The Immediate Goodness of God

Konnichiwa minasan! 

We've finally reached the end of the line (in four days haha). I'm not really sure what happened, General conference just kind of eclipsed everything. It was really good and I took a lot of awesome notes. But the best part of this week was honestly just all the progress Myoujin Kyoudai has been making and so that's all I really wanna talk about.

You see, he got a new job the week before last that made it so he couldn't come to church, which, for obvious reasons, made us very sad. Church that week was significantly more lonely. But then on Tuesday we get a random message from him asking if we were planning on being at eikaiwa a little early that day. We said yeah, and asked why, and he hedged about and said "oh I just wanna talk." so we pressed a little further and lo and behold, the greatest miracle: "I said I wanted to talk, but really I just wanted to tell you I can come to church Sundays again. Long story short, I decided I hate having to work instead of coming to church." It was at this moment that I understood Alma 29:16. We probably sent him like 15 different rejoicing stickers and also a voice message of us screaming in joy. He laughed. It was great. And it doesn't stop there!

The next day we and the elders had an appointment with him again to help him out with his apartment, and we had decided to give him a new copy of the Book of Mormon with the Jesus Christ challenge and some colored pencils. And since then he's been reading and marking stuff that he's liked. He even brought it with him to game night on Friday so he could show us. He said he's trying really hard to really understand what Nephi is trying to teach in 1 Nephi, and I'm so proud of him for trying so hard. But wait! There's more!

I had told him to do his best to take notes during general conference on Sunday, and he actually did! He had like five separate notes on his phone, and he told me "I've never focused so hard in my life. I understood like half of the talks. My head hurts now." It was super cool too because out of nowhere he started looking through our LINE conversation for a scripture I had sent him last week, D&C 58:42, and said that he really liked it and was glad I sent it to him. It made me very happy. He's been doing so good. All the stuff that's happened with him has reminded me of Elder McKay's talk from general conference. None of these things are necessarily huge things, but they manifest the immediate goodness of God and how much He loves his children. The miracles are always there, it's just up to us to notice them. 

Other stuff happened too, most notably visiting Yabuuchi Kyoudai on Friday. He lives far away, but he's really cool and we felt like we should visit him, and man oh man did that become an adventure. I swear the man is a literal Disney princess. He's a bit of an interesting soul, and when we got there so I could give him my meishi before I left, we found out that missionaries hadn't visited him or given him a meishi for three years, so he was so happy we'd come to visit him. We had a lovely little lesson with him about peace in Christ, and we were able to set up another appointment with him to make baked potatoes. And then he was worried about us going home so he biked with us all the way back to the church, and it was even more of an adventure. He stopped randomly once and plucked some seeds from a dead plant and told us they were asagao seeds. How he knew, I have no idea. And then he stopped randomly again, did a bird call, and a whole bunch of birds answered him back! Apparently it was a really famous bird too. It was wild. It was really quite the day. 

And you know, at the end of my mission, I really feel like the best part has always been these relationships with people that I've been able to create. There are days I will never forget simply because they deeply involved people I can never forget. There are eternal friendships I have forged with people here that bring me indescribable joy. It's feels a little silly to say, but it's the moments where someone I worked with and care about so much sends me something as simple as a shrimp emoji out of nowhere that really make my day. It's the simple but significant things, when the brother you've been working with tells you “I didn't think I had any eternal friends, but now I know I have one” or when a sister tells you that what you said was exactly what she needed to hear. It's visiting the brother who lives an hour away by bike to give him a meishi and finding out that he hasn't been visited or given a meishi for three years. It's when a sister who's been investigating the church for years invites you to come with her and her family to visit the grave of her father. It's seeing a brother use the note you gave him encouraging him to go to the temple as the bookmark for his Book of Mormon. I love these people so much, and being with them, serving them, and loving them has brought me so much joy. There are so many amazing things that happen, and so many tender mercies every day, I can't list them all even though I want to. But being with people and sharing love with them, whether it be a spiritual moment, or when a 6 year old tells you he wants to serve a mission in Disneyland, has really made my mission the joy that it is. It's hard to leave, but that's okay, because relationships are among the things we can take with us after we die, and even when we move far away. They really have become one of my greatest treasures. 

See you all in a few! 

愛しています！💕 

Sherwood 姉妹

1.) we found old glasses in Myoujin kyoudai's apartment and Dettmer Chourou looks like a professor lol

2.) Yamatokoriyama district #squad

3.) the best dying photo ever

4.) we found prickly pear

5.) sakura! 

6-7.) yabuuchi kyoudai, the man, the myth, the Disney princess

8.) biking with yabuuchi kyoudai