Tired, but not from lack of sleep!

Dearest fam fam!!

    This week was absolutely wonderful and so tiring!! I love y'all so much and I hope that you know how grateful I am for the sacrifice that you have all made so that I could go on a mission! I truly am having the best two years of my life out here. I have learned some of the most precious truths that I will hold very dear to my heart forever!! Thank you Grandpa Johnson and Grandma for all of the financial support and spiritual support you have given and continue to give me!! Thank you mom and dad. There truly aren't any words I could type or write on paper that would do justice to how much my heart is grateful for you and how much I love and appreciate you!! I know there were probably times when a lot of us thought that I wasn't going to be able to go on a mission. Whether it was my health, physically, or even for a time I wasn't prepared spiritually. Thanks to the wonderful examples of my family I was able to gain a testimony of the atoning sacrifice of our dear Savior! Thanks to wonderful friends such as Tallen, Joe, and Nils I was strengthened even more! Contrary to what doctors told me I never once doubted that I would be able to serve a full time mission. I had to! After how much the Savior blessed me in teaching me of His sacrifice, I knew I had to tell my brothers and sisters about it, it was my duty. Some told me that IF I served a full time mission there might be handicaps for me or that, at least, I would not be able to serve to far from home. That never felt right to me and I felt deep down that something special was planned for my mission. My mission call was like opening a door to a familiar room that I had nearly forgotten, and I am just barely starting to realize how perfectly God has planned my mission. There have been very specific trials that I have overcome in my life and EVERY single person that I have been privileged to teach has struggled with one or two of them. There was a moment in which I didn't know that the atonement was real. I felt much like Alma the younger harrowed up in my sins and I didn't see a way out. But I called on Jesus in every bit of strength I had late one night, on what was very much a wrestle for forgiveness of my sins. I have only had but few prayers that were answered as immediately and powerfully as that night, and I bear solemn witness that Christ's atonement is real. God lives and He is perfectly just and perfectly merciful. 

     This week I was able to share my testimony (as well as last week) more intimately with my amies and help them grow to understand our saviors love. One special moment that I will never forget was with Damien. He is from the Martin Islands and is studying here in Limoge. He is diligently reading in the Book of Mormon searching for his answers. Beings his baptism was planned for this week we went over the baptismal questions to make sure he was ready. I knew deep down that there was something bothering him a bit, but I also knew that whatever happened he would overcome it if we listened to him. After reading the questions he said he would like to learn more about repentance and Joseph Smith before he was baptized. At first I was a little curious as to why these two subjects were the two subjects he wanted answers to. I thought he knew repentance really well being raised in a christian home, but apparently there was something on his mind that was bothering him. I won't tell you what it was because I don't want to share peoples mistakes with others, but let me just say that he had the faith and courage to tell us that he struggled with one of the commandments that we had taught and he asked us if he could be forgiven.....I looked at him with a big smile and almost tears in my eyes and said....oui!!! c'est ça le grand plan de Dieu de pouvoir repentir et devenir le plus en plus comme lui! or YES this is the great plan of God, to be able to repent and become like Him!

    He is a strong example to me of faith and I am learning a lot from him. We have moved his date to the end of February but he has made a ton of progress and I know he will definitely be ready by this date.

    There are loads of other things I would like to share with you and I hope to find the time to write them in letters. I pray that you will all keep our Lord and Savior Jesus close to your hearts this week and I will keep you posted!
Love Elder Lyons

New Amie's!

OK first I will get the little things outta the way. NO, I don't need new or more contacts because I have been wearing my glasses pretty much my whole mission. I have more than plenty, even if I were to use only my contacts for the rest of my mission I would still have leftovers. However, I am pretty sure that my glasses are from the old prescription and I just want new ones, so I think that will be my Christmas gift to myself....but I see perfectly with the contacts!  Yes, I got the new drivers license like months ago.....sorry that I didn't send an update!

 

     I can't believe that Chris is gonna be leaving in a couple of days!!!!! THAT'S so crazy! 

     Well, last week was another marathon week and I am WASTED!!! We pretty much never eat dinner because all of the rendezvous that we have seem to fall at that time.  Even when planned rendezvous fall through we seem to pick up plenty of unplanned ones on the way!

    Damien is still progressing really well and he even walked an hour and a half to come to church yesterday!!! He is super sweet, and hopefully we will be having his baptism the fourth of February. We just finished up with all of the lessons and will be reviewing everything to make sure that he understands and there isn't anything missing.

    We met two awesome men from Nigeria this week! We were passing by and old amie that we had fixed a rendezvous with and he stood us up.  When we called him to see what was up he said he was running late and would not make it but that we should teach his friend who would be at his place....OK why not!  SO, we knocked his door and sure enough, Ike (like mike without the m), answers and was more than happy to learn about the Church of Jesus Christ. It was weird because he is new to France which means that he hasn't learned to really speak French but, he speaks perfect English. It was more difficult to teach him in English than when we have taught others in French!!! Just not used to it I guess.  It went really well! He loved the message and now we are teaching both him and Victor ,(the old investigator), and they are super pumped to read the BOM and to learn more. The last rendezvous Victor gave a sweet prayer and asked God to help them to know that our message was true after diligently studying and applying the principles of the BOM!!! It is amazing how many wonderful miracles I have found by updating and using the area book like we should! A lot of missionaries think it is a waste of time or that it takes to much effort, but it is a sacred record, or it should be a sacred record, of how certain people have progressed or been dropped ,where they live, and what past missionaries thought they needed to work on.  Even Elder Ballard emphasized the importance of missionary work in this domain when he said,"if the Savior came to you and asked you to give a report of the piece of His garden he has entrusted you with, and he asked to see your area book to see what you've done, would you be comfortable with what HE saw?" A lot of the baptisms I have seen have been through area book work, in one way or the other. Whether it was through the actual old investigators, or asking for referrals from them ,or porting in their area. There is a lot of potential there!

     We also had a few rough porting sessions this past week, but we testified our little faces off trying to show how much God loved these people.  Most everyone I have talked to lately has been atheist and you can only imagine how hard it was to try and find something to relate to, and even when we did find something they wouldn't let their hurt feelings, pride, or hate, move for long enough to let the spirit testify to them that God loved them.  I KNOW that a lot of them felt something, because we had some intense contacts about the atonement with some of them.  It broke my heart when they chose to disregard their feelings despite how strong they were! I can only imagine how much God feels for these people and how much patience He has as well.

     I have really grown close to my Savior this week. We taught the plan of salvation a lot, and I have grown an increasingly stronger testimony of the reality of our Savior's atonement.  How precious this gift He gave us to repent really is!!  I love being a missionary and I hope you are all loving life as well. Know that despite whatever difficulty we have, there is absolutely NOTHING that our dear Savior didn't overcome for us. GO TO HIM!! He will guide you over the gulf of misery and through the valley of sorrows! He knows what it's like for us ,better than we do, and no one gets back to our Heavenly Father without taking at least one step towards Gethsemane! 

    I love you guys, and I love my big brother Jesus!! Keep on chugging and I will send another letter with some pics tomorrow!

Love Elder Lyons

Crazy Week!

Where to even start!?  I guess I will try and answer a few questions. My companion is from somewhere around Sandy Utah.....No I haven't had time to buy a Christmas gift yet. We haven't really had time to do anything but work our buns off, which is good!! I think the only thing I will be buying anyways will be a new pair of glasses because mine are still on my old prescription and I think I would like some nicer ones. Other than that I will save the rest for school or something!

       OK, now the good stuff!!!  First off I finally sent those letters, sorry it took so long! Secondly, the first district meeting was awesome! We met at the Poitiers Elders apartment because we all live forever away from each other.  The churches in each of our separate villes are far away from the train stations so we just meet up at Poitier's apartment.   I used 1 NE 16 where Nephi brakes his bow and takes the initiative to make a new one as an example.  When we go out "hunting", (or searching for new investigators), and we don't find anything, and our "bows" break (or our ideas for finding don't work), we need to take courage, resist murmuring, and also have the faith to take the initiative and make a new bow or idea to find people.  Like Nephi we need to ask our Father in Heaven,"Where should I go to search for investigators....(instead of food)."  We have also been given our own liahonas, the preach my gospel and our scriptures to help us receive revelation as to how, when, and where, we are to help people come closer to Christ. It works according to the faith and diligence and heed we give unto these tools.   After the formation we practiced contacting and I think it went really well!

        Later I went on exchanges with Elder Whitecar in La Rochelle (SUPER PRETTY TOWN) and boy did we have a good time. We didn't get back until 4pm so we only had about an hour until dinner but we used as much time as we could contacting and literally EVERYONE stopped and talked to us! It was INCREDIBLE! We even got a number from someone who said we could see him later. Then the best part is: that after dinner we went to an apartment complex and started knockin' all the doors, and again EVERYONE would at least talk to us!!  AND, outta the 10 or so people we knocked into, TWO of them fixed rendezvous with us.  One of the young women, named Laura, talked to us for about 20 minutes. We basically taught her the first lesson!! She was super sweet and had LOADs of good questions!! AND now she is a new amie that La Rochelle is teaching. Apparently their first rendezvous went REALLY well and they gave her a tour of the church and had a great time!! In any case, SUPER awesome exchanges!!

       Later in the week  you won't ever guess what happened!  We had an interview with a journalist for one of Frances biggest radio broadcasting groups, France Bleu. Apparently Mitt Romney served part of his mission in Limoges so they wanted to know what a normal day for missionaries was like. SO, me and Elder Fisher had some training by a church media leader to help prepare us, and then last Thursday the journalist interviewed us. It was kinda cool, we got to share why we were here and what we do a bit.  I hope that people will better understand who we are while listening to this.  The journalist herself said she changed her mind a lot about us and realized that we aren't a bunch of freaks like they seem think.  Anyways, it went on air this morning and the bishop said it went really well.   It should be online as well so you might be able to find it if you would like.

      ANYWAYS,  back to real missionary work!! We taught a ton of rendezvous this week and hardly had time to eat lunches.....not a good idea by the way. We had a really good rendezvous with Damien who will be getting baptized on the fourth of February. SWEET! We taught him how there are two things separating us from God. Spiritual and Physical death. Christ already ransomed ALL of us from physical death, it is a free gift from His atoning sacrifice, and He also made it possible to overcome Spiritual death (or our sins), by the same sacrifice.  This requires 5 things on our part. We need to have Faith, Repent, be Baptized receive the Holy Ghost, and Endure to the end. It went really well.

      We taught this same lesson to a man named William ,from Ghana, and invited him to be baptized! He is ready and is all down for it!!  The only let down is that he is going back to Ghana and wont be back til February. The good news is, that there is a church super close to his families house in Ghana and he will be going to it with his cousin who is a member already! PERFECT!

       We also made new amie this week that we taught at the church, and many other good things are going down but I unfortunately am going to have to let you read about them in the letters because I need to write the Pres. now.  I loves all of you and I enjoyed hearing from so many of you at the farewell!!! You're all great and I loves y'all tons!

LOVE ELDER LYONS

Limoges

Well, I guess I got a lot of explaining to do beings I didn't get the time to write on last Monday.  This was due to all of the traveling, new transfers, and other stuff.  I just sent a lot of pictures by e-mail to ya, so hopefully you got them.   I have lots more coming ,but yes I am waiting on you to send the other SD card. This way I can continue to take more here!

     First off ...no I haven't been sick, so that has been absolutely wonderful!  A little tired after 9 hours of travel on three separate trains mais ça va.  MY new companion is not really new, in fact he will be going home at the end of this transfer, or as we say in the mission, I will be killing my comp! He he missionary lingo ! I am also the new district leader for Limoges, La Rochelle, and Poitiers.  I thought Pres. learned from his mistakes but I guessed wrong.  He he just kidding it'll be awesome! My new companions name is Elder Fisher and he is really inspiring for me. A lot of old missionaries either work harder or get really lazy their last transfer, and he is on fire!! He is really good at talking to as many people as he can throughout the entire day and finding ways to serve them.  He loves to talk to people on the buses and other forms of public transportation.....something I could definitely work on!!

    We have lots of work to do.  They recently fixed a baptismal date with a young man named Damian from the Caribbean Islands. He is super cool!  It was a pleasure to meet him and see his example of faith and his desire to learn and find the truth! We are also teaching a super awesome Asian lady ,who reminds me A TON of Tia from Dunkerque.  Her situation is pretty similar and I thoroughly enjoyed teaching her about Christ and how to obtain faith in Him and His atonement. I shared experiences with her on how I had gained a testimony of Christ and it was cool to see the light in her eyes as she intently listened to what we said. We also had a really cool lesson by our DMP (mission leader) at church on the plan of salvation with her and I really hope that her faith will be strengthened and that we can help her gain a testimony! She's legit....oh by the way her name is Quionji.....pronounced kee-on-shee!  There are also a lot of other potentials that we are working with and we've already hit the pavement with some really cool contacting experiences.

    I  had a really cool district leader training ,in Tours, by our Zone Leaders (LONG TRIP....for a train) and I am super excited to do my best to serve the other missionaries!!

    Well, a lot of settling in things are finally done. I love the ward, the town is big and beautiful!!!!!! The South is way different than the North and they speak REAL French.  I finally realized how different the northern accent is! Well I don't have enough time to write everything in detail but I will finally have time to send a letter this week.....well actually it is already written.  I was planning on sending a package as well but it was too expensive so I will just send the letter!!

Valenciennes District

Jason and Elder Horton

Jason, Remy, and Elder Horton at Remi's Baptism

Jason with Christmas Tree

A Bison Grazing in front of McDonald's! Say What?!

Elder Horton with damage to car after he ran into a pole. Probably after he saw the Bison.

    I love you! MY heart goes out to my lovely grandma!! I am so so sorry that you are experiencing the nastiness of pancreatitis!! I love you, and you are in my prayers.  I will also send your letter in the mail too!!  I love you Chris and I am so pumped for your mission.  I am praying for you as well.  I haven't forgotten the rest of ya as well.  Well, je vous aime tous!!!

Elder Lyons 

Going South!!! Say What?!

YO!

         I got some strange news. I'm going down south!! I have been transfered to Limoge, which is as south as our mission goes.  This means I can literally say that I have served as far north as I could and now as far south.  My new address is:

 

74 Rue Ernest Ruben

87000 Limoges

France

 

         I still don't know what to think about it because I absolutely loved it here!!  All the members, Elder Horton, Rémi!!!!!!!!  We also have a really tight less-active friend who we have been working with. He's been making some sweet effort at coming back and has even taught with us.  He brought two friends to a rendezvous we had with him last Friday!!!!  Which, by the way, are SUPER golden!! 

    His friend Kevin has not chosen a religion to follow but he knows that God is there and has had lot's of spritual experiences in his life.  He is looking for a place to be baptized because he has felt the need to do it! He absolutely loved our lesson with Emile (our less active friend) and Emile provided his powerful testimony at the end to seal it off!!   Next rendezvous they will be fixing a specific date for his baptism because he has already expressed his desire to do it!!!  I am so excited for him and for Emile and the missionaires here!!!   We have pretty much been working our tails off trying to reactivate other less actives after seeing the fruits from this experience with Emile.  And of course,  LOADS of porting, which comme d'hab is my favorite!!!

    Well I have no idea what else to share. I am still kinda in deep thought mode....Know that I love you and feel your prayers for me everyday and I am so grateful for your examples and testimonies. God lives, and He loves us SO much!! At the measure you keep His commandments is the same measure He will help you in your trials!( Alma 38 ) I love you and look forward to sending a more detailed e-mail on Monday!

 

Love Elder Lyons

WE never got another e-mail on Monday.  I am assuming he is traveling.  He has a really long way to go to get to his new area!