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| We wrote Kanji! |
Hello Amazing Family!
Wow I can't believe another week has gone by, and now it's 2015!! This year really went by so so so fast, and I can't believe it's been another New Years in Japan! I definitely missed you guys a bit during this week, but it was such an awesome week full of amazing miracles! Heavenly Father has truly been so kind and loving with the blessings he's been showing to Elder Higashi and I. Elder Higashi is such an amazing missionary, and I feel so thankful to be working with him. He's such a great example of faith, diligence, and just having those really pure intentions in serving the Lord. He's an awesome companion, and I feel so thankful to be serving with him! It was such a cool week!
With it being the week of New Years, it's one of the largest holidays in Japan, and most of this week we're not allowed to be out proselyting, but it actually ended up being one of our most productive weeks so far in the transfer! We had many different dinner appointments with members, and we were able to meet with many of our investigators and have great lessons with them! As well on the 1st we had a mission wide Read the Book of Mormon all day, and it was such an amazing experience. It was so awesome to feel that fire of the Book of Mormon once again, and refresh that testimony again at the start of the new year. I read almost all of Alma, and it was so awesome to read of the missionaries, and the many miracles of faith that they witnessed. One person that stood out in my mind was Amulek! I've never before realized how much he left behind to serve God, and I was so impressed with his desire to serve God, the acknowledgement he had of his weaknesses, but his overall unshakable confidence in Heavenly Father and the Holy Ghost. It was so awesome! But I'm really excited to share what happened on the 2nd. ;)
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| With Elder Barnes and Elder Killpack |
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| Us and Ryo at the bishop's home |
So! We had a mission New Years conference actually in my old area of Urawa, and so all of the missionaries met to celebrate the Christmas miracle, and get ready for the new year! It was so crazy not seeing any of the sisters that I was with in the MTC, but it was so awesome as usual to see so many of the missionaries I love and have impacted my life so much. It was such an awesome conference, and I felt so thankful for all of the amazing miracles Heavenly Father has shown everyone during the year! What was WAY cool though was later we watched Meet the Mormons as a mission! Oh... And the way cool thing was I was asked to translate it into Japanese for the Japanese missionaries! I had the whole microphone and everything, it was so cool! So so so hard, but really just a cool miracle and experience I'll remember for a way long time. :) I felt so thankful for the gift of tongues, and just the opportunity Heavenly Father has given me to learn this amazing language! I love Japanese so much, and I'm excited to keep learning more! Heavenly Father has truly helped me so much with learning Japanese, and I feel so thankful for the chance to keep learning and striving to master the language! I love Japan and Japanese! :)
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| New Year! |
There were so many awesome miracles this week, and I felt such a strong feeling of thankfulness to this whole year Heavenly Father has given me. In this year I truly felt the love of our savior Jesus Christ, and especially the powerful love he has for his brothers and sisters here in the country of Japan. It makes me pretty sad to know that this year I'll only be a missionary for half of it, but I'm so thankful for the amazing full year of being a missionary. It's completely changed me from the person I used to be, and it's shown me the person that I really want to strive to be. I've set a goal as well this past week to be a seminary teacher by 25 or 26! I hope I can be as awesome teacher as Mom and Dad! Haha, but my mission has truly given me a vision of the person I really want to be in this Gospel, and I'm so excited for the future! I know that as I keep giving a full effort every day and give my whole heart and soul to these 5 months, it's going to be truly life changing. I love serving as a missionary with all of my heart, and I'm so excited for the things ahead. :)
It sounds like everyone is doing so great though! I'm really excited to hear where things are going with the "people" I heard about during the conference call! Please keep me updated! I'm so thankful for all of the amazing blessings Heavenly Father is sending to you guys, it makes me so stoked to keep working harder! I'm so thankful for all of the awesome love and kindness you guys always share with me. It truly has blessed and impacted my life in so many amazing ways, and I'm so thankful for the amazing family I have. Thanks so much for all you do for me, and always the outpouring of love, I really do appreciate it so much. :) Love you guys! But anyways, it's been a really amazing week, and I'm so excited to keep going forward with faith, and continue to give this work my whole heart! I love you guys so much, have an amazing week!
Love,
Elder Justesen
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