Week 21

I was talking with a guy a couple weeks ago and he shared with me
the coolest thing. We were talking about Elder D. Todd
Christopherson's talk in General Conference which kind of talked
about the economy and he told me that the lord always knows what
he is doing. He works in the temple and told me that a year ago
before the economy fell, there was just OK attendance at the temple,
especially during the morning and day times. Now it is packed! When
we go in the mornings, it is a full session. He told me the lord always
is in control, if we're lacking on temple work, he will chasten us to get
us to go there and that's exactly what is going on here. There's really
good faithful saints here that are attending the temple weekly.

We were over at Grandpa Washburn's house one night this week. I
think I told you about him, he's an Emeritus Seventy, East Phoenix
AZ Mission President, and also Las Vegas Temple President. We
were asking him about his two talks that he got to do in General
Conference and he lent us HIS book. It's a biography on his life. It
is so cool! I've been reading it and its really opened my eyes to just
how important and amazing the temple work is. I was also reading
about his time as a Seventy. He was in the Area Presidency in Africa
and spent years over there opening up the continent to the church.
Anyway, I just thought it was so cool to have him in my area and
get to spend time with him. He knows and talks with a lot of the
apostles still today.

I haven't gotten the line of authority yet. I could have gotten it when
we went to the temple this morning but the guy that takes us has to
work at 9 so we leave pretty quick after we get out and the mission
office opens at 9. So I haven't gotten that yet but I'm sure the zone
leaders will get it to me this week.


You wrote that I'll be getting Elder Bailey....did I put Elder Bailey when
I wrote you? I was getting Elder Kaylor but plans have changed.
President called us a couple nights ago and switched some things
around, so now we are getting Elder Garcia....this will be a interesting
transfer to say the least. Elder Garcia is different...very different but
like you said I'm just going to treat him like an all star and hope he
will be.

Only 2 months til Christmas, that will be crazy. I'm only 1 week away
from my 5 month mark, it's next Tuesday the 27th, we even have a
baptism that night so that will be awesome!

We do have two pumpkins in our apartment. We're gonna cut them up
today and make them into jack-o-lanterns, that will be fun. We don't
have any Halloween decorations. We could have them but we haven't
gotten any, and we don't really live with members. Members own it
but it really is like our apartment, they don't go back there ever so it's
really "ours" lol.

You said that Sister Detter has a niece in the mission...who is Sister
Detter? lol there's only a had full of sister missionaries so I probably
do know her already. Unless she's out on the east side of the mission
in Twin Falls, they're off in their own world over there, the mission is
kinda split down the middle; west vs. east.

This past week has been really good, we've taught a lot of lessons but
we have been having to battle with sickness here. Not us, but ALL of
our investigators are sick with the flu. 20% of the Boise School
District has been out the last few weeks because of the swine flu.
It's spreading around like crazy! Our zone leaders had it last week
also, I'm glad that I'm immune from it now haha.

Yesterday I had an awesome experience. We had dinner out in the
17th ward, which is the country ward and we had like 20 minutes
so we looked over a Part Member Family list and we went to go
visit a lady that was living out near dinner. We only had 10 minutes
before dinner when we got out there so we were gonna just say hi
and set up a time to meet with them. Well for some reason I
grabbed my backpack out of the car and brought it in with me.
The sister was super nice and she was telling us about herself and
her situation. Her husband isn't a member. Well I felt prompted to
share a scripture with her before we left and I read Alma 7:11-13.
That one talks about the atonement and how Christ suffered all of
our pains, afflictions, temptations, trials, and sorrows so that he
knows what we're going through and how to help/comfort/strengthen
us. After I read it she told us that she had just finished praying
when we got there and had asked for help and guidance because
her adult step son has addictions to substances and that has been
causing a lot of contention and  afflictions within their family and she
said that scripture was the exact thing she needed to hear. I was
almost speechless when we left her house. I definitely felt that I was
where I needed to be and doing  what I needed to be doing. It was
definitely a memorable little experience.

Well I hope you all are happy and doing good, I'll continue to pray
for you all. Love you!

-Elder Johnson

"There is no misfortune so bad that whining about it won't make
it worse."  -Elder Jeffrey R Holland