June 18, 2012

Oi mãe!! como estás?? opá! parece que esta semana foi tão incrivel! mesmo como tu :)

Wow....Damian went through the temple and you and Kendal and Dad and everyone was there. I bet that was AMAZING! I've been thinking a ton about the temple lately. I was thinking last sunday, not yesterday but the other day, about covenants and ordinances. I would really love to go through the temple again, just as a little reminder and spiritual booster, but hey, i'll just appreciate it more after a 2 year drought right? :) but seriously, that sounds like the temple was an incredible moment mom. I'm so glad that you got to be a part of that. You're such an amazing person and an amazing example to me, and all of my friends. I hope you know how much we all love you, but me more than any of them, and i'm luckier than them all, because you're mine :) And I thought about when we all get back too. Patrick, Damian, Kendal, me, Ryan, Sam, Jacob, Chase, Logan. Man I'm so pumped for these guys!! and one thing i've realized, is that time on the mission FLIES!! today is transfer P-Day. Turns out i'm staying here in Madeira, and Elder Faias is taking off tomorrow. I'll be getting somebody new, I just don't know who yet :) But  yeah, anyways, this time is going to pass SO much faster than I ever thought. It makes me think about every day that i have, because i don't have very much left. Then I got thinking about how thats the same in life. We don't have very much time to perform our labors, and to create friendships and to help our neighbors and our brothers and sisters. And soon enough, that's it. It made me think about the times when i feel lazy or when things are rough, we just gotta remember, that the Lord only asks for our best for this short little space of time on Earth. We only need to quote unquote, "sacrifice" to keep his commandments for this short little 80 years on earth, and then after that we're promised an eternity full of happiness and joy and peace, with our families and friends. For ETERNITY....i don't know how many 80 years are in an eternity, but i know that this life isn't very much! :) so whenever we're worried about life, or we get down, or we feel like life's hard, just remember, yeah it is sometimes, but it's short...and the promises are sure, and they are more amazing than we can imagine.

Just real quick this brings me to an investigator of ours that is really starting to progress, and she's the reason that i've been thinking about this lately. Her name is Eliza and she's from England. She speaks portuguese perfectly, but she likes to speak English better, so i've been speaking a lot with her. Basically, Eliza is about 32  years old ish (she won't say, so i'm just guessing :) ) She's the only child and she lives with her mom. her parents seperated just a few weeks ago. Her dad has been horribly controling and even abusive to her and it has really caused emotional problems. She's always been talking about the time that she's lost and how hard her problems are and nobody knows what it's like to have problems like her. She's been coming to church and we've had some lessons with her but she's just super nervous and talks super fast and stutters a little bit, and she gets nervous around the members and she's scared to stay out past 7 at night because of what her dad has done to her, and she's afraid her dad is gonna be in the area. And she calls her mom to ask permission to stay out and all of this. She has just really been damaged emotionally because of her past. And she finally said something the other day that really really made me sad. She said, "I never got anywhere with God!!" She said that all of her friends who followed Satan were better off than her. they had their lives organized and they had a family, and jobs, and all of the things she wanted. She's tried to follow God and never got her anywhere. It made me cry to hear her say that. She was shouting this after church and everyone had left. She was like breaking down. We offered to give her a blessing to calm her down, and so she could feel the love the Lord has for her personally, but she just didn't want it. She was just nervous and just wanted to leave. Finally she said i'm out of here. And she was walking down the hall of the church, and there was a member there. And he just calmly said hi how are you? how are the lessons going? and have you had a chance to pray and ask Heavenly Father if these things are true? and that's when we said....Eliza, these things. We want you to ask Heavenly Father if THESE things are true, and if THIS is the path the Lord wants for you. We don't want you to waste anymore of your time by looking back on the past. Heavenly Father wants you to come to Him and follow him, now. Because this is the path that He created for His children. She calmed down....but then got a little nervous and left. But the Spirit was SO strong. and it made me realize what blessings had come to my life because of the Gospel. And because of my Heavenly Father. It was such an incredible experience. and THEN....she called us today, and apologized for all of the things she had said, and done, and she's starting to calm down. I think we're gonna talk about Alma the Younger with her. I'm SO excited!!! pray for her, that she can be calm and that she can feel the spirit and the Savior's love ok? Thanks :)

So another really cool thing that happened yesterday!! AMAZING! we were sitting down to pray cuz a lesson fell through, and we only had about 30 minutes before we had to get to the house and we didn't have time to go anywhere, but we really wanted to do the Lord's work. So we prayed and asked Him to show us what we needed to do. And we said amen, and then looked up and there was a lady walking down the road to our right. we both felt it. So we got up from the bench we were on and walked over to her. We introduced ourselves and asked if she had 10 minutes to talk with us. She said yeah of course! so we sat down on a bench, talked with her, gave her a book of mormon and she said she would read it and pray about it before our next appointment on wednesday! it was AMAZING!! we felt so good about it and Heavenly Father answered our prayers...right on the spot. Tender mercy. It was an amazing thing. Especially cuz this week was really rough for us. WE hadn't found many people, but then the Lord blessed us in the last 30 minutes of the night. And so please please please pray that Angelina will be in the park this wednesday at 430 ok? thanks so much! :) But this week has really strengthened my testimony of the fact that Heavenly Father guides and directs us. I've felt the Spirit in the work these last few days. And I want to say one more thing. On Saturday, I started a more serious study of the Book of Mormon than I ever had in my life. It's the corner stone of our religion, it's the most correct book on earth, and a man will come closer to our Heavenly Father by abiding to it's precepts than by any other book. I felt like I needed to be close to Heavenly Father. And so I started. And I promise you, that the power of the Book of Mormon is real. That the Lord will enter our lives with more power and directness as we study the Book of Mormon. As we study to understand and study to become, not just to read. It's the promise of the Prophet Joseph Smith and it's the promise of the Lord, and He keeps His promises. I've seen it.

Anyways, so yeah, I just got a call from the ZL's my new companion is named Elder Bond. I don't know anything about him yet. I just know that he's coming in this week! I hope he doesn't have a problem with bed bugs....cuz it turns out that literally, we have bed bugs. I have like 97.5 gazillion bites on my legs and arms.....obnoxious buggers. Have any ideas about how to get rid of this obnoxiousness??? :) yep and Elder fais is off to the continent again. He's pretty excited about that cuz he gets to get away from them!! haha :)

Well mom, i'm sorry i dind't get to reply to all of what you said. I really really REALLY enjoyed reading it and i hope you keep telling me everything that's going on at home, i just wanted to tell you that stuff :) I hope you all know that I love you all, and i'm praying for you everyday. and I know that the Lord is watching out for you and I promise you that the Lord loves you. and I do too!! Love you and thanks for everything!!

Love,

Elder Jordan Brady