A Couple of Thoughts

(Elder Cummings)

Elder Gray and I are doing work in Merced together.  We have been all over the stake this last week helping to prep apartments for new missionary companionships.  As a result of all the hauling that we were going to have to do, the mission switched our cars!  We are now driving a small pick-up truck, a Nissan.  Christmas came early!

And as if driving a truck wasn't enough, our teaching pool is taking off again!  Bertha and Jessica will be baptized this next Saturday.  Bertha's younger son set a date for December 10.  The Hmong branch is keeping the fire bright too!  Saint (11) and Stephen (12) came to church for the first time on Sunday.  Both boys were immediately surrounded by friends and loved the service.  We went by after church to watch Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration with them, and they loved that too!  Their testimonies are taking off.  Both of them moved out of the picture book version of the Book of Mormon and into the iconic blue-bound one.  Stephen is trying to read a chapter a day!

We taught one of the three Jasons we visit on Wednesday, and it was one of the most powerful discussions I have ever had on the topic of repentance.  Teaching from the tailgate of the truck might have played a part in that, and without a doubt the Spirit was doing the heavy lifting.  We talked about consciences for a bit, and not very deeply, but it came to me again that the conscience is one of the clearest evidences to me of God's love for his children.

This week I have had a scripture on my mind, Moroni 7:47-48:

"But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day,it shall be well with him.

"Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen."

Something that I noticed as I continued to think about the words, is that the punctuation in the second verse can carry two meanings.  First, we should all pray specifically for charity so that we can be filled with charity.  The second meaning I found is that a natural result of sincere communication with the Father is an increase in Christlike love.  Looking back on my missionary service here in Merced, I can say with certainty that as my prayers have become more heartfelt, regardless of the subject of my prayers, my love for those we visit regularly and those we pass of the street has grown immensely.  I can no longer walk by someone without wanting to stop them and share the message of the restoration.  Everyone needs the peace that understanding the fullness of Jesus Christ's teachings can bring.

I find the example of Jesus Christ so incredible.  I found this quote from the prophet Spencer W. Kimball in my studies this week:

"Jesus said several times, 'Come, follow me.' His was a program of 'do what I do,' rather than 'do what I say.' His innate brilliance would have permitted him to put on a dazzling display, but that would have left his followers far behind. He walked and worked with those he was to serve. His was not a long-distance leadership. He was not afraid of close friendships; he was not afraid that proximity to him would disappoint his followers. The leaven of true leadership cannot lift others unless we are with and serve those to be led." (Jesus: The Perfect Leader, August 1979 Ensign).

I am so grateful for my Savior.  He is the best example to be found.

With love,

Elder Jared Cummings

Ok It's Cold Now

(Sister Ellsworth)

First off, nothing really crazy or cool happened this week. Lot's of little strange things but mainly we taught and looked for new friends :) We met a young lady named Alicia who has a huuuuuge family. They are from Africa and there are more than 15 people living in this big house. We found them because her brother had gold painted tennis shoes and I thought they were super cool, but turns out they had already been taught some lessons by the missionaries and have records in our area book. Hopefully a miracle will come around and we will be able to help and teach them. We spent a lot of time with our recent converts this week too. Manuela and Nadia are doing super great! Nadia is working for a member in our branch and is helping us teach every week. Manuela loves to make us Portuguese soup,  which is the best thing ever. Alda is also doing well. She's going to get married in two months to her fiancée, who is very nice. All of them are also introducing us to their friends and we're working with four investigators because of them. WOOT!

The Elders in our area had three baptisms this week which is AWESOME! It was a really great little party afterwards too. Of course, we made cookies. One of the members in our branch told me afterwards that the Sisters can get everyone to come to the baptisms because of our cookies. They love chocolate chip cookies and cinnamon cookies!

It's gotten quite cold here. I was really grateful for the breeze in the summer but it's probably the worst thing ever now. But that's more motivation to have lessons inside! It has also been kind of nice because it's really easy to find our investigators and members in their houses. No one wants to be outside!

Overall It's been a great week. Lots of ups and downs, lefts and rights, forwards and backwards. This isn't really something new in the life of a missionary though... In one day you can teach and have a thousand appointments and then the next day you prepare in a simliar way but absolutely everything falls through and you have to pick up the pieces and start again. Perspective and patience are two things I thought I had before my mission but I realized that those things are so much more complicated than I expected.

Heavenly Father has a plan for each one of us. We have such a small understanding sometimes and it's hard to trust in that plan. I'm so grateful to have the knowledge that I have about where I came from, why I'm here, and where I will go in my life. I'm grateful for the opportunity to serve in Portugal, land of the bolos de Belém and bacalhau. I'm grateful for the support I have from my family and everything else! I hope all of you have a super great week!!

Be happy and the world smiles with you :)

Heres a poem for you:

I wish I was a glow-worm

a glowworm is never glum.

Because how can you be grumpy

When the sun shines out your bum?!

Be a happy glowworm.

Love you,

Sister Ellsworth

Focus on the One

(Elder Cummings)

This whole week I have been working with a new companion, Elder Gray, another Hmong elder!  Our companionship transferred a week early so that Elder Perkins could be spending more time at the mission office over the next couple transfers.  Elder Gray and I have been tearing it up!  It is a blast to be back with someone who speaks my native Hmong!  I had no idea how much I missed speaking it until we were driving up from Fresno late Halloween night after a meeting for all zone leaders and sister training leaders at the mission home.  In this mission we don't proselyte Halloween night, so President Clark took advantage of the opportunity to give some instruction before November really set in.

Something that has been on my mind over the last few weeks is perfectly embodied in this video:

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2016-03-0024-focus-on-the-one?lang=eng

One thing President Clark stresses with mission leaders is the importance of ministering to our stewardships, the companionships we lead.  I have had several amazing experiences this last week doing just that.

 I have been throwing the thought around for a while now that the Spirit will lead you to the extent that you let him. I have found that to be so true. We were doing our gospel studies with another companionship earlier this week (this ties in to both things, I promise).  As we were going through listening to each other as we each shared what we learned from our personal scripture study, one elder was sharing how he had read D&C 10:4 while studying the topic of diligence, which says:

 "Do not run faster or labor more than you have strength and means provided to enable you to translate; but be diligent unto the end."

In the very moment he read the verse I felt compelled by the Spirit to ask "how has your experience with depression informed your interpretation of that verse?"  At the time of asking this question I did not know that he struggled with depression.  The thought came to my mind, and because I trusted that the Spirit would lead me to minister to this elder I expressed it.

Instant tears came to this elder's eyes, and for the first time in the year and a half he has served as a missionary he talked openly about his ongoing battle with depression.  We then worked together to ensure the needed support was put in place for him to work towards a healthier solution than bottling it all in.

In the ongoing conversation we have been having since then I have come to a new appreciation of Isaiah 55:8-9, which reads:

 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts."

God thinks much more of us than we think of ourselves.  He recognizes with eternal gratitude all of the small things that we do for him.  He rejoices with us when we do what is right.  He is absolutely joyful when we persevere through opposition.  He cares for us as individuals and works towards our individual salvation and exaltation.  All life experiences and all church assignments are given to us to prepare us for that end, "[our] dross to consume, and [our] gold to refine" (How Firm a Foundation, hymn #81).

In speaking about his modern-day calling as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Elder David A. Bednar says, "It's not a large corporation.  And the apostles are not the board of directors.  This is an individual work.  The Saviour knows people by name.  He knows their circumstances.  And He directs us in our work to bless the lives of individuals, not run a gigantic organization."

That is true for all aspects of church service.  It is about individuals, and as we reach out to individuals we do the Savior's work.

You all have a blessed week!  Share the love of Christ with those around you!

With love,

Elder Jared Cummings

and another quote to think on, from Elder Neil L. Anderson: "Please don’t see your efforts to share the love of the Savior with another as a pass/fail test with your grade determined by how positively your friends respond to your feelings or invitation to meet the missionaries. With our mortal eyes, we cannot judge the effect of our efforts, nor can we establish the timetable. When you share the love of the Savior with another, your grade is always an A+."

Captain Moroni

(Anziano Wilkinson)

This week we had the chance to go visit Milan again! As always, it's a terribly long train ride, but we survived it once again. The reason why we went up there was because there was a meeting for trainers and trainees in order to help the trainees understand how things work as well as give us trainers a refresher course. Basically, they told us what to do if we got hurt or sick, or if a bike breaks, or if an emergency happens. Nothing's super special, but all important stuff geared at helping us be more informed and more efficient. It was nice though to see many of my good friends there as well, since many of them are training or for some reason or another showed up to the church building we were in.

We also found some cool places to explore in Ancona as well! There is apparently an abandoned fort in the top of the highest peak overlooking the ocean. It's open for people to walk through the grounds (but not the buildings, sadly haha) and it's pretty sweet, kinda like Chernobyl in a way! Here's a picture of the view from atop the peak; in the foreground is a super old Jewish cemetery (or at least it looks super old):

And here's also a random art price that we found that was pretty awesome. It's called "La Porta di Nu" if I remember correctly:

Lately I've been reading in the book of Alma in the Book of Mormon about the conflicts between the Nephites (the good guys) and the Lamanites (the bad guys). The Nephites had relatively recently switched from a monarchal government to a more democratic form of government and two decades later there apparently still existed a faction of opposers of the change. They referred to themselves as kingmen and advocated for there to be a king once again set up in the place of their "chief judge". They didn't have much success and when the matter was put to a vote, the voice of the people expressed that they would much rather have the freedom to choose their rulers. Eventually a portion of these kingmen dissented from the Nephites and joined the Lamanites and proceeded to rally them up to go to war with the Nephites. This began a long and difficult war between the two groups where one group was fighting unjustly for greater power and the other fighting (or rather defending) for their liberties and lives.

A prominent figure in the recount of this conflict was a man named Moroni, who was the captain of the Nephite armies. He was a man of great integrity and faith and when the liberty of his people was threatened, he was the man everyone turned to for the defense of the people. Alma 48:16 sheds some light on the type of person Captain Moroni was. It explains that Captain Moroni's "heart did glory in [the defense of his people]; not in the shedding of blood but in doing good, in preserving his people, yea, in keeping the commandments of God, yea, and resisting iniquity." Clearly from this verse we can gather that he was a great guy, whose glory was in doing good, but verse  17 sheds even more light onto the quality of his character when it says, "Yea, verily, verily I say unto you, if all men had been, and were, and ever would be, like unto Moroni, behold, the very powers of hell would have been shaken forever; yea, the devil would never have power over the hearts of the children of men."

What a statement! Basically, if everyone was like Moroni, there would be no evil in the world, because we would all be beyond the influence of it! He was a man whose heart was set entirely on doing what was right and he was driven by the cause of freedom and defense of the many things he was grateful for, like his family, his country, and his right to worship (Alma 46:12). Imagine if we were all a little more like Moroni! Imagine if we were all a little more committed to "doing good,... keeping the commandments of God,... and resisting iniquity"! The world would be a much better place, without a doubt. Take some time today and think about this; think of ways you can be more fully dedicated to good causes and good things and remember the promised blessings, including that, if we would all do it, then "the very powers of hell would be shaken forever". We may not be able to convince everyone to be more like Moroni, but if we can do our part, then I am certain that we can make a difference, even in our own small ways. As Mother Teresa once said, "What we do is nothing but a drop in the ocean, but if we didn’t do it, the ocean would be one drop less."

I hope you have a great week and that you find even more ways to be even more valiant in "doing good"!

-Anziano Jake Wilkinson

The Gospel Blesses Families

(Elder Cummings)

Yesterday Foua, Leng, Chen, Teng, Rose, and Kou all came to church.  They are one big happy family all together!  The baptism for mom and the oldest two will be next weekend.  They are excited.  It has been a process for sure.

We were talking to Foua about when things really changed.  She has had missionary contact since 2009, and was never willing to come to church and even talk with the missionaries about baptism until very recently.  What was it?  She began reading in the Book of Mormon every day.

Everyone has their own conversion process, but gaining a testimony of the Book of Mormon is essential for each convert into the church.  From a testimony of the Book of Mormon a sure testimony is gained of Jesus Christ and his work on the earth.  As Foua has studied the words of prophets in the Bible, but especially in the Book of Mormon, she has grown in faith, and now moves forward with baptism unto repentance.

The Book of Mormon invites all to come unto Christ.  Read it!

With love,

Elder Cummings

Halloween, New Companion, & an African woman gave me a dress

(Sister Ellsworth)

Ola!

We had a crazy week this week! It started off with a companion transfer and I have a new companion named Sister Oliver. She's from Washington State and has been in Portugal for one year. (Yeah she's old...) Haha. I made it to my four month mark this week! Can you believe it? Whew. Some days it feels like I've been here forever and some days it feels like it's only been a few days. My companion is from the United States but we only speak Portuguese. I haven't spoken any English for almost 5 days (besides a couple of specific vocabulary words). Wooooooot! She's a really fun companion. We love to mess with the Elders, as seen in one of the photos. That was after they had scared us during lunch at the Chapel and caused us to drop our lunch all over the floor. We printed out pictures of them and left them all over their door. The sticky note says "tomem cuidado" which means take caution. Stay tuned for more pranks....

Also, weird thing happened this week. We were talking to this big ol' mama African lady, you know like one of those ladies from the deep south except Portuguese style so a lot more sass and attitude, and I wanted to be nice so I told her I absolutely loved her African dress. She invited us into her house to talk, sat us down on the couch, disappeared into another room, and came back with African dresses for the both of us. So now we have legit African dresses! Haha! Her son is marked for baptism in a few weeks.

One thing about Portugal is basically everyone is learning English and so sometimes people will ask us to teach them English words and such. Manuela was being all sassy with us and the Elders, teasing us about random things and I tried to teach her the word sassy. She thought about it for a second and responded in a thick Portuguese accent: "I am sexy?" All of us missionaries were doubled over in laughter. Then she tried to correct herself and asked: " I'm saucy?" We spent 5 minutes trying to help her say sassy but it just wasn't quite right every time.

A few of you were asking for my address and here it is:

Rua Jorge Barradas 14C

1500-370 Lisboa

Portugal

I WOULD LOVE LETTERS! We only get mail once a month or so, basically whenever someone goes to the mission office, so it's a real treat to get mail.

As for Halloween, they don't really celebrate it here like they do in the States. They will buy costumes and such but don't go trick or treating or carve pumpkins. We have an activity tonight to teach the members how to make caramel apples and carve pumpkins.

Don't mess with the sisters!

Our authentic Halloween costumes

AMO VOCÊS!!!

Sister Ellsworth

Buon Halloween!

(Anziano Wilkinson)

This year's Halloween was admittedly not very eventful for us; just any other day pretty much. Halloween is just barely starting to become an observed holiday in Italy and as of yet they're still at the stage where old people get quite confused when kids come up to their door saying "dolcetto o scherzetto!" (trick or treat!). I'd say they've still got a few decades before they'll be up to pace with America haha. On the bright side though, we happened to get a ton of food given to us on Halloween. I guess this year a bulging sac of food will have to do in place of a bulging sac of candy!

On another note, Anziano Larsen and I recently met a kid named Jackie who is a pretty solid magician! When I first saw him, he was deftly moving a deck of cards around in his hands, swiftly maneuvering individual cards and periodically shuffling in a way that appeared very skilled. I recognized immediately that he would know a magic trick or two, so I asked him to show me one. He proceeded to show me a seemingly impossible (as always haha) trick where he practically made my card appear out of thin air. Then he showed me another and another, each one just as amazing as the last. I was quite impressed, to say the least!

We got to talking and eventually I asked him if he would be willing to listen to our message about the restoration of the gospel and he agreed. As we explained to him the doctrines of the restoration, he became quite interested, asking dozens of questions about prophets, the atonement, and the Book of Mormon. As for his religious background, he doesn't really have one. He believes in God and is part of a christian family, but he's rarely ever been to church and never read the bible, but it was clear to see that when we started expounding on these simple doctrines that gears were turning in his head. Gaps were being filled and understanding multiplied as we shed new light into his heart.

This experience got me thinking about truth and how it works. Prophets teach us that all truth can be gathered into one great whole, whether it come out of the mouth of one of God's spokespersons or out of a science lab; it's all the same and all comes from the same source, which is our Father in Heaven. With a puzzle, when we have all the puzzle pieces, then there is only one obvious way that it all fits together smoothly and creates a whole image. And truth is the same way! If we were to have all the pieces, then they would all fit together nice and snugly and it would make perfect sense; there would be no confusion. But the problem is that in this life we simply don't have all the puzzle pieces and, by design, as long as we're still on the earth we never will manage to gather all the pieces. On one end of this puzzle we have religious truth, which is complete enough for us to see the image that is starting to take shape, depicted in bright, vibrant colors. On the other end of this puzzle we have scientific truth, also depicted in bright, vibrant colors, but colors from a different spectrum. In times past, the lack of scientific knowledge left this part of the puzzle quite unfinished and indistinct, so it wasn't hard for people to believe that all of the puzzle pieces belonged to the same puzzle. But now, with today's much more developed understanding of scientific truth, we can see the image start to take shape. Yet from what it seems, it almost looks like an entirely different puzzle from the first, since the colors are different and the images don't seem to align yet. This causes many to proclaim that they are two separate puzzles and in fact do not go together at all. They say that one puzzle depicts fanaticism and falsehoods while the other depicts truth and reason and thus they do not go together. They complain that the puzzle of truth would have been long ago finished if its pieces hadn't been mixed with those of an entirely different puzzle. Sadly, many deny true science while many others deny true religion.

The truth is, however, that both halves belong to the same puzzle and that ignoring or rejecting one half or the other is to ignore or reject half of the truth. Let us not forget that all truth comes from the same God and that he is not limited to only physical or only spiritual means of communicating it. Truth is truth, so let us be grateful for that portion we have and diligently and humbly seek that portion we lack. One day it will become quite clear to us all how the two halves of this puzzle fit together, so let's not hyperventilate if for right now we can't see it all!

Anyway, I hope you had a great Halloween and that November proves to be just as good!

-Anziano Jake Wilkinson