Elder Zach Johnson: Three Months Left in New Zealand

Hello, hello everyone! I hope everyone is having a good Conference/Easter weekend. I'm really excited to be able to watch that next week. So, this week, Elder Jones and I got our calls telling us that we only have three months left in the mission. I will be leaving New Zealand on June 30 and arriving in America on June 30--so that was pretty crazy to get that phone call. Time is going by fast, and to be honest, I hope it slows down a bit. The mission is the best!

This week was really, really slow....not a whole lot going on due to a funeral in the valley, that got everyone very, very busy. We were able to meet up with this guy name Johesefet or something like that. I was on trade off with Elder Deardon and we went to this area in Rawhiti. He's met with missionaries before heaps (Elder Larson, Elder Tibbitts) and he was very open and willing to learn....he's just heaps lazy as when it comes to finding time for God in his life. When we went by, he really opened up to us. He said that he was going through some hard and stressful times with his family and that he's considering coming to church. We invited him to our special service that was happening last week on Sunday. He said that he would come....but he didn't. So, we're hoping to go by this week and smash him....with some Spirit and invite him again! We'll take Bishop around. Our Bishop is the man and can really have a good impact on the people we are visiting. Later that day, we went and visited this old as man who lives in the nicest house I've ever seen up on the mountains that over looks the beach. He's in his 90's and he's really lonely. We went up and just spent some time with him. I know it meant a lot to him. He told us heaps of stories, made us milo and has us sign his guest book! We're going to go up there tomorrow and hopefully we can get him to come to church with us.

Elder Jones, Elder Finau and I were able to attend a funeral of one of our recent converts' son. This is his 3rd son that he has lost in the past ten years. He was baptized like 6 months ago and is so strong in the church. I was totally amazed by how he handled the death of another one of his sons. He spoke at the marae and just testified of the plan of salvation and the Spirit was so strong. I'm sure everyone that was there was able to feel the power of his words---not only that, but amazed at how well he was able to handle the whole situation...thanks to the Atonement. Such an awesome experience.

So this past weekend, our Bishop had one of his friends from Mangere come up and visit. Thank the almighty that she was Samoan ha ha! Man, she made us the meanest feeds! I was in heaven. I haven't had taro, Lu, Koko Samoa! Man, it was amazing. We were so happy ha ha, our feeding is a lot different up here than in the city. If we're hungry we get fed whenever, sometimes too much! So that was amazing!

Yesterday at church, as part of our Easter program, Elder Faamau and I were asked to speak. It was really good. There were 151 people at our Sacrament meeting! Normally there are like 40, so I was kinda nervous to talk at first, but it ended up being awesome. It made me happy to see our amazing ward full.....AND I was able to catch up with a family that was visiting from my ward in Papatoetoe! That was awesome, I really missed them. Then to top off the week, we went to have dinner with Elder Finau, Elder Jones and the Semenoff family. That was awesome. They just flew these two guys from Argentina to come and play rugby. It was so cool to see how happy they were, aye! Heavenly Father blessed them, definitely! Hopefully we can get to know them better and teach them! (but I don't know Spanish!)

I love you guys! I hope that you had a great week. Hope all is well! Things are going great over here. Have a good week!

Ofa atu!

Love,

Elder Johnson