Hello everyone!
Ready for the weekly news?
Last week in good ol' Springfield Ohio....
Tuesday
Today was my first interview with President and Sister Welch. I'm looking forward to it. I've gotten to know President Welch a bit more. Not really on a personal level, but I've seen how he teaches and we've been able to hear a lot of great things from him last Wednesday at zone conference. I liked how he said " The true measure of discipleship is how you treat your wife.". He also likes to say how this is the roleplay of life. We do a lot of roleplaying on the mission so that we can get the kinks out of our teaching, so why not to get them out of our habits. A lot of things that I've ever done, I really have tried to make it so it keeps an eye toward my future with my family. So I really like having such a good "roleplay".
The interview went really well. Pres. and Sister Welch are great people who really have a way of cheering you up in a very special way. Sister Welch warned us about Seasonal depressive syndrome or whatever it was called. Just when your body doesn't get enough vitamin D and you get really depressed. The winter was really intense last year apparently. Sister Welch said it was the coldest winter that they had since 1914 so I guess it was a pretty crazy time for everyone. We're supposed to take about 5000 mg of Vitamin D every day. If it means I'll be happier during the winter then I'm totally ready to do it 😄
Over all, it was a very good time over in Huber Hights. We got Wendy's after and I don't know any time that's not good with Wendy's.
Today we met with Mar___. He lives with his girlfriend and her mother(She's super nice), grandfather and grandmother. The grandfather is in really bad shape right now, and maybe if we get the opportunity to keep getting to know them better, maybe we can give him a blessing. I think it'll be good to ask the bishop and get his opinion on it.
Wednesday
Today was a really productive day. It was the first bit of snow we've had so we filled up the morning hour after contacts by wiping off the snow from people's cars. We're just going to do that every time it snows now. We found out where Brother Lowel lives! We were wiping off a car and he came out. We went into his apartment and he showed us his paintings. They're really nice and he's only been doing it for a little bit. I guess when you're 78 you end up accidentally accumulating some skill so hey, perks. Brother Lowell is the first member we met. He drove us to Springfield and he lives just around the corner. We've gotten to become much better friends over these last few weeks. He's super awesome.
After lunch we tried to do some contacting. We weren't able to find the people we were hoping to, but we were able to meet 2 others that I think helped them a lot. The first is Tam___, a member who hasn't been active since she was 13. She's maybe 56-60 so it's been a bit. She said she would love to have the missionaries over more, because she gets lonely and gets down so it's a blessing. We told her about the Sisters we have and they have an appointment of Friday. They're all excited.
The next is Lyn____. We were trying to find a member on her street, but the dang house didn't exist. We had 213, and we had 216, just no 214! So we thought "hey, let's just go tracting. Might as well use the missing house as a pickup."
On the third house or so, we met a woman named Lyn___. She has had a really rough last couple months and she really needs some help. When we were at the door, she told us she was moving, and we just asked if she needed any help with it, and she just broke down and invited us in. Apparently getting out of Springfield is one of her main concerns and issues right now, and she just unloaded everything on us. You bet we have a return appointment with her.
We ended up going around the campus at the college and we ran into a less active that we met last Sunday! We got totally rejected by someone we were trying to contact, and he was just walking up the street! It was one of those crazy things that happen to people looking for us, we just end up right in the perfect place for them. He told us that he left his trunk open so his car ran out of battery life, so he had to walk, he was going to see if he could get in contact with us and hey, there we were! He's taking a sociology class and the people there are absolutely driving him nuts. It's a lot like the situation that happened with Steven back in Vermont. Scholars of feeling more than fact and a total lack of research and all that fun stuff. He told us about a specific presentation about Religions with polygamy. So you know what that means. And yes, it was that 😂 According to Brother Kelly, they wrote the LSD Church on the slide, and this is a college presentation, so you know they did their research 😂 brother Kelly set em straight so there we go.
So basically, we were exactly where we needed to be that whole day. Super cool stuff.
Thursday
Today was new missionary training. It was basically a zone conference with a different name. It was a good refresher and was needed. I found out in one of Sisters Welch's lessons, playing the guitar with a member isn't appropriate so oops on my part cause I did that on Tuesday 😅
I was asked to do the prelude and hymn, but they didn't tell me which hymn till we were there. But hey now I know We are all Enlisted. I'm going to be playing a lot, as I was warned by Sisters Welch. I have a lot of homework.
We left late, and had a great time on the ride to and back from NMT. After getting back and having dinner, we met with some members. Great people, I can't wait to get to know them. We gave Mar___ a call and he's doing great with the BOM and applying it to himself! We see a lot of great things happening.
Friday
Weekly planning n stuff! I'm shortening my journals cause holy cow it's a long email. We did planning till 2 and companionship inventory (pmg 147 or so) till 3. We're getting closer as companions and that's great.
We saw Jos___ today and hopefully he goes to church on Sunday.
Then we had an amazing dinner with Brother and Sister Johan, and they gave us a ton of left overs of really great food. Apparently we got the lighter load of food because we only got one bag instead of three 😂
After dinner, we went to the Abston's house and helped them move the grills to the church for the party tomorrow.
Saturday
Today was the church party. It was a good time and we shared a light the world message, then ate some pancakes. Later we went over to Huber Hights to see David's baptism, and then have Elder Conrad do a baptismal interview for Mar__, a sweet 9 year old with an incredible testimony and a past that's all ready to hard. She's in great hands now though. There was a little ward party afterward, and there was really good food.
Sunday
Sunday's are pretty much the best days. Y'know the church? Highly recommend it😁 today was Fast and Testimony meeting which is always great. The gospel principles class went well and we met Sister Woods, she's a character and is seriously the funniest old lady you'll meet. She called me the Jolly green giant with red hair 😂 how great is that? We didn't get Mar___ to church sadly, but we'll keep on trying. After church we went to the Haworth's for dinner and they're as great as always. I've been sick for a while, but I'll get over it. So all in all, today was a good day :)
It's been a full week of driving and training, but so full of miracles.
We know that the work we're doing is the work of the Lord.
I promise to fulfil my purpose.
With love,
Elder Johansen
