The Best 2 Years: Elder Jace Thompson in Omaha/Japan: the one with the campfire

"Boom, you looking for this?"

Starting with Monday, I got one of my big bucket list items checked off. I finally had a campfire in japan!!😆😆😆 We ended up going with the other Elders that are in our apartment and went to the same hike that Elder Wynn and I went on a couple weeks back and all went up and had a big fire together which was an absolute party! After that, we came back home, showered, and tried to get the campfire smell out of our clothes. Then we went to the senior couple's house and had Thanksgiving together!! 😆😆😁It was so fetching good, and they had all of the Thanksgiving Classics: mashed potatoes, carrots, rolls, gravy, turkey, squash yam marshmallow things, and fruit salad. It was so good, and it was hands down better than last year's Thanksgiving when we went to KFC🤣🤣

Tuesday was Zone conference!! And it was so great!!😆😆😆 Elder Wynn and I gave a training about Hope! And how through the spirit, we are able to feel hope! Especially in missionary work, when it gets hard and we are not seeing as much success as we would like to. Zone conference ended up being really good and I think everyone was able to learn a lot! It was a little weird because Zone conference was at the end of the transfer this transfer because things were a little weird at the beginning of the transfer.

Wednesday, we saw some crazy miracles! First off, we went to go visit a member, but they weren't home and we were a little sad because it had started raining so we knew it was going to be hard to find people and talk to people outside. But, luckily, we ended up being able to talk to a guy who is from China and has been looking for a church in the area, and he hasn't been able to find one. We invited him to ours, and he said he really wanted to come, and so we are hoping that he will be able to make it to church sometime soon! After talking with him, me and my comp had got a pretty strong spiritual impression to go to a cafe that we had gone to last week and talked to a girl that had been working there while we were there. When we initially started talking with her last week, she had really good English and so we went back and invited her to come to our English class. She was very ecstatic and wanted to come and after we had talked with her, she sent us a text later saying that she was having a really rough day, because work had been difficult and she had made a few mistakes at work so she was getting down on herself. But after we came, she was so happy, and it really made her day. No doubt the spirit was guiding us that day. At night, we also had our English class and again our friend Mari came and it was super great and we had lots of people come which was a very big surprise!

Friday was a very good day! We started the day with some service for a nearby community center, which was very refreshing. After the service, we went and got some very delicious Indian curry with the other Elders that we live with and had a great time there. One of the workers said that the day before, two girls from Nepal had come in and we're looking for a church around and she told them to go to our church and so hopefully they will be able to make it to church sometime soon! After that, we had our English class, which was really great and a lot of fun as usual. Then, we went and visited a member named Yuki姉妹. She is one of my favorite members in our area, and she has become my Japanese mom!😆😆 She is super loving and doesn't have any kids of her own, so she loves to talk and be friends with the missionaries! We gave her a visit and talked with her for a while! After that, we went and had dinner with our friend Mari! She took us to a very nice and expensive all you can eat meat buffet and when we sat down she offered to buy us the most expensive option which was very crazy! Of course we said that we didn't need it and so instead she bought us the second most expensive option! 😅😅She is way too kind to us and we had a very, very great time with her at dinner!

Saturday was a very, very busy day for us! In the morning, we got up early and went on a big hike with the ward, which was a ton of fun! We had some of our friends come and everybody packed a lunch and we ate lunch at the top of the mountain... The funny thing is that this is the place Elder Wynn and I had gone for the campfire and for the hike, so this was our third time going to this mountain! 😆😆 after we came back down, we had just a minute to kill, and then we had a big cookie baking class as a ward! We also had lots of friends come to that and we all baked different cookies together, which was also super fun!! After we finished the baking class, we cleaned up and kind of got caught talking with the members, and so we didn't have a lot of time before our sports night started! That was again a lot of fun, and that took us to the end of the day. We also had some members who brought calligraphy for us to do so we practiced writing Japanese characters during the sports night 😆😆

Sunday started out with going to church and having a pretty good day at church! Then after, we had song practice cuz we are practicing lots of different songs for our ward Christmas Concert. After finishing singing, we came back home and since it was a fast sunday, we took a little nap for lunch because me and my comp were still so tired from yesterday😆😆 After finishing lunch, we had different meetings and calls with different missionaries and then we went to a member's house and had dinner together! This is the same family that we played Uno with a couple months back and we had a ton of our friends come! We also had a guy named Alex who is traveling around the world and is in Japan for a little while so he spent the whole day with us and he is a member from Las Vegas! The meal was so good and it was so fun since we had almost 20 people there which was a very great time! 😆😆

Spiritual thought:

2 Nephi 28:32

Wo be unto the Gentiles, saith the Lord God of Hosts! For notwithstanding I shall lengthen out mine arm unto them from day to day, they will deny me; nevertheless, I will be merciful unto them, saith the Lord God, if they will repent and come unto me; for mine arm is lengthened out all the day long, saith the Lord God of Hosts.

To all of you who think you are lost or without hope, or who think you have done too much that was too wrong for too long, to every one of you who worry that you are stranded somewhere on the wintry plains of life and have wrecked your handcart in the process, this conference calls out Jehovah’s unrelenting refrain, “[My] hand is stretched out still. I shall lengthen out mine arm unto them,” He said, “[and even if they] deny me; nevertheless, I will be merciful unto them, … if they will repent and come unto me; for mine arm is lengthened out all the day long, saith the Lord God of Hosts.” His mercy endureth forever, and His hand is stretched out still. His is the pure love of Christ, the charity that never faileth, that compassion which endures even when all other strength disappears.

—Jeffrey R. Holland

Well, that's all I got for this week! Feel free to email me!

That's all, folks.