Wednesday, June 17, 2015

6/15/15 First Week in Eureka!

Hey everybody.

It has been an interesting week to say the least. Up here in the
boonies there are some interesting people. We taught a man named Byron
who randomly came to church and wants to be baptized. The only twist
he is a bit crazy he told us many things I can not publicly say, and
he desperately wants to confront Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan in Beverly
Hills because they hurt him and his family. He wants us to go with
him... Welcome to Eureka I guess. It was quite the interesting lesson.

We don't have a car... In Eureka 2nd ward! Which happen to be the
smallest up here in the stake, but it is still too big! So we got
permission from president to ride with the sisters in our zone, we
have Hermanas (Spanish sister missionaries) in our ward so they drive
us to dinner a lot :). It feels kinda funny riding with two girls
around town, but I ain't complaining I guess. Hahaha. It's interesting
being a district leader as well, especially when my district is me and
my companion, and 4 sisters... Hahah. I call them every night and see
how they're doing. It's pretty funny sometimes. I taught my first
district meeting on Friday and boy was I scared to teach a bunch of
missionaries about missionary work that have almost all been out
longer than me! But it's fun at the same time. I have to teach a gain
tomorrow... It's a constant struggle. But I'm doing good :).

We went to this community event up in Arcata called "Arts Alive." It
was just a bunch of people walking around and looking at art and music
and dancing that we couldn't partake of. We had a little table with a
board with a picture of a tree on it. Then we had sticky notes. We
called it our "gratitude tree!" They could put whatever they are
thankful for on it! I met a guy from Gainesville, FL and we talked for
a bit as well. All I've been wondering for a week is "why do people
live here!?" Haha it's such a random place and we've met like 10
members when we were just out contacting, they were on vacation! We're
like, "wow that's cool I guess!" It's such a weird little town and
they still have movie rental places, NO REDBOX. Like really! I'm
living in the 70s it feels like because it just has that vibe. It's a
cool little town though. Lots of one way roads... But there's like not
enough traffic to justify it. It's quite funny actually.

We've taught this guy named Sean who is super cool and he knows a lot
about the church and has talked to multiple missionaries. He is super
funny and makes a joke about everything. Hopefully we see him at
church pretty soon.

Well I hope you all are doing amazing! I miss and love you all a bunch!

Elder Janson


The Bozeman's, staunch Warriors fans :)


Me and Achal


Sister Majors and me at transfers! Best sister ever! Gonna miss her.


The Williams!


The doers of our laundry for 4.5 months! The VanWeerd's the best
people in the world.


Sisters, well Hermanas technically, givin us rides cause we lame
and don't have a car...


 Us being amazing

6/8/15 District Leader in Eureka!

Family!

So it has been the craziest and best week in the mission! I've never
been closer to a zone, and we had so much fun together. There's so
many members I don't want to leave and missionaries and everybody! But
I am moving on to go to better things. As you can see I'm going up to
Eureka, the northernmost zone in the mission. It's 4 hours from Santa
Rosa. Fun stuff! But I am also going to be a district leader, so I
can't act like I don't know what I'm doing anymore hahaha. 
It's pretty funny because my district consists of me and my companion and 4
sisters... People call it being relief society president. So that will
be full of awesomeness! I'm going to be companions with Elder
McKinley, and we went into the MTC together! He's super cool, and also
Sister Aguilar from my MTC district is in my district up there. I'm so
excited! They are the coolest people ever. I'm pretty nervous to be
district leader. On Thursday you get a call from president if you are
getting a leadership assignment, and our phone rang and president was
on it... We all freaked out haha. But I'm excited at the same time.
Definitely a new experience.

It's been another week full of sirens in the wonderful city of
Fairfield, and hearing of robberies and theft and all that fun stuff.
I've noticed while ice been here as well... I've never seen so many
ice cream trucks (or heard so many) in my life! It is really quite
creepy when we're walking around and you just hear eerie music
everywhere and creepy white vans drive by. Definitely makes it fun :).

We went to dinner at a Hmong members home, and they make way more food
than is needed. Luckily they don't get too offended if you don't eat a
bunch, or I would offend all of the Hmong people in the world. Me and
Elder Young were together on exchanges and Sister Clawson and Thomson
came as well. After dinner the sisters found a girl and talked to her
for a bit, then they wanted to say a prayer. They called us over, and
this girl wanted everybody to hold hands, and of course I ended up
next to Sister Thomson. I haven't ever held a sisters hand for so long
hahaha. It was pretty funny. Then after that, a poor little boy was in
a corner with his mother blocking our view of him. Sister Clawson,
trying to be all friendly, says in her loud voice, "Are you playing
Hide and Seek!?" The mom turns around and freaks out. It turns out the
kid has his pants down to his knees and was peeing in the corner. Oh
my gosh we lost it and we still haven't let Sister Clawson forget
that.

Because of transfers, we like to write in missionaries journals and
sign it and stuff. So I ended up with the privilege to have 4 sisters
journals on my desk one night and they all literally said, "it better
be heartfelt!" So I sat and wrote a bunch of heartfelt journal
entries. It was loads of fun.

The other night a representative form salt lake came to do some new
pamphlet training in our stake center. He also ended up coming to
watch us as we nightly planned at 9. So that was interesting! He just
watched and took notes as we did our thing. We usually just plan for
what we do the next day and what we will teach. Then he asked us
questions. He works at the MTC as well. It was cool having the big guy
in our apartment :). We planned very well that night needless to say.

I watched a video I've seen many times before, called "The Savior Want
to Forgive." I loved the message of the man who was involved in crime
and drugs, and felt like he had no right to Christ's grace. It was
really needed for me because recently people have been challenging our
idea of grace and the enabling power available to us from it. I know
that Christ love us and simply want s us to just acknowledge him and
accept his sacrifice, and he will make up the rest. We can't sit and
do nothing. We must do our part. But that doesn't change the fact that
without him, we would be lost. I know Jesus Christ lives. I know the
atonement is there for us if we only turn to him, and don't reserve
anything. I still need to read the full talk, but I recommend it for
sure.

I love all of you guys!

Elder Joseph Janson


 Had fun at the food bank...



You know what that is ...



 WML Ben Nelson and his wife!


 He's helping us watch our preach my gospel DVDs.


The Fairfield Zone


Saying bye to Dominique!



Me, My "sister" elder Huff, and my "dad" elder roper

Wednesday, June 3, 2015

06/01/15 Its better than you think

Dear Family,

We had a sweet week! Taught like 21 lessons is week, so that was
rather surprising! Most of the lessons were not even planned by us.
The lord pretty much just put people into our path that would listen
to us. We had so many lessons yesterday and we were fasting, so it was
quite the grind.

We had an interesting experience on Friday I believe. We met a guy who
used to go to church in the past, but has now gone to a different
faith. The conversation turned into him condemning church history and
saying that Joseph Smith was dishonest, we are a cult, and all kinds
of ridiculous things. He even went so far to say he got something from
You-Tube. I was trying to be respectful, but at that point I said, "oh
wow, YouTube is a great source definitely." He completely ignored me.
We ended up just bearing our testimony and leaving, but something cool
about this was I felt the spirit even through the contention while I
bore testimony. When we got in the car, the song that happened to be
playing in our car, was "Praise To The Man." It was so cool! Then
later that day we taught a new family, and the guy was arguing saying
that we believe grace is only achieved after denying all ungodliness,
so he thought it sounded impossible to achieve grace. We finished the
lesson and testified, and got in the car. The song playing was none
other but "Amazing Grace." We freaked out! It was the coolest thing
ever. God was saying basically, "it is all true what you are teaching
and testifying of.

So living in Fairfield is interesting. If you don't know, our car
window got smashed in while we weren't using it and were with Elder
Young for about 9 days. Luckily nothing was taken, but you can't
really go one day without hearing sirens in this beautiful place haha.
It's definitely fun.

We saw a young woman from our ward sitting in our car in this one
neighborhood we were in on Saturday. We went and talked to her and
she's super cool and we asked where her friend was she had talked
about that had seen us walking a lot. She was about to meet her! So
her friend came out and we introduced ourselves and talked for a
second. They were both like 17. It was super funny to see them and
then their other friend named Joseph was dropped off, and we had been
trying to see him for weeks! We set up a lesson with him and got to
know him better. Members helping out definitely is a plus :). You
never know who the lord will send you too.

Overall it was an amazing week and I'm sad I will probably get
transferred next week. i love this ward! It's huge and has a bunch of
awesome people who are all about helping us. Dominique is doing great
and we have almost finished her new member lessons she still has top
notch questions for us and texts us whenever she does.

I'm grateful for all of your prayers and support, and good luck to
everyone like Jake and Corey going on missions soon! It's closer than
you think, but better than you think as well.

Love all of you.
Elder Janson

More Chalking ...


Yo Sushi!