Melton-Japan-Mission

"The basic gospel law is free agency and eternal development. To force us to be careful or righteous would be to nullify that fundamental law and make growth impossible...If we looked at morality as the whole of existence, then pain, sorrow, failure and short life would be calamity. But if we look upon life as an eternal thing stretching far into the pre-mortal past past and on into the eternal post-death future, then all happenings may be put in proper perspective" (Elder Spencer W. Kimball, Tragedy or Destiny , BYU Devotional 1955).  This last Sunday Elder Melton gave a Sacrament Talk on Opposition and Free Agency. Over the last couple of weeks, we have become a little more aware of how free agency plays such a critical role in our lives. We have thought about how God created "both things to act and things to be acted upon" (2 Nephi 2:14). We continually see how this plays out here in our mission, with our families, within the church, and with friends back home. S...

In Japan New Years is a big deal. They prepare their homes by deep cleaning showing a fresh start for the year. Most businesses close early and there is no activity for a couple of days. Some go to Shrines or temples in homage but mostly it is very quiet in a sacred way. No fireworks in Tokyo but bells are rung at midnight. With the New Year there are opportunities to start fresh again, to improve ourselves and have a better outlook on our lives. It sounds a lot like repentance. That is another type of new beginning. Japanese New Year's wreath outside of Post Office We put together gift bags for our apartment building between Christmas and New Years. There are eight floors so we made 30 packages of banana breads or other treats. Depending on the timing, we labelled them either Merry Christmas or Happy New Year in Japanese and English with our name. We simply placed them outside of each door. Since we are the only foreigners in the building, it was not difficult to identify us. One ...