Week 96 - May 23, 2016

Family.

What up?

This week was sooo Glorious. 

I want to begin by saying that I am truly grateful for my personal membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Later-day Saints.  I am grateful to belong and to represent the Restored Gospel. It's true.  I know it. 

This week we had Zone Conference and it turned out very well.  There were a lot of good things said and we all learned a lot.  In our mission right now, we are focusing a lot on "Find Teach and Baptize" and so we are constantly talking and thinking about how we can be more effective in these three areas.  The topic of the meeting was on these three things and I was able to share a few things about "Fear and Finding."  In other words, "Opening Our Mouth to Everyone." 

A thought came to me as I was preparing. 

It was this:  Every time we fear, we are thinking of our personal self.  And often times when we fear, we often start our thought or our words with "I," which in some situations can be classified by  Pride.  And the source of pride comes from the devil, so if we focus on the Savior and OTHERS, then all of a sudden we notice that we have no fear within us.

Recently as Elder Brown and I have been focusing on others, we have been able to receive more guidance from the Holy Ghost.  

Elder Brown and I have been able to set three baptismal dates this week.  HUGE MIRACLES!

One was a from a miracle 전도 about two weeks ago after District Meeting. Her name is Sister Moon Jung Sook.  She has come to church two times and 김수경 자매님 has done an amazing job at fellowshipping her. 

Every lesson we have taught has been with her and she has provided all the things that our investigator needs.  The lessons have been packed with the Spirit and after church yesterday, we went to Sister Kim's house and during the lesson Elder Brown and I felt really inspired to ask her to be baptized.  As Sister Kim was bearing her testimony, I looked over at Elder Brown and said, "We are going to invite her to follow Jesus Christ and be baptized." Then next thing we knew was that she was accepting our invitation to be baptized on June 5th.  The Spirit was so strong and Elder Brown, Sister Kim, and I were all very happy.

It was a great day and an experience I will always remember.

Our other investigator we met this week for the first time, we got a baptismal date in our first meeting.  I have never been able to do this on my mission!  The Spirit was so strong and his desire to follow Christ is huge.  He is my little brother, 18 years old and just such a stud!  He said straight to us that our meeting was "Glorious!" and he said he had the chills when we were showing him the baptismal font. 

We had four investigators out at church yesterday which was also Huge!!

The Lord is pouring the Heavens out upon 천안!

I love you!  Thank you for all your support! 

Elder Cole Thomas Johnson  (PACE)

Week 93, 94, and 95 - May 16, 2016

Family.

This week has been soooo good.

(On May 8, 2016, Elder Johnson was able to call home for Mother's Day.)

 (Everyone in the family was able to talk to him.  It was a thrill for them, as well as Elder Johnson being able to talk to all of them.)

 (Elder Johnson and his companion, Elder Brown.)

So many positive and uplifting experiences have come out of this week.  I have fully transferred over to Cheonan now and have been able to get to know the members and the area a little bit more.  I still don't know everything but I am slowly learning!

My companion is Elder Brown from Timpview, Utah.  He is the man.  We are super similar in so many ways, and we work super well together.  He is a great example to me and is filled with faith!

 (Elder Johnson and his companion Elder Brown from Orem, Utah)

 (Eating at a Carl's Jr. in Korea!)

We are really focusing on three things now:

Thoughts 

Others 

Finding ,Teaching and Baptizing. 

We both don't have much time left in the mission field and so we are both learning so much from each other and are becoming very effective instruments in the Lord's hand.  The Lord is strengthening us and giving us revelation from on high. 

I want to share a quick thought that came to us this week as we were talking. 

Putting attention or focus on something that you have little or no control 

over will allow no success or progression and  will do you absolutely no good.

Focus on the now and the important because it's what you can

change and it's what you can do.  Change to Become. 

Focus on the Lord and the Work. 

This week I have been suffering from a cold, but I am now over coming it and am almost back to normal health.

However, we saw some crazy cool miracles this week that I want to briefly describe. 

(Missionaries in Elder Johnson's District)

On the way home from District Meeting this week, it was pouring rain.  It was lunch time and we were on the way home just right out in from of our apartment when we saw an older mother and her son pass by.  We said "Hello" to them and we started a conversation.  It ended very well.  We received their address (which never happens) and planned on going to their house the next morning.  Well, after we finished eating, our other appointment cancelled and we realized that we were going to go out and talk to people in the rain for three hours until our next appointment, but we also realized that we could go visit the address that we had just received from the lady and her 22 year old son.  We had a feeling to go buy some bread and deliver it as a gift.

On our way to their house, the timing was absolutely perfect.  We met a guy in the elevator who was going to the same destination as us.  He was going to fix their sink... Anyway that guy had met with missionaries a long time ago and wanted to start meeting again. 

We met with the mom and the son.  They came out to church yesterday and a member invited them over to dinner last night.  We all ate together and shared about the Book of Mormon, its importance and what blessings we can receive from it.  It was a very spiritual night!  I feel very good about both of them, and I feel that they can be baptized in three weeks.  It's a huge miracle. 

We also had a bunch of other crazy miracles like right after we got done praying to know where we needed to go, we were directed to go right by the Spirit and we met a little kid who took us to his house and introduced us to his parents.  The next thing we know we were in these people's home teaching the gospel to a family!

They didn't have much interest, but the Lord led us there and they let us in to share our message! 

Prayer is so real!!!!!!! 

We met so many cool people on the street this week.

We have Zone Conference this week!  Pray it goes well!  I have a lot of preparation to do.  I love you!  Skype was glorious and I look forward to seeing you all so soon.

Follow the Spirit. 

Elder Cole Thomas Johnson

PACE