Ministering Angels

Well this week was not one of the best weeks for me! In fact, it was a VERY hard week for me to work. Monday was P-Day and it was nice. We were able to get some arrands run and had a Family night. Tuesday we did a division with one of the companionships in our área. I was with Elder Pacheco. Elder Pacheco had an eye exam (he will need eye surgery) and that took up the whole day of work. Wednesday i went to the temple which was really cool and really spiritual as usual. Thursday-Sunday it was rain rain rain and cold cold cold. There was NOBODY on the road and people didnt want to let us in or let us talk to them. It was a very long, wet and dreadful week! Every day I woke up with a worse cold! Its not good to be out in the rain and cold Wind when sick but I didnt have a choice. Sunday rolled around and it was really hard to get out of bed! My head was hurting and I just got a few hours of sleep during the night. I didnt feel weel to go to church but I didnt really have a choice! I did like church though. The spirit was nice and Strong. After lunch, Elder Emanuel and I went back to the house to rest for the afternoon, (he was sick too!). It was good to get some rest.

 

Last night I was feeling really upset. Upset by the lack of sucess that we had throughout the week, upset at the difficulties that were being faced in the zone, and I was really depressed and sick! Than I got a phone call from Elder S. Ferreira. I was his companion for two transfers in Bage and trained him. Now he is in my zone and we are really close friends. He told me that he decided to go home and stop serving as a missionary because of personal reasons. I was really heart broken when I heard that because I didnt want my friend to make a bad choice. We talked for a bit and i tried to help him and support him as much as possible. When I was ready for bed I was feeling overwhelmed with all the things that was going on and I just felt so so sad. I felt alone and small. I felt like I couldnt do anything to make the situation better. So I decided to get on my knees and say a prayer. During the prayer I remembered a promise that was given me in my Patriarcal Blessing that when needed, I could call ministering angels to help me.

 

For the first time in my life, I prayed and called ministering angels to help and comfort me. I especially asked for the spirits of my past Family to be with me. I was expecting to feel someone touch my shoulder or rub my hair but that didnt happen, but within a matter of seconds, i felt the room fill up. I started to get warm, my heart callmed and stopped beating quickly, and I knew that my Family was around me, comforting me. After a few minutes of feeling this I decided to lay down and get some sleep. When I got into my blankets, they were warm, like ive been using them all day and I felt really really comfortable and calm. When I closed my eyes I saw a bright light, like someone turned on the light in the room, but when I opened my eyes, there was nothing there except the darkness. I closed my eyes again and I saw the light again. I realized that I was seeing the glory of the angels around me. My spiritual eyes wernt open so I couldnt see them, but when I closed my eyes, I could see there glory.

 

This was a very big and spiritual experience for me. Last night I went to bed saying, ``Thanks God, tonight ill be sleeping with lots of angels.´´ and I knew that they were there. Im so thankful for the experience that God gave me. I am thankful for the priesthood and the Faith that I have to call for ministering angels when I need them most, I am thankful for my Family and the love that they have for me to help me and comfort me in times of need. I am thankful for the Holy Ghost being my constant companion throught all of my trials and troubles in life. I am thankful for the church in my life and the opportunity to be a missionary and serve God.

Lastly, I just wanna congratulate my sister Lindsay on the birth of her 4th child, Lucy Jane. She is a very beautiful and blessed baby!

 

Love,

Elder Horst

 

p.s. Here is a cool talk about ministering of angels.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2008/10/the-ministry-of-angels?lang=eng&cid=email-shared

Family History and the Temple

Well Family this week has been a really good one for me. I have been feeling more energised and more happy this transfer which makes me want to work alot harder. I also have been working alot on self-improvement and I can already see some good changes in my atitude, atributes, and scripture knowledge. Ill start this letter with a cool experience that happened while on a devision with my good friend Elder Emanuel.

We were both visiting a new área, to help them with the work. The elders in the área gave us a list of less actives and random people that they had in the Area Book. My companion and I started visiting the list of adresses on the paper. The first door that we knocked was an old single lady. She happily let us in. We treated her like every other less active home. Told her that we missed her at church, got to know her a bit, shared a message one something that we think could help her, than invite her to church! The difference was that when we were getting to know her, we found out something very special about her. This day marked 15 years that her husband died from câncer. Her husband was a firm member of the church but when he died she just couldnt handle going any more. She threw away all the books of the church and all her memories with them. She just decided to keep one book of mórmon that was special to her.

The spirit was really Strong and we couldnt help but realize that  her husband sent us to her house and wanted us to invite her to be sealed to him. How cool is that??? With tears falling down her face she told us about how much she loved him and how much she has missed the church in her life. She told us how she feels so bad for blocking out the church in her life and how she wants to get better and maybe even get sealed to her husband for eternity. It was a really neat experience.

The week was full of experiences like this. We talked with a man that was in the middle of getting a divorce, a 16 year old girl that got pregnant. Today I was able to go to the hospital and talk to a few girls who recently had a baby born. I talked to someone in the road that has a sick aunt. All these situations are diferente but the explication and meaning of them are the same. What we know is that we have a Father in Heaven that loves us and cares for us. He wants that we be happy in this Earth and recieve his glorious blessings. When we keep the commandments we can have this and recieve the greatest of all the blessing of God. Eternal Life.

I know that Jesus Christ is my Savior. I know that the church of Jesus Cristo is the only true church on the Earth.. with love,

Elder Horst

Rain, Wind, and not a Speck of Sun!

Well the first week of the transfer seemed to be a great one for me and my new companion Elder Oslo. We have been working hard and we are really excited for all the new missionaries in our zone. Missionaries with fire that are ready to work. Our zone. Partenon, is one of the most famous zones in the mission. Thats good News because all the new elders come really excited to work here. Ive had the luck of working here for almost 8 months now!

Weve been having really good sucess with our Ward MIssion Leader. His name is Brother VIlanova. He was just released as a member of the Quórum of the 70.... so he knows his stuff! He has been helping us in our weekly meetings to be better missionaries and to work better with the Ward. In fact, right now, my companion and I are preparing for a Ward training on missionary work. We are challenging all the members to do 6 contacts a week. That means talking to 6 people a week and asking them if they want to come to church, or hear from the missioanries, or just have a Family night. I hope it will work. If just a few people do it I know they will animate the others and we could have tons of work to do because of the references from members.

Ive been studying alot about the Book of Mormon in Preach My Gospel lately. Its amazing how powerfully they describe the Book of Mormon. Literally whatever problem people have can be solved by Reading the Book of Mormon. Literally any question people have about God and life can be answered by the Book of Mormon. Who wouldnt wanna read it??

This week we have had lots of rain storms and its been super cold! Im not a big fan of the rain because it slows down the work alot. Its hard to enter into houses of people when you are soaking wet and cold. But thats okay. The house seems to be pretty warm, its just hard to get up out of bed sometimes:)

I start physical theropy this friday and ill be doing it three times a week for ten sessions. Im excited and hope that it helps me alot! I hope that all of you are enjoying the sun and doing your part as a member missionary. Love you all!

Love,
Elder Horst

 

Another Good Week in Brazil

Well things have been going very well here in Porto Alegre, Brazil. Another transfer has ended and there has been lots of changes to the zone. Out of the 8 áreas that we have, all of them are making changes with transfer day! Thats exciting News but also alot of work! As Always, transfer day is also a good time to clean the house, organize my things, and rest before the next transfer starts. I am really excited for the next transfer because my companion and i will work really hard to get things in order and have baptisms! Wahoo!

 

This week was really busy having to get ready for transfer day. We hardly had time to work in our own área! We decided to trade our P-Day from monday to wednesday. Wednesday we went to the museum at PUC. PUC is a cathlic colege that is actually really nice. We use the internet here on P-Days cause they have really upclass computers. The museum was cool. We learned about energy, the body, and a bit about animals too.

 

This week I also had an exam at the doctor. They prescribed that I take physical theropy for ten or more sessions. I start Thursday, we will see how it goes.

 

So I just wanted to share with you about some cool experiences that has happened with my companion and I. Probably the most important thing that a missionary does every day is Daily Planning. During daily planning, we are able to work out what we will do the next day and how we will have a day of success and efficiency. Sometimes, it can be hard to plan when we didnt make appointments and other times we just dont have enough people to fill in every hour. When my companion and I have a blank spot in our plans for the next day we like to fill in out with the word MIRACLE. It seems silly but it seems to Always work for us! Here are a few examples.

 

3 O´clock - pick up the box of Book of Mormons from the bishops house

4 O´Clock- Miracle

 

We arrived at the bishops house late, around 3:45. We were planning on getting the box of Book of Mormons and having him to drive us home, but he was just leaving the house. We decided just to walk home with them which was a bad idea because they were extremely heavy and our house it really far away! Guess what! after 5 minutes of walking a member that lived in another stake pulled over and gave us a ride home.

 

Another example. We were knocking doors one day and found a Family to teach! We were so excited and were able to mark a baptism date with them! Over the next few weeks, every time we passed there, we could never find him home! We decided to stop passing there and dropped him. The next day we were walking down the road at 5pm waiting for our miracle. Literally the second it hit 5 the father of the Family drove by us, stopped the car, and schedualed a day that we could visit! How cool is that?

This transfer we have had so many mini miracles that has helped us and our área. Its very true that with the Faith of a mustard seed, many great things can come to pass.

 

Love,

Elder Horst

One of our districts

The Museum at PUC

The human body.

Shrunken heads.

Lamanite sculptures.

Lamanite baby dolls.

Amethyst, the ruby of February.  It is really cheap here.