Transfer #7

     I cannot believe that I am officially transfer 7. That is so insane. Time flies by way too fast! My companion and I are both staying which is awesome. It is his last transfer in the mission so I will send him home.  I am district leader again over 10 missionaries and it is best news ever! I love being district leader so much! It pushes me to be the best that I can possibly be. Especially when we have sisters in our district who had 38 lessons last week to finsih the transfers. For Japan that is a lot!! 

     But we had the biggest miracle Easter Sunday yesterday to finish off the transfer! We worked so hard to lead up to it by working with the youth, members, and investigators this last transfer. 

     We were able to see our friend Ben enter the waters of baptism, I got to go to the temple and be baptized for my friend Natalia's grandpa which I will never forget, and we have a date for the 16th of next month to go with all of the youth and Ben to the temple to do family work. Just an eventful transfer which I will never forget. I have never seen the Lord's hands at work so much in my mission. We had an activity with the youth and we had 4 investigators come which was such a miracle, then the miracle of Easter is when we had 11 investigators come to church! Such an amazing transfer! I am so excited to push harder, work harder, and give my all to the Lord. I love this work! 

     Yesterday was such an amazing day. Easter Sunday. He is risen. He is risen! Are there sweeter words for the ear to hear. Our Savior and Redeemer of the world stands once again in the kingdom of heaven. He was in the tomb for three days, but He was not resting. He was teaching with every second He had in paradise. He gave everyone the chance to hear His word. I love my Savior so much. I want to give every second I have to this work. I will never give up, or waste His time. He never did. He cared for and loved everyone. He performed His Atonement with greater love than man can hold. He suffered EVERYTHING, so that we may not have to. Everything.  I do not think we can even comprehend. 

16 For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent;

17 But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I;

18 Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit--and would that I might not drink the bitter cup, and shrink--

     If it made Him, the greatest of all, to tremble and bleed from every pore because of pain, why do we still sin in our wish as Alma said. Why would we put that upon Him and why would we put that upon ourselves? We do not need to feel that anymore! Give it to Him! Give up the pain and misery! HE took it! Lift up your eyes to the Horizon. To the Son, for soon He cometh. Never give up! He atoned for us. At the heart of Atonement is one. He atoned for all of us! For you.. for me.. everyone. He knows you perfectly. He knows each and every one of us as we are and as we will one day be. Hold on. Let Him walk with you every step of the way. Let Him carry you when you cannot stand. Let Him guide your life and be the way. Let Him save you. Let Him. That is all He leaves to us. All we need to do... is Let Him. 

     I pray that the Savior can reside in all of our thoughts and hearts in this Easter season. For Him "it is finished," but for us, our work still goes on. May we work to bring any and all unto Him once again. 

     I love you all so much! The new year is a great time for a fresh start, but if there was ever a day to change it all and find the path, it is in this Easter time. In the time of our Risen Lord. I love you all so much! Have the best week ever! 

Love,

Elder Trevor Aiken

Stay out of the "shade"!

Ben's baptism!

     It was such an amazing experience this week to be able to stand in the circle and confirm our investigator Ben a member on my 10 month mark. It was such a spiritual moment for me. I loved it. Also, being able to sing at his baptism was such an amazing experience for me and I loved that moment. 

     This week was such a great week with so many experiences. One of which was when I was walking down the street and walked past a place that was selling baked yams and it was so natsukashi (nostalgic). It reminded me of my mom's candied yams soooo much. It was a good smell but I did not get it. But what I did get could not be stopped. The temptation to eat it was too powerful. It is a waffle in the shape of a fish, that is filled with custard cream and is lightly coated with powdered sugar. Good gravy it was like Christmas morning! So good! I am not going to say that I had two but I am not going to say that I did not have two if you know what I mean. But anyway,  it was a great week with the temple, a baptism, and really good food!

     This week we had a great opportunity to work with many different people in many different cultures and there is one thing that I learned and connected to a talk I had read earlier last week that, "a distraction doesn’t have to be evil to be effective--sometimes it can just be shade." As we talked with investigators and listened to their concerns, I recalled upon my own life before my mission and realized how many things we do that do not seem wrong. In the story from the talk, (I cannot remember the name sorry) when cows are being corralled down a hot dusty road, they will wander off the sides to the pleasing shade of the trees to get out of the hot sun. How many times in our lives do we do things that seem harmless and are not evil. They are not sin, just getting some shade from the heat of the day or the stress of the world. Sleeping in a little bit on Sundays because the week was so hard. Listening to music all the time to reduce stress and losing time to listen to the spirit. Avoiding family members or other people because you need time alone and you do not want to talk. Sleeping, listening to music, or being alone are not bad things at all! We do them all the time! (Unless you're a missionary because you cannot be alone). But those things if used in abundance or in situations or circumstances where they do not belong, such as Sunday mornings or whatever it may be, harm us in unseen ways. They are not in the slightest evil, however, Satan uses shade to lead to the total darkness. If you miss one Sunday it is a million times easier to miss again. If the music you listen to is inappropriate or loud, you lose the chance to have quite moments to have the spirit to be with you. Yet sometimes we think we do have other quiet moments which are really idol moments. We see them as so harmless to just have some time alone all the time. But Satan uses that time to fill an empty stage in our mind with bad thoughts or temptations. He loves idol hands.  I plead with you to avoid the shady things. Life is hard, no doubt about it. But if we just stay on the path, even though sometimes the sun is blaring down, it will be a perfect happiness that awaits us at the other side at the end of the road. I love you all so much and I hope you have the best week ever! Look for shade in your life. Find the light. I pray that we all can do so. 

Love,

Elder Trevor Aiken

Fall in love with the Gospel!

     How are you all doing?  Time flies by when you are having fun - holy cow. I cannot believe I hit 10 months on Sunday. This mission is blowing by. But this week was so fun. 

     A little girl got baptized on Sunday!!! It was one of the most spiritual experiences I have had in my mission to be invited to stand in the circle and confirm her with the gift of the Holy Ghost. It was so powerful for me. I realized that it was the first baptism I had seen since my own! It was so amazing to feel of that spirit. It made me want to be a father even more! I cannot wait for the day to see one of my children make the choice to enter the waters of baptism! 

     This Ward is awesome! We are really progressing in this area and are just looking to go even further. We are not even close to our potential. Because the potential limit is the Lord's limit and that is far out of my reach in this His work. 

     Today we got all of the Tokyo West and Tokyo East zone missionaries and played volleyball together. It was way fun. I had a few dives which is the best feeling ever! Until the court burns on your knee but that is ok! Also, word of advice! Never go out in the rain and forget your rain pants but do not have enough to go back and grab them. Because it is not fun and it is very cold and you get rain tan lines on your pants. But that is also ok!! Wanna know why??

Because there is no better feeling than being able to fall back in love with this gospel every day. This perfect good news. This joy! The Relief Society president in my ward here (she is from the Philippines and speaks perfect English) laughs every time she calls and I pick up because I am just always so happy. I just am not able to not be happy! This is the greatest work on earth! We have a Savior of our souls everyone!!

     Wake up! Remember Him! How can we be sad when He has already been sad for us?! Why sin when He has already taken it!? Give place no more for the enemy of your soul! Fall back in love with this gospel! Remember what made you fall in love with it in the first place! Christ is the personification of love. This gospel is love. And I love every day that I am in His service. I have never been so happy! Isn't it so fun to change, take a step forward, and never look back?? Isn't it so cool to notice the change we can get through Christ?? I cannot and will not, except for in times when I am humbled to my knees, think of where I would be if I did not serve this mission. This is not a long blog because this pday was weird and busy, but I just challenge you to please try to fall back in love with the gospel again in any way. 

     When I was in the MTC, a man came and spoke and said how in his mission, when he was struggling a lot, he would read the Book of Mormon and would ask the Lord again if it was not true. Not because he doubted his testimony, but just to get another spiritual witness and confirmation and he felt the warmth and joy and confirmation every time. It gave him the strength to go on and to proudly serve his mission. He said he did it multiple times and challenged us to do so. So whatever it is, do so to get yourself another witness of this gospel. If we receive an answer once when we are in our youth, Satan will start working every day onward to make us forget our doubt that feeling we had as the years go on. Ask again. Act again. Fall in love with the message that gives a way to our Father and an eternity with our families. Fall in love with the gospel of love. I get to do it again and again every day. I love you all so much! 

    Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Trevor Aiken

Week 42

     My brothers and sisters!!!! How are you doing? I am doing so good!!! The other elders and I started our running to day and we woke up early and went and did a little 5k and that was the best thing! We are doing 3 days a week now!! Let's go!
     The work is going awesome. We are talking to roughly a hundred people a day on the streets and giving a quick minute or two message about the gospel and asking if they are interested. I will not lie to you most of them are not. But!! The Lord is preparing his children! I am a firm believer that if we plan out our day by the spirit and have places to go, then the Lord will put his prepared children in our path from point A to point B. But if we have no direction and just go wherever then we put things in our hands and guessing and it is so much harder for the Lord to put his children in our path. 

     So in my area right now we have about 320 less actives that we are trying to visit, work with, and check on which is hard. So we stop and talk to everyone on the way. That is our main focus. Housing is not really a thing in this mission at all (knocking door to door). I have gone two times so far my whole mission. But, also we had a really cool thing happen last week. We have an investigator who is approaching his baptismal date on the 19th of this month and we just set his "second baptismal date" to go to baptisms for the dead on April 16th! We are allowed to go with him for his first time. But we want it to be a Ward effort to go with us and we have all the young men and some of the YSA's coming with us to the temple on that day too. We are pushing our ward and working with them to all get names and go together. It is really exciting and such an awesome opportunity to go do it. Get to the mountain of he Lord! And bring any and all with you that you can. Such a cool week. 


     Talking to 100 people day and getting rejected 99 times is hard, but we do it for the one. We found a man at around 8:55 right before going home last week. The last one on the street. He looked Japanese and I stopped him and started speaking to him in Japanese and he just goes, "Hey man I am from Australia. You can speak English." Haha so good. But he is a Chinese man from Australia and his in his 20's and he is soo cool. He is Christian which is so rare for us. We talked about the restoration a little bit, gave him the Restoration pamphlet and asked if we could meet again to share our message and he said absolutely. We are meeting tonight at the Church! So awesome!
     One thing that I held onto this week though came from our finding efforts. When you get rejected so many times it can be discouraging, when you wonder what impact you are making in these people's lives. But I love D&C 64:33.
"Wherefore, be not weary in well-doing, for ye are laying the foundation of a great work. And out of small things proceedeth that which is great!"
     We will never know the impact of the things we do on the people around us. Do not give up! You never know the good you do! There are few people who do know though, and that is God and Jesus Christ, but just as equally, Satan knows. He knows the good you are doing and wants nothing more than to deter you in your efforts. He wants you to give up and give in. Something my older brother Brock always told me was when life is so hard and we are about to give up, that just means that something so great is about to come around the corner! Satan knows it so he works extra hard to bring you down in that time of trial so you will not see through the clouds and see the sun shining on the other side. Never give up! Sometimes we are burdened down with grief, but we never, ever, bear these burdens alone. We never will. But, never forget, how many trials we face or don't face is not a measure of who we are and the success in our lives. Our success is never measured by how strongly we are tempted but by how faithfully we respond. Give it all. Total surrender to His will is total victory. Give it all to the Lord and see what he is waiting to give to you. Give all, but never give up. Do not quit!! Hold strong. Let us stand together in these last days. This is a gospel of change, second chances, and endless opportunities. It is hope. It is literally the epitome of hope. Hold to the rod. We have no reason not to be happy! Do we not have a loving Savior who redeemed us all? Are we not a part of the truest church on earth, and subsequently the great work on earth? Rejoice and lift up your hearts! 
     I love you all. Thank you for all you have done for me. You likewise willnever know how much you have done for me. I testify that example you set, the things you do, and the trials you face, never go unnoticed,
     Have a great week!
Love,
Elder Trevor Aiken

Week 41!

     This last week was an awesome week! This is my favorite area, Ward, and apartment yet. It has been so fun. I have been fighting to eat healthy, work out, and go running together, but the other Elders were just not feeling it. 

     But then..Zone conference came...President Nagano spoke and led the first training of the meeting and then... Sister Nagano went up and it was just straight fire. She said she wanted to talk about health and I thought, "ok, here we go. Note taking time!" She went through nutrition, exercise, and eating healthy. The whole time I just kept looking over at the other Elders and guilt tripped a little bit you know. Then Sister Nagano finished strong. "Elders and Sisters, when you accepted your call to be a missionary you gave your body to the Lord. It is not yours anymore. You gave yourself to the Lord. This is the Lord's time. Don't waste his time." Game.. Set.. Match! All I am going to say is that the other Elders and I all have a diet plan, we work out from 6 am for an hour, and starting next week we are running three days a week! Miracles come in so many ways! So many ways! 

     Also, if you have not all wished my big brother Tanner Happy Birthday you better do it soon ok. That is some important stuff! I love my brother so much and he is such an example to me so please wish him the best!
     Now, a little about the work. I will tell you what we are doing in my area right now. When I came here, our area book was pretty small because they just added 2 more Elders here recently and there was not any activities. Now, we are working with the youth and have an activity and a spiritual message every week which is so awesome to see their testimonies grow. We are doing Mogi lessons (practice lessons) with members where they play the part of an investigator and we teach them, then we pray together for the investigator, ask them to pray for the investigator in their personal prayers, and we follow up with them with our miracle the following week. That has been awesome. One thing I make me and my companion do in every area is go to the city hall and ask where the nearest service building is and we go ask for service opportunities. We will go join an English class and teach next week which is so exciting too. Also, our main finding efforts is what we call Kinjin dendo. (Golden investigator proselyting). We just stop people and we state our purpose right at the beginning so that there is no confusion and we teach a short principle and invite them to learn within a minute or so. We are just focusing on finding the elect, but that is what it is like for me!
     The spiritual thing I learned this last week came from something President Nagano said in his conference that I have not heard for a while. He was talking about his son and how it takes a village to raise a young man. Almost as if I could hear the words the scripture for 2 Kings 6 came to my mind.
16 And he answered, Fear not: for they that be with us are more thanthey that be with them.
17 And Elisha prayed, and said, Lord, I pray thee, open his eyes, that he may see. And the Lord opened the eyes of the young man; and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha.     
     I was raised, protected, and guided by so much more than a village. You have all guided my life and given me direction. I cannot imagine my life now if it were not for all of you. And if our eyes could be opened we truly would see chariots of Fire
round about us as far as the eye could see standing ready at our side, fearlessly looking to guide us home. We are and never will be alone in this fight. I was filled with such peace this last week because there will ALWAYS be more with us than they that be with them!! We have endless Concourse of brothers and sisters fighting alongside us on the other side of the veil, and villages and villages to raise us up in this life. Never give up! To Zion!! To Zion!! Onward and onward to the victory! 
     I love you all so much. I miss you all and I am excited for the day when I will see you again, but until then, please let us have eyes to see and ears to hear the chariots coming to our aid. I love you all so much! Have the best week ever!
Love,
Elder Trevor Aiken

Week 40

Is she cute or what?  Find her name below.

     How is everyone doing? I transferred to Adachi this last week! It was a huge surprise and it was so hard to leave the people in Takasaki, but I love this new area already. There are some amazing people here! We were able to set up a wedding reception at the church as missionaries and then we were able to go. It was so awesome! It is so cool to see a couple take that step to go get married in the Temple in Japan. That is not something you see it a lot. I loved it. 
     We have some awesome investigators. All of them are foreign so they speak English! It is so weird to have all my lessons in English right now. But so many foreigners live in Tokyo. Including the other Elder's investigator who is from Amsterdam. He is a 6 foot 7 ex-pro kick boxer. He is the coolest guy ever. He knows more about the gospel than I do I think. He is basically a member he is just working so hard to quit smoking, but he gave a talk in church a few weeks ago because he knows so much!

     But anyway, the transfer was still hard for me. It was hard to leave a young man we had helped come back to church and were helping prepare for a mission. Sometimes this work is so hard and I wish the Lord could just finish it! Do it for me haha. This feeling does not come all the time, but there are always those frustrating times that come, but my eyes were opened and I was very humbled this week by this quote from President Monson. "God left the world unfinished for man to work his skill upon. He left the electricity in the cloud, the oil in the earth. He left the rivers unbridged and the forests unfelled and the cities unbuilt. God gives to man the challenge of raw materials, not the ease of finished things. He leaves the pictures unpainted and the music unsung and the problems unsolved, that man might know the joys and glories of creation." I had never thought of it that way. God rested the 7th day and gave that time to us to work. For us to work with His creations to become like Him. I wonder if that is why they say that thousands of years for us is like a day in heaven, because it is the 7th day. I was just thinking out loud, but I love this quote.
     This is our time to work our skill, to give our all, and to try
ourselves so we can finish the unfinished earth he left for us. It is the time for us to grow. I have definitely come to know little by little, more and more, the joys and glories of the creation. I hope in times of trial and hardship we can remember that the Lord left this work for us to do. It is yet unfinished. Whenever we question why, just remember where it says it dozens of times, "for a wise purpose." He knows everything. He has His purpose. He just wants us to return to Him and this is how we can. 

     I love you all so much and I hope you have an amazing week! Go out and finish the unfinished, sing the unsung, solve the unsolved! This is our last time in the vineyard! Go out and give everything you have! Then leave the rest to Him. Have a great week!
Love,
Elder Trevor Aiken

By the way...have you ever seen a cuter little girl than Miaichan? No. No you have not. (They call little kids chan after their name in Japan. Here real name is Miai.)

Twice as good...

Lunch with my companion Elder Adachi! 

   Ok here is the joke for the week. Who is the greatest doctor of the Bible? It is a toss up. Job had the most patience, but Moses delivered all of the children of Israel... Sorry that was such a Larry Aiken joke right there!

Can you tell we like to eat?

     But anyway, our p-day was messed up because we had splits with the assistants in Tokyo on Monday and Tuesday so here we are. It is funny though when you have splits, your attitude towards it is completely based on your relationship with your companion. If you are in a good companionship you do not want to leave. If you have a bad one you treasure the day away - haha. My companion and I are just killing it though! We are doing so well. We just figured everything out and are working well together. It is just crazy that the transfer is already coming to an end again this week. Time flies so fast. If he transfers, the odds are I will become senior companion because at this point 80% of this mission in my transfer are younger... and I am only transfer 5. So young. 

     But I thought about how I have learned from my companion this last transfer and how our companionship progressed and I held onto a quote he told me. He told me that, "A good relationship is when the good times are twice as good and the bad times are half as bad." That is how it ended up this transfer. Everything we did that was fun was twice as fun. All of the miracles we witnessed held twice the joy. We found joy in each others successes and goals. Then when the hard times hit, we each took half the burden and took it together. It made it twice as easy. I thought about how true that statement was when he said it and how opposite it is when we are not having a good relationship. 

     I thought about my relationships before my mission and how I treated others and was treated by them as well. How are our relationships in our family and with our friends? Are we twice as happy in the good times and are we rejoicing in each others successes? Are we happier around them and feel like burdens are lifted? But, most importantly, how is our relationship with God? This relationship is different because we just have to do our part and the Lord will always be there and do his. Are you twice as happy when you are following the Lord? Are you giving yourself to Him? Are you feeling like your burdens are lifted every day from Him? Take the step. Make the relationship. Make it stronger! He made us. I think we can make time for Him. 

     That was just a thought I wanted to share with you this week. Sometimes we get so angry or flustered because of how our friends sometimes treat us poorly, or even family members, but are we doing the same to the Lord? He gives us everything. He saved us. Yet, sometimes we do not even take the time to talk to Him for a five minutes in the morning or the evening. He is dying to have a relationship with us. Let us strive to play our part. I love you all so much and have the best week ever! 

Love,

Elder Trevor Aiken