Devotionals, Talks and Other Stuff

(Sister Ellsworth)

Alô ao todo mundo!!

Another week has come and gone. We had a blast with miracles! First off on Monday I brought my poor companion to the Mission Home and she died. Hehe. The next day I went with some other sisters to go get our new companions. I'm serving with Sister dos Santos now and she's awesome. She's from Porto so I'll finally be learning how to speak Portuguese!! Haha. She loves to laugh and have fun and has a super strong testimony.

On Wednesday we went to a Devotional with Elder Owen and Elder Durrant. It was awesome! We learned a lot and we were excited to try new contacting and teaching technics. During the week we starting contacting people using the new phrase they suggested which is: "Would you be willing to hear a brief message about ....." There was one day when we were walking towards the chapel and I looked to the side and I saw a woman sitting in the passenger seat of a parked car. She was older, about 50, and it looked like she was sleeping. I had the thought to go talk to her but thought, no she's sleeping. Then I was like.. What the heck am I doing?! Don't ignore spiritual promptings!! So I stopped in my tracks and ran back to tap on the glass. I told her that we were doing a project to help people have more hope. She gave a smile smile and declined. I could tell that something was up so I asked her what was going on and she gave me a surprised look. Then told us that she had been diagnosed with lung cancer. I gave her card of Christ and she offered to let us come by and talk to her for a bit. #MIRACLES

On Sunday my companion and I were emergency speakers lol. It happens more often than you think... But we talked about prayer and scriptures. I realized that I while I was speaking you could see exactly who was reading and praying. You could see it in their faces... It made me think a little bit about our personal preparation for the Second Coming. Recently and ever since Adam the prophets and apostles have asked us over and over to have daily scripture study and to always have a prayer in the heart.

Have a good week!

Sister Ellsworth

D&C 18:10

(Aldste Cummings)

Tjena!

This week has been pretty busy and things are only going to get busier. We had zone conference on Thursday and it was so great. President Youngberg is most definitely inspired. The big takeaways that Elder Martineau and I have started to apply in our own work is experimenting with new contacting approaches on the street and working with local church members individually on personal mission plans so they can start getting more involved. Elder Martineau and I have a vision for Skövde. The only sad thing is that one of us is probably transferring to another area next week.

Yesterday, we witnessed a miracle. About 10 weeks ago, Elder Martineau randomly visited a less active member we found on the phone. His name is Amir, he's about 25, from Iran, has been living in Sweden for 7 years, and was baptized about 3 years ago. He doesn't actually have "uppehölls tillstånd" which is actual permission from the state of Sweden to stay in the country so his boss sort of takes advantage of him by forcing him to work nearly 100 hour weeks in his pizza parlor. He can't quit because without a job (which is very difficult for an immigrant without tillstånd to get), he won't get any money, and will most certainly be denied tillstånd and sent back to Iran.

Well, he found the time to come to church two weeks ago and absolutely loved it. He told us that he had decided to start coming back to church regularly. Within that week, he received tillstånd from the government! Now he can quit his job, go to school and get a degree and start a real profession. Yesterday at church, he was ordained to the priesthood and I could not have been happier. It was so amazing to see how much God loves His children. Seeing Amir there, seeing how happy he was, how much faith he had, and his desire to come closer to God made me feel just a tiny bit of what I imagine God feels when He watches us take steps to come back to Him.

It was such a beautiful experience. God really loves each and every one of us regardless of who we are or what we have done. His greatest joy is seeing His children returning to His arms and becoming purified in Christ.

Love,

Äldste Cummings

John 7:17

(Aldste Cummings)

Hey all!

This week was pretty interesting. We did a lot of work meeting folks and finding some more on the streets of Skövde. A few highlights that I can think of include:

1. I was on splits with Elder Helm from Borås. He accidentally called someone in our contacts who told us she wasn't interested a few weeks ago. She didn't pick up the phone but she did send a text saying that if we ever contacted her again she would call the police. That was kinda funny.

2. Elder Martineau and I made a deal that if he ate a teaspoon of wasabi then I would eat the rest of our jar of low-quality bread and butter pickles by the end of the day (there was about a pound of pickles left). So he ate the wasabi and had a terrible experience with it. So then I had to eat the rest of the pickles which was a different kind of pain. The wasabi was a quick intense pain. The pickles were a long, mentally and emotionally draining process. I was literally dreading putting more pickles in my mouth by the end of it. A lose-lose really.

3. It was Elder Martineau's birthday on Saturday! He turned 20. So we made banana bread and lit some candles and then got sushi later in the day.

The scripture I chose this week is something that we've been emphasizing lately with our investigators and something that I have seen in my own life. The Savior teaches us a very logical concept: We learn truth by first acting in faith and experiencing how it effects us in our lives. Or to put it more crudely: You can't knock it 'till you've tried it.

I've had countless conversations with people who try to convince me that the Book of Mormon isn't true. I listen to what they have to say and then ask them if they've read it. And the answer always is that they haven't. The truly sad part, however, is when they refuse to read it. How can you possibly know if something is true or false if you haven't taken the time to learn about it or apply it in your life?

The gospel may seem a little backwards to people who expect to know if something is true before they act on it. But like Alma teaches in Alma 32, that requires no faith. The Lord requires us to have faith in Him and take the first few steps, then we can know by our own experience that the doctrine is true.

Love,

Äldste Cummings

Transfers, Baptism, and Holy moly its cold!

(Sister Ellsworth)

This week was good! We got a call from Miguel and he passed his baptismal interview and was baptized Sunday after church! He's a great guy. The way we found him was a miracle! We were having a few weeks where a lot of our investigators weren't progressing and a lot of appointments were falling through. Our faithful District Leader promised us that we found find someone that was prepared for baptism. The next day we lost even more appointments but then we got a call from a random number saying he was at the airport on the way home from Angola and wanted to talk to us. He got to Costa da Caparica and sat down with his suitcases to talk to us. We marked him for baptism and he was baptized two weeks later! It was an awesome experience.

​Miguel and a random member lol

Tanya!!! She's a recent convert and we're training her to be the next sister missionary! haha!

​Rodrigo!! He's one of our super good friends. He's from Brasil!

As for my last transfer I'm going to stay here in Costa da Caparica! I'll be serving with Sister dos Santos. It's gonna be good!!

As I was listening to the testimonies during Sacrament meeting this week one of the members talked about how this week she felt frustrated about not receiving answers to her prayers and that she felt sick of always having faith. Then she shared an experience about how the Holy Ghost comforted her and reminded her that these experiences are what will help her grow. I smiled and remembered all the times I felt too tired. I think in my journal I wrote that I was exhausted more times than I can count but it's so worth it. I look back on the last 17 months and it's the best thing I've ever done. I learned so much, met so many awesome people, and really come to know who I am and who I can become. I love being a missionary!! Haha

Love,

Sister Ellsworth

D & C 122:8

Hej hej!

This week was pretty great. We did lots of finding work and were able to talk to tons of people. Our most positive investigators where out of town so we didn't really get to meet them. But that enabled us to spend a little bit more time with some investigators that we haven't really been able to devote a lot of time to because of other things going on. We had a couple of break through lessons with some people. It was just a really good week.

We made pumpkin bread! The don't sell pumpkin puree in Sweden so we had to buy a pumpkin and roast and puree it ourselves. The bread turned out great. A little reminder of home.

This weeks scripture is a pretty special one for me. It's one that has helped me through a lot of things in my life. We all go through trials and sometimes we wonder why it is that God has allowed us to suffer so. We feel that the pain or grief is undeserved or unwarranted. Yet this simple verse can change our perspective completely if we are willing to let it.

For context, the verse follows a string of verses containing  very serious trials that could potentially afflict Joseph Smith but then continues to end with:

"The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?"

We must always remember that the Lord Jesus Christ was the most perfect person to ever live. The most undeserving of pain and suffering. But he suffered more than we ever could. For us to assume that our lives are unfair is to consider ourselves greater than Christ Himself. In the face of affliction, we must humble ourselves and look to Christ Jesus for our example and our strength.

I hope you all have a great week!

Love,

Äldste Cummings

Puzzles, Sacred Cigarettes, CTMM

(Sister Ellsworth)

Hey!

This week was fun! Sister Selman and I went on another adventure. So here in Portugal they have Chinese stores that sell super cheap junk... Kinda like the dollar store and it's literally a missionary's favorite place. We went hunting to find something to help one of our investigators understand how the Restoration works and that being part of any church doesn't save you. So we found this little puzzle book with lots of little puzzle pieces. It worked out that we took one piece from each page to create a new puzzle that didn't make any sense at all. Kinda like this:

So on our way to our lesson we found two of our friends and one asked why I was carrying around a kid's puzzle book. I explained that the puzzle was broken and asked them to fix it. The Jose and Zé, two grown men started to try to put the puzzle together without 90 percent of the puzzle. It was so funny to watch them argue about where the pieces go. Then we explained how we created the new puzzle using parts of the old puzzle, in the same way how people created churches using parts of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Then we gave them the rest of the puzzles and explained how God restored all the pieces of the Gospel.

We also met with one of our investigators that has problems to stop smoking and we came up with the classic idea to make some celestial cigarettes. We took an empty box of cigarettes and decorated it with pictures of Christ and inspirational quotes. We passed Rodrigo by and told him that we had a surprise for him and we wanted him to guess what it was. He laughed and said... "Hm... What is the most rediculous thing I can think of..... Something you guys would never do... I know! Sacred cigarettes!" We looked at each other and started laughing and showed him the box. He looked at us and was like.. Seriously? and then busted up laughing!

Other than that it was a week of lots of work!

Love you guys,

Sister Ellsworth

​

BATISMOOOO!!!

(Sister Ellsworth)

WHOOOOO!!!!!

We had a miracle baptism this week!

One of our friends Elton who was marked for baptism next week called on Tuesday and said he was going to move to Germany on Friday. We were like..... what..... So we asked him if he wanted to be baptized before he left and he said that he wanted to receive an answer from God first. So we fasted like never before and on Wednesday we met with him and asked if he had received an answer and he looked at us completely distraught and said that he hadn't and that he wouldn't be baptized. I thought a little bit and asked him what he did to look for an answer and he responded that he prayed and then went to bed. I was like... did you read the scriptures..? Or listen for the Holy Ghost? And he said no. We smiled and explained how if we want to talk to God then we pray but if we want God to talk to us then we read the scriptures! Elton didn't even wait for us to finish. He dropped to his knees and said a long silent prayer. After he was finished he sat back in the chair, grabbed his Book of Mormon and let it fall open.

It opened to 2 Nephi 31. He started reading in verse 13 which says:

Wherefore, my beloved brethren, I know that if ye shall follow the Son, with full purpose of heart, acting no hypocrisy and no deception before God, but with real intent, repenting of your sins, witnessing unto the Father that ye are willing to take upon you the name of Christ, by baptism—yea, by following your Lord and your Savior down into the water, according to his word, behold, then shall ye receive the Holy Ghost; yea, then cometh the baptism of fire and of the Holy Ghost; and then can ye speak with the tongue of angels, and shout praises unto the Holy One of Israel.

Elton start to laugh! He look at us and said "Well, I guess God wants me to be baptized in Portugal!!" So we ran to get everything organized, called our District leader for an interview and called President for permission to confirm him and on Thursday night Elton was baptized!!!

WhOOOooOOHOoOOOO!!

My comp and I are also writing a song because both of us are going to stay here forever. It goes to the tune of Let it Go.

The lights glow bright on the airplane tonight, no companion to be seen.

14 hours in isolation, and for the first time, I'm in jeans.

You feel like crying when your mission bids goodbye.

They didn't let me extend, heaven knows I tried.

Don't let me go, don't make me leave,

I still haven't made it to AP!

Just 6 more weeks and then I'll see...

Family!

I won't go.

I won't go.

You can't make me pack anymore!

I won't go! I won't go!

I'm gonna stay here in Portugal!

And I don't care what President will say

Let this song be sung!

We were never gonna train anyway.

It's funny how the mission makes you gain 15 pounds

and the fear that now controls me is when the plane hits the ground!

Still some time to see what I can do

To teach some lessons to the foobs (foob = fubeca =lazy investigators in Portuguese slang).

No job no school no boys for me! I'm free!

I won't go! I won't go!

You can't make me pack anymore!

I won't go! I won't go!

I'm gonna stay here in Portugal!

And I don't care what my family will say

Let the mission roll on!

My faith is growing from my head until my feet!

My soul is reaching out to every person in the street!

The thought of going home is like a death sentence.

I'm never going back.. The mission is my life!

I won't go! I won't go!

You can't make me pack anymore!

I won't go! I won't go!

I'm gonna stay here in Portugal!

And I don't care what my boyfriend will say

Let the mission roll on!

We were never getting married anyway.

​Haha we walk in the street singing this song and duet it with the other sisters in our district.

I love my mission... so very much... I'd love to say that it's the best two years but they're only going to let me stay for 18 months... I've learned so much about who I can be and who others can be and why we're here and why everything is so important. I'm so grateful for every day and I'm grateful for a companion who loves running. (I have never ran to so many appointments or buses in my whole mission... The people here in Costa know us as the Maratonas, the Mormon marathoners.)

Love you all!!

Have a great week.

Sister Ellsworth