Rough Week

July 11, 2016

Happy Birthday Takashis!
Fun lunch with member.

What!!!
Elder Law's recommend had expired so only a picture in front of the temple.

Elder Unsworth, Tou, Elder Law
He may not be our investigator but he will always be my friend!

As I said before, A tough week!!!

So you stop by a rice field,

and take pictures!

But more than that, you enjoy the beauty of Japan
and the truth of the Book of Mormon!

Highlight of the week:
Dinner with the Itokazu family.
What a great family

Elder Law, Elder Unsworth, Hiroto, and Sho.

P-day fun

Natural History Museum 

July 12, 2016

A little dark but a cool dinosaur

T-Rex

T-Rex Elder

Another picture with the T-Rex

Turtle

Mammoth

Me pretending to be a caveman. 

It would stink to be this guy if you had a sore throat. 

One big whale.

No one believed me that I was sick until we went in the heat thermometer and I glowed.

What a week this has been.  There has been so many ups and downs, it

is crazy!  Well I think in this letter I will just tell you about some

of my investigators and then you can see how my week went.

So my first investigator that I would like to talk about is Ishino.

So we haven't been able to contact him for the past like two weeks.

So one day I got the bright idea to go visit him at his house and see

how he is doing.  We went to his house and sure enough he was there.

We talked to him for a while and we found out that he found a job!  So

that is why he hasn't been able to talk with us.  Well as we talked

more and more we came to find out that he had lost all of his interest

in the church.  He wants reading the Book of Mormon or praying or

going to church.  We tried to help him out and tell him that he needs

to do those things and he kind of rejected us.  Well, I am sad to say,

but I think we are going to have to drop him.  I was so sad when we

were talking with him, he just didn't seem the same anymore.  I

remember when I found him on the street and he had so much interest in

learning about who God is and how he can help us.  Well, I am not

giving up on him yet, I am going to have a member talk with him a bit

and see if there is anyway the church can help him or something like

that.

My next investigator I would like to talk about is Lin.  He has been
pretty sketchy lately and hasn't been really keeping our commitments.
He would read the bible every day but he would not read the Book of
Mormon.  Well Elder Law and I went into the lesson thinking we needed

to either set expectations or drop him.  So we went in to his house

and had a way fire lesson.  We testified hard core of the Book of

Mormon and how it can help our lives.  We also talked about how prayer

and going to church can also help us.  He said that he will start

doing those three things so that he can figure out if this is Gods

true church or not.  So that was good!

Next is my new investigator named Tou.  He is very interesting.  We

met him last week but had all our lesson this week.  We taught the

restoration and he liked that.  We then taught the plan of salvation

and he loved that.  We were even able to set a baptismal date with him

on August 13!  He came to church that week and told us he liked it but

that it was hard to understand because his native language is Chinese.

After church we watched the restoration video and he said that it is

kind of hard to except that Joseph Smith saw God the Father and his

son Jesus Christ.  We then tried to set up another day to meet with

him and teach more but he was acting kind of weird about it.  We

didn't think much of it.  But later that night he sent us a text and

told us that he doesn't want to investigate the church anymore.  We

were so confused.  We had no idea why he said that, so we are going to

meet with him this week and see how we can help him and if maybe we

are just taking things too fast or what.  But hopefully we can help

him out.

Next and defiantly not least is our wonderful Nagashima.  Well he was

also pretty hard to contact with this week because he had a bunch of

tests to do and he was sick.  So we met him on Sunday and went to a

members house to have dinner.  Everything was going great.  The

members love him, he loves the members and everything was just

perfect.  We were able to teach three of the commandments to him.  The

law of Tithing, Word of Wisdom, and fasting.  He said that he would

follow these commandments and that he is excited for his baptismal

date.  Well we gave him a paper that his mom needs to sign because he

is underage.  He took it and said he would talk to his mom about it.

Well I called him the next day and he said his mom doesn't want him to

be baptized and that he can't be baptized anymore.  I was heart

broken.  So many of our investigators were falling out of the sky.  I

am defiantly not giving up on Nagashima.  We are going to try and meet

with his mom but everytime we ask him he says that that would be hard

to do.  But we are going to find something we can do to soften her

heart or at least talk with her.  I am so sad about Nagashima but I

know that if I continue to rely on the Lord and always plead to him

for help, he will help me.  I love Nagashima and I really hope that I

can see him be baptized.

Well that is how my top investigators are doing.  I have tons of other

ones but they are not progressing as well as these ones.  This week

was a pretty rough week and to finish it off, I am sick now!  I am

going to die!!!!  But I can't give up there.  I am excited to go at it

this week and work my hardest.  I love Togane and I know the Lord will

continue to bless this wonderful land.  I hope that I can figure out a

way to help my investigators and find out how we can fix their

problems.

Well everyone, it is time for me to sign off.  Thank you for all your

love and support.  It means a lot and I love always hearing from you.

I love you all so much and I hope you have an amazing week.  I can't

wait to hear from you again next week!  Hopefully this week goes along

better than last week.  Please if you can, pray for my investigators,

especially Nagashima.  I hope everything turns out okay with him. I

love you all and I will talk to you next week! :)