Week 41 Japan Tokyo mission

Special visitors this week! :) Megumi And Minami Chan from Koiwa! They

surprised me and came to Eikaiwa, :) so good to see them. They both

just barely received their patriarchal blessings. So wonderful to see

them.

This is Manami. She was baptised two years ago...She has been to church with us for the last 3 weeks. She's cute. :) this is the gym at the top of the 5 floor church
building,




(Before transfers-we were going through some old sisters clothes in
the house-gross right?) I think they look lovely :) ~~

She wrote me a cute message on our mirror :) so sweet.

Sister Bettridge- sorry we don't have a good picture together yet... She's great though! 

Apple pie from and old man I met on the street. He decided to take the
lessons and come to church! He brought me this pie to church to thank
me for introducing him to the elders. Way cool!

There is this thing in Japan called purikura. You take pictures and it
makes your eyes bigger (Japanese joke) as you can see it makes my eyes
huge!! Hahaha so funny!

Dear Family,

I've had a wonderful week! :) Sister Bettridge and I have really made
an effort to try and talk with everyone this past week and we were
able to meet some really neat people and invite them to church. We
definitely had some harder days where it seemed like everyone we
talked would give us us a weird look or ignored us. Gotta love those
days!
We had interviews this past week and sister Nagano, my mission
president's wife, said something that really helped me to this about
faith in different way. She said that faith is not a measure of how
much you can do everyday, or how successful you are, but a measure of
how long you are able to run without giving up. It is a Measure of how
much you are willing to give the Lord without receiving the blessings
in the needed or wanted time. Our faith is truly shown when we pick
ourselves up each time we fall and continuing to serve the Lord
despite the circumstance. It helped me think of a lot of the efforts
sister Bettridge and I have done in Matsudo lately. You might think
that because we were trying to be obedient, talk to everyone, and
following the Spirit that we would find and see amazing miracles! It's
not always like that, and it's not meant to be. If the Lord gave us
miracles every time we asked him for them, then how could we ever
learn to exercise our faith and show the Lord where our hearts and
loyalty remain? Sister Nagano is so wise! Anyway, what she said has
really help me this past week. We talked with over one hundred people
and only one or two of them took the time to listen for a little
while. It's comforting to now that someday everyone will have the
opportunity to hear and learn the gospel. That will be a wonderful day
in Japan. I'm truly blessed to be able to be here witnessing it happen
slowly but surely. The lord really is at the head of this work.

We had an amazing lesson this week with the woman we found at our
basketball activity last Saturday. I hadn't taught the restoration in
English for over a year (probably since being back home when I would
go out with the sister missionaries on splits). It had probably been
even longer for sister Bettridge. It was definitely a time when we had
to trust in the Lord to guide us in what to say. The Spirit was so
strong, and Rochelle really felt the Spirit. She has been searching
for the gospel for so long! She has studied many many different
religions, but she described them all as not feeling right in her
heart. We know that she felt the spirit strong and she is praying
about being baptized. So many miracles! :) we pray that the Lord will
help her to put the pieces she is missing together as we teach her and
as she prays. She is amazing.

We had a really neat experience with the Young women this week! Sister
Bettridge was introducing herself to all of them at an activity and
they made me introduce myself again too. I mentioned that I like to
make sock monkeys and everyone got really excited! I showed them
pictures, and they were all so excited. The young woman's president
asked me if I would direct and activity for the girls to make them and
invite their friends to come. This was a really neat experience as we
have been thinking really hard about how we can work better with the
young woman. Such a neat miracle! God knows all things. :)
Yesterday, we felt like we needed to go and visit a member in our ward
after church. We had never met this member, but we assumed that she
had always come to church and that because the ward was so big that we
just hadn't met her yet. Anyway, we visited her and as we talked at
the door, we learned that she was actually a less active member. She
expressed that she had been struggling a lot. She had served a mission
about 10 years previously and said that if it weren't for her mission
experiences that she would probably disbelieve in God completely. She
had had some really hard experiences in the last couple years and said
that she still wanted to believe in God, but that she hadn't felt his
love or guidance in her life so a long time. Because of this, she said
that she had began to doubt if there was a God who actually loved her
and cared about her. It was a tender moment for sister Bettridge and I
to speak with this sweet woman. She confided in us and asked us for
help in regaining a testimony. I have never seen a person filled with
such desire and humility before than this woman looked at this time.
We promised her, in the Spirit of the Lord, that she would be able to
know once again and feel Gods love for her. She agreed to help us
practice the lessons every week with her in Japanese. We are so
excited to teach her and learn from her. Seeing the look in this
woman's eyes made me want to be a more humble servant of the Lord. She
is amazing.

It looks like this letter is going to be a little bit shorter than
usual, but that's okay! :)
I love you all so much. This church is true. God lives and loves us.
He is aware of us and He knows our hearts. He answers our prayers and
knows our thoughts.
Have a wonderful week!
Love always,

Sister Hubbard

Week 40 Japan Tokyo Mission

Dear family,

I have recovered from last week and am fully healthy again. :) it
snowed for the first time today Matsudo and Tokyo Area. It's pretty
slushy, and will probably be gone soon, but it snowed!! :)

Sister Bettridge and I have kind of had a slower week, but this next
week will be really busy as we have interviews and exchanges with the
other sisters in our zone. We had an awesome Zone meeting this past
week and the spirit was so strong. The mission President is really
pushing us all to hit the standards of excellence in all of our key
indicators and promising us great success as we strive for this goal.
It was a neat experience to be apart of the Nagano's trainings and
help them convey their thoughts and feelings to the other
missionaries. My companion, Sister Bettridge, is an amazing
missionary. I've learn so much from her already and I'm thinking that
we may be together at least a couple of transfers, but I guess we'll
see what happens.

This week, we saw an amazing miracle at basketball! Our church has a
big basketball court on the fifth floor of the church building, and so
every Saturday evening everyone gathers together and we play
basketball wi our members and investigators. It's a lot of fun. This
week, sister Bettridge and I were a little bit worried we wouldn't
have any investigators going to the basketball activity, but we felt
like we should go anyway. After about 20 minutes of no one showing up,
the elders walked in with a man and a woman who they had found earlier
that week. We began talking with the woman and she asked us straight
out if we would please teach her about what we believe. So cool! This
woman's name is Rochelle and she is from Jamaica! She speaks fluent in
English and is teaching English in Japan right now. As we began
teaching her about the restoration, the man she came with (he's
somewhere from America) began interrupting us. Long story short, this
man was a self proclaimed ex-Mormon and he began bashing the prophet
Joseph Smith and saying bad things about other prophets.
Sister Bettridge and I stopped teaching. He was very loud and began to
try and make us question what we were saying and testifying about. We
didn't say a word to him. After he had finished ranting, I looked at
Sister Bettridge and then we both looked at her and continued
teaching. I felt a great amount of peace come over me and we
continued to teach as if nothing had happened. She, feeling the
Spirit strong, asked us if we could get her a Book of Mormon to read
and if we could meet again to learn more. She is so prepared! The man
tried many times during the lesson to disrupt the feeling of the
Spirit, but it was too powerful for him to thwart. It was really neat
for me to see realize that it doesn't matter what is going on in the
world around us, if we are connected with the Lord, we cannot fail or
be disrupted. Our testimonies really can remain firm and strong, and
so can the Spirit inside of us, so long as we are obedient and seeking
the Lord. I really saw that with Rochelle. She is so close to God and
has been searching her whole life to find what she has found. We are
so excited to continue to meet with her.

There is a woman named Y--- Chan in our ward who is preparing to go on
a mission. Sometimes we take her around doing missionary work with us,
but this past week she decided she would like to study with us. A bit
of a side story, the day before we met with Yuri chan we had had a
really rough day. Almost everyone we talked to had said no and we took
some pretty harsh rejections And people telling us to go away. Anyway,
we met her at the church and she shared an experience about how she
had had an missionary opportunity with one of her friends. She
expressed great regret as she said that it was the perfect opportunity
for her to share the gospel, but she didn't because she was afraid.
She said that she didn't know what to say and that she felt that she
may not be able to be a missionary after all. It was difficult for me
to watch her share her experience. I think most missionaries can
relate to the fact that talking to random people is not an easy thing.
Being said "no" to is not an easy thing. Yuri chan then asked us what
we do when we feel scared to talk with people. Sister Bettridge and I
were able to testify and share scriptures that really helped her at
that time. I shared my favorite scripture with her and told her that
God is always with us as we talk with other people. At that moment,
the spirit was so strong. We shared the lords promise in Doctrine and
Covenants section 84:85, 88

85 Neither take ye thought beforehand what ye shall say; but treasure
up in your minds continually the words of life, and it shall be given
you in the very hour that portion that shall be meted unto every man.

88 And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before
your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my
Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to
bear you up.

She broke into tears. She said that she knew that the scriptures we
shared we true and that she felt the Lord close as we were teaching
her. She is so awesome! We love her so much. As sister Bettridge and I
had this experience, we both felt comforted and built up from our
previous day. We felt the Lord's love and his gratitude for our small,
but heartfelt efforts. Our efforts as humans must be so small in
comparison to the works of the Lord. I was thinking about this the
other day, and wondering why God must love us so much. We are so
imperfect and we always turn to our own natural selves. Why does he
love us so much? As I was thinking, I thought of the love my parents
have for me. A memory came to me. I remembered going through a drawer
in one of mom and dad's room once and finding a scribbled picture that
one of us had given them once upon a time. It was tucked specially
into the corner of the drawer and when I found it, I wondered why they
had kept it. In mom and dad's eyes, it was so precious and so wonderful
because whoever drew it must have tried their best, and given it out
of love. I think it is the same with us and our Kind Heavenly Father.
We try our best to do God's will, but somehow we still ends up in
scribbles and scratches instead of a beautiful masterpiece we
originally imagine. As we come before the Lord, offering our greatest
work, a scribbly mess (at least in my case) He, as a loving parent
reaches for my masterpiece and work and treasures it forever. Im
running out of time, so I'm not sure how much sense that makes, but I
am so grateful for my Savior Jesus Christ. I'm grateful for His
Atoning sacrifice for me. Jesus Christ is the Savior of the World, and
our advocate with Father. This church is true. God is close to us, and
there are angels all around us from the other side. I'm so grateful to
be a missionary.
Have a wonderful week!
Love always,

Sister Hubbard xoxo

Week 39 Tokyo Japan mission

Dear family,

Thanks for all the letters! It's been a really busy week and I'm so
grateful for your love and support. I feel so blessed to have such a
wonderful family. I love you all so much.

This week, as I mentioned, has been really busy! Sister Bettridge and
I have seen so many miracles together this week. We began teaching the
family I was telling you all about last week and they are looking
really really good! Very prepared people. Just a little recap on them-
the mother is a single mom and she has four children. Her children
range from 8 years old to 2 year old. She is way busy, but has a very
strong desire for her children to grow up in the church and to have a
relationship with God. Such a miracle for sister Bettridge and I. :)
it will be fun to teach a family again.

Some more info about my new companion, Sister Bettridge. She is from a
small place called Hurricane close to Saint George. She is the second
oldest of 5 kids and is the sweetest sister ever! We get along really
well and she is a very hard worker. Her Japanese is really good and
she is a tenth transfer missionary. I am very blessed to be working
with her. :)
We had an amazing MLC meeting this past week and President and Sister
Nagano gave amazing trainings again. They are both so amazing and
inspired. I am so blessed to work closely with them both.

Our mission has changed the way we do Temple p-days. We are now going
in our various zones throughout the transfer at different times. Our
temple p-day was today, which is why I am emailing today. :) Temple
P-day didn't work out the way I thought it would today, but as a
result I feel so grateful for the Lords tender mercies in my life. God
is so merciful to us. In my hardest times, I now that my Savior, Jesus
Christ, stands near by. I felt Him so close today. I just want to
testify of His love for us. We are given weaknesses to allow us to be
humble and to rely on the Lord for help. I'll share my experience from
today...
This morning I woke up all excited to go the temple! As I was getting
ready, I started to feel like I had no energy and despite it being
warm in the apartment, I felt really cold. My excitement to go to the
temple overpowered whatever I was feeling and I paid no attention to
it. We left to the temple and just as we were about half way there, I
began to feel a sharp pain in my stomach and felt really dizzy. I felt
like I should sit down, but because the train was packed pretty full
of people, there was no where to sit accept for the floor. Sister
Bettridge noticed there was something wrong with me and suggested that
we get off the train at the next stop and so we did. By now, I was in
pretty bad shape. I felt very sick and nauseous. Sister Bettridge
taking my arm, we both looked for a place to sit down in the strain
station but couldn't find a bench anywhere. I ended up sitting down in
a corner near some stairs where in tears sister Bettridge and I both
prayed asking Heavenly Father to either help me feel better or provide
a way for us to get home. With the crazy traffic and the trains, we
would have to walk a pretty far distance from train to train in order
to get home, and I felt like there was no way I could do that. There
were thousands of people around us in the noisy train station going to
and from their trains, I was sick, and we were desperate for help. We
knelt down in the middle of everything and said a prayer together. It
was a sacred moment for me. The Spirit was so strong and I felt like
all the crazy things around me stopped for a moment. I felt the
Savior's love so strong, and I knew that He was mindful of us.
Although my health wasn't doing any better, I felt like we needed to
stand and begin walking towards the ticket gates. We did so together.
As we walked, we came face to face with our ward mission leader who
was on his way to something. Brother Orito must have seen the looks on
our faces because he immediately came to the rescue. He gave me a
blessing in the busy station not far from the place were we had knelt
down previously together. As he placed his hands on my head, I felt my
body receive strength and the pain was taken from me for a moment. His
blessing was given in Japanese and I will never forget the words he
said. He was an angel sent from God to be at the station at that exact
time when we needed help. I know it. He was the answer to our prayer.
After the blessing, he stopped a Taxi for us and rode with us the hour
or so trip back to our apartment where I was able to rest. All I could
do was thank him with tears in my eyes.
To some people, it may seem like such a small thing that Brother Orito
did, or that it was a coincidence that he was there in the same
station, but I now that it was the power of God. I love these people
so much. I love our ward. I love the people we meet everyday on the
street. They are my brothers and sisters. I am left in awe when I
think about how amazing the Lord's miracles are. God answers our
prayers and helps us. I know that God lives and loves us. He is close
by even when we don't realize it.

I've spent most of today having flu like symptoms and resting easy,
but I'm grateful I was able to have this experience. Sometimes we need
to have these kinds of experiences to know that God is in control of
everything and that He is aware of us personally. I know that God
lives and loves us. We are so so blessed. :) I love this gospel so
much and I am so grateful for the opportunity to be here in Japan
among the people here. I testify that God lives and loves each one of
you.
Have a wonderful week!
Love always,

Sister Hubbard

Week 38 Tokyo Japan Mission

Sushi Sister Hubbard ate over the holidays

Dear family,

We had transfer calls this morning! Yes, I am staying in Matsudo, but
my companion, Sister Morley, is headed to the Tokyo first ward and
will be teaching in English! There are two English wards in Tokyo and
she will be serving in one of them. She's pretty excited, and it will
be her first move to a new area! Pretty crazy! This transfer has gone
so fast. I was hoping that maybe sister Morley and I would have
another transfer together, but I guess God's will is otherwise.
There have been a lot of changes happening in our mission again, and
it looks like this next transfer will be really different, but I'm
excited for the new challenges that lay ahead! Starting this transfer,
the mission leaders will no longer dendou in other sisters or elders
areas during exchanges. Missionaries will always travel to the leaders
areas to be trained, and the leader's area is to be a model area for
the zone. Thus, all zone leaders and sister training leaders will have
to step things up in their individual areas, and set an example for
all the other missionaries. Also, the leaders for the zone will always
be a companionship. My sister Training leader companion, sister
Takahashi, is transferring to Niigata. So, my new companion, who is
coming to Matsudo, will be the new Sister Training Leader. Matsudo
will be the model area for the Matsudo Zone as the zone leaders are is
also Matsudo and will be doing the same thing. Pretty crazy!! When I
first heard, I was pretty stressed out, but God has really been
merciful in helping me feel at peace about everything. With his help,
we can do anything. :)
Anyway, my new companion's name is Sister Bettridge! She actually
served in Sado right before me and was companions with Sister Horito.
Although I've only met her once, I know she is an amazing missionary.
I'm so excited to work with her! :) I think it will be a great!
Mom had a question about what happened on Sado this year for
Christmas, and I will like to share the BIG miracle. There was a women
who we visited almost everyday on Sado. She was a Philippine woman who
would come to church every week by herself, sometimes dragging her
reluctant youngest daughter to church with her. She was one of
members, and every week she would express to us her great desire for
her family to come to church. All of her children had been baptized,
but none of them wanted to come to church or have anything to do with
it anymore. Well, this Christmas, her whole family went to church for
the first time and her children decided that they would all continue
to go with her! This member, _____ Shimai Facebook messaged me and
told me all about it. It brought tears to my eyes to know that her
desire from the beginning of when I went to Sado, had finally come to
pass. This woman never stopped praying for and never stopped inviting
her children to come back. Now they finally have, and not only them,
but her oldest son's girlfriend is now investigating the church too. A
wonderful wonderful miracle!
The hope was to get 4 baptisms in Sado for Christmas, but I think God
had another plan. About two weeks ago, I learned that my past
companion, Sister Ahn, had a horrible bike accident and that she broke
her back. That was really sad for me to hear, and she went home. As a
result, they had to pull the sisters out of the area leaving the
people who were preparing for baptism to wait a little bit longer...
At least on the sisters part. The elders had two investigators who
needed a little more time to prepare, but I believe they have
baptismal dates for this month sometime. We will see what happens.
This transfer, they are whitewashing Sado sisters. Sister Franks (I've
talked about her a couple times before) from Koiwa, will be going to
Sado! She will be training a new missionary there and so I am sure the
people we were working with and preparing for baptism will continue to
prepare and eventually be baptized. I have no doubt. :) They are
prepared. Sado will have a rich harvest yet. God loves the people
there so much.
Our lessons this week were a little bit sukunai, but we weren't able
to do missionary work on the 31st and the 1st because of New Years. We
cleaned our apartments all day on the 31st and we read the Book of
Mormon all day on the 1st. It was a really neat experience for us to
do that. I love the book of Mormon so much. I received a lot of
personal revelation as I read on that day. The Book of Mormon is true
every time I read it, and it will continue to be true. It's amazing to
me to feel the power that we are able to receive as we read the Book
of Mormon. I find that whenever I feel like there is something missing
in my life, it is because my study of the Book of Mormon is lacking.
Whenever I really study the Book of Mormon, I feel empowered. It's not
just a feeling, but an actual empowerment to do things. In Alma
chapter 31:5 it says that the power of God word (the scriptures) had
most powerful effect upon the minds of the people than anything else.
I believe that this is true.

"And now, as the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead
the people to do that which was just--yea, it had had more powerful
effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else,
which had happened unto them--therefore Alma thought it was expedient
that they should try the virtue of the word of God."

I encourage you all to try the virtue of the word of God. It works!
President Benson said "There is a power in the book which will begin
to flow into your lives the moment you begin a serious study of the
book." He later encouraged the Saints to "flood the earth and
[their] lives with the Book of Mormon." I know that this promise is
true. As a missionary, I always want to study a million different
thing and gospel topics, but something is missing when I do not read
the Book of Mormon. I always find myself coming back to it. It is so
powerful.

This past week, we ate lots a lots of sushi! I think I may have eaten
a grand total of two whole raw fish... Haha. (Not all at once of
course) Many of the members invited us over for lunch and dinner
during shogatsu (new year) and we ate so much food! Sushi was a big
deal everywhere we ate. I'll have to send some pictures. We received 3
referrals this week!! One of them was s referral from the elders and
it seems to be a pretty solid one! It looks like we will begin
teaching a family again, which I am so excited for! :) The elders
found a single mother with four kids who want to learn about the
gospel and so we are excited to meet with them. So many blessings! The
other referrals are members friends. The members here are so solid. I
love them so much.

In the next couple of weeks, we have appointments with investigators
who have a lot of potential. We think that we will be able to see a
lot of miracles this next transfer because of how many prepared people
there are. We taught a woman yesterday named, _____ San. She is way
prepared and excepted our invitation to be baptized right away! He
husband, like our other investigator, Shizuko San, is also hantai
though. (Against the church and doesn't want her to be baptized) we
are praying that both of these women will be able to be baptized this
month and that their husbands hearts will be softened. They both want
it so bad and so I think that God will answer their prayers and
provide a way for them to receive baptism.

Well, I'm just about out of time but I just want to say thank you all
once again for your amazing examples me for your love. This gospel is
true. Continue to do the things that you know are good and right. The
ultimate teacher is the Holy Ghost. As everyone thinks about this new
year and the kinds of goals and things they want to accomplish, I know
that the spirit will help you to know what goals you should strive
for. God can magnify our goals and our efforts if we rely on Him for
help.
Love always,

Sister Hubbard