Monday, August 3, 2015

JT - Re-dedication day!

Yeah Japan

Dear Everyone,

So, yesterday, as the Japan Kobe Mission, we each had the opportunity to do a re-dedication of ourselves and the areas in which we work.  This Has the potential to change each of our missions and to change the people in their acceptance of the gospel significantly. I will talk more about it in a little bit. First, I'll talk about my week. It is dumb how Satan works. Whenever anything good is going to happen, Satan works so much harder to tempt you and to make everything seem to go wrong for you. For example, when people get really close to baptism, or serving a mission or any of those big, righteous decisions, they face so much opposition and trials. That is the pattern throughout all history, and the events leading up to the re-dedication was no exception. I'll be honest, this was one of the roughest, most discouraging week I have had in a long time.

Starting off with last Monday. We were on a train on the way back from shopping and what not for Preparation day. We had it planned so that we would get back with plenty of time to prepare for our lesson that we had scheduled at 6:30 that night. Timing was going to be comfortable for that. However, at about 4:45 on the train, the train stopped at one of the stations and wouldn't moved. It stayed in the same place for about 10 minutes before anybody asked what was going on. Apparently they stopped the train because of rain and they weren't sure when they would be able to continue going. We were still about a half hour train ride away from our station. After about 45 minutes, they had all of the people on the train get off and take a bus instead of the train. So, at this point, there was no way we would make it to the lesson because at 7:30 that night, we had FHE with a family. We wouldn't get back to our station until 7:00. So, we needed to call the person to tell him we wouldn't be making it, however, our phone died for no apparent reason! It ran out of battery even though we knew that we charged the phone. What else? Elder Brown got up and could not find his wallet. It was gone. Also, it wasn't really raining at all but yet they still stopped the trains. That was all really frustrating and super unfortunate. Well, we were able to borrow someone's phone and call our investigator and we were able to make it to the FHE. However, Elder Brown didn't have a wallet, which had like everything in it. So next day, we needed to go try to find his wallet. We had to file a police report, had to walk about an hour to get to a place that the police station told us to go, fill out paper work and then take the hour walk back to the train station in order to get back in time for Eikaiwa. The walk back was pouring rain. Out of no where, pouring buckets of rain. That was insane and so unfortunate. Our week was absolutely filled with moments like that. Also, every single person that we tried to visit this week wasn't home. Every single one of them. We also had a few appointments set up with people, but each one of them either called and cancelled or weren't at home. What's more? Our investigator who said she wanted to get baptized is super busy with work all month with no days off, so it looks like she isn't going to get baptized until at least next month. That I'm not worried about because she will get baptized and it really doesn't matter when she does it, but that was another unfortunate thing that I didn't particularly enjoy. It was a rough week, but I have faith that it will go up from here.

Oh by the way, they were able to find Elder Brown's wallet and we got it back on Friday. Everything was still in it!

So here is what the week was building up to, the thing that Satan was trying hard to stop happening. A couple weeks ago, during Zone Conference, President Welch was talking to us about his mission (He served here in Kobe Japan). He showed us the number of Baptisms his mission had each month he was on his mission. There was one point on his mission where the numbers jumped significantly, like an average of 30 per month to an average of 75 per month. (I don't remember the actual numbers, but it was that dramatic of a jump.) how/why did that happen? He said that the month of the jump, his mission president had all of his missionaries do a re-dedication. That day, each missionary said a prayer in which they re-dedicate themselves to missionary work and each companionship re-dedicate their areas for the people to accept the gospel. They did that and they saw a huge increase in their numbers. President Welch decided that now would be a good time to change the mission by re-dedicating our areas. He told us, "on August 2 between 6:00 and 7:00, we will be doing this as a mission. Prepare for it." So after all the personal preparation and the study that led up to this event, we re-dedicated ourselves to being a missionary as well as re-dedicated the area of Maizuru under the direction of President Welch. It was a great experience and we are all so excited to see the results of this effort. I really need to work harder to be more focused on helping these people and being totally obedient to the Lord in order for this to work out. This requires a lot more work, dedication and consecration in order to bring this to pass. I am way excited because I need a change in my mission and in my life. I have so many things I need to change, I need to work so much harder and I am grateful for this opportunity to do so. So, stay tuned for what happens because of this haha.


This is the place where we did the re-dedication of the area and our
personal re-dedication. Very beautiful place and many bugs that would
bite you.

After the dedication, we looked at the sun and it was a perfect dark red circle.  It was pretty crazy!

So yeah, crazy week. It probably seems like I am complaining a lot in this email, but I know that everything is alright. God is in control of all this and I trust that everything that happens happens for a reason. I trust that if I just keep doing my best to be obedient and doing all I can to fulfill my purpose as a missionary, it will all work out in the end. When things are hard, I always remember the quote that hangs in my Grandmother's house; "I never said it would be easy. I only said it would be worth it." Love you all!

Love,
ラムロー長老 Elder Lamoreaux
日本神戸伝道部 Japan Kobe Mission


Selfie on the bus with some High School kids


Pretty nice view of part of our area

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