p.s. we didn't intend to match but those things just happen when you're a missionary

our easter eggs <3 mine is charlie brown

my tan line!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! yahoo!

On Mon, Apr 28, 2014 at 3:07 PM, Megan Daniels <megan.daniels@myldsmail.net> wrote:

Ai suru kazoku ya tomodachi!!!!!! Konnichiwa!

This week was incredible and I'm not sure how exactly to explain to you the amazing life of a missionary but I'm going to try. I LOVE TOYOOOKA.

sidenote, the weather here has become the most beautiful thing of my life. Like 5/7 days each week in the winter it was snowy and super freezing and hailing and rainy. Which is totally fine because the sun always shines when you're working with the Lord and despite the weather being a missionary is still fun. BUT this past week has been paradisiacal and in the mid-20's (c) every day and my arms are getting tan from biking and I'm starting to get a missionary watch tan line #officialmissionary and also cardigan tan lines on my forearms. It's pretty humid but it feels like heaven. It's been like a 3 day run since we turned the room heater on. 

We found 3 new amazing angelic investigators this week <3. The first is named Anna chan- which is apparently a real japanese name- and she's 20 and super cool and her heart is super open and she's living by herself and looking for a job here in Toyooka. SHE IS SO AWESOME. we taught her again this morning and she's basically my favorite person ever. We have a special lesson that we teach when we meet with potential investigators which always ends up sorting out those who truly have interest and those that are just really nice and want to be friends and have zero interest in learning about God. In the lesson we do a lot of How To Begin Teaching suggestions and basically introduce the idea of God as their loving Heavenly Father, prayer, the attitude of importance of Jesus Christ, and the meaning of life. We also set expectations that we'll be meeting regularly, giving them assignments (reading from the Book of Mormon) and we also tell them that they'll want to be baptized twice within the lesson. All of this lesson is my favorite part but I especially love that part. It's true!

When we taught this to Anna chan this morning she was awestruck that we can talk with God. IT'S TRUE. I LOVE TEACHING JAPANESE PEOPLE. It's soooooOOOOOooOOOO ooo cool- the coolest thing in the whole entire world- to see people hear gospel truths for the first time. Clean, pure, doctrine. And the Holy Ghost touches their hearts and their faces light up and their eyes get super big and your heart expands to reach all the crevaces in your chest. Which brings me to our two other investigators, Ibuki chan and Natsumi chan <3

This past week we've been repenting so much. We're being super obedient but as we all know and become super aware of on missions is how imperfect we truly are and how perfect God truly is. And how desperately we need His help to do His work. And we need the whisperings of the Spirit to direct us to those who will accept our message and who have been prepared by the hand of God. And we need to really follow through with those promptings every time, depsite how small they may be. We had mensetsus this week and kaicho and I talked about this. (interviews, with the mission president.)  I've been praying so hard to know where to go and while biking past some apartments last week I felt impressed to go there. It was the smallest impression ever and I didn't even think it was an impression but I figured that if I didn't follow it there's no way I'll continue to receive these impressions, so we went there the next day. Most people weren't even home and everyone that was had zero interest. But while we were leaving I caught a glimpse of the buildings across the road which reconfigured in my head later in the week while seeking revelation for a place where we could find those that would accept our message. We went thursday and again, no one had any interest. But as we were walking back to our bikes we saw 2 precious middle school girls sitting on a curb so we went up to them and invited them to eikaiwa (english class.) After some friendshipping and lots of talk about korean pop music we figured out that they were curious about Jesus Christ so we invited them to have a tour of the church and I'm like all out of time but we met with them on saturday and taught them (one of the girls we talked to and a different friend she invited to meet with us) the above described lesson and the whole time they were just in AWE that God existed and is their Heavenly Father. we'll have to meet with their families real soon because they're so young and we don't want the families to become hantai (anti) but the moral of the story is that this gospel is true and being a missionary is my favorite thing ever of my whole life and I'm not ever going to let kaicho pull me from toyooka and kogure shimai is amazing and i will send you pictures because I have to go.

Thank you soooooo much for sending me loads of pictures of mexico!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it's amazing how old you all look, expect mom and dad and grandma (;

love you with all my heart,

Daniels shimai

p.s. WHOA THAT IS WEIRD THAT I'LL BE CALLING YOU SOON. i don't have any info yet but i'll let you know when I do. Kids: don't do your homework on Sunday at midnight. It's bad for your health.

yayyayayya Happy Easter!!!!!!

SPENCER THAT'S SO LEGIT YOU CAUGHT A FOUL BALL AT THE TIGERS ANGELS GAME! You should probably let mom touch it still. but know I'm proud of you.  Yesterday was also Satake shimai's 89th birthday and Mao chan's 16th! Satake shimai is doing really well and paid her first tithe! <3 Mao chan hasn't actually met with us for 2 weeks so that's been heart breaking. Granted she just started high school and is making lots of new friends and participating in lots of clubs which are both good things but eternal life is sooo much better!!!!!!!!!!!! We're working on it.

This week we were blessed with tons and tons and tons of housing time and met lots of crazy people and also lots of wonderful people. I think the hardest part about being a missionary is having experienced the peace and warmth and happiness and satisfaction that comes from the restored gospel of Jesus Christ; feeling the strength of His priesthood power that is on the earth today; having the hope that we can live with God again and with our families forever after our time on earth is over; having the assurity that what you're doing is right as long as you're following the gospel of Jesus Christ and the counsel of living prophets and all the incredible church leaders; and telling someone that they can have the same blessings (in a second grade simple manner) and they just wave their hands at you like you're a swarm of fruit flies in their genkan. and they don't understand the eternal significance of their rejection. and they don't give eternal joy a chance. I've tried a million different things to say to people in their genkan that will overcome their agency and make them choose to listen to our message but unfortunately that's not how it works. I really wish it was haha. I think it really depends 1. on whether their hearts are open or not, and 2. the brightness of our faith-- whether or not we have the Savior's countenance within ours. We're not salesmen. We're simply sharing the joy that we have with those that need it too. But the opposition just makes the moments when we find potential investigators and new investigators- the ones that feel the Spirit as we speak and want to feel it again- a jillion times better. And those ones make all of this worth it.

I love you all!  No, they don't celebrate Easter here, but Kogure shimai and I boiled eggs and colored them with colored pencils!!!!!!!! Elder Nelson announced it was Easter yesterday in his talk and everyone got really excited and ahh so ka so ka?! We're working on Japan. (;

We haven't done a ton of Less Active work because we still need the branch president to fill out the necessary forms. But he and his wife took us to a couple less actives houses and we became friends. One lady had tons of origami flower boquets in her genkan. JAPAN!!!!!!!!

haha also, my headaches have basically ceased! I've been drinking lots of water, and I did receive and follow your advice in your email, Dad. Thank you!!!!! The picture of the kids in Mexico with the Japanese flag is soo awesome!!!!!!! 

I love you lots and I hope you had a Christ-centered week and especially Easter Sunday.

love,

Daniels shimai

ai suru kazoku ya tomodachi!

thank you so much for the emails. MITCH YOUR FACE MASK IS YABBAI! please tell me you bought that! you look just like jack black in nacho libre (: hahaha send me more pictures of the family trip in mexico!!! I'm sorry it rained while you were there, but fortunately it was only for one day.

I'm sorry, this email isn't going to be as monstrous as last week. I learned sososososoosososoooo many wonderful things this week. I got to go on my first split with the Sister Training Leaders! They are so incredible and I love them!!!!!!!!!!! Sister Papenfuss, my temporary companion, is on her 11th transfer and has been an STL for a looong time. She is a true disciple. She did inform us that we aren't supposed to work with the less actives until we have a bunch of paper work, so that project is currently on hold hahah. Back to normal dendo!!!!!!!! Honestly, it was the best thing ever to get back out into the neighborhoods. But I am still super excited to work with these beloved members. sooooon!!!

hahah I got to get real familiar with the map of Toyooka and I've concluded that maps in japan are like cross-word puzzles because the numbers jump from the low 300s to 1800s and it's way confusing. But I believe I have been prepared for this moment, thanks to many cross-word competitions with Mitch and then later with the rest of the kids at Olive Garden. natsukashii!

I finally got to watch General Conference!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The Zone Leaders and I watched it with the door wide open and the window shades drawn back so you could peer in from the reihaido where the members and my companion were watching it in japanese. CONFERENCE WAS SO AMAZING. all of the talks were sooooo good!!! hahah also I died because of how precious Elder Scott is.

I have to go but know you are all in my prayers! I love you all! I love my Savior, Jesus Christ, and I love my Father in Heaven. I know Heavenly Father hears our prayers and will ALWAYS bless us as we faithfully keep the commandments. I know that as we keep our covenants and become clean through the power of the Spirit that we can also tap into the enabling power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I know they will help us. I also know we need to ask.

have a wonderful week! be faithful!

love,

Daniels shimai

minasan!! konnichiwa! 

Nooooooooooo we have to wait an extra week for conference!!!!!!!!!!!!! </3 We'll come to the branch building next weekend and I'll get to watch it in english hopefully? I know they'll have it in english but I might need to watch it in japanese in order to be with my doryo. I'm not positive but I'm SO EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! alsooooo

ELDER CHRISTOFFERSON IS COMING TO KOBE!!!!!!!!!! AND HE'S MEETING WITH OUR MISSION!!!!!!!!! woooo!! technically ibaraki, but our zone leaders said that he'll still do a tour with us. I'm SO EXCITED TO MEET HIM AGAIN!!! He's the best. How was his talk at conference? Obviously it was fantastic but what was it about?!?!! Thank you dad for the highlights. I truly appreciated them. I want to hear Bednar's analogy!!!!! Also just everything, I miss conference. Last conference I was in the MTC?? natsukashii

so the biggest change of my life as I currently know it happened on Friday at Zone Training meeting in Fukuchiyama:

**From now on all of the sister missionaries in the Kobe, Japan mission will be focusing 100% of our efforts on oyasumi kaiin (less active members). 

I think that was the last thing I ever expected to hear. Prior to the announcement Zinke Kaicho was pretty clear that once our beloved investigators receive the ordinance of baptism and confirmation, that the ward/branch then takes them under their wing and we continue to find and teach non-members. 

To be honest, at first I was a little disappointed because from here on out we are not meant to spend our time going from house to house, introducing the Gospel and the idea of a loving Heavenly Father to people and looking for those who are prepared to hear and accept our message. Nor are we supposed to street (which is kinda already non existent in Toyooka because as consequence of the countryside, everything is pretty far away so most people have a car. Also it's cold.) But since it's been warming up I've seen people!!! Real ones!! And they're young! 

The Zone Leaders didn't have much information for us, but they said that all of our time is devoted to less actives, unless we still have investigators that we believe we should continue to teach rather than turn over to the elders. (And we don't have a ton, but our 15 year-old with a baptismal date is ours.The rest we're handing over.) 

Anyway, I was a little skeptical and then I realized I was being faithless and that it wasn't a huge restriction on our dendo, but rather just a piece of the infinite knowledge of the Lord granted to us. This is His work. He'll move it along as He sees fit; His plan is perfect beyond our comprehension. I asked my Heavenly Father in that meeting if this is His will and the confirmation was powerful and undeniable. I thought about the members of the Toyooka branch that I love with all my heart. The members that have multiple callings, and still work and still join us in our lessons and still sacrifice their time to welcome our investigators into this branch and still sneak us cookies after church and still invite their friends to meet with us and still manage to sleep and eat and live. I love these people. I truly love them. They need our help. I'm doing this because I love them. I'm going to love these less-actives and I'm going to do it for them to help them receive eternal life. I'm here in Toyooka and here in Japan, on a mission for 1 1/2 years, because I love the Lord, my Savior and Redeemer, my Master and my King. I love my Father in Heaven. And they love these people so much more than I can comprehend. God sent His Son on our behalf. and The Son sacrificed each moment of His life for us, for them. They believe each of us is worth the effort. They're worth all of my effort. I'm looking forward to this transfer (:

after that announcement anything else that happened earlier in the week escaped my mind. Oh!! we met with Mao chan. basically it's the best feeling in the world when it clicks for people why they need a Redeemer, and when they realize that Jesus Christ made it possible for them to live with God again. Life is good. 

Kogure shimai is amazing and hilarious and refuses to teach me proper ways to say ''ahhh that's too bad'' or ''sad!'' because she thinks it's hilarious when I say things that apparently translate to ''I'm going to miss you!'' to dead hamsters on the bike path. haha but really she's awesome and has so much dendo fire and I love her. she was a less active all through high school and we're sooo excited to work towards helping these people. My nihongo is improving? my head is still kinda rough but if things get worse I'll ask for a blessing. haha I took Excedrin yesterday because it was fast sunday and those days are always pretty hard for the headaches and it's incredible how strong caffeine is, especially when you're a missionary. hahaha

Have fun in mexico!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! sorry you missed your flight, mitch. but I'm happy you got there (: thanks for sending me the picture of you all playing cards. Tell Grandma happy 70th birthday for me! 

I love you all!!! You're in my prayers! Pray for Japan! and for the missionaries in your ward! 

love,

Daniels Shimai

p.s. the sakura are out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and a recent convert in the branch who is 73 re-taught me the sakura song which i sang in my kindergarten musical. natsukashii. I'll try and get a good picture this week

p.p.s. here's some creepy anime that the choro tachi's recent convert drew of the missionaries

also the current fukuchiyama zone!