Transfers (5/31/21)

We have had quite the last two weeks. My companion got transferred from another city here in Goiania, which will make his time here in Goiania a little over a year. I got another Brazilian in my area, and he is coming from another city here in Goiania also. A fun little fact: both my zone leaders and my companion all were in the same MTC district and group and now they are together. Kinda fun. 

There have been a few things that have stood out to me this last week. First is the temperature. For some reason, it feels like it is getting hotter here. Maybe it's just me getting weaker. The second is the words hear and hearken. The third is the Spirit. 

Hear and hearken are really interesting. You really have to put yourself in situations where you can hear the spirit. I am learning so much about how we seriously cannot survive without the spirit in these, the latter days. But when we hear, we need to hearken. If we only do one, then it really profits us nothing. If we hear the voice of the Lord but don't do anything about it, why did we even hear it in the first place? They go hand in hand, and we need to use them both. This ties right into the Spirit. We need to put ourselves in situations and places where we can hear and feel the Spirit. One of the best places is our own home. But there are definitely situations we cannot control, and I have found that in this last week. In those situations, I can still choose to do certain things, no matter what others around me are doing and no matter the situation. I can still pray when there is a lot of chaos, I can still read my scriptures in the morning, I can still be obedient to specific rules, I can still be grateful for what I have. There is great power in being grateful and having the Spirit. I truly know the Spirit can and will teach you things you need to know in any situation. My mind is brought to an experience of mine on a youth trip: one of our leaders taught us something he learned from the Spirit just from a song we listened to on the way there. An amazing lesson he taught us. An amazing feeling we felt. 

We also had a baptism on Sunday, and of course everything that could go wrong did go wrong. But in the end, it turned out really well. It started with being hungry. The baptism was originally going to be after Sacrament Meeting, and then it got changed to 3 pm. Then we were filling the font, and the water stopped. So we got a bucket and started filling the bucket and it wasn't really doing much of anything, so we stopped. Then nobody showed up. Then after a lot of chaos and calls and texts we finally got a baptism in. It was a kneeling baptism because of how little water there was, but it was great. It was really nice. This really is Jesus´ church. 

I also know that God watches over his children (you) in any and every situation. This is wonderful to know. I have seen it, and if you would like to say you haven't seen it all I have for you is look a little closer, look a little harder. It really is not hard to see God in our lives. Yes, sometimes it takes searching the little details, but that's where He works magic. The details. By small and simple means are great things brought to pass. The small things in our life bring great miracles. There is no doubt in this. 

I hope y'all have a great week and look for God's hand in your life. I hope y'all can keep the Spirit with you in any and every situation. This will bless you and strengthen your testimony about Jesus Christ also. He is our Savior, our Redeemer. He loves you. Enjoy this.

Quite the Week (5/17/21)

Hey howdy hey,

This was a good week. We were supposed to have zone conference but ended up having a mission tour with President Parrella. He's the area president for Brazil. Super cool man and super spiritual. We thought we were going to have an interview with him, but it was just the zone leaders messing with us. They messed up a few things for us but nothing major. Just caused a little bit of confusion with lunch, but we ended up having a great day in spite of it. I am learning the importance of what President Nelson said about us needing the Spirit with us every hour of every day. Missionary work doesn't work without the Spirit. 

A little bit about the contrast of using the Spirit and not using Spirit: I think the main and biggest feeling is when you go to bed. If you have the Spirit with you and you had it throughout the day, you say your nightly prayers and you feel spiritual satisfaction. It's easy to sleep, you wake up better the next day, you're happier and a better person, and you progress extremely quickly and learn extremely fast too. Words flow, thoughts come, actions are smart and easy, and everything is faster, better, and easier. Sadly, not every day is like this, but joyfully, we can make the majority of our days like this; and dare I say, we can make every day like this. It probably won't start tomorrow and last until you die. That's just not how life works. As we learn in the scriptures we gain and learn line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little. Every day we can build on yesterday's spirituality, and eventually we can get to the point where we are living that celestial lifestyle. Our thoughts and actions are those of the Lord. We become His angels to bless and uplift others in need, even when we are in need. Our days are easier, more fun, happier, and just better. I challenge all of you to try this. Like what Moroni says with prayer, we need a sincere heart and real intent, the Lord will make these things known unto you, He will reveal His mysteries and His way to you. What a blessing to believe in revelation and receive revelation. 

Something else from the mission tour that stood out to me was to ask for miracles. This has always been something hard for me, but we asked the Lord to give us miracles and guide us to those who are prepared to let God prevail in their lives. Ask and ye shall receive. We received. There were many blessings and people who answered this prayer. It is fun to meet these people. Their humble heart and true desire to grow closer to their Redeemer is wonderful. The Lord has big plans for all of His children. He loves you. Make those little changes in your behavior, thoughts, and actions to better have and feel the Spirit and you'll know more of God's plan for you faster than any other time of your life. A wonderful blessing indeed. I wish for a wonderful week for you all and that it will be filled with many spiritual experiences. Love y'all!

Elder Locey

Dia das mães (5/10/21)

Happy Mother's Day yesterday to all the mothers out there and all the mothers who have taken care of me and mothered me. I'm grateful for y'all. I forget where I heard this, but the love a mother has for her child is the closest we can get to the love our Father in Heaven (and Jesus) has for us. This is true. 

Y'all know those days and weeks when you try, but nothing works? Contacts fall though, lessons fall though, people block you, stop talking to you, etc. Something my companion said about a million times last week was, "Don't get discouraged" (or something on the lines of that). I thought of the scripture that says "let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power" (D&C 123:17), and this applies here I think. We had some good laughs, too; somebody texted my comp saying they thought he was cute. Heh. I thought it was funny.

A member also brought us lunch one day and put a little note in it for us. At first I thought it was going to be a secret combination love note, but boy howdy was I wrong. It was heartfelt indeed, but in a different way. They were full of gratitude. They also shared a scripture from Alma: by small and simple means are great things brought to pass (37:6). Every single contact we have who doesn't talk to us after, every lesson we had that doesn't bring forth fruits, etc., is simply just us preparing these people to accept and embrace Jesus Christ in the future. God is a merciful God. He gives many chances to His children, both who have accepted Jesus and who have yet to accept Him. We have this life and also the spirit world, the millennium, and many other opportunities. But remember this: do not procrastinate the day of your repentance. I have yet to see something good come from procrastination, especially with repentance. What a wonderful word, repentance. What a wonderful friend to have, Jesus Christ. 

I am also developing a testimony of how nice it'll be to enter the Celestial Kingdom and rest. This life really is designed to prepare us for the next life, which is eternity. I think it'll be fun there. Inheriting all that God has. I hope to see y'all there. (I'm not saying that right now I am qualified for this great inheritance, but I hope this desire will continue to turn into action. Our thoughts usually become our actions.)

But I hope y'all have a great week. Look for God's hand guiding you for the cool plan that He has for you and don't be afraid to say you're a part of Jesus' church and that He and the Book of Mormon are here to bless your lives. This is true.

Here We Are Again (5/3/21)

I feel like last week's email possibly ended rather abruptly. That is because I typed at a record- (and thumb-) breaking speed from 5:57-6pm. Funny how we always want what we don't have. Oh well.

I've been studying a lot of Portuguese this last week. A comment that my parents said, "You learn a lot about your own language while studying another language," is true. I learned about English conjugations, such as the word (to) go. Everything except he and she is go. I go. You go. We go. They go. They all go. Y'all go. But for he and she you always add S. He goes. She goes. (In this case I guess you add the letter E also. Didn't think about that until now). But y'all get the point. Ah! Get! I get. You get. We get. He gets. She gets. (Y'all is different though. Y'all gon get got. English in the South is not normal English). But long story short, it's good to learn about the language you speak. Try it out a little bit. 

Now to attempt to tie that into the Gospel: you often learn about the good when you have the bad. The opposition. I have never really liked opposition. Why can't everyone just get along? Well, 1. That would be boring. 2. Lehi taught us why in 2 Nephi 2:10ish - 30ish. I find it a little difficult to translate for you but basically without opposition we cannot be good. An interesting concept to think about. Elder Bednar already thought about it for us though. He talks a lot about how we need to be agents and not objects. Agents to act and not objects to be acted upon. A very good lesson from a very wise man. I invite y'all to do this, act. Use this wonderful God-given gift of agency for the benefit or others and yourself. I don't much like making decisions for little things like Wendy's or Taco Bell, but when we make these little decisions and roll with them (be sensitive to the Spirit in case you're making the wrong decision, but for little things like what shoes do I wear or what burger do I buy? Just make the decision; this isn't salvation we're talking about--this is a burger), they will eventually help us make bigger decisions later in life. (We need to make little good decisions first though; you can't be making little bad decisions like do I want weed or beer? What a stupid decision. You don't want either.)

Anywho, a funny moment this last week was when we woke up from a little after lunch rest/snooze/nap and my Brazilian comp asked me something and I responded in English then said something in Spanish because I forgot Portuguese. Then I looked at the calendar and started counting days in French. My goodness. (I'm not trying to brag, but I can count to like 20 in French and that's about it, and half of Portuguese is Spanish.)

But I hope y'all have a wonderful week and are very productive with your new decision-making skills. We start small, and as Nephi, Alma, and the Lord have said, by small and simple means are great things brought to pass.

The scariest avocado I've seen. We threw it away because it was super bad. Every other picture I took this week was extremely blurry for some reason.

Finally (4/26/21)

This week was a good week. In my studies, I have learned quite a bit. One thing being that it takes a bit of time to adjust to being in a new area, country, language, house, friends, leaders, etc. About 6 ish weeks. I have seen the Lord's hand in it all. He has a plan for every single one of you no matter how much pain your feet, knees, legs, back, and body are in walking on this very bumpy path. You are flattening out the ground for your future generations so they can continue from your example to pave the way for the marvelous Second Coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is a painful path worth taking. I'm just grateful it's not as painful as the path He walked. 

This week went a little faster than the other weeks. I am forgetting what happened, but something notable was that we bought another pizza this week (or 2 times this week, I think), and it was amazing but then a few days later a little painful when we were a little confused why we didn't have any money... heh oops. That one is on me. It was so good though. 

I also bought an avocado that weighs more than 1 kilo. I am extremely excited to eat this thing. But like a big truck takes time to accelerate, this big avocado takes time to ripen. It has been like 4 days now, and it's still in the toddler stages of walking. That is to say it is close to being ripe. 

I, too, feel like I am still in my toddler stages of speaking Portuguese, but no matter because I, and every single one of you have an amazing promise: I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up (D&C 84:88). I have seen that. I have seen the Lord help the understanding of other people when I speak. I say something totally wrong, and somebody gives the right answer. It's awesome. Well I don't say it totally wrong, but there are much better ways of saying things. 

The Lord loves when you lose yourself in the service of others. He knows you are busy and if you do it for but a small moment it will be given back to you tenfold. But, sometimes we need to focus on ourselves. I know you can find peace in helping others and answers to your own prayers. Elder Bednar said there is no such thing as equilibrium, so focus on the activity at hand. 

I hope y'all have a great week. Look and pray for ways to serve others through small and simple means because great things will come to pass!

First Full Week/Focus (4/19/21)

Here we are again. It's been a little while. It's been about 2 weeks since I left the land of having a car and air conditioning and a lot of missionaries who lived kinda close, and it has been a ride for sure. 

My first week was a li'l tricky. The first few days were a groggy tired blur of confusion trying to understand another language again haha. But I had a week that felt like a month so that was a little tricky. With the help of my dad and Jesus I have found out why. 

I forgot Jesus. 

I wouldn't recommend doing this. As a missionary you are supposed to invite others to come unto Christ, and I was doing that: I was studying, I was praying, I was doing everything right, but my problem was I was thinking about how cool it was to be in Brazil and what other people would think and all that stuff. 

With one simple little change, all turned for the better. Instead of asking, "What can I study to help me today?", I asked, "What can I study to help Thy children today?" Haha. Little wording difference but big impact. Putting Jesus back into Jesus' work. 

The next week went a lot smoother letting Jesus back into my life and having him guide me as opposed to me trying to find happiness in food, sweets, drinks, etc. As the scriptures say, they have satisfaction for but a moment or something. I have discovered in life we have many many unsatisfiable desires, but if we forget ourselves and our desires for just a few minutes, we will feel a little more satisfied with what we did for Jesus and others in those few minutes. Later this will turn into a normal way of life, and we will finally feel more and more of the much needed, long-lasting satisfaction. But it needs to be renewed many times, like eating food or drinking water. 

I then gave a talk in church about it haha. There were 5 people at church--4 elders and our bishop. When we spoke, we talked into a camera. Different experience. Maybe this is what the apostles feel like during Conference right now. They obviously have a nice camera and more people there but same concept. I talked about where we are looking and what we are focusing on. Because what we focus on grows. 

We have lots of little changes and slight adjustments to make, and I invite and encourage y'all do make those today. Observe, ponder, and think about where you're looking, what you're looking for, and adjust as needed. Just little daily adjustments like my prayers. 

I know that God knows a lot more than I do, and I am grateful for that. I know He has a plan for every single one of you reading this right now. That plan involves Jesus. That plan was established before man created time. That plan was established in the grand heavenly council with God our Father, Jesus our brother, our Savior and Redeemer, and us! This was a plan that would stretch long past our puny and pathetically short amount of time here on earth. I am grateful for this plan and how we are important to this plan. We, like our Savior, are essential to this plan for it to work. I encourage you to keep this in mind, to set your sights on Jesus so you can be with your family after we part ways for a short time, so we can be with our Heavenly Parents again after this little trip down to earth. God loves you. I love you. Many many other people around you love you. Have a great week.

Woah (4/5/21)

My companion tried to explain the difference between Disney and Pixar to me, talking about 3D and 2D and flat screen LED program stuff and animation and the math behind it and how that's 2D and 3D is completely different and all that stuff. I was so confused. 

I caught a little lizard when
we went in the chapel.

So I wrote that first paragraph still in America and boy howdy do we do different things in America hahaha. I am currently writing to you from Brazil, more specifically a place called Goiânia 2. It's good to be back. I was a little nervous if this was really in God's best interests for me and if I was supposed to leave to go back to this mission. Heh. It is indeed in His great plan of His for me, and I know that He has a great plan for you too. Just let Him in and let Him work His magic on you and in your life. Seriously. It's a lot better than anything you can come up with. 

I have completely forgotten what I did the last few days I was in America, but I know on Monday we played basketball, eh, Tuesday we went to Karen's farm and helped out a bit more, Wednesday we shipped off some boxes home of random things I have acquired in the states like jackets and stuff (never thought Florida would get cold), and had a good district council. I don't have my phone anymore so y'all probably won't get any pictures, sorry haha. I should have thought in advance. But on Wednesday I finished packing and didn't get much sleep but got a few hours of stress and anxiety in. Just kidding. I got a blessing, and it was nice. If y'all are thinking about getting a blessing, just humble yourself even a little bit and ask for one. Seriously. It's not hard, and even if you don't super love the person you get a blessing from or the person you want a blessing from isn't there, it'll still be a great blessing because it's not their priesthood, it's God's. They are speaking God's words. What a blessing to have the priesthood. After the blessing, all was well. Got up at 6am and drove to Jacksonville. So crazy.

The flight adventures were crazy, but I won't go into detail because looking back it's kinda boring haha. So many random things like people taking pictures of me, staring at me, showing me on video calls--just a bunch of random stuff haha. But I went from Jacksonville to Charlotte. It was weird there; I don't like it there. Then to Ft Lauderdale. It was so amazingly nice to see missionaries again. I went around 10 hours without a companion or seeing a missionary. I felt like Alma when he bumped into the sons of Mosiah. I was out of energy, then I was full of energy; I was full of questions and doubts, then I was full of the spirit, not questioning anything. What a wonderful experience. God is great, people. [On April 1, he drove from Gainesville to Jacksonville, flew to Charlotte NC, flew back to Ft Lauderdale where his flight was delayed and didn't leave until almost 2 am early April 2, flew to Sao Paulo, then finally to Goiânia.] 

Flying to Brazil was good but rather long. There was a weird vibe of fear on the plane, oddly enough. Then there was Elder Bowen and I, sitting next to each other, not a care or fear to be found in us. It's amazing what a knowledge of Jesus Christ will do for a person, especially the knowledge we have. That's why I'm here, so people need not fear. This life is meant to be full of joy and happiness. If yours isn't, I invite you to ponder on what you can do differently to let Christ into your life so you can be happy, then go and do it. Seek the proper help and have no fear because "perfect love casteth out all fear" (Moroni 8:16). Don't have motivation? Suck it up and go and do it because motivation and desire will follow action. I can promise that. I can also promise that you will feel better, be happier, and people will notice a difference in you, a greater light and life and love in you. Try it out, and try to tell me it wasn't nice because it will be. Anywho, we landed and boy howdy was God's hand in my travels. So many angels and tender mercies. From the baggage to the people we bumped into to the workers and everything in between. God is great, people. 

We were warmly welcomed by Brazil's heat and the glad hearts of our mission president and his wife. So wonderful to see them again. There were a few hiccups with some elders' luggage, but hopefully that's all good soon. God is seriously helping my tongue and my ears so that I can speak and hear the wonderful language of Portuguese. I am surprised and grateful for how much I understand and can speak. God is great, people.

Got to my new area and seriously hit the ground running. I am very used to spending hours on the couch and visiting a few people then it being 9pm. That's not missionary work. We moved in and opened the apartment again. It was closed because of Covid. We dedicated it because it just wasn't a good vibe. Never experienced that, and I really did not like it. All is well now. The priesthood is amazing, people. God is amazing. Between sessions of Conference, we were calling people, and we actually taught the Restoration real quick to somebody. It's amazing what came back and what didn't. All my scripture knowledge is in English, but I gave the First Vision without any mistakes. Interesting how that is. I don't even know it in English haha. 

We also had a baptism on Sunday. Super cool. We watched the priesthood session, had the baptism, broke our fast, then watched more Conference. We were busy haha. It has been really hard but extremely rewarding, like 10 fold rewarding, even 100 fold. We invited a few people who answered our calls to watch Conference and sent them a link for it. We set up some lessons for tonight yesterday. It has seriously been a wild ride. 

Anywho, I guess I had a lot on my mind haha. It's been a great time here. I invite you to let God into your life more fully. Let Jesus heal you. Permit Them to help you, love you, and bless you. You will never regret this. It has been amazing for me, and it will be for you too.

Part of his letter to us:

I enjoyed Conference too. We watched all except the Sunday afternoon session in Portuguese. It was a little tricky. My Portuguese is ok; it's a lil tricky to understand when people speak quickly, but God is seriously helping me out hahaha, like I am seriously so impressed with how much I understand and how much people can understand me. But back to Conference: I thought I got a lot out of it until I heard the last session in English, then I realized I got just about nothing from the other sessions and got rather discouraged. Haha. There's something about your mother tongue that just.... hahaha.

It's been quite the last few days. Talk about baptism by fire, hitting the ground running, and jumping in on the deep end. It has been really hard but extremely rewarding. Hard in the sense that "the wicked take the truth to be hard" and to be completely honest, I was a little wicked (for lack of a better word, maybe fubeca) in the States. I'm back to in bed before 10:30, up at 6:30, shower quick. Rules are meant to be followed and not bent, pushed, or broken. We don't scroll through Facebook or Facebook watch aimlessly for hours. It has seriously been a wild ride. 

On Saturday I didn't even know what day it was. I was so dependent on my phone that when somebody asked me for the time and date, I said I didn't know. (I could have told them the time because I had a watch on, completely forgot!)

I really like my companion. His name is Elser Barroso (if I remember correctly). He's Brazilian, from São Paulo, and is super cool. He was in the mission office before this and this was the area he was serving in, but now we live in the area and are closer to members (sadly we still cannot eat in members' houses, and most wards are not in person for Sacrament yet). The area is called Jardim Pompéia. It's a little north of Goiânia by like 10 or 15 minutes. I think it's in a place called Goiânia 2. Not 100% sure. I don't really have a phone to look anything up haha. Speaking of the phone, we have 1 phone per companionship. It's an A10 or something. Nice phone. Has a fingerprint thing. We are both signed in on our email, Facebook, and Messenger. They don't really use Hangouts here. They use WhatsApp for everything; when in the States we kinda used Messenger for everything (for teaching and communicating, like video calls and texting, etc). I'm not really sure how p-day works yet, but we will find out. 

I have gotten random spurts of giddiness. It's been fun. We were walking down the street, and I just wanted to jump around because I was so excited and happy to be here again. The sun rises and is crazy bright before 6:30am haha. It is rather warm heh, and our chapel is super far from us. But no matter because it's a great time here. On the contrary, I've had random spurts of "Why am I here? I could be sitting on that comfortable couch in Gainesville right now with some nice A/C watching Conference, I could be snacking on food, I would have food" hahahaha (we have some cheese, ham, bread, ketchup, and like 3 hot dogs, that's it, for now). Long story short, I feel like I picked up where I left off for Brazil, but the devil is putting in some work on me in this confusing time. I have packed everything I own, moved to a different country, been thrown into a different culture, different people, different language, different climate, different lifestyle, and different everything. The only thing that is the same is Jesus and His church. It's nice to be able to go to the church, to have seen our bishop, to have seen some members and a new member be baptized. It is a different vibe here, a different life here. Talk about being uprooted and thrown far from the comfort zone haha. (I have discovered you don't do a whole lot of growing when you're sitting comfy on your behind. You grow the most and the fastest by doing things and by using your agency wisely.) But no matter because this is Jesus' work, so I'll have His help. It's nice. 

I hope all is well back home; all is becoming well here as I adjust. I just need to be a tad bit more patient haha. I've been here for what, 4 days now, 5? And I'm expecting to know everything hahaha. Hope y'all had a great week and continue to have fun. Love y'all!