Hello my pretties! Thanks for all the emails and stuff, I love getting em' back and it's cool to catch up on you all. Anyway some crazy (well not too crazy really) stuff happened this week so I'm gonna catch you up with some stories first.
Well Wednesday we were out trying to hit a zone goal we had of everyone in the zone getting 20 meaningful conversations that day. Meaningful conversations include good contacts, lessons, less-active visits and stuff like that. Anyway we were at around 16 or so when we took off to have dinner at the legendary Sis. Randlof's apartment complex (we don't go into her apartment with her, that would be sinning so don't get your knickers in a twist). On the way there we pass by some train tracks that go through a major intersection but they have lights for the trains too (weird right?) so it pretty much runs like a normal intersection. Anyway, when I hit the intersection the light was green but right after that it went super fast. I looked back to see if Elder Richeson was gonna follow or not but didn't look that far because a train was about 30 feet away going full speed! I was like "Well, Brazil can wait till the after life I guess" But not really, the train just honked real loud and didn't actually come anywhere too close to me. It was a wake up for sure though cause I thought Elder Richeson had followed me! I turned around and could see him till the train passed and basically freaked out for 30 seconds thinking I had killed my companion. He's fine though, he just punched the train off the tracks (not really, he just circled back). End of story we're both fine but were kinda freaked out.
So Sunday was da bomb. Elder Ballard (yes, the apostle, who else would it be?) came and spoke to our mission! First off he's a lot shorter than your think. I'm 5'8" and I looked down to him when we shook hands (haven't washed it! jk) so that was a bit of surprise. Second he was really informal. Yes, he was every inspirational and apostolic and all that but he was cracking jokes and making side comments the entire time. At one point he said "Your mission president is a great man, I hate to tell you this though..... He married way over his head. I'm not sure how he pulled it off but he did" He told us some cool stories and some funny ones too but we learned so much from him it was awesome. We were told to show up with questions written down that we wanted answers to just in case we did a Q&A with him, but we didn't need to for me. He actually spoke on the two topics I was thinking about! Talk about inspiration! The spirit was so strong too you could practically feel the angels around us. It was something I'm sure I'll never forget.
So this week in my attempt at spirituality I want to talk about something Paul says in Romans that I really liked. He said in Romans 8:
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be
able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
I loved that so much this week. It came to me in a time that I was pretty down and needed a bit of help. I just love in 38 & 39 there about nothing will separate us. God will always love us and always want us to come back, Even if we are ungrateful, unprofitable and unworthy servants. Just keep that in mind whenever you feel down. God will always take us back. We might need to do a little work to be able to feel comfortable with that and there may be some repenting to do but God always is on your side and wants your back.
I hope you all have a great week, especially all those that just got out of school! Parents I hope you have a lot of patience.
- Um no exercito de Deus
Elder Teela
Elder Teela
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