Roubando Cigarros

(Sister Ellsworth)

Hey yall!

This week was fun. We ran around talking to people and having fun. I think one of my favorite moments was when our investigator, Antonio, gave us a huge handful of cigarettes. We have been working with him for nearly 4 months and finally he called us almost in tears saying that he was sick of being addicted and brought us these. I saw a man really come to his knees and plead for help. We taught him about the Atonement and before he left he managed a smile and promised to read.

Take that!!! Haha

The later at church we had all these cigarettes in my bag (i forgot to take them out) and in Gospel Principles I pulled out my scriptures and all of them came tumbling out. Then the Patriarch asked for all of them and took the filters off and handed me back the white part. I was like... why?? and apparently the filter stops cuts really well. LOL I love being in an area where all the members are converts!

Other than that it was pretty uneventful. The Church is still true!

Sister Ellsworth

D&C 31:3

(Aldste Cummings)

Tjena!

This week has been wild.

We woke up on Monday at 2:30 AM to arrive in Sweden at 6:00 AM Tuesday (Sweden time). I couldn't fall asleep on the plane and we didn't get to go to bed until 10:30 PM that night. So we had been up for 36 hours by the time we finally got some rest.

I have been assigned to serve in Skövde with Elder Martineau! It's a medium-sized college town near Göteborg. It's been pretty great. We have been working pretty hard and have been very busy. The congregation here is pretty small--around 30 members come to church on a good day--but they're hardworking and we are too. Together, we make a good team.

Weird experience of the week: A schizophrenic lady with no pants walked in on a lesson we were teaching and spent the next 15 minutes talking about how much she wanted to bear the children of the man we were teaching. I would explain more, but it would just make less sense.

I chose the verse above this week because it reminds me of how important this work is. Sometimes, you can get dragged down in how difficult it is and how often you get rejected or how tired you are, but the Lord councils us to rejoice in it. I am here to do His work and there is no greater call. I really could not be spending my time right now in a better way and I am so excited to keep going at it for the next two years.

I love this work. I know Christ lives and is our Savior.

Love,

Äldste Cummings

Fall In Portugal

(Sister Ellsworth)

Hey! There are many stories that happened this week... It rained once. Apparently that means it's fall now! And it rained on Pday and I'm not quite sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing but we went out to see Rossio and Santa Apolonia anyway. We went with a huuuuge group of Elders. Our zone has 30 elders and 6 sisters. It was us and half the elders so it made for some pretty fun and crazy adventures.

We had a couple of lessons with some lazy investigators and gave them the whole 1-2 thing. It's basically where you give a really powerful stop-being-lazy-and-do-the-things lesson and they wrestle with the spirit the whole time. One decided to start reading and the other kinda just backed off and continued to run. That's okay. Area book, right?

We had a fantastic Zone conference though. Our president gave an awesome training on being a Woken up missionary. You can look the scriptures up later because they're pretty cool. (2 Nephi 1:13, Alma 12:11, 2 Nephi 4:28,  Psalms 24:3-4, Mormon 9:27, Alma 5:7, and Mosias 4:5.) I would also add Revelations 3:16 and Mosias 4:27.

He talked about waking up is when your conversion takes place and you being to understand how the Atonement works and why it works. You start to work because you love the Lord and not just because your District leader is going to call that night and ask when happened or that the Zone leaders are pushing and pushing for numbers. One of my companions asked me once how she can work tirelessly and we had a good long talk about how the good missionaries are the ones that try and don't stop trying. They're the ones that work hard when no one is watching, the ones that smile and are happy when talking to people even if they know that they are standing in fresh poop (that happened this week too XD).

I think the most important thing I've learned so far is how to love being a missionary. This is the best thing I've ever done and I've never been so happy (and so exhausted) in my life. I mean just look at this beautiful place....

Rossio

top of a restaurante named Bellalisa in Rossio. You could see all of Lisbon. We stayed there for a long time :)

​bahahaha *points finger and laughs* Oh tourists. You're so funny with your crazy sunburns. She had a white hand mark on her arm from sunscreen.... you gotta rub it in honey......

Love you all, Sister Ellsworth

Arrived Safely in Sweden

(Aldste Cummings)

Raw Eggs, Animals and Brazilians

(Sister Ellsworth)

Hey yall!!

This week was pretty fun... Telo smashed a raw egg on my head. C'mon guys I need ideas for missionary appropriate revenge.... LOL!

We had divisions this week with Sister Salas and Sister Pastrana. Sister Salas and I stayed here in Povoa while our greenies wandered around in another area... lost and scared without their moms. Haha! Sister Salas and I had a party here were we hit the ground running.... Literally. We were late for like everything but we taught a bunch of lessons and contacted a bunch of really cool people.

We were walking in the road and we basically found a picture of Portugal.

This is an underground trashcan that is so full of beer bottles that it's over flowing. We left a Word of Wisdom pamphlet :)

We found a new best friend!! It's a little teeny tiny lizard that hung out with us and rode around on my shirt for a while. He was so cute!!!

Also there's a petting zoo really close to our house and one day the peacocks got out and we helped chase them back into their pens!

Okay I swear I'm doing missionary work and not just playing with animals XD

We also found this Brazilian family this week. The mom had talked to the Elders a while ago and invited us back and we heard their whole life story in an hour. We laughed and cried and groaned and now we're best friends. The best part was hearing that they believed that God sent us to teach them about God.

Love you guys! Have a great day!

Sister Ellsworth

2 Nephi 25:16

(Aldste Cummings)

Hej hej,

This week has been so crazy. We got our flight plans. We're heading out of here at 3:30AM on Monday and will land in Stockholm at 7:00AM on Tuesday with a short (literally 1 hour) layover at JFK. We are so excited. I can't wait to get over there and be completely blown away by how little Swedish I actually know/can understand. I can tell you all about the Gospel of Jesus Christ in Swedish, but I have none of the vocabulary needed to order a meal or anything of the like. I guess that's just something you pick up in the field.

I had a fun experience this week with my companion, Elder Bird. His permanent retainer broke so we got to take an exciting off-campus trip to the orthodontist. It was the chillest orthodontist office ever. they let us sign our names on the wall like they do with their other patients and they gave us free slushies afterwards. It was so fun.

Anyway, this week I've been thinking a lot about how important the Gospel of Jesus Christ is. A quote from our missionary teaching guide entitled "Preach My Gospel" states it very to-the-point:

"Regardless of needs or problems, all people are best helped as they accept and live the gospel."

At first this may seem rather unqualified and and a blatant generalization, but the more you think about it, the more you realize that it's true.

Given that Jesus is the Christ and the reality of His Atonement and Resurrection, is it not true that it is through Him that we can receive all the help we need in this life and more? Through His Atonement, He took upon Himself the pains and sins and afflictions of the world so that He may know how to help us in those very same pains and sins and afflictions. He is the perfect sympathizer and thus is the perfect panacea for all mankind. He is the Light of the World, the Living Water, and the Bread of Life. Dependence on Him for succor and salvation is perhaps the only thing that every single human that has ever and will ever live share with each other. It doesn't matter where you come from or what has happened in your life, Christ Jesus is the answer. He unifies humankind.

Knowing this, its no surprise that we have a responsibility to "talk of Christ, rejoice in Christ, preach of Christ" and so forth. He is the way the light and the life (John 14:6).

I know He lives, I know He loves us, and I know that through Him we can find everything we ever need in this life or the life to come.

Äldste Cummings

Greenie Happenings, Resurrection of Investigators and Cake

(Sister Ellsworth)

Hey Yall!

Well this week was quite interesting... Training is really fun, exhausting, and lots of work. My comp is still learning the language so it makes teaching and talking in general hard for her but she's a trooper.

This week one of our investigators was resurrected. Like his family told us that he died. And then he tapped me on the shoulder in the park. You could have picked my jaw up off the ground and restarted my heart. He was one of my first investigators here in Povoa and after he went to church on that Sunday he had a stroke. we didn't know so we passed by for an appointment during the week but his wife was wailing that he had died.... But then we found him again this week happy and smiling. It was super weird and I'm still half convinced that he died. But you know you can't shake a dead man's hand...

We had a couple of really hot days this week and at 3 pm there was no shade so we visited some recent converts and they gave us cake. Cake is awesome.

As we were leaving their house this lady in a night gown hollered at us from across the road (it was like 4 in the afternoon). She was waving her arms around and hollering "Jesus girls, Jesus girls!!" So I smiled and went over to talk to her. This 40 ish yeah old woman was completely drunk. She was drenched head to toe in very strong perfume. She began yelling/slurring that she need us to pray for her friend who wouldn't open the door. I asked if her friend was sick and this lady turned around to this brick wall, knocks on it like it was a door, and hollers to her "friend" to come out. Trying not to laugh I suggested that we pray with her and then she can come back in a few hours to see if her friend came home. She agrees and then raises her hands above her head and starts hollering the Lord's Prayer at the heavens. But instead of saying "In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost" she starts repeating "In the name of the Pope, the Son, and the other one." As she was praying her eyes were rolled back and she stumbles backwards and bumps into the brick wall and says to the wall, "Oh sorry, sir. Have a good day." I almost lost it. My companion wasn't understanding this crazy drunk lady but I had to stuff my hand in my mouth to keep from laughing. Then the lady thanks us and walks away for a couple of feet and stops, turns, comes back, and the whole situation repeats itself three times. It was probably the funniest thing that has ever happened here.

Then we taught English class which was a whole other adventure. We had a race in between the missionaries and the students to see who could list the most words in the other language. Some of the words that the Portuguese students wrote were so funny... including these new "recently discovered" animals: Beax (bear) Birde (bird) Snack (snake) Kankopoo (kangaroo) Rabbic (rabbit) Camil (camel) Chark (shark) Pavo (peacock) and other beauties. It was a really fun class. :)

Sunday afternoon in Povoa... 98 degrees and not a living soul on the road. Knock all the doors!!!

Love you!

Sister Ellsworth