I believe in the good things coming

Another good week in Barstow! Tomorrow will be 5 months since I reported to the MTC.. crazy how time flies! 

We had a lot going on this week. We went down to Victorville to watch a world-wide missionary broadcast (the first one they've done in over a decade). It was pretty good. They talked mainly on the basics of Preach My Gospel, but there was a lot I got out of it. 

This week we've been helping Camille, one of our investigators, to quite smoking. It has been a pretty awesome experience! The church has a 15 step stop smoking lesson that we've been helping her with, and she is doing so great! The night before we started she smoked the last of her cigarettes (about 20). So far she has gone 5 days without smoking! She is so dedicated to it! Pat, from the ward, did the 15 step program several months ago and has been helping. That has been really awesome. I tell you what, it sure wasn't easy for Camille, but it's amazing to see the progress she's made. It is amazing what faith can do!

Stay positive and love your life!

Aloha Ke Akua

-Elder Johnson

First companion...wearing his glasses

My apartment

Hammock....

Hammocking!

A little recycling

Day 146

Another great week here in Barstow! It was a little bitter-sweet because Elder and Sister Mower are going home. They are amazing. They're the only proselyting senior couple on the mission and have served their whole mission in Barstow, so I've been serving with them my whole mission. It's going to be sad not having them around, but it will be good for them to see their families again. Last night the ward put on a little farewell party for them at the church, which was really nice. There was dessert and then the Mowers shared their final remarks to everyone and their testimonies. Then everyone had the chance to add their own few words. It was beautiful. By the end the room was in tears. The Mowers have  become a part of this ward. It's really hard for them to leave. They say their family has been worried they won't want to come home ;)

Right now Elder Coombs and I are teaching 3 sets of investigators that are super close to being baptized, but need a divorce from their previous spouse so they can get married. There's not a lot we can do about that, but just keep encouraging them and teaching them! It seems to be a pretty common thing out here. 

But man, I sure I am loving it out here. I'm learning new things every day. My favorite part of missionary work is seeing the joy in the lives of the people we teach.

Stay positive and love your life! 

-Elder Johnson

Farewell to the Mowers

Washing our car

Six more weeks of Barstow

Today is the first day of my 4th transfer, and I'm staying in Barstow! By the end of this transfer I will have spend 6 months here! Barstow is like a home to me now haha.

This has been a pretty cool week though. We met a really cool guy on the street named Tim. We said hi to him as he was walking down the street and he was all smiles! He was very excited to talk to us and invited us over to his house to teach his family the next day. We showed up the next day and he was so happy to see us! He had his family all gathered together and they were all ready to hear our message. They all go to the Church of God in Christ (which is the church that had the awesome choir that sang at our Christmas program). They all had a strong faith and testimony in Jesus Christ and loved hearing our message. Tim said that he would like to work towards baptism. That was a really awesome experience. Life is good!

Stay positive and love your life! <3

-Elder Johnson

Hair cut

#Btown2016

Things are going great here in good ol' Barstow! There's lots of different kind of people here, but there really are a lot that are really friendly and willing to talk to us. Last night we had some open time and decided to go tract an apartment complex and had so many people tell us to come back and share our message. It really is neat to see such humility! 

There was a lady a couple weeks ago that stopped me in the parking lot a couple weeks ago and asked if we could help her with her electric bill. When she realized we were missionaries she got excited and said that she's been to our church before! She had some concerns that we helped her out with and we asked if we could visit her home to teach her more, and she happily agreed! We ended up having a really awesome lesson on the restoration with her and her husband and they really opened up to us and told us about a lot of things that they've been through. They came to church yesterday, participated a lot in the Gospel Principles class, and made some good friends. Things are looking really good for them! 

So fun fact, Elder Coomb's brother served in this same mission a few years ago and spend 8 months in Barstow! We found one teaching record in our area book of a former investigator named Steve who was taught by his brother, so we decided to visit him! The teaching record said they dropped him because he was drunk every time they went over. We went to the house and it looked pretty vacant. We knocked and nobody answered. We asked a man who lived across the street if Steve still lived there. He said that Steve and his family were evicted from the house. He pointed to a house up the street and said that he thinks some of his kids are living there, but he wasn't sure about Steve. He said sometimes he sees Steve walking down the road. We went to the house he pointed to and talked to Steve's daughter. She said her dad was not doing well. He's living homeless now and he stays in the shed of their evicted house. She said if he's not there he's at the liquor store. We went down to knock on the shed (which was tiny). Sure enough Steve opened the door. He was holding big can of beer did not look like he was doing too good. He really is going through a hard time. He's been struggling over 30 years with alcoholism, has lost everything he owned, has other health problems, and on top of that was recently bitten by a poisonous spider. We felt really bad for him. There wasn't a lot we could do for him, but we did let him know that God loves him and said a prayer with him. He is very humble and believes that he is going to be okay. Even in his such harsh circumstances he knows that there are other people that have it worse than him, and that he needs to keep on moving! We are going to try to work with him some more.

Well folks, stay positive and love your life! Don't forget to love one another, just as Jesus loves you <3

-Elder Johnson