45th week in Japan
6/20/2016

Constantly Learning

Dear Family and Friends,

Uwajima is a great place. I continue to love the people here more and
more every week. My companion and I have been working on getting to
know our investigators better and teaching people rather than lessons.
I have come to realize how important it is that we focus on people's
needs individually. God made every single one of us different, so it
is very important that we teach people to how they need to be taught.
Teaching the gospel is such a great learning experience. I am grateful
for the chance that I have to constantly testify of the joy that this
gospel brings to me.

This last week nearing the end of the week we had a companionship
exchange with our Zone Leaders in Mastuyama. After district meeting we
exchanged companion and Elder Murakami and I took a train to go visit
one of their investigators. We were going to help him clean up his
house. I was way excited because there are very few service
opportunities like that in Japan. We were able to help their
investigator clean up and teach him a lesson about the gospel of Jesus
Christ. Teaching people about how they can be happy in this life and
receive salvation in the life to come is such a special opportunity. I
am so grateful for my zone leader Elder Murakami. He has been such a
great example to me and I feel like he has really helped me out a lot
the last few transfers here in Uwajima. On a mission you just build
special friendships with certain missionaries, and I really feel like
I have with Elder Murakami.

Serving a mission really changes who you are. My life has changed so
much since I left for my mission. I have gained such a stronger
testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel. I have learned how to
truly pray for help when I need it. I have learned that the Book of
Mormon is true. Learning is something that I have actually come to
enjoy on my mission. I know that by the time I come back I will be a
completely changed person.

This week I am going to work on praying with more sincerity. I know at
the end of the day sometimes it is difficult to kneel down and give a
sincere pray when you are so tired, but think about how much of a gift
it is from our Heavenly Father that we can pray to him. I would like
to invite everyone else to join me on praying with sincerity this
week. My Ponderizing scripture for this week was Mosiah 23:22.

Questions:

1. Stores are pretty similar here to what they are like in America.
Obviously they have a lot of different foods, but the layout is pretty
much the same.

2. My companion does like to cook. He is pretty good too. His mom used to cook
him a lot of Japanese food in America. I did not see him at the MTC
because he fast tracked, which means he was only there for 2 weeks
because he already knew Japanese. We have not gone to Uwajima castle
yet because it has been raining on our P-days.

3. Yes, they do bull fighting in Uwajima. I haven't been able to go
see it yet, but I would like to go one day if I can. I am not sure
which river that is, but there is a lot of fishing that goes on in
Uwajima because we are right next to the ocean.

4. I am not exactly sure why they built the castles. I think they were
all built a long time ago though. Some have been remolded. There is an
emperor and a prime minister in Japan. I haven't read much on the
history of Japan, but I do hear about it a lot from people while we
are housing. When they talk about their religion sometimes it leads
back to the history of Japan.

5. I don't know of any museums really here. Uwajima is pretty small, and
there isn't too much to do. It is a really good place though.

6. It is actually just a branch, but things are going pretty well. We
are trying to get more people to church right now. That is a big
focus. The branch president is doing well. He is awesome. I love
playing ping pong with him because he is really good. (Maybe even
better than dad... Maybe). My new companion did introduce himself in church.

7. We haven't met too many new people lately. We meet new people every
day, but not too many new investigators. We haven't had interviews for
a while. I think we will have them this transfer though. Interviews
are once every 2 or maybe 3 transfers. I forgot.

8. Yes, I have been feeling great. I have been exercising a lot more
and eating really healthy lately, so that has helped. The umbrellas
work awesome, but we don't get to use them much because we can't use
them while we are biking. I actually gave one of them to my trainee
because he had to go far away and I figured he might need it on his
way to Osaka.

9. I think Father's day is Sunday here in Japan. I am pretty sure it is the same day as in America.

Thank you everyone. I love you all. 皆さん最後まで耐え忍びつずけてください。愛しているよ！

ハーシ長老
Elder Hirschi

playing pictionary with the English class

lunch I eat about everyday now