I hope you had a great time celebrating the birth of our Savior! It was a great day for us. Nothing went exactly as planned, but in the end, it went pretty awesome!
We went to church and tried to set up for teaching a few of the recent converts, when we got distracted by a less active who has been starting to come back to church. We talked to him for a minute before we went to find our recent converts.
Turns out they were participating in a welcome party by the ward, and were just having a great time. We had to return a random call from an investigator from two years ago before we joined them, so we got there just to see a bit of the party. Brother S hit up all the YSA's in the ward. Haha. And then he walked up to me with two tomatoes and said they eat them like apples in China. Not half bad. Then one of the Ward members was trying to convince us to eat it in chocolate sauce. We conveniently had to go because we were running late.
We went over to the Ward Mission Leaders house for lunch. He made a delicious feast, and we brought Grandma O'Reilly's Peanut Bars (using her recipe) covered in chocolate. Probably one of my most used recipes on my mission. Simple and delicious and American. Which makes it go over great. :) then, we realized that none of the four Elders prepared a message, so my companion just threw it on me, and... It went alright. We read Luke 2:10 and talked about how Christ is a message of great joy.
We were going to go out and talk to everyone about lighting the world in the busy parts of Shibuya, but we had an impression to visit an Elderly man, Bro T instead. We didn't have time to get there and back before our next event, but we went for it.
It was his wife's birthday, and he is a widower. Plus it was Christmas. He was a bit lonely, but he lit up as we spoke with him. And he had a gift sitting on the table to give the missionaries the moment we walked in the door. We had filled a stocking with some candy and a note, so we exchanged presents, and we were so glad we visited, though we didn't have much time. We set up a time to visit again and talk a bit more.
Then we hurried back to a birthday party for Brother S. He's the less active that has been coming back to church. We had some snacks, sang some Christmas songs, Happy Birthday, etc. and he did up his hair fancy. Usually he hides it in a hat, but he showed it off this time. He has been growing out his hair now for ten years. Apparently it's his hobby. :) he felt very loved, and we took 8 MILLION pictures, by request (what do you want to do for your birthday party? Take pictures. What else? ... Take pictures. Haha. Ok. He loves his hair)
Then, we got to do a bit of "paper work" for Zone Leader stuff. Love stats. Haha.
So it was probably one of the crazier Christmas's of my life, but it was a blast!
As I have focused on being a light for those around me, I have noticed a great pattern. In order to reflect the light to all those around us, we have to be close to the source, our Savior, and we ourselves shine brightly as well. There is no greater way to joy then reflecting the light of our Savior to all those around us!
So let's follow His example, and LightTheWorld all year!
Hurrah for Israel!
Elder O'Reilly
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| The Birthday Party! |
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| Temple day with Elder Goldsberry |
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| Cool robot we saw today! |
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