Monday, January 21, 2013

Hello Family!

 

Well, this week we spent a lot of time helping our friend Chiba get ready to go on his mission.  We went over to his house and helped him clean it and get him packed up.  His house was disgusting and a complete disaster!  He doesn't have anything really to come back to.  His parents are anti-gospel and they don't really talk anymore, he doesn't have anywhere to put all of his stuff like his clothes, phone, games, bed, books and things, so we packed up the few missionary items that we had into one suit case and then threw away everything else that he owned.  He gave everything he had for a mission and now he only has like 100 dollars and a suitcase full of clothes and scriptures to his name.  It was way powerful to see Chiba so willingly throw the world away so that he can serve.  He is one of my best friends from the mission for sure. He has a lot of faith and was always saying that the things that he is throwing away are not important, the mission is important. 

 

Yesterday, we were able to stand in on his setting apart to be a missionary which was a way cool experience.  We went over to the stake center and spent the day with him, the stake president, and a bunch of single adults that are preparing for missions.  I didn't know that missionaries could stand in on someones setting apart, so we had to call President Budge and ask him and he said it's okay.  Who knew?  Afterwards, we went over to the stake president's house and had a big dinner with like 30 people.  I love Japanese people.  They love to have really big extravagant feasts with lots of people.  We said goodbye to Chiba last night and now he is flying to America. 

 

On Friday we went to a Karate class with our investigator and his son.  Elder Clark has been doing Tai Kwan Do for 12 years and is a black belt and is 6'6" so he worked over all of the sensei's and stuff, haha.  He was sparing with our investigator and he accidentally kicked him in the face and knocked him out, haha.  He had a bloody mouth and a fat lip the next day, hahaha.  Elder Clark felt so bad about it, haha!

 

We went bowling on Saturday with the young men in our ward and an investigator that we found last week.  He is Filipino, but his best language is Japanese.  He got recruited by San Diego State for baseball a few weeks ago.  He is a boss catcher and he is way excited to go to America, although, his English is not the best, haha.  He knows it though so he loves hanging out with us and talking about Christ with us.  His name is Hyuma. 

 

Asada is doing very well.  He came to church and has a great time.  During Sunday School, our ward mission leader asked him why we close prayers in the name of Jesus Christ and he said, "it is because Christ took upon Himself all of our sins when He died upon the cross, therefore He is our Savior and Redeemer".  Everyone in the room was silent and then one of the sister missionaries said, "Yabai Sore"!  Which means like Holy Crap!  They where like, "Where did you find this kid?"  We found him at the train station and as of two weeks ago he had never had an opportunity to study about religion before and he wanted one so he took his study seriously and knows it's true, cause it is true!  If people actually study the gospel they will find out that it's perfect and it answers all of the questions of the soul!  It's perfect!   Our only concern is still his parents, but so far so good. 

 

This next week is going to be a good one! We need to find new people cause we have been dropping a lot of not progressing ones recently.  It's sad, but that's the way it is.

 

It's great to hear that everyone is doing fine and I hope you all have another great week!

 

Bye Bye!

 

Love,

 

Elder Crandall