The Power of Prayer

Hey mom!

That's great that you got to go to the temple! I’m so blessed to have the opportunity to go every transfer! Speaking of which I will be going next week Tuesday! How is Jenifer and Bill doing?

(I had to ask him about any paper work about his return. I don’t want to distract him, but just curious when we will start hearing about return stuff) Haha we don't call them trunkie letters, but yes I do know what you are talking about! Elder and Sister Loftus are really chanto about sending letters on time so I don't think you will receive them late. But I don't know when you will get it. I know I will get a letter once I am 6 months away from my return date, which is in about 1 month. 

So ya the P-day schedule changes were announced but President Warnick is still making changes and will announce them sometime in the near future. Basically we can start P-Day from 8:00 am. And then on the other days we can move studies to whenever and then lunch is now 30 minutes! Lunch will be hard. But we will live and I know there is a reason so we will work with it! 

(The little boys were in Haydon’s room and found a mysterious box, well not that mysterious) I'm so glad they found my treasure chest! Darn I should have hidden things in there for them specifically for when they found it. (There is another treasure box but it has a lock on it) The box Granddad made me is full of knives. I locked the keys inside on purpose so I could always keep up on my lock picking skills. Every time I wanted to get inside it I pick the lock haha. There is a little red and yellow tin box somewhere in the shelves that says like fireball or something on it. There are lock picking tools in it. A hair pin and an allen wrench. Good luck! Man those boys are so cute! 

I was reminded about the power of prayer this week! I read recently in a talk that prayer isn't like ordering groceries (not that I've ever ordered groceries before but,) where you call, order and forget about it until they come. Prayer ought to be always in our hearts and we ought to be doing all that we can to accomplish it, to be doing the right things at the right time so that we can be where we need to be for God to bless us. This week on companion exchanges we went from our apartment to the church. That morning we said a prayer that we could find someone who would listen to us. And from that point I kept that desire in my heart and let it guide my actions. We said another prayer before we left the apartment and within 10 minutes we called out to a guy who had a lot of interest in who God is and how he can receive help from Him. The day before we also were housing, the first guy whose door we knocked on was actually a potential investigator the other investigators always met on the streets but never knew where he lived. He is from Nepal and fluent in Japanese. Just yesterday we went out to the ocean, a place called Umi no koen or in English "The Park of the Sea". There was no one out there at all. A couple guys fishing. We decided to go housing. No one there either. Well they were there but they were all old rich people who all gave us the same excuse. After 60-70 houses we decided to go to a place closer to where we lived. On the way there is where things started getting good. Just from the old rich people housing to the nearest station we were able to meet 5 or so people who initially didn't have very much interest but throughout our conversation started pondering the purpose of life and the existence of God. We made it to the station and decided to pass out flyers for English class. We met several people who had a lot of interest in English who said they would come. Then we met Kishor! He is 18 years old and from Nepal! He is the man! He is so nice and wants to learn about Christianity! I know that God loves his Children and he will guide us to help them if we just be obedient and faithful and prayerful. Thank you for all of your prayers, they help so much!

I have been cleaning out my suitcases because they each way like 70 pounds somehow! I had like triple the amount of clothing I needed and I will be sending some shirts and ties home somewhere in the future. It’s amazing, I have worn the same pair of shoes almost every day of my mission and they are still going strong! I walk tons and bike tons but the sole and the seams are still good! It's a pretty awesome blessing! 

I love you so so so so much!

ドレーパー長老

Week 72!

We are having a huge worldwide mission broadcast this next Thursday to announce schedule changes so there will be a changes! (I know that they have to exercise in the morning so I asked what does he do?) For exercise we just have some weights in the apartment that we lift (nothing major haha) and push-ups  and sit ups and stuff like that. I hate running so I avoid that. We ride bikes up mountains everyday so I think that covers it haha. 

(I asked what has been his hardest responsibility so far, District leader, Zone leader or Tech Person) Hardest responsibility is zone leader I would say. (What transportation do you use the most in this area) I use the trains all the time. Not every day but we easily burn like 2000 yen a week on trains. Every week we ride trains for a couple hours in total. But when we just dendo we usually walk or bike. Sometimes train if we want to go to the other side of the area. (The houses look tiny, are they?) The houses are tiny here! Although I've been able to learn what is a big house in Japan. Our house is easily triple the size of a normal Japanese house. 

This week was very fast! Our basic schedule for the week is: Monday pday; Tuesday visit brother Noshiro; Wednesday English class; Thursdays are weekly planning; Friday we have district meeting in Yamate and in Yokosuka. That usually takes the whole day until 6:00pm; Saturday is District meeting in Kamiooka; Sunday is church! 

We had splits twice this week. First was with the yamate elders and then with kamiooka elders. It's so interesting to go on splits with missionaries. The point of the split is to help them and train them and to show them an example in dendo but I feel like every time I end up learning so much more than I feel like I taught! 

On the way to yokosuka district meeting I was reading a conference talk. Trains are interesting because you can't just bring up gospel topics in a very bold way because the chance of getting missionaries kicked off of trains isn't zero. But you can talk to people and try to let them bring it up and I love it! It's seriously so fun. To me it's the most natural way to dendo. Anyways so I was reading a talk and I felt that I should put it away and say hello to the guy to my right. So I did. The guy basically freaked out. "Why did you just say that to me!?" He asked. "I just felt like I should say hello" is what I said to him. Turns out that some missionaries not too long ago had called out to him in yokosuka and he wondered why. He said they had the same black name badge. It was an awesome opportunity to share basically with him what we do as missionaries and about the message we bear. 

The same day I was waiting for the train and a guy walks straight up to us and just stares at us about a foot away. "Konnichiwa!" I said. I didn't say too much after that because the guy went on to tell me about the problems he had in his life. He talked of how he lost his wife some time  ago and how it was really sad. Unfortunately he didn't really give me time to teach him anything about the plan of salvation but I did manage to testify to him that God lives and he loves us. His plan and his point of view is much larger than ours. Sometimes we don't know why something’s happen but we can always be sure that God loves us. I had to get off the train at the next stop but I love the truth that we have a God who is our  Father and He loves us more than we know. It doesn't matter how low we feel that we have sunk, or how dark our days may seem, that love can lift us and fill us with the most wonderful feelings of peace. 

I made some killer bread this week! We visited a young family in the ward and I made them some bread and I made us some bread. It was seriously so good. 

Thank you for being he best mom ever! I had some time to reflect on how amazing of a mother you are. You did everything to me! Thank you so much. I know it's not easy to deal with me but you always did so with love and patience. Whenever I had a hard time or was upset, you comforted me and I always felt better afterwards. You always made delicious food for us and I regret not helping you more with chores and things but I thank you so much for all you do for me and us!

I love you Mom! 

Elder Draper

ドレーパー長老

He has some Nigerian friends!

Hello!

Sorry I'm so late today. A friend to the missionaries took us to china town in Yokohama and it took way longer than it should have. But it was really fun though.

We haven't been able to meet with any of the people we have found. We have tried but haven't been able to. Some canceled, some didn't show up. Oh well! We are still trying to contact them and still looking for others. At church there is a guy from Nigeria who always comes to church. He's not a member but loves to come. I usually translate for him. He didn't come last week and he showed up late this week right after sacrament meeting. But the reason he was late was because he brought his friend! Right after sacrament meeting he walks in with another guy from Nigeria! In gospel principles class there was more people who speak English than Japanese so we just taught it in English! We taught about the creation and we asked them what their favorite part of the creation is. Some people answered sunsets or the sky or the stars. The new guy from Nigeria answers light. The reason is because "without light there could be no plants or animals or humans. And even assuming we could exist without light, it would be dark and we wouldn't be able to enjoy the beautiful creations of God." It was so deep! He blew us all away. 

You should keep organizing the photos! I bet it's so cool to look back at the photos. I believe in you mom! (when he left my goal was to organize and put 3 boxes of pictures in albums. I finally started!)

The ward we are in is seriously so awesome. We have had a couple meal appointments this week. We are trying to come up with ways we can thank them so if you have any ideas please send them our way!

Well this week was pretty cool. We had zone meeting which I was so nervous for! But it was so fun! It was interesting being on the side of training this time. But I still learned so much it was crazy! I love my zone so much. Everybody is so obedient and willing to work hard. We haven't had too much success in finding many people yet but we have found some. There is a Chinese guy in Yamate who has a baptism date so that's awesome! 

I had the opportunity to go back to Kichijoji! I had splits with Elder Battaglia and Elder Matsumoto, the assistants to the president. They were there when I was so it was a nice reunion! I got to meet one of my favorite members ever! Kajiura Kyoudai! I found out while I was there that he had a heart attack in December. He's been pretty sick lately but he is still the most genki man I have ever met! I love him so much! We shared some scriptures that really brought the spirit. It was a very sweet reunion. 

That's so crazy about Tanner! I saw his picture of all the wreckage. That's so sad! But I'm sure they will recover soon! He's such a strong missionary and I know the Philippines are a strong country. I'm glad that he was finally able to skype home! 

I love you so much!

Elder Draper 

ドレーパー長老

If you would like to email him he would love it!

haydon.draper@myldsmail.net

Try a little harder to be a little better!

Hey mom! 

  

Sushi is a good choice! I also got some this week. Here, most of the sushi places are you sit down and sushi goes around on a little conveyer belt and you can pick anything off of them and then if you want something specific they have a little screen you order from and it comes on the belt and just beeps when it gets near. People always ask me if I had ever had sushi before Japan and I always think of IOU and honestly IOU is pretty much the same as sushi here! Except I can’t remember if IOU has sushi or only onigiri. Does it just have the fish on the little ball of rice or is it always in a seaweed sheet? 

  

That sounds like a very eventful week! We still have about 6 weeks left in the transfer. This transfer was 8 weeks so. English class is fun. We are working really hard to make it a more effective thing though. There are about 25ish people I think?  I get to play the piano in district meeting and for priesthood meeting in church. Not yet in Sacrament Meeting. My wrist does still hurt. I just use it all the time so it never gets any time to rest!  

  

The weather has been weird lately! The only time it has snowed here was in the 11th month. Since then it hasn't snowed. It actually gets really warm( like today) and then it plummets and rains like yesterday! Audrey told me that when it snows in Logan its almost always like how Idaho was! I will have some fun winters if that's what it will be like every winter! 

  

Man that sounds really nice to sit by the fire and watch snow! It's weird to think of having time to do something like that one day. I feel like free time doesn't exist anymore haha. The other day I was watching a Mormon message and the dad was making pizza with his family and instantly I thought  “how can he make all that pizza in under an hour!?" But then I remembered that in the real world, unless work doesn't allow it, you can usually take more than an hour or however long! It's so weird to me that like in the summer or on weekends I didn't have time limits on eating food. Funny huh? 

 This week was so good! We had MLC (Mission Leadership Council) in Kichijoji. It was so spiritual. We just talked about the mission and how it was doing and we received tons of trainings and I'm so excited for the future! It seems like a lot will change here pretty soon.  

  

Ever since then,  Elder Yoshikawa and I have been trying just a little bit harder to be a little bit better and it has made all the difference! I know you and everybody are always praying for me and all of us. Thank you so much! It helps so so much. This week we have found somebody every day almost! We have found 2 people while housing, we have had two different areas in the mission send us reassignments to teach people who actually live in our area not theirs, we have found a couple people on the phone and have appointments with them and then when we were in the middle of district meeting a sister in the ward came in and asked if we could come talk to this guy who was looking for something it seemed. We went and talked to him and turns out that he came here once like 10 years ago and he thought he would stop by today. We (all 6 missionaries) showed him the church and then upstairs he asked us tons of questions about what we loved about the church so much and we all taught and bore testimony for like a solid 1.5 hours! It was way cool.  

  

This week I've just been focusing on praying always and it has seriously changed the way the work has gone this week. I was able to give two blessing this week. One of which I was the one giving the blessing and the other I stood in. The one where I gave the blessing was probably the most revelatory experience I've ever had. I only knew a little bit about what this sister was going through but right before I gave the blessing I said a little prayer to know what I should say. It didn't come all at once but as I opened my mouth, it was literally filled with the words I needed to say. I wasn't' nervous, I wasn't anxious, Just pure peace and understanding. I am so grateful that the priesthood has been restored to the earth again.  

  

I am enjoying my mission so much. It's literally nothing like I expected it to be. It's so much harder. But I have learned to be faithful and happy during any situation. Happiness isn’t dependent on our conditions. It is dependent on our foundation of Christ.   

  

It's been a very humbling, exciting, spiritual, cold and wet week! 

  

I love you so much! 

  

Elder Draper  ドレーパー長老 

Haydon has spent his very first, entire year in Japan!

Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu! (Happy new years) 

  

There it goes! Can you see it in the distance? The first January to January year I spent in Japan. It’s gone. Crazy how time works!  

  

We actually got a lot of meals this week! It was awesome! We went to the Bishops house in the morning and talked about the ward and how we can help. Then they fed us some pretty good tomato base soup. Then they let us wash their windows! It was so nice of them. They know missionaries are always looking for some service to do and even though they could have done it all by themselves (and probably better) they saved that one last thing for us to do.  Then we went to our apartment and did a deep clean all day. In Japan, New Years is a huge deal. Like nobody is home or everybody is busy. So this year, to use our time wiser, President Warnick had us do an all day deep clean on the apartments and then yesterday on the first we studied certain things all day. It was interesting!  

  

So ya two nights ago we went to Yamate with a less active and her boyfriend. We were planning on getting dinner at shabu shabu but it was way packed. So we found this Hawaiian burger shop that was amazing! The bike ride over there was amazing. We rode along the river the whole time and slowly got deeper into the big city of minato mirai.   That’s where landmark tower and the big Ferris wheel are!  

  

It's so fun going to all of the district meetings in Yokosuka and Yamate and Kamiooka every week. Nothing too crazy has happened though.  

  

We are just trekking up the hills and trying to talk to everyone!  

  

Lately my left wrist has hurt a ton. I might go see a doctor or something. It’s weird though because it doesn’t hurt all the time. Just when I turn my rist to the left. But it's been hurting for about 4 days or so.  

  

Oh yes, on New Years day we had church! I gave a talk in sacrament meeting! It was actually my first real talk in sacrament meeting! I always give a short testimony when I transfer but I gave a full 10 minute talk. But of course it wasn’t actually 10 minutes. I'm sure it was about 6 minutes. I think that that is a law of the universe. Your talk is never as long as you practiced!  

  

My talk was on agency. I translated it into Japanese and then Elder Yoshikawa made it sensible hahaha.  

  

I know that Christ lives and he is our Savior. He is there all the time. There are no exceptions. He loves us and he can change us to become better people if we will let him.  

  

I love you so much!  

  

Elder Draper 

 ドレーパー長老

Yokohama Thunder Thighs!

Wow! Sounds like a crazy trip! But I bet Audrey will never forget it! Haha. Weird to think that next year I will be there as well!

Ah man it's so weird to me that one of my companions has already met my parents! Haha. I love Elder Belnap! Ya I feel like my English is fine but at the same time I really have nothing to compare it to so I could be horrible. I know I'm losing my English grammar when I speak pretty hard. There's this one specific grammar principal in English I just can't get right. In Japanese it's so easy.

So ya I LOVE my new area! People say that if you get called to Yokohama you get the Yokohama thunder-thighs. It's very true. We basically bike everywhere and there are massive hills everywhere! Our apartment(there is 4 missionaries in this one too) is at the top of a pretty ridiculously steep hill. I'm making it a goal to ride up it every time so I can get stronger. I am zone leader with Elder Yoshikawa over Yokohama South zone. I honestly don't know yet how many people are in our zone haha but there are three separate districts with about ten missionaries in each. It's pretty different from district leader in that I don't plan for the district meeting every week. We do do the zone meeting every month though.

Yoshikawa Choro is my companion and he is so great! He is from Osaka. He is 3 transfers ahead of me right now. He's just so funny and obedient and is great.

So ya this week I left Kohoku and took a 40ish minute train strait to gumyoji station. On the train I talked to three business men (they were together) and they were headed home to Kyoto from a business trip in Tokyo. They speak a dialect of Japanese called kansaiben in Kyoto and well the kansai area. So they were speaking mad kansai and I wasn't getting any of it haha. Two guys spoke to me in kanto (like tokyo and Yokohama area) Japanese so I could understand. But whenever one of the guys would talk to me I just stared at him like I did when I first got to Japan whenever I talked to anybody haha. They thought I was insane for not drink sake. In that ten minutes the topics of word of wisdom, law of chastity and other things came out haha. I missed my stop talking to them. I bailed on the whole thing once the guys started to get really creepy.

This week We were throwing down a kubarikai (where we pass out chirashi) and these two different old ladies stopped and were so happy that we did free English class! The one lady was soooo happy that I could read Japanese. She literally stepped back and clapped her hands haha it was the best. So I hope they come!

It's getting way cold here! Like I guess you said it should be in the 50s, which I don't know what feels like anymore since I use Celsius haha, but it feels so much colder than that! I bought a really nice p coat at a thrift store in back in kichijoji and its way warm! I'm glad I come home in the summer though because that means I can get rid of/send some stuff home that I only use in the winter before I come home. There's noooo way I could bring all this stuff home.

So we were flying down a hill and I felt that should stop and check my front tire so I called out to Elder Yoshikawa and we stopped. The tire was a bit loose and the brake brake pads were running against the wheel how it was supposed to. So we fixed the looseness but couldn't fix the tire. So we walk a little bit and an old guy calls out to us and we stop and talked to him. He has no interest but he wanted to gives us a ton of little toys he made out of like plastic bottles and milk packs and stuff. It was weird but nice to have someone want to share something they thought was good too! We went just a little bit further and stopped another guy and he didn't really have interest either but turns out that he works at a bike shop! So he fixed my bike for me right there! It was awesome!

I know that we can improve through Christ's atonement. The atonement of Christ isn't only for sinners to repent, it's also for saints to become stronger and better. I know that he has again restored his church and all the ordinances and covenants that we need to return to God again and to live with him forever.


I love you!

Elder Draper


PS I can't wait to talk to you on my Saturday!

ドレーパー長老

Christmas in Japan.

No worries! I wasn't stressed because there was no way I was going to let the stupid connection take away my family time! I just didn't know how to get it back is all. (referring to our phone call Friday night)

Christmas was so so fun! We went caroling all day long! I made stockings for the other elders and put them by their beds at night and they were happy when they woke up. I called home and then we walked around the streets and stood in parks and asked if we could sing to people and when they said yes they loved it so much! One guy and his 2 year old son let us sing on the streets and the son's eyes lit up and he was trying to dance and sing along. The dad was touched I think. He started taking a video of the kid and us. Then we talked to an older lady who actually called out to us and she and her dog "Boo-Boo" were all decked out in Christmas gear and when we asked if we could sing for her she said "Oh yes, please do!" So we sang for her Silent Night. I thought she was going to cry. She said it was the best Christmas she has ever had! That made my day. Then at 4:00 we met some members from the ward and we went caroling some more! We visited a ton of less active members and some widows and some people who lost their son and then at the end there was a surprise curry rice, meat loaf, salad and fruit dinner and it was SO GOOD. I made the lady a tiny tiny paper crane out of a little square of the chopsticks holder. She liked that. This week we went to all of the district meetings in the zone so that was fun! I met some sweet people on the trains like always! But it was fun going to Yamate and Yokosuka. We took 2 days to go to the Yamate where there is a famous church. (It’s the 1st LDS church in Japan)They had a huge open house and over 900 people came within 2 days! The first day I did the uketsuke ( I ran the welcome desk) and passed out little pamphlets about basic info of the church and Christmas and book of Mormons and stuff). Then the second day we weren’t supposed to go but they called us and asked us to come because there was so much people! We went the second day and passed out flyers and easily passed out like 600 flyers in about two hours. It was insane. It was way fun and a couple of people said that they would like to learn about the Christ and his church! I loved the Christmas year and just trying to share the true meaning of Christmas to everybody around. It was so amazing. 

I am so grateful for you all and for choosing this church and for raising me in it. It has blessed my life with security from the changing world around us. I know it is the Church of Christ in these latter- days. I know that Christ lives. I have felt the power of his atonement and I know that it changes lives. He literally lifts the burdens from our backs. With Christ, there are no ends, we always have second, third and how ever many chances. That's why we celebrate. That's why we're here, to learn about him, to discover truth and choose to follow it and to come to know that it is true. I love you all so much! Elder Draper ドレーパー長老