Do something fun and enjoy life!

What a wonderful week it has been! We've been working on finding more investigators and we found some really awesome people!  We had a cool experience meeting a man name Dave Cook. We knocked on his door and he asked if we were preachers or Jehovah Witnesses. we explained who we are and talked a little about families. He said he wasn't interested and started closing the door but paused and said would you like a drink? we said yes cause we knew that would most likely get us in the door and allow us more time to talk. So he let us in and told us to have a seat! turned out he's good friends with a Less Active member who has been wanting to come back to church! so we have plans to take them over and have a lesson with him! what a blessing!  We were also able to meet with Doyle and Shirley. . We watched the Joseph Smith movie with them and they really felt the spirit, they even told us they did. It was a powerful lesson. We also we blessed to finally get a hold of Melissa and Emily! they both are praying to know if baptism is for them.    

    The beginning of the week was freezing! our car was frozen shut haha. We also found this lake that was frozen over! i had never walked on a frozen body of water so, why not!? it was cool! The wind the past 2 days have been 55 mph! i love the wind so its been fun!

Elder Baxter of the 70 came and spoke at our stake conference! We got to ride up with the Young's, man was that a blast! Elder Baxter is such a powerful speaker. one thing that was really powerful was what he said about temples. Every cornerstone that's placed weakens satans power. something else that he said, which made me wanna do temple work so bad was thinking of the people we're doing the work for. picturing them rejoicing when we go to the temple exclaiming "todays my day!" It really

brought the spirit putting it in that perspective.

Well I love yall and hope this week is a good one! Do something fun and enjoy life!

Elder Johnson

Beautiful West Virginia Fall

Walking on a frozen pond

You've been notified!

this week was awesome! 

The other night we tried this new BBQ joint in town called Dickeys. Man was it good!! the waitress and cashier lady REALLY wanted me to get some pie, it was very tempting. what tipped the scale was that they offered me a piece of cheese cake for free if i get a piece of pie! anyone who knows me knows that sweets are my weakness so i gave in! haha it was worth it cuz we invited them to learn about the church! 

We had some really great experiences this week, especially with member coming out with us! We have been trying to figure out how we could help "sister" Cline understand the gospel and what would be beneficial for her to have a spiritual experience. The members who we took over were the people who were meant to be there and share their testimony. Members have such an impact on investigators. Missionaries get transferred all the time, members are long term and establish that immediate support system that is soo crucial for an investigator. Sister Clines progression really has gone way faster with the member support! 

The Spirit is so great!  I had a lot of times where i felt the Holy Ghost speak through me in lessons. We gotta just open our mouths and talk to people and the Spirit WILL give you the words to say. thats a  promise from the Lord to missionaries AND members!! how awesome is that! If you have someone thats been on your mind, that youve wanted to share the gospel with, pray about it and go for it! 

We have been having a god time "notifying" members in the ward. Its where we take a bunch of sticky notes and write a bunch of nice things, post them, ring the door and knock, then RUN! its so much fun! i love seeing peoples reactions to it, especially less actives :) 

These past 9 1/2 months have just flown by! im excited to keep serving! i love this work so much! take care and happy early thanksgiving! 

Love Elder Johnson

Knocking on the door like you're the cops

what a week! We had some interesting things happen! 

We went to see one of our investigators, "Ms.W". shes this energetic, spicy African American women. Elder Brenchley knocked on her door with his loud knock but she didnt answer so we were walking back to our car when we heard " and WHERE do you boys think your going? knocking on my door like your the cops then take off! get over here!" hahahahaha it was hilarious; thats Ms W for ya. We had a great lesson with her, helping her figure out her purpose here on earth through the plan of salvation lesson. 

We were stopping by to see our investigator Loukas, they needed to reschedule. as we were leaving we heard someone from down the street yell "Elders!!!"  It was Sister Young, so we drove over and she invited us over to dinner that night! She had already feed us once! I love the young family so much. they make me feel so loved and support us a lot. We had dinner with the Heller family, who i also love a lot. Sister young and her son Ryan came over when were finishing up and sharing a spiritual thought. before we left sister Heller wanted to sing a few hyms with us. It brought the spirit very strongly. 

Tom Wood and Charla Cline came to church this sunday! President and sister Salisbury came to our ward Sunday also!! The talks were great, classes went well! Was a great day!! President interviewed us during sunday school. we walked around the building a few times as we talked. i love the Salisburys so very much. During priesthood Tom spoke up and complimented Elder Brenchley and i very kindly and said we were "his missionaries"; "his guys". its really awesome and makes a missionary feel really good to have their investigator call them their missionary. ahh being a missionary is the best!! i love serving other people and sharing the sacred restored truths with them. honk and wave at the next missionaries you see while driving! maybe even stop and say hi. love yall so much!

Love, Elder Johnson

This Sunday was the best Sunday I've ever had on my mission!

Well this week it got a lot colder! I dont think 8 months here has gotten me used to the weather haha. 

Where do i start? Well we got a referral from some other missionaries off mormon.org. they wanted us to go see this man, Tom Wood. He used to meet with them but he moved. So we looked and looked for this guy but couldnt find him, We asked some people in the area where he should be and they directed us to him! He said he was really glad we found him and was calling the church building and looking in book stores to get a Book of Mormon. Im glad we found him. 

   We met with David Lilly this week. Hes been investigating for a while now and has been hesitant about baptism. We didnt wanna push him, and i didnt want to stop teaching him cuz i see so much potential in him. This week when we met with him it was gunna be a make or break lesson to see if he really was interested in still meeting. We talked about baptism and the proper authority. He understood and asked if he could be baptized!!!!! so hes now on date which i didnt think would happen anytime soon. It was a testimony builder for sure! 

   This sunday was the best sunday ive ever had on my mission!! We had 4 at church! Charla Cline came!! she brought her friend kevin, who we've never met before. it was testimony meeting so the spirit was really strong. they both said they wanna come back next week! and Kevin wants us to come over and teach him!! We also had the 10 yr old twins at church!!!! Mackenzie and Lindsey!! They really enjoyed it. They fit right in in primary and had a great time! Sister Heller invited us, them and Sister Blackburn (theyre grandma) over for dinner! So after church we went over and had a great meal then a family home evening. that really brought the spirit for when we watched the Joseph Smith movie. I love that movie so much. It is really powerful. The twins liked it and after the movie, Elder Brenchley and i bore our testimonies and invited them to be baptized and they said yes! It was really great and the Hellers connected really well with them. 

    What an amazing time to be a missionary! The work is moving right along! Especially in this area! Im so grateful that i chose to be a missionary and serve my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.If you havent had the chance to see meet the mormons then go see it! im so excited that its playing in Bella Terra!! I hope all yalls week is great. Love you and am grateful for the prayers and support! I can feel it. Love you

Love Elder Johnson

A Miracle in the rain

Conference was inspiring, uplifting and just all around wonderful. From the angelic music of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, to the talks inspired from men called of God. If you didnt watch it, you have time to repent! Its on LDS.ORG !! check it out haha. 

   Well this past week was great! We were walking to go see one of our potential investigators and this women said hi to us from her porch, so we stopped and talked with her. She ended up letting us in and said she used to meet with missionaries before and in VERY interested in family history!! So we have a return appointment with her and a couple in our ward who are very good with family history, tomorrow! It was a blessing to meet her.We also got to preview the Meet the Mormons movie! It was such a powerful film!!! I love it so much!!! Yall gotta go on MeettheMormons.com and fill out the stuff to have it played near you!!! It has such a great message and shows that us Latter Day Saints arent extra terrestrial crazys! haha 

It has been getting a lot colder around here! The other morning it was hailing!!!! time to get out what i call my sleeping bag jacket. haha. Last night it was pouring rain! Our appointment for the night cancelled so we went over to Kroger and helped people out to their cars and load their groceries in the car without getting wet. It was a great way to meet people and see if they want to learn! There was this one lady who asked for some "literature" so we gave her a Book of Mormon and she gave us her address without us asking and told us to stop by! miracle! 

  Yesterday as we were getting our food for the week at wal-mart we ran into a lady from our ward, Sister Heller. she talked with us for a little while then she said, " finish up your shopping and ill buy your stuff"! she said when they lived in California, they would run into the Elders and buy their groceries for them! it was really kind of her! 

  Well thanks for all the prayers and love. it means a lot! Dont forget to spread the word about Meet The Mormons! its a powerful missionary tool. Love yall! 

Elder Johnson 

Wild wonderful West Virginia!

Wild wonderful West Virginia! home of the mountaineers! Theres no place like it. Maybe thats why my cool cousin Ethan is on a team named after this place! 

well today, 8 months ago i embarked on this mission! its gone by really fast! We had a wild and wonderful week this week. Met a lot of really nice, and some not so receptive people. There was a man that talked to us at the beginning of this week. He went off talking about our sacred doctrine and mocking it. he didnt give us a chance to talk so we walked away when he was done. the spirit was gone and i felt really angry, and confused at how someone could be so inconsiderate. As i thought about it and prayed, i was able to feel calm. it really strengthened my testimony. i know that what we believe is true and no angry old man, nobody can take away that i know this gospel is true. 

  We went to this buffet called Ryans. Its an awesome place! as we were eating a manager guy comes up to us and starts asking where we're from. at first i was thinking we were getting in trouble. but he started talking with mormon lingo so we understood. He ended up giving us each 2 free meal passes!! so we can go back and eat 2 times for free!!!!! pretty cool. Something else cool that happened, that my Father will probably will be proud/happy about; we were tracting a street and there were these teenagers playing basketball. Elder Brenchley made a deal with them. If we beat them then they had to go on mormon.org. We ended up beating them (i scoring the winning basket ) It was really fun to be able to play some basketball and share the gospel while doing it. 

  Saturday, Shady Spring High had their homecoming parade. We went to that and sat with the Mcgradys. It was a lot of fun sitting with Sister Mcgrady and her daughter cuz everyone knows them and they made it a lot of fun cheering and such. All the float were throwing out candy! it was great! talked to some people and even got someones number so we could meet with them. We met up with the Young family after. They are such an awesome family! Love them so much. They take really good care of me and my companion. We consider Sister Young our mission mom haha. Yesterday was a big faith builder, not only cuz of church but of an experience we had. We got a call from the  other Elders saying that Steven Snuffer ( a man in our ward and our area) was found unconscious in his home and is now in the hospital. We figured something was wrong when he didnt answer our phone calls the other day. He always answers. We found out he had fallen at 5 am Saturday morning and couldnt get to the phone. he might have had another stroke. he wasent sound until after  church at 2pm the next day. his dog laid on him all night to keep him warm and alerted the people that went to go see him. We saw him with the hellers (his home teacher) to give him a blessing. When we walked in his hospital room he asked if we were there to play pool. We got over to his house and play pool with him sometimes, its awesome. we said we were there to give a blessing and he was very thankful. It was hard to understand him but the spirit was defiantly there. Elder Brenchley annointed the oil, it was his first time. it was a powerful experience. Im grateful for the power of the priesthood and know its real. Thanks for the support! Love yall very much.until next week  

Elder Johnson