2 Nephi 25:26

Hey Everybody,

Thanks for all the emails and updates!

Letter writing is an interesting thing.

Thanks for the pictures! I loved that picture of the neighborhood with the trees going like crazy.

Anyway, I don’t have too much time today.

So I’m attaching pictures from P-Day last week, when we went to Sintra. We took the same train I took all the time in Amadora (since it runs through Benfica). It was a really, really cool feeling. It’s so weird to think that the majority of the last 8 months of my life has been spent within about 15 square miles. I really got a lot of my fire back to travel and see cool places.

Lisbon can really wear you down, but Sintra is a world of its own. It’s SO cool. Being on a mission here in Portugal makes it seem like I’m on a different planet anyway, but being in Sintra makes it like being on a moon of that planet.

Anyway,

The amount of time I have also somewhat corresponds with how much I have to say.

We had zone conference yesterday, and it was probably the best zone conference I have had so far.

I’ve been thinking a lot for a long time about fixing problems. Every zone conference, it’s to fix and prevent problems. Financial Secretary duties, fix and prevent problems.

But you can’t fix a problem by treating the symptoms – you have to treat the problem.

It’s like any good episode of House – the patient has a million random problems, but they all come from something like a tumor in the patient’s pinky toe.

I think sometimes we are too scared to actually fix a problem so we willingly and ignorantly settle for treating the symptoms.

President Terry talked about nourishing righteous desires in Zone Conference. The other trainings done by the assistants and zone leaders were about specific issues, like companionship unity or usage of the Area Book or whatever.

I feel like I should mention something that has been sitting on my mind for the past while.

With the name of Christian, I had people all through high school asking me how my parents could name me Christian if we’re supposedly not Christian.

“And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins.” (2 Ne 25:26)

HOW TRUE IS THAT FOR EACH OF US??? Yeah, it's in the scriptures that sit on our shelves and on our laps in church, but man.

It’s like we assume that our testimony (whether of the Book of Mormon or fasting or whatever) implies a testimony of Christ.

SARCASM: Why talk about Christ over and over when you can learn the deepest depths of doctrine about fasting and sacrifice or kingdoms of glory or intelligences or etc.?

Do we really talk of Christ, rejoice in Christ, preach of Christ, and prophesy of Christ?

Or do we talk about our neighbor, rejoice in last weekend’s activity, preach of the Gospel according to Brother and Sister Priestcraft, or prophesy of how cool we will be in the near future?

In my opinion, if those are the kinds of things that somebody does, they don’t really deserve to be called Christians.

We have to recognize our own individual need for Christ (not humanity’s need, our own need. Why do we care if we receive salvation or not?).

We have to rely on our hope in Christ as our anchor.

We have to realize that Christ has a lot he wants of us.

We have to rely on the fact that if we don’t do what he wants us to do, it doesn’t matter how much faith we have in him.

Yes, we all have everyday lives, but they are completely and utterly worthless without Christ.

Well,

Out of time.

I hope this doesn’t sound like a massive faca letter or anything, but man.

“Remember, o man, and perish not.”

I love you all so much.

Elder Lobo

By the way, I finished up my moleskine yesterday. BUYING A NEW ONE TODAY.

Check out Megan and Jake Kent's blog (link at right) for pictures of their cute new baby! Congratulations to them!!!

Isaiah 55:2

Ministerial Certificates -- one with Pres. Hinckley and one with Pres. Monson

Sintra -- sign translation "ENTRANCE PROHIBITED TO STRANGE PEOPLE"

HEY EVERYBODY

A HUGE thanks for all the pictures and updates on how everybody is doing. I’ve been thinking a lot the last few weeks about the weekly email and such things, and it really blows my mind that it’s the only connection between me on this side of the world and you on yours.

I wish I could go through every week and respond really specifically to everybody’s stuff. I’m not really sure that I could do it all justice, so please accept my apologies for not going into great detail about many things.

I have about twenty minutes left, and seeing how I didn’t really talk about what I have been up to in the email last week, I figure it would be good to do so this week.

These last couple weeks have been pretty big for me. I’ve had a lot to think about and reflect over.

But first and foremost, we had an investigator in church for the first time in weeks. Her name is Márcia, she´s Brazilian, and she´s about 45-50 years old. We knew her from English class, and she used to come to every class (Tuesdays and Fridays) until her work schedule changed. But we invited her to a ward fireside about the Restoration, where she was very intrigued and accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon and talked with us for about 20 minutes after the fireside. We didn’t coerce any of it. Then, last Sunday, she showed up at church! She stayed for all three hours. The lesson in Gospel Principles was that Families Can Be Eternal. I ended up being the one to give the class. She was very curious because she has a 20-year-old daughter who she wants to come to church with her, and the lesson that family is the only unit of eternal importance really hit home with her. She asked if people who have been divorced can still get baptized, too. She’s also been reading the Book of Mormon every night, without having to be pushed and reminded into doing it. Elder Croshaw (who is still a Financial Secretary with me) and I are really hoping we can do everything we can for her, but her schedule is the biggest obstacle.

What else.

Well, right before transfers, I had my interview with President for the transfer. Since coming into the office, I had really been struggling to keep a burning motivation all the time and about everything. The stress of the financial secretary job, especially in this mission, is very high. I have had, and will forever have, very high expectations for myself, but my lack of experience with renting houses has made it very difficult to have a smooth process every time we get a new house for the missionaries. When you have four variables (us, the missionaries, the landlord, and the contract), a lot changes every time. I have been working hard to make the contract a lot better, but there have been a lot of landlords trying to GET THE MOST, and it’s been really frustrating. Our contract in the past is completely worthless and holds no weight with the law. We have been left to do this contracting without any help from the real estate people nor anybody else.

But I talked to President about all this, and how it has all just completely broken me down. The only reason that I do anything anymore is because I hope for a life afterwards that won’t have these problems. Nobody trying to GET THE MOST, nobody being tempted to do so, etc. I explained to him that my hope in Christ is the only thing I have to hold onto. Going into the interview, I knew I would tell him that, but I felt like the Gospel is supposed to bless you with a lot more than just a hope in Christ.

But if you have a hope in Christ, you don’t need anything else.

And that’s all I go on.

So lately, it’s been a lot less stressful, and it’s been so much easier to sit down and do my best with what I have, because I know that’s what the Savior wants from me. The only perfection I believe in now is not the perfection of the ideal way of doing housing contracts, but it’s in the Savior. I don’t even think an ideal world I can imagine now even compares to what Heavenly Father wants to give all of us.

What else.

Well, this weekend, all six of us in the house upstairs got massive colds, and President ended up getting it, too. Any by the way, I asked about flu shots, and people have heard of influenza, but nobody ever gets it. I’m on the other side of the crazy wide world, folks. Crazy. And on this side of the world you buy milk and honey without a reasonable price. (Oh, socialism. Lovely, lovely socialism)

I already got my ballot and sent it back. I do get a lot of politics updates from the front-page headlines of newspapers laying in the streets. Apparently there was a final debate and Obama “won” it, and apparently that led to him leading by 6% in the polls. People here are much more interested in our politics than their own.

Anyway.

Time is basically up. I don’t have that many pictures to send.

Yeah.

Até já. Amo-vos.

ELDERLOBO

The picture attached is of me with my replacement Ministerial Certificate (my actual go-home date should be Jan 22) -- I have one with Pres. Hinckley and one with Pres. Monson -- GET THE MOST!

SPECIAL EDITION: Get The Most!

HEY EVERYBODY

This will be a SPECIAL EDITION email.

GET THE MOST!

This phrase comes from a stencil graffiti Elder Hobbs and I found a few weeks ago while we were visiting Castelo São Jorge in Lisbon (picture attached). We were walking back to the Metro station and saw it on the wall, and were completely blown away by how ridiculous it seemed, but how relevant it seemed in the world. Since seeing it, we have discovered that it has incredible meaning for us as human beings, as well as for us as children of God.

But what does GET THE MOST mean?

At first, when we saw it, we attached the meaning of “make the most of every day”, as if it were some happy, motivational graffiti to keep people thinking on the bright side. But as we thought more and more, it came to fit more in line with the basic economic idea of Adam Smith (I think that was his name) that self-interest is the most beneficial for an economy. But this kind of self-interest is founded in a whole lot more than just dollar amounts.

In all reality, GET THE MOST is the counterfeit way of getting happiness. It’s best summarized as “Suck the moment you are in completely dry!” This attitude, at its extreme, is living for the moment. It doesn’t account for the aggregate benefits of all the moments combined together. It looks at life as a sum of moments that were all hopefully taken advantage of. Take advantage of now to keep yourself from missing out on getting something for nothing. This is GET THE MOST.

For example, while driving, I slowed down so somebody could have space to turn onto the street I was on (traffic was bad). In so doing, the person behind them saw that and GOT THE MOST, speeding up to fill in the tiny gap, and I had to slam on the brakes. GET THE MOST.

Another way I see it is when missionaries come into the office. We are like a mini distribution center for the missionaries, and there are a lot of things that you can get for free. So missionaries come in and ask, “which movies are free?” “The Restoration, The Lamb of God, etc.” “I’ll take one of each.” So the missionaries tell the members, and even members start coming in and asking for free movies, even though they are only free when they are going to be given to an investigator. This is GET THE MOST.

Mission trinkets (jerseys, suits, patches, bags, ties, books, etc.), in extreme abundance, are another symptom of GET THE MOST.

Another way I saw this was in some advice I got from another missionary while having a really hard time dealing with the ever-growing responsibilities of being a financial secretary. He said that I just need to forget about the bad things and enjoy the little things, and he pointed out elders in the past who loved the office because they could drive the car, they got to see the phone bill, they got to know transfer assignments early, etc. He also said to “fake it ‘til you make it”. Being in the office, apparently, is just an opportunity for me to progress, and that is all I should worry about, according to him. This is GET THE MOST.

To redefine GET THE MOST, it is sucking the most out of the moment for yourself just because you can.

Let’s look at a list of people in the scriptures who embraced GET THE MOST:

-Satan. (Even after getting kicked out of heaven, he is still trying to get as many people to follow him.)
-Laman and Lemuel. (Even after barely helping build the boat, they still decided to take advantage of a sweet cruise across the ocean, making themselves merry.)
-Judas. (Even if he knew Christ had to be crucified, Judas still wanted the silver.)

The list goes on and on.

But people who do not go about getting the most do not live for themselves and their own progress. But this, somehow, allows them aggregate progression beyond the sum of the moments. They refuse to GET THE MOST now because doing so will keep them from more valuable, lasting rewards later.

NOT GETTING THE MOST is an incredible principle to live by. It means that you sacrifice some (if not all) of what you have now for the benefits that will long outlive the moment.

To understand this better, let’s look at a list of people who were NOT GETTING THE MOST:

-Adam and Eve. (They fell to make life possible for everybody else, even though it meant sacrificing their ignorance.)
-King Benjamin. (Was the king but still served like a normal person.)
-The Three Nephites. (Chose to help God on the earth feeling the pains of the sins of the world instead of going straight into heaven.)
-Job.
-The Holy Ghost. (Doesn’t have a body now and still works like crazy for EVERYBODY IN THE WHOLE WORLD.)
-Our Savior Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. DEFININTELY NOT GETTING THE MOST. He even asked if there were any other way to do it, but he didn’t GET THE MOST by giving up. He DIDN’T GET THE MOST so we all could have the chance to GET THE MOST in the end.
-And my favorite example: Christ being tempted by Satan while fasting in the desert. (Come on, man, you’re the Son of God! Wouldn’t it be flippin’ sweet to turn this rock into bread?)

With all this, let us all follow Christ’s perfect example of NOT GETTING THE MOST. I know that as I have tried so hard to live by this principle, I maintain the eternal perspective much better, and I love the Savior so, so much more.

If we go about truly NOT GETTING THE MOST, we will avoid the pride cycles we find in the Book of Mormon. We will avoid the seemingly harmless indulgences in this life to find true, everlasting happiness in the presence of our loving Heavenly Father. I know this is true.

Nothing is worthwhile without Christ. If we could satisfy ourselves with this world, we would have no need for the world to come.

I hope you all enjoyed this along with the original GET THE MOST graffiti picture.

I love you all so much.

Elder Lobo

Singing by the choir

Well,

Hey everybody!

Thanks for all the great emails this week. I really enjoyed reading them all. I got a letter from Brother Larimer in the mail (WOO! MAIL), too, and I’m hoping I have enough time to write back today (I only have about 35 minutes left in the P-Day).

Darrell sounds so awesome! Keep me posted!

Another week of incredible awesomeness to report.

Conference was SO COOL. It was incredible. Elder Cobridge’s talk blew my mind. I was so focused during his talk that I was just… completely sucked in. Elder Croshaw and I had been talking about a lot of the things they talked about throughout the couple weeks before conference: how pointless the world is without the Savior, how confidence and hope have to be in concrete things besides your own abilities, and a bunch of other things. Elder Uchtdorf’s talk about hope was great. Elder Holland’s talk really struck me that even if there were only two human beings in the whole universe, our Heavenly Father would still love them enough to provide everything they would need to return to Him. So COOL.

We had Saturday morning at 5 PM on Saturday, and then Priesthood rebroadcasted Sunday Morning, so four sessions of conference on Sunday. It was incredible. I can’t wait to go watch it again in person.

And did anybody else notice that Andrew Allen (from the Skyline Ward) was on a massive close-up while the MTC choir was singing during Priesthood Session?? I jumped out of my chair when I saw him. Where is he going??

Basically, Conference envelops everything I could possibly want to talk about this week, except for transfer meeting, which was yesterday.

Today for P-Day, Elder Croshaw and I went to Baixa in Lisbon to get him a suit. We went around a few stores, and at a store called Zara (where I got my 6-month tie) we found INCREDIBLE SUITS for 150 € total (about $210). We found some really ridiculously cool suits that I would try to find an excuse to buy for after the mission. There was one I really, really, really liked, and tried really hard to rationalize buying it right now. I still haven't spent the birthday money on anything, etc. It was a dark-brown, striped (but the stripes weren’t pinstripes – it looked like the fabric was woven in alternating directions), two-button suit with the European cut, so it didn’t look like a giant box with buttons. I’m kinda bummed that I bought two American suits before I came here. Anyway, I definitely want to get a suit like that for afterwards (because there is no way I will find brown shoes that fit me anywhere here). It was a really fun P-Day today.

Transfer meeting yesterday.

We weren’t in it, obviously – we just got Subway for everybody. But the striking news is that missionary files were retrieved to review for the financial secretary spot, and Elder Croshaw’s card is still there right next to mine (I caught a glance when I was talking to President yesterday). This means that it is highly probable that Elder Croshaw is STAYING. ANOTHER. IN THE OFFICE. I feel so sorry for him. Hahaha. Lift where you stand, I guess. The last person to stay for five transfers in the office only did so because his new companion had to go home, so he spent one extra transfer in the middle of his stay as the lone financial secretary, in a tripla with the other office elders.

Short email this week. Sorry.

O tempo passa a voar! (Time flies!)

Amo-vos!

ELDERLOBO

Stars

[The office tourist attraction mentioned before.]

HEY EVERYBODY!

I’m glad to hear so much good stuff is going on.

Is Jason going to leave behind the dreaded green badge at Intel?

I guess the rearranging of the ward boundaries was inevitable. I’m kinda bummed that President Weight and everybody won’t be in our ward anymore. It had been quite a while without a change, though. The wards here in Portugal are combining like crazy. The branches had been growing so much that whenever there were over about 100 members in a branch they were split. Amadora and Queluz joined when I was there, and now Benfica and Odivelas are supposed to be joined pretty soon.

YEAH! Accompanied lesson! I don’t know if having members help in the work helps there as much as it does here, but it is SO important! I’m so glad to hear you had a lesson at home.

Kevin is back already! Crazy. It doesn’t seem unbelievable, like it did before. I remember how weird it was for Tyson Frodsham to come back – it seemed that when people leave on missions that they are never going to come back. But after watching people go back home from here, it doesn’t seem like that farfetched of an idea.

So today, for P-Day, we cleaned up the plants and everything front of the office. By “plants” I mean five little palm bushes, a ridiculously huge palm tree, and a bunch of other bushes that had all never been pruned. [See the first photo above!] Luckily, though, Ariana had taught me how to prune bushes, and after four hours, we took care of it all. President Terry worked with us, too, which was awesome. We have a general authority coming this month for a mission tour. It was a lot of fun and great exercise.

Anyway, as for happenings during the week, it all funnels down into last night.

I knew last week when I wrote that email that I was being ridiculous about stress and everything. I knew that all the stress and frustration with everything was just completely unnecessary and wasn’t even worth my time.

I had really been going downhill until Saturday night when I got sick (something from a member, I think), and spend Sunday inside with a lot of time to think things out. I wasn’t understanding the value of things. I was looking at life and the world and just seeing a lot of futility and nothingness because of people. People seem to ruin everything. We don’t understand each other, we are offended so easily, we forget the important things, etc. I had just finished reading Helaman and 3 Nephi this last week, and all I saw was the nothingness of man (Hel 12) and how stupid it was that Christ had to be so specific about what to call the church. Then, 4 Nephi, after all that, it doesn’t take that long until everybody forgets about what really matters and it all goes to chaos again. It just seemed like people were a big waste of time.

And we arrive at last night.

So last night, I was kinda fed up with how crazy I was going, and I knew I was being ridiculous. So I went out and sat in our 8th floor kitchen window, overlooking the Benfica stadium, Monsanto, and a ton of buildings. There is no ground visible from our window – just buildings and people. I looked at them so frustrated with how bitter and impatient they are with each other and how it makes it fruitless to try to be kind and patient with them. But then I did something I hadn’t done since getting in Portugal – I looked up at the stars.

It caught me off guard. When I looked up, I couldn’t see the world anymore. The whole time here, I had been driving myself crazy trying to help people all around me. There were (and still are) tons of problems all around, waiting to be solved, and when they do get solved, people don’t stick to the solutions, and it all goes back to how it was before. Frustrating, isn't it?

I think I understand a little bit better now why Moses, Nephi, and even Christ went up mountains to commune with God. When you’re at ground level and try to look up, you still see all the people and buildings surrounding you. It’s like there’s no escape. But when you get above it all and look up, they’re not there, and you see that there is so much more than just us in this universe.

I was sitting there, and instantly after realizing I was indeed looking at the stars, I thought of Switchfoot (the song “Stars”). Since everybody else wasn’t in the kitchen, I started singing it to myself, playing the rhythm on my leg and the air guitar, trying to remember the words (I’m not very good with the words of songs). It was awesome. The music I listened to back home had this kind of effect for me. I moved onto singing “Oh! Gravity”, which basically says, “why can’t we seem to keep it together?” Then I moved onto “Meant to Live” and it all made sense.

Despite all the stupidity and frailties in the world, and all our annoying shortcomings, we were meant to live for so much more than just arguments and inability to make our dreams come true.

I knew, on paper, the Plan of Salvation, but KNOWING is a completely different thing. Knowing something can be very passing. It can come and go. But one thing I can cling to is that no matter how little I understand or how annoyed I get with the world, I know the purpose of it all is so much more than itself.

Maybe it was a little apostate to sing (and rock out to) Switchfoot to myself, but I don’t think so.

But either way, the best part is that we were meant to live for a whole lot more than just being born, struggling to learn how to live, and then dying long after the chance to really apply what you learned. For me, it’s like being a financial secretary – I don’t learn my job to do it well, I learn it well so that the person I have to teach (my “office child”) can do it well. Is that fleeting and pointless? In and of itself, yes, but it’s all meant for so much more than that. I don’t have to know nor understand the value of it all to believe there is so much more beyond the thing itself.

I had that before the mission, and that quickly faded after leaving. I got so focused on all the things around me and I was supposed to be doing and forgot how it’s all meant for so much more than just itself. The mission isn’t just to bring people into the church – there is so much more.

I think this kind of attitude accounts for the uncertainty that I was hating before. I was so annoyed with how confident people were in their own knowledge – and I couldn’t find anything to balance that out until last night, when I found that I could be confident in something I didn’t understand. Confidence has always been something I have been very reluctant to have, and even when I had it, I was reluctant to use it. I still am, to a certain extent, but I think this kind of confidence in something that overshadows all the fallacies of nature is the best I have found yet.

Moroni 7:20-22:
How is it possible that ye can lay hold upon every good thing? And now I come to that faith, of which I said I would speak; and I will tell you the way whereby ye may lay hold on every good thing. For behold, God knowing all things, being from everlasting to everlasting, behold, he sent angels to minister unto the children of men, to make manifest concerning the coming of Christ; and in Christ there should come every good thing.

You don’t need to understand why eternal life is desirable if you know that it’s definitely better than anything the world can offer.

TIME’S UP

I LOVE YOU ALL

ELDERLOBO