"This Week We Took Many Pictures of Mystical Beings"

Grafitti, spotted on the concrete stairs of some apartment buildings 

Charlie, spotted in the home of a kind couple that fed us dinner

~American Dreams~

 

The dynamic duo 

This week Sister Sandall and I started listening to the Old Testament in the car. I completely forgot how hilarious and scandalous and riveting that book is! Maybe it has to do with the fact that I haven't had television or Internet for 8 months, but it seriously would make the best tv drama series. Murder! Marriage! Crazy moms plotting to help you steal yo brother's birthright! Concubines! Babies everywhere! (My favorite story is probably the story about Dinah, Simeon, and Levi in Genesis 34)

If anything, the Old Testament has really made me appreciate living in this time period, in the millennium. If this is the last time period before Christ comes again, it means we have had all of the revelations and commandments we can possibly have to prepare us. How blessed are we to live in the most evolved and civilized time period! Sometimes we complain about commandments and they seem like a burden, but the time before Moses and Jesus Christ without a lot of the laws we have today didn't look like a lot of fun to live. Fun to read, but not to live.

So many people we teach Moses's Ten Commandments to say "that's so basic and easy!" It didn't used to be that way, and I'm grateful that we've reached a point where that's instinctual. Now if only the new laws and commandments became that way too... 

Sister Kaede Takeshige 

We Cool

Aside from trying to grow out my bangs and having many awkward hair days as you will see in the pictures below we had a greeeeaaaat week! 

Two of our sweetest friends got baptized on Sunday 

It got warm enough to do weekly planning outside in the sun

And I ate some senbei.

But best of all, I learned so much from the scriptures. I couldn't write everything that I learned, but one of my favorites is about this one lady missionary in John. When Jesus travels through Samaria, a woman filling up her water pot meets Jesus and learns that He is the Messiah that was prophesied about. Once she learns this, she goes and tells all the men in the city. 

"And many of the Samaritans of that city believed on him for the saying of the woman, which testifies, He told me all that ever I did.

"And many more believed because of his own word; And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world" (John 4:39,41-42)

The woman converted many to come unto Christ, but more importantly, she let the Spirit of God do the converting. It reminded me of the worldwide missionary devotional we had a few months ago, when Elder Bednar taught that the missionary brings the message unto the investigator, but the spirit brings into the heart. The church sends out scraggly, stinky, clueless 18 year old missionaries around the world, but the only reason it works is because this is God's work, and if we work just hard enough to be worthy of the Spirit of God to be with us, miracles can happen! 

Another scripture that I really liked:

"And for the space of three hours did the Lord talk with the brother of Jared, and chastened him because he remembered not to call upon the name of the Lord" (Ether 2:14)

Most times we don't hasten people unless we know them really really well, like a family member, or a close friend. If we do that in any other situation, we can alienate them. No one likes being yelled at by strangers, but when it's someone we love, we listen. Most of the time. The next verse says,

"And the brother of Jared repented of the evil which he had done, and did call upon the name of the Lord for his brethren who were with him." 

And so I've set a new goal for myself. I want to be so cool with God that he can chasten me for three hours and I won't feel offended, because I definitely am not at that point yet. It's definitely made me to some introspection and check my pride. Am I humble enough that God would feel okay telling me what to fix? God wants us to be the best we can be, and if we let him fix us, we' would be so much better off! 

And here is a picture of the most confusing and awkward district in the mission:

English Elders (1 stake), Chinese Sisters (3 wards in 2 stakes), Korean Elders (I dont know what they cover), and the APs(not pictured) (116 wards in 7 stakes) 

100

We had zone conference this week! We have a goal of getting 100 baptisms in the Utah Provo Mission for the month of May. Eek! It seems like a bit of a stretch, but I truly know that this is God's work, and if we show our best, and are obedient in every way that we can be, IT WILL HAPPEN. People won't suddenly change their minds, and God won't force anyone to change their life, but I truly think that we will be able to find those who have already been prepared by people other than us. 

This morning I read something that I really liked. 

"For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved." 

If we are allowing people to feel guilt, shame, and condemnation, we have missed the point of Christianity. The point of Christ is to help us feel hope that we can be better and move on from the things that bring us down. 

zone

😆 Happy Mothers (skyping) Day! 👩

tiny snail friend 

"Sometimes I Wish I Could Show Shia LaBeoouoeaf's "Just Do It" Video in Lessons"

This week was awesome. I've really learned that there truly are people that are prepared to listen and accept the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and people that are not. 

There is a woman we are teaching whom I will refer to in this e-mail as Z. She had met with missionaries before, but didn't feel right and stopped. A month later, she felt like she wanted to continue to learn more and that was around the time that we came into the area. In the short time we have met with her, she has gone from not even feeling comfortable saying prayers to drinking in everything in the Book of Mormon and receiving revelation left and right. It was so cool! As we were answering some questions that she had while she was reading in 2 Nephi, her face literally lit up, and she said, "so... God gave us opposition, so that we would have choices, and not be restricted to just one condition... so I have the freedom to choose. So Adam eating the fruit was not a bad thing."  Watching that epiphany dawn on her and take effect to her very being was like watching a falcon discover for the first time that it had wings and fly away majestically into the sunset. Just a little bit like it. Z has been reading the Book of Mormon every day since. 

There is also another little family that we have been teaching for a while. Every single family member is pretty awesome already, and humble and open hearted, and this week they said a family prayer together for the first time. They said it was the most wonderful and beautiful thing that had happened. 

Ahh!! I love that people let God change them! 

However, sometimes there are people who are unwilling -- unwilling to change, unwilling to try, unwilling to see all the answers to their prayers. And sometimes that's frustrating. Sometimes my first instinct is to shake them and go "JUST OPEN YOUR EYES AND LOOK AT THE WORLD AROUND YOU" One time an investigator literally prayed and said, "if this thing in my life gets fixed, I will believe in you God." Her thing got fixed. She still doesn't think prayers work and God is real. Which is frustrating. But unwillingness is a choice. And like Z taught me this week, this choice is part of God's gift to us on this earth. We have choices so we can grow and know what happiness is.  And if in the future, we learn that we made the wrong choice, we all have a chance to change our minds! That is the beauty of this life and God's design of it. Z at one point chose to stop learning. But look at her now! Sometimes we watch people make the suckier choice, but in the end, it will all be okay. We just have to be patient and not be like Sister Takeshige and have these urges to shake people. 

"For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my firstborn in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holieness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility." 2 Nephi 2:11

WONTONS

 

back at BYU

pls read

One of our investigators started illustrating the stories in the scriptures as he read them

"subject:"Had Too Much Fun Again This Week"

This week we were in a lesson with a lady who is here visiting her daughter in Utah. She said, "I have a lot of interest in knowing if these things are true, and knowing if God is real, but not my daughter. She's not into this stuff." The member we were with said, 

"She's not not interested! It's just not her time yet. Someday she will need it."

If we really are all God's children, we all need the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Literally every single soul in the entire world needs it.

"And now Alma began to expound these things unto him, saying: It is given unto many to know the mysteries of God; nevertheless they are laid under a strict command that they shall not impart only according to the portion of his word which he doth grant unto the children of men, according to the heed and diligence which they give unto him. And therefore, he that will harden his heart, the same receiveth the lesser portion of the word; and he that will not harden his heart, to him is given the greater portion of the word until it is given unto him to know the mysteries of God until he know them in full." (Alma 11:11-12)

A softened heart is not a weakness. Often times we see hardened hearts as strong and independent, but what growth does that allow for? Only when our hearts are humble can we learn the mysteries of God and become better everyday. I hope that we can all be humble, not humbled, because the latter is never fun. 

BEING A MISSIONARY IS THE BEST THING IN THE ENTIRE WORLD BECAUSE HEARTS OF THE PEOPLE WE TEACH ARE OPEN AND HUMBLE AND THE "MYSTERIES OF GOD" THAT THEY UNCOVER BY THEM READING SCRIPTURES AND PRAYING ARE PHENOMENAL

Basically we get front seats to the coolest phenomenon in the entire world.

Sorry for this disconnected e-mail. All in all, 'twas a good week. 

Pictures: 

A peanut butter jelly shake 

My companion made me elk steak

Only had 20 minutes to finish the pie. Barely made it.

goo goo ga joob

chirashizushi 😍

New tags 

Everyday at 10:15 am while we are doing studies, this rat comes in front of our window to say hi

Feasts

It is finals season at BYU, so it's been a weird week on the missionary side of things in Provo. Some days we would be booked the entire day and running around to appointments, and other days everybody would cancel (because finals suck) and we would spend the entire day finding and knocking on doors of strangers. You know you're blessed when you've been a missionary for 7 whole months--and knocking on strangers' doors feels like a foreign activity because you've rarely had to (too many people to teach up in here whoop whoop). We're a little terrified of the week to come; we have 7 (7!!!) teaching appointments just tomorrow, and then everybody is moving back to China because the semester has ended. So our teaching pool might die. I predict a whiplash in busy-ness in the next few weeks. I'll have to learn to be a door-knocking pro. 😓

This week I have been thinking a lot about the parable of the great supper. In Luke 14, Jesus tells story of "a certain man [who] made a great supper, and bade many", and when the feast is ready, he tells his servant to let the guests know that everything is ready now. One friend bails and says he cannot come because he needs to inspect some new land he has purchased. Another friend says he has bought new oxen, and needs to go take care of them. Another friend says he's got a new wife, so he cannot come. This guy just wants to have a party and feed his friends free food and everyone bails. So sad. 

God just wants to have a party with us and give us free things, but so many times we just bail and make stupid excuses! How lame of us! All these alternate activities his friends are doing weren't necessarily bad; but it's pretty rude, especially since these guests seem to have already made a commitment to come. We can fill our lives with activities with things that aren't necessarily bad - buying land, checking out your sweet new ride, spending time with your family - but if we have already promised God that "yes I want the thing I'll be there when it's ready" but we aren't there to receive it, we have taken for granted a generosity. We have wasted somebody's love, broken their hearts, and maybe even lost their trust. 

God has prepared a feast for all of us. In 2 Nephi chapter 32 it says, "feast upon the words of Christ, for the words of Christ shall tell you all things what ye should do." If we were to only feast on the scriptures, the words of the prophet, and inspired thoughts of each other at church, we will be fed with infinite knowledge, direction, and guidance. We would never be lost or confused. We would all be happy, and it would be a great party! 

Here is this cool talk that I found on the parable that has super cool thoughts on the parable. Elder  Hammond basically says that dinner party etiquettes apply to our spirituality wellness: 

1. Don't cancel (If you've made a commitment, keep the commitment!)

2. Don't be late ("Ye shall not procrastinate the day of your repentance until the end" You'll miss the appetizers!)

3. Eat everything delicious thing you're served  (Don't deny yourself blessings)

4. Don't leave early (There are dessert-blessings to come!) 

Speaking of food, here are the only pictures I have from this week:

We Moved!

This week we moved! We used to live in the basement of a really kind elderly couple. It was a really nice place, but we didn't have a kitchen. We turned one of the bathroom sink areas into our little kitchen. It was fun, but time to move on 

Zai jian to our little fake chu fang 

Our new apartment is really cold, but there is a real life-size fridge! 

On Saturday Holly got baptized. At her baptism, she had many many friends show up, and to my surprise many of her friends were also my friends! It warmed my heart to know that there is so much missionary work to do in Provo, and the people I love are a part of that.

Holly was so excited, and it was so heartwarming to see her being able to make that step with the help of so many great friends. If there's one thing I've learned from my mission, it is that as a missionary, I do nothing. It's up to the missionary efforts of every single person in the church, and we are missionaries are just there to help with the actual ordinance of baptism. Everything that comes before and after is just as important. 

In 2 Ne 31, it says, "if the Lamb of God, he being holy should have need to be baptized by water, to fulfil all righteousness, O then, how much more need have we, being unholy, to be baptized, yea, even by water!" 

Christ gave us an instruction manual of the way to return to live with God again; and I know that by following those instructions of having faith, repenting, being baptized, and receiving the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end, we can be perfectly happy. The problems of life won't go away, but we can face them with the confidence and peace that Christ had in His life. 

Sister Takeshige 

Loitering on BYU campus: