Letter from David

Manao ahoana ianareo! Hello y'all! 

Inona no Vaovao? How are y'all?

Y'all aren't going to believe this.... I got my visa!!! This morning my Mission President called me and informed me that my visa had been approved both by Madagascar and the US. They have my itinerary for the flight there. I am going to fly from Lubbock to Dallas, and here I will meet my MTC elders (who i miss dearly and can't wait to see) then I don't know where I'm flying from there other than Madagascar. But it actually happened! I'm so happy, and I cannot properly put into words how amazed and grateful I am for all of your faithful and humble fasts, prayers, and words of advise for this to happen. The Lord will surely bless you with a rain of blessings. 

Ok, phew. That was a little crazy. I'm going to get to what happened this week (plus another side story of Pablo for those of you who are amused from hearing about him). Ndao ary isika!

Tuesday: Elder Ward and I went to Amarillo for district counsel to discuss what had happened with our investigators the last week. Now, Elder Ward drives a truck....a Toyota Tacoma. We had a part recall on one of the engine parts and we had to get it to the dealership in order to change the part. This would require us to carpool. So, we had to call the zone leaders in Amarillo and have them pick us up from the dealership which you have to understand is absolutely humongous, even for one in Texas. Also, the street was so busy, it was nearly bumper to bumper when the light was red, no chicken was going to cross that road. We had district counsel and had an amazing discussion on families and how we can be better teachers. We did some roleplay and the we left. When we were on our way back, we decided to get a car wash at a place called quick quack car wash. The logo was a yellow duck wearing sunglasses, which i thought was interesting. Whenever we go there we see from time to time a yellow duck mascot pulling some hilarious dance moves outside the wash. But we didn't see him this time, which was a little sad, because he always makes me and Elder Ward laugh a ton. We came back to Tucumcari and did some finding. I knocked on an old lady's door and we got to teach her a little bit. Her name is Joanne, and she has a ton of potential. We got to teach her about the restoration of the gospel last Tuesday, and it was amazing. 

Wednesday: There is a man that me and Elder Ward would go and visit in the hospital named Mickey. He was such a strong soul even though he is in his 90's. He fell from his front porch and broke 3 ribs and punctured a lung, and he had to go to the emergency room in Amarillo for some medical treatment. Fortunately, he didn't need to have surgery. We visited him for a few weeks, and on Wednesday, we found his room empty, which meant he had made it home safely. I am so grateful for him and for his spirit he carried with him. After that, we did some more finding and I want to share a story about finding real quick. A couple of days ago we went finding and we went up to a house that elder ward felt impressed to go to. Before we even got to the porch, a brown retriever like dog stopped us and just looked at us, it didn't bark, didn't growl, it just stood there in our path. Then when elder ward tried to pet him, the dog started to growl. And it scared us for a second because we didn't know if this dog was chained or not, but after we backed up for a while, we found to our relief that it was chained, so we went back. But the scariest part was the growl, because the growl sounded like a truck without a muffler in slow motion. I've seen some musicals with dogs singing in it, and this guy wasn't musical at all. He just wanted to eat us. That's what happens!

Thursday: We had another lesson with Dawn again and we had it at a members home. The name of the member is JD. He is super nice and always allows us to come over. We had a lesson at his home and we also gave Dawn a blessing for her back. Her back seized up because she was trying to grab something and her back tightened up. Poor gal. She said she felt better after the blessing, which was good.

Friday: There are certain types of birds down here in Texas and New Mexico called Grackles. They are in a lot of ways similar to a type of bird called the lyrebird, which can imitate virtually any noise from a chainsaw to a camera shudder. When the Grackles are around, I am always interested and amused at how they sound. They sound like monkeys blowing into cazoos. We did some more finding and we really didn't find anyone to teach. We got home and did some research on our area book, which is a pain in the you know what to organize. We are still in the process of organizing it.

Saturday: this was the day that I was especially afraid that we would have another confrontation with the infamous Pablo. We didn't end up doing service that day, but instead we went around town looking for formers and inactive members. We managed to edit our Master list so that it was updated to the best of our ability, and it still has a couple of flaws in that which we are trying to fix. We did some more finding, and we saw a man named Paul who said he was looking for a church to go to. He said that you would come to ours, but he didn't actually come. Elder Ward and I are still trying to work up the courage to go finding on a college campus in town here, and there's not a lot of people to go finding for in the first place, but I'm sure if we do it then we'll find someone to teach. This is an average Saturday to us Tucumcari elders.

Sunday: I had the privilege in helping the primary with practicing for their primary program next Sunday. I absolutely love playing the piano for them, they are such a joy to me, and I love their little voices. This Friday, we will be having a primary program party at sister Swapp's house, and there's going to be a lot of fun there with games and singing. Next Sunday is the primary program, and I am not that nervous (which I probably shouldn't be). I got to thinking, what are my spiritual gifts? I had never actually had this concern before until this moment. To be honest with you all, it was actually pretty stressful. I looked up and down over and under for the things that I thought I was capable of doing, and nothing seemed to come to mind. There was a member of the high counsel there, and he told me he already knew some of the gifts that I had. I was a little bit astonished. He said that I was very musically talented and I was Fearless and many other things. This opened to me a different aspect of my life that I never found before. I'm grateful I got to talk to him into refresh some things in my mind.

Alright, now for the Pablo story. 

Dawn, one of our investigators, was asked out by a very mysterious 33 year old man we didn't know, until I looked at his profile picture on Facebook and found to my horror that it was Pablo who had asked Dawn out. We told her to block and avoid him. She did so. We saw him last week at the Ministry of hope while we were doing service. This lady I don't even know asked us about one of our investigators who lives right next beside her. Before I could change the subject, Elder Ward said her name was Dawn, and I looked over and Pablo had a weird look on his face. He knew what had happened but didn't want us to know that he knew. I was scared. Just a little. 

Well, that's that for this week's episode of the district in Tucumcari New Mexico. I hope to hear from y'all soon! 

Malagasy scripture 

James 1:5 

If any of you lack wisdom let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.

Jakôba 1:5 

Raha misy aminareo tsy manam-pahendrena, dia aoka izy hangataka amin’ Andriamanitra izay manome malalaka ho an’ ny olona rehetra sady tsy mandatsa; ary homena azy izany.

Love you all lots! 

~Elder Johnson~

Elder Johnson's request

This past P-day as I was chatting back and forth with David over email I mentioned to him that I would be loading some money onto his debit card so he could go out to eat with his companion.  He responded...

...Thank you so much! It really does mean a lot to me that you do so much to keep me happy, and i'm super appreciative of that. But what would really make me happy is if you extend a challenge to the family to read the Old Testament with me...I know its a big challenge, and they don't have a whole lot of time to do it, but i feel like it would help you guys a whole lot.. Do you think that could work?

~Elder Johnson~

Sometimes your children school you on what's important. I was so happy that his focus as a teenager has shifted from gaining temporal things to gaining spiritual things.  David went on to challenge us to finish the old testament by February....wowza...yeah that's a challenge alright! I have committed to do it and I extend the challenge to all who want to participate.  Furthermore (yes there's more) he extended the challenge to finish the standard works by the end of the next year, "if not earlier," he added. Yes! Why not?  My mother heart can hardly contain how proud I am of how he is completely diving into his role as a missionary.  My sadness that overcame me when he departed on his mission, is now replaced with overwhelming joy! Let's do this!

.

Letter from David

Hello everyone!

This week has been absolutely fantastic! I love serving here in New Mexico, even though sometimes it's super hot down here, but nontheless the people here are so amazing and their reception has been a true blessing to me. I cannot be more grateful for them. And I also cannot be more grateful for all of you! Thank you all so much for your fervent prayers and fasting on my behalf, I have seen in abundance the blessings which they have brought to me, and I hope that you will start seeing the blessings the lord will rain down on you for your kindness.

Tuesday: For the first time here on my mission, I was able to help out at a Dinosaur Museum! It was amazing, we got a ton of rain down here on Monday night and Tuesday, so we had quite a bit of standing water. One of the museum worker's houses got leaks coming in from her roof and her walls because the water was sitting on her roof for too long and the gutters were clogged. So, we helped her to climb onto her roof and unclog the drains. When the drains were unplugged, the water came gushing out and it was just about the funniest thing for me and Elder Ward. We helped her back down from her roof (just in case you were wondering, we didn't get on the roof...that's against church policy), and got the ladder back to the museum. After that, we went to the Ministry of Hope to do some service because we had missed the week before, and guess who was there.......Pablo. 

Yep. Pablo.

It was a little awkward at first, but he said he was sorry about cussing us out and calling us brainwashed, and he said he was willing to listen to a little bit of what we had to say about the bible, but Elder Ward has a sneaking suspicion that he is only saying that because he is in public, which I could understand. I got to know him a little better, and he brought his homeless friend Larry with him. I got to talk with him a little bit, too. We are planning on visiting them sometime this week, and not for too long either. After that, we went finding and we visited the Powell family and talked about life after death. Brother Powell is a Mechanic and he is a great christian.

Wednesday: Elder Ward and I went to District Counsel (again....we go there often, now don't we?) and we discussed in great detail the importance of families and roleplays. Roleplays are super fun, but they can also be a little bit awkward for the person teaching. We do roleplays all the time at District Counsel now, and it has been very helpful not only to me but to everyone. We got 2 new sisters (one of them came out with me into the field), and we had the privilege of getting to know them better. They are great missionaries and I can't be more grateful for them. We came back from Amarillo, and went finding some more...I can't remember much more of this day, but I will say on Monday after we had Dinner at a member's home, we went outside and saw the most magnificent rainbow. The colors were so vibrant and radiant, I had the slightest urge to cry. 

Fortunately, I didn't.

Thursday: We went finding a LOT that day, and we didn't find a single person to teach except for one man named Eloy. He's Catholic, and he was willing to read from the Book of Mormon. That day, however, was a very exciting day for us Elders, and do you know why? Because Dawn was having her baptismal interview that night. We were so excited! We went to the church and one of the mission leaders with his wife came to Tucumcari and interviewed Dawn to be baptised and confirmed. She passed the interview! We were EVEN MORE excited!!

We just could not wait until Saturday, which was the day that Dawn would be baptised.

Friday: We went to Logan to go finding and to meet up with one of our investigators. His name is Joe. We had called and texted him many times, and he answered nearly all of them. We came to his house, and he was not there. We decided to drop him, and I will say this much, that we do not joy in exiling  potentials. They are generally the people we love to teach, and Joe didn't want anything to do with us anymore, so we had to let him go, which was a shame, but it was ok, because we knew that the lord would bless us with more people to teach. We went finding a lot that night, too. We really didn't find anyone to teach. In Tucumcari, there are more dogs and cats here that there are people. You wyoming people would know how many rabbits are in Cheyenne, which is a lot. Well, multiply that population by like 2 and thats how many dogs and cats there are here, even though Tucumcari is like 1/4 the size of Cheyenne. There are also tons of crows and ravens here, so it's super funny to go driving the truck by puddles of water where the birds usually hang out and then splash them all and see an ocean of black feathers coalesce and fly away.

Saturday: The big day finally came!!! The Baptismal service started at 5 pm and there weren't very many people there, but it was still a very spiritual experience. There were probably no more than 15 or 20 people there. Elder Ward and I were scrambling to get people to do certain things like give talks or say prayers. It was all so rewarding in the end. Elder Ward baptised Dawn, with the presiding authority and I as the witnesses. We had cupcakes after the baptism, and everyone got to know Dawn a little better. She is just a ray of sunshine! (Haha, get it? Dawn....Sunshine....oh!)

Sunday: I fasted and prayed that my visa (if it  was the lord's will) would come soon enough. I got an email saying that I had an update on my visa status, and we were so happy until we opened it and read that it hadn't come yet and that they would let my mission president know when it will come. It was ok, though. I had the supreme privilege of confirming Dawn a member of the only true and living church on the earth today, and giving her the mighty gift of the holy ghost. I am ever grateful for her loving spirit and her amazing sense of generosity she carries with her. I will never forget how she taught me how to knit and how she loves rock and roll. She is one of the greatest people I have seen to blossom spiritually. Elder Ward bore his testimony and shared with us a scripture that talked about if you only had one person join the church because of you, you would still be really happy, and I bore my testimony and told the story of how Billie broke his bow and how we need to break away from satan's spiritual yoke of bondage, and enter into the yoke of christ. For those of you who don't know what I mean when I say Billie broke his bow, it is a reference to a story of one of my ancestors when she was away from the salt lake valley and her family were being harassed by indians, and one of the indians scared one of the oxen named Billie, who happened to break his bow and run away from the indians. 

As you can probably tell, i haven't obtained my visa yet, and what I have been told it probably won't be coming for a few more weeks. 

Recenly, I made a scripture case made out of cardboard for my malagasy scripture case, and it came out too small for the malagasy scirptures, but it can fit my cambodian scriptures nice and snug, and also my english and spanish book of mormons. I taped pictures from the ensign on the case, which I thought turned out to be a success. I also did the same thing for my scripture journal, which I also invite y'all to keep.

Also, I forgot to mention to y'all that I have completed reading the New Testament and the Pearl of Great Price. It is amazing writing and I strongly encourage you all to read them.

Thank you all so much for your prayers and love. Hitahy Andriamanitra Ianareo!!! (God bless you all)!!!

Malagasy Scripture

Doctrine and Covenants 25:15

"Keep my commandments continually, and a crown of righteousness thou shalt receive. And except thou do this, where I am you cannot come."

Fotopampianarana sy Fanekempihavanana 25:15

''Tandremo lalandava ny didiko dia handray ny satroboninahitry ny fahamarinana ianao. Ary raha tsy manao izany ianao dia tsy afaka mankany amin’ izay misy Ahy.''

Sunshine and smiles,

~Elder Johnson~

Letter from David

Top of the morning to y'all!

I gotta admit, this has been the best month and a half of my life! I didn't have any baptisms, only one investigator came to church, I even got cussed out! And it's so interesting that these last 6 weeks have been my absolute happiest yet....wow.

So, the visa. 

My dear friends, at this time my visa has not come from the Madagascar embassy. It is something that I have discussed with the Lord, and he feels that staying in Tucumcari will help me to gain more experience to prepare me better for my mission in Madagascar. It was not necessarily something that I liked at first, but through the calm assurance of the spirit I received the feeling that accompanies heartfelt prayer, and felt that it was right for me to stay. I cannot thank you all for your loving prayers and fasts, they have been counted by heavenly servants. I promise the Lord's blessings as you continue to

do good in the world. 

Alright, enough of all that! Lets get to the good stuff!

Tuesday: Elder Ward and I went to zone conference in Amarillo! This was the last zone conference of the transfer, and because of that some of the sisters got emotional. Sister missionaries are good at mending hearts. Then we ate out for the last time as a district at a taco place. When we got home, we taught a lesson to a 15 year old named Declan. He plays basketball with us on Thursday nights.  We taught him about the gospel of Jesus Christ, and we taught him especially about the holy ghost. I could feel the holy ghost as I bore testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel. 

Wednesday: Elder Ward and I went to every lesson that we had scheduled and guess what? Every single lesson and meal plan fell through. At the end of the day, Elder Ward was a little discouraged and I did my best to lift him up with some humor. It worked, and I'm hoping that my humor can keep people going. 

There isn't really much more to report on this day.

Thursday: Dawn told Elder Ward and I that she had been asked out on a date by a 33 year old. We were a little surprised at first, and I told her "well, we will see how it goes." And then I asked her what his name was, and guess what....his name is Pablo. 

Does that ring a bell?

Pablo, the drunk man that cussed me and Elder Ward out that had a homeless man in his home? Yeah. That was him. Sure enough, we found him on her Facebook messenger, and they had been talking back and forth. It was honestly a little bit awkward and gross. We told her to block and avoid him. To out relief, she did so. Thursday was in the similitude if Wednesday plan wise, except the fact that we had a lesson with Dawn, which was great. 

Friday: Elder Ward and I went to Logan to teach a lady named Erin. But on our was there, we texted her and found out that she was out of town. So we tried around and went home. By this point, me and Elder Ward were pretty ready to quit. Right as that happened, Brother Morris called us and asked us if we wanted to eat out at Dels! We were soooo happy! Nothing like steak to make your day! But on the way to Dels we saw Pablo jogging. We strictly avoided eye contact.

Saturday: before general conference, we had to go stand as traffic guards at a 5k run event. As Elder Ward and I were standing there, we saw Pablo AGAIN with his dog, and his dog did something pretty funny. His dog stopped at the corner and popped a squat and did his business, but Pablo was going "No, no, no!!!" And when the dog started going, he went, "ahhh, man!!! Mohammad!! (That's the dog's name (Also, who even names their dog after a prophet?))". And he started cussing and kicking the sidewalk and then he ran away when Mohammad was done. 

After that amazing experience, we went to general conference and pretty much focused on just that for the rest of the day excluding planning and meals.

Yesterday: we had general conference again. We invited dawn to conference and she watched all 4 sessions of it! Super proud of her! We had a lesson with Bryan Brown, and then we got our calls (for our transfer assignments) and it was to my great pleasure that I learned that I will be staying with Elder Ward for another transfer! Yay!!! 

I'm going to apologize again and say that i haven't taken very many pictures again....i am so sorry and promise to do better next week. For Sure!

Malagasy scripture of the week

Doctrine and Covenants 

Section 24 verse 8

Be patient in afflictions, for thou shalt have many; but endure them, for, lo, I am with thee, even unto the end of thy days.

Fotompampianarana sy Fanekempihavanana 

Fizarana 24 Andiny 8

Mahareta amin’ ny fahoriana, fa ho tojo maro ianao; nefa iareto ireny fa indro, Izaho momba anao hatrany amin’ ny faran’ ny andronao

As always, I love you all and pray for you all! Have a great week!

~Elder Johnson~

Letter from David

Hello everyone!

I know I've only been out for about a month and a half in New Mexico, but the time still has gone fast, I can hardly keep up with the date and time! Just a fair warning, I did not have the opportunity to take very many photos this week, so I do apologize for that, but hopefully I can get some more in this coming week. 

My week was pretty busy. 

Tuesday: Elder Ward and I went to Amarillo for district counsel. Dawn had to get her baptismal date moved which was something we discussed a little bit, alongside the fact that elder ward and I had to have a drop lesson with one of our investigators. His name is Gasper, and he is a botanist. We invited him many times to read and pray about the book of Mormon but he was too busy, so we dropped him last week. One thing I forgot to mention is that me and Elder Ward are the only Elders in our district. The rest are all sisters. We are also the only missionaries in Tucumcari. After district counsel we went shopping for our weekly groceries and went back home. The trip to Amarillo always is a little bit confusing because new Mexico and Texas are separated by time zones, so every time we cross the border, we have to skip ahead one hour or back an hour depending on where we are coming from. Elder Wards truck is always set on Amarillo time so that we don't have to switch as often. We got home, and we taught dawn another lesson (I think it was on the commandments). She accepted the invitation to keep the commandments, and we promised her blessings for that.

Wednesday: That morning we went to a members home and helped prune a tree that was well over 50 feet tall. It was pretty interesting, because the kids were running around under the place where the dad was cutting off the branches, and the dad was yelling at the kids to go somewhere else. I couldn't touch the kids and Elder Ward couldn't either, so we were just along for the ride. Some of the branches were so big I had to saw the ends of them so that they would have firewood for the winter. Later that day we went finding, and we didn't find anyone to teach, which was ok. We went and visited another member (Her name is Tifani) and we caught her right as she was getting in her car to go camping, so we didn't meet for too long but we were able to ask her how she was doing and how her book of Mormon reading was.

She's been doing pretty good in that aspect.

Now Elder Ward is a district leader, and every night he has to call the sisters to see how they are doing. There are three different groups: Tradewind, Windsor, and Tascosa. That night Elder Ward called the Tascosa Sisters. 

Thursday: we went and did some service at the ministry of hope again, doing the same routine of salvaging bottles that haven't exploded yet and putting them in boxes. I talked with a man named Larry, and he is a very funny guy. His brother is in the hospital because he fell off his front porch and broke a few of his ribs along with a punctured lung. We went and visited him a few weeks earlier, and he is in good shape, well on his way to getting back home. When I was putting trash in the dumpster, a few wasps flew out of the dumpster and chased me around for a while, which was apparently very amusing to a few people watching including elder ward because I ran away flailing my arms around to try and shoo the wasps away. Elder Ward and I went to Logan to stop by at a member home to see how they were doing, but no one was there. We were walking away when a lady walked out of her house and asked who we were. We said "We are missionaries spreading a message about Jesus Christ", and when we said that, she loosened up and she started saying how she loves Jesus and how she is a Baptist but she's not sure if that's the church she thinks is true. We answered some of her questions, we gave her a pamphlet to read, and we asked if we could meet with her again. She said yes, and she gave us her address. After that, we went around Logan trying to track down some members, but since Logan is a really small abandoned town, like 3/4s of the town is ghost town so a lot of the member records are outdated by 20 or 30 years or so. We cleaned up the member records and then we went home. We had another lesson with Dawn after lunch, and went out to a restaurant with a member for dinner. This was the day we had the drop lesson with Gasper. It was a little sad to see him drift away from what we had taught him, but you gotta respect agency.

Friday: Elder Ward and I went to Logan again to visit with a recent convert. His name is Tony, and he is such a great learner. He loves the gospel and is very anxious to share it with everyone he meets. He got his patriarchal blessing in the mail when were visiting with him, and he shared a little bit with us (because he felt inclined to do so). We talked with him about Adam and Eve.

While we were travelling to Logan, the mission office called us, and informed me and Elder Ward about my visa. She said she called someone from salt lake city (mission travel) and she said that I should expect to stay here for an additional 1 to 2 transfers in Texas. This was a real moment of faith testing right there, and it is still something I struggle with. She also said that the visa could come this week, but that is less likely. So, I guess I could be staying here for another 3 months or so, because that is where the Lord needs me right now. I just need to worry about the people I teach and interact with, and not about something I cannot control. 

Saturday: Elder Ward and I went finding again and on the last door we knocked on, we taught a lady named Kenya about the restoration. We have a return lesson scheduled for tomorrow. 

Now, once every year, Tucumcari holds a festival called Fired Up, and it's basically just like frontier days except it's more like a frontier days with a huge farmers market. Elder Ward and I used this as an opportunity to find some people. Unfortunately, we couldn't find anyone to talk to. We met up with a lot of members, though. During that event, we helped the ministry of hope inflate a bouncy house for little kids to come and play in. A really cool thing about Fired Up is the car show. There were a lot of funny looking tow-mater trucks there that were different colors like teal and pink. I couldn't take any pictures of them because I was proselyting.

Yesterday: I gave a special musical number in sacrament meeting, and it was the same "come thou fount" I gave in the MTC. Everyone loved it, and a lot of people were asking for my email so that they could have that arrangement of come thou fount. There were more people than usual, because a member of our ward recently died of cancer, and her family members were coming to comfort the husband and to help prepare for her funeral. Her funeral is on Friday, and I would only ask of you that you could all pray for Mickey truesdale, that he can be comforted and that he will be able to press forward with faith. After church, we went finding some more and didn't find anyone. We went and cleaned up some of the members records. We had a lesson with a member named Bryan. He was sick a couple weeks ago, and me and Elder Ward gave him a blessing. He got better, which was really good. 

Well, that's pretty much all that happened all last week. I finished the book of Mormon for the first time in my life on Wednesday, and I can now say I have learned for myself that the book of Mormon is the true word of God, and that it is the most correct book on this planet. I know that the book of Mormon is true, and that everyone that wrote in that book were prophets of God. I know that this is the restored gospel and it is spreading across the face of the earth. I know these things to be true, and I stand to this day as a humble fervent witness of Jesus Christ and his infinite atonement. I know without the slightest fleeting moment of skepticism that Jesus is the Christ and that he is the good shepherd of Israel. I know we are his sheep, and he has sheep that are not of this fold. I know that he lives, and loves us to the end. 

I hope you all can have a good rest of your week, and I will keep you all posted on the visa.

~Elder Johnson~