Week 85

We all have time!

We had a surprise this week :)

On Tuesday we were informed that our apartment was turning into a 4 Elder apartment! SO now there will be 4 elders in Abeno! Exciting!

Last week we got to watch some General Conference, I will have to start watching that in Personal Study as we are always so busy with lessons haha. 

We saw a lot of miracles and such in the past week. And some low points for sure. 

So Tsukui Shimai. We sadly had to drop her. Through writing we discovered that she was just planning on keeping not just our church, but more Christianity in general as second priority and then we asked her what her first priority is and it is Soka Gakkai. Soka Gakkai is a Buddhist Sect and yes of course we want her to experience the joy and change from Christ and make covenants with Him, but she didn't want to stop Soka Gakkai, so we respected that and said she couldn't accept baptism then. It was pretty sad. She is super lonely and in a way wanted baptism to appeal to a friend. So not even a good reason to be baptized. But it was sad to realize how lonely she was. But she asked if she could keep coming to church and we said she could! She is always welcomed for sure.

That SAME night we set another friend on date for baptism which was a great miracle! He hasn't come to church yet, but wants to change and come unto Christ, so we'll be teaching him more regularly from now on. 

On Sunday, a new friend came to church which was great! She is really interested and wants to learn more about our church. 

Another friend that is scheduled to be baptized on the 23rd of this month is trying to overcome beer, so if you all could pray for her. Her name is Ueda. (Think U-EH-DA)

Elder Marks and I had a very good talk on Easter Sunday, really brought our companionship together! I'm super grateful for him.

I want to bear a short testimony about Christ. 

I believe in Christ. I have felt His love and His strength. I know that strength is real. I know He suffered for my pains and afflictions. 

He loves us so much to let us experience hard things. I am so grateful for that level of love from him. 

I love Him too. He lives!

I'm so excited for this brand new week!

My brother Cal got his mission call!  I was able to join in for a few minutes while he read it.  He's going to the Philippines Tacloban Mission and will be speaking Cebuano.  He reports to the Manila, Philippines MTC July 19th!  I'll miss him by just a few days!