New Companion

A cool mini dragon lizard thing.

A Family that invited us to a family night.

This week was crazy. Last Sunday night was fun because President invited me, my companion, and the assistants to participate in the farwell dinner for an Elder who is going home a week early. I got to help Hermana Jordan get the food ready and it reminded me a little of helping mom get Sunday dinner ready back home. It was really tasty and for dessert we ate brownies with ice cream.

On Monday we had our last district meeting for the change. Our district leader, Elder Woodbury, is going home this Monday so I am going to miss him. It feels wierd that he is going home because I met him almost a whole year ago and I remember thinking that I wanted to be just like him and now he is going home. 

On Tuesday there was a training meeting for trainers and their new missionaries. After meetings like that, my companion and I go to the bus station to buy their return tickets, but for one companionship there were no returning buses the rest of that day so they got to stay with us and go with us to our appointments. It was kinda cool to be in a group of four missionaries, it was like we had 200% more spiritual power than normal.

On Wednesday we found out that President finally picked the new financial secretary. President doesnt want people to serve in the offices for more than 3 changes because people have a tendancy to burn out a little bit due to having the work load for so long. Elder Griggs, my companion and the current financial secretary, is going to finish 3 changes after this change so President has been looking for a replacement for like 2 weeks now and he finally picked one. His name is Elder Calero and he is from Nicaragua. He has about 8 months on the mission and he seems like a pretty cool guy. He has been with us in a trio ever since wednesday so that Elder Griggs can teach him everything that he needs to do. Also on Wednesday we visitied hno martín again (the atheist) and it turned out that he had read the entire Book of Mormon in a week! We were pretty suprised, and he had a fairly good recollection of what occurs in the book. Unfortunately it didnt really help him because he just wrote a list of over a hundred doubts and "contradictions" and stuff and didnt pray about it. He is a really interesting guy. Also on wednesday we a had a little miracle. All of our plans fell through later in the day and so were going around trying to find something to do when we ended up outside the house of a member. We have started doing role plays with the members where they take on the role of a close friend and we teach them. We asked her to think of a good friend that she could be and then we started teaching her. As we were finishing up, her friend out of nowhere walked over to where we were and the sister we were with invited her to listen to us. She accepted and we had a really good discussion on the importance of service. Now we have a return appointment wiht her and she seems kinda excited. The wonderful part is that she already has a friend that is an active member which will really help her in the process of learning to make and keep covenants with the Lord. We havent found hardly any new investigators this change so we had a little fast to be able to find the people the Lord is preparing and we found her so we are counting it as a miracle.

Friday was the Concilio (council) where all the zone leaders meet and discuss stuff and President trains them. Concilios are a pretty big deal and we are invited as secretaries but we had way to many things to get done on Friday so we ended up not going. Instead I had to fix a mess that the President to the Secretary a year ago made for me. Whoever he was, he made some bad errors on renewing visas which makes more work for me because I have to go through certain processes with these Elders to be able to get them out of the country. Everything went well on Friday though so he will be able to leave on Monday but Im sure there were some little miracles going on to make that happen. Its a good thing im friends with the people at the immigration office (the place I go when I need to apply for or renew visas for Elders)

And now today is saturday and unfortunately I am feeling quite sick with a cold. I seem to get sick at least once every change and I am a little tired of it. I guess thats just what happens when you interact with as many people as we interact with everyday and shaking all those hands. After the mission I dont want to ever have to shake another hand but I dont think that will be possible.

Thats awesome that Colin passed his driving test! I was still scared to drive for a while after I got my liscense, especially on the freeway, but I got used to it really fast. I bet he is pretty happy to beable to move around on his own now and have that freedom. He will have to teach me how to drive again when I get back, its been like a year and a half since I left for college and basically stopped driving so I probably dont remember too well haha. That is so awesome that Andy is home!!! wow. What are his plans? do you know what college he is going to or anything like that? ask him for me because I would really like to know what his plans are. Tell him that he should go to BYU Provo. That is also super awesome that Joav is heading out soon. What mission is he headed to again and when does he leave? 

I heard about that tragic school shooting that occurred a while ago. Alot of taxi drivers mention it to us. It wrentches my heart that it occured and I imagine it must be having quite a ripple effect on the topic of gun control. People ask us questions about why God permits such terrible things to happen such as that. I dont always know what to tell them, but I try and help them to understand that everything unfair or injust that happens to us in this life is made right through the atonement of Jesus Christ and that we need to have faith that all injustice done to us, even if it be death, will be made up for and corrected.

I hope y'all doing well and reading your scriptures. You should all read Mosiah 7 in the Book of Mormon. Its a wonderful chapter that talks about Christ and his infinite and personal atonement that he made for us and to what end it was done. I especially love verses 11,12 and 13 because it illustrates just how much Christ loves each of us personally, that he would suffer all of our personal pains, afflicitons, and sicknesses to better know how to "succor his people." Succor means to give help or assitance. I am remembering this as I am sick right now, and I am remembering it as I hear about the tragic events that befall everyone everywhere. I know that Christ is our savior and that he loves each and every one of us and is ready and willing to help us overcome our obstacles and have patience in our afflictions. I am happy to be here to help people to come to find out the truthfullness of this for themselves. I hope each of you are seeking for opportunites to share this knowledge with others so that you may too feel the joy that comes from seeing someone change their life for the better.

Thanks again for sending me the blog posts, I really enjoyed the pictures and reading about how Kember has been doing. Have a great week everyone!

con amor,

Elder Johns