August 27, 2012

Hello!

 

Another transfer has passed, I have officially been on my mission for one year, and my new companion is currently on a plane on her way to Japan from the MTC! A big week! Picture #2 is of me beating out my companion's futon which are the beds (more like little mats) that we sleep on. Picture #1 is of how I celebrated my 1 year mark. Ate some ice cream. Looking back at the last year of my life and especially reading my journal entry from exactly a year ago, I realize just how different I am now. I feel like I knew nothing except that I love my Savior. Obvi thats good I knew that but I feel like other than that I was clueless. I feel like now I have a much clearer idea of what I want and what is really important. I am so excited that I still have 7 months to give my ALL to these beautiful people to help them come unto Christ.

 

This week I gave one of my investigators a piggy back ride. Facer shimai has the picture so I will have to send that at a later date but believe me when I say it was hilarious. You would have to know the investigator but I was literally crying laughing. I haven't given someone a piggy back ride in FORevzzzz. It was so funny!

 

So I don't know who I will be training yet. We will meet all the new missionaries tomorrow and then our Mission President will decide who we will be training. So next week be looking forward to see/ hear about my new companion!!!

 

This work is the best! It's all true!!!

 

Love you!!!!!!!!!!

love love,

xoxo

gg

August 22, 2012

Hello!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Life ROCKS!!!!!

 

No time no time sorry sorry! I'm doing the fastest email time of my life okay so here goes!

 

Picture number one: I'm obsessed with this picture mostly because I am obsessed with the people surrounding me in it. The one on my right is none other than our BISHOP. I LOVE THIS MAN. He is hilarious. Full on witty. And the other one is one of his couselors. They both ride their bikes to church every week. They are the bomb. We all had to take pics in our helmets. We're so cool.

 

Picture two: This is my current district. Each and every one of them so unique it hurts. I love every minute of District Meeting every week. It is like prime time television except a little more spiritual and no commercials or Ryan Seacrest. Love it!

 

Picture three: This is me at our local grocery store in the fish section that is bigger than all the other meat sections combined times 2 maybe. Anything you could ever imagine that comes from the ocean. What a dream. You may or may not notice but it just so happens that one of our investigators has a daughter who just so happens to do eyelash extensions. Don't doubt I went and got my eyelash extention on for p-day. That. Was also a dream. Told you I'd find them here. That pic is for you Jaycee.

 

Anyway, I'll let the pictures talk for this week. I love all of you, I love this work, and most of all, I love my Savior!!!

 

Until next week when I will most likely have a new companion!

 

love love,

xoxo,

gg

Ariel

August 13, 2012

Jungle fever as in we seriously live in a JUNGLE as you can tell by the picture of a spider I included. That was taken very close to our apartment in the entrance to a park we have to ride through to get to our church. This park is more like a jungle. The other picture I included was taken at an all mission conference we had a few days ago. The featured elder is my second cousin I never knew I had, Elder McGahan. Small world eh? Anyways he was confused when I marched right up to him and was like hey! we're related!!! I love doing stuff like that.

 

Sooooo this week...

 

Like I said we had an all mission conference and I LOVE those. It was the first time we have been all together since we got a new mission president. We did all kinds of things that if I wrote them you would think, what a DORKY missionary thing but I was eating up every second. If you would like to catch up with the details and much much more, feel free to visit japantokyomission.blogspot.comour new mission blog! There you can find all sorts of goodies! Just in case you would like to stalk me more! Anyways, I love mission conferences because they remind me that I am not alone and I have an army of thousands of missionaries around the world working towards the same GREAT cause. Not to mention I have the Lord with me every day. #luckily

 

We also had a ward activity on Saturday that was SO fun! It was a curry competition. Where everyone makes curry and brings it to the church and we EAT! It was delicious and SO fun!!! Especially because a couple of our investigators came and brought their WHOLE family! Activities are such a great way to help investigators realize how much of a family each ward is. I really love it. Also, as the third picture explains, we played a game where you get blindfolded and spun around and then go try to whack open a watermelon with a stick. Genious. I don't know WHY we don't play this game in America it is the bomb. Go ahead, try it at your next party, it'll be a hit for sure!

 

Believe it or not, sometimes missionary work is hard. I know, shocking right? Well remember the investigator I told you about last week? She called us before church yesterday and told us that she wouldn't be coming. Later we found out that it was because she didn't want to go because she doesn't understand Japanese. It is an understatement to say I was devastated. I was sitting in sacrament meeting just wanting to sob. BUT as I was praying during the sacrament I knew that no matter what happens, number 1: I have a Savior who is there for me and knows EXACTLY how I feel. number 2: I have to be strong and continue to brighten the day of everyone I come in contact with because I am a representative of Christ and that is what Christ would do and number 3: I feel like I have said this so many times but, the Lord has a plan for each and every one of His children. That includes Chou san and every other person I have ever met in Japan and every single person reading this email. He loves ALL His children. I feel SOOOOO grateful that I know that truth. I feel SOOOOOO grateful that whenever I feel alone I can get on my knees and remember I am NEVER alone. It hurts my heart to think that not everyone has that knowledge and THAT is why I am on a mission. I love it. I love Japan. I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

Remember, through love, we find happiness, through the love of God we find joy evermore.

 

I LOVE you!!!!

 

love,

xoxo,

gg

Ariel

August 7, 2012

This week was literally the bomb!!!!!!

 

Okay so we have an ivestigator named Chou san. She is the bomb. This is her story... My companion met her a few transfers ago on the street. She came up to my companion, saw her nametag that it said Jesus Christ and said to her "Jesus Christ, amen!" and then told my companion she wanted to learn and they exchanged numbers. Since then we have been trying to get in contact with this woman. We would call her ALL the time and she either wouldn't answer or couldn't understand a thing we were saying because she is Chinese and can't speak Japanese very well at all (don't doubt before my mission I thought Chinese and Japanese were like the same thing too). So we got one of our Chinese members to call her and even then it took a few weeks before we could finally get a meeting with her. So we met with her and our Chinese member and it was like a Japanese to Chinese to English translation game. We told her our purpose was to help her come unto Christ and asked if she wanted to meet again and she said yes but she would call our Chinese investigator when she wanted to meet because she is really busy which usually means "call you never".

BUT we had hope and patiently waited a couple of weeks until..... she called Qiu shimai!!!! (that's our Chinese member's name). We were by the train station one day about to get on our bikes to ride to visit a less acive and some potential investigators when we got a call from Qiu shimai. She told us that Chou san called and wanted to pray together so she was coming to Qiu shimai's house. She asked us to come over and of course we hopped on our bikes and got there as fast as we could. (despite my directionally challenged self which is a whole nother story in itself). So we get there and are soaking wet not from rain but from sweat and we wait. Well Chou san ended up not being able to make it but she told us she could come to church the next day when before she said it was too far!

Fast forward to the next day... we went and got Chou san from the station for church and she was literally giggling with excitement. We got to the church and sang a few hymns together before it started and she LOVED it. The first hour of our church is Relief Society so we started there and Chou san understood with the help of Qiu shimai translating for her. Fast forward to Sacrament Meeting. We were sitting down waiting for sacrament meeting to start and Qiu shimai taps my shoulder and is like, Chou san wants to get baptized! She said she wants to become a member of our church. She says she has been searching for a church since she got to Japan 5 years ago and today she feels like she found it. Of course this is literally the thing every missionary wants to hear. She started asking like who she needed to pay and exactly when she could get baptized, like how soon. Anyway we went on with sacrament meeting and it was fast and testimony meeting and the spirit was SO strong. Chou san was literally balling. After it was over she wanted to make a day to be baptized so we told her we had to teach her the lessons and stuff first and she was like okay I'm free whenever. Teach me. So we set up a lesson for almost every single day of this week and proposed for her baptismal date to be in 3 weeks and she was like no, I want it sooner. So, we have a baptism with Chou san in a week and a half!!!!!! We had her first lesson on Monday and Qiu shimai ended up not being able to come so literally by a MIRACLE we were able to teach her the first lesson. Ahhh!!! I wish I had time to tell more but obvi our schedule kinda filled up this week so we didn't really have time for p-day. I will tell more next week but just know that God is in the details!!!! I AM OBSESSED WITH THIS WOMAN!!!!!

 

I love this work!!!

I love my Savior!!!!

 

 

love love,

xoxo,

gg

Ariel

ps if you didn't guess the picture is of my companion and I with Chou san. The room that we are in is our church's chapel. That was the night we taught her her first lesson. She was like jumping up and down excited.