And So Begins the Last Chapter...

Hello,

This is Shinji. (See picture) He got baptized yesterday, but the person who was going to perform the baptism wasn't there. Sister Brady turned to my companion and I and said, "One of you will have to do it." I was like, "I'll do it." So I got to baptize Shinji yesterday! It was so awesome!

I told you guys about our Christmas day and how awesome it was. We were able to visit a less-active named Shams before he went back to Iran. We went to Sakae and did caroling dendo with Sister Brady, Sister Kartchner, and the Gokiso missionaries. We sang Christmas songs and talked to a lot of people. It was a ton of fun and we definitely got our name out. The Sisters found an investigator too. After that we hit Outback Steakhouse for Christmas dinner. Good day.

We got a transfer call on Saturday and found out I'm transferring. I kind of saw it coming, but I'm still sad to say goodbye to Fukutoku. I am looking forward to going to Shizuoka for my last transfer, though. I will be Zone Leader with Elder Takabori, a Japanese Elder from Jersey. He's fluent in Japanese, but has a Jersey accent because he lived there for a long time. I think Elder Takabori and I will get along great, work hard, and have fun. I was in Shizuoka ken this time last year so it will be just like old times.

This week we were able to get a new investigator. Shinji was baptized and we set an appointment with his older brother Rean who has met with missionaries in the Philippines before. He has a lot of good potential and his mom already wants him to get baptized really bad.

It was a good week. We made the rounds on the people I wanted to say goodbye to and had a good last supper at a member's house last night.

That's all for now.

Love you all.

Love,

Elder Sanderson

How to Kill a Zone

Hello!

So we had a Zone Conference and the AP was incubating an Alien Baby called influenza. Then it struck us all on Friday. Literally the whole Zone was down. I was sick this past week as well, but I'm fine now. In other news, I lost 5 lbs.

We had the Zone Conference and we were sick, so unfortunately we weren't able to work as hard as we wanted to this week. We were able to do a companionship exchange with the Ichinomiya Elders on Wednesday and Thursday. Elder Ahuna and I went to teach an investigator named Komori-san. He has a lot of potential to progress, he just has a difficult time gripping onto one idea and going with it. He likes a lot of various religious beliefs and he hasn't prayed about which one is true. He is really nice to the missionaries and likes meeting with them. He tries to understand all the missionaries teach as well, so that's good.

We also did a kokan with the Ogaki Elders. I was able to do Shamoto-san's interview to be bapized and he passed! Unfortunately we will have to do it again because he wasn't able to be baptized on Sunday because he had to go to work all of a sudden.

We were able to have a really good lesson with Shirakawa and Naoko this week. We talked about Alma the Elder and his conversion. We read from the Book of Mormon about the people at the waters of Mormon. Naoko had to leave in the middle of the lesson, but she said she will try to quit smoking. But, we were able to commit Shirakawa to be baptized on Jan. 19th!

Well that's all I want to type now. See you on Wednesday!

Love,

Elder Sanderson

PS that sounds like I'm going home this week, but I'm not ok?

We Wish You a Merry Christmas and a Case of Pink Eye

Hello,

We had a slower week this week. Some time management issues and unplanned things popped up a lot. Things started off well, though. We had appointments on Monday and Tuesday. Monday night was fun because we visited Ayumi's ,one of the Sister's investigators, family. We were able to have a good time with her parents and calm some of their fears about her being baptized. Then on Saturday Ayumi talked to her parents about being baptized and they said that she can make her own choice and they won't kick her out of the house! She can be baptized.

On Tuesday night my companion and I were able to do a companionship split with members so we could cover two appointments. My companion and a member taught Jessyka's boyfriend and I went with our ward mission leader to do service.

On Thursday we taught Ryu-san about the Restoration. It was a great lesson and she had read the pamphlet, so she grasped everything quickly. She took a Book of Mormon and said she would read it. Due to her age and mobility problems, however, she said she can't meet us. We told her that we would stop by again with a friend later. She isn't an investigator right now, but we hope to get to teach her again.

On Thursday and Friday we had a companion exchange with the Inuyama Elders. I had a really good talk with Elder Benzon about how he can be an effective District leader. He felt that he had come to a good point with Japanese and missionary skills, but he wanted advice on how to apply it for the rest of his mission.

Our weekend was kind of a flop. My companion was sick on Saturday, so we were only able to go to the ward Christmas party. Then on Sunday I woke up with pink eye and had to go get medicine with a member. We had to stay inside all day, so I didn't infect northern Nagoya with a plague. We were able, however, to go to the Christmas Devotional and my testimony of the love of God and the reality of our Savior Jesus Christ was strengthened.

Their were some troubles with the investigators in Gokiso this week, so they ended up not getting baptized. And I wasn't able to go anyway. They will, however, be baptized next week, so here goes round two! I'm still praying for them.

On a more positive note, we get to Skype next week! My companion and I will do it on our Dec 26th, so it will be Christmas there. I can do it at 10 or 11 am, so it will be 6 or 7 pm. We still have another pday before then, but let's figure it out soon. That's all.

Good night and good luck,

Elder Sanderson

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Hey!

I'm emailing on Sister Hall's iPhone. Technology!

We'll another great week in the rear view mirror. We were able to get a new investigator this week. We tried hard to get a new investigator everyday. We weren't able to get one everyday, but we got a lot of potential investigators. We found Ryu san through housing during a companion exchange with the Gifu Elders. Ryu san is an eighty-year-old, Chinese Christian woman who met missionaries in Taiwan about thirty years ago. She could have even bumped into Mom. Ryu san speaks perfect English, so communication is no problem. We spent about thirty minutes at her door and talked to her about various things in the Gospel such as the afterlife, Christ's ministry, etc. We were able to set an appointment with her for this Thursday.

We had some good progress with a less-active member named Uchu kun. He's twenty-two years old and loves studying English, but he has a hard time wanting to go to church. We went out to eat with him and Kai-san, a PI, on Monday night and Uchu kun was dendo-ing Kai really boldly. Uchu was asking him questions about what Kai thinks about religion and God and things like that. It really got Kai thinking. Then on Friday night Elder Doll and I went to eat ramen with Uchu kun. We got to talking and he said he still wasn't sure if the church is true. We talked about prayer and the Book of Mormon being the evidence of the truth of the Church. He said he would read the Book of Mormon.

In other news two more investigators I taught in Gokiso are getting baptized this Sunday and I may get to baptize one of them! Soooo stoked!

Anyway gotta go love you!

Love

Elder Sanderson 

Jupiter! Two Baptisms!

Hey there, all you happy people!

This week was fantastic. Quite possibly the best week of my entire mission so far. We had a lesson with Matias at the McDonald's again. We were a little more bold with him this time, but it helped us let him know his own role in learning the Gospel. We got to visit a less-active we haven't visited in awhile named Shams. He's a funny guy from Iran. We were able to help him with some translation for his resume and we set another appointment for this week.

We visited the Hall family this week and we talked about their friends who they want to invite to hear the Gospel. We wrote down a list of eleven people then immediately visited them together. We sang a Christmas song and then invited them to the Christmas party. It was cool to see the people we visited light up when we sang a song and talked with them.

This week we were able to go to two baptisms. The bishop's daughter was baptized on Wednesday night and a bunch of the Sisters' investigators came. Little Ayaka-chan was so cute. So then on Friday my boy Wei Jing Xuan in Gokiso gets dunked! I walked into the church before the service and I almost tackled him. He has such a sick testimony! He was talking about how he didn't know how to overcome difficulty in his life until he met Elder Ludlow and I on the street. He began to elaborate on how he knows his life with change, but it's for the better. I was talking to him afterward and told him how Elder Ludlow and I were studying one day and I was falling asleep, so we went to go get ice cream at the convenience store. On the way home from buying ice cream we ran into Wei. Boom. I am so humbled and thankful to be a part of the salvation of another one of Heavenly Father's children.

A former investigator in Fukutoku named Makino-san was able to come to the Wei's baptism as well. We are getting to be good friends with him and we're currently trying to get him back into the investigator pool. On Saturday we did service together and had some fun at a ward barbecue, then later that night we got on top of our apartment (completely permissible, don't worry) and looked at Jupiter and her four moons with Makino-san's telescope. You could see Jupiter's rings! It was mind-blowing. A member, Tsuzuku Kyodai, also hung out with us and was really good at fellowshipping Makino-san.

Last night we visited a member family named the Hisakas. I looooooove members. The Hisakas are way nice and we were able to help their thirteen-year-old son know how he can gain his own testimony. We challenged him to read the Book of Mormon everyday and then next month during Testimony Meeting bear his testimony. He said he would. It was a pretty heavy, Spiritual moment for me. Not sure why. But I think his parents will help him and talk with him. He'll be fine.

That's kind of the news this week. Love you all.

Love,

Elder Sanderson