from 9/12 email....."Build bridges; don't destroy them... Let love conquer pride!" -President Uchtdorf

Aloha!

Man, is this already week 5 of the transfer?? The time really does go by.. These past couple weeks here in Ontario, California have been pretty eventful! We ended up teaching a lesson to a Pastor.. or did he end up teaching us? It was quite interesting hearing what he had to say and learning about his beliefs, while sharing our beliefs his him as well. As a missionary, you learn that not everyone is going to accept what you teach, and that's okay. In the end we all come from the same God or Creator, after all, which is why it's so important to love and respect people for who they are, regardless of their background or belief.

It's really nice that my companion, Elder Gomez, grew up speaking Spanish. That comes in handy A LOT; whether it's talking to people on the streets or even teaching lessons! Like the other day we knocked on the door of a Spanish lady, who allowed us to come in and teach the Restoration! Well.. Elder Gomez taught the Restoration. I said, "mucho gusto," and then did a lot of smiling and nodding :) This scenario happens fairly often, which is cool, but then we always turn them over to the Spanish Elders.

I'll tell you what, the mariachi music is starting to grow on me. We hear it all the time down here! It takes me back to the time in Utah when I had 104.7 as one of me pre-sets."Mi Preferida! Mas Musica!" XD We hear it coming from cars all the time and houses as we bike by; especially on weekends! We bikes past so many fiestas on Friday nights! They've all got laser lights, mariachi music and all.. It's legit!

We actually have an investigator that lives in the apartment right across from us! There is a lot of craziness going on with his 8 roommates, so we usually go to the park with him to talk.He came to scripture study with on Wednesday evening, which was pretty cool! It's funny, in the Missionary Handbook it says when you can't arrange for members to bring investigators to church to "bring them yourselves if members are not available," but then states directly after that "investigators are not to be given rides in mission vehicles." Elder Paxton and I had talked about how that's a bit contradicting. We should bring them to church, but they're not allowed in our vehicles? How can this be??
Well I think I finally figured it out this week when we went to scripture study with Joseph ;) Joseph was rollerblading behind us as we biked to church, but he was feeling pretty tired partway there, so I let him grab onto my bike and I pulled him the rest of the way to the church Marty McFly style! Well, in actuality it was probably more Napoleon Dynamite style haha But there you go, I brought him to church without him entering a missionary vehicle ;)

We've taught some other good lessons this week as well. We picked up a new investigator with a nice lady who was part of another Christian faith and had never talked to missionaries before. She liked our message and said she would read the Book of Mormon. We should be seeing her again next week!

Stay Positive and love your life! 

Aloha ke Akua

-Elder Johnson

With a fish taco