Christmas time is here!

Hello everyone! Welcome to the official best time of year, Christmas time! A whole season dedicated to celebrating Christ's  does not get better than that! I love Christmas!

This past week was way good, it was probably the busiest one so far. A lot of crazy encounters with people happened. For example, we were biking down the left side of the road. Biking in the same direction down the right side of the road was a kid around 18 years old. So, we catch up with him, and just kinda start talking/yelling to him from across the road. Apparently that was enough to catch his interest, so we talked for a while, and got some contact info, and set up a meeting with him later. It was way cool, Heavenly Father was definitely working out the details of that one.

On Thanksgiving Day, we had our Zone's Christmas conference. It was way good, there was so much that was said about raising your vision to what God's vision is. We have no idea the potential we have, even in this life. Like, we know that we can become like God in the life to come, but what about now? What does tomorrow hold in store for our potential? To quote Elder Uchtdorf's talk "A Summer with Great Aunt Rose", "Now is part of eternity." Every day, we can rise to our Father's standard for us. For example, maybe today God wants you to be a bit more patient, a bit more loving, show a bit more faith in Christ. Fulling God's will for us everyday is how we prepaid to fulfill it for eternity. So, this week try just s bit harder, when you feel like you can't go anymore, just keep trying, I promise Heavenly Father and Christ can make up the rest.

Keep up all your good work! I love you all, and appreciate all of your letters! Have a fantastic Christmas season!

Elder Nelson

PS Thanksgiving dinner was a bowl of instant curry made in our apartment. Needless to say, 'twas delicious.
PPS Today I was an adult. I clean a drain.
PPPS In Japan, it's pretty common to have business cards for yourself. This week I got mine! I think I'm one of the first missionaries to put his Instagram on his cards. Call me Elder Trendsetter

I'm not creative enough to make a good email title.

I hope you all had as good of a week as I did, cause that would mean you all had a fabulous week!

First off, we had stake conference! It was way good, my favorite part was they had a priesthood session which I got to go to. There were quite a few missionaries at that one, so I think they used some slightly slower, easier Japanese, but I understood a good 95% of what went on that meeting. It was way good! I can't promise that I understood a lot during the normal session of Conference when there were a ton of native Japanese speakers.... But it was good anyways! The people here in Japan are way better members than I am. Most of the talks in priesthood session focused on member missionary work, and the people in the ward are way more helpful than I ever was. So basically,
I need to pick up my slack! Member missionary work is way important! So, if you have any way you can help your local missionaries, do it! You'll make there day and hopefully move the work of the Lord further!

This week was crazy, we had three days in a row where our investigators bailed on our lessons, but rescheduled at later times in the day. It was great that we got to meet with them all, but since some rescheduled, and then came a bit late to our lessons, they overlapped with another persons lesson! So, we kept going on splits with the other Elders in our area to cover everyone. It was way stressful, but way good! Lots of going off the fly and just following the Spirit to make everything work out!

I was studying from Preach My Gospel the other day, and a way cool line jumped out at me. It says, "Heaven is a continuation of the ideal home." That made me stop and think for a while, and I noticed that everything in the gospel is there to help strengthen our family relationships and make them last into eternity. Through Christ and His atonement, we really can live together as families forever. I'm so grateful for this gospel and the happiness it brings to me!

I hope you all have a great week! Love you all! Happy Thanksgiving this week!

Elder Nelson

PS For people at Timpview, I ran into Elisa Toma at Stake Conference. Pretty cool!
PPS A little glimpse into how Japanese I am. I didn't know what to make for breakfast, so I just cooked some rice and poured milk on it. Yum.
PPPS I got to get stuffed in a train the other day. Way fun!

What are the chances you run into someone from Provo in Tokyo?

Hello everyone! I hope you've had a great week. Like, at least a level 12 kind of week!

First things first, the coolest thing I the world happened on Saturday. Elder Brown and I were up in Chofu, a neighboring city to Fuchu, and were handing out fliers to our free English class. While I
was doing that, out of no where walks Kisho Noda! Some of you people might remember him from Provo, he did a 10 month long exchange program, so he got to know quite a few people in Timpview. Way cool miracle! We are almost never in Chofu, and he said he never walks the way he did, but we both ended up there at the right time. Heavenly Father had His Hand over us that day, making everything work out so we could meet. It was way great!

We had splits with the Zone Leaders this week, so I got to send Elder Brown off and work with Elder Jesperson for a day. He is a way great guy, and way funny. He and I did some streeting for a couple hours on our way to a potential investigators house, and met some awesome people. One kid was in high school, and had an umbrella disguised as a sword. So, you now, Japan.

There was so much rain over the past 3 days. We were biking home from Chofu, and when we got to our destination, every part of us was soaked. But, since I had the rain coat of Champions, I wasn't nearly as wet as Elder Brown. Let me say, getting rain on and having a helmet on gives you some wacky hair styles. Way fun, I was grinning like a dork the whole time because of how both cliché biking in the rain is for missionaries and just how much fun it was to be out.

This week, I was reading from the Book of Mormon, and read from the Book of Helaman. In chapter 9:4-5, the Lord says some amazing things to Nephi. I would recommend reading those verses, and ponder how you can be like Nephi, how you can be better in your life and have access to all those blessings. I know that it's helped me so far, and I will definitely keep trying to improve myself. That's what this is all about, improvement and become more like our Savior.

Love you all!
Elder Nelson

PS There are a ton of Christmas lights all over the place, pretty much the best thing ever.
PPS Much like PS, I have found the Christmas Spirit.
PPPS At McDonald's here, the have a thing called Shaka Shaka Chicken. It is amazing.

Aaaaaaaaand we're off to another transfer!

So, transfer week has come and gone! Elder Yamada has left my side, and in his place I now have Elder Brown. He's a way cool guy who loves to work hard ands how is getting a lot of good things done. He's from Spanish Fork, Utah, and went to Berkley for a year studying Physics.
So, things are going great here!

This week has been way good for me, for several reasons. One, with Elder Brown, we are stopping and talking like crazy with everyone, and already found some new people who have some interest. Way cool! I think the best part of all this contacting that we are getting done is that we have plenty, little opportunities to share our testimonies with people we just met. Like, in one hour, I get to share how I feel and what I know about our Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the Book of Mormon. It's crazy! That's probably one of the best parts I've seen about serving a mission so far, just getting to bear my soul out to people, and every time, without fail, getting a little reassurance from the Holy Ghost that what I said was true. I read an amazing talk about this called Candle of the Lord, by Elder Packer in the January 1983 Ensign. It's very inspiring and I'm so glad I get to apply all those principles in my daily life.

One of the coolest moments I've had with an investigator lesson so far happened on Sunday. We are teaching a man named Fukushima, and we're talking about faith in Christ, and we showed him the video of Christ healing a man blind from birth. I felt like I should ask him if he had ever needed something like that in his life, some help from God. He just broke down and told us all about his struggles and everything that he's had to go through. The amount of love I felt for that man was indescribable at that moment. I know that this work is the Lord's work and He wants us to help all His children come back to him, and partake of His love. I'm so glad I get to go along for the ride as the
Lord's servant and give all I can to this work.

I love you all, and hope you have a great week! Have fun listening to Christmas music on the radio!

Elder Nelson

PS They say you change on your mission, and now I can report that this is true. I now eat veggies. What.
PPS I found a good place to buy donuts. Yes.
PPPS Time flies, like, it's already November. What is life.
PPPPS I found a thing called hair wax. Not hair gel, hair wax. I now understand how anime characters style their hair. This stuff is amazing, my hair game has never been so on point.

Elder Brown just doing his thing

Miracles up the proverbial woozza

Man, this has felt like the fastest week in my whole mission. Such a good week!

So, a lot of this transfer has been Elder Yamada and I just trying to find some people to teach. We have a good number of potential investigators, but no one who really wants to hear our message right
now. Well, something finally happened! We were out trying once again to contact this guy in his house who Elders had found the previous transfer, but haven't been able to contact since. We knocked on his door, and talked with him for a good long while. We taught him about who a God is and how he can talk to him through prayer. He said he didn't really know about God, and looked me square in the eyes, and asked, "How do you know is even real?" Let me tell you, when the scriptures say that you will be given what you need to say in the moments you need it, they were not kidding. I looked him right back in the eyes and bore him my testimony of God, of Christ, and of the power of prayer. Apparently, the Spirit worked through my broken Japanese enough to get to him, because he really started listening, and we eventually set up another lesson with, which went way well. It's so
nice to be working with him!

Another cool finding experience was running into this older man while housing. He was really cool, and we had a great lesson about the apostasy. It was another experience where both Elder Yamada and I felt really good about meeting him, and we're super excited to work with him. We know that the gospel will be a huge benefit in his life.

So, this week I've been thinking a lot about testimonies and how to grow ones faith. What I've found is that the act of bearing ones testimony is the best way to actually grow one. As someone said in a
talk that I read, was that part of sharing is testimony is staying strong to what you know and hoping for what you don't know. Don't be afraid to share something that you only hope is true, as that is the
leap of faith that our Heavenly Father requires of us. That is my challenge for everyone this week, take that step, and let our loving Father  fill in the space. Part of finding is giving, and in the act
of giving, you will find.

Love you all! Have a good week!
Elder Nelson

PS I went to the DI equivalent of Japan today, just to look around and see if there was anything that I wanted, and it turns out that Nintendo stuff is way cheap here. Like, I walked up, and there was a
box full of Nintendo Wiis, Gamecubes, Gameboys, DS, anything. All of it was super inexpensive.
PPS I ate at a restaurant that all it served was cabbage pancakes. It sounds weird, but it actually was really good. The Japanese translation of the pancake stuff is "anything you like, fried". So, cabbage pancakes with almost literally anything.
PPPS My ward has so many cute Japanese babies. Like, so many. It's ridiculous.
PPPPS For exercise, I've convinced the entire apartment of Elders to do ab workouts. Now, every exercise day is ab day. Yes!

Also, an experience that I just remembered from this week that I have written down. This last Fast Sunday (yesterday) was a very good one for me. My whole life I've been trying to make Fast Sunday's the joy that we're promised they should be, and it actually happened this week. For the first time, I fasted for a specific blessing, or a specific investigator who I have great faith in, and I want to see him progress like I know he can. So, I dedicated this fast to him receiving his answer to his prayers, and that I would best know how to help him. Every time today I was hungered, or tired, or my body hurt, it just served as a reminder that I was doing this to help someone else, and it just put a huge smile on my face and a prayer in my heart.

Love you all!

A park that we ran into today in the rain.