No Regrets: Hastening the Work in Tokyo: God does not call the qualified. But lucky for us, he qualifies those he calls.

At the start of every letter I try to think back to everything that happened that week, I try to get it all down in the email, and then I always realize later that I forgot to write about a ton. As a missionary, the pace of life seems to be 2 or 3 times faster than regular life, and one week is enough time for a lot of change to occur. One whole transfer (6 weeks,) is enough time for a person to change completely.

That thought just hit me, but I'm gonna try to recount this week as best I can anyway. ;)

BIG NEWS! We were weekly planning and tried calling Fuji and the call canceled immediately for the hundredth time in the last 2 weeks. I stood up, because I was kind of really upset that he just disappeared off the map without saying a word and all we knew was that our calls weren't going through. Whether his phone was broken or our number was blocked, we had no idea, but we weren't about to just give up ever seeing our friend again without at least a proper goodbye. I walked into the other room, flipped open the other Elder's phone and punched in Fuji's number. No answer.

For about 2 minutes.

He called back and seemed shocked but kind of happy that we were talking. We caught up on life, and he was particularly happy to talk to Elder Frazier. He said work had gotten crazy busy and he was sorry he'd been gone. Well, fairly short story even shorter, we set up an appointment to play ping pong and talk.

I still haven't really talked to him much, but Elder Frazier met him on splits and had a great time, and he came to church and hung out with some of the members and had a great time! We were just so happy that we met him again. We've said quite a few prayers of thanks!

God does not call the qualified. But lucky for us, he qualifies those he calls. I have a very strong testimony of that. Within Elder Frazier and my area, the work is normal if not a little slow, but as soon as we go to the other Elder's areas, we always see wonderful tender mercies. For example: This week I was on splits with Elder Jones, and as we did all in our power to talk to every single person we could, we found a family that not only wants to hear the gospel, but wants us over at their house (which in Japan is somewhat rare, but easily the best opportunity to feel the spirit).

Elder Jones and I realized we both have bags given to us from
Elder Crosby!!! We really connected while talking about that man.

Last week, Elder Mutzelburg and I were able to do something similar and on our split we met a man who promised he would come to church but would not give us his number. Normally that a nice way of saying no, but the spirit confirmed to me that he'd be there as I prayed for him that week, and on Sunday Elder Mutzelburg gave us a call to say the man was there!

We do these half-day companion exchanges with every companionship in the zone, and in that time we have about 2 hours to go finding. In those two hours, we always find the most wonderfully prepared people, and I'm so grateful that God sets that up every time.

We have an awesome friend named Hiroki who we're also meeting every single week. He has a Christian background and loves the lesson and is doing well.

While streeting last week, Elder Frazier and I were also able to meet a man named Matsuda san who invited us over to his house!! But it gets better: his wife was also there. The two of them listened as we taught half of the Restoration lesson, and then asked if we could meet another day in the week to get dinner. So we got Indian Curry together and the two of them opened right up and we've become good friends. They want another ward member to meet with them which is PERFECT because without a true friend in the church, learning/coming at all is extremely hard. (*hint hint* anyone reading this, help your ward missionaries and befriend those they teach ;) Anyway, things are going great there.

One more really fun thing! My first day at Eikaiwa I hit it off with a guy named "Taka." He's also 19 and basically is like Sam Liechty turned into a Taiwanese guy who lived in Britain and speaks perfect English and wants to change the world. So naturally we got way tight! Every time we meet after English class we talk a lot. Apparently his father was baptized and that's what made him think to come when he received a flyer.

Anyway, we found out he was going back to Britain for school this week and so we had to have one last hurrah.

He came to our sports activity, we got all you can eat Pizza, and then we (in his words) "suited up" and ran out the door to hand out flyers for eikaiwa together like missionaries! He looked like a real missionary next to all of us. So much so that we took pictures with him wearing Elder Morris's name-tag!

I don't know if that's inappropriate... I don't think it is... anyway, we did it. I'm gonna miss him. He did way good and helped me get better at being a missionary! I'll definitely keep in touch with him!!