Many Miracles

July 17, 2016


Hello Family and friends,
This has been a busy, spiritually enlightening week. I am so happy.
This week we were able to go to Sapporo for our Interviews with
President Nakatsuka. Our interviews were held in the new honbu, which
is on the Sapporo temple grounds. It is so nice. Elder birch(my
grandpa) made a comment about the new honbu, that I thought was really
interesting, "this honbu will probably be here until the second
coming". It is very true, because this temple, and the temple grounds
are very, very nice. A lot of money was put into this temple, and into
the temple grounds; the visitors center, the temple president and
temple workers building, and the honbu building (Mission home). The
work is truly hastening, and these buildings will stand through the
rest of the latter days. The temple is truly glorious. We were able to
go through the temple open house, and actually were able to do some
service in it as well. We got to have the job for about two hours of
opening the big oak doors to the celestial room, and then closing them
on the inside when the people came in, and then opening them for the
people to leave. It was such a great opportunity to be able to be in a
temple again, and to be able to spend a lot of time in the celestial
room. I love Temples. I am so beyond grateful that the Sapporo temple
was built, and that next month it will be dedicated. It will be such a
great blessing to so many people, and is planting so many seeds for
the people to go to see it. We have a good member and his wife in our
ward here, He was the previous stake president, and right now they are
serving a service mission from their home, but this good couple has
gone to the Tokyo temple every single month for the last 12 plus
years. They are a great example, and they are so very excited to have
the temple here. I love the Satous. The temple was the highlight of
the week, but the huge highlight that we had this week was this man
named Kousaka (co-oo-sa-ka) San. Below the portion of my journal entry
from Saturday when we found him.

....After that we wanted to go to visit the referral's that we
received from the Shimaitachi, and when we went to the first guy, who
lives on the second floor, I saw this other guy on the bottom floor,
and I just started talking to him, and when you first looked at this
guy, he looked like kind of an older man, who didn't really take care
of himself too much, he looked like he probably smoked a lot and
wasn't in the best health. He frankly looked like a pretty doubtful
prospective person to here our message, and be willing to change, I
unfortunately had these thoughts, but I did at least do my very best
to give him a chance, and because I did, God showed me that he loves
all of his children, and that the worth of souls really is great in
the sight of God. After talking to him for a bit, we asked him if he
wanted to talk about religion and stuff, and he waved us into his
house "Hairinasai." (Come in, Command form)) Haha it is so fun and
awesome when people say that. We came in and could barely make it
through his Gankan, because the door was kind of being pulled open by
this string, and his dryer or washer was just crammed in the Gankan,
so we had to squeeze through, like literally if I was a heavier
person, I don't know if I could have made it through this tiny space,
we had to turn sideways and slide through. Haha taking off our shoes
was really fun. After we got in we sad down in his living room, but I
mean this is just the kind of experience that you live for in Japan.
We walk in and literally I have never been in a room more packed with
stuff, and frankly a messier place. His bed and couch were across from
each other, with about 3 feet in between, which was where his table
was. His table was scattered with his cigarette materials, and he had
his can of some sort of alcohol. The kitchen was also right there in
the same room, and was piled high with dishes. Let's just say that
walking into his apartment and looking at everything was quite the
experience. Oh also on the other side of the table was his big, and
actually pretty nice, flat screen tv, that was of course on. Anyway
that is the setting with this guy, but we get in there, and we start
talking to him. We find out that he is retired, that his job when he
did work, was "cooking". He has lived in Tokyo for most of his life,
and then one other place, before finally moving here about ten years
ago. We asked him about a family or kids (he is 65 years old) and he
said that he does not have any, he appeared very very lonely, and I
felt so sad for this humble, goofy, kind man. We asked him what he
believed, religion wise, and he just said "My Cat!" In the best voice
ever. His cat was very cute, but it had a very interesting looking
thing on top of it that Bachman choro and I both thought was another
cat on top of it at first...Yeah, we later found out that the cat had
been ripped to shreds on the top of it's body by a bird, and so his
cat had some super crazy huge scars, fortunately the cat was able to
grow hair on top of these scars, so it didn't look too gruesome. The
cat's tail was also an extremely short stub, and looked as if it had
been cut off at some point in life. So now that you understand the
cat...he had such a strong and deep love for his cat. He talked about
his cat in a way that a man would normally talk about his wife; such
affection, and true happiness. I don't think that this man feels that
he has much to live for, but he definitely lives for his cat. Anyway,
we started talking to him about our message, and he was so receptive!
We taught him about the the Book of Mormon, and asked him if he would
read last two paragraphs of the introduction before next time, and he
pulled out his (broken) glasses and just read it right there! Haha it
was so awesome. We also taught him about the word of wisdom, because
he already knew most of it, and he asked about it. About halfway
through us being there, he pulled out a cigarette and asked if it was
okay if he smoked. We told him that it was okay, but that he would be
blessed if he didn't. He ended up not smoking the whole time that we
were there. He clearly didn't have too much for himself, but he
offered us drinks, and gave us two different juice drinks, I got this
melon one (melon;cantaloupe flavor is really big here.) But this drink
was way good! He also offered us a ton of snacks, and really wanted us
to just chill with him for a long time. He actually even said once
that he was really lonely. It was really sad. Unfortunately we didn't
have too much time, I told him that, and asked if we could come by
next Tuesday and Saturday. (Tuesday we have exchanges here, and I knew
that I would meet him on Tuesday, but that Bachman choro wouldn't, so
I figured maybe he would let us meet with him twice.) He happily
agreed, and we asked him if he would listen to our lessons, and he
said that he would. He said that we could come every day if we want!
Haha he is such an awesome guy. As we were about to get up to leave, I
felt really strongly that we leave him with a prayer. I asked him if I
could pray, and he said okay. We taught him the basics of prayer, and
then I said a prayer. The spirit was very strong, and the presence of
the Holy Ghost was very apparent. After the prayer, Bachman choro
asked him how he felt and he said that he felt a really calm feeling.
He said that what he was feeling is something that Japanese people
don't feel very much. We were so pumped! We explained to him that that
was the spirit, and that the spirit tells us when things are good, and
are true. He is such a golden investigator, and I have so much hope
for him. We left, and rode back home exhilarated from the biggest
spiritual rush. Bachman choro said, "I think that that is the best
lesson I have taught on my mission!" Haha it was such a happy
moment....

 I will be meeting with him tomorrow, and plan to challenge him to be
baptized. Please pray for Kousaka San.

I love you and I hope that you know how much your Savior loves you. He
is rooting for us, and the hosts of heaven are watching, and pleading
with us to choose the right, and to come unto Christ. Christ is the
way. He is the light, and the only way to find true happiness. I know
that the gospel is true. I know it. I know that Christ is my Savior
and Redeemer. I know that God is our loving Heavenly Father. I plead
with you to find out these things for yourself if you do not know. Ask
Heavenly Father in prayer, and if you truly desire to know, he will
tell you. I know he will. I testify of the truthfulness of the Book of
Mormon. If you want to grow closer to God, read that book. Thank you
for your love and support.
Love,
コノバー長老
Elder Conover