A Picture with Elder Clayton from the Quarum on the 70. 

 Touching a first edition Book of Mormon!!

 Hunter is looking forward to a special baptismal service this Saturday of the family he and his companion found while knocking doors.  We'll hear more from him in his email on Monday.  Super Missionary Elder Johnson!  We love you!!!

 I'm so happy that you had fun celebrating my birthday! Did you save me any pizza? Sounds like Ammons b-day was pretty busy! That's so fantastic that K came to church! That speaks volumes! That means so much, please don't under estimate how much that means! Serving specifically in the YSA in the states has taught me so much. Young people, or anyone really, are very hesitant to read something, especially a "new" religious text they are unfamiliar with. In addition to that, they just can't comprehend the importance of the Book of Mormon. I would kill to have some of our investigators at church!   Man, I really need to meet S! Make sure she's there when we skype on Mother's Day or something! I simply must meet this fantastical person! I did get the picture and recording! I'll have to go to a computer to access it though. The zone is doing amazing! It's don't a complete 180 since I've been here. It's now (almost) full of good hardworking missionaries that want to do what's right. There's a couple people here and there that are thorns in my side, but that's fine. All the good makes up for it! This week has just been fantastic! We had A"s baptism on Saturday! It was a bit of a mess because a family that is basically his family wanted to do everything.....so the musical number ended up falling through then I ran around to all of them before and told them what they were doing. It was hilarious! But it was a very nice baptism. A was so happy, he was just beaming from ear to ear! Then on Sunday after church, we got a series of texts from R, the girl we Tracted into who's whole family is on date for baptism now, and from C! This is what they said. "But what I wanted to tell you guys is that I'm a very emotional person. And I see all of you guys as one of the greatest blessings in my life. I thank God for sending you guys to our door. In just little time you have all impacted my life greatly, I will forever be thankful for all of you." - R

And then C...I texted him, "Hey C, we loved having you at church today! We hope you enjoyed it! Everyone loved seeing you there!" Then he said,

"I sure did enjoy it and Elder Johnson I have something for you I'll give it to you when I see you :) today on my way to the library I told my brother I have spiritual father who found me and he was like who, what are you talking about and I was like it's Johnson. He looked at me like okay your point is and I just smiled and he said your turning into one of those crazy mormans and I said to him yeah a crazed lover of Jesus." A couple days before, we got a text from a less active guy we've been teaching. We deleted the text, but it basically said, "Elder Johnson what made you know that God called you to be such a great Elder?" Those three texts just absolutely made my week this week! Filled my heart full of 'warm fuzzies!' Anyway.....ill send the pictures in my email to everyone! And please let me know if you got the pictures from last week!

Hunter

We also gave a Book of Mormon too a Reverend yesterday! He wasn't going to take it, but after a pleasant conversation and appealing to his expertise in theology we got him to take one! He said he was going to read it by himself and not talk to anyone, including his Pastor about it! Woohooooo!

Hahaha, dad, I'm happy you had fun dancing with mom! I just feel bad for the poor kids that had to see you dancing......:) That's too bad about S's Grandma. You should show her the mormon message by Pres. Monson I think it's called 'untill we meet again.' It's really nice. There's a fair share of missionaries that haven't been as diligent and committed as they should be out here. It really is just sad when they waste their life away like that. Being on a mission in southern Cali has drastically changed my outlook on a lot of things, especially my relationships with people. At least K is up in Utah! What a great place for her to be! Justus wants her to get baptized. Don't worry. If it doesn't go anywhere, eventually he'll realize it. That's the story with S right now! He's dating a member and has been for a year. But now he's finally going to get baptized in April! Woohoooo! I'm so happy that you found Ranger! That is excellent! The power of prayer is real!!! 

In other news......It's really awesome working with Elder F. We have a baptism this weekend. I'll send pictures next week! We had a big long talk with C yesterday. He told us he was going to get baptized in another church on Sunday, so I told him to ask them with what authority they were baptizing him with. Turns out he didn't get baptized, so we asked him why yesterday when we were over. He was to scared to ask them the question. Because he knows they wouldn't be able to answer it and would put him on the spot and ask him why! So they interrogated him last night.....we still need to find out how that went. I told him we were proud of his decision to get baptized, just a little disappointed he was doing it in the wrong church! But to go ahead with it, because if he did he would just be getting wet and can still get baptized the right way! We shared the story of Paul going and baptizing people again who hadn't done it the right way. We asked him how he felt at the baptism and he just started talking about how awesome it was and how their faces were glowing! So we asked him if there was any part of him that did not want that. He thought for a bit and then said no. So we're just going to wait for the spirit to work on him! We taught a new investigator we found yesterday. We put her on date for March! But we have to pass her to a family Ward. That's ok. That's about all that's going on right now. If I think of anything else I'll let you know!

Hunter 

1. Elder D

2. I'm teaching a horse

3. Les trés amígos! They were all sitting down, so I whistled and got them all to look at the same time. The leg belongs to a guy named J that we're teaching 

Hey everyone! So this week has been fantastic! I am staying in the YSA Ward for six more weeks. Wooooohooooo! We were able to teach and talk to a bunch of people and we had stake conference!!! I want to share two stories. One is a story that was shared with me last Monday.

Another is a story from Stake Conference. Here is the first. It took place in 1974 during a sacrament meeting. This young man was preparing to leave on his mission and was giving his farewell talk, and this is what he said.

"Brothers and Sisters, as you know, the last two weeks, I've been waiting for my mission call. During the time I was waiting I had a dream. I knew it wasn't an ordinary dream. I dreamed I was in the pre-existence (where we lived with God as spirits) and awaiting my call to come to earth. I was filled with the same anticipation and excitement that I had before I received my mission call. In my dream, I was talking to a friend, and I felt a special closeness to him, even though I've never met him in this life. As we talked, a messenger came and gave me a letter. I knew it was my call to go to earth. In great excitement, my friend and I opened the letter. I gave it to him and asked him to read it aloud. It said, 'You've been called to earth in a special time and in a special land. You will be born to the true church and will have the Priesthood of God in your home. You will be born in a land of plenty, in a land of freedom. You will go to the earth in the United States of America.' My friend and I rejoiced as we read my call, and while we were rejoicing, the messenger returned.

This time he had my friends call. He told me to read it aloud. It said, 'You've been called to go to the earth in circumstances of poverty and strife. You will not be raised in the true church. Many hardships will attend your life. Your land will be fraught with political and social difficulties, which will hinder the work of the Lord. You will be born in Costa Rica.' We wept, my friend and I as we read his call, and my friend looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, 'When we are down on earth, please come and find me.' Then, the missionary giving his farewell talk said, with tears in his eyes, 'Brothers and Sisters, I have received my mission call. I'm going to Costa Rica.' About a year later, the bishop of that Ward received a letter from that missionary with only four words. 'I FOUND MY FRIEND!!!'"

Story 2. This was from Stake Conference. I'm telling it as best as I remember.

There was a man born.....somewhere in Idaho. He was born into the church, but in his early 20's decided he was going to do what he wanted. So he joined the Hells Angels, and rode around with them for a little upwards of 20 years. One night he got kind of wasted and the next morning decided he needs to detox and do an evaluation of his life, so he went to one of their detox houses. Not sure what state it was in. He was sitting on the porch and praying, asking God what he wanted him to do. He saw two young men walking down the street. These houses of theirs are gated, and guarded by Dobermans that are trained to attack people when they come close to the gate. The missionaries saw the dogs and rather quickly walked on. When they were about 100 meters away, he saw them stop. Then they started coming back. As they approached the gate the dogs rushed up to it! Only to turn around before they got to the gate and go lay back down. The two missionaries opened the gate, walked in and came up to the man. One of them asked him if he knew some person and some person. The man replied, "Yes, they are my parents." To which the young missionary replied, "Then I am your brother."

The reason I wanted to share these stories is that they epitomize my feelings towards missionary work. I just want all of you to know, the Gospel is true. I know this is the work of the Lord. I know that there are specific people and reasons I am here for. I know God loves us all individually and infinitely. I have seen His hands and His face in this work. I love all of you so much!

Hunter

 This is C, Elder F, me, and B. B is his fellowshipper and is an RM as of about 4 months ago. He is awesome.

Right before we took the picture, he muttered to me, "The next time we take this we're going to be wearing white!"

This week was great! C called and said he was going to come to church and wanted to try meeting with us again! We were so excited!  It's great to hear that T's eagle project went so well! Send me some pictures of it! Did you get the pictures of me holding the monkey's hand? That's awesome that you and mom are speaking in Stake Conference! I think some things that have helped are family keep the Sabbath Day Holy are.....going to church, cooking nice meals, playing music together, doing our family scripture study, personal scripture study, taking a nap, doing home teaching, doing fathers interviews, (btw dad, you've got no idea how many times I bring those up when teaching people, I'm so glad you did those with us on a fairly regular basis)......some things I would add that I don't think we did often would be inviting non-members/investigators over for a meal, having a less active over for a meal, playing a nice game, scripture trivia games, going out with the missionaries.....that's about all I can think of! There is this awesome talk on the sabbath day I just read. It's called 'The Sabbath Day' by Mark E. Peterson from April 1975. It is awesome!! I recommend reading it before putting your talk together, although you've probably already read it because I feel like you've already read everything in the gospel library and most of LDS.org. Anyhow, Your prayers are helping! We just had a lesson with S again and we are going to be putting him on date for April sometime near the end of February. A is getting baptized on the 20th, is awesome, and he is going to start coming out with us to teach people! We just got him his own PMG today from the office. He is completely solid. Here's a list of our investigators that we're focusing on. A, A, M, C, D, R, and H. We're continuing to find lots more to teach every week! We have a goal of handing out 10 book of Mormons every week. Last week we gave away 16!! In any case, they do more good sitting on someone else's bookshelf than ours! Not anything really exciting happened this week other than this young mom we talked to. We were just about to walk by her, then we both turned around at the same time and started to talk to her! She looked like she was about to cry, so we just talked about how much God loves and cares about her and shared a scripture from the Book of Mormon with her. We asked if we could come back and she said yes of course, whenever we want! It's so cool how the spirit just works on people that are humble and have an open heart! Anyhow, love you tons! 

Hunter

Here's a cool story about Agency!

"One of my esteemed colleagues told me of his efforts to aid a young college student who was feeling sorry for himself, who was lacking motivation and had no sense of responsibility. My friend made an attractive proposal to this young man. In a conversation that went something like this, he said, “Son, I’m going to take over full responsibility of your affairs from now on and relieve you of your worries. I’ll pay your tuition at college, buy your clothes, furnish you an automobile and a credit card for gasoline. When you get ready to marry, don’t worry about it; I’ll look for a wife for you, and I will supply you with a house that is furnished. I’ll support you and your family thereafter without any effort on your part. What do you think of my offer?” After a moment of sobered thinking the young man replied, “Well, if you did that, what would there be for me to live for?” Then my friend replied, “That is what I’m trying to make you see, my boy. That is the purpose of life--there is no joy without struggle and the exercise of one’s own natural abilities.” (A Time of Decision)

And here's a cool story about finding truth!!

"From our youth many of us may remember the story of a very young boy who was abducted from his parents and home and taken to a village situated far away. Under these conditions the small boy grew to young manhood without a knowledge of his actual parents or earthly home. Within his heart there came a yearning to return to that village called home. But where was home to be found? Where were his mother and father to be discovered? Oh, if only he could remember even their names, his task would be less hopeless. Desperately he sought to recall even a glimpse of his childhood. Like a flash of inspiration, he remembered the sound of a bell which, from the tower atop the village church, pealed its welcome each Sabbath morning. From village to village the young man wandered, ever listening for that familiar bell to chime. Some bells were similar, others far different from the sound he remembered. At length the weary young man stood one Sunday morning before a church of a typical town. He listened carefully as the bell began to peal. The sound was familiar. It was unlike any other he had heard, save that bell which pealed in the memory of his childhood days. Yes, it was the same bell. Its ring was true. His eyes filled with tears. His heart rejoiced in gladness. His soul overflowed with gratitude. The young man dropped to his knees, looked upward beyond the bell tower--even toward heaven--and in a prayer of gratitude whispered, “Thanks be to God. I’m home.” Like the peal of a remembered bell will be the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ to the soul of him who earnestly seeks. Many of you have traveled long in a personal quest for that which rings true. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints sends forth to you an earnest appeal. Open your doors to the missionaries. Open your minds to the word of God. Open your hearts, even your very souls, to the sound of that still, small voice which testifies of truth. As the prophet Isaiah promised: “Thine ears shall hear a word … saying, This is the way, walk ye in it.” (Isa. 30:21.) Then, like the boy of whom I’ve spoken, you too will, on bended knee, say to your God and mine: “I’m home!” (The Way Home)

C, one of our now former investigators, was wanting to learn about the church, and we were teaching him, and it was going great! Had a fantastic few lessons on the restoration, plan of salvation, and an amaaaazing gospel of Jesus Christ lesson, and then a couple days ago, we read 2 Nephi 31 with him and talked about it. He got really quiet, and we asked him what was wrong and he said he was disturbed because he was being told everything he had believed and learned growing up was wrong, and that he was having an 'internal conflict'. So we told him that was his feelings about his own beliefs fighting against the truths the spirit was testifying to him about. It was way cool, but after we left he texted us and dropped us. I can't say I was surprised, but I was still sad. It's very much like the rich young ruler who couldn't sell all he had. He couldn't give up what he held dear to his heart. C is a very nice boy......he just couldn't give up what he's been told all his life, even when the Spirit testified to him so strongly that everything we were saying was true. People are just uncomfortable changing, and will often not change even if they know they need to, just because they are uncomfortable doing so. We found a family this week! Two weeks ago we were tracting and this YSA age girl answered a door. We gave her a BOM and she said we could come back next week, so last week. When we came back she had remembered we were coming over, and said her family was going to join us, and was that alright? We were fighting so hard to contain our excitement!!!! We taught the Restoration and talked about church. The mom asked what we thought of the Virgin Mary and I told her we didn't worship her, but we hold her in high esteem, and she didn't really get it, so I compared mom to Mary (love you mom!) to explain that they are both awesome, we just don't worship them. But that family is so solid!! The mom and three daughters and one son are all baptismal age and it turns out the dad is a less active member and we had no idea u tip he came to church yesterday with three of the kids!!, (the mom was sick) we were hopping up and down in our seats and on our feet and in the car all day long, we were so excited! So that basically sums up the week!

Elder Hunter

  1. Picture of Elder F

2.  Monkey shaking hands with the missionaries

Elder F is fantastic! He's really young for a zone leader, but that's ok, we're all learning! He just gets to learn faster than everyone! I'll try to get a picture with him ;) (I can't tell if you're joking about that or not haha) That's crazy with all the Ward stuff going on....and being sick! That's gonna be real tough on the youth program. I'm going to send an email about the week later today! We've got some lessons earlier today so we're doing some of our emailing a bit later. Thanks for the testimony and pictures of the family!

Hunter

Wow! So this week was amaaaazing! The Lord has blessed me so much this transfer and I've finally realized it! I've been praying for he ability to talk to anyone and the gift had been granted! "Ask and ye shall receive, knock and it shall be opened!" And it took work! It took faith! I had some blunders, but for the most part, now I just open my mouth and it is filled! Sometimes I ramble, but it is filled!

It's great! You would be baffled at my personality now. I'm soooooo different from what I was before the mission it's crazy! And these past three weeks have probably been when the greatest change has happened. Let me tell you about a few of the miracles this week! On exchanges with the AP's I went with Elder C to their area. We had the temple tour, so for the most part the day was shot, but we finished dinner and had a short lesson with a wonderful recent convert named S who is having some struggles, but he is awesome!

Afterwards we went and walked around amongst some complex's and just talked to everyone we absolutely could! We did that for an hour and a half, and on our way back to the car we saw this lady coming out of her car and she started walking down the sidewalk towards us. We said hi and she stopped to talk. I forgot what was said, but eventually we gave her a Book of Mormon and explained that it was something very special to us and it was one of the ways God shows his love for us.

The whole time she had had a small smile on her face and I thought it was the 'your very nice boys I'm not interested' smile, but as Elder C bore his testimony of how much God loves her, I realized she was smiling to try to stop from crying, and she just broke down right there and started crying. We let her cry for a bit and she explained that she was just going through a really tough time. She held the Book of Mormon close and said thank you. Thank you so much for this book.

We got her address and number and set an appointment for Saturday or Sunday....I forgot.

Next! Last night we only had an hour to work, so we not to a complex to visit someone we didnt have a house number for and on the way in talked to two girls. We gave them both book of Mormons and set  return appointments. We then set up 2 more appointments with two other families we talked to! Those are the blessings of talking to everyone!

So that's about it! Sorry this is late, we just got out of an incredible lesson with A and it went a little late. The spirit was so strong!! It was so good we put her on date for......April 6th!!!!

Woohooooo! I'm so stoked. And more good things the rest of the week!

Thanks so much for the testimonies! Where's As?! Can you have hers sent? I want to print out a few this week. Love you!!!!!

Hunter