Goodbye Elder Ricks,

Hello Elder Jensen

October 30, 2016

This is Brother Oami. I was able to prepare him to be baptized. I love this man and his testimony is on fire. I will miss him but when we come back he said we can visit him! :). I love Oami so much! :)

This is the Stake President.  His name is President Tabuchi.  He took us out to lunch and we ate all you can eat meat.  It was very good and it was a fun time being together as an area missionary before we all left.  I will miss the amazing members in Narita! 

Narita church sits on the top of a hill.  Everyone can see it.

Elder Ricks and I in front of the church.

This is the Narita church, it is so pretty!

This is sister Ushijima.  She is way nice and always cooks us food.
We were doing some finding around the station and ran into her.  I was
able to say goodbye to her and say thank you for everything she did
for me.  She is a great member!

  

This is a new investigator we found.  His name is Shohei. 

He is way nice but I only got to meet him once. 
 He is going to love meeting with the missionaries.

We went and visited the Bishop to say goodbye.
 He lives pretty far away so we had to go by train.
Well sadly he wasn't home so we just took a picture with his family and I gave them my goodbye card.  They are a way nice family!  I love this family so much.  

Saying goodbye to the Elders in my apartment.
 They were a hoot!

Elder Gelinas and I became really good friends with the time that we had with each other.  He is also from Washington.  He is a great missionary! 

Apartment pictures with Elder Ricks.

Outside our apartment.  It is hard to say good-bye to such a great missionary.

Our last picture together as companions.  Elder Ricks will do great in Narita.
Train ticket in my hand.  What is in store for me in my next area.

On Elder Nitta and I transfer, we got to ride this expensive
train. By expensive it was $4.00.

Man was is nice on this train and I GOT MY OWN SEAT!

This train was really fast and very relaxing.

Halloween party with the ward and Eikaiwa class.
 I really love this ward. 

This is the outfit they gave me to wear. I think I am a muscle biker dude.  My companion is the elephant.  His name is Elder Jensen.

Man am I strong!!

This is a place called Lake town.  It is the biggest mall I have ever
seen.  It is actually really famous and is in the Pokemon games. It is
also the biggest mall in all of Asia I think.  It is honestly so big.
We went to a 1/3 of it today and it took us 3 hours just to get
through that part.  It is so big and I will have to go back there
again someday.  It is way fun! I bought Michael a present there
because I found something that he would really like.  I think I might
be able to find a lot of my presents there for the family.  Hopefully
I stay in the area for awhile! Haha

Elder Jensen and I.

We have only done 1/3 of the mall.
This is a cool Halloween thing they had.

A golden massage chair.
It looked expensive.
 In would love to have it! haha

A cute pug puppy I found in the mall.
Man, I wanted to keep it!

After walking around we went and got ice cream at Baskin Robbins.
 They had 31% off because it is the 31st.  It was pretty good!
  It tasted like American Ice Cream.
The picture is Elder Jones, Elder Jensen, Elder Unsworth, and Elder Ogden.  

My birthday pack is here!

Oh, the package is full.  What is in it?

Disney!  My favorite!!!

Elder Jensen is not too excited about my presents.
Oh well, I love them!!

Elder Jensen and I were having a lot of fun at our apartment.
"O Romeo, my Romeo, Where for art thou my Romeo?"

Good fun! :)

I am having a hard time finding Nic's email from this week so I am going to publish this and find it later and add it.  Sorry!

Good-bye Elder Calhoun

 and Elder Ricks!

October 24, 2016

My last picture with this great missionary!

This is called Narita San.
 It is a huge shrine by my house!

These are like guardians for the shrine.

Elder Ricks and I!

Just some fun pictures infront of this shrine thing.
 I think this has something to do with the priests.

So this was placed at a shrine to have the priests pray for the
requests of other people.  I found this one to be pretty funny.

This is the big main shrine.  When we were leaving they were
performing a huge ceremony.  It was cool to watch but I think we
weren't aloud to record it so I didnt.  But man it reminded me of
something from moses time.  There were chants and a huge fire and they
were putting peoples stuff near the fire so that they would be come
sacred or something like that.  It was crazy There was also the main
priest there taking care of some prayers or something like that.

There was a nice park nearby so we went and checked it out!
This is Elder Nitta and Myself.

Elder Ricks and I at the park.

Look close you will see me!

Hello beloved friends and family, boy do I have some news for you!  So this came as a shocking news this morning but I am being transferred to a new area!  I am leaving the grand Narita and heading for Koshigaya.  This area is right next to my first area which was Kasukabe. I am way excited to be heading there!  I cant wait to get to my new area.  This will mark number 6!  I am just moving all around the mission.  My new companions name is Elder Jensen.  He is from Sandy Utah and I am so excited to be with him.  Another fun fact is he was in the MTC with me and we were in the same class.  I am so excited to be working with one of my best buds that I already know! :). I am sad to be leaving Elder Ricks but he will have fun in Narita with his new companions.  He is getting Elder Lloyd. He will have fun with him.  But I hope they take care of all our new investigators and the ward.  We did a lot of finding this week and have found some pretty awesome new people.  Elder Lloyd is lucky to be coming into a new area, especially Narita!  I know he will like it here and they will have fun with all the new people we found this week!

So going into how the week went!  I would like to share something that I wrote to my mission President with all of you.  

Tuesday was the big day.  The Bednar Conference.  We woke up and left to hit the train on time.  We wanted to get to the conference early so then we could get some good seats.  Good thing we did because there were so many people who came right after us or right before the conference started.  As I was sitting there I kept praying in my heart that I would feel the Spirit and that I would find some new areas to improve on.  I really wanted to learn some new things, I didn't want to be entertained but I wanted to learn how I could improve my finding and teaching and become a better missionary.  Well as soon as Elder Bednar entered the room, there was no doubt that the Spirit was there.  I couldn't tell at first if it was because I was nervous or if it was because I just felt so different than usual.  But I am sure that it was the Spirit that was working inside me.  Well the conference went on and man it was an exact answer to my prayers.  I went away knowing so much more and I really felt like I was taught from on high.  The biggest thing that I learned about and that I also commented on in the conference was being an agent.  I found it very interesting that that word kept sticking out to me in the conference.  I thought faith, hope or service would stick out or something around those lines, but the word was agent.  Going out and acting for yourself.  Not being an object.  It was very interesting to me to think of missionary work from a new perspective.  Am I being an object or an agent?  I thought about this last transfer and how I did and to be honest, I feel like sometimes I was an object and not an agent.  This scared me and it shook me back into being an Agent.  I don't want my mission to turn into an object where I was just doing what everyone else was doing or I wasn't working my hardest or things like that.  I want to have confidence that everyday when I went out I was being an Agent and I was doing the things the Lord would want me to do.  There were so many things that I learned from the conference but the only thing I wish I could have had more of would be time.  I didn't want it to end.  I wanted to keep learning from him and I wanted to ask him a question and be taught.  Like he said, "This is a once in a life time opportunity to be in this meeting with an Apostle, the Area Presidency, your mission presidents, and so many missionaries of the Lord Jesus Christ."  I wish we could have more conferences like that but to be honest, it was such a spiritual and sacred thing that it will remain special to me for the rest of my life.  It honestly has changed my way of thinking and I think it has changed my mission.  It was an answer to my prayers and I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to learn from Elder Bednar.  There are so many other things I would like to expound on and talk about but there isn't time and I don't want this letter to be too long.  So I will leave it at that.  But I really did enjoy the Bednar conference and I hope you did too! :)  On our way back home we were doing some finding and we found one new investigator.  He is kind of shy but he said he wanted to meet up again and learn more.  It was so cool because we were about to head home and give up on the day.  But the last man I saw was heading the opposite direction we were and I had that feeling, "Go talk to him".  So I did and it turned out he wanted to learn!  It is amazing how much missionary work changes when you become an Agent! :)

There were so many wonderful things that happened this week but I think the number one thing of this week, transfer, and mission is being able to talk with Elder Bednar and learn from him.  He is such an amazing man and a true servant of the Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  He is an inspiration to me and I hope that I may be privileged to meet him again sometime in my life.  He is such a good leader and he gives amazing talks.  

Another great thing that happened this week was doing the follow up training at the mission home.  I was able to see all my friends and Elder Ricks got to see his friends and we both just had a really fun time.  My old companion Elder Calhoun is heading home this week so it was great to see him and talk with him one last time.  Hopefully after the mission I will be able to see him again.  I just love being able to be together as a mission and learn from one another.  I learned so much at the Bednar Conference and I learned a lot from the follow up training conference as well.  This week was just a really powerful week.  I love being a missionary right now and I love all the wonderful conferences that I had this week.  It really helped out with my missionary work and it invited the spirit into my life.  This week I have felt the Spirit so much, just walking around or enjoying my time, I feel the spirit so much more.  It is amazing.  I also feel it a lot more when I talk to members about their conversions and how they met the missionaries.  I just love being a missionary at this time and age. 

Well I am sorry but time is getting short so I must end this email.  But know that I love you all so much and that I am happy to have you all as friends and family.  I hope you have a wonderful weekend this happy Halloween season and I hope you get lots of candy!  People in Japan don't really do Halloween trick or treating.  Kind of sad, I wanted some free candy!  Haha I guess I will have to get some from the members.  Well anyways, I love you all so much and I hope to hear from you this coming coming!  Take care and don't forget to do the little things! :) 

I love you!!!