Week 68!

     Hello everyone!  How are you doing? I am so happy! Holy cow I cannot even believe it. The work of the Lord continues. How can we not rejoice every day?! I am just always so happy and I love it!! This is the greatest work on earth! 

     This week was great. My MyLDSMail got deleted so every single one of my emails I have received in my mission is gone so that might have been the saddest day for sure. Then to top it off after that... after 2 weeks of putting ointment on the burn that was our investigator thinking I was a woman on the phone... (My voice goes up when I am nice and really sincere or excited to people! Like when you talk to a kid or a dog it happens!) after the burn was nearly gone, it happened again!  We went to visit a less active member but she would not come to the door because she was sick so she spoke to us through this window. The glass was the kind that's blured so I could not see her face. Just a blurred image. And she could not see mine. She was an older woman so I was using my kind voice and trying to be sincere and told her we just wanted to see how she was doing and she really appreciated it! She said it was so nice and she said, you know what, I will come to church on Sunday. I was way excited. That is awesome! We will be waiting for you at the church. We can go in together. She was excited and said ok. What is your name? I said Elder Aiken! Elder?? Elder?? You aren't a girl? Aren't you one of the sisters? My companion just lost his marbles. He about wet his pants. Two times was too much for the man.  I know sister missionaries have power and I guess Elders do too who sound like them!  Not one of my better days!

    This week I have not thought out a really deep thought per say but I had a very powerful experience I would like to share. Last week we got ready for the day and started off our personal study. It was the day we were planning on meeting Maki. As I sat in my study and tried to ponder what we should teach specifically, I thought of the trials she is facing with her divorce, raising two kids alone, facing the world with no light. No Savior. She was wading through these waters of life without knowing there was a life guard who walks upon them. In an instant I felt a love and a spirit that I have literally never felt in my life. In this moment I felt a pure love and spirit for Maki. I do not think I have ever felt more humbled in my entire life knowing I have been so blessed to always know I have a Savior there who can take it all. Maki did not know that. I literally tried but could not comprehend what it must be like not having that knowledge because I have always known. And I literally slumped in my chair and began to cry. I felt as Alma did when he said "O that I were an angel, and could have the wish of mine heart, that I might go forth and speak with the trump of God, with a voice to shake the earth, and cry repentance unto every people!" In that moment I felt such a love for the people of Japan that I have never felt. I wanted every single person to know that they have a Savior and a light who can take it all. I wanted them to know it is going to be ok. The spirit filled my soul and it stayed with me literally all day. My thoughts were constantly directed towards that lesson and his work. I felt like I was one with the spirit in my purpose and calling. We met with Maki and had an amazing lesson. She finally told us her experience in person where she heard God speak to her and say Come unto Me. She said that normally she would think it was her own thoughts, but I told her I can promise it was the Lord because he has given us this direction and plea in the scriptures written by his prophets to us. We then shared Matthew 11:28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

And she was in shock. She said, "It is in the scriptures!" We told her Ya it is!! It was so cool to see her reaction. Then we went on and we told her we wanted to teach her about who it is we are coming unto. Jesus Christ. We testified of his life and his atonement. We told her imagine that Jesus Christ could take all of your pain, sin, stress, mistakes, sadness, etc. everything! She closed her eyes and just sat there for like 2 or three minutes. Then I said is that something you want? She opened her eyes and just began to weep and said yes it is something she wanted. The spirit was literally tangible. It was wrapped around me and around the room. It enveloped us. We told her the way is to be baptized. We asked if when she knew that this message is true if she would be baptized and she said she would but it would take some time. Little by little. It was so powerful to see her faith!

     I cannot describe the love I feel for the Japanese people. They are my people. I love every second I have with them. How can just a mere 9 more months be enough for one person to be with the people he loves. I am treasuring every day. If you give people a hope it will open their eyes. If you give people a Savior, it will open their hearts. And that is when the spirit can enter. That is when conversion takes place. 

     Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Trevor Aiken

Gold Medal week!

     Hello everyone!  What a great week!  We got to watch the Sapporo Temple dedication which was amazing.  Many people will be changed from that experience!

     Also this week goes down as one of the most eventful!  There were 2 stories I want to share, and since it's the Olympic season we will talk in terms of medals.  First, the silver goes to an Elder I went on splits with.  (Sorry - no bronze)  We pulled up to this light and saw this young man we wanted to talk to but right as we pulled up it went green and he sped off without even seeing us. So the chase began. Not in a creepy way, but we were going the same way anyway so we thought ok we will talk to him at the next light. Then we start going down this big hill and my companion is road biking it while the kid is on the side walk and I am about 15 yards behind all of this just watching my companion try to catch up to this kid. Well the kid swerves out into the road and my companion has to slow down and he thinks, ok I will go on the sidewalk and he can take the road because he is going too slow. He sees an opening and goes for the sidewalk... Miscalculates and his front wheel hits the curb and it bends, breaks off, and he and the bike going flying forward. He goes over the handle bars, front flips, and while he is in mid air, he is now facing me (backwards) and we make eye contact as I just see this face, like "oh it's over man just leave me" type of thing, and he goes about 5 yards and lands with the bike right next to him. The bike is destroyed, but the miracle is is that he lived! He was basically unfazed! His elbow was a little scraped, but this Elder is interesting in the way that he wears long sleeves even in the dead of summer, so because of that he wears gloves so he doesn't get a hand tan.  And that turned out to be a tender mercy because his gloves and his sleeves got shredded but his arms and hands were fine!  It was seriously wild up there, but he made it.  I have not seen slow motion like that in real life. 

     Now for the Gold medal!   It goes to one of the most powerful miracles and experiences I have had on my mission. Remember Maki Tanaka I wrote about last week?? We had an amazing lesson with her on Thursday and it was so powerful. We had two members present and they were so powerful! The spirit was strong and amazing. It went for like 2 hours!! She had so many questions and the spirit was so strong I was not stopping this one. Plus the members were so hyped. We taught that God is our Heavenly Father and we taught her how she can know it was true. Prayer. We challenged her to pray and we went home that night and prayed with all of our hearts that she could receive an answer to her prayer. She really wanted to and was so excited to try. She had such a sincere desire to know and she opened up to us about some really hard trials in her life right now. She wanted to know. The following night I wanted to call her and to thank her for coming to the lesson on Thursday just to show love and have daily contact and so the feelings of the lesson would not diminish I guess. But I just felt that I should call her. I did not think she would have prayed yet because we had the lesson the night before at the end of the night. So I called and she is just way happy on the phone as usual and I thank her so much for the day before and she says, "no, thank you", and then she says, "Elder Aiken I tried praying." It caught me off guard, but I asked her how it went.   (This is all in Japanese of course). She went on to tell me, "At two in the morning I went into my room. I was up for hours thinking about he message you taught and I did not know if it was true. I had some doubts. So I went and kneeled at my bedside at 2 in the morning and I prayed. I asked Heavenly Father, Are you there? Is this true? And then.. I heard the words, truly heard, "Watashi no tokoro ni kinasai." I opened my eyes because I was certain there would be someone in the room but I could see no one in the room. Elder Aiken, God just spoke to me." "Watashi no tokoro ni kinasai" in English means "Come unto me." The Lord spoke to Maki Tanaka in answer to her prayer and told her to "Come Unto Him!" It was literally one of the most powerful experiences I have faced on my mission. It was such an amazing thing to witness the glory and love of our Father in Heaven. He does answer prayers! He does speak to us in these latter days! He is there! This church is true! And now Maki Tanaka knows that! Sure she still has some trials to overcome and some things to beat, but now she knows. She knows the Lord knows, and she cannot deny it. That is what she told me. It was crazy! It was like a movie! I love this gospel! I love the Lord!  I hope that lifted your Faith because it did mine. I definitely like the Gold medal this week. But Please submit your votes to Trevor.aiken@myldsmail.net ok! Haha sorry I am just so happy! Have an amazing week!

Love,

Elder Aiken

Week 66!

     Week 66 was an awesome week! It started off with faith and hard work and a desire to see miracles of course!! 

     On Wednesday we came together as a zone at zone conference and we knelt together, 22 missionaries, in prayer. We prayed to see baptisms this transfer and prayed to know how many we felt that we could see in the next month. It was so powerful to see 21 servants of the Lord with such a strong desire to serve our Savior kneel with me in prayer. The spirit was so strong. We set a range goal to see 18-24 baptisms and immediately got to work to see it. It was so awesome. I prayed to Heavenly Father and just told Him I would give him 24 hours of faith. Just 24 hours of pure faith that we would see miracles. Then when the 24 hours ended, I started again.. And again.. And it still continues. It led us to two new investigators and we had an amazing baptism yesterday with our investigator Mizuguchi! 

     He was baptized by the bishop of our ward. So awesome! He had such a desire to change his life. He just told us that he wanted a new life and fresh start. He wanted to feel forgiven and clean. He was so saddened and disappointed by the choices he had made in his past life. He has tattoos all over his arms chest and back so he always wears a black long sleeve shirt so no one will judge him. He was very hesitant to be baptized with other people watching, but he finally agreed and said it would be ok. He was baptized and he was so happy. He told us the tattoos were obviously still there but all of the decisions he had made felt like they were washed away. It was great.

     A huge miracle came of it as well. In our mission, as you probably know, we have our area books on our iPads. It is all digital. So the other day we went and synced our iPad and all of a sudden there were around 250 people in there from the sisters old area book because there are no sisters in our area. There has not been for 2 years so all of these people had not been taught in 2 years. So we needed to find out who had interest and who didn't because now our area book was huge and unorganized. So we decided to start calling and invite people to the baptism. We called a woman named Maki Tanaka. She was so nice and I invited her to come to the baptism and she said her really good friend was actually a member in a neighboring ward and she had gone to her baptism 3 years ago but never went back to the church since. She was hesitant but said she might come... and she did! And she had a great experience. All of the sisters in the ward just went and fellowshipped her so well!! Maki was so nice and acted so natural in the church though that they thought she was already a member at first. But I asked her how she felt and she said she felt so happy. I tried to explain to her that there are moments in our lives when we feel a joy we do not understand. Like when we look at beautiful view or scenery. Or when we hold a new born child for the first time. Or when we see someone get baptized. I told her that in those beautiful moments, that feeling of joy or peace is Heavenly Father touching our hearts through his spirit, trying to let us know He is there. That there is something more out there. That He loves us. It really clicked with her. Then she asked me, "But why does everyone here seem so happy all the time and why are they always so nice to me. They always show love. Even when I visited the other ward three years ago. I want to know what you have that I am missing." I asked her if we could teach her about that very thing and she was so excited! She said, absolutely! I have work off all week can I come to the church and learn at 6 o'clock on Thursday! I said of course you can! She was fellowshipped so well by two sisters who came up after to me they want to teach her with us really badly and Maki wanted them there as well. I told Maki that one of the sisters cannot do it this week though and Maki said, oh that is fine I can meet the following week on Wednesday at the church as well. Can she be there then?  I said absolutely and testified of the blessings this message contains. She just stood there almost dumfounded. "Elder Aiken I do not know why, but I just believe the words you say. I do not know why but I just feel that they are true. I just believe them." I was so humbled to see the power of the Lord and His spirit working on someone who had not had contact with the missionaries for 2 years! Almost every time in those situations they have forgotten the missionaries or have no interest here in Japan. The Lord prepares the hearts of his children every day! 

     God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is unchanging. But, "If ye have imagined up unto yourselves a God who doth vary, and in whom there is a shadow of changing, then ye have imagined unto yourselves a God who is not a god of miracles." - Mormon 9:10. God is a God of miracles! He is always revealing himself to us in our lives. His hand is ever open just waiting for us to take it. Never give up! He is always there and help is always on the way! He will send his angels round about you to lift you up! So keep loving. Keep trying. Keep trusting. Keep believing. Keep growing. Heaven is cheering you on today, tomorrow, and forever. I cannot give up or lower my faith because I know there is something great that awaits me every day I don't. This gospel carries me. Remember, remember The gospel is not weight; it is wings. It carries over the trials and sorrows of this life. Let it carry you! Let it be your wings. It forever is mine. 

Love,

Elder Trevor Aiken

HOT...HOT...HOT!

     How are you all doing?? I am doing... Good! This week was rough at first leaving my last area and everyone I have come to love. But I walked into Kawagoe and I thought the only way to overcome that feeling was just to get to work. I am working in the hottest prefecture in all of Japan. The single hottest city in Japan is one of the neighboring areas to mine in my mission.  It varies from about 85 to 105 with 100% humidity everyday and there is no wind. It is seriously like death valley. I would show a picture of how much I sweat out here but my dignity holds me back. But I have lost 2 kilos since I have been here and I love it! My backside is evidence of the heat!

     I am back to the straight countryside again, no more Tokyo city life. There definitely is not millions of people outside. You will be lucky to see about 10 or 15 people on a one hour bike ride on the largest road in my area. It is straight hills. Straight hills. Straight hills. I was feeling a bit nervous leaving my home in Adachi, so I just begged the Lord that if I was diligent and worked hard every second to help that feeling go away. And he did!! With miracles!!!!! 

     I do not have a ton of time, so I do not have a big spiritual thought this week so I will send miracles. The first was the second day I got here.  I told my companion that we were going to give it everything we had today. To ride as hard as we could so that we could get to the places that actually had people and walk around finding there so we did not spend so much time where there are no people (though I will say, going down these countryside roads for an hour is a great time to think.  IT is beautiful!) So we went hard all day. Just finding all day. 

     I came and the area did not have many investigators. We went to this Eki and found for a little bit and found a new investigator Suman from Nepal! We will meet with him on Tuesday. Then after that!! No one had interest for about 4 hours at 3 different locations... So we went to leave and we were looking for a 7/11 to grab dinner because we were so far from the apartment and we went down the side roads, had no idea where we were going really, and then there is this park... And there is one man... With an AMERICAN FOOTBALL IN HAND AND AN OFFICIAL RIDDELL COLLEGE FOOTBALL HELMET ON!! Do you know how rare that is! I thought a Satellite had hit Japan. I thought a great white had finally learned to walk on Land. I thought the Dolphins just won the Super Bowl. It was like BYU just beat Alabama. It was like I was finally my dream 6'4 playing for BYU. I hauled at that guy. I went and talked to him and he was hyped. He told me he plays receiver for a semi-pro league in Japan and that he has been to America a few times. He asked where I was from and I said Utah and he goes oh really! "Ya the U of U and BYU are two really strong prestigious progra".... Like what? In English this was said I might add. He asks, doesn't BYU's senior quarterback have a good chance for the Heisman this year. I was just blown away at his knowledge it was like I found my best friend in Japan! I told him I went to BYU and he asked me "isn't that a Christian schoo"? I told him it was and that as Christian volunteers we teach the same message that that school supports. He told us he actually had a high school friend who was Mormon and served a mission!! We told him that we would love to share the message with him that he friend shared as well and invited him to church and he goes "This is awesome! Can I come next Sunday with my girlfriend?" Um... Yes!!! So amazing!!! 

     Then on Saturday Night we were planning for Sunday morning and it came to referrals and we honestly thought to put none because of how our day looked, but I said no let's go for one. We did not know how it was going to happen, maybe as I went on that first Sunday and got to meet the members for the first time, that they would give us one a we showed that love. But right before church a member comes up to us and says there is someone on the church phone can you talk to him. I told her that my Japanese is probably worse than hers. She said no he is speaking English. We went and the man said "Hey my name is Chris. I am a return missionary member from the Philippines. I have a referral for you. She is a Philippina. We will be at the church at 3 o'clock." I was like no way... They came at 3 together, we gave her a church tour, taught her in the Chapel and she said she felt so relaxed and felt such peace in that room. She said she wants to feel this feeling more and wants to be taught. She wants to find the truth and she has been looking. We will teach her and her sister from now on every week!! And Chris will come to every lesson as well and teach with us!!! There are a few more but it would be long. I want to close just with some cool stats because I love stats!!

     The first missionaries  that came to Japan came on on August 12th, 1901. They saw 27 baptisms in the First 24. Because of this missionaries were taken out of Japan until after World War 2. But in those next 78 years Japan has gained 3 temples, 8 stakes, 13 districts. 128,000 members. It's fantastic! And there can be more. President Eyring gave a prophesy about Japan. In that prophesy he promised that people would line up to be baptized in front of our church. All of those blessings are contingent on one thing. The people in Japan changing their hearts. He did not say Japanese people, he said the people in Japan. In our stake alone, 40% of the baptisms are not Japanese. People's hearts are already changing. The Sapporo Temple is a great example of that. Did you know that there is no gate around the temple? People can walk the grounds 24/7. Anytime. Everyone in that area has seen the temple in person or on a card and want to know what it is. His prophesy is being fulfilled little by little. The hearts in Sapporo are changing little by little and they are changing here as well. 

     I know in time that Japan will change, but it will take time. I saw these stats and I also thought, have our hearts changed about missionary work in Utah? There are so many members all around us sometimes we feel like we do not need to do any. Or there is no need. Please let us be missionaries for all of our lives. Please find ways to share the gospel at home. Pray for opportunities!! Most importantly uplift the members around you and help them. You never know what they are going through or if their testimonies are struggling. Please take more heed to do home teaching. It is so crucial. My last area was kind of struggling with testimonies and lack of love shown to some members in the ward. They did not feel needed or wanted. A part of that was 11% home teaching complete each month. Please let us change our hearts. I am so excited to go home and be a different member at home! I am trying my best to do it here haha. I love you all and I hope you have the best week!!

Love,

Elder Aiken!

Leaving Adachi

     This week was an awesome week! Full of miracles! We went finding this week and found a young man named Akagi and asked if he wanted to learn about Jesus Christ and he said "yes" and wanted to meet that Thursday. We taught him in the middle of this park and taught about who God is and about prayer. We taught him that God loves him and wants to hear from him. We told him that he can pray to him any time and told him how God answers our prayers by touching our heart through happiness and peace. We asked him how he felt right then and he said he felt happiness and felt peace. We asked him why he thought he felt that way. He said he did not know but was so excited to hear the answer. We told him that was God's way of touching his heart through the spirit to tell him this was true. He was overcome and was so excited to think that God was speaking to him right then. He said he wanted to know that this was true and he really wanted to pray. He said he was going to pray and strive to receive his answer and that he wanted to meet again next Thursday! Such an awesome miracle! A miracle that the other elders will follow up with because finally I am transferring! I will miss my "family" in Adachi!  I love them all so much.

    I am going to Kawagoe in Saitama Ken. I am so excited to go there!  My new companion is Elder Rhea and we are exact opposites, but I am excited. There are something like 22 new Elders coming in after this next transfer. It is not Tokyo but still pretty big. It has about 100 members and a decent amount are pretty good at English.  I am officially transfer 10! Double digits! What happened!!?? The time is just gone. I mean for heaven sakes BYU Football is back in business. That doesn't make any sense. So crazy. 

     Today I wanted to talk about a spiritual thought that has been on my mind this past week as we have been working with some less actives and investigators.  I wanted to talk about putting on our spiritual armor of God. I have seen such a difference in my life when it has been on and off, and I have seen it ten times moreso in my mission with people I have met here and it breaks my heart to see it. When I write these blogs I am not writing it to a "congregation" so to speak. I am not writing these to a group. But rather I write these to assembled ones. I write these to individuals praying to touch one heart or help one person as I write these by the spirit, so I pray that I can! 

    When I talk about the armor of God I am specifically talking about reading and praying. We need to put on and keep on the armor of God and read and pray every day. When we take that armor off we leave ourselves vulnerable to the attacks of the adversary. But sometimes we feel like the armor is so heavy or that we just want to take it off for one day, it's fine. Or not even that we want to take it off but that we are just "too busy" or "too tired" to do it. But when we take off that armor and the adversary sends his fiery darts it is so much easier than we think to get injured. Sometimes when we get injured deeply through sin or trial, it is really hard to put that heavy armor back on because it hurts to put it on top of those wounds. I write this as a plea to those who have their armor on to keep it on, but even moreso to those who took it off and may have received wounds and it seems as though it is too painful to put the armor back on. It is painful to put it back on a fresh wound, it is is for everyone. But, Christ knows the wounds are painful, he knows that feeling perfectly. That is what the Atonement is there for. To heal those wounds. Not to repair us, but to restore us to our natural form. There are no remaining scars. Christ took those. He took the scars for us. Let Him heal you. Let Him restore you. He has restored me in a way that I cannot put into words. He continues to restore me. It humbles me to the depths of my soul EVERY DAY. I have come to see Him as He is. He is there. He will heal us. Every day. Never take off that armor! Put it on and please keep it on. Strive to get to the temple. Strive to always be worthy to partake of the Sacrament. Read and pray!

     Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Aiken