20 May 2013

Dear Family and Friends,

"What are you doing to have so much success?"

Those are my favorite words to hear in a phone call. On Sunday night we got a phone call congratulating us on keeping the zone afloat this week.

I think 'success week' doesn't really do it all justice. We unfortunately had someone fall of date, no baptisms, no one progressing, but in all other aspects we've had a miracle week. 

It started last Wednesday. Monday and Tuesday were decent days teaching a moderate amount of lessons, but Wednesday was when it all fell into place. We had planned to go visit some formers in the morning and then some other formers later in the morning with a member family. We had no luck on our own from 10-11am that morning and went back to meet up with the member family. With them we visited a former investigator family who all had a baptismal date that then disappeared..  Well, they're still missing. When we were piling back into the car to head home I felt that we had to go knock on a different door - one that we hadn't knocked on who we knew was a former investigator. We drove over to the trailer, knocked, and she answered in tears. One of her sons is in jail and they have been struggling for a long time. She was taught two years ago by two different elders and wasn't ready at the time. She said that she always saw other missionaries walking past her trailer but never to it. We sat down with her and talked about trials and overcoming them and committed her to a baptismal date then and there! It was cool to be guided to someone who was finally ready to accept the gospel. Unfortunately she's the one who fell off date, but that's a different story. We were pushing for a 2 week baptism but will probably change that and head towards the 15th of June instead of the 1st. We are meeting with her and her husband tonight to talk with them about the church and our role as missionaries. They have a lot of potential.

Another great potential came from an idea from district meeting. The training was on making lists of contacts with people - not necessarily people that are interested, but just a list of EVERYONE they know. After that we pray over the names and sit in silence as the person marks each name they feel prompted to mark. Then they call them and invite them to sit down with us to meet. Well, we implemented that this week to resounding success. We got 5 referrals from one family and 10 from another (still waiting for their addresses.) The first person called her friend and set up a lesson right then and there. We stopped by on Saturday to teach her friend and had a nice chat and invited her to church. Well, she showed up to church with her family of five in tow as well! Woooooo! It was cool to see them participate and take the sacrament as a family. We have another appointment with them tonight and we are going to extend all a baptismal date for probably June 15th as well.

Our Bishop pulled us aside and thanked us yesterday - this was the first time they had had investigators in church for "months." The members did an awesome job introducing themselves and talking with the investigator family. We did a lot of background coordinating as well to let people know they would come but even those we didn't talk to reached out. Success.

We have been working with someone who had a baptismal date for the 11th of May but cancelled just before. I wrote briefly about her last week. We met with her once this week with another member family and had an awesome lesson about setting examples. The parents testified about how they sometimes had to encourage (or pull) their kids to church when they were younger but how it always paid off. They had a daughter there who shared her testimony about her grateful she was for her parents doing that to her. It was pretty tender. Anyway, we knelt in prayer afterwards and told her to tell her kids why church is important to her to see if they'll go with her to church.

They didn't go :( We'll keep working with them though.

It's hot! Ahhhh. Air temperature is bad but hot air, that just kills you. We got cut 50 miles for some reason and we're biking over 10 miles a day. Speaking of, my "cyclometer" speed rating often jumps from like 2 to 14 when I'm maintaining a constant pace and then it will just go to zero after some time. Anyone know why? Readjusting it temporarily fixes it but then it gets out of place again. Very frustrating.

We went to the reservation this week to do some baptismal interview. I'm pretty sure that was the first time I've been on a complete reservation before. It was a bit...different. The chapel was...different too haha. Dirt roads, everything was dead, it was a different world. We spoke with the senior couple who covers the reservation and they told us about some of their challenges, specifically about how there is no word for "commitment" in Pima and no one is willing to firmly commit.

On Monday we had a pretty cool experience. We had a referral for a trailer that ended up not existing. As we went to the car a member pulled up and gave us a super solid referral that we will be visiting sometime this week. A family that moved from CA and wants to go to our church. In the right place at the right time! What's that saying? Be where you ought to be when you ought to be there doing what you ought to be doing.

I think one of the highlights this week was biking around town and OYMing this family. After the lesson all five of them accepted a baptismal date but all five of them are for the English missionaries. 

We got news yesterday that we're moving out of our apartment next week instead of in 3 weeks. Ugh, there's so much to do before then... Good news is that we'll be in a two bedroom, bad news is that means that there will be four missionaries which is often too much fun.

We found a pet ferret this week? One of the neighbors is watching over it until someone claims it.

We were in a trailer park talking with some people and some kids challenged us to a game of knockout. I told them that if we won they would have to listen to us for a few minutes. I won. Now we have a bunch of potential families to visit! 

One of the priests in the ward offered to make us wood pens this week and laser inscribe them with whatever we want. I asked him to make, "Elder Johnson - Arizona Tempe Mission" and then on the other side, "Barrio Ray 5 - Chandler, AZ" He'll be using cherry wood and they look sweet!

Thanks for the letters Natalia, Jamie, Jeff R, Mom, Dad, and Grandma and Grandpa J!

Its been a good week and we have a good one to come! 

PS: If you find the turtle let them know!

With love,

Elder Johnson

13 May 2013

Dear Family and Friends,

 

It was fun to Skype home yesterday! Especially being able to talk to you guys back home and having Mark skyped on a laptop at the same time...never done that before!

So I guess the big news is that .01% of the time I'm wrong and am not staying in Queen Creek. I was 99.99% sure I was staying haha. 

Chandler is a lot different than anywhere I have ever served. Yuma and Queen Creek had more farm fields than people it seemed. Our address is 1287 N Alma School Rd #174, Chandler, AZ, 85224

On Sunday night we were awaiting our transfer calls and as I wrote last week, they never came. Monday afternoon before the calls Elder Lanier and Sawyer called to say goodbye and told me I would enjoy this next few transfers, whatever that meant. That night as we were waiting around the house waiting for transfer calls President Howes called and asked me to be trainer among some other assignments. I was pretty nervous. Later that night the Zone Leaders called and said I was leaving (President Howes doesn't tell us if we're staying or leaving) which meant that I would whitewash train - just like how I started my mission down in Yuma. Whew I was pretty stressed out for that!

At transfer meeting we found out that five visa waiter Elders came in. Elder Myler was there as well as some other people I've gotten to know. "the Argentine" was slated to come in for 3 or 4 transfers but never came in due to visa problems. Everyone was fighting to get to train him since he is a native speaker haha. Anyway, long story short, I am training Elder Diaz, "the Argentine," and am having a great time. He is super energetic and very prepared to be a missionary. Already I've learned lots from him. I also realized that Elder Diaz is the first 18 year old spanish missionary here! Also the first one to come in for 3-4 transfers.

The rest of the transfer meeting was crazy. President Howes chose this past meeting to make all the changes for the mission split. All the missionaries in the valley/phoenix area were invited and told to bring all area books. They then changed just about everyone's wards, moved apartments, split zones and moved districts. Cars were swapped and taken away for some and weird changes were made to boundaries. They've moved districts from one zone to another zone now. I can't imagine prepping a mission for a split haha. I guess that's an accomplishment though, eh?

When we first got to our apartment, I walked in the door but was very very confused when I saw a TV that was on and a computer. I looked around a bit then realized I had walked into someone else's apartment! I quickly ran out of the apartment and opened the door next door (?) and walked into ours. Unlike in Yuma, it was clean and everything was put away. Lots of food too!

So far we have been speaking tons of Spanish. I talk to him purely in spanish and he talks to me in English. I help him with his English and he helps me with my Spanish, kind of like with Elder Valdez but I'm trying not to be as lazy and am speaking more Spanish this time. I've already seen tons of improvement in just six days!

We cover the Spanish ward here. It was probably the most energetic ward I've ever been in! The Bishop is from Bar(th)elona Spain and has the very unique accent. He is an awesome guy and very very energetic with a young family. The ward had us stand up in sacrament meeting to introduce us, in Sunday school, and gospel principles. Never had that happen before! There hasn't been a baptism in the ward since September (when Elder Myler was here) but we're going to change that. Having a native speaker in a Spanish ward makes a HUGE difference. Not to mention there are seven 'Diaz' families in the Spanish ward haha

I was flipping through the Ensign and saw a picture of someone familiar ..Jim Kabbani!? Ensign from Oct 2008. Cool story!

Finding our way around Chandler has been an adventure. Someone in a ward that we don't cover offered to give us a ride around Chandler to show us all the streets and whatnot so we did that our first night. We drove over 30 miles and it was super super helpful. The roads are relatively easy to understand.

We found out that we're getting moved into a bigger apartment next month. It seems like every time I unpack I get told I'm moving.

We've been biking a lot. In Yuma I had 1,000 miles per month, in Queen Creek I had 1,100 per month and here we get 650. The area is a lot smaller but the Elders before used a lot of miles at the start so we bike 15 or so miles every day. It's hot, too...

The chapel for our ward is nine miles away which doesn't help too much. 18 mile round trip before lunch time on Sundays.

Elders quorum on Sunday was pretty funny. The lesson was all about being a good husband - we sat there awkwardly. It felt like a marriage prep class. 

We have one investigator in our area that was on date before that fell off. She was supposed to get baptized on the 11th but called the Elders and told her that she didn't want to on the 5th. We went by and visited her and found out that the problem is that she works a lot and rarely gets to see her kids. Her kids don't want to go to church and she won't go unless they go. So we're working with the Young Women's leaders to get the daughter interested and involved. The woman is very prepared and has a strong testimony but won't commit without the daughter. Usually the kids aren't the set back. 

Our district goes down to the Native American reservation. I'll be doing like 6 baptismal interviews down there on Wednesday and Thursday haha. In our district is a senior couple of who cover the reservation. They're on fire! Really nice senior couple, lots of energy, and a good sense of humor. Our district has no other Elders, just two Spanish sisters, the senior couple, and us. 

The Spanish work in Chandler is "legendary." I've heard about this ward and area my whole mission. We see more Hispanics in one day than I did in 3 months in Queen Creek. We have been busy talking with people and orienting ourselves. Chandler is full of apartment complexes (not vertical ones) and trailer parks. Perfect! 

Driving down the main street is a pretty nice experience, visually, but as soon as you turn off of it things change pretty rapidly. Imagine my surprise when I saw this Ferrari!

I had almost the worst OYM of my mission but luckily saved myself. We went up to talk to someone on the street and asked her algunas questions. She responded that she wasn't interested. I offered to give her a card and she said, "I wouldn't be able to read it anyway!" I assumed she was blind and started to say, "Well if you see us and need anything..." but stopped myself at, "if you s-" Whew. To my defense, her guide dog didn't have one of the typical leashes and she didn't have a cane and was out with her kids. Disaster avoided! 

Anyway, we're in a good place doing good work in a good ward. Life is good.

Thanks for the letters: Andra and Grandpa and Grandma J!

Con mucho amor,

EJ