Week Ending 8/12/2013

• Dinner with Non-member
• Baptism guy dropped 
• Don't judge a book by it's Cover
• Dinner with less active and investigator
• Non-member and best enchilada's ever
• Dad the fish master (Picture)

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From: Samuel Johnson <samuelj@myldsmail.net>
Date: Mon, Aug 12, 2013 at 12:16 PM
Subject:
To: Tina Johnson <tinaej8@gmail.com>, Russell Johnson <russellcjohnson@gmail.com>


I cant believe another week is gone! They go by so fast. The members in our ward have been awesome this week and we had three dinners where there was a nonmember friend there. None of them were really interested but at least they had some exposure to the gospel.

Unfortunately our baptism guy dropped us :( He said he sought guidance and he has decided to stick to his faith. The book of Mormon is key to conversion. If someone is not willing to read it and pray about it they are not going to get an answer that this is Christ's true church.

We were going home for lunch the other day and this guy flagged me down so I pulled up next to him and he had this big scraggly beard and tattoos everywhere and he was smoking a cigarette and he said are you staying hydrated? and I said yep and he said do you need so water? and I said no thanks I have some then he said have you had lunch yet? and I said nope and he said meet me at subway and drove off hah so when elder daley caught up I said hey we're going to subway so we did and the guy bought us lunch and he shook our hands said his name was Phil Skinner and left :) Just a reinforcement of the old saying "you cant judge a book by it's cover".

Transfers were this week. I'm staying where I'm at though so that's good. I like this area :) We had the opportunity yesterday to go see a less active woman in our ward and she had her non member friend over. We taught her about the restoration and the less active bore her testimony about it. It was awesome! The spirit was really strong. I know that her friend felt it too. I think it scared her a little bit because she knew that if what we were saying was true she was going to have to change a lot of things. She wanted nothing to do with the book of Mormon though :P Hopefully we will get to see her again.

We had dinner with this guy named Mario this week. He is awesome. He made the most amazing enchiladas ever!!!! Unfortunately he said he is not interested in our message, but he would like to keep having us over for dinner every couple of weeks. Hopefully something will happen to where he will want to learn about the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Elder Daley and I are getting a lot better at teaching together. It's a lot more fun that way :) our lessons have been going really well. We just need to find more people to teach! Everyone keep doing your missionary work! If you pray and ask with the intent to act on the answer you receive God will put people in your path! The church is true!

Love
Elder Johnson

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Ooooo fish master! Way to carry on the Johnson tradition :)

Tell brother slack I am doing well.

It sounds like Tanner is doing good. You need to go rock climbing with him because he says no one will go with him.

Sounds like you had a pretty crazy trip down to AZ! How's it look down there? The same?

Keep taking mom out to play pickle ball, she loves that stuff :)

Things are still going great here. I love it so much! There is nothing like being on a mission. I just want to talk to everyone when I get home! People have the most interesting stories I love it. I cant believe I have already been gone for two months, it scares me. It makes me want to work so much harder because I will never have those two months back. I decided this week that I am going to start memorizing scriptures everyday. I started on Wednesday and I already have over 25 scriptures memorized :) I taped a clip to my bike (like one of those ones you put on chip bags) and I just clip index cards with scriptures on them to my bike that way I can practice while I am riding :) Keep working on Larry! I always ask people about their conversion stories and most of the time it wasn't the first time that they talked to missionaries that they converted.You just have to keep trying until something clicks for them. You probably already know that.

Well I hope all is well. I love you.

Elder Johnson

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One of the monster fish I caught at Blue Springs Reservoir. On this day I was the fish master

Hi Sam,

Hope your week is going good. Couple of things I keep forgetting to tell you. Brother Slack that taught your temple prep class keeps telling me to tell you Hi and he hopes you are doing good. Also Grandma Johnson did get your letter and she really appreciated it. You should write her a paper letter about once a month since she does not do computers.

This week was a little crazy. Lot's of stuff went on.

Monday we had Grandma Ewell over for home made ice cream and cake for her birthday. We had Verl and his family and Dwayne and his family over. The ice cream was good and everyone stayed for a while.

Wednesday Darren and I took two trucks to Camp Verde to pick up more white fencing that he had down there. The trip was supposed to be an up and back trip on the same day. Getting there everything went fine and we loaded the stuff. It was late by that time and we were going to stay over night, but decided to get back. Cade said it made Conner cry because I told them I was going to come over and stay the night. I felt bad, but was traveling with Darren and he wanted to get home. We head out and hadn't got the the Camp Verde second exit and I blew the turbo pipe off the truck. We found the clamp on the road put it back on and started off again. It blew off again. This time I limped into the McGuireville exit. It was dark by now. I pulled into the gas station there and pulled under a light so we could see to work on the truck. While we were putting the clamp back on a semi-truck with a big trailer backed into the side of Darren's truck. So things were not going to well. By this time it was getting real late so we drove back to Camp Verde and stayed with a friend of Darren's, Brother Ray. He is a pretty good mechanic and the next morning we got the part on so it would not come off. We drove home with out any more events.

Friday we had a priest camp out up to Addision Ashcroff's cabin and fished Blue Spring. We caught some nice fish, three that were over 19 inches. They were real fighters. I was the fish master on this trip and was catching then pretty regular. The boys kept saying, "Don't tell me Brother Johnson has another fish on." They would come and crowd me out of my place and I would move to another place and start catching more fish and they would come crowd me out again. I let the boys that were not catching to many fish reel some of them in. I think everyone caught some fish, so it was fun. Weather was beautiful.

Saturday when we got home I was tired, but you mom wanted to do something. We went and played pickle ball for a little while then she was tired and it was pretty hot and she quit.

Today Tanner brought a couple of friends over for dinner. We made home made chocolate ice cream. We visited for a while. The boy is a returned missionary so maybe he will inspire Tanner to want to serve a mission.

I have included a picture of one of the bigger fish I caught, not the biggest but pretty nice.

Well hope you are working hard and smart. I liked what you said in your last letter home about preparing to teach. That is really important. Sounds like you are getting some good service in also. Keep up the good work. We are trying to be good missionaries. We visit Alice next door and I am working with Larry, the guy I home teach. We'll see what happens.

In Sunday School they were taking about the people in the early days that were called on missions by revelation and how some had great faith and went and others ended up apostatizing. I think it is in D&C 124. Missions can be hard and discouraging, but as in those days those that overcame great trials and persevered became great missionaries and future leaders of the church. Keep working hard and you will receive many blessings and see many miracles happen.

Take Care.

Love Dad.