Writings from West Virginia: #JSquad #FairmontOnFire

Hello everyone! After seven and a half months, I am out of BV and back in good ol' West Virginia! I LOVE it here! It's awesome. If seven and a half months taught me anything, it was how to work effectively with whatever you have, and now that I actually have big (ger) area, we are ROCKING it! Fairmont is going to EXPLODE with the work here, I can feel it. It's just waiting, hence the hashtag in the title, #FairmontOnFire, because it's going to be on FIRE before the end of this transfer.

I'm here with Elder Jolley, who is fantastic! We are having a lot of fun together. He's from Idaho Falls, Idaho, he's been out around Four and a half months, I'm his second companion, and he's one heck of a worker! He really enjoys learning about how to do things differently and different perspectives, which I think really helps the Fairmont area. We've already tried some cool new things, and seen some awesome success because of it!

My last day in Buena Vista last Wednesday was hard, it kind of sunk in finally how much BV meant to me and how much I loved it and all the people there. I really did! Buena Vista changed my life, and I enjoyed every second of it there, even the hard parts. I can hardly believe that I actually spent seven and a half months there! It was all a blur, a wonderful, amazing, blessing filled blur!

Brother A. took us out to The Original Italian Restaurant on Wednesday for dinner, so that I could say goodbye. I also got to say goodbye to so many good friends including: B. and D., B.D; Brother A., Brother T and A, B.P., the Ca. family, the Lo. family, Sister Bu., the An. family, The Ba. family and the Bo. family!, the Ca. and Ut. family, my other Ca. family and the Cl. family, the Fl. family, the Fue. family, the Fur. family, the Go. family, the Ha. family, The Hi. family, the Ho. family, the Hu. family, the Ja., family, the Jo. family, the La. family, the Mi. family, the Mo. family, the Po., family, the Se. family, the Shi., family, the Th. family., the Tr. family, and the Wh. and the Ta. families!!! All these pictures are forthcoming*. :) I'm sorry if I missed anyone! I love you all!

I miss them, but I'm excited to be here.

With all the packing and writing stuff and getting ready, I didn't get to bed on Wednesday until around 1, then I got up at 3:00! It was a nice two hours of sleep, haha. 4:30 in the morning was my last goodbye with Elder French and Elder Harris, the YSA Elders. We snuck into their apartment and woke them up so I could say goodbye. I also wrote Elder French a letter and put it on his desk. I'll miss him a ton.

Most of the day was spent in a van/car driving! I rode with Elder Bingham and Elder Williams to Blacksburg in a Jeep Compass that the church is selling, and then there we picked up Elder Price and Elder Lopez, who are HILARIOUS. We drove with all 5 of us up to Charleston. The Charleston Depot was great (We aren't supposed to have transfer meetings anymore, so we don't, but Charleston is still the place where we switch luggage around, have a little message, and then head out, so we call in the Depot now, haha)! I got to see a lot of my buddies and have some fun there.

On the train ride to Clarksburg (one 15 passenger van towing a little uHaul trailer) the van broke down a couple times! Gotta love those West Virginian hills! We finally made it to Clarksburg after two break downs, and eating lunch at this cool little place called The Custard Stand in a TINY town called Sutton, WV. They had good chili dogs though. That was a great way to reintroduce me to WV, a good old fashioned Chili Dog. It had been too long! :P In Clarksburg, I got to see Elder Millard, one of my best friends, who is now my ZONE LEADER! Woo hoo! That will be a party. They call and I call every once in a while just to chat with them because they are awesome. Finally got to Flatwoods and met Elder Jolley! Like I said before, he's awesome. I also got to meet my District Leader, Elder Carter, and his companion, Elder Furrows. We are in a district together with the Fairmont Sisters, Sister Kirkby and Sister Marsh, who are the Sister Training Leaders, so I knew them from my time at MLC. I also got to see Sister Robinson and say hi to her! I went to high school with her, so that was fun. This is a great zone!

On Friday Elder Jolley took me to meet some cool people! We got to meet R., a member who needs some help staying active sometimes, so we go over once a week or so and share a message with him and help him along his path to the kingdom. He's a really funny, older guy who LOVES Mormon Messages, so that's normally what we watch with him, haha. We also had dinner with the N. family! C. N. got back from a mission around 7 months ago, and her sister O., who is an awesome less-active with a little boy, made us "Buffalo Mac & Cheese," which is basically Mac & Cheese with hot sauce in it, and it was actually really good, haha! It was like, baked or something, which just made it awesome. C.'s boyfriend, B., from Morgantown who goes to the YSA ward, was there too, along with their non-member friend N.! We tried to teach him, but he didn't seem too interested. We got his number and told him we'd call him, which seemed to be a good compromise for him, haha.

Saturday I got to meet L., an AWESOME man who was going to get baptized a couple weeks ago, but his White Blood Cell count was "critical" so they immediately told him he couldn't go outside or be near people. :( Luckily though, it's gone back up, and now it's just "low" instead of "critical" so now he is getting healthier, woo hoo! He talks a TON, so you really have to kind of guide the lesson, but he is converted and ready for baptism. We went over the baptismal interview questions with him, and he's ready! He didn't come to church yesterday because his health is preventing him, but he really really wants to come this week and thinks that he'll be up for it.

We took our Ward Mission Leader, Brother H., over there with us. He did a great job teaching, too. I also go too meet the T. family, some great members who struggle getting to church on time, and we also went and saw R. with Brother H. He is a less-active member who pastors at other churches now. We had a really good conversation with him about some common protestant questions about our church, like how the bible says no one has seen God (Moses, Stephen, John), Priesthood restrictions (Levites), etc. Stuff like that. It felt really good to be able to expound the scriptures to and reason with someone again. I haven't done that for a long time. It's not Contention, but a tension of views that makes for a good discussion. :)

Sunday was great! I got to meet the ward, who are all AWESOME! We especially have a great Bishop, Bishop B. He's awesome. He's only been Bishop for 3ish months now, but he does a really good job, and I think he knows where he wants to take the ward in the future. We get the opportunity on Sundays to go and take the sacrament to the F. family! They served a mission in Oakland, CA about a decade ago, but now they are homebound because of her declining health, so we take them the sacrament. He made some really good steak for lunch. They are great and super nice!

We contacted a media referral that we received on Sunday night, too! W. requested a Book of Mormon. We went over there, he answered the door right away, so we started teaching him! Ended up having a really quick, good lesson about the Book of Mormon and a really brief overview of the Restoration, committed him to read the Introduction of the Book of Mormon, and he invited us back the next day (today)! It should be a good lesson today, we're excited.

Also on Sunday I got to meet C., his girlfriend D., and his son C. D. is a less-active returning member, and C. and C. are investigators. They are the BEST. C. is HILARIOUS and they are SO CLOSE to baptism. The only thing holding them back is getting married, which is a more complicated situation I hear than we wish it was, but we believe in miracles in this church, and so help me I will see them enter the waters of baptism before I'm done here! We taught them the law of tithing last night, which they committed wholeheartedly to live by, because they are awesome. Something else I love about C. is he isn't afraid to ask questions. He really wants to know and understand the gospel, and so he is not afraid to let you know what he is thinking, and it is GREAT. In the middle of tithing, he goes, "So where does the money go?" The way he said it could have been construed as "attacking" or something, but he just asks because he really wants to know. We explained it and it made perfect sense to him and he is excited to live it after his baptism! They are awesome.

So that was the last 5 days, haha! I love it here in Fairmont, it is going to be a great place that I will always remember, I know it! Thank you all for reading this, I love you all and thank you for your support. Have a GREAT WEEK!

Also a shoutout to my best friend who completes his two-year service in 5 days. You are the best Ryan!

Love,

Elder Brax Johnson

Also, shoutout to Elder Hugentobler!

*Note from Braxton's mom:

I have all the photos of the wonderful BV families, but since I don't have permission from each family to post them on the web, I will hold on to them for him. If you would like a copy, just email Braxton and he will let me know. I would be happy to send it to you! His email is: johnson.braxton@myldsmail.net