Week 38: March 20, 2017

Aloha family and friends!

Elder Peterson and I are very happy and excited to announce that last night, Sierra Penn was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. Sierra has been such an amazing investigator and she has definitely been prepared for this moment. She has always come to each lesson craving to know more and to learn. She has often times studied ahead, asking questions about doctrine we hadn't planned on teaching that day just yet. Most times, we would come away learning a lot from her. It has been such an honor and a pleasure to get to know her and to feel of her spirit and love for this gospel. She was introduced to the church by a co-worker. He invited her to church and accompanied her on her first day. The next week, she had the faith and strength to come all on her own. (He lives in a different stake/ward area, he isn't inactive). She studies extensively throughout the Book of Mormon and has impressed us as well as even our mission president who had the opportunity to meet her during a lesson. We look forward to her progression in the gospel and helping her to understand even more.

We also had a mini-missionary this past weekend. His name was Joshua Reed from the Danville stake. We had a lot of pretty set plans that fell through almost immediately so we were in kind of a panic. What would have been a good 4 hour block of travel, being at the Visitor's Center with our investigator, and then travel back, instead became a day full of finding and miracles as our investigator cancelled at the last second. He was able to join us for the baptism. He is a very kind young man and will go far in life. He is planning on going to BYU Provo for a year before heading out so Tallin and anybody else planning on going there next year, if you see him, tell him I said, "Hi!"

Transfer calls are in and it seems my time with Elder Peterson is at an end. We have had an amazing time getting to know one another and working together. We have gotten along so very well as a companionship and he is a good Elder. I wish him the best of luck throughout the rest of his mission and beyond. I will miss all of our movie quotes woven into our everyday conversations. I will instead be companions with Elder Roberts, who I do not know much about yet but will look forward to meeting tomorrow.

This week will be one full of opportunity and work and blessings. We've been given a lot of great council lately from our mission leadership and I can really see the blessings coming from this council. There are a lot of blessings to be seen and a lot of work to be done. I love this work and I love you all! Hurrah for Israel!

-Elder Kaitoku​

Week 37: March 13, 2017

This week, we have a baptism on Sunday! Sierra, our investigator getting baptized, has got to be the most converted person I have ever had the opportunity of teaching. She has been so dutifully studying the scriptures and this gospel. Some days, it seems we hardly do any teaching because she's already learned a lot of it in her own personal studies. She was introduced to the church when her co-worker, a member, invited her to church one week. She loved it and has been coming ever since. Her baptism is set for Sunday at 4pm. This weekend, we are getting a mini-missionary. From the youth program in Danville, Elder Reed will be joining my companion and I for the weekend. He will get the whole experience of the mission life! From waking up early, to knocking doors, to a baptism, he will get to experience quite a lot. Needless to say, it's going to be an exciting weekend. 

In other news, I was going through the newspaper for coupons when the spirit seemed to lead me to the Safeway pages. As I began flipping through, something suddenly jumped out and caught my eye. Hawaiian Brand Portuguese Sausages. No. Way. So that's the story of how I dragged my companion all the way to Safeway last P day to get some Portuguese sausages.

Last P day, we had a zone activity. Our zone is 100% completely comprised of Elders. The Bro-Zone. The Brone. We had a fun activity where we played ultimate disc and two hand touch football through the mud. It was nice and muddy and most of all mui macho. *spanish guitar rift*

The work has been going amazingly well. My companion and I have had a fun two transfers together, learning a lot from one another and working hard. We've been getting along very well. Transfer calls are this Saturday so we will see how that goes. 

Week 36: March 6, 2017

Aloha Everybody,

This past week, the mission leadership (Assistants to the President, Zone leaders, and District leaders, and Sister Training Leaders) got to hear from Elder Carl B Cook. He was in our mission and he gave us some great words of advice about helping our investigators to be truly converted. It was a great training. Often times, we see a lot of recent converts go straight to less active because they haven't truly repented and been converted. It was a great training to help us as missionaries avoid this and ensure that those we baptize are truly ready for it.

This week, we dropped a baptismal date because he wasn't able to make it to church. He will be out of the country for a few weeks so we will have to get back in touch with him when he gets back. The other baptismal date got pushed back one day because the font was so booked. She is super awesome and is really looking forward to being baptized. She's begun planning out her baptism already. Her name is Sierra. The way she was introduced to the church was a co-worker who is a member. He invited her once and she's been coming ever since and is now getting baptized. She studies a lot. She'll bring up questions about things we haven't even begun talking about because she is doing her own research. We had 3 of our investigators come to church this past week. All has been well. 

It's been awesome to hear about many of my friends back home getting mission calls and even going out on their missions already. I love this work and I love this people. Sorry for the short(ish) email but I've gotta run! When I get a new camera, I'll start taking and sending more pictures! Until then,

-Elder Kaitoku

Week 35: February 27, 2017

This past week was a great week in some aspects and kinda slow in others. We were able to get one of our investigators, Gregory, to the visitor's center at the temple. When he came to church last week, the class got into some deep doctrine, talking about temples and such. He was very confused and wrote down a lot of questions. Thankfully, we were able to get a lot of those questions answered at the visitor's center. 

Another one of our investigator had a lot of questions about deep doctrine and the plan of salvation. After much studying, prayer, and some fasting, we were finally able to resolve her concerns and answer her questions. She said it's been made much clearer to her now and she is very thankful for our explanation. 

President Frandsen came out with us this past week and we had a great lesson with another one of our investigators. She has been super solid and continues to be very solid. Our President said he couldn't wait to go home and tell his wife about her. It's been a blessed week for our current investigators. Unfortunately, we didn't get a lot of finding done but we will continue to work on that this upcoming week.