Welcome Home Elder Johnson

19 July—Brazos (LAST LETTER HOME)

Hello family and friends!

This week was a good week. We had our buddy, Juan Garza, come to church again. He is a cool guy, plays in a band that travels all over Southern Texas singing and playing all kinds of instruments.

We have seen miracles this week as we have put our disobedience acts on the alter as an act of obedience. We had a day where everything fell through at 7:30pm, and we didn't know what it was that we were to do. Then we realized this is not our work. We are doing the work of the Lord. That is when we humbly sought for the guidance and direction of the Lord. When we prayed, we felt the impression to go and try a certain part of our area that we hadn't really tried before. It was over by a members home. When we got there we found a trailer park that we had never been to, and we started talking to people asking them if they would be interested in hearing a message about the gospel of the restoration. The third lady that we spoke with was a less active lady that we had been looking for, and her father who is not a member of the church. It was a great miracle. Then the next day we went back to the same area and tried another section and we found another part member family with a son named Cesar who is a very nice kid that we are going to start to work with.

Things have been running very well in the zone. This is the first time my whole mission that we have been hitting all of our goals. Every single one, except for our keys goal, which is average sit downs and OYMS. It is amazing experience to be able to pray each night about each companionship, and know them well enough to be able to ask the Lord for what they need, and praying for their investigators. I have loved being a zone leader for the Houston West zone for eight transfers. I have been able to serve in each district in the zone throughout my mission and it has been very humbling to see little tiny seeds that I planted earlier on my mission grow into a beautiful family tree.

Quick experience on Saturday. I was talking with the district leader in Houston 8 and he was telling me about a family that I taught when I was there. I had the privilege of baptizing two boys, Max and Steven, there. Their mother always had a doubt that she would never tell us. Well, it turns out that she finally opened up to the missionary's and she wants to be baptized! She knows the church is true! Another family in Houston 8 is progressing very well, and they come to church every Sunday and all they need to do is get their marriage license and they will get married and baptized. I can honestly say that my joy was full that night. Other families in Houston 1 have been able to bring their bothers and sisters to church and be baptized.

The standard of truth has been erected and no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing. I know that statement is true. The only thing that will stop ourselves from progressing is ourselves. We need to make sure we keep the natural man in us dormant, or even cast it out. My favorite scripture that I have been able to say is my favorite, since I have been on my mission, would have to be Mosiah 3:19. It has helped me to really submit myself and to try to really become a disciple of Christ, to become one of his friends not an enemy.

The thing that has changed the most about me as I have been on my mission has been to do the little things. I am going to pray in the name of Christ (see prayer in Bible Dictionary) and I am going to read my scriptures everyday, and apply them to my life. And I am going to magnify my priesthood callings, whenever they are given to me. I am going to be obedient and follow my church leaders. I know that by doing this things I will be able to cut out the natural man in my life.

My favorite thing to study on my mission has been to study the mighty change of heart. It has to do with everything. This is really the purpose of life. To give our hearts to him. And to show that we have given them to him through our obedience to his commandments and diligently seeking to become more like him everyday. I know that the mission has given me a foundation to build upon for the remainder of my life. I have a firm foundation in Christ and know it's time to build the temple. I want to live my life in such a way that I can have the spirit to be with me always. I know that this is the Church of Jesus Christ. He appeared to Joseph Smith and called him to be a prophet. The Priesthood has been restored and through it we can partake of the saving ordinances of the gospel. Through the Atonement of Jesus Christ we can have a mighty change in our hearts and really have no more disposition to do evil, but to do good continually. The Book of Mormon is another testament of Jesus Christ. I love this work and I love being a missionary. The badge comes off after the mission, but not the change.

-Elder Johnson

12 July—Brazos

Hey Family!

Things here in Texas are going great! This month the mission is focusing on obedience and the zone has been applying it and we have been seeing miracles happen here!

This week was a week of hard work for us here in Rosenberg and Richmond. We have really been trying hard to find newbies and we had a funny experience happen this week while we were out talking with people. We found a bike trail that lead to the back of a trailer park that we had been to before, so we decided to take it to the trailer park for the first time. We were going kind of fast and my brakes don't work very well, when suddenly I saw a little stream right in front of my path. I tried to brake but it was to late. Splash! I rode into this little stream that was probably five feet wide, and jumped off my bike and the only part of me that got wet was my right foot. My companion was laughing at me, but the cool part is that when we got to the trailer part we talked to a lady who has a brother that is a member of the church. His name is Angel and we have been trying to find him for ever! Turns out that this summer he is out of the state visiting his cousins and wont be back till school starts. But we are now going to teach Jessica his sister and we will see what happens!

The other good thing is that right now we are teaching Sandy and Frank, and they are progressing well. They really have the desires to change, and those are the type of people we are looking for to help the work move on. They are actually a member referral. We have been receiving a lot of them lately and they help out a ton. President Saylin shared some interesting information with us that I want to share with you. And that is that almost 70% of baptisms that happen in our mission are from member referrals. So I can promise that if you have a little bit of faith, and invite friends to church and to visit with the missionaries, you will see results and you will be able to have some of your best friends with you at church. If you are afraid just remember this. We are in the Church of Jesus Christ. This is His church. We have a secret weapon and that is the spirit. It will testify of the truth of the Restoration to everyone. It is then up to them to accept the message or to reject it.

I have been studying prayer lately. And the Bible Dictionary is totally cool! It talks about praying in the name of Christ, and says that when we pray in the name of Christ, we pray in a way that our mind is his mind, that our desires are his desires and our ways his ways. It says that most prayers that are not answered is because we don't pray in the name of Christ, but instead we pray for the selfish desires of our hearts. So that is what I am trying to do. Align my will with His.

I love you!

-Elder Johnson

27 June—Brazos

Hey Family!

This week we are emailing Monday instead of Tuesday, because we have a busy week ahead of us with the leadership meeting, and also a ZLC meeting this week.

But I wanted to tell you about the good week that Elder Garrido and I have had here in Rosenburg and Richmond. We have been patiently searching, talking, knocking doors, and asking people if we could share the important message of the restoration with them. One day, I think it was maybe on Tuesday, we were finding people to go and teach and we went to this street were it didn't really look like there was going to be much success because there were some nice looking homes around, but we decided to go down it anyway. At the very end of the street there was a little dirt road with some smaller homes and trailers that were not visible while we were at the entrance to the street. We knocked on the door at the end of the little dirt road and a very nice lady answered. We began to talk with her, and she told us she was from El Salvador, and back when she was living there she had a friend who was a member of the church. She went on telling us about her friend and how he was such a good man, and told us she would be happy for us to come and teach her and her family later that week.

We went over on Saturday and had a very awesome lesson with them. We knocked on the door and the husband answered it, and said pasale which means come in, so we did and we began to talk with them. The husband immediately began to talk about religion these days, and how there were so many issues with it and everything. He definitely started of the lesson with the ball. He had control with where he wanted to go. He would ask us a lot of questions and we were able to answer them through the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, and when we gave answers he would say things like exacto! Prefecto ustedes saben and things like that. Then we were able to teach this family the restoration, and we felt inspired to watch the 20 minute restoration DVD because we felt it would be better for the family because that way the husband would have to listen and learn instead of talk and talk and talk.

By the end of the movie there was a great spirit, and everyone was content and happy, we were able to testify of the truth of the restoration. Their 3-year old girl liked the movie, which made the dad really happy. The family accepted dates for July 30th. They said they would come to church this week to see how it is and to see if they like it. We are really excited about this family.

Other than that we are excited to keep working the with ward members and our investigators. This past week I had the chance to interview a man for baptism in a different ward and at the end of the lesson he asked me what I was doing on Saturday and I said, well more missionary work, and he invited me to come to his baptism and baptize him. I was shocked and I got permission to do it, so I will be baptizing him today, because his baptism was moved to today so that's exciting!

Well I love you all a lot and I hope you all have a good week!

-Elder Johnson

21 June—Brazos

Hey Family!

Things here in Rosenberg are going great! We have been busy-bees as we have started to take over the sisters' area! All-and-all, things have been the same, but the thing that we are the most happy about is the fact that we obtained seven member referrals this week! We are really happy about it. Five of the referrals are from a young man who had just finished serving a six week mini-mission! We are teaching his cousin and the cousin's boyfriend, and his two sisters and their boyfriends. It was amazing to see the change in this young man. He went from waking up at 12:00 in the afternoon and playing video games all day to having the desire to read the whole bible this year, and coming out with us to teach his family! It is awesome!

We also got one referral from our recent convert, Richard. He introduced us to his mom and we are going to start teaching her. We hope to see her come to church sometime with her son. It would be a great experience. We also got one from an older lady in the branch, and we didn't even ask for it, but she just gave it to us and said that she had given it to missionaries before but they never went to see her. So we went by but no one was home so we are going to try again.

Well, it sounds like everything went well this past week, and I just want to say happy Fathers' Day to Dad and all the brothers-in-law: Jeremy, Greg, and Tyler. You all are cool guys and thanks for being good husbands to my sisters. And thanks Dad for the good example you are for me, and I hope you enjoy the letter.

Well that's about it for the week. Nothing crazy exciting happened, but we are super excited for this next week so we will see if I will be able to provide some cool stuff for you all!

-Elder Johnson

14 June—Rosenberg

Hey Family!

This week I am pleased to announce that I will be staying in Rosenberg with Elder Garrido for the next six weeks. The cool/crazy/exciting/intense thing is that the sisters' missionary area for the branch was closed down this transfer; so we have doubled the size of our area, moved to a new apartment in Richmond,(sorry I don't know the address yet), and now we get to work with all the members in the branch! We are very excited about this, because we can really focus on getting member referrals and building up our relationships with them.

We also had our investigator fireside this last Sunday, and it went really well. I think it was the first time that the Houston West Zone was able to get every companionship to come to the fireside. We had a total of ten people there and it was just a very spiritual meeting. It was super cool.

As far as transfers go, only two missionaries from the zone were transferred, and we are excited because we will be able to grow more in unity and see good things happen in the areas. But it is the calm before the storm, because there is a huge group coming and a huge group leaving next month, so many missionaries are going to train and that means many people will be getting transferred.

I forgot my camera again, but I hope to bring it next week so I can show you the picture of Richard getting baptized. And what my companion Elder Garrido looks like.

Good news for the week is that we had our dear friend Abel come to church! He is a less-active member who is missing both of his legs. He came to church, and it was the first time that he has been in about three months, so we are very excited about it. It is great to see the branch go serve and help him.

I guess this one goes to the friends, just to let you know I have really wanted to stay completely focused on the work the last few weeks of my mission so that is why I haven't responded to a lot of the letters. We will catch up soon! I hope you understand.

I am not really sure what to say to you this week besides the fact that everything in my life is going great, and I am still loving to study the scriptures. I hope everything goes well, and just so you know we email now on Tuesdays instead of Mondays.

I love you!

-Elder Johnson

7 June, 20011—Brazos, TX

Family!

Richard is now a member of the church! He is so awesome! His baptism was super cool, and it just showed the kind of man he is! We got to the baptism, and began to fill up the font and some brown rusty-looking water came out. It was dirty! There was some road work going on outside, and some how it affected the water in the fount. Anyway, while this was going on we were frantically thinking of other solutions to fix the problem, like going down to the Brazos river, or using someone's swimming pool. When Richard heard this he said, no I want to be baptized right here. He said President Puig, you're a holy man right? Then let's get this baptism started!

Then we started the baptism, and Richard was baptized. He was so happy afterwards, and it was a cool sight to see. His life has completely changed and it was nothing any of us did. The change all came from the spirit, and Richard's open heart. Sunday, he received the Holy Ghost and it is so cool to see the fire he has. All he wants to do know is share the gospel with his friends and his family. He swallowed a little bit of the water, and he got sick from it. We gave him a blessing, and he just about had tears in his eyes and he said that's some powerful stuff. The priesthood of God is back on the earth, and with this authority all of God's ordinances can be performed once again. So awesome.

Right now in the branch out efforts have now switched from our own efforts to involving more of the members. We knock and talk, and knock and talk, and have a hard time getting any where. The other day a young women from the branch invited her boyfriend over for dinner, and he accepted a baptismal date. The family is pumped. This guy's life is about to change for the better. The gospel is true.

We got in our first Bible bash the other day. It wasn't even intentional. A man looked like he was interested, we start teaching, and he tried to back us into a corner, which didn't work. He showed us his Bible, and in the back it has a section about how "Mormonism" is a cult. And all this other garbage. I think that is so lame! Who puts that in the back of a bible??? It wasn't just about our church, but about tons of other churches as well. I was grateful that I had the chance to realize that this was a testimony builder, not a destroyer because I know the church is true! There is nothing anyone can say that will prove the Book of Mormon false, or prove that Joseph Smith was not a Prophet of God.

The church is true! That is all I have to say today. We will see what happens with me next week. Transfer calls come Tuesday, and I will let you know what happens!

Love y'all

-Elder Johnson