Dear mom,
This last week was super awesome as well. You’ll have to read the story I wrote in dads email about the woman with the Alma experience. It’s a pretty intense one.
Sounds like everything is going pretty well back home.
It’s cool to hear that everyone is starting to move out east! That would be super awesome if Chad got the job in Philly! We could go see them all the time! And also Philly is a pretty sweet city, except all the murders and drugs and stuff like that...
Good to hear that everything is working out with Jess. And good to know the Jacksons are such good friends! It’s for sure an answer to her prayers! And that is a pretty funny story about the battery! Haha made me laugh.
It’s pretty nuts that Heathers gonna be having another baby anytime now! You guys will have to send me pictures! Hope everything is going well with the baby, I’ll be praying for her.
Transfers were yesterday and I stayed here in the same area (Limeira) with the same companion. This transfers gonna rock! We got a bunch of people who are very possible to be baptized this transfer so it should be a really good and busy one. Today we’re gonna go and play some soccer with some of the members and try to get some investigators to go with us so that should be pretty fun.
It’s funny that you sent me a quote by Gordon B Hinckley cause my comps family did to but the one he got was ´you can be smart and happy, or stupid and miserable... It’s your choice` haha I thought that one was pretty funny, but also true. It really is just a choice that we make. We can live seeking knowledge and happiness, or we cannot, and be stupid and miserable. So I just hope I always stay on the side of happiness. I also like that other one you sent me. It really is true that people don’t just come into our lives for no reason. We all have something to learn and something to give.
I’ll be praying for you guys.
Love,
Elder Raleigh
Dear dad,
So what you said about the double helix thing is exactly what I was saying about to my companion this last week! I think I’m gonna like this talk! (I kinda pictured it as a circle and each category had like a bar that grew taller every time it goes around. That’s crazy we had the same idea of it! I think this talk is exactly what I was looking for so thank you.
(See: http://www.lds.org/broadcast/misc/CES_2006_Eve_BednarDA_%20SeekLearningByFaith_00920_000.pdf)
Sorry to hear life is so busy there. Life is pretty busy here too. Yesterday was transfers and I stayed in the same area again, which is the city of Limeira in the State of São Paulo. I’m pretty happy about staying here. It feels like home now haha.
This week we’re gonna help some people get married so that we can baptize them so that should be a pretty cool experience. We taught them this last week and the spirit guided that lesson like I’ve never seen before! The girl had a crazy experience! So she kinda struggles with depression and this past week it started to have a really physical effect on her and her heart was having trouble beating and so they went to the hospital and she almost died! But in the moment she felt like she was gonna die she realized she wasn’t ready and she remembered all her sins and things she hadn’t resolved and remembered Christ. In that moment she put out the strength to say out loud “Jesus me salva” three times, which means Jesus save me, and immediately she felt better and her heart started to work okay again. So then we were there like a few days later and didn’t know that this had happened at all and she told us about it. And here is the miracle that morning me and my companion studied that part in the book of Mormon where Alma is struck dumb and suffers for all his sins and it is almost exactly what happened to her! So we read that to her and the spirit was super powerful! We all learned something during that lesson, but I think the main thing is that sometimes we are given things in this life that are way too much for us to handle but if we just call on the name of the lord he will save us. The only reason anyone ever falls and stays fallen is because they just don’t ask for a hand to stand back up. Through this experience we all realized the very real power that Christ has to save us. So by the end of this lesson they both had a baptismal date and a date set to go and get their marriage rolling. They realized that Christ saved her for a reason and that she should make the best of it now. At the end my companion asked them how they felt and they said it was hard to describe but they felt like they wanted to let out a laugh but didn’t know why and just felt at peace. It was a truly miraculous experience and I’m glad I got to be a part of it.
So that was probably the coolest thing to happen so far on my mission haha. So things are going really good here. And I’m working on the language still and on my conversational skills. I can pretty much have a conversation just until someone says a really big or uncommon word. Haha but I can pretty much understand everything that people are saying so that’s kinda cool.
I hope everything keeps going good back home! I’ll be praying for you guys! Man times going fast! At the end of this transfer I’ll have been out for 6 months already!
Love,
Elder Raleigh