October 15, 2012

Well I received news of the thing I definitely didn't want to hear on Saturday from my Mission President. At about 1:30 or so while we were at lunch he called me to inform me that G-ma Gleason passed away on Friday night. I can't lie and say that it wasn't tough because it was pretty hard on me. Especially knowing that I won't be there and am not there for any of it. But after the phone call I knew the only way to keep my mind off of everything was to work and work hard. So thats what we did. Elder Messias asked me if I wanted to go home and relax for a little bit but I know that would just make it all harder and I told him we had people to teach and appointments marked. And I know that G-ma would want me to keep going. We worked our butts off these past 2 days and were blessed for it as well. This whole week we have been working like crazy and the Lord is blessing us in so many ways and is seeing the work were putting in. I dont want to say that everything was perfect because it defintely wasnt and we had some people that were going really well fall through, but we stuck to it through the hard parts and we came out strong. We are trully seeing the Lords hand in our work and we are doing all we can to do His will.

Its tough to be in this situation like I said being on the opposite side of the world but I have been strengthened and comforted by the Lord. I know that this life isnt the end. There is more after this and I will see my good ol´ G-ma again. God being perfect didn't create all this just for it all to end here on earth, this part of our life is just an extremely small phase of who we are. We existed before this life for who knows how long with God and after this life their will be no end or time. It will be eternity. Without end. I know and have a strong testimony that if we continue doing all we can and following Christ in all He did we can receive the greastest blessing of all, eternal life (D&C 14:7). But we need to do all we can and we must search and find Gods true path. I know that this church is true, and I know that through living prophets God´s Plan of Salvation has been restored on the Earth today to answer lifes great questions. Where did we come from? Why are we here? and What will happen after this life? The answers to these questions have been restored in the fulness of the gospel. I know that the only way to enter into Gods Kingdom is to be baptized with the authority of God, the Priesthood, has also been restored here on the earth through Joseph Smith. If you dont know it and have a testimony about it as well, search for it with our Heavenly Father and He will answer your prayers. I know and promise that He will. This is Christ´s true church on the earth and God´s kingdom here on earth. This isn't the end and I know I will see my grandma again. Love You G-Ma

Eu Te Amo

Elder Gleason

P.S. "...while you cannot change the past, you can change the future... With God´s help, you need not fear for the future." -Elder David S Baxter (General Conference April 2012)

"Be Happy Without Fear"

 

 

October 8, 2012

Wow, so general conference was amazing this past weekend, I learned so much and was able to strengthen my testimony even more in the gospel. It was so great to hear from our living prophet and apostles and hear the words that Heavenly Father wanted us to hear at this point. There was so much that we could all learn and I hope that everyone was able to receive answers to the questions they had, I know I did. One thing I liked a lot as well was Russell M. Nelsons talk about asking the missionaries about lifes great questions. I reinforce that invite for anyone who isn't a member of the church. The answers to lifes great questions have been restored!

However, this week we also lost a lot of work time, with general conference and we also had mission council which is for all the Zone Leaders on the mission. We had to leave on Tuesday night at about 6 to go to Sorocaba and we slept there with other missionaries. Elder Siddoway, from BYU, and Elder Vincent, my MTC companion. They're companions right now in Trujillo which is also my first zone that I was in and we slept in their house. So many great memories that we talked about. Then we lost the entire day on Wednesday in the captial of Sao Paulo, but a majority of the time was spent in vans and buses. We only got back to our area on Wednesday night at 630. One full complete day out of our area. So the week was a little difficult and we had to try and pack everything into a few days. However we had an amazing experience this week on Thursday. We were looking for 2 less active members but no one was home so we knocked on the neighbors door to see if the people still lived there, long story short we ended up teaching this family that we knocked their door. At the end of the lesson the wife asked us why she was feeling a burning sensation in her heart when we were talking to her, we testified that it was the Holy Ghost confirming what we were teaching. Then the next day we went back again to reinvite them to general conference again and she told us that the night before we showed up the first time she had had a dream about finding the true path of Christ in the middle of so many paths that exist and then we showed up. IT WAS AWESOME! And on Saturday they went to general conference in church dress. So sick. It was an awesome experience. And extremely spiritual.

As for the rest of the week we faced a few difficulties but we have faith and know that if we continue we will be blessed in the end by the Lord.

Eu Te Amo

Elder Gleason

P.S. Alma 46:15; 47:10-13; 48:11. 17

"If we have faith in Jesus Christ, the hardest as well as the easiest times in life can be a blessing." -Pres Henry B Eyring (COnference April 2012)

October 1, 2012

Well we had another transfer this past week, man how time flies, I am now on the back end of transfers on the mission. This week I got a new companion, Elder Messias (Messiah). Elder Maciel is now the executive secretary for the mission and sits behind a computer and in air conditioning all day haha. Elder Messias is from Recife, the same city where Elder Vieira is from but he didnt know him beofre the mission. The one really bad thing about the transfer is now neither one of us knows how to cook... And we get a lot of money from the members for lunches so were going to have to start eating at restaurants a lot more often. So much easier when you have someone who cooks good food for you and you dont have to do anything haha.

This week was another week of milagres. We marked another 3 baptismal dates for October, me and Elder Messias. And we have a lot of good people to work with, here in a little bit were going to be seeing a lot of thr fruits of our hard work were putting in. And on Sunday we had 2 miracles happen that we weren't expecting whatsoever. We were wating for a lot of people at church like 10 or so and by the time church had started only 1 had showed up and we were pretty upset but then out of nowhere a couple that we were teaching showed up. We had invited them to church so many times and they never went but yesterday they showed up. And then a boyfriend of a member showed up and he is super interested in the church and is wanting to change his life around. AND another young man whos been coming to church for awhile was presented to us and he wants to be baptized and were going to teach him this week. The lord trully blessed us for our hard work that we put in this week in ways that we werent expecting whatsoever.

Well this weekend is general conference again on Saturday and Sunday, my 3rd on the mission already and I'll only have one more, so weird. I'm super excited though to be able to hear from our living prophet and living apostles. What a great priveldge that we have to be able to hear the voice of the Lord through his servants here on the Earth in our days. I know that what they will say will trully bless our lives if we put it in to practice and will help us with anything that we are struggling with. What a blessing to have a living prophet. I am so grateful for the love of the Lord that he has for each and every one of us. I am so greatful for the words that He is continually providing for us to strengthen us when we are week. I know without a shadow of a doubt that these men were called by God in our days.

Eu Te Amo

Elder Gleason

P.S. Alma 40:11-13, 25; 41:3-6, 10

"There is seemingly no end to the expansive capacity to love. The feeling of love from our Heavenly Father is like a gravatational pull from Heaven." -Elder Paul E Koelliker (General Conferance April 2012)

September 24, 2012

The Lord trully blessed us during this week and we were able to mark 3 baptismal dates for October. One that we marked is the cousin of a member and she just moved to Itu about a month ago. She hasnt had the easiest life but she is seeing how much her life is already changing just in these couple weeks that she has gone to church and started reading the BOM. Its such a great thing to be able to see the lives of people change right before your eyes and even better to have them recognize it and tell you about the changes. It is very gratifying.

However unfortunately the young woman that was preparing to be baptized this past Saturday backed out for now. She also said she doesn't want to have us teach her anymore but just be friends. It was pretty shocking, we werent waiting for what happened whatsoever and it was a pretty sad night. But everybody has their free agency and each one will choose what they want to do. For now she chose not to, but im positive that in the future she will be baptized, who knows maybe even while I'm still here in Itu.

Here in this area during these 6 weeks i have learned a lot about many different situations that we have come into contact with. It has been a great learning experience and I hope that I have learned what the lord wanted me to learn. We have been teaching quite a lot of people with marraige problems and family problems and after leaving a lot of the lessons when weve heard so much stuff I just have to say Wow. I hope and pray that I learn from these situations and can help my family in the future be in better places than some of the things that ive heard.

This week is also the week of transfers and we find out tonight what will happen with the zone and with us. I'm not really sure what could happen but it could be anything. I just know that whatever happens is the Lord´s will. I've tryed to ask for things too much i think with transfers and usually happens in a much different when than I expected but at the end of each transfer I know that the Lord had a reason for putting me where I am and with what companion. This transfer went by extremely fast, 6 weeks passed by like nothing.

Eu Te Amo

Elder Gleason

P.S. Alma 37:6-7; 38:2, 5; 39:14

"No pain will last forever. It is not easy, but life was never meant to be either easy or fair."

-Pres Boyd K. Packer (General Conference April 2012)

Pictures

 August 31st was JRs one year mark. This is his shirt before he burned it.

 After the burning, JRs souvenir.

 Miami Heat Championshirt t-shirt JR got a few weeks ago from our dad.

JR says, "Me and D Wade. The best player in the world is on my shirt."

September 17, 2012

This week was another tough one. We are finding a lot of new people to teach with all the contacts we do and everything but when we teach them they don't have any desire to learn more or search for answers with God. But we keep chugging along and im sure that we will continue finding the Lord´s elects here in Itu. The area here is huge so we have plenty of new people to find every day without a doubt. We just gotta get out there and continue working hard like weve been working and the Lord will bless us with people who want to follow Christ.
This week we also had the baptismal interview with the young woman that is preparing for baptism and she passed. Shes really excited to be baptized and her dad is even more excited. Her dad has been waiting an entire year for this and now its finally falling into place. She is super intelligent and the elder that interviewed her said that the interview was really great. So she should be baptized this next saturday which is the day we have marked with her. So this week we´ll be preparing her for her baptism.
The zone is going pretty well too and we are baptizing weekly as a zone which is fantastic. We can definately be baptizing more per week but at least its weekly. As a zone leader its pretty neat because you get to see everything thats happening in the areas in my zone and how we can help each one. But its also a tough thing because you know everything thats happening in each of the areas haha. The good and the bad. It can get pretty stressful. If all the missionaries in our zone, or mission, or the world were working as hard as they could every day and doing the best that they could there would be a lot more converts to the church. I have so much respect for the mission and this glorious work that we do as servants or the Lord and representatives of Christ and i just want to do all that i can during these 2 years that i have. And i know that im doing the best i can and that i will do even more. No one else will do this work for me so i gotta do it. And its definately not easy, but i love it. This is the Lords work without a doubt in my mind and He is waiting on each and every missionary to do the best he can. And i will do the best i can for the time that i have which is short.


Eu Te Amo
Elder Gleason


P.S. Alma 34:9-10, 27, 31-33; 36:3-4, 19-21 and 2 Chr 24:19

September 10, 2012

When missionaries told me that the 2nd half of your mission always goes by a lot faster I am now seeing the truth of it. The week wasnt even the best that ive ever had and was even a little difficult but it still went by super fast.
Also as you can see in the pictures i got my 2 miami heat championship t shirts from my dad this past week and now I can rep it up in brasil as well. Gotta let everybody now who I root for and what team is the best even if they have no idea who it is.
So this week like I said was pretty tough and we didn't have a ton of results that we were able to see and we had a few disappointments with some realy great people were teaching but were keeping our heads up and battling on. Also on wednesday we had a multi zone conference which had all the missionaries in soracaba and itu together to have trainings from president and some other missionaries. And part of those "other missionaries" was me and Elder Maciel. We gave a training to about 50-60 missionaries on how to do contacts. It was a really neat experience but kind of weird at the same time. Especially because there was quite a few missionaries that got here with me or who are older and i was giving a training to them. But it went really well and i was able to learn a lot and hopefully the other missionaries learned from it as well. The good thing was that it wasnt all the missionaires together at the same time but was split up into 4 groups and we had 30 minutes with each group and we did practices and stuff. So it went really well. The worst part of the day was how long it took. we left at 6 in the morning and got home at 8 at night. Because to itu its about an hour and a half bus ride and we had to go with the bus schedules.
Also this week with the girl we have a baptismal date with I was able to see the true power that the Book Of Mormon has. She told us that she was going to wait on her baptism because she had a ton of doubts and everything about the church from stuff that she found on the internet that just talks trash about everything. But we told her to instead of looking on the internet for this stuff read the BOM and pray about it after every verse she read in the chapter we left. The next day at church we asked her if she did it and she said she did, we asked her if she could deny that it came from God and she said she couldnt, then we asked her if she would be baptized on the day we had marked and she said yes. All this because she sought the knowledge about these things with our Heavenly Father instead of with man. Its one of the things that i find really impressive about the church and the work we do as missionaries. We dont ask people to believe in what were saying or the Bishop or parents, no one. But to believe in what Heavenly Father will answer us through prayer. Heavenly Father, God, is the one that gave me an answer that this gospel and the BOM is true, not man. I love being a missionary and getting to see these miracles that happen with us and the people that we teach.


Eu Te Amo
Elder Gleason


P.S. Alma 32 (the chapter that helped the girl we´re teaching-especially verses 26-43) and 2 Chr 6:14; 14:11; 15:2