March 13, 2017: I was born in a hospital!

Hello everyone this week was by far the busiest week of my mission!!

But to explain the title, please think with me and remember how people don't have interest, but they don't want to be mean to you and say no and then they make up some ridiculous excuse.  Well this happened last night.  We were housing and we meet another Buddhist guy and his excuse was that he was born at a jinja and therefore he is Buddhist (pretty strange excuse right), then from behind me Elder Price says "I was born in a hospital".  I bust up laughing on this guys door step and this guy start to laugh at me and all we were able to do was give him a flyer.

You may find this funny but it was kinda you had to be there type of thing...  still way funny!

Well this week we went to the neighboring city, Koriyama 3 times on consecutive days and on Wednesday we went to Sendai for MLC.  So needless to say we were in our own area for about 1 1/2 days this week.

Saturday and Sunday we had district conference where a total of 105 people from 3 branches were there!  Now that is a big turn out!  I was really excited/surprised to see that many people in a place that is at least 1 hour away from the rest of the branches.  Also the less active mom and dad came to the meetings which makes it 2 weeks in a row that they have come!!  The Ono family are making great strides to come back!

Well I forgot my journal but we have had a bunch of small miracles!

On Wednesday we had MLC from 8-1 then bus from 2:30-6 and eikaiwa at 7.  Once we got off the bus we headed to the apartment to drop of our stuff.  While we were walking nobody was out or would listen but with eikaiwa to start in 19 minutes we passed by a 20 year old kid and we talked with him for a little and exchanged phone numbers and he became a pi that texted us later that night!! That happened again another day just before we traveled to Koriyama for the meetings!  We had plenty of what Elder Price and I call "no time miracles".

On a short note, we gave a blessing to a member going under cancer treatment and she was actually feeling good and came to sushi with us today so that was cool!!  Well love you all and thank you for everything!  Have a good week!!  The book is blue, the church is true and God lives!  Have a good week !

 

Elder Halverson

ハルバソン長老~日本仙台伝道部

 

 

March 6, 2017: THE DOG POUND!👌🏿🐶🐶

Ok so I've finally made it to Iwaki! (福島県いわき市). Its really nice down here with lots of sun and cool temperatures.  It's like Southern California in March and early April.  Iwaki is the lowest part of the mission and the Fukushima prefecture.  Only two hours away from Tokyo!  We are actually closer to Tokyo than the mission headquarters in Sendai.  So that's pretty cool!  Iwaki is awesome the members are great and already feel like family.  We are already seeing miracles here!

On Sunday we visited a less active with the Pounds and it turns out that she is going this week to Aizu for cancer treatment.  She is way happy for us to be there even though we came really suddenly, she asked us to come back on Tuesday for lunch and to give a blessing of healing before she goes over for the treatment!  It was way cool for her but also the the senior couple that just came here to Iwaki! 

This week we had a mom and a dad return to church after 10 plus years of inactivity.  The daughter and son of the family come to church every week.  Well the son is at BYU-Hawaii and the daughter is a usual.  We had the set appointment and when we found out that smith Kaicho wanted to work with us for a day, it was perfect cause the times worked out that way.  We had a little visit with them where we talked about God and how he just wants us to go to church to be with family and feel the spirit.  It was really simple and that's what did it.  Both the mom and father came to church the next day! And they said they wanted to come to district conference the next week also!  Pretty great first week!!

BTW we found a Japanese Tom Sellick! He looks like dad with the Sellick mustache but Japanese!!  lol 😂

This week has been quick and I am really tired!! All my time is cut in half it feels like!  Iwaki is a great place with tons of really nice people!  I know the church is true.  The Book of Mormon is true and God lives.  We can talk to him directly though prayer!  Its awesome down here.

Love you all have a good week!

Elder Halverson

ハルバソン長老~日本仙台伝道部

 

 

February 27, 2017: Packing up and moving on!✌🏻️😥

Well it's the end of a wonderful week and it was capped off by President Smith telling me that I've been transferred down to Iwaki which is the lowest part of the mission.  Iwaki  is called the Hawaii of Tohoku so it must be great there.   I've been called as a zone leader and will become companions with Elder Price from Gilbert Arizona. 

Elder Davies and I had the most successful Sunday of our missions.  First of all our miracle referral, Sister Inumaki, got baptized and she will receive the gift of the Holy Ghost next week.  She is awesome, a really pure person, it is unfortunate that I only meet and taught her for a week, but it's all about her getting the gift of the Holy Ghost.  She had some trouble at work and she burned her hand and face so when she got in the water it was a bit painful.  But when she went down and was baptized and come up out the water she said that all the pain had gone away and was feeling fresh and brand new!  She is already starting to see the blessings of following Christ.   After hearing that I wanted to get baptized again!  Haha. I am excited for her, she is a new member that is just blossoming.

Just before that, we had a lesson with President smith as the joint.  We taught the Lee family!  Brother Lee has been a investigator for a couple of weeks and come to church and everything.  This week finally his wife came to Japan and he brought her to church.  So she has a christian background (even though being from China) and has read Bible and everything!  It was like we were looking a big plate of tonkatsu we were licking our lips at the thought of teaching, but so was President Smith.  We start the lesson and Pres Smith starts talking about how he feels as if he has meet the Lees before this life.  That is exactly what Brother Lee was saying when he talked about goen (a Chinese Japanese phrase about meeting someone in the previous life and receiving luck from them and then eventually meeting them on the earth). We draw up the plan of salvation on the board and that is when President takes over!  Within the hour he teaches with power and uninterrupted knowledge the plan of salvation, the restoration, and the gospel of Jesus Christ.  All of it all of it.  I was more than happy to take a back seat to this awesome lesson!  Elder Davies and I were the junior companions to President Smith the whole lesson 😂.  But again, we were blessed to have the Lee family on the edge of their seats listening to all of that, feeling the spirit and accepting a date for baptism on the 6th of April.  It's a family!  Haha My last Sunday here we finally get a family!  I firmly believe they will get baptized down the road!  Ugh going to miss them!

Lastly through all the activity of baptism prep, Elder Holland of the Quorum of the 12 Apostles came to the mission and had a missionwide conference.  Its was again an 一期一会once in a life time experience.

This man is intellectual, experienced and an incredibly special man.  I knew that before but it never set in until he spoke with his classical power and passion that can only be really felt in person.  He held a question and answer for the majority of the tour but at the end he talked about salvation.  Salvation is not easy, if it were easy the mission of church would have been a lot easier.  The road to salvation goes through the Garden of Gethsemane .  Christ opened the gate for us to gain salvation by suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane and giving up the atoning sacrifice.  Salvation is knowing God and Christ.  The only way we can know him is by walking in his shoes, feeling what he felt, and knowing just a fraction of the pain that he felt.  It goes though the Garden and he showed us the way.  Now let's do our best and when we trip, stand back up and try again!!

I am sad to leave Furukawa but I am not craving sad hah because I know I accomplished the will of God in this area!  I love this place and want to come back sometime after the mission!  Love you all and have a good day!

Yes, I know I have forgotten a bunch of English.

 

Elder Halverson

ハルバソン長老~日本仙台伝道部

 

 

February 20, 2017: Too Busy

February 13, 2017: Crepes with Czech's🍜

Well this week had some crepes, ramen, tonkatsu, and lastly some NATO!!!😊😊✌🏻 Stomach was full all week.  I think that will make you happy mom! 😂. In all seriousness, this week was a good one and we accomplished the mission standard of excellence.  We needed a nonmember to come to church to get standard and after 20 mins or so of sacrament Miura san comes and stays for 2 of the 3 hours.  So he is a man that is progressing slowly but surely.  We can't go to fast when we teach him because we will leave him in the dust behind us (so to speak). He has a little mental problem and apparently was an investigator 3-4 years ago.  However since hearing what the branch members say, he has completely changed over these couple of years and is progressing a lot better than previously.   Everyone is a child of God and needs to taste upon the good word.  Excited to continue to teach him!

 

We got into a lot of houses this week either for lessons or just getting invited.  We housed to some Czechs, we couldn't share anything but the hospitality of those 3 people we meet as way nice!  I promise there are good people out there, you just have to house in the cold sometimes to find them.  Plus it reminded me of the crepes dad would always make.. I promise I am not trunky.

 

Friday was a really busy day we had lessons at 3, 5, and 6pm.  All of them were really good and spiritual.  Especially the 5 o'clock lesson where we set a new bap date with our investigator named Chiba san. She is a single mom who wants to improve her life and her kids future.

She let us in and we sat around her tokatsu and had a short discussion about the plan of salvation and after we committed her to be baptized and she said yes and that she will try to make it out to church on the 19th with out us asking her!!  She is very aggressive and it's in a very good way.

Sorry my letters aren't great but I take an incredible journal!!

We have two choice in life 1) enjoy or 2)endure.  I want to talk about this with kanji (Chinese characters). 辛 this is tsurai which means heart breaking, suffering, pain etc. however if you put another line at the top it becomes 幸. Which is happiness!  Do you notice the difference one line/decision makes?  When that line goes into the top it make a cross.  Because of the cross at the top we can go from pain and suffering to happiness!  Because of Jesus Christ choice to die on the cross and suffer for us we can go from pain and heartache to happiness.  Now why would we choose to suffer when Jesus has already done it for us??  Lets all choose to be happy and make good choices!

I know Jesus is our savior and best friend!  This is true and church is also true!  Love you all and have a good week!!

(Btw mom put this in the ward newsletter thingy). Please!

Elder Halverson

ハルバソン長老~日本仙台伝道部

February 6, 2017: 僕はもうおじいちゃんだ (I'm an old man)

Alright everyone,  it is ok if you don't take a break from your Super Bowl watching to read my email.  Now all you people just watching for the commercials, your missing out on the beauty of 300+pound men doing athletic things.  If you are that commercial only person, please watch the game!

 

I know most can't read the title so I'll explain it a little bit.  I am already an old man!  My body is probably not going to hold up these finally 6 months.  Most likely I will be limping down the ramp in August!!  I know that is just music to your ears mom! 

 

We continued to teach our investigator with a bap date.  However he did pull a couple no shows to lessons, but when we went to his house he always lets us in.  We had a little discussion about the Book of Mormon and baptism!!  Every time we visit he always says that he was close to a miracle!  I am not sure what that means but he said that he has felt this way ever since we found him.  Miura san is looking good too and he still has a bap date for after the transfer ends... cause of that I am kinda nervous about this transfer.  I've been here for a total of 4 so I feel like it's time...  :(. But idk yet cause still got 3 weeks.  Lets go nuts!

 

Also this week we had a mission tour with the President of the Area Presidency.  Elder Whiting came and did 2 conferences with half of the mission.  He said over and over that he is just an orderve (the thing you eat before the big meal) (BTW I AM FORGETTING TONS OF ENGLISH) because Elder Holland is coming in 2 weeks so he was just prepping us for it.  He shared a lot of stories and thoughts about his mission (In the Tokyo North, Now the Tokyo mission) and especially about having fun on the mission and the Savior.  He said that we can either enjoy or endure our mission.  We can choose to enjoy the cold of Sendai or endure it.  I'll be honest there have been some days where I have endured it.  Just for example I thought I was "enduring" my time being a young missionary where i didnt understand much of what was going on.  But I look back on that time and I know I enjoyed it.  I loved being a bean!!  It was way fun!  I am enjoying my mission and love serving the people in Japan.  They are great.

 

However, when you look back you know that some times were hard and challenging but you dont remember them specifically in fact the only things we remember perfectly are the good times that we all had.  So lets choose to enjoy our time so that we can have more memories!  So put on a smile and enjoy it!  Think positive

Sorry i am not good at righting letters but i am pretty good at telling stories from memory so just wait till i get home!!

 A few fun things.

I had ZL splits this week and got to be back with an old comp. ELDER DANIELS, it was way fun i loved it!  It was great to be back with that guy and work in Kamisugi!  The members are great!

Also when the Fam comes to get me after the mission.  A member said that she will hook me up with a place to stay in Tokyo which is right next to the temple.  Turns out that her son lives in this big house that we can stay in apparently!!  Way excited Mom, Dad and Syd??

 Finally we had a great guy named lee san come to church.  After we had a little sit down with him and he started to open up to us and said that before he meet the missionaries a few months ago he was this really lonely and really homesick, then he gets invited by the missionaries to church and he loves it at church cause everyone is talking about life and he feels so good when ever he comes!  He said that he believes that God helped meet this american missionary in japan of all places.  Long story short, he accepted the invitation to come back to church next week and learn about the plan of salvation!  It's even better cause this guys wife is christian and is coming to Japan in a few weeks!!  I'll keep you updated on his status!!

 Love you all and continue to watch fat guys doing athletic things!! The church is true and God loves you all!

 

Elder Halverson

ハルバソン長老~日本仙台伝道部