Sister Crofts-Called to Serve

June 23, 2014

Minasan konnichiwa!!!

How is everyone doing?!?!?! I hope it has been a great week. June is almost over. WHAT. I am so grateful for the experiences I am having. I love my mission so much and my companion. OH MY I LOVE HER!!!! She is such an awesome missionary and we are working hard, talking to everyone, and seeing so many miracles every day. We are finding a new person to teach almost every single day. God is blessing us so greatly. Sister Moore is from Roy. So she is way good friends with Mitch and Makenzie Stevens and lots of people I know from choral edition. It is so crazy. She went to the U before her mission and is studying to be a doctor. SHE IS AWESOME.

Punam came to church this week! She loved it and is coming next week! Yayyyyy. I love her.

We went to Fukutoku for stake conference and on the way there we had SO MANY MIRACLES. We found 1 woman who had been an investigator 20 years ago and then the missionaries stopped coming and moved so she couldn’t find the missionaries again and has been wanting to find them again. She is not in our area but she wants to meet the missionaries again. Then there was one man who was listening to us having fun and we started to talk to him. He asked where our church was and ended up going to stake conference with us and watching it. He is going to be the elder’s investigator there. He loved it!!! Then there were all these people we talked to who were interested in the gospel. I love teaching Japanese people about Jesus Christ, even if it doesn’t have any meaning to them at first! At the end of the night, we just couldn’t believe all the amazing things that happened just from traveling by train and talking to everyone about the gospel.

We met this new Chinese girl named Su last week who we met with again on Saturday. We first taught her 30 minutes of English and then shared a message about our church. She is 21 and is living here with her friend, but at first she said “iranai” (I don’t need it) and that she wants to rely on herself and doesn’t think there is a god. So we talked about the Book of Mormon and introduced it a little bit. We asked her to read it and she said there was no way she would read it, but then we continued to share our testimonies about how important this book is and how much god really does love and know her. We finally asked her to read 1 Nephi 1 and she said okayyyy I will read it. Me and Moore Shimai’s goal is just to help her to believe in God. I don’t care about anything else if she can just know that there is a loving Heavenly Father who is there to help her! It was such a miracle that she took the Book of Mormon and said she would read it!

There was another woman we found last week who we visited today. When we went to her house we shared a simple message about prayer. She had never prayed and never even thought about God before. So we talked about how much she loves her children and how it is the same way God loves us. It was so simple, but I felt the Spirit burn so strongly in my heart. She was listening so intently and I know that she felt something.

Even though it is hard to find people that will join the church and progress towards the blessings of baptism, one of my favorite things about serving in Japan is the fact that they don’t really believe in God. I will tell you why. Because when I tell them that God loves them and that he is their Father, it is always kind of a shock and is always something completely different from what they have been told, or not told, their entire life. It is something that will be planted in their hearts forever- regardless of whether or not they want to hear more. I am doing everything I can to help them find greater happiness and peace. Every rejection hurts, but I just remember - this is what I was called to do! I am doing my best and I think that God has to be proud of me for trying, because it IS HARD and it IS SCARY and it IS discouraging sometimes. I have to let go of every ounce of pride and fear and just do it and let God help me. I am so blessed and grateful for these experiences... Gahhhhh IIIIIIIII loooooooooooovvvvvvvvvvvvvveeeeeeee mmmmmmmmyyyyyyyyy missssssssssssssiooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!

HAVE A KILLER WEEK

Crofts Shimai