Elder Watkins Japan Nagoya Mission: March 2015

Tuesday, March 24, 2015

10 Doughnuts for 1 Dollar

10 for a dollar...

When you read that you might think that you can buy 10 doughnuts for the total price of 1 dollar together. Sounds like a good deal right? That's what me and Elder Nilsson thought on our kokan. Turned out it actually meant that there was a selection of 10 doughnuts that were 1 dollar EACH. We didn't realize this until the cashier at Mister Donut rang it up and gave us the donuts. We'd bought 20 of them. 10 dollars from each of us, and our favorite doughnuts weren't even amongst the 10. Burn.

Me on the Mt

This week we had iPad training by Elder David F. Evans of the 70, head of the missionary department and incidentally a former Mission President of our mission who also served here on his mission. He speaks Japanese very well and knows a ton about our mission, and he's a great speaker. I've heard him speak at the MTC and on a couple of broadcasts on my mission and he has become one of my favorite General Authority speakers.

While we did learn a few things about iPad dendo, the conference was mostly a voice of warning and a call to repentance. Elder Evens himself said "You've probably never heard a general authority speak like this to you." He was very direct and rather strong as he told us not only about obedience with iPads, but for everything, even after our missions. You can imagine there was a long portion about the evils of pornography, but he also spoke of other temptations that are put into our way throughout life. He told many stories and experiences from his life and about Yamashita Kaicho and other General authorities. We really enjoyed it! It was exciting and kept us engaged and made us realize what we need to do now on our missions to make our eternal lives the best.

It's Morphin time!

One very important thing Elder Evans talked about was how we have the ability to choose to be free from sin. The word "addicted" implies that you are trapped and can't choose to stop. That can happen, but only if you let it. He said that many of us have probably already seen some form of pornography, but if we were addicted, we would not be able to function as missionaries. We can still choose to stay away from sin and to repent before we get trapped.

On another note, this week I feel like we did our best, but it didn't show in our numbers, and we didn't actually see many of the folks we set out to see. I feel like I am becoming a better missionary, but nothing is happening for our area. I was confused, I know I can still do better, but why doesn't it seem to be working? I looked in the 2 Nephi 4 this morning and found that Nephi went through the same type of thing. I guess I need to trust in the Lord more, I don't have a whole lot of self confidence, but if I trust in Him, He can get us through.

Me on the Mt

And we had a fun weekend, we even got to go to a primary activity and jump on trampolines! I'm not sure that's in the rules or not, but it was only for 10 minutes haha. Well this week is transfer calls 1 week early. I don't know why, but perhaps President Yamashita is going to General Conference next week. Anyway please as always pray for something good to happen!

I love you all a whole bunch! Hit me up sometime. Maybe in the near future I can use facebook... but we will see haha.

Love,
Wat chan

Me on little Mt Fuji near the church

Happy Birthday to my Sister Jasmine!!!! And Anniversary of the day our puppy Cinnamon came to our home!!!!

Eikaiwa class

Elder Nilsson playing hangman at eikaiwa

Elder Nilsson on our kokan

Elder Dana

Elders Nilsson and Yamada (they are actually the same person) haha

Elders Uema and Vaughn

Nice house

New iPad book (still in draft form)

A Masked Rider name plate on someones door. A fellow fan!

Me and Becky at iPad Mission Conference

Housing swag

Me, Jackson, and Beck

Walking back to the station

All the missionaries at meito!

Moulten and Bills

Nilsson and Tallent in the park

Quaker Oatmeal?!?

Pegasus sign near a horse track

Samurai battle ground!!

Save the trees!

My Star Wars themed planner!

TuAkoi has taught you well!

Primary trampoline fun!

trampolines!

Lady walking her pig, don't see that everyday.

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Those Medellin' Kids!

Pic Tallent took at Hillswalk

Dear people,

How are you all? This week we worked hard and it seemed on some days like we couldn't do anything (it snowed on us for a whole day, etc), but it was good because we were doing the Lord's work. And wouldn't you know it, we did see miracles; one investigator prayed for the first time with us and looked in the Book of Mormon for answers to his problems and another investigator came to sacrament meeting. We my not always know what we're doing, but something is happening from it!

Me covered with snow

Saturday we had our last Kids Eikaiwa for a while. Reason being that Inagi Shimai who is the mastermind of it all has a new job that will take away from her being able to work on it with us. And it is a bit strange for just 4 dudes to teach these kids and their moms. So we had a big kids English party! We sang just about every children's song and nursery rhyme known to man, played games, and ate some goodies that Inagi Kyoudai brought back from America. It was fun, but sad that we won't see them for a while. Those kids are so cute! Working with them has taught me a bit about kids and being a parent/teacher someday. We invited them all to continue learning English from the missionaries personally whenever they'd like. The parents are all so nice.

I was touched when the older kids walked up to us and said, "Thank you!" to us. It was pretty neat to see that these kids really like us even though we switch every six weeks.

Snow on our bikes

We also got to watch a broadcast devotional from Tokyo where Elder Nelson of the 12 spoke. He talked about 15 gospel topics you can explain simply to your friends. He invited all the missionaries to stand including the ones far away. There were only 4 of us and 12 other members in the church in Nonami, but we stood anyway haha. Then Elder Nelson talked about missionaries for a minute saying that we "desire to help others have better lives" and that we are fulfilling a prophesy to gather Israel. It was pretty cool hearing it put that way. We don't always think of it like that, but it reminds me of why I'm really here.

Me being cool

I forget sometimes why I came here in the first place. But I remember when I see my pictures and letters and remember the missionaries and the Conway ward. And the scripture that says "If ye have desires to serve God, ye are called to the work" (D&C 4:3).

Well y'all this week we will get training on using iPads for dendo! We are looking forward to seeing this hastening of the work. Speaking of, you can now see a news story of elder Ballard's visit to Japan on https://www.lds.org/church/news/ so check it out if you have a slack moment.

Love you all and wish you all a good week! Please write me sometime too, I'd love to hear from more of you!

All dat love,
Watdawg Choro