Happy Thanksgiving!

     Today was transfer calls!!! I have big news!! I am going where the Lord needs me to go and that is... nowhere! I am staying! Pfew, that was stressful. I am so happy! I am not ready to leave this place. It has become my home. This is the place I hit my 6th month mark in last week. It is all I know. But I am just loving our investigators and these members. So good. 

     Anyway, I learned a lot this week! The first probably being, do not try to take directions from sister missionaries sometimes. Because sometimes they say go right and then right, but they meant go left and then left. The second thing, and probably the most important, is that I learned that a lot of basketball players go to Europe to play ball. No... I go to Asia to play ball. I am a highly sought after player in these parts. Sure, am I the tallest on the court most times? Sure. Have I turned into the Mehmet Okur/Channing Frye of Nagaka hitting threes playing the 5 position? Maybe. Also most importantly, am I one for one for the opening tip off? That also might be true. But that is not important!  

     To the more important things of the work! We are seeing so much success with our investigators. We had to drop our only real progressing investigator last week, because he told us he would never get baptized. It was hard thinking that would leave us without a progressing investigator, but as a part of my testimony I knew that if we spent our time on people who were not ready or prepared at this time, then we will miss people the Lord wants us to focus on who He is preparing. This is not my time here so I have no right to waste it. As we took that act of faith we saw the miracle of getting two new progressing investigators last week which was cool. I am loving every second! I promise you I will not come back the same as I was. I am growing and molding in my Father's hands into the man He wants me to be. It honestly gets harder every single day to picture where I would be if I had not served as I progress in the Lord. This is my life and my light. It honestly has to be in these days. I do not know a lot of what is happening back home other than when I read Helaman and 3rd Nephi I feel as if I am reading the daily news in some senses. The secret combinations and evil of the world is spreading and these days are getting harder and harder and harder. Sometimes I have to look in the mirror and see who I am in this world today. I recall upon the first half of Jacob 5:66: For it grieveth me that I should lose the trees of my vineyard; wherefore ye shall clear away the bad according as the good shall grow, that the root and the top may be equal in strength, until the good shall overcome the bad, and the bad be hewn down and cast into the fire, that they cumber not the ground of my vineyard; and thus will I sweep away the bad out of my vineyard.

     The bad will be cleared away according to the growth of the good. That the roots and the tops may be equal in strength, until the good shall overcome the bad. Now there are dozens of thoughts I had about what the roots and the tops could represent for us, but this one that stuck with me. I compared it with the wheat and the tares and thought about how the Lord says in D&C 86 that the blade is yet tender so he cannot separate the wheat from the tares. Maybe our roots are strong, but if the blade is tender or our tops are weak, or in other words, if our actions, our appearance, our words, and our behavior do not represent our roots and separate us from the tares or the branches bearing bad fruit, how are we representing the Lord? How are we really different? We have heard it a million times! But I will say it again. Are we Sunday Mormons? Are we really treating the Sacrament as a continuous event that is supposed to shape and guide all of our life's actions throughout the week, rather than the 3 hour block on Sundays? Do we get home from church and get out of our Sunday clothes and do things that lose the sacred atmosphere of the that holy day. Do people see us as different? I hope we can separate ourselves from the world more than we are now. That is the number one blessing I receive as a missionary is that I get to be separated from the world. 

     I took a step back the other day and I realized I have never heard a swear word since I have been in Japan. Do you know how amazing that truly is? I could not say that for a day throughout all of middle school and high school. We need to separate ourselves from the world so that when the Lord comes to view his vineyard, He sees branches bearing good fruit, or He sees the wheat growing from the tares. Will He see you? I know He always sees us and our good works, but can we say that He will he truly see us as in the world but not of it? Will we stand as ensign to the world and separate ourselves? I pray that we can do so.

     Keep your feet on the path, your hands on the rod, and keep your eyes on Christ. I love you all so much! Here goes my second 6 months! Happy Thanksgiving and have the best week ever!

Love,

Elder Aiken