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| Got a package for christmas and it was amazing! Mom you are the best person in the world and i love you so much! We love our christmas tree! and the ensign is so amazing to have. Dont ever take for granted that you guys can listen to the prophet! |
Alright so this week... I can't remember if I already told you about gabriel but we marked a date with him for baptism! He is 16 and totally awesome and prepared! He is reading the book of mormon and watching conference talks and bringing his mom to church haha so we thought for sure it would all go smoothly right? Wrong!!! His baptism was marked for this saturday and then we got a call saying we had a zone meeting in chapecó this week so the DL cant come to do the interview cuz its too far away... Ahhhh frusterating!! Haha but the important thing is that he is totally loving the gospel and wants to be baptised!
Then there's Candida. She finally came to church after 6 dang long weeks and it was awesome! She has already been like a year ago with other elders but she has major social problems with people so its really hard for her. As for smoking though... ugh I hate cig's!!!!! So we thought she would finally be done with them but then we went back this week and asked how she was doing and her mom went and bought her more cuz she though she was going to have a panic attack... Dang it literally hurt inside when I hear that. I think on our missions we get a glimpse of how not only our own parents but our heavenly father feels when we aren't doing whats right. It's weird cuz like you're not necessarily mad, just totally disappointed! Dang it stinks! But we visited her three times this past week and she was originally smoking 7 a day but she said she is lowering the number a lot. I wish I had grandma here to tell her her story! I've tried but i dont think she truly wants to give it up the way grandma keller did. So that means we've gotta start at the bottom and help her build her faith in Jesus Christ.
But anyways we are teaching a lot of people now which is awesome, its just that people her are so dang catholic that they cant understand the concept of the apostasy and really refuse to open up there minds. Plus we have a ton of investigators who just never do anything we ask haha thats pretty normal but that means that we have got to become better teachers and help them feel the spirit more in the lessons to motivate them to actually come to church. And on this subject our president sent out an amazing email last week.
The guy is just a genius and his letters rock! I finally just began to understand them now and i love them! He is such a smart guy! I wish i could forward them but they're in português and it doesnt translate directly... But he send out a massive email this last week based only on the scripture, D &C 88:122 and the quote from Elder Bednar, (i dont know exatly what it is in english just translating) "If we always do what we have always done, we will always have what we have always had". And man, the email was just totally awesome! The scripture talks about designating a teacher amongst ourselves and that teacher needs to be the Holy Ghost. We as missionaries are not going to do anything, just explaining the gospel and trying to prove something to people, we have to do everything we can to invite the spirit to be with us in the lesson so that these people can have all of this knowledge brought back to their rememberance, (John 14:26) And he used the quote to talk about how we all need to get out of our comfort zones and do the things we have never done before. Just like Coach Pete says, the only way to every grow is by challenging yourself and leaving your comfort zones. And its so true! If we ever want to get better at anything in life, we have to do things that are hard, and make us uncomfortable. He said that maybe the things that we did in our lives before were probably great but only in that specific period of time. Times change and we shouldnt ever necessarily be the same person! We should be challenging ourselves every day and trying to better ourselves for our Heavenly Father. Oh and that was another huge part of the email! He was talking about how we have to change now because Jesus Christ is speeding up this work. He gave tons of examples including the mission age and other things but its true! Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are changing things here and speeding up the work to prepare for the second coming. And basically the point of his email is that we have to choose now whether or not were going to change as well in order to match the pace of the Lord or are we going to stay the same person and simply do what we need to and sit by and watch as the Great Work goes forth? We cant ever think that we have aririved to a point where we have learned all that we can. I'm totally seeing that on my mission! I feel like I could have 100,000 years and not be able to study and learn everything that we can learn here on this earth. But anyways the gospel is amazing and missions are awesome! The only way to be happy in this life, truly happy is through the gospel of Jesus Christ. I love and miss you all! Hope all is well and that you're all staying righteous haha
Elder Keller
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