He entered the field six weeks after me and is a wonderful missionary. We had a lot of fun and saw a lot of success in those few 24 hours. He will be living in the same apartment building as Elder Myler and I and we hope the three of us are in the same ward! 

This week was also a week of continued miracles in the South Phoenix zone. Things are exploding. We've seen our average lessons double for two weeks straight now. This week was particularly exciting as the success was spread very evenly across the entire zone. Every Sunday night we meet at 8:30 to report stats and send them to SLC (via wifi sync) and it was so exciting to watch companionship walk through the door at random intervals and shout for joy as they reached a goal they set and run around and give everyone high fives. There is a special family feeling in this zone right now that is drawing everyone together. It's amazing how happiness is the best medicine for anything. 

With that success so evenly spread, we often wonder what makes it so hard to put people on date in our own area. We've never done more than we are now but the people just aren't saying yes to the invitations. We extend invitations literally in every single lesson. But joy is abundant in the face of opposition because this is the Lord's work and we know who wins at the end of the day.

Montana del Sur is a ward that never ceases to amaze me. The Bishop has been a member for 16 years, three of which in the Mission Presidency and three of which as a Bishop. He is a saint of a man and a living example of love, consecration, and service. Nothing makes us happier than when we get a call during the week from Bishop saying, "Elders...I've been thinking and praying about _____ (investigator.) How is he/she? How can I help?"

This ward has the missionary spirit because the Bishop has the missionary spirit. It's amazing!

The temperature has been uncharacteristically nice in Phoenix this past week.

One of the things that never gets old about missionary work is talking to the most interesting people. This past week we visited a home that was listed on the membership list. As we got closer three men approached us, obviously drunk, and when we asked if a woman lived there they said, slurred voice and all, "SHE'S DEAD..." Ok..."Wait, she lives down there, by that red truck!" 

We thanked them and walked away.

There was no red truck on the entire street. There was a red bush.

Alcohol...

DID I MENTIONED THAT WE HAVE BED BUGS?!?!?

On Friday afternoon during my spanish study I finished my reading of the Book of Mormon in Spanish. It took me 10 months to read the first 100 pages and two months to read the last 500 haha. I guess I wasn't really trying for those first 100. 

That book is true! Before I read it I would pray. After I read it I would pray. And every time I read it I knew that it was true. Read it. It will change your life! Reading it has brought me closer to God and has helped me make even the smallest of decisions. I set a goal to finish it in a certain amount of time and I made it. It was an enlightening experience. I'm currently reading through the New Testament and set a goal of four weeks to read the entire thing. The scriptures are the best.

Spanish wards are exciting in ways that English wards can never be. For the Mothers day party on Saturday the ward had a dinner that was prepared entirely by the men. Guess what we ate? Spaghetti with meat sauce and salad haha. Then there was a night of talents. The Elders Quorum did the best mariachi that I have ever seen. Except none of them sang or played an instrument. They made instruments out of cardboard and danced to Mariachi music and pretended to sing and play it. It was absolutely the funniest thing that I have ever seen before. They did a great job and it made everyone laugh. 

Next week I'll have the pictures.

There's just a different air in Spanish wards. In the face of so many trials there is so much joy! True joy comes from faith.

Happy Mothers day Mom! It was fun to Skype home yesterday and talk to you. Did my letter get to you this week? Thank you for everything you have done for me! You'll find more in that letter :)

I have had the best timing to go on a mission ever. In the past two years: missionary age has changed, my mission has been split, I've experienced two mission presidents (each for a year), online proselyting has rolled out, we have received iPads, AreaBooks have gone electronic, a temple open house has happened. Can you imagine more exciting things happening!?!? 

Yesterday at church I saw something very unique. I saw a family of 5 Muslims walk through the door and sit down! I went over and introduced myself and quickly learned that they came with their friend, a retired Air Force officer. He had served for years in Iraq and this man was his translator. I don't know how much detail I should go into for safety reasons but it was an amazing experience to meet this humble, humble family. I tried to shake his wife's hand and was politely denied: Muslim women do not shake hands of foreigners. They were very scared that they would offend me with that. They are an angelic family.

The man that brought them was sent by the First Presidency to be the first mission president in Afghanistan. He organized the church there, was the first branch/mission president,, baptized the first convert in Afghanistan. During his service he had zero proselyting missionaries with which to work. And do you know what is cool? I'M TEACHING PEOPLE IN AFGHANISTAN OVER FACEBOOK! 

Good things are happening. Next week is transfers. If you would like to send a letter (which you should) and cannot do so by Thursday, you will have better luck sending it to the Mission Office. I hope and pray that Elder Myler and I stay together. This is our last transfer. If this was ever likely to happen, the timing is perfect for it now. I'm going to remind the Office that we have bed bugs and we wouldn't want to spread them around the mission with a transfer :)

Have a fantastic week!

Love,

EJ

10 March 2014

There have been three points on my mission where time has hit me. When I hit 6 months, when I hit 18 months, and this past week when I realized I had less than 4 months left. a;lksjd;slkdjfalskdjfa;lsdjh;fashdaslkndal,kjsdf;liasjdflknasdf;lajs;dpfjasdlngkdfpgjsd'flgkmsdflgjsdpf'gjsrsdflgjsdfljgksgf

 

That's the sound that I made when Elder Myler and I realized that. We've made a lot of jokes about it like, "the hotter it gets..." etc etc. Good thing neither of us are slowing down at all.

 

South Phoenix is insane hahaha. I love it here. Everything about it is awesome. Story time!

 

This past week we drove into a gated community on the golf course (the gate probably cost more than most houses here). We drove around, found a white Mormon family that is in the spanish ward, asked if they knew Spanish people in there, drove to the house they gave us, and on the way I noticed something...A 2012 Maserati Grand Sport! So naturally I pulled the car over and we went and knocked on the door. It was the race spec - big fat tires, double exhaust. Beautiful car. After some moving around inside and some whispering, someone finally opened the door. It was a man from Venezuela with very broken English. I asked if he would turn the car on for me and rev it. Nope. I asked if he would trade it for our Corolla. Nope. Finally we gave up and started talking about faith. He wasn't interested and reached out to shake our hands and say goodbye. He had a massive gold watch on. Four of his five fingers were cut off halfway and so he only had stubs.

 

DRUG HOUSE!

 

I've also been picking up lots of Mexican slang words. They're the best. I used one with a member this last week and he started laughing so hard that he was crying. He was driving at the time and I felt a mixture of awkwardness and danger haha. Turns out the word that i used meant something TOTALLY DIFFERENT than what the person in Yuma had told me. It was a really really bad word haha. Oh well, you learn new things everyday!

 

Last week I wrote about the South Phoenix zombies. Well this week I need to correct that and add a new category to it. South Phoenix Witches! Elder Myler and I were sitting at an intersection, minding our own business, when Elder Myler leans forward and says, "look at those nails!" I thought he was talking about construction nails.

 

Nope. In the car to our left was a woman with 7" fingernails on one hand! And they were BLUE! Naturally I let out a shreiking cry and we drove away quickly but not before I could take a picture of it. For all of your sakes, I won't attach it, but it is disgusting hahahah.

 

And then returning to the previous topic: ZOMBIES! WE SAW A REAL ZOMBIE THIS PAST WEEK.

 

But first, some background. Elder Myler and I were finishing a split that we had done. I went with one member, he went with another. On our way back to the church we got a phone call from him and he told us that a truck had just driven into the house across the street from the church and it had resulted in a complete demolition of the house and an explosion! There was lots of smoke. He told us to meet at one of the other companionships houses so we took a different route and met there. It was 9:40pm - very late due to the traffic. As we get into our car and turn away, I noticed how dark it was. No street lights! That's ok though, we were in a car. As we turned the corner onto a dark street, the headlights of the car brightened a silhouette. A ZOMBIE! It was a man walking all by himself EXACTLY LIKE ZOMBIES IN MOVIES WALK! He was on the sidewalk, arms out to his sides at shoulder level, and stumbling forwards with his legs matching the height of his hips! I SCREAMED SO LOUD. I'm sure he heard me. Elder Myler stopped the car and I screamed "GOOOOOOOOOOO!" So we shot down the road! When we reached the end we looked out the back window and he was still walking like that, 100 yards behind us! We were laughing so hard all the way back to the house. It is the most ridiculous thing i have ever seen in my life

 

There are zombies here.

 

Speaking of fun stories, Elder Myler almost died this week. We are teaching a man who has two ferocious German shepherds. One bit a missionary three weeks ago right before I arrived. The house is enclosed with a fence. To knock the door you need to walk past the fence. Being a great companion, I let Elder Myler walk past the fence to knock the door. He did so very, very cautiously. Before he got to the door he looked around the corner of the house to see if the dog was there. He saw one chained up and thought he was clear. So he turned around. In a quick flash of fur, the OTHER German shepherd was all of the sudden at his side! Elder Myler panicked and RAN but for some reason not for the gate! The Shepherd went into pursuit mode, jumped, and bit his bag. Continuing to maintain my reputation as most-supportive-companion-ever, I closed the gate and locked Elder Myler in with the dog!

 

Pause. To justify myself, it was either he die or we both die. Survival instinct! Totally justified.

 

Continuing...anyway, so the dog is flying through the air biting his bag and a split second later the owners run out the door and scream at the dog and it runs away.

 

Elder Myler survived with no damage, except that done to his pride. We laughed awkwardly for the next few minutes as the owners got things under control. Good times.

 

This week we had a great week! We jumped from the 12 member present lessons that we taught last week to 23 lessons with members present! The mission is still really struggling with knowing how to use Facebook effectively. This last week we talked about how to teach and find people and Elder Myler did a great job! President Toone is trying to find a way to get me to go around the mission and train people but I don't know how that would work. We taught 15 lessons in our area and 8 lessons with members present on Facebook. That was a great week.

 

One such lesson was to a woman that lives in our area. She and her family went to MX for a few days so we taught them over FB! We used the relief society president as the member present and she did PERFECTLY! And now she's taking that excitement to the ward :) I try to give as many different people as possible chances to teach on FB with me so they can catch how exciting it is. I think I've used over 20 different members now.

 

While teaching that lesson on Facebook, Elder Myler got a crazy message. One of his family members had walked allthe way from Idaho to Phoenix (with a guitar) on a spirit walk. We read the message and had a good laugh about it.

 

It's March. What happens in March? March Madness! So, to spike some competition here in the zone we created a triple elimination March Madness bracket! It was inspired! Every week there are "three games." Each game, each companionship will "play against" another companionship (8 competitions per game) to compete in something. Monday-Wednesday the "game" is a combination of member present lessons+referrals contacted. Thursday-Friday is a "game" about new investigators found. Saturday+Sunday is a game about total at church, on date, and progressing. Those are some of the key indicators that we use to measure ourselves. After each "game" we will update the roster (which we printed 2 feet x 1.5 feet) and text out who each companionship will be competing against the next day. Each companionship created a team name. It's awesome. Everyone is super excited about it!

 

This past week I met a man named, "the Prophet Israel!" He sat us down and we had a non-contentious conversation about his beliefs and ours. He knows his bible better than anyone I've ever met. Let me rephrase that, he knows references better than anyone I'd ever met. As he talked to us I took notes of what he said. It was hilarious. These are directly from his mouth:

-"Moses and Jesus prophesied of ME!"

-"There is no such thing as a white Jew! The Jews were all black and it's only us blacks who will be in heaven!"

-"Leprosy just means their skin is white! All white people have leprosy!"

-"Black means clean, white means dirty! You all have a devil!"

-"Isaiah 53 is hogwash and was written by the feminist Pauline!"

-"King James (of King James Bible) lived before Jesus Christ!"

-"Satan is a bad booger."

-"Don't defend yourself because you have nothing to defend yourself with!"

-"Obama and I were buddies back in university!"

-"Russel Smith wrote the Book of Mormon!"

-"The whole new testament was written by a woman! Pauline!"

-"The first man [Adam] was made out of the blackest soil in the universe!"
-(paraphrasing) 'when Jesus cast legion (which apparently was originally LIGION) out of the swine they ran into the water! Every time you get baptized you get a demon! And getting baptized makes you RE-ligioned!"

 

It was one of the funniest and most entertaining lessons of my mission and despite him going off on us about being white and having leprosy, there were absolutely no hard feelings and we all left loving each other!

 

Weird!

 

We had a man show up to church yesterday who has been anti-ing our members. He sat quietly through sacrament meeting and then when we invited him to stay afterwards he said, "I have to go - I am teaching a class on Hebrew and Greek in my church." Hahahahahhaha. He has a PhD but that was the funniest reason I've heard in a long time for not going to church haha.

 

As of today, all 30 test missions have iPads! That's over $2,000,000 of iPads! Exciting times!

 

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the letter this week! You won the competition of fastest to write me! And thank you family for yours as well :)

 

All is well here, I hope all is well there as well!

Have a great week!

Love,

eJ

3 March 2014

New address! Who will be the first one to write me?!? 7611 S 36th St #214, Phoenix AZ 85042

There must be a God because I'm back with Elder Myler!! We are so excited to be together again and we've had so much fun already! And we're in South Phoenix, baby! The crack capitol of the USA a few years ago and home to what we lovingly call the Phoenix Zombies! 

We had done the "math" right before transfer meeting and figured out that we would probably be together. So we went to work and started planning what we would do when President Toone read our names and that we'd be companions. 

The normal procedure goes like this, "And in Phoenix South 11, Elders ____ and _____" The missionaries then get up and go hug, sometimes with lots of excitement, sometimes with less haha. 

We wanted to leave a mark. So we played baseball. How?

When President Toone said, "Elder Myler and Elder Johnson," neither of us stood up. Instead, Elder Diaz stood and pitched an imaginary ball at an Elder who swung an imaginary bat. Someone else yelled, "FLY BALL!" 

That was our queue. We were sitting on opposite ends of the room and stood up when we heard that. We stared at the ceiling looking at the imaginary ball and ran to the back of the room with our hands in imaginary mits and then ran into each other. After recovering from the "shock" we "noticed" that we were companions, got excited, and ran back to our seat.

It was the most memorable one of the day. 

Elder Myler is the THIRD companion that I have had twice haha. I've never heard of that happening before more than once! 

We talked a lot about the area. Elder Myler believes it has been under-performing and in the four days that we were together in the past week we already set an area record. The future is exciting! We are both on the same page for everything and it's AWESOME!

South Phoenix is completely different than Mesa. Whereas Mesa was poor, South Phoenix is destitute. It has everything that comes with a poverty-stricken city: drugs, violence, gangs, and intense minority groups. Things are rough down here but I LOVE it. My second day gave me the taste for what South Phoenix would be like:

The ward that we serve in, just a Spanish ward, is amazing. It is very organized (DREAMS DO COME TRUE), the members share the gospel on their own, the Bishop is excited, the ward mission leader is amazing, and great things are happening already! The members have very...unique...pasts but that's ok, all that matters is the future! They're converted and are converting many! Retention is at 80% for the first year - probably the highest that I've seen in any ward. 

There are 18 missionaries in the zone including us, a fraction of the 30 that we had in Mesa. I was sad to see Mesa go but I was excited to be able to serve in a zone so small. There is a family atmosphere here. 14 of the missionaries here are Spanish speaking.

We have a 2014 Toyota Corolla. We picked it up with 30 miles on it. It has a backup camera?! Hahahaha. And no tiwi :D

Within my first two days here I had an experience that has changed my life and has changed my mission. We were at the church waiting for our member to show up to take us to some lessons and the Sister Training Leaders (STLs) called us with an emergency. They were alone at a different church building at 7"30pm when a man ran up to the locked door and started pounding on it while screaming, "I NEED TO GET SAVED, LET ME IN!" 

After a few minutes, he fell onto his knees in tears and the sisters talked to him through the door. They called us and we floored it over. 

When we got there they were talking to him outside. He was a meth addict and has been haunted and tortured by "the devil and evil spirits." He was 20 years old and clearly had been through hell in his life. He had piercings. We took him inside the church and into the chapel, sat him down, and told him his life wasn't going anywhere. He told us some of his recent experiences, which were shocking, and told us that he was willing to give anything up to have peace. He was desperate, depressed, lost, and confused. 

We gave him a priesthood blessing and he immediately calmed down. It was night and day. His voice level softened, his countenance changed, and he recognized that he was a child of God.

That was humbling in and of itself.

He told us that he had been clean for 11 days. He was so proud of that. And you know what? I was proud of him for that. 11 days is not very long but that was all the hope that he had. In his eyes, he was winning! And in mine he was too.

As Elder Myler and I got in the car to drive back, we reflected quietly on that experience. This kid was my exact age but our lives were going in completely different directions. 

I could have been (name changed) "James." I could have been a meth addict, running around alone at night being haunted by personal demons. I could have had his life.

But thanks to everyone that preceded me, I am not. I am serving a mission for James. He is my purpose. I am out here going through what we do everyday for James' everywhere. I am serving a mission so that James' children don't have to experience what he did. I am serving a mission so that James can trust himself, can believe in himself, and can believe that his future is as bright as he wants it to be. I am serving a mission to say thank you to my ancestors for helping me be who I am today. This isn't for me; it is for all of them. But what it has done for me is inspiring.

I would do anything for any 'James,' because I've seen James' change. And it's the best thing ever.

That experience was so intensely profound that it has changed the way I approach everything. I wake up at 6:30, exhausted beyond belief, for James. I work hard all day everyday for James.

And it is all worth it. Every. Single. Second. 

James has changed my life. There are few other single moments in my entire life that have impacted me as much as 'James' did in that moment.

Yesterday was the Gilbert Temple dedication. It was a special experience. It was a little strange hearing such loud sounds inside the celestial room, but whatever! President Monson strangely didn't look very happy. 

I found my apostate great great great (etc) grandpa in the Doctrine in Covenants! D&C 132:124! Alpheus Cutler!

We had a cool experience this last week in a meeting with the DLs and STLs of the zone. We met together to discuss the needs and make a training plan for the month. It was exciting to see everything come together as we refined ideas and made plans. That's the coolest thing to experience.

This past week was Mission Leadership Council (MLC). I love MLC. I learn so much at MLC every single time.

However this time President Toone thew a curve ball. President Eyring, when he gave President Toone his final interview, commissioned him to teach the missionaries of the Arizona Tempe Mission how councils in the Lord's Church work. So that is what we have been doing.

But at MLC we counciled in a different way. We did a mock High Council disciplinary meeting. It was intense, terrifying, and inspiring. I've never felt the way I did when being involved in that practice. It was agonizingly sad and unbelievably peaceful at the same time. Weird combination. I won't go into the specifics for what we "role played" but I had never felt what I did before. 

At MLC, President Toone also spoke to the missionaries that replaced Elder Diaz and I in Mesa in front of the whole group of 40 of us. He said that we were all there to support them as they replaced Elder Johnson and Elder Diaz in Mesa, "a zone that was run marvelously and magnificently." That was a nice moment. 

On Saturday night, contrary to previous instruction, President Toone invited all the missionaries to watch the Gilbert Temple Cultural Celebration video. It was hilarious. I haven't laughed so hard in a long time and I *think* that the humor was planned. It was also very well done and ran smoothly, despite the massive rainstorm. That was the first time it had rained in months. I honestly can count on one hand how many times it has rained in the last six months. 

Thanks for the letters Susie and Family! 

Miracles are going to happen here! I'm so excited to be here in South Phoenix and even more excited to be here with Elder Myler! #ComoSeDiceANDALEPUES

Thank you all for your continued support! Be sure to like and share my posts on Facebook so that more people can see them! 

Con mucho amor,

Elder Johnson