I'm off to Brazil!

Hello!

 

So I'm off to Brasil! Can you believe it!? I can't.... I'm still in a little bit of shock. Okay... a lot a bit of shock.

But, Eu estou muito animado!!! ( I am so excited!)

 

Scripture for this week:

"If God be for us, who can go against us?" - Romans 8:31

Think about it. Who is more powerful than God? Only our agency allows us to choose not to accept his help.

 

Enduring often times sounds painful to me. "Endure to the End." It makes me think of a passive life. Or a passive mission.

We are going to, and maybe even already have had some of the hardest experiences in our lives.

And they aren't going to get easier.

Our missions will be hard. Our lives will be hard.

It is our mindsets that make the difference.

We can think, "6 more months! I can make it 6 more months!" or "just another Sunday... I can make it through church one more time", and we will be enduring.

And yes, the work will continue, our investigators will progress because of our endurance, and our lives will be blessed because we are holding.

But how much more would the work prosper and our lives be blessed if we persevere!

Faith is ACTION! And so should our work and our lives be.

Do not only endure to the end. Persevere to the End! My Preach my Gospel teacher encouraged this in all of us in all that we did.

There will be times though, that it is all we can do to hold on and just endure.

I have no doubt that we will each experience this in our missions and in our lives.

But it will be okay. We will be okay.

 

Even Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail wondered about his captivity and wanted to get back to work, "Oh God, where art thou?"

To his pain the Lord said this:

"And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep;

if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way;

and above all, if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good."

-Doctrine and Covenants 122:7

 

What a poetic scripture and verse from the Lord. I can't imagine anything more terrifying and yet, the Lord knows all.

And is preparing us each individually with what we need to face what is to come.

We often times ask for a sign. We often times don't realize that it came in a trial and we are still standing with more wisdom.

 

We must remember that God is with us.

There will be times we will feel forsaken by others. By our familes. By our friends.

Maybe our significant other. And maybe even we will feel as though God has done the same.

In times such as these we should remember and turn to our savior.

Remember! That he endured all the pains that we have on top of his own.

When his own friends betrayed him or couldn't stay awake in his very hour of need and support.

When the people killed him for fear of their own pride. He walked through the very hour of death and never look back.

All of this for you. For me. And for our eternal salvation and happiness. I owe him everything.

He endured. He persevered. And look at how much he accomplished!

The salvation of every single life that was, is, and will ever be!

 

I will write again next week! When I am in BRASIL!

"I love you all! God loves you more!"

 

MTC investigators

Alrighty! So all the Brasil-headed missionaries are in a frenzy here! Our visas have been on hold for so long, but now there has been a dramatic number that has been accepted! Everyone wants to know who got there's and even if it is you!... there's hope!!!  I have mixed feelings about it. I think it would be really cool to be called somewhere in the states first, but the Lord needs me where he needs me so I'll be happy with whatever happens with my visa. :D Plus I absolutely love my companion and district right now and I can't imagine having gone through these last 5 weeks without them. I know that my visa was delayed for this purpose.

 

My mom asked me how we get investigators here in the MTC. Did I ever mention Hugo? Hugo was our first investigator and we created a wonderful bond with him. We had our doubts that he was real, but we bonded so well and created such a relationship that we truely believed. After our 3rd lesson though, we found out he was one of our professors. I cried. Now I know that seems a little dramatic, but missionary work is hard. Portuguese is hard. And the spirit is strong.

Even though Hugo wasn't real as we knew him (he was portraying a real person), I will always remember him as my first investigator.

Now with that said... we have 3 professors in total. And each companionship teaches two of them as someone different and then we teach eachother as well. So at the moment we have 4 investigators. And we play the roles as seriously as we can. It's an incredible experience and amazing how the spirit helps us to differentiate between who they are in real life to who they are as investigators during the lessons. One of our investigators has a wife too, so we teach her sometimes! It's fun to teach a female!

 

Okay! I need to go! My time is up! I will have more stories next week!

Remember that I love you all! But the Lord loves you more in a way that I can't even comprehend.

Wow! I have been out on my mission for a month!

Wow. This month has passed by faster than any time frame in my entire life. But I feel like I have also accomplished almost more than any time period in my entire life as well. And I know this is because of the blessings of the Lord and his spirit. I have come to realize the divine relationship I have with the Holy Spirit. He is one of my best friends and I have realized how much I have relied on him as such my entire life. Often we take our friends for granted and we forget that they are there for us so I have made an effort to realize his help, his comfort, his companionship, and the strength he gives me. I am trying to communicate with him the best I possibly can. I think that sometimes it's easy to forget that he is a member of the godhead. He was given and accepted the calling to be without a body so that he can guide us and support us. I am forever grateful.

The scripture of note this week is from Doctrine and Covenants. Section 88, verse 63.

"Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you."

Simple and direct. If we want to know the truths of The Book of Mormon. Of the church. Of the gospel. If we need help understanding or comfort the Lord wants nothing more than to give us our answers and help us. But he won't do that unless he know how much you truly desire to know. When we go to him in prayer, when we take the effort and time to search in the scriptures the Lord knows we're not just looking for the easy way out. As we draw near to him, he will draw near to us and reach the rest of the way that we cannot.

Our investigators have jumped from 1 to 5 this week! It has been crazy, yet so incredible.

Seeing the spirit of the Lord touch the hearts of these people is an amazing experience and has taught me what is most important.

The MTC truly is the Lord's university. He will teach you what you want to learn. This is true in life as well.

I love you all! Pray to our Father. He wants to hear from you. :)

Conference was amazing!

So conference has been amazing! It's really cool to have conference in the MTC with so many priesthood holders and missionaries going out to do this great work. Everyone was thinking about how we could apply what was said to our work and it is an incredible feeling. Another cool thing about conference in the MTC is that it is basically a 3 day weekend! Because we have no classes on Saturday and Sunday and Monday is p-day! So it's pretty cool.

 

Also... Every Sunday night we get to watch a movie after our devotional. This week was "The Testaments" which I didn't realize was just one movie.   ...haha...

It was so cheesy, but so wonderful! I realized that it is where basically all the clips of our Savior come from in Mormon messages and such. The best part was when the two leads would kiss or touch hands..... oooohhhhh boy! There was a riot of missionary "hoorahs"!  Poor deprived missionaries is what it is.

Elder Bruce in my district whispers "ahhh... 2 years" so I leaned over and whispered "18 months!" hahaha okay so it wasn't very nice, but it was so perfect!

 

Something I find really interesting here at the MTC is the agency we have. We don't have teachers or chaperons walking us around or checking up on us. Everything we do is by our own choice. I was thinking about it today as we were sitting outside the temple after having done some ordinances. We get to visit the temple every P-day and we just walk there from the MTC by ourselves. I hadn't realized it, but if I wanted to instead of going back to the MTC or going to the temple in the first place I could just walk down the street. See a movie. Use the phone. Go all the way home! And nobody would know besides my companion until somebody realized I was missing.

The MTC is not a jail. It is not a boarding school. It is an opportunity. We only have to be here if we want to be here. We only have to work if we want to work.

This is such an incredible knowledge. Our district works off the theme, "Pray as if it is all up to the Lord, work as if it is all up to you."

How much I progress here is up to me. The Lord blesses us with as many miracles as we want. It has been amazing to see the miracles come from this! My goal this week has been to work as much as I possibly can! And study as hard as I can! I have never studied so much in my life!.. But guess what... The Lord has helped me accomplish things that I didn't know I could. And when I have been completely exhausted thinking I can't cram anything else in my brain today.... I am able to teach a lesson as if I've always known those words.

 

My companion, Sister Bierman and I, have made friends here at the MTC who is actually FROM Sao Paulo Brasil! He is so kind and just wants to help us learn the language! He has been here 7 weeks and didn't know any English before he came and can speak to us fluently in English! It reminded me how trust and humility before the Lord can make all things possible... in only 7 weeks!

 

Out of all the things I got out of conference, and trust me... i have about 12 pages of notes... yowza! The most significant theme I found was that God loves us.

God loves me. He loves you.

He does NOT want you to go through this world alone.

 He misses you and he wants you to succeed! He wants you to be happy.

He would do everything and anything for you if only he could! But he doesn't so that we can grow.

So that we can be independent. So that you can use your agency. And so that you can feel free.

 

Many know the scripture from 1 Nephi. "I will go and do the things the Lord commands. I know the Lord provides a way, he wants me to obey." 

If nothing else this week I have learned, and I want you to remember to not look over a keep part of this phrase.

"I know the Lord provides a way."  He does. If only we will trust him.  His plan is so much better than we think ours is.

 

I love you all! Thank you again for your support! It keeps me going when I don't think I can say even one more word in Portuguese.