Hey, sorry about missing last week, we had a zone p-day in Hikari and so 12 missionaries were trying to get a hold of one computer to use for e-mail.... I was more than happy to let everyone go first, but then time ran out.... oops!
Ok, so first big news. Wednesday we had transfer calls! Can you believe it? It's already been 3 months with Elder Okada, and 4.5 Months in Yasufuruichi. Usually the calls come around 8:30 or so, but for some reason ours didn't come until after 9:30! That's a long time to wait while we keep getting calls from everyone asking what happened. So right now Yasufuruichi is a 4-man (well, 2 elders and 2 sisters) area, so it was way sad to hear that only 1 of the 4 missionaries are leaving. So I feel really bad for Sister Kaneko, the only one to get transferred out of Yasufuruichi this transfer. So, that means that I'm with Elder Okada for another 6 weeks (at least) and that we have another Sister coming in. This is going to make 6 months that I've been in Yasufuruichi and 4.5 months with Okada 長老. That's crazy! Good things are happening here, though, lots of work to do.
So, Monday's zone p-day (where everyone in the Hiroshima area gets together for a p-day) was Olympics themed. Now when I say Olympics, it was just a bunch of different games with some semblance of a tournament feel. We played Uno and Ninja (it's a great game, especially when you add foam swords and ninja masks to the mix) and this sweet game called 100. So, to play 100, everyone has a sheet of paper, and sits in a circle. There 2 dice and one pen. Everyone in the circle takes turn rolling the dice until somebody rolls a double; once somebody rolls a double they take the pen and right all of the numbers from 1 to 100 as fast as they can until the next person rolls doubles. When the next person rolls a double you have to pass the pen (or as it turned out, they will just steal the pen out of your hand as you write!) and then continue from whatever number they left off at. That's a great game to play with a bunch of 20-year-olds who just want to win. I ended up getting to 100 first and went to stand up but realized the table was in my way so I sat back down. But the act of standing got the chair all off balance and I ended up falling straight back onto the floor. It was all in slow motion and everything; I could feel the chair just tip and was not able to do anything about it. If this computer had an SD slot I would send the picture!
Speaking of pictures, I promise I'll get some out...soon. I'm not quite sure when but all it really takes is a SD reader, which this computer doesn't happen to have. One of these days I'll just hit up an Internet cafe and send over all of the pictures (that might be a little sketchy... )
Today I was reading in Acts about Stephen and then again about Saul. Stephen was preaching the word of God, related the account of Moses and all of the connections to Christ and was stoned to death for it. His last words to the people who stoned him were a prayer to God asking for their forgiveness. If we could find out how to have that kind of love, or at least see people in that sort of light, that would be a world I would like to live in, and that's the kind of person that I'm striving to be. Then there's Saul. He was pretty hardcore against the church, his whole job was to put Christians in jail. But even during all that the Lord had a plan for him, He even called him a chosen vessel. It's understandable why everyone didn't want to trust him when he said he converted. But he was still a child of God, he still had worth, and he still had a destiny to fulfill. There are going to be times where we meet with people that won't even give us the time of day, but that doesn't mean that they are bad people or the scourge of the earth. They are God's children, and He has a plan for them. Sometimes we might even be somebody’s Saul, earn back their trust, and prove you are who you say you are by your works.
Here's to one more Transfer in Yasufuruichi, and to everyone, HAPPY FEBRUARY (Okada 長老 didn't believe me when I said there were 2 r's in February).
Elder Everett
エベレット長老
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