September 6, 2015

This week was really great and we saw TONS of miracles! The first part of the week went really fast, we had a lot of random things that needed to get done around the area as well as this kind of volunteer missionary couple that has been helping us out here moved back to Sapporo this week :( Those first three days shot by so fast and then we hopped on a plane to go up to Naha for a conference with Elder Choir of the seventy. It was so fun to get to meet so many missionaries and get to know them after being with just the four elders here on Ishigaki for a while now! I had a lot of fun especially being with people who have been in Japan around the same time as me, since my apartments have been almost mainly older missionaries!

The conference was AMAZING! I can`t put into words, I went in with a lot of questions and ideas for how I can improve and it seemed like Elder Choi talked about every single one of them. He really helped me and I felt the whisperings of the spirit throughout and I truly felt enlightened from his council and from his words. He spoke a lot about elevating our thoughts and putting them as close to God`s as possible. How we can work our hardest and start with our thoughts which moves to actions, habits, characteristics, destiny. AKA Mrs. Holmes thing that she taught me all the time as a kid. It was fun to see that come back and how much it affected me at that time. Everything comes from our thoughts. We have to make our thoughts higher and more in line with the Lords and we can accomplish all things.

We got back late on friday night, and then saturday was pretty ridiculous! We taught five lessons! And we met with Yudai after what had been a while of not meeting, it turns out that since school has started he hasnt been able to get home until 8:30 at night and that schedule goes until the end of this month. Japanese school is absolutely ridiculous, they put those kids through so much.But he was way pumped to get to see us, we also got to teach the Yabukis who have a baptismal date on the fourth of october. AND THEY CAME TO CHURCH! In ishigaki one of the hardest things is church attendance and they both showed up fifteen minutes early! It was great to see them there, she even dressed up for it! It was also fun to see the Lords timing, as Elder Quinn got two flat tires that day and we were still able to meet with everyone somehow, as well as teach more lessons than we had planned for. I also ate raw fish that had been caught from the ocean an hour before, it was DELICIOUS! Japanese people are way nice and good at sharing their raw fish ;)

Sunday was great with the Yabukis coming to church, we also had a couple lessons and a lot of time to talk to people and make a few return appointments, it was a great experience for me to just continually see how much the Lord is blessing this area. I know that as we continue to work that the Lord will bless this area even more and slowly but surely many baptisms will come and many people will want to hear this message. But it has to come through us doing all of the small and simple things right now to bring that great thing to pass.

I love this work, and I love you all more than the new couch and washing machine we are getting today! Keep your thoughts elevated and enjoy life!

Love,

Elder Krebs

August 31, 2015

Friends and Fam,

WHAT A WEEK! We had all kinds of stuff going on, once typhoon clean up was over we got back to the grind. It was a holiday called o-Bon (pronounced oh-bone) this week, which is comparative to Christmas in America. Families get together for 3 days and eat at the ginormous graves here in Ishigaki, they believe the spirits of their ancestors come and eat with them, it was cool to experience as well as see more of the Japanese culture. Ancestors are very important here, and it made missionary work very fun as we were able to relate everything back to ancestors and eternal families, a lot of people thought it was a good idea but since it was o-Bon they just said come back after so hopefully we will get to meet with them soon!

Wednesday was a good day of dendo(missionary work), we were supposed to have a lesson in the afternoon but it cancelled because o-Bon started that day which was a bummer, she is a lady named Catherine she is Japanese, speaks English, and catholic! She has been taught the lessons before, but we were able to meet another one of her friends from the Catholic Church while knocking doors, who just so happens to be the grandma of some of the kids we play basketball with a lot, so all kinds of neat connections there, and that grandma really wanted to study with us and with Catherine! But we are meeting on Tuesday so hakuna Matata! Then English class that night, fun as always! We had a cool miracle when a less active from Tokyo came to our English class, he had served in the Fukuoka mission 10 years ago, and was just visiting Okinawa for fun, it was a neat experience to hear about his mission I hope we were able to help him grow some desires to return to church again.

Thursday was a fun weekly planning, I really enjoy working with Elder Quinn and am grateful to be able to learn more again from an older missionary! We were able to plan effectively for next week and are really getting the vibe for Ishigaki. #Vibe #Radical then we dendoed all night long! It was way cool, way cool.

Friday we got to go to a legit festival type thing for o-Bon with a member, it was fun and really interesting... I will try to send videos later Japan has a pretty rocking culture, I love it. We were also able to meet hitomi, aka super prepared awesome nice grandma. She already has almost all of the same beliefs as us and when she hears the lessons she accepts it all. But entering into the church through baptism is hard for her because she has had bad experiences in the past with churches. But we are working to help her overcome that as she feels and learns from the spirit more!

Saturday was splits with my main man elder Haoka we have gone together a few times before so it is fun to get to work more with him. As a Japanese person his Japanese is pretty dang good so it was fun to learn a lot there and refine a lot of the things we say a lot, so that it sounds more natural. We were able to see a lot of miracles, and find a few new people for him and Elder Allen to teach! We ate at A&W for dinner which is always delish, in Japan no restaurants have free refills, not even McDonald's...which is really hard for me. But A&W has all you can drink root beer, so I usually use it to my advantage and drink a lot...🏻️it is cool to have seen Elder Haoka change a lot over these last 3 transfers, we came in to Ishigaki together and he was a brand new missionary and he is a completely different person now. He has so much confidence and is just happier! I hope I have been able to change that much, I needed it a lot more than he did when he started his mission.

Sunday was stake conference! Whooooooooooooooot! We were able to teach a lesson with our branch president before church to an investigator named Yuki. Dude is a stud. 30, super talented at music and drawing, just an all around awesome guy, we taught the restoration and he seemed to really like it and was excited about the idea of prayer. Our branch president said it was a great lesson so that was really good to hear from him. Elder Quinn and I are starting to really get in a rhythm of teaching. #Blessings we had all kinds of other lessons and were way busy with those. At the end of the night one lesson fell through and we had a little extra time, we felt like we should go visit a couple people who had said we could come back In a nearby apartment, and met with one! An awesome lady from Indonesia, she is catholic but has stopped going, she really wants to strengthen her relationship with God so she took the Book of Mormon and wants to meet again soon! #Miracles

I feel so blessed to be in such an amazing area! The Lords hand is in everything, I have recently been thinking about how much we have to truly rely on the Lord in every aspect of our lives. There is no way people would agree to meet with us unless the Lord was touching their hearts, I often think about what I would do if two Asians showed up at my door in America and in broken English told me they want to teach me more about God and Jesus Christ. First I laugh, but then I realize that that is exactly what it is like for these people, and they say YES. There is a power in this message and it is only as we rely on the savior that this work can truly roll forth. I love the Lord. I have enjoyed psalm 23 this week about the Lord being our Shepherd. It has given me a lot of comfort that he will guide us, especially when life gets harder.

I love you all so much!

Elder Krebs

August 25, 2015 TYPHOON

THIS WEEK WAS Crazy! We had a ginormous typhoon hit us on Sunday. It is the biggest this area has seen in 50 years the city got pretty destroyed so we were out all yesterday doing service so I am emailing a day later. I will send some pictures and videos later, it was pretty dangerous! Water started coming into our apartment and I had to get up every 30 minutes from 10:30 to 2:00 am to wring out towels and replace them. I was pretty pooped the next day but the apartment was safe so I feel blessed, and we had power all night which was way rare here almost no one did. We had a cool experience when the power went out for like 10 minutes we decided to pray that it would come back so we didn't sweat to death that night, we prayed and it came back like 10 seconds later and didn't go out again after it had been flickering all night before that. Lord truly knows us all and answers prayers even over a small thing like that. We had a mini sacrament meeting on the apartment since we couldn't go to church and it was a really great experience.

Clean up was crazy, the church got flooded, and it got flooded again today as well... But we got to go to a ton of investigators and members to help them!

Other than that though we had an amazing week, Yudai should be getting baptized next week! And we were able to meet with a man and his wife twice this week and made a baptismal date for 10/4 with them, the yabukis! They are amazing, he had received a Book of Mormon like 10 years ago but left it in his hometown, after we met once he had his family ship it down and he started reading it by himself and so did his wife, they have some amazing questions, and are really prepared to hear this message! They are so amazing, I am excited to help them progress and learn more about Christ, a missionaries calling is so amazing!! I am so blessed!

On Saturday we didn't know whether the typhoon would be coming so we planned a lot of proselyting time, so we were out for 7 hours knocking doors! It felt soooo good we haven't had much time to do that lately and it was a great experience! People in Japan are all so kind. I am grateful to be here! On Tuesday we were able to teach a lot of lessons! The lord blesses us as we keep working hard here and he really wants to see Ishigaki see success, so we will keep on pushing!

Love you all so much!

Love,

Elder Krebs

August 16, 2015

I am still in beautiful Ishigaki! Loving every second, it is fun to see a new companion adjusting to the heat down here ;) He is doing great though! His name is Elder Quinn an Elder from California, an awesome guy and really kind. He is older and only has 3 months left on his mission, which further teaches me that the Lord knows I need a lot of help! I am grateful for the older missionaries I have been able to work with here and learn so much from. We are excited to continue to help Ishigaki grow and progress!

This week was pretty stressful with transfers and getting everything ready for Elder Lucas to leave we got to visit and meet with a lot of the members and investigators though! One of the members gave us Japanese KFC, that was pretty fun to try it out! More like chik-fil-a to be honest. We got to see a lot of our investigators and Elder Lucas was able to testify and they were all really receptive so I am excited to continue to help this area grow and continue where we left off with Elder Quinn. So whoot for missionary work in Ishigaki! 

It is fun doing missionary work with a new companion, and learning how they teach, how they talk to people and things such as that! Adjusting is a good thing, and it has helped me learn a lot. We have been able to teach quite a few lessons together already which is a blessing and I am grateful for the opportunity. We met one new investigator our first night together named Yabuki who is AWESOME! He knows a lot about Christian churches, and has been wanting to learn more, he has some interesting questions such as can his cats go to heaven with him, because he LOVES his cats. He is just an awesome 35 year old man who works on a boat all day, I am excited to teach him more!

We had a cool experience yesterday, we were knocking an apartment and we looked down and the other two elders were riding their bikes past us. We asked them where they were going and they said to a less active, and I felt pretty strongly that we should join so we ran down and rode to the less actives house with them. They were just going to get the address of his son so they could try to meet with him, but he let us in, and he had served a mission and I felt like we should try to bring that up. So I started asking him questions about his mission, and we were able to talk with him for about an hour about his mission and he was getting pretty teary thinking about the experiences he had and seemed like he was going to put a lot more effort into finding a new job so that he can come to church again! It was a great experience and just shows that the Lord always has a plan in mind and to see all the little things that happen that made it possible for us to go and meet with him on his one day off in like a month. 

I love Ishigaki, I love Elder Quinn, and I love the gospel! I hope everyone is doing well and staying healthy!

Love you all,

Elder Krebs

August 10, 2015

Another week, another typhoon, another two days inside :( This week was interesting, it is weird to know that my companion is for sure leaving and I think it gave us both a lot more energy to push harder and work to find those people the Lord wants us to. And we saw many miracles this week, but we also had some big disappointments. 

Yudai was supposed to get baptized on Sunday but because of the typhoon and some other things we weren't able to have the baptismal service, but we will hopefully be able to have it next week. So please pray for that! We also saw a lot of awesome miracles this week, we had a young family come to church which was so cool to see how excited the ward got. They loved it, the Ooki family is so awesome. It is a mom with her two children who are 8 and 5, they are the stinking coolest little girls ever. They loved church, and are very willing to listen to our message and are very excepting and see what can come from teaching them more. We know the Lord has a great plan in store for them! 

During the typhoon I had an awesome experience of getting to call Kouta from my first area of Miyazaki, he was the baptism we had right after I got in to Japan. It was amazing to talk to him, and any missionaries that want to feel good about their language progression should call someone from their first area later on. I never felt like I was progressing in the language and was still stuck in the same place, but I was able to talk to him for 30 minutes about all kind of stuff and understood it all. It is such a blessing from the Lord to be able to be given these gifts from the spirit and I feel so grateful to him. Kouta was able to go to the temple a few weeks ago and is preparing to serve a mission!!!!!!!! I am so excited for him, and to see how much more he can help the kingdom of God grow!

We had another amazing miracle yesterday, we have been teaching a lady Hitomi recently who is married to a man from switzerland, we had talked to him a few times and he was fine with us coming over. But yesterday we went to their house and taught for an hour to him about our church. We were able to explain our beliefs, and he was very nice and respectful as he listened. He doesnt like organized religion because he was forced to attend as a kid so he has a hard time thinking of it as a good thing. But he does want to come to church, and see what it is like! But we are praying that as we teach them more his heart will be softened and they will be able to receive baptism! They also gave us DELICIOUS Swiss Chocolate I thought I had died and gone to heaven when I ate it. So good. 

It was cool to see the Lord testing us as well this week, right after we got out from the typhoon Elder Lucas`s bike broke in a pretty spectacular way hahahaha the gear shifter just broke cleanly off and his chain snapped in half as he was changing gears. The bike has been through a good mission ;) So we had to walk 10 minutes back home, and then 30 minutes to a members house to borrow their bike. But we were able to talk a lot and have some good bonding time. I am gonna miss him a lot, he has been an amazing companion who has taught me SO much. But I know the Lord has a plan for me to be able to let me continually grow and progress. So I am excited to see what it is. I am for sure staying here in Ishigaki though! 

Love you all so much, never forget that the Lord knows everyone individually He knows our problems and our joys. And he wants to help us always, we just have to be willing to ask Him and turn to Him. I pray for all of you every day!

Elder Krebs 

ps. Typhoon was suppppper cool and strong. just btdubs

August 2, 2015

Hello everyone!!

What an amazing week in the Gaki! We had some sad news yesterday as the mom of the two people that are supposed to get baptized wasnt able to come to church yesterday so she can`t get baptized then :( But we had an awesome lesson with the son, yudai, and he still really wants to be baptized and he believes everything he said, our branch president told him about a youth conference they have in Okinawa and he looks like he will be going! So he will be getting baptized this week on Saturday or Sunday so please pray for him!! 

We were able to teach a lot of lessons this week, and we were kept very busy with all of them as well as preparing Yudai and his mom for baptism! Saturday was probably the best day of all! We got to play basketball with yudai in the morning, and then we had kids english class which was awesome. Tons of kids come every week now and they are super cool. like ice cold. We really enjoy teaching them! Then we had to come home and do our studies and prepare for a dinner that we had that night with our branch president and an investigator family! We made super yummy breadsticks to bring over and they bought pizza which is ridiculously expensive in Japan. We were able to watch the last 15 minutes of meet the mormons in Japanese which was really good. The spirit was there strongly and that family and our branch presidents family really built a strong relationship! I love when we are able to work with the members it makes the work so much more effective here!

We got to see a lot of cool miracles just in our lessons this week and being able to still find more people to teach in just the short amount of time that we have to knock on doors or talk to people on the street. The Lord is truly blessing us with those people who are prepared to hear this message in Ishigaki, and I am so grateful!

Elder Lucas leaves next week though to go home to America. It is way scary as I have been able to learn a lot from him and he has helped me a lot, the ward loves him as do all of our investigators. So it will be hard when he leaves but I know that The Lord is the reason this work is progressing and so this area of Ishigaki will continue to explode with my next companion as well!!

Love you all and hope you are well!

Elder Krebs