I made the whole bag of lentils... That was a surprise.

Playing soccer in Parque da Paz


Onion garlic lemon veggietastic LUNCH


Hey everybody!

NEWS.

Well, this week had the most time out finding people of my entire mission: 30 hours and 30 minutes. Usually, with lessons and not using time very well, it's about 15 hours. We've been looking like crazy for new investigators, trying to build on the effort of the members (because really, we full-time missionaries are to build the foundation of our work on the work of the members. It's not the other way around.) Good news, we found some people:

Wow.

So we started knocking doors Wednesday night – contacting hadn't been going well, and we weren't sure what else to do and felt like knocking on this one street wouldn't be a bad idea. We knocked one building (16 doors) without much positive feedback. In the next building, we were knocking and at the second-to-last door, a rather large Portuguese man in his boxers opened it and greeted us, and said, “ah, hold on, my wife would love to talk to you.” I was thinking, “oh no, she's a Jehovah's Witness and he's atheist and we're going to have a wonderful little discussion and then be on our way.” BUT NO. She turned the corner and almost shouted in English, “ELDERS!!! HOW ARE YOU???” Elder Nielsen and I were looking at each other like “what in the world is going on??” It turns out that she was from the Phillipines – her name is Mesila. She was baptized there 9 years ago, and then moved to Portugal 8 years ago and fell into inactivity. Elder Nielsen is SO LUCKY. He has no idea. We teach them in English, because that's what they speak at home. She doesn't really speak Portuguese. Her husband, José, speaks English and understands well. He said he's catholic and sees no change in the future. This first time, he was watching TV and just turned the sound down and didn't really want to participate. The next time we came, we brought her a Book of Mormon in English, and while we were talking with her, he was leafing through it. The next time, we brought a member with us, and José started asking some questions and accepting invitations to read. The member gave Mesila a ride to church the next day. Yesterday, when we taught them about the Plan of Salvation, José had already turned the TV off and was completely focused on us and what we were saying. It was absolutely amazing. ABSOLUTELY AMAZING. We taught in English! I remember being a new missionary and thinking that I was terrible at teaching because I couldn't speak very well, but experiences like these can blow your mind! It was amazing.

I'm out of time. I don't know if it was this keyboard or what, but I didn't get that much written.

There is NOTHING better than the truth.

AMOR A TODOS

Elder Lobo

Train of Thought

"Let your light so shine..."Church in Lisbon...
The Elevator in Lisbon...
A tone of crazy graffiti in our area...
"I am the light and life of the world..."

Hey everybody!

Thanks for the emails. It's cool to see picures!

I never heard anything about MP3 Players – the only problem with MP3 players is that you can't get any new music very easily... but having an MP3 CD player is the best because people can SEND YOU MP3 CD'S! Cough. Hahahaha

I'm so excited to hear that there are other members of the church on Dad's side of the family somehow!

So ever since Sister Lister got transferred to Setúbal, I was basically nominated to be the ward pianist. It's been pretty crazy, seeing as I don't really read music very well. I use the simplified hymnbook to know the chords for my left hand the play the tune by ear with my right. It's been interesting.

What other random news...

Oh yeah, Saturday was INSANE. I was on a division with Elder Wilcox in Almada, and so we went straight to Corroios via light rail to get back together, then went to Lisbon by train to drop off Elder Nielsen's passport so the executive secretaries could start his visa process on Monday. From Lisbon, we took the train 50 minutes south to Setúbal to help teach the mini-MTC there. We saw George, an indian investigator of the zone leaders who is getting ready to get baptized in a couple weeks. When we asked him if he had been reading the Book of Mormon, he laughed and said, “You bet I've been reading!” Setúbal is so cool! Lisbon and Almada are all concrete. Setúbal has wider streets, less chaos, more green, etc. My vision of Portugal thus far has been very limited to the concrete jungles and chains of transit lines.

The train ride to Setúbal was a great chance for me to think, which is something I haven't been doing well for a while. I've learned from experience and having other people tell me that my thinking is basically what makes me. It's like a constant state of research, and whenever I don't have a topic, everything starts going downhill. I've thought a lot about agency lately. This morning I was trying to answer a question I had of “Did I choose to have agency?” For example, did I choose to be given agency and have to go through this life and everything? Or was agency forced upon me? It would seem a little ironic to have agency forced upon somebody imperfect, especially me, who inevitably will end up tripping over his own shoelaces in the frantic race back to his Heavenly Father. It seems to me that at least this life is our chance to choose to keep our agency or not. You can give it up to Satan, who is incapable of giving anything in return, or you can give it up to God, who promises that you will be perfected in the end by giving it to Him. This life is very revealing – it's like our lunch we had with Leonardo and Marina, who asked, “Who wants dessert?!” I quickly raised my hand and said, “I do!” but Irmã Mack shot out her plate without a sound. It was a big lesson about faith for me. God is asking us, “Who wants eternal life?” And I feel like this life is a long run through the woods and wilderness to dive at His feet with our plate extended.

Another lesson:

On the way back to Corroios for the baptism of Irmão António's daughter and one of the Irmãs' investigators, we left the Setúbal chapel at 6:30. The train was to leave at 6:57. I realized after a couple minutes of walking that the only way we could make it would be if we ran the whole way. So, we started running. We ran the whole way, making it with two minutes to spare. We didn't stop running. It seems to me like Christ gave us a train to catch, and the only way we can make it is if we run. Why would we otherwise choose to walk at a comfortable pace, knowing with an absolute certainty that we would miss the train? Once we started running, why would we stop? Why stop running, when the guarantee is that if you run, you'll make it? Why stop running? Why ever stop running?

We've been working hard to try to find new investigators. I've decided to do what I always knew I should do and stop and pray together during the day. We've been really trying to get help to know where to go or what to do or at least have some hint as to what we should do. So we went on Monday to try to talk to Donivoni, a contact we made on Elder Nielsen's first night. We have passed her every few days for the last three weeks, and she had never been home. She wasn't home earlier that day, either, but we went to try again because we had walked to the area nearby. We rang the doorbell down below, and somebody let us in the building. We went up to her house and knocked the door, and a guy answered. We asked if his mom was home, and he said no. We asked him if he had ever heard of the Book of Mormon. “Yeah, I just started reading it yesterday.” !!!!!! His name is André and he's 22. He was Catholic in Brazil, then tried out the evangelical church, then back to catholic, and now he didn't really know what he should do. He's been looking for a church here. He read everything in the beginning of the Book of Mormon – the testimony of the witnesses, Joseph Smith's story, and all the way to 1 Nephi 8, Lehi's dream. We asked him if he wanted to come to church with us, and he absolutely did. We marked the next possible visit for Saturday, and as we left, we said, “See you Saturday!” And he responded with, “And Sunday too, don't forget!” When we got to the bottom of the building we said a quick prayer to thank Heavenly Father for helping us find one way or another the people truly searching for the truth. The Lord does His work on His time, that's for sure.

And now I'm out of mine!

Amor,

Elder Lobo

Pictures from Liz Jefferies' Homecoming Fiesta

Ok, this first picture is actually from Easter with Gold, Maryann, and crew at my house. It's a nice picture so I threw it in. :)



Ella with 'her' chicken. :)

Jenny watching her boys. (sorry, my pictures aren't the greatest here!)
Lisa...(my dad took this one)
Jonny, Emily, and Sammy
Faber boys and chicken...(Hyrum and Joseph)
Uncle Evan and Aunt Jo....and Sheridan too. :)
Virginia...
Wendy...
Liz and Aunt Kathy...
Aunt Kathy and Aunt Jo...
Feel free to add more pictures! I forgot to pull out my camera until it was almost time to go, so I missed getting pictures of lots of people. :)

BOA PASCOA

Going to parque da paz

Hey everybody

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAD!

I was reading in our mission history the other day and I'm pretty sure I saw that Osiris Cabral and his wife were the first couple missionaries in Portugal. I read your email to me about when you got baptized, and I realized that you might have known this same Osiris Cabral I read about. Did you?

I'm glad to hear the trip to Utah is going well. I'm glad the network got all figured out. Hahaha

Oh man, where do I even start with this week??

We found several new investigators this last week through street contacts, one of whom expressed desire to be baptized into the Church (he had been taught by missionaries 8 years ago). We taught his mom and his niece as well, and it's amazing to me how some doors get opened. They said that they never let anybody in to talk about these kinds of things, but they LOVE the elders.

It's been crazy to reexperience the beginning of the mission all over again. I've started to wake up again every once in a while in the middle of the night in complete panic for no real reason. I remember getting the headaches during the lessons trying to understand what everybody was saying. I remember not having any real idea about what was going on but doing my best anyway. Very little has changed, really, it's just that now I'm a little more used to it all. There's very little that anybody else can do, well, there was very little that few people could have done for me to make it any easier without losing focus. It's been hard to watch Elder Nielsen knowing how hard it is to be a new missionary. I don't know what more I can do for him than try my absolute best to teach by example. I remember how hard it was for me to have a sincere conversation with anybody at the beginning. I was on guard at all times – in a new world of sacrifice and forgetting of self. It's taken a long time to see how I can use myself to help others. Now that the language isn't a big problem for me, I can focus better. But as a new missionary, your faith and understanding isn't as deep as it will be, and it's almost like walking blind.

Saturday, we went to Seixal to offer tours of the chapel there, and there was only one person who ended up receiving a tour, but we found one person who wanted to go to church the next day for easter, I'm guessing. We went and had hardcore feijoada at Leonardo and Marina's house (but they're not Brazilian) and then raced back to Seixal to teach in a mini CTM. There were only 20 or so members there, but it was good. President Terry spoke, then we did the presentation of the “one by one” principle, which demonstrates the need for people to come feel for themselves instead of just being told or shown what we have (as shown in 3 Nephi 11). We taught Francisco and Kari (he's from Finland), and they were two of the most humble people I have found in a long time. Kari has read in the Book of Mormon, and we gave him a copy in Finnish.

My mind has been so busy I have hardly had any time to think. I've always known I thought too much, but lately, I haven't been able to think enough. I had been doing one or two entries per day in my moleskine last transfer, but I've been going 4-5 days between ideas lately. I guess I've got the same symptom I had when I got in the mission – I was always worrying about what I was supposed to study instead of worrying about what I needed to study. It's a trust that has come and gone for me – the trust to depart from a rut of study routines to the freedom of exploration and discovery of new principles. The mission (life, too) is a departure in many different ways. I wish I had the presence of mind to keep exploring that idea...

One thing I did realize on the train with Elder Bass on a division was about the three nephites. Nine of the three nephites wanted their service to have an end and be received in the kingdom of heaven. They got it, and were blessed. But the three wanted to stay so they could keep working, and they were promised the “fulness of joy”. I think that really applies as a missionary.

I realized for the first time this Saturday that a lot of people that fall into the category of “other missionaries” generally look younger. It was weird.

I feel like I've been walking around all week with my shoes untied but just haven't had the time to stop and tie them. That's basically how I would summarize this week. Hahaha

I love you guys and I hope everybody had a wonderful Easter.

Elder Lobo

"Sou de Portland, Oregon" ????

P-day in Portugal - Packing,
Pizza, Package, Pop

First day with first greenie Elder Nielsen

Hey everybody!

OH MY GOODNESS.

OK, so President Terry said in the meeting before we went to meet the new missionaries that he was absolutely convinced that the Lord had prepared us and the new missionaries, and that who he had assigned us to train was what the Lord wanted. We went in to the training with the new missionaries to sit down, and I saw ELDER NIELSEN, who I knew was coming. Long story short, PORTLAND, OREGON is being very well represented here in Almada. I had seminary with him senior year. He's from the Bethany Ward, and Kaitlyn Morgan was in his ward, along with some other people we know. Unbelievable! I remember joking during the Christmas phone call that this would happen. The more I think about it, though, it blows my mind. The timing for me to leave the office and just the right time and get here and learn SO MUCH to get me ready to be who I need to be for the rest of eternity... I feel like I have started learning how to love during these last 7 weeks.

I have never worked with anybody who is brand new in the mission. I was already understanding and speaking a lot when I came into the mission, so I never really found out what it would be like to not have a single clue what somebody said when they opened their mouth. It's been cool to watch him double every day. He amazes me. I remember how chaotic and stressful my first week was for me, and I'm trying to keep focused and not try to relax too much, because this is serious business. But we're having great days every day so far, and the shock is starting to wear off, especially since today is P-Day, his chance to breathe a little and take care of everything that has been on his mind for the last week. And, like I was joking, I do still need to teach him how to make rice.

Irmã Mack is training Irmã Nkutxi (“ni-KOO-chee” from Angola, who is one of the first missionaries to leave the country of Angola. They're SO COOL. Our district is awesome. Elder Wilcox and Elder Bass are still our zone leaders.

Conference was INCREDIBLE. Every conference is the best conference yet. We watched Saturday AM in the chapel live at 5 PM Saturday evening. On Sunday we watched Priesthood at the chapel at 10 AM. We went and had lunch at Leonardo and Marina's house to watch Saturday PM, and it was in Portuguese but you could hear the English behind it. I understood the Portuguese. Then we went trying to round up our investigators to go to the Sunday AM at 5 PM, but it didn't end up working out. We had a meeting with our ward mission leader between sessions, and then stayed and watched the Sunday PM from 9 AM to 11 PM, going straight to bed when we got home. Genral Conference is like IKEA – No matter where you see it, you always feel like you're in the same place.

I decided to try to find the theme for this general conference, and in putting together all the talks, I came up with the following:

Commitment to sacred covenants to love and serve others by sacrifice is the only way to transform ourselves into the happy beings of eternal value we truly want to be.

I loved President Eyring's talk: “We must be transformed through making right choices where that is hard to do.”
and Elder Bednar's!!! It blew my mind. Elder Bednar seems to learn and understand things in a way very similar to the way I learn, so almost anything he says makes perfect sense to me.

But yeah, everything I learned is encapsulated in that one sentence theme. Condensing 10 hours of conference into one sentence gives one sentence the power of 10 hours to me. I read that sentence and I remember everything I heard understood. I highly recommend everybody to try a similar idea.

Anyway, we taught Silva's friend Edson this week, but Silva is moving to Miratejo. It will be good for him – he won't be living with his girlfriend anymore, he'll be closer to his family, and he'll be closer to the church. Also, we found another family this week to teach – it started with a woman, Natalia, whom we contacted on the street. We visited her house, found that her son had been taught two years ago but the missionaries got transferred and they lost contact with the elders. There was a death in the family, and they had a lot of questions for us. On the way out of the door, we felt that we should talk to a woman looking out of the window (we don't do it that often), and she turned out to be the sister of Natalia. Paula, who was baptized when I got here, has been working on Sundays, started smoking, and hasn't ever been home for us to talk to. But, we've been talking to Liliana, the girlfriend of her son, and she has discovered some curiosity. We went last night to talk to Paula, but there was a big neighborhood party in her house for the Porto vs. Manchester United game, so we asked if we could read something really quickly to give a kick to the party. Nobody really responded to the question, but Nuno (17) and Liliana (16) responded with a loud “EU OUÇO!” They decided it would be better to come the next night, so we're going over tonight.

I love you guys like crazy. Have a fun trip to Utah!

Amor para todos,

Elder Lobo

OH MY GOODNESS

What would you say to somebody being born into a moment like this?

Distrito de Almada

Hey everybody!

Thanks for all the updates. Every week it's like switching on the news and catching a glimpse of what's going on over there on that side of the world (but way better – the news totally isn't worth watching, especially here).

So, I come into this email with some news. I don't even know whether to call it good or bad. But I'll explain that later.

Several cool things happened this week. Oh my goodness. Elder Corbett and I were walking around Cacilhas at night talking to people, and we got to a point where nobody was near us, so we started having a conversation about our effect as missionaries. For example, are we just supposed to be in the right place at the right time and hope that all the “seeds” we plant will someday accomplish something? For example, with all the investigators who never really realize the desire to progress and follow through with their commitments, will they someday realize what they were doing? Maybe the garbage man will see the passalong card that guy behind us blatantly threw away and want a copy of the Book of Mormon or something. Basically, we weren't sure how exactly we were going to accomplish our purpose of helping people come unto Christ. We were talking about how maybe the only real guaranteed success is our own growth that will come from dedicated service. But we came to the conclusion that we're not here to just put our time in and then check out. We're here because we CAN make a difference. We have in the past made a difference in the lives of certain people, we are right now making a difference in the lives of a few people, and we will continue to find people who we can help. 30 seconds after those words came out of our mouths, a kid at the metro station (metro is the nickname for the light rail system in Almada, even though technically “metro” is the name of the subway in Lisbon) called for us and we started talking to him. He was 8 years old, named Júnior, and according to him, he will be the best soccer player in the world. So, we got his autograph, just in case. He started telling us about when the elders came to his house two years ago. We started talking about the Plan of Salvation and Jesus Christ, and he really listened and consequently understood. We talked about the story of the Book of Mormon, and when we showed him the picture of Christ visiting the people in the Americas, he said, “if I were that kid in the back I would run up and give Jesus a big hug.” His mother, Linda, was cleaning the metro at the time (the actual train) at the station, and when she finished up she came over to talk to us. I felt a really special interest from her, and I think something from what Júnior was saying (like begging to come to church with us) might have really touched her heart (I hate using that expression, but really, it got right to her core). We taught her on Sunday with Leonardo, then we read 1 Nephi 1 with her on Monday, then we ran into her in the street yesterday and she said she had continued reading with Júnior like we had invited her to do. We have run into her twice in the street in the last three days. This seems to happen a lot with our investigators (Silva, Hudson, and now Linda), and I am reluctant to admit it, but I don't think that's a coincidence.

So we were teaching Silva yesterday about the Gospel, reading 2 Nephi 9 with him, and afterwards he made us lunch, and while we were making lunch, the phone rang, and it was President.

I'M GOING TO BE TRAINING A GREENIE.

I can't say I didn't see this as a possibility, but oh my goodness! I can't train a greenie! I'm the one that needs to get trained!

There have been a lot of things going through my mind, and as I've been getting more and more nervous, it seems to be helping less and less. All I have to do is just not let anything get in the way and not settle for doing any bad habits I have (no matter what you all may think, I'm not a missionary machine). I don't have anything to compare it to... I trained a new intern at StowAway2, I trained Elder Barrett as a Financial Secretary, but I've never had anything like this.

The terminology in the mission says that your first area is where you were “born”, and I'm attaching a picture of an advertisement that just appeared today. It says, “What would you tell somebody about to be born into a moment like this?” That's the million-dollar question for me right now, I guess.

My goodness. We're reorganizing the house like crazy, cleaning, planning his first P-Day, planning his first lesson (it's likely going to be lunch with the Saturninos, this classically old Portuguese couple in the ward). I remember my first P-Day like it was yesterday. We walked around Lisbon – it was so cool to run into other people from the MTC, meet Elder Barrett, etc. I'm going to have to decide where we're going to do compras probably. Heck, I'm probably going to have to teach him how to make rice. RICE!!!! Feijoada. Etc. Oh my goodness. I have no idea what it's like to have a child, but I imagine this is a tiny, tiny glimpse into what it's like. He's going to copy the way I speak! He's going to copy the way I do contacts! He's going to copy the number of times I knock on a door! I can't handle this kind of responsibility! Hahaha. The principle will always remain, however, of the need to have the freedom to act and not be acted upon. I appreciate very much all the room to act that I was given as a child, and though sometimes I wish I could have been pushed to do this or that, I had to learn for myself. Especially on the mission, I clearly see the need for independence of testimony.

Like Elder Bednar said to us, and I'm paraphrasing, “You have to help your investigators, kids, and everybody else be spiritually independent of you.” We have to preserve and cultivate the right to act and not be acted upon. We have to have the opportunity to knowingly choose our consequences. We have to be independent enough to use our resources to find the answers we're looking for.

Anyway, tomorrow is the big day. He's going to remember it forever.

Amor para todos,

Elder Lobo