Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Week 92 – July 15, 2013

Aloha,
We didn't have any time to pick up my driver's license this past week so we went today, not realizing that today's a national holiday (Beach Day) and that all of the government places are closed. I'll be going to get it tomorrow.

I went on exchange with the Yokohama zone leaders this past week, Elder Hill (my former companion) and Elder Young (from New Zealand.) That was a lot of fun. It almost felt like I never transferred out of Kanagawa.

Yesterday I had an interview with President Wada. We had a great time talking for about 50 minutes. I'm so grateful for the relationship I have with my mission presidents. They have been such a great source of inspiration and support.

This week will be a busy one. We have staff meeting (a weekly meeting) followed by transfer calls tomorrow morning. I'll need to go get my license tomorrow because we're picking up eight new missionaries tomorrow night and I'll need to drive one of the cars home. Wednesday will be spent training the new missionaries and getting them off right. They'll attend our eikaiwa and stay in the mission home/our apartment (Sisters in the mission home and Elders in our apartment) another night, then we'll train them and their trainers a little Thursday morning and send them off to their areas. Then on Friday we have a mission leadership council where we'll train the zone leaders and sister training leaders. Normally we have mission leadership council at the beginning of each month but we've called this one specially because we have a bunch of things we want to train and 'cascade (pass on) to the mission. 

Is Elder Hathaway still in the ward? Sister Hathaway doesn't know this yet because we'll be making all of the transfer calls tomorrow morning, but she'll be white-washing into a new area and training a new missionary. It'll be an exciting call for her and I'm sure she'll have a lot of fun.

Regarding my returning home, I've changed the date again. With the mission split, the transfer dates for the Tokyo South mission have been offset from the Tokyo Mission by three weeks causing my original return date to fall right in the middle of the transfer. We talked with people from the area office and I've been able to extend my mission to November 19, 2013. November 19 is two days before that transfer will end, but that day is 2 years and 45 days after the day I entered the MTC (October 5, 2011) and there's no extending longer than 45 days without going to the Bretheren. I am excited to return and see everyone, so I hope you don't feel like I don't want to see you. But I think that will be a good time to finish my mission. And I'll get back just in time to spend Thanksgiving at home. Also, thinking about plans after getting home, as far as school I've been thinking about either trying to go straight to BYU or maybe take a semester at UH-MC. If I was to stay there on Maui it would be cheaper and I could take a lot more classes (maybe 21ish credits) and maybe work part-time and save some money. I'd also be able to spend time with Keanu and Keawe (and mom and dad of course), going to seminary every morning and doing things on the weekends with them if they have time. I know mom and dad are probably thinking you'd rather have me off to BYU as quick as possible, but I'm sort of leaning towards staying on Maui for a semester. I haven't really put a whole lot of thought into it, there's no time to, so it isn't decided or anything. Let me know what you think.  

Time has really flown. It's hard to believe my mission's gone by so quickly. Of course I still have about four months left, and I promise I'll give as much as I can and sprint to the end. I've loved my mission so much. I've grown so much and had so many good experiences. I'm so happy to hear of all those leaving from the ward on missions. It's so good to be a missionary!

I do have a favor to ask, if possible. Would you be able to buy two copies of a book, 'The Power of Everyday Missionaries: ' by Clayton M. Christenson for $6.99 each? Here's a link to Deseret Book:

It's an amazing book on how to do member missionary work. If you could I'd love it if you could buy two, send one to me and have the other sent to you for you (mom and dad) to read. Could you do that? If shipping's really expensive to here will you at least buy just one and read it? Let me know.

Thank you so much for all of your love and support! I hope you're all doing well and finding the joy of the gospel! I love you so much!!! Have a great week! 

Love,
Elder Rindlisbacher


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