Well this week has been a good one!  It has started to be a little warm this week, but not super hot!  It has been like 85 degrees and it is really weird because I remember last year being a little cooler around this time of year. 

 

So I had my last Thanksgiving on the mission and man was it a really good one!!  We first went to an older couples house because their family couldn't make it for Thanksgiving.  They are pretty awesome!  They served their mission in Cyprus, next to Greece, and they had a lot of cool experiences that they shared from there.  Then after our dinner we went to a member of the Stake Presidency's house and had a good dessert there, and tossed around a baseball with his son, it was kind of nice throwing a baseball around after a long time of not doing that!!  Then after that we went to the Bishop in the ward's house and had some more dessert there and that was really good!!  It was a super good holiday and I really enjoyed it! 

 

This week was pretty good with our missionary work!  It was a little difficult being able to meet with people this week because of the holiday, but we still managed.  We were able to meet with the one family right before they went to California on vacation, and that was really good!  They are super excited for their baptism on the 22 of December. We talked with the kids about getting baptized on that date too and the ones who are of baptism age are wanting to and are pretty excited about it!  That family is awesome!

Next we have Cole who is awesome!  He is always super excited about meeting with us and really loves to learn!  He has come to church two weeks in a row now and that is awesome, because you can tell that he really enjoys it!  We are planning on inviting him to baptism this next lesson on Wednesday.

There is also the other family who is doing pretty good!  Because of the mom's work schedule, meeting with them has been a little difficult, but it is going to be awesome when they get baptized!

We have a less-active family who came to 2 hrs of church on Sunday and that was really awesome!  We found that with the father we just teach his son, Ian, and he start to just commit himself to want to change and follow the commandments!  Like this past Saturday we taught Ian about the Word of Wisdom and Tithing and when he came to church he was wondering where he can get a slip to pay his tithing.  He also committed himself to start better living the word of wisdom!  So that was really awesome to see!

 

There is a lot of great things happening this week!!  It is super exciting to see that!!

 

So this week I have gotten a little sick. :(

 

Hope you have a good week!

 

Love,

 

Elder Luke Johnson

New blog for Arizona Phoenix Mission!!

Just to let you all know there is also a new blog for the mission.  The old one is still there and has mostly pictures and things going on in the mission, but this one is specifically for information, addresses, etc.  It was created by the mission president's wife, so has accurate and current updates.  The link is: http://azphoenixmission.blogspot.com

The other one is:  http://azphxmission.blogspot.com/  This is where I get a lot of the photos of Luke from the events they have going on in the mission.  It too was created by the mission president's wife.

So this week has been super amazing!!  We are working with so many people!!  Man it is crazy just how much success happens when you just have that faith and work your hardest to find those people who are ready to be taught the gospel!! I have found over the course of my mission that there should never be any time where you don't have anyone to teach.  If you try hard enough and have that faith in Jesus Christ and his atonement you will have a lot of people to teach.  The things that we always try to do to find new people is visiting those who are either part-member families or referrals.  That has been how we have been able to find all of these people that we are teaching!!

So yesterday we had 10 investigators at Sacrament meeting and that we so awesome!!  We had one family where Karin, the mom who is a member, has three un-baptized children that are so awesome!  We taught them the Plan of Salvation to them yesterday and really had an emphasis on be baptized to enter into the Celestial Kingdom.  The oldest, who is 14, in our past visits has not really opened up to us because of her trying to be a "cool" teenager, but this last lesson we got out a concern of her that really help us to help her to be baptized and feel the spirit. She was afraid of some things and so we offered to give her a blessing and while I was giving that blessing I could just feel how much our Heavenly Father loves her and it was so awesome to be able to participate in that and feel of that! :')  After I was done with the blessing she was just glowing with the spirit and I could really see that she had felt the spirit, and so we set a date with her and her brother and sister to be baptized on December 15th!  That was so awesome!!

We had a new investigator come to church yesterday.  He was that guy who text-ed us randomly and wanted to come to church.  We had an amazing church tour with him yesterday and he has researched a lot about the church on mormon.org, and lds.org and was curious to know so he wanted to meet with us and that was so amazing!  His name is Cole and he is 16!  He researched all of this by himself and that was so awesome to see that!!  God has really prepared him to accept the gospel!  We are going to have a lesson with him on Wednesday and so that should be pretty awesome!

We also had another family come to a bit of church, they had to leave early because of their crazy kids, but they are pretty awesome!  We set a date with them this week for the 22nd of December and so that is going to be awesome!!  We are going to start teaching the kids a bit more to get them ready for that date! :) They are so awesome!
We also had Peter come to church, but he isn't really wanting to progress any further, he is a hard one to understand but it will happen with time.  :)
We are also teaching a couple of Less-active families, with un-baptized 8 year old children and one of them came to church yesterday!! They are pretty awesome!  The father was raised in the church, but went less-active early on in his life and is a huge guy that probably could beat me up, but the nicest guy in the world with an awesome family!!  So that was a really happy thing!! :)

So this past month I have seen this area grow a ton, from not teaching anyone, to have a whole white board full of people to teach!!  We started off with not having too much time in the day to have not enough time in the day! And that is such an awesome thing!!  I hope to continue to see this amazing area continue to grow! :)
The work of the Lord is so amazing and the spirit is 100% to credit for all the amazing things that are happening in this area and I love it! :)

I love you guys!  I only have one more holiday season on the mission and man have a grow a lot from this service to our Heavenly Father.  It is so amazing!

Love ya!

Elder Luke Johnson :)

Mission Tour (Photos taken by Sister Taylor). MISS THAT FACE!

So this week has been a really good one!  The Weather here has been about 85-90 degrees and that is a bit warm for it being November! My companion keeps expecting the fourth of July to roll around soon, this is kind of a lot like last year was so the cool down should be happening pretty soon! But it is very nice weather now compared to the blistering 115 from the summer so I am pretty happy! 

 

So staying true to Teri Johnson form and probably going the extra mile a bit, I have started to play Christmas music this week! You would be so proud! :)  haha I remember back in July me and Elder Newton were listening to Christmas music to make the heat seem a little less poopy! In fact, right now, I am listening to a mix of Christmas tunes that he gave me! 

 

Well this week has been booming!  The area has gone from not too much going on from us now having a white board full of people that we are teaching!!  I am really excited for all of the work that is going on and it is so amazing to see the spirit of the Lord really working here and we are finding the harvest from that!  We are working with a ton of part-member families and they are starting to progress and that is amazing!  We have an investigator family that moved into the ward a week ago and they are amazing!  They are super ready for baptism!  They are a family of 6 kids and the parents and they are awesome!  Three of the kids are of baptism age and they are pretty awesome!!  We are going to teach them tonight and help them to set a date to be baptized!

 

Next we have a family who just moved in from Layton! They are a part-member family and the kids aren't baptized but they are open to learn and I know once they really feel the spirit they will want to be baptized!  We talked about the spirit last time and gave the 13 yr old girl a restoration pamphlet and she said she didn't like reading so I had her just read a page and then work towards the whole pamphlet!  I know that the spirit will touch her and help her to be closer to Christ!  There is also a 12 yr old and a 8 yr old there too who aren't baptized and we are going to be teaching them too!!

 

There is also a part-member family who just had a little girl baptized named the weeks and the dad who is the non-member was there and really felt the spirit and so we are going to be going over there tomorrow and hopefully start to teach him!

 

We also have Peter who we are trying to work with but he has kind of not wanted to progress any further.

 

We have some Less-active families that will hopefully be starting to come back soon and that is awesome as well!!  We are working with some un-baptized eight year old kids with those less-active families and it is really getting them excited about the gospel and it is so cool to see that! They are pretty awesome!!

 

So we have a ton a people to teach now and that is such an amazing feeling to have!  I can really tell how much more happier I am when we have people to teach!  It is so amazing how with the spirit and faith and doing some different things that haven't been done in the past to always have people to teach!

 

So this week has been really great!! My companion and I have been working on a lot of stuff and he has grown a lot just from this week!  We are really starting to work together and it is amazing to see that!  Some times I forget that he is training!

 

Well I think that is about all for this week!

 

Have a good week!

 

Love,

 

Elder Luke Johnson

October 30th Letter (Transfer Week, but none for Luke!)

Things here in Surprise have been amazing!! The weather has started to be really good again!!  With a high of about 80-85 and that makes biking a bit more bearable now!  It is kind of funny because I always talk about how last winter was great with the members and they are like, "oh you must be going home soon!" and I am like nope! Not that soon! I am now considered the "Veteran" now and it is really weird to be called that! Super crazy and fun this mission has been!

 

So we have had a really great week this past week with this next one to be a great one too!  There has been so much untapped potential in this area that it is crazy!  Using different find ideas, having more faith, and being lead by the spirit have proven to be what the area needs to be successful, it is really what all the areas need! I really have learned that these past few weeks.  We have been focusing on more things to be able to teach people and there has been some great work come out of that!  We have gone from having no one in our teaching pool to now having 10-15 families that we are working with.  Unfortunately, a lot of them have really weird schedules and it makes it difficult to meet with them, but we are and we are trying and there is some great things happening from that!

 

We had an investigator family move into our area from another and they are awesome!  They are the Mathews family and the parents both want to be baptized and they want their kids too as well (3 of which are baptism age)!  We had a great lesson with them last night and that was so awesome!  They were asking about being sealed and and the temple and all of that and really want that for their family! So they will most likely be getting baptized in the next month! :)

 

We also have a part-member family from St. George move in and from the looks of feelings of that family they are super ready for baptism.  They have four kids who aren't baptized and the mom is wanting to get back active in church!  So that should be some good things happening from that!

We also have another family.  They are a part-member family who the dad, Rex, is not a member.  His wife is super active in the church and as an 8 yr old being baptized this week and one of his kids, who is about 6, said that when she is 8 she wants to be baptized, but she wants him to do it!  So that is awesome!  I kept thinking of that scripture that talks about being taught through the mouth of babes! So we are going over there tonight and are going to see how the spirit has been working on him.

We also have the another family who the dad is not a member, and has taken the discussions before but because he was working out of town for a while couldn't continue, so we are hopefully going to be teaching him because his wife really wants the priesthood in that home so that they can have a more peaceful family.

 

We have a whole bunch more, but for right now that is so main ones that we are working with that we are excited about!

We had a ward council training last week with someone from the mission presidency.  It was really great and we should be having a lot of work with some more part-member families and less-active ones too! 

Other than that things are going great!!  Elder Rigby and I are doing great and he is starting to learn some of the things of missionary work.  It gets to him at times but I remember back when I was new and leaning things and it did with me.  I just have be able to help him with that.  For me it is just 2nd nature now, but I am trying to help him be able to get to that point.

 

Have a great week!

 

Love,

 

Elder Luke Johnson