Letter from Michael 5-5-2014-Transfer to Protea Glen- Soweto-cut head

5-5-2014

Ello,

So my new area is Protea Glen. My new companion is Elder Dutson who is in the same MTC group as Elder Haynes. He is still 18 years old though. I like Protea Glen so far. I was excited to find out that we had a car and it was stick. But after a few day we had to swap it for an automatic. We have to share the car with other Elders because we are in another 4 man flat again. The other Elders are Elder O'rierdon from Australia and Elder Mwale from Molowi who is being trained. Anyway, Elder Mwale can't drive and Elder O'rierdon can't drive manual so we had to get a different car. The people seem nice here. It is nice to be in a ward instead of a branch. There is always smoke in the air here everyday because there are just random fires everywhere that no one cares to put out. Oh yeah, and I might have gotten stitches last night. So it is a four-man flat and we were horsing around. I slipped and hit my head on the edge of a shelf.... boys will be boys. It was pretty deep but no worries. It is all good now. Plus I got some sweet pictures.

- Elder Johnson 

Parts of letters to his parents:

We were in the car last week at night. Some guy walked up to us and asked us if we could teach him English. We explained our purpose as missionaries and told him we could help him with his English as we share with him the restored gospel with him. He said sure and we set a time to see him. We have seen him a couple times since then now. We gave him a Book of Mormon and explained how it could bless his life and even help him with his English. He was very grateful for the help, the Book of Mormon, and the Restoration message we shared with him. He seems like one of those golden investigators. I am confident that he will enter the waters of baptism one day. He is a great kid. His name is Ephraim and he is 18 now. It will be nice getting some more priesthood holders in the Lord's church. Also, we have had some great lessons with recent converts about enduring to the end. They truly have testimonies of the Savior and his restored gospel. We even got some referrals from one of them. It is a family that we are starting to teach.

- Elder Johnson

Sorry, Mom. I started with the group email and was so anxious to send individual emails that I left out a ton of stuff. The area is nice. Almost 100% black. There aren't really any street signs here which makes things difficult to get around but I am learning. Having this change and new area has rekindled might excitement and motivation in the work. Elder Wadsworth also served in Protea Glen as well. The area is huge and time will let me know whether I like it better here or in Polokwane.

Elder Dutson's last companion didn't really take care of the area book for months. So I have been working with him to organize and fill it out. I believe it is very important to keep it up otherwise it is not fair to the next elders.

Tell Blake Congratulations on his mission call. I am proud of him. He will be a powerful missionary.