May 27, 2013

Hello everyone! Just to start off, I want to apologize for another short letter. Saturday night our leaders called and said, "President has invited all the Elders in the mission to go to the temple on monday." So of course we took taht opportunity. We had to leave at 5 in the morning and we took a 2 and a half hour bus ride to the temple. It was super great. My area is incredible! There is a subway, mcdonalds, wendy´s, burger king, and a TGI fridays within 5 blocks of my house. And a mall across the street. And to make it even better there are over 100 people in chruch every week and they all understand missionary work! This week 3 investigators went to church and they were all brought by members! They understand what they are supposed to do and they do it! We also had a great lesson with a man who has been investigating the chucrh for over 2 years now, and we commited him to be baptized last night. He will be getting baptized on the 9th of June. My companion is from El Salvador and I have been getting a lot better at my spanish very quickly. Other than that, the weather is getting cold and I´m super excited to be working here. I promise I´ll have more to write next week and I´tll be more exciting. Time has just been really short lately. I love you all though and hope you have a great week. Don´t forget to read and pray every day! Also dont forget the importance of church and how important it is to think of the savior and his sacrifcies for us as we partake of the sacrament! Love, Elder Johnson

May 13, 2013

Helllooo!!! It´s snowing down here in the end of world. I´m pretty excited in this moment, but everyone tells me I wont be excited for much longer. It was super awesome to be able to talk to the family yesterday on skype! Braden and spencer are growing up so fast! Especially spencer with his six pack! :P But this week was going pretty great, until sunday, then we had no investigators in church. I was a little discouraged, especially cuz the district president came to give a talk, and to also interview two men who were going to receive the Melchezidek priesthood, and they also didn´t show up. So in total, including the branch president, his two sons, and the district president who come from another city, and us two missionaries, we had 9 people in church on sunday. So that means there were only 3 members from the city in church. It was a little rough on me. Then the District President got up to speak and he told us, that a member of the 70 went to his ward a couple of weeks ago. The city that they are in has 3 branches now with an average of 90 people a week in each branch. The 70 said that when he served his mission there about 35-40 years ago, there was 2 people in the entire city who took the sacrament every week, Him and his companion. It made me feel a lot better to know that even if the results don´t always come, as long as we are serving the Lord with exact obedience the blessings will come in the Lords time. Right now, this city is really small with very little members, but I know that as the members continue to live the gospel, that they will be able to see their city grow into a district and mabye one day even a stake! He also talked about the importance of reading the scriptures and praying daily. I know it probably gets really annoying hearing it from me every week, but it really is one of the most important things we can do. That we HAVE to do! It´s a commandment of God to do this things, and when we dont, we are disobedient. Someone shared in the last General Conference that we we need to make praying as common in our every day lives as breathing or eating. I have been working on doing this, and its a little bit hard to make it so common, but I have noticed that as I focus on praying and asking the Lord more frequently for His advice, that things have been a little easier, and that as I read the scriptures, I more easily find answers and learn things that really strengthen me and help me to know what to change in my life to be in allignment with the Lord. I promise that as we push ourselves to do these things that we will see the hand of the Lord more in our lives. I know that it will strengthen every one of you who does it and it will help you to straighten your life out, and change the things that you want to change. We´re not all perfect at all, and thats why we have come to this earth. That´s also why Heavenly Father sent His Son, so we could know what we need to do to change. It is only through His atonement that we can do so. I love you all, and hope that you are enjoying the heat, cuz I´m definitely not :). I hope you all will do your best to read and pray every day. Do what it takes, cuz in the end it will wall be worth it, and I promise that! Freezing his behind off, Elder Justin B. Johnson