August 18, 2013

Dear Family,

Thanks for the e-mail it sounds like everything is going great and that the Yuzawa group had a good time. I`m a little jealous of the grits and eggs because I don`t think you can buy grits over here. 

Well things here have been going really well. To answer some of your questions about Miyako there are about 10 active members here. It is probably one of the smallest branches in the mission. Our church is on the first floor under someone's house. So it is pretty different than most of my other areas. 

This last week we actually had a companion exchange with some of the other elders in our district. So in order that we could do the exchange we had to get on a plane and fly to a different island. We went and worked with the elders in Ishigaki. As we were about to go over there our plane got canceled because of bad weather. So we ended up taking a detour. We flew to Okinawa and from there flew to Ishigaki so it took more time than we wanted it to. However it was a fun time and we saw so many miracles. We found a couple of great people that said they would come to English class there which is awesome because they have been trying to start it up for a while now. 

At the end of the exchange we came back to Miyako on a really small plane. The plane fits around 40 people at max but there were only about 20 on it. So that was a new and exciting experience. It is only about a 30 minute plane ride from there to here. This transfer I have been on so many planes that it is kind of hard to believe. 

We also had our stake conference here so we got to watch it online. This week we are also going to be moving into our new apartment which is kind of exciting. Some new missionaries should be coming to Miyakojima as well in a couple of weeks. The mission is definitely increasing in size which is super exciting. Well I love you all so very much.

Love,
Elder Joseph Gandy

P.S. Some elders in our district just met a kid that came back from an exchange program in Utah who said he wants to learn more about the church and go to BYU for college. It's interesting the many different ways people are prepared to receive the gospel.

August 12, 2013

Dear Family,

Thanks for the e-mail it sounds like everything is going really well and that you are having a good time. As for here it has been a pretty good last few days. 

For zone conference we went up to the island of Okinawa which has two different zones there. One half of the island is the zone I was in before and the other half is the zone I`m in now. My zone consists of 12 elders and 5 sisters. Everyone in my zone is on the island of Okinawa except my district we are all on three different small islands. 

Zone conference was a lot of fun and I learned so many different things. We talked quite a bit about faith and if we exercise that faith how it will help us in our missionary work. We also read some scriptures in Ether 12 which is one of my favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon. We also talked about accountability and the Doctrine of Christ. It was a very spiritual and uplifting conference. 

While I was there I got to see some of my previous companions. It was amazing to see how much they have grown and become the missionaries that they now are. I was just super happy to see that they were all doing really well. Right after the conference we had to go as fast as we could to the airport to catch our plane we were lucky to make it with just a few minutes to spare.So that was a little bit of an adventure. 

Thanks for all of your prayers. I love you all so very much.

Love, Elder Joseph Gandy

August 7, 2013

Dear Family, 

Well I'm sorry for e-mailing kind of late this week. Our p-day was changed to Thursday this week so our entire zone could spend p-day together. Next week it will be back to normal though. Everything has been going super well we have so many investigators that we are teaching every week. We are trying to do our best in helping all of them. Everyone is different so we are really trying to figure out there needs. This would be so hard if we had to do it all by ourselves which is why the Spirit is so helpful in our everyday work. 

Well I'm sorry for the short e-mail I don't have to much time today. Tomorrow is our zone conference so I'm looking forward to learning a lot then. I love you all so very much.

Love, Elder Joseph Gandy  

July 28, 2013

Dear Family,

Well the weather is hot but it is mostly because of the humidity. We
do a small simple activity and we are already sweating a lot. We do
occasionally have a great nice ocean breeze to cool us down at times.

It really is a small world. There are not a whole lot of people on
Miyakojima. So it might be hard to meet people who are from here. I do
know of a couple of missionaries that used to be in the Fukuoka
mission that were from Gilbert Arizona. As far as pictures of our
apartment go we will probably be moving sometime soon so I`ll wait so
you can see the new place. 

As far as the work here everything is going fantastic. We had an
exchange this last week with the zone leaders. It went really well. We
found a lot of great people who seem interested. We also got to meet
with most of our investigators this past week. We were able to meet an
investigator that we haven`t seen for a while because she was super
busy. However when we met everything seemed to be going well and she
still has a strong desire to learn and come to church. During the
lesson she opened up and told us some of her concerns. We were able to
help by teaching her specific to her needs. It was a great lesson.
Listening has really become the key. If we listen to our investigators
and to the spirit we can understand the different needs that people
have. Sometimes you have quiet investigators but that is when good
questions can help them. 

I`ve learned so much this last week and am
grateful for all of the blessings I`ve received. I love being a
missionary and this experience just keeps strengthening my testimony
that this is the true church. I love you all so very much and pray for
you each day.

Love, Elder Joseph Gandy

July 21, 2013

Dear Family,

It definitely seems like everyone is in the missionary spirit over
there. I was super excited to hear about Alex receiving his mission
call. I`m sure he will do great. I love being a missionary and am
excited for so many of my friends to have this experience as well.

This last week has been great. As far as transfer calls went nothing
changed. So Elder Nakabe and I can keep working hard. There was a big
festival that was going on last week. We were worried that it was
going to be hard to find people to meet while housing but it actually
turned out very well. I feel like the spirit led us to the people we
needed to meet. We found some great new investigators that also seem
golden.

The work with less active members has also been going great. So many
of them really do want to come back to church. We are going to do our
best at helping them with the three things every member needs which
are a friend, responsibility, and being nurtured by the word of God.
However since we are not in the position to give members a calling
I figured that we can ask them to help in our missionary efforts by
fellowshipping investigators and so on.

This really is an amazing work and I know that the work of spreading
the gospel is moving forward rapidly. I`m so grateful to be a missionary.
Thank you for your prayers and support. I love you all so very much.

Love, Elder Joseph Gandy

July 15, 2013

Dear Family,

Thanks for the e-mail. I`m also really enjoying reading Joshua`s
e-mails as well. Everything here has been going pretty well.

There was a typhoon last friday so we couldn`t go outside. We did however
find a good way to work if we are stuck in the apartment. We started going
through our area book and called as many people as we could. It turned
out to be really effective. We found and talked to this lady who met
the missionaries before and said we could come visit her when there
wasn`t a typhoon.

The investigators we have been working with are
kinjin (which means they are golden people). It is amazing seeing
people progress and make changes in their lives so they can live the
gospel. The other day we also went to visit a less active member who lives
pretty far away. I felt like we basically rode our bikes around the
entire island. It was tiring but we had a great visit.

Recently we have also been learning a lot of different expressions that
people use in Miyako. It has been fun learning them but it is honestly
like a totally different language. Lucky for us they are not used very often.
Only the elderly people here know a lot of the different expressions.

It has been a fantastic week and a great transfer. Today we have our
transfer calls so we`ll find out later today if anything is changing.
I love you all very much.

Love, Elder Joseph Gandy

Love,
Elder Joseph Gandy

July 7, 2013

Dear Family,

Hey it has been an amazing week and it was great reading your e-mail
along with the ones that Joshua sent. The weather is super hot but I
heard that the weather in Arizona is more so. Its cool to think that
Joshua will be out of the MTC working really soon.

Right now the big thing that is going on is we have a couple more
investigators with baptismal dates. We have been working really hard
and doing our best to help these children of God receive baptism on
those days.

It really is an amazing time in the Lord`s work. Over the course of
my mission I have seen the work progress especially in Japan. I`m sure
that is how it is all over the world. I love being a missionary. Everything
about it is amazing. The joy that comes from sharing the gospel is great.

Last week we had a special training. Because we are on an island we
couldn`t go to the training with the other missionaries. For that
reason we had the meeting with Pres. Gustafson, his assistants, and a
few other missionaries that are also on different islands. I learned
so many different things from the training. We talked a lot about the
importance of sacrament meeting and how we can work more with members.

I`m looking forward to this next week. I love you all very much and
pray for you everyday.

Love, Elder Joseph Gandy