We Met Elder Cook in Fukuoka

Anyways so the reason we were in Fukuoka yesterday is because Elder Cook from the 12 came and spoke to us, and it was amazing. 

So first, the story of how we got there. We left Saturday night to go on a 12 hour ferry to Kagoshima, the bottom tip of Japan. We then took a two our Shinkansen ride up to Fukuoka, gathered, listened to the training, took another two hour Shinkansen back to Kagoshima, stayed the night there, and are having pday here in Kagoshima and go home tonight on another twelve hour ferry. But it was so worth it. Elder Cook got up and dropped straight fire. If he was a rapper, I would buy his mixtape. We were all sitting there studying and he walks in and we all stood, and the spirit was in that room so strongly because a literal prophet of God was in our midst. We all got to shake his hand and receive training from him. The part that stood out was when he talked about success on your mission and how we are "branch builders" or in other words, we strengthen the church wherever we are assigned to go. Obviously baptizing people is priority, but he said success is measured by how much you strengthen the people you work with and bring them closer to Christ. I had been thinking about my last area, Shimonoseki, where I had been for four transfers and hadn't seen any baptisms and I had been wondering if I was successful there or not. I was wondering if I failed there. As he was talking about that, the spirit told me that I had strengthened one of the Young men that was going on a mission soon, Genki, and that I had been successful. It was a very strong experience and I am so grateful for the Lord telling me that I had seen success there. If he cares for someone that worries about that, he cares about everything and anything you want and desire and worry about, and he wants to help you! I needed to hear the exact thing and I know for a fact now and can tell you strongly I was successful there. And then Elder Cook was talking about how he's been asked the question of whether or not the leaders of the church receive revelation like hey did in the bible or doctrine and covenants, and he told us that they do and that they know the Savior. They know him.

Anyways, my comp has been way sick this last week and we didn't really get out, so that stinks so we've been studying a  lot haha. Anyways, it's been a good week!

Also a kid walked up to me and hugged me on the street which was way cute but so weird haha I hope he liked big sweaty American.

We also found a Brazilian restaurant by where Hotokesama (guy who thinks he is God) lives. It was way good.

McDonalds breakfast in Kagoshima

 Me and Elder Palmer

The top of the boat

Inside the boat. It's just cubbies haha.

 

Last week, Sano Shimai taught us how to make Oshibana bookmarks, or pressed flower bookmarks and it was way fun and I made four.

Giant plates of curry for $10 is always a win. 

Broncos

So I got a Broncos shirt and tie in a package so I'm way pumped.

So this last week was a good week. So remember how we went down and back on a sixty mile bike ride? Well it paid off! We got a call Monday night from a lady we gave our number to that we met on a street after she approached us and she called and asked us if we can go down and teach her, even though it's way far, and so we said of course we can! And we got with the Sano's and they drove us down there an hour away (that's what they're here for as senior missionaries pretty much) and we taught her. She's like 60 and has depression and was super happy that we were able to come and visit her and she called again last night and I just talked with her for about ten minutes because I think she just wanted someone to talk to and we're going back again. Well after we taught her, we went to lunch and the Sano's like going to the beaches all over and so we went to three beaches on the way home and they were all way pretty and one of them is famous for the perfectly round rocks and the sounds the waves make on the rocks, kind of like Rice Krispies, and it was so pretty. Anyways, we also taught our other investigators and they're all doing good. Our high school aged kid believes what we tell him and when we asked if he would keep the word of wisdom he said yes, instantly. He's a stud and the only thing keeping him from being baptized already is church, because church is at 10, and soccer is often at 11.

This last week I've been thinking about something simple. Happiness! There's been many many many times on my mission where people have told me "I love being with you because you're just always happy, no matter what." I'm not saying this to level up myself but rather to show how living the gospel of Jesus Christ is the only way to have true happiness in your life. It's true. We hear it so much over and over again that it's become habit. But being a punk 19 year old selfish kid doesn't make you happy. Thinking about yourself doesn't make you happy. Neither does being lazy. Hard work, diligence, and charity make you happy because you're in a position to feel gods love and show that love to others around you. There's a scripture I read that I've been working on ever since I found it. I was praying one day about what I needed to do better as a person and be happier and the words came to my mind 1 Peter 3:10. Well, I had never read that before so I checked it out and it says

10 For he that will love life, and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they speak no guile:

11 Let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it.

Or in other words, if you want to be happy, seek peace, work for it, and love others. It's simple! It's true! And as I've been working on it, life has been infinitely better than before! Everyone remember that happiness is a choice! It's very much so a choice! We were made
to act and choose, and even though sometimes it's hard, we can be happy!

I love you all!
Elder Tschirki

#getbuckets

 Elder Sano

 

 Sister Sano

 Elder Wooston and Sanos at beach

 Broncos!

60 Mile Bike Ride

So as the subject says, me and Elder Beer, our Zone Leader who came down on Thursday, decided to ride down to the bottom tip of our wonderful island of Amami which is about thirty miles away. It took two and a half hours and I don't recommend riding in Japanese heat and humidity in church clothes. Needless to say we were tired. We then get to where we wanted to go, Setouchi, and we had about an hour and a half and we met some wonderful people. We tried visiting a less active but they moved, but as we were walking to our bikes a lady came up to us and talked to us and said she met missionaries a long time ago and she wants to meet again so we exchanged contact info. We then met a lady that took the Book of Mormon and gave us her number so that we can call and set up a time to come back and teach her. We also met a man that would love to be taught but he's going to Tokyo for a couple of months. So after a lengthy ride, we talked with who we were supposed to talk to. We had a really quick dinner and left right at 6:00 PM and made it home right at 9:00 PM. The ride home was probably the most physically hard thing I had done because it was all mountain and uphill tunnels that are 4000 meters long and it was really just grueling. Uphill for three straight hours at high speeds is not fun and I thought I was going to die. But then this happened.

I was praying as I was riding and my legs were starting to cramp up a little and we were still a little over an hour out. I didn't want to have to stop, I just wanted to make it home on time. We were both struggling, and I just kept praying and kept praying for help and strength and it never seemed to come. That's a little frustrating. With every pedal it hurt more and got tighter while going up hill, but as soon as the slope ended, simultaneously so did he pain and the tight cramps. They were gone. The rest of the forty minutes or so were easy, and it was still a good long ways out, but it was easy. As I was going down about twenty minutes out, I was thinking about what happened and the words came to my head "My shepherd will supply my need, Jehovah is His name." That was such a powerful experience!

If we try our hardest, and keeping working, and keep praying, we will be strengthened. We won't necessarily be delivered. BUT, Jesus Christ will strengthen you and enable you to be able to do things that you may not have been able to do in the first place. For me it was
thinking I was going to physically not be able to ride up these mountains, but as I kept going, I received the strength. The pain didn't subside during the hill, but as soon as I got up, it was gone. I had strength again. I know that Christ will help you in every and any circumstance you are in if you ask in faith. As President Uchtdorf said in his last conference talk, if you don't have faith, have hope. Believe. He can't force you to do better and work harder, that's your choice. But he can help you. That was my lesson learned this week, and
it left a big impact on me.

Anyways, Amami is great. It's getting really hot and it's 100% humid and way fun. I love it here.

Morals of this last week: follow the spirit and go where you feel like you should go, ride 60 miles and have fun doing it. I doubt y'all American serving missionaries have done that :)

Love you all!
Elder Tschirki

#getbuckets

Elder Beer is in the blue tie

 Missionary work up in the shacks in mountains

Poorly Planned Beach Cleanup Service Project

So as the title says, we cleaned the beach and it was poorly planned so it was just us four at the beach doing service for three hours. Shoutout to a certain fireman Brother Peterson for trying to teach us how to plan service projects from the Windsor second ward. We tried.
We needed your help. But it was fun and we picked up a TON of trash. Well, the Sano's came, so it was six people. BUT while we were at the beach, I found a massive blue hermit crab. Like it was huge. So elder Agnew kept it, and in revenge for last week's "mail box" incident, put it in my companions desk. So when we were planning that night, we heard scratching, and we didn't know what it was, and so we opened the desk and there's the blue hermit crab. So yeah. There's crabs everywhere here and obviously we're going to be doing pranks with them. Stay tuned.

So we taught a few lessons this week, and here's the rundown. They're all reading the Book of Mormon and loving it. They are receiving answers to their prayers and writing them down and loving the scriptures and everything written in them and how much they help their lives. But they don't feel like the time is right for them to get baptized yet. They're the most progressing golden investigators ever, just without the readiness for being baptized. So it's a little hard but there's not much else I can ask for. They have to progress at their own pace. But they are making huge progress in their lives and it's amazing to see how the gospel helped everyone!

Anyways, we just had training from the assistants today before email about obedience over Skype. So some thoughts I've had about obedience.

-it's the only way to get promised blessings from God.
-it's easier to follow God in the long run. 
-Obedience brings happiness.

Being obedient to commandments, even when we don't understand them will always bring us happiness. If we obey with a willing heart and believe in the blessings, we will get them. Every time. It's easy! We teach obedience everyday as missionaries and obedience is what changes lives! It shows that you trust God! So please, be obedient!

Sorry that wasn't deep, mind blowing doctrine like some weeks but I'll do that again sometime. I love you all!

Elder Tschirki



                                                                  Beach clean up squad

Sometimes people put barbed wire and lock the stairwells in apartment buildings.

Crab in the desk

Super Saiyan

Yep it's been 9 months but feels like yesterday but also a lifetime ago. Life's fun. Oh I'm staying here another transfer with elder Woolston #putinwork. 

This last week was good. Nothing super outstanding happened. One of our investigators Shigeta, who studies religions, said that he thinks that the church is small because it's kind of strict and people don't really want to join because there's a lot of rules. I was thinking about that, and you know what? It's true! Following Gods commandments are hard! He has high standards! He has the commandments so he can find his elect! Oh also, Shigeta wants to teach me and Elder Woolston some Soka Gakkai (a sect of Buddhism) mantras and prayers. He believes that religion needs to work together and find peace and world harmony. That's not wrong either. Do I want to learn Buddhist prayers? Actually yes, it sounds way cool. Will I as a missionary? I'm not sure. If I keep praying to God will it be okay? I'm not sure. I don't know what to do there so like help me out here. If I let this guy teach me a Buddhist prayer is that wrong? I have no idea really so yeah. He's way cool though and was an elementary teacher so he explains things very clearly and easily because he normally uses a massive vocabulary and knows more religious words than we do as missionaries and we know a lot. 

It's been getting really hot as in sometimes you have to come home and change your pants at dinner because your bum sweats a lot. It's humid and my hair is getting kind of curly. 

OH, I got to speak in sacrament meeting, play the organ (I play every week here on Amami) and teach Sunday school class on Sunday. The talk was really good and Japanesd wasn't a problem. I actually wrote it all in Japanese and just the ideas, not like a script. That was fun. But that's not what I'm going to talk about. 

What I feel like I should talk about is that God really truly answers our prayers and we can receive solid answers and guidance from our Heavenly Father. The formula is simple.

1. Have a question. (Joseph Smith did.)

2. Ponder it.

3. Pray with a very specific question and with real intent to act upon the answer. Pray with a pen in one hand and a paper or book in the other and show God that you're ready to write down the revelation that you receive. 

4. Listen. If nothing comes, ponder and read. 

5. Thank god again in prayer.

6. Act on what you learn.

Now to tie it all around, the mission has helped me figure this out. This is what I figured out works for me and I've gained a strong testimony that answers to prayers are very literal and guiding. This last week I had a question about how to not let setbacks determine who I am and how the best way to overcome temporary problems and setbacks are in regards to becoming a disciple of Christ. I prayed about it and almost instantly the thought came into my head to "read an Elder Bednar talk from 2007." I thought to myself, okay, there's like two so I'll figure it out. If it was just me making it up, well, that's dumb. I'm not going to come up with something like that out of nowhere. I'm usually thinking about Godzilla and Indo curry. So I acted on it and I read the first one, Ye Must Be Born Again from the April Conference. There, I found my answer.

"The spiritual rebirth described in this verse typically does not occur quickly or all at once; it is an ongoing process--not a single event. Line upon line and precept upon precept, gradually and almost imperceptibly, our motives, our thoughts, our words, and our deeds become aligned with the will of God. This phase of the transformation process requires time, persistence, and patience."

Conversion and becoming a disciple isn't a one time action! You don't get on Jesus' level of righteousness after one choice! But rather, it comes from a lifetime of choices that build up to what you want to be. In order to become something great, you have to set goals, be accountable, and work diligently for it. It takes time! Patience! Persistence! I found my answer! It's something I always knew but never really had applied. The gospel is about changing people from their natural, fallen state into Godly men and women. Its wonderful! So there's my lesson of the week. Prayer is real and I've had a number of other experiences like this too on my mission. God's there and loves each of us! 

Anyways I love you all! 

Elder Tschirki

I'm Super Saiyan (Dragonball Z) oh and I don't use hair product, the humidity is doing great things for my hair straight up.

 

We found a crab in the street and brought it home and put it in our mailbox for the other elders to come home to.