私の愛する人！Hello my loved ones!
How are you? I hope all is well and I can't believe summer is over for you guys already, time went by so fast. Holy cow... Haha but I hope it was a summer filled with fun times, memories, and learning experiences as well because that why we are here. But good luck in school and staring back up to normal life, I'm sure the moms are grateful for that haha well first off ARCHIE MY CUTE NEPHEW OF MINE! Happy Birthday! Holy cow you're getting so old and big. Hope you have a good day buddy, love you. Okay I just wanna start writing about this MIRACLE filled week. Oh heavens, God is blessing us and being a missionary is just too good right now! Let's start with the scary/funny part of the week. We were at District Meeting in Fukuchiyama and as we walked from the train station to the church this guy kept smiling at me and so I just did a bow and we went on our way. Well right when district meeting ends, the guy walks into the church. I was so nervous, he just walked in and sat down. The elders ask him, uh what do you need? He said nothing, I'm a LA here but I saw that sister and she's just so cute I had to come. I was so uncomfortable and nervous ha so we always go eat after so the elders had to make a plan to get rid of him and protect me as well, it was a interesting 10-20 minutes. So Tomoka first, she's a 45-50 year old lady with 3 kids who have moved out etc and she's the one told us she wanted to be saved, yeah pretty awesome ha well we visited her and we talked to her at her door right now but as we are sharing our message, the neighbors start banging on their door from the inside and just being loud and etc. well she gets ticked ha and walks over there, knocks back and says 止めなさい or I command you to stop! Haha and they did, then she comes over and apologizes for that and we tell her it's okay and she's says no it's not, you two are like daughters to me who have a light around you and bring me a great message, you don't deserve that. So cute ha but after she said I have something I want you to hear. I really want to learn to control my temper. As you saw, I'm not good at it. So we talked a lot about prayer and the atonement is the way she can overcome that. She's been having a hard time praying lately so after we talked about that she said she would pray. We've been waiting to hear her forever. Yeah for weird knocking on doors haha So we have this cute member named Setoura Shimai, she's pretty recent convert and we teach her weekly, well her knees have been hurting her so she can't bike to the church so we have been doing phone lessons and this week we shared Alma 34:41 and talked about how if she has patience and trust in God and asks him for help with her knees then we promise they'll be healed. Well the next day she came to our souken party, we were shocked. We asked her how her knees felt and she said sisters, they don't hurt anymore. Wow! God is real and amazing. She prayed and asked for help and he saw her faith and knew our promise to her so granted that blessing to her. I love Heavenly Father and His unconditional love. Okay now the best part of the week, Sunday. Oh was it amazing. So our mission has a goal that each companionship does at least 20 lessons a week. Well it's been a little hard these last few transfers but this week my comp and I really focused on it and said we would do it. Well it's Sunday around 4:45 we have visited about 5 people, no one was home because this week is obon the holiday to celebrate dead ancestors. We needed 3 more lessons to get it. Well we go visit this LA family who I haven't been able to meet this whole time and they are family who I've heard needs help. So I'm just praying their home and well they were! And it was so heart breaking, the mom just bawled in my arms as she talked about her trials now and some pains she's holding onto is why they won't go to church. And she stops and just cried, and I wasn't sure what to say and my comp felt kind of sick because it was SO hot so I just prayed father help me ha and I just had a feeling, testify of my love for her. And so I was able to tell her I didn't understand but God does and he loves her and I felt his love so much for her that my heart was pounding. It was such an amazing moment. We will be going back soon. Well after that we still needed 2 more and we still had about 1 hour left. My comp was feeling sick and wanted to stop and so we started heading to the church and I just said okay next person I see is the one and so we turned and this lady was there so I stopped her and told her we were missionaries and we taught about God loving her and prayer. It was so guided by the spirit. So we asked her if we could meet this week at the church again so that she can learn more and she looks up and says yes Tuesday? But we will be on our exchange so we said Thursday and she agreed. We exchanged numbers and she said I'll see you Thursday at the church. It was a miracle! Right after my comp said, I'm good, let's go get that 20 and so went finding and were able to teach two more before we headed home. We felt so good and exhausted but wow I've never been happier and so aware of how God blesses us when we try and have faith. Sorry this emails longer, just so many miracles but last is the thought of the week. It's from Proverbs 29:18. "Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he." So I've been thinking a lot about goals, setting goals has been a weakness of mine my whole life so I've been wanting to improve that. So we read this in District Meeting and it just hit me. If we don't have a vision then we won't grow, and gods law is for us to grow so unless we make goals and accomplish then we won't feel happiness. Goals make growing easier and also make it so you can see that growth as well. Before the mission I was a bad goal setter and still have lots to learn, but I've seen the change in my own life and how much more I'm able to improve through making a goal to achieve. So my challenge this week is make goals, yearly, monthly,weekly, and daily. God will help you more if we put forth the effort to improve by setting goals and strengthen our weakness. He wants to help always but especially when he sees someone who is trying their best to change and grow. I know goal setting is a true principle of our church that can help us more than we know. I'm grateful for the blessing it has been to learn about goal setting here in on my mission. It's changed me more than I could of imagined. I love you and miss you all! Have a great week!スミス姉妹 Smith Shimai
"Our new member, he does his hair like this, haha"
"Finding LA houses"
"Oh my"
"In people's bathroom ha, you have to put them on when you go in"
"Bleaching the state and the comp thought I was crazy haha"
"Im a pro ha all the members were so impressed with my chopstick skills ha, dads not the best anymore:)"
"This is Soumen, rice noodles they put it down slides in the summer:)
"We did an obstacle race but I was the video and picture taker..Ha"
"At the end they stuff whip cream in our faces but I wasn't there"
"So my comp wanted to include me and surprised me with a hit..Ha"
"It's a bamboo slide ha"
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