Letter sent 2.21.10

whats up?

this week has a been pretty good. i geuss ill just share the highlights, oh it was transfers this week but of course im still here in miyazaki and surprisingly i still have the same companion elder burnett form salt lake. But thats good. we get alopng really well and work well together. we have a good time dendou..ing. so im excited to see what will happen here in miyazaki this transfer. pretty exciting. oh and also i had pizza this week ata a buffet, its been so long, of course its japanese pizza. so its not what you think but it was way good. anyways

so this week we went to the hayashi family (non members, we teach them eikaiwa every saturday) They have 2 little boys and 2 little girls and a baby on the way. there awesome. We brought shimuto a birthdaycake and celbrated his 4th birthday. hes way cool we sang and stuff and a had a good time. its way funny to have lessons with them. everyone has their own book of mormon and the 2 youngest boys love to pray they always want to pray. its really fun working with them. we shared with them a message in moroni 7 13. it was simple for the little ones. it just made me think how blessed we are, how blessed i am. to have been called to japan, sent to miyazaki and get to work with and meet tons of waycool people. I love it hear, and i love the poeple. this was truly a blessing from none other than our Heavenly Father.

we have aslo of course been working closely with tsuda. hes haveing a hard time quiting the last 2 or 3. somtimes he goes a day without smoking but is having a tough time. we shared ether 12 12 with him onee of my favorites. He just needs to have the faith that he can see the miracle and trust in the lord, because with the lords help nothing is impossible, but its still going to be hard. i cant understand that addiction or craving so its hard. but yesterday to help tsuda i am too quitting my addiction. Yesterday i told Tsuda i was going to quite English. Its way hard, and my head hurts, but hopefully it helps and i can understand how tusda feels. its way hard ahving a gaijin companion and all but im trying hard. ima kara, zutu nihongo. its going to be way good for my japanese cause i need it. still i dont understand what people say here. i can get general ideas but its way tough. its crazy how far ive come though. anyways thats that, im done with english. anyways i hope he can quite this week, thats the only thing holding him back from baptism right now.. anyways its been a great week. im tired, i think i will always be tired, its way good though. its not suppose to be easy, just worth it deshou.and it is. its awesome.

until next week,

elder martinez

letter sent 2.14.10

genki? genki yo. saikou

jya this week has been awesome, some pretty sweet stuff went down. its been way good, weve been pretty busy this week also had a long bus ride to fukuoka this week which was relaxing but ill get to it in a second, well this week has been a little hard, we dropped 2 investogators, or i should say they dropped themselves. it was way sad. one lady in particular is always busy and stressed with work, shes like our message and would listen at her pourch but we could never get a lesson at the church with her cause she was always so busy. i committed her to baptism when i first got here and she said yes, she had a great desire to go to the celestial kingdom. but lately like the last 3 weeks has just said go men ne, isogashii. its been frsutrating but this week we just asked her about things and about baptism and she said nows not the right time for her, things are to crazy. she ll call us when shes ready. it was really tough but we respect her decision. we bore testimony of the reasons we came to Japan and left her with that, it was hard. shes looking for this gospel and she needs this gospel, i know it would bring true peace to her life as it has to all of our lives. i know she was looking for this peace and wanted it, but just couldnt quite see it the way i did.life is only hard because we make it hard. if we just focus on whats in important nothing else matters all that much, we just need to trust in the Lord and he will take care of us. i wanted her so bad to know that but i geuss it just wasnt her time, but i still hope she calls again. anyway we have been working with tsuda too. hes doing great . the day befroe yesterday he didnt smoke any. hes trying so hard, he lives with a smoker and is having a hard time but is doing well. he haas to quite this week for sure, it will be way hard but i think he can do it. we havnt set up an interview yet but tentatively it should be a week from this friday. hes prepraing pretty hard core. hes scraed the interview is like a test about evrything in the book of mormon even though we shared with him the same questions that will be asked. hes way cool and im excited foir him.

so now for one of the many climaxs of my week. we went to fukuoka on tuseday. stayed the night under the temple in honbu, a real bed bytheway(and couldnt sleep well)! woke up and met Elder Dallin H Oaks of the quroum of the 12 apostles. it was so sweet, we had a taikai with him, and before got to shake his hand talk to him for like 30 seconds. it was way cool. the apostles are so amazing now since ive been on my mission ive seen elder Holland elder Scott and now elder Oaks. they are all so very different but all hold the mantle of an apostle of Jesus Christ. they have so much power. the spirit was so strong when Elder Oaks entered the room. It was so awesome. We had a good meeting and he addressed many things, even had a question session which was way cool too. it was def an amazing once in a life time experience. Anyways he announced changes that are happening in the fukuoka mission, eacyh year the church consalidates missions and because the decrease in missionaries lately japan is changing. It actually is good for us, anyway The hiroshima mission is done as of this july. It will be split in half and merging with Fukuoka and kobe missions, So now my mission includes the Hiroshima stake! it was pretty sweet we are all really excited about that. anyway its been a great week and amazing to hear from an apostle of the Lord. 1 nephi 10 18. the lord still works through a Prophet and his apostles today. we are so blessed to have President Thomas S Monson and general authorities to lead in guide us through these latter days. thanks for the emails and have a good week. and happy valentines day.

love elder martinez

Letter sent 2.7.10

Well well well. yappari lots of big news these days. congratulations to trevor and kristen! thats way sick. im pretty pumped for them. That will be sweet. crazy. but good crazy

anyways my week has a been way good, miyazaki is still legit. i love it here. So this week our focus has been on tsuda, weve met and continue to meet everyday. Hes way cool. Hes progressing towards his baptism on feb 28th. just needs to quit tabaco this week, which he can def do. Im way pumped for him, we actually had a little scare. he had some worries at the beginning of the week, i was with elder burdge the zl on splits when he talked about them. I thought this might happened so we planned for it, we had a really good lesson. we both bore testimony really strong and the spirit was strong, after ward it got quiet and hes ask if he could humbly partake of us baptizing him. it was so sweet. he orignally had a baptismal date for the 14th but we rescheduled for the 28th. hes been doing really well since then. the other day he aske if the day after the next was too fast to baptized haha it was way funny. hes got to quit smoking and get an interview, so its been really fun working with him and seeing his life change through keeping the commandments and putting his trust in God. So thats been really good. we have been working with lots of people, i love it here.

well yesterday we went to kagoshima for conference steak conference. kagoshima is sweet its on a huge hill, its known for its huge volcano that erupted on staurday we couldnt see the volcano cause everything was cloudy from ash and junk. it was cool. well this letter is going to be short but i want to share Pres. Margetts message. it was way good. he talked about a native american tribe. they have a ceremony in which a boy must pass to become a man. He is lead into the forest blindfoolded and sits on a log the whole night, he cant take the blindfold of until he feels the warmth of the sunrays in the morning. So the boy uis sitting on the log, he hears animals and beasts, people and the wind is blowing feircely. he was very frightined and though he would be injured or attacked by other tribes or animals. but he left the blindfold on and ganbaru-ed. when he finally took it off he found that his dad was sitting right next to him and had been the whole night. we are never alone, in times when we cant see the light at the end of the tuneel, the times when we dont feel like we can go further or at times for others when they simply cant see. He is there and he lives. we need to show our faith in him and constantly draw closer to him, reach for him and we will find him. we will find peace and comfort. Im know this to be true, i have experienced and im excitesd to share this with people who dont have it, and i encourage all readers to try to share or pray for an oppurtunity to share this gospel. truly a blessing. ijyou. until next week

love elder martinez

letter sent 1.31.10

tanoshyugozaimashita.

well this week was way good. lots went down. oh and i made my birthday cake this week except, in japan there are no ovens just toaster oven microwave things, in apartments and stuff, and i really wanted to have some funfetti cake, so i put it into the rice cooker. haha it turned out allright, looked way weird at first but was still good. haha

anywaysthis week i finally made my way to the beach for the first time in japan! it was cool, we played american football with some members and an old invetstigator were trying to teach again. hes way cool, hes like 28 and a pretty solid dude, hes training now for his rugby season coming up so he enjoyed playing with us, we had fun, it was nice to run around on the sand, but made me sore, im out of shape. Anyways we got to met with him at a members house, we ate some good food and made takoyaki (octopus things)had a good time, we shared a pretty awesome messgae so i hope that will turn out good.

As foir our investigators there all doing well, we have some pretty cool investigators. I have told you a little about Tsuda before but this week has been good. we have been talking about the word of wisdom and it has been really hard for him, he was a heavy smoker. hes been doing good but this week we talked and asked him if he thought if he could go without smoking for a day and he said hed try. i asked him to ride to the store with us, i bought him juice and stuff and than went back to his apartment and took all his lighters and stuff (he agreed) The end of the next day we went to check up . he looked alot more genki and happy and we we asked he saidhe didnt smoke that day! we were so pumped and way excited for him. way happy...then he said he smoked 3 his friend gave him after dinner at his house haha. anyways it still was way good, we were way pumped, hes still working on cutting down but hes almost there. he also said this week that his life has been alot better since he started meeting with us, it was really cool, we actually fasted together yesterday and he did awesome. this gospel is helping him change his life around for the better, its really cool to see. weve taught him almost all the commandments and hes still doing well. so thats been the highlight of the week.

last nught we did some home teaching at the shibukaichyo house (branch president) he had a normal meal of rice soup salad gizards and squid haha, it was good. we had a good time with the family as they tried to speak english to us, (there dauighter is studying it in middle school.) it was good. we shared the first presidency's message for january about holding on. and shared on of my favorite scriptures, Doctorine and Covenants 88:63. Its awesome. we talked about how everyday we need to build our akashi by doing the little things so we can "draw closer" chikazukinasai! when need to do the little things averyday so when rough times come we can hold on and not loose hope like some of those in Kirtland. so the messgae trhis week is hold on a little longer. if you havnt read it i would reccommend it. anyways that was a glimpse of my week. hope everyone is well and thanks for the support and prayers

love elder martinez

letter sent 1.25.10

its been a really good week i dontknow where to start. we had a cleaning inspection on wednesday so that took some time to prepare for but we have the cleanest aprtment in the mission now. haha. i geuss thats cool. um we also had zone conference today in taniyama. it was cool, to see more of japan. ive seen almost all of kyushu already and i love it. Zone conference was way good. for the AP training i had my first family home evening in Japan. they talked about our family here in japan, and the realtionships we need to build within our ward, with our companion and everyone we come in contact with. everyone learns something from us whether were teacxhing or not, how we act and present ourselves. so that was pretty good. we need to set the example for others so they can see our happiness and want to feel the samne love we feel as members. So that was cool. and then next day we had a junkai or split with the APs it was so fun. theyre awesome. we had lot of fun with them. we had several lessons with investigators and less actives that day which all went well except for a less active i taught in a crazy hospital, that didnt go to well...oops that night we ate at a mexican resturant in miyazaki! i was so pumped the cheif is mexican, were going to be friends. haha hes cool soo that was awesome. hisashiburi. we got to wear sonbrarros and stuff too natsukashii. after we took out shane, a half gaijin family here in miyazaki, hes home now from byu idaho but going back next semester and preparing for a mission. It was fun to dendo with him and show him how fun it can be. i wish i would have done that before my mission.That night the petersens gave me a birthday present . a huge bag of chips salsa, gaucamole, cheese and stuff. it was awesome..and tortillas. there way nice yous should look them up on facebook and be there friend. anyways that night the 22nd i ate some icecream and blackthunder with the aps to celbrate it was sso good. on my birthday we did service at the petersens house(they run kindergarden( so that was way good to finally be able to work outside, jpanese peopl normally dont let you serve them.

so we had lots of good lessons this week. me and one of the aps, elder stevenson ,the 70s son, had a lesson with hiejima. it was really well. it was on ether 12 12 and taking blind stps of faith, it was really good i extended the baptismal commitment and she wants to but her parents are hantai because there buddhist. so hoepfully something can change with that. and yesterday we met with kadota. we read out of the new gospel principles book about repentance. it was also good, hes on his way to baptism as well. he wants to repent and then be baptized but it might take a while. im so excited for him, hes going to be such a solid member.

pretty much all of our ionvestigators have tobacco problem so thats been tough but i love shareing mosiah 2 41, it really puts things into porportion. temporal sastisfdaction or eternal happiness, god will bless those who keep his commandments, sweet promise and pretty easy to follow the commandments if we just keep an eternal perspective.

lastly today, pday was awesome. tokutome kyodai shimai took us to the worlds longest pedestrian suspension bridge in the world. it was so nice to be outside in the wilderness. it reminded me of alma 3044, all things denote there is a god a surpreme creator. it was so sweet, i have good pictures but cant send them here so someday. its to bad cause i have tons of good pictures and theres actually people in them. anuyways the tokutomes drove us out there we stopped at a farm of papaya cabbage cucumbers and other stuff. they were friends of the tokutomes and loved meeting gaijin liker us haha they gave us tones of yasai veggies. then we had lunch, we ate miyazakis very own chicken nanban. so good, and now im here. so its been a long week, but im doing well. its awesome to be here in japan sharing the best message this world has to offer. anyone can find happiness through this gospel, i mean i have thousands of miles away with weird food people language and no family. talk about miracles.

until next week.

love elder martinez

Happy Birthday

This (obviously) is last year. Hopefully he had a great 20th birthday today. We love you Elder Martinez!

Letter sent 1.17.10

so my weeek was well, we were busy and had alot of lessons, tsuda is progressing he came to church but left half way through sacrament and i still dont know why. haha funny man i think everything is all good, well i set 2 baptismal dates this week! me. cool eh. they are not strong so i dont know if theyll keep it but its really helping them progress. i made one with yuki and yuge. there nice people and have good desires but we have a lot to work on before the 14th. i hope they make it. tsuda also has a baptismal date for the 14th. it will be interesting to see what will happen. our srtongest investigator doesnt have a baptismal date but is working on repenting he says hell be baptized after he repents, it may take a while but hell be a strong member when he gets baptized i hope ill be here when he gets baptized. hes awesome. we met with him yesterday. anyway i guess ill right about other stuff about my week in my mass email. but it was good, my companions birthday wasa the 16th i made him cake and junk tried to make it good. he turned 20 as well, on week before mine. also zone conference is this week so ill get to have my interview with the mission pres and ask about the email. oh and this weekend on the 22 and 23 me and elder burnett are going on splits with the APs of the mission. im scared i dont know why there coming normally they just go on splits with zone leaders but im justa junior and brunett is a district l;eader so i dont know why its happening. maybe cause my companion is going zone leader but i dont know, itrs scary for me none the less. well im not sure what to write about . its been a crazy week. lots going on in miyazaki. its a cool place with good place. we have awesome members and a ton of investigators. oh and they have pizza but its not good haha they put like mayo and corn and weird stuff haha but ill
eat something good.