Giving blessings, World Cup and Investigators :)

Weekly Email - June 16, 2014

Isaiah 12:2

How's everyone doing? This week has been good, the World Cup started this week and my goodness it is insane. The whole city shuts down for the Brazil games. Everyone is wearing yellow and green and nearly every house has a Brazil flag. Imagine the fourth of July combined with the super bowl times 10. It is awesome, haha. We have to stay in the days Brazil plays. they play again tomorrow. it would be impossible to teach anyone and a bit dangerous because of the alcohol. The people all watch the other games as well. They may have no idea who the county is but its futebol so they watch, haha. It's really cool to be a part of. Besides the World Cup it was a good week. They asked me to give another talk in sacrament meeting. They must like picking on the gringo, haha. We had some real good lessons this week. We met with T----- and P---- nearly everyday. T-----´s son (P----´s father) has a drug abuse problem and it is really hard for T-----. She has been basically left to raise his three kids. So we taught a lot about how God is our father and he will support us in our challenges. Yesterday we invited her to be baptized and she had the concern they she can't read and that we read a lot in our services (hymns, class). I told her no need to worry, the gringo does alright and he can't read or talk or understand Portuguese. They even asked him to give a talk. Hopefully that gave her some comfort. P---- is an awesome kid. He is 17 and really has a lot of motivation to make something of himself. He sees the trap his father is in is not what he wants. We are also teaching a young man named T----. The priests quorum is really awesome in the ward. There are only 4 of them but none of them have parents who are members and they all live in the same neighborhood and are great buddies. T---- is another one of their friends. He has been investigating a lot of different churches (JW, Universal, Catholic) and the priests in our ward told him about ours and gave him a Book of Mormon. We have had two lessons so far with him and they have gone really well. We had zone conference this week so we were able to see they rest of the new zone. They sure moved a lot of people around last transfer I didn't know any of them. It was a great training, the AP's (assistants to the president) were there as well. Finally got some more Books of Mormon there as well, we had been out for about 2 weeks. I gave my first actual blessing this week in Portuguese. It was a another neat experience. It was for T-----. I really love the ward here. I'm starting to be able to connect whose is family with who, names are still tricky though. Overall a lot of teaching this week. We are working on getting more members at our lessons. It's hard here because the area is so big, everyone lives so far apart but fellow-shipping is very important. Did a lot of contacting this week. We met the craziest people it seems contacting. We have gotten to be friends with these two ladies who are always there at the mall where we contact. One sells jewelry and they other hands out flyers for her pizza restaurant. They are always there so we talk to them a lot. They may not know it but we have taught them almost all of the lessons in our conversations with them, under cover teaching, haha. Neither of them live in our area but hopefully we can refer them to other missionaries. 

Love you guys have a great week!!! 

Isaiah 12:2

Com amor,

Elder Mountain

Elder Mountain representin' in Rio ;)

Nate on a bus in Rio.

A spiral staircase to an investigators home in Rio. 

Alley in Rio during World Cup!

A picture we had not received yet of Elder Mountain and a convert/friend from AZ. :)

Email - June 9, 2014

Sounds like you guys have had an eventful week! Glad you guys are having fun at the pool and at Sonic and out west. This week was another good one. Been battling a cold the past few days but I think I am past the worst of it. This week we had Stake Conference and it was a special broadcast from Salt Lake. The area seventy and Elder Richard G. Scott (who speaks Portuguese) and Elder Russell M. Nelson spoke. I'm pretty sure it was for all of Brazil. It was a really good conference. The Saturday adult session was just normal speakers from the stake and they talked a lot about preparing for the temple that's going to be built here. The people are all really excited. The church has bought the land but hasn't started construction yet. Talked a lot about family history and missionary work. This week Elder Veiga and I worked a lot on teaching in the street. It is easy when you are making contacts to be tempted I guess to just give them a pass along card or get their phone number without teaching them a whole lot. So this week we tried to improve our contacts and teach a one minute restoration or plan of salvation lesson to them. It has taken a lot of work because you got to talk so dang fast to make it work,  haha, people will only be interested for 30-60 seconds, so you got to make it count. Oh, Elder Veiga and I stayed in the area (forgot about that). A lot of the zone changed though. 3 of the 6 in our district including the DL are new. Elder Fox is still in the district though. This week Elder Veiga has had me lead some lessons as well. He is good at pushing me, he has been a great teacher. We had a really good lesson with T------ (the lady who cant read) and her 17 year old grandson. We taught the restoration and it went well. First time I said the first vision in Portuguese in a lesson. The 17 year old, P---- was really interested. It has been hot the past few days here. Summer here is gonna be really hot. The stake center we went to for stake conference was massive. It was like a small temple. It has to be bigger than the tiny Birmingham Alabama temple we went to once. I don't know if all the buildings are big like that here but I was surprised. Have been continuing to read the Book of Mormon with Elder Veiga. I'll read Portuguese and he will read English. He has learned English really fast. It's funny sometimes he will say Book of Mormon phrases like `I am exceedingly afraid` or `My book upon my desk` haha, it has been a blast learning with him. The leadership is all so young here. Our elders quorum president has been a member for about 8 months, our bishop is 28, our stake president is in his 30's, growing pains I think when the church is growing fast. The buses kinda went on half strike for a few days so it took forever to find the buses that we needed and they are always packed with more people than you could imagine could fit. I had a cool experience this week when the stake patriarch who is in our ward. He called us and asked if we could give his wife a blessing. She was sick with a cold so we needed to anoint her with oil. She asked if I could anoint and if Elder Veiga could give the blessing. I wasn't sure if I could but Elder Veiga told me you can do it I know it. I had studied how to give a blessing briefly before but it had been a while. So I gave it a shot, it was neat how the words came when I needed them. The holy ghost, and the gift of tongues is real, that's for sure. Elder Veiga always tells me trust in the Lord he will help you. It is definitely true. It was a testimony builder for me. Was a good week for sure. Love you guys!!!

Eu sei que Jesus vive. Ele e minha luz. Todo de minha paz e felizidade e por cause dele. 

Com amor,

vamos la!

Elder Montanha

Super hard to see but it's a night picture of the crocodiles that Nate mentioned in his last email. Scary!!! The bridge doesn't even have a gaurd rail!!

Teaching in Brazil, VISA finalized & clapping on doors :)

Weekly Email - June 2, 2014

Elder Fox and Elder Mountain, together in Provo MTC and Sao Paulo CTM.

Another week down in Brazil!!! Glad to see all of you guys are doing well. Can't believe Aunt Cindee had her baby tell her congrats for me. This week was another good one. The language is progressing little by little. Elder Veiga has been an awesome teacher for me. He definitely has patience to be companions with a fresh gringo, haha. Transfers are tomorrow, we actually will find out if one of us is moving in a couple hours. I hope not, and I don't think so, we have only been comps for 3 weeks. We had a really good week of finding this week. We found 8 new investigators. One really neat experience we had was with one of our new investigators M-------. We were teaching her the restoration and it was going great. We got to the first vision and Elder Veiga started to quote it as I held the picture of the first vision that's in the pamphlet. She stopped Elder Veiga about half way through (which normally isn't ideal, haha) and said "This is exactly what I imagined would happen if we had a Prophet again. That he would be a young boy with pure intentions, he would pray in a forest, and he would see God and Christ. You mean to tell me this happened"? haha, yes it did happen. I have never seen that reaction to the first vision. Often people have doubts that a 14 year old boy in the USA is who God called to be Prophet but she already had imagined it exactly how it happened. It was pretty neat. We knock on doors, or clap hands, haha, once in a while and we had some really good luck in this one small apartment complex. (I asked him about the clapping and he said,"yeah we do that for the houses because they all have gates. we knock the doors for apartments".) There are maybe 15 apartments in there and we ended up getting 4 new investigators. One of them who is an older lady actually had been interviewed for baptism a long time ago and we didn't know about it. She doesn't know how to read so she said it's hard for her to get a testimony of the Book of Mormon. That was the only thing that kept her from being baptized last time. So we gotta try to figure out how to help her. This week I had to go to the federal police and get my visa finalized. It was foreverrrrr away so we took a bus to the secretaries apartment and spent the night there and left the next morning to go to the police station. We got there at 7:00 in the morning and ended up getting back to the secretaries apartment at 4:00 in the afternoon. The Brazilian government workers are really fond of Americans, haha. We were put in the back, of the back, of the back of the line, but i got it. I met a really nice guy from Argentina there. He spoke Spanish and a little English but didn't know much Portuguese so I ended up teaching him in English. He was a really nice guy. He moved here from Argentina for work and is saving money to help his family move. He was really interested in the Book of Mormon too. It has been a bit wet this week, really nice temperature though, maybe 75-80. The food here is amazing. Really different but amazing. Haven't gotten sick yet. The water seems to be clean. No one drinks from the tap they either have filters or buy some from someone who has one, so there isn't much reason to worry. They drink guarana (a type of soda) here like water too. They drink that stuff non stop all hours of the day. It's really good too not sure why they don't have it in the USA. Church was really good this week. I really enjoyed the classes. It's a small ward (the EQP teaches every week and the bishop teaches gospel doctrine) everyone has a few callings and we don't have a WML at the moment, but they are really close, like a big family. They have made me feel very welcomed. Anyways, been a great week. The language is getting better everyday, only if I could get these people to talk slower, haha. 
love ya!!!

Sei que jesus vive. Eu sei que ele nos ama. Sei que o dom de lingua e real. Sei que o livro de mormon e a palavra de deus. Sei que este evangelho e simple poderoso. Ele pode mudar nossas vidas. Eu amo voces!! Obrigadao por sua amor. tem uma semana boa!

Translation:

I know that Jesus lives. I know he love us. I know that the gift of language and real. I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God. I know that this gospel is simple and powerful. It can change our lives. I love you guys!! Thanks a lot for your love. Have a good week!

vamos la!

Elder Montanha

(I might actually get a name tag that says that!!)

Provo MTC district #220 reuniting in Rio!

First 2 Pday emails from Brazil and lot of pictures!!

Weekly Email - May 19, 2014

Missionary Training Center in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Rio!!!!! View from the Mission Home! Gorgeous!!

Man what a week!!! First I love it here in Brazil. It's is awesome. My companion is Elder Veiga, he has been out 8 months. He is a native but speaks a little English. He is awesome and very patient and helpful teaching me the language. The language is getting better everyday. We go contacting a lot here where we just talk to people and invite them to church or teach them about the Book of Mormon. My first day here I couldn't even introduce myself without looking like a dumbo, haha. The language here in Rio is wayyyy different than in Sao Paulo. The second day with a lot of practice I could introduce myself but Elder Veiga had to so the message part about the Book of Mormon or whatever. Then on the third day he said alright it's your turn to do it by yourself. I was so freaking nervous but he helped me out with the words and I got it down and we ended up getting 60 contacts that day. We always go contacting at this exit of a mall that is constantly pouring out with people. So we target the families and we will do it on our own so we can cover more ground at once. It was fast growth from the first day were everyone one looked at me like I was an alien. I even convinced someone I was from Belo Hortizonte the other day, haha. The people here use a ton of slang that doesn't have the same meaning as it would literally translated so it's going to take a while to learn all of that. Just like redneck English that I speak, haha. I taught Elder Veiga 'ya'll' and 'howdy' the other day. He really wants to learn English so when we study we read Preach My Gospel and Book of Mormon together, he will read in English and I will read in Portuguese. It's a great way to learn. Oh the buses, they are crazy. They have three different kinds. A small van that goes to the outskirts of town, a school bus size one, and a huge mega size of 3 school buses one. All of them are packed to the rim, always, haha. They are like clown cars. They are dang expensive too. They are R$3 for one trip. Our area is massive so we ride the bus a ton. The other day I had a scatterbrained moment with the bus. Since it is so packed Elder Veiga and I normally can't stand by each other so when the stop comes he will yell at me get off because the area is new to me. Well at one stop I heard him yell, I thought I heard ``time to get off`` but he said ``time to get off at the next one``. So I wormed my way through the people and got off at the stop we were at and I didn't see Elder Veiga. Then the bus takes off again WITH Elder Veiga still on it. I was like "minha nossa" (my gosh) how am I going to find him. So I start running the direction the bus took off, hoping that he realizes I got off. About a quarter mile later, at the next stop, I see him running towards me. Thank goodness, haha. That was crazy. Welcome to Brazil moment for me, haha. (not so funny to his Ma!!) Anyways the people here are so humble. Their food is dang amazing too, haha, so good. Different for sure but really good. The ward we cover is awesome. They are smaller, 150 members or so but they really made me feel welcome at church. Oh, guess who had to give a talk on Sunday? haha I did. The bishop wanted me to give a quick 5 min talk and introduce myself to the ward. It went pretty well. There are so many churches here, it's crazy.  I really like Pres Lima. The day I flew in to Rio we spent most of the day with him. He actually is about to be released in June to be in the Quorum of the 70. Man its hard to type English! It's weird, takes me a second longer to remember how to spell. My brain is on overload, haha. We have some baptisms this Saturday hopefully. A father and his two kids. He is so humble. There is a huge divide here between the rich and the poor. Some people are super comfortable and others make R$10 a day, or 5 bucks. No matter what they have they give you their best. They are such a happy people too. Always laughing and joking about something. Oh, something neat the Rio temple is being built in our area!! They have just barely started construction but it's underway. It's right near the beach off the highway. The name of the suburb we cover is called Camorim, so maybe you can google pictures of it. I love it here that's for sure. Oh, Elder Veiga is from Campo Grande Brazil. Love you guys, I think that's everything. Love ya!!!

 eu sei que jesus cristo live. eu sei qui pai celestia ee litermente nosso pai. ele nos ama muito. o poder de Deus e real. e sento ele cada dia.

com amor, vamos la!!

Elder Montanha

 He says it's a drink his companion likes from the area of Brazil that he's from but it's not popular in Rio.
Not sure about the straw?? 

Elder Mountain and his first companion in Rio!!!

CTM fiesta!!

Nate with an Elder from a neighboring ward here in GA, small world!!

  

His district in the CTM in Sao Paulo.

Some Elders from Peru that Nate became great friends with while in the Missionary Training Center.

Weekly Email - May 26, 2014

Week two in Brazil!!! Man it has been crazy but a lot of fun. This week was great. Elder Veiga has been a great teacher. I have seen my Portuguese improve a lot this week. It's small steps at a time but it's cool to see what I can do that I couldn't when I got here. We had a good week teaching. We had most of our lessons in the homes of our investigators which is a big push here. It's really easy to have lessons on the street but the problem is you probably will never find them again so it's important to meet in their homes. People are constantly protesting for one reason or another. One day this week the police went on protest (WHAT???? that cannot happen!!) so there were no police available so we had to stay in after dark. We found a few families to teach this week. One, N--- and J----- we are really excited about. We had a really good lesson with them and they called us later in the week to tell us they have been reading the Book of Mormon and like it. Another lesson that really sticks out in my mind is the one we had with F-------. She is an older woman who owns a business where she makes dresses. Rae would love to look around her house. When we were there a little girl Rae´s age was getting a dress for her bday. Anyways it was the first lesson with her. Elder Veiga had met her before but she was always busy. It was an awesome lesson. Very powerful! Elder Veiga is a great teacher. He always tells me ´Alegria Elder!! Alegria!!!(joy)` whenever we teach or contact. We gotta show in the first few seconds, "dang, something has made that person happy, I wonder what it is." I have learned a lot from him. We did quite a bit of reactivating work as well. There are three inactives that live right on the same street as us so we see them often. One of them, R--, is one of the funniest guys ever. He is a huge person, in the literal sense (350 pounds maybe) and has an even bigger heart. He is super nice and tells his jokes slow enough so the gringo can understand. Also it's been interesting, no everyone but some of the natives are surprised that I can speak Portuguese. I guess they are used to the Americano tourists. They say, "Voce fala?" (you speak?) haha, luckily they like talking with the American. We had a bit of a roach problem this week in our kitchen, haha, but with some spray and using flip flops as the weapon of choice I think we eliminated all of them. I am surprised by the amount of English speakers in our ward. There are 4 or 5 Americans who live here who all teach English or have English schools. One of them is from Scotland and another is from South Carolina and they are good friends and they always are bickering who is teaching the correct form of English. The work is so different here than Arizona, it's almost overwhelming, there are so many people. In my last area I think I almost met every single person. Here there is probably 100,000 living in our ward, if not more. So many people to teach. So much to do always. I love it here. The language is coming slowly but surely. I love the people of Brazil. I am so grateful for the opportunity to serve here. Love ya!!!! Happy bday Ali!!!!

Com amor (with love)

Elder Mountain

View out Rio apartment. Living in the city for sure!

Rio apartment - bedroom.

In Brazil!! CTM and Rio arrival!!

Email received from The Missionary Training Center in Sao Paulo - April 30, 2014

Hey family! I made it to Brazil! Man it was a long day and a long flight (9 & 1/2 hours). We will be Skyping on Sunday May 11th at 6 oclock Brazil time. Not sure what time that will be for you guys but you can google it to figure out. It will only be voice unfortunately no video. Sao Paulo is so dang big. We drove on a bus from the airport for 2 hours or so and it was just solid down town city. My comp here is Elder Fox. He was in the district with me in the MTC on Provo, Utah. It's great to see him again, and cool we got it the same time. Doing great other wise, still like a dream I am here. The people are so nice here I can tell already. The nice lady who sat next to me was super nice trying to understand my super broken Portuguese. It's going to be a lot of work and my head may explode trying to think so hard but I'm gonna love it here. Also I don't have a Skype account so if you can make one for me and send the username and password so I can use it. love you guys it was great to see you. take care!!!

Weekly Email - May 9, 2014

Man what a week!!! Brazil is freaking awesome first of all, and I love it down here. My comp is Elder Fox if you guys remember him, he was in my MTC district in Provo. Crazy that it happened like that. He was serving in the Charlotte North Carolina Mission and is from Oregon. Great guy, really enjoying being with him. It's so crazy being in the MTC again. I feel like it's starting all over again, it's pretty fun. All of the focus, of course, is on the language where as before it was on the lessons with Portuguese on the side. It took my brain a while to get going but its amazing how fast you learn here. There is about an even number of Brazilieros, Americans, and Hispanics here. It's a lot of fun to talk to all of them. We have two Brazilieros in our room, they are a blast to talk to. I feel comfortable enough in the language now where I can have a conversation about anything really. Portuguese is easy, in the fact that you don't have to know all of the words, you can describe them and they will understand. We have three teachers all of which are Brazilieros that just got back from their mission in the last year or so. They are great. We have gone proselyting twice so far, that was an adventure but man it was fun. We ride a bus to a park or bus stop or something where there is a lot of people and just start talking to people. They are all so receptive. The second time especially I couldn't believe it! I was having a conversation with a native, they understood me, and I understood them. They are so nice, very polite as well. For an example, we talked to this guy who was a minister or something for a church and was comfortable with his church. In the USA I would expect someone like that to just walk away or even maybe say a rude comment or two but here he said I respect you so I want to listen to what is it that you believe. They are so sincere. It really is amazing. The traffic/streets here are insane. They are tiny and all of the cars absolutely fly every where and there are a million and a half huge buses all over the place, not to mention all of the motorcycles who all ride in the middle of the road flying past traffic, haha. It's crazy. Sorry I can't upload any pictures, the computers here aren't capable of sending them for some reason. Next email hopefully I can. I'm super excited to get in the field and get a braziliero comp. It's hard to describe how nice they are, haha, they are instantly your best friend. And they love seeing you trying to speak the language. It's been a long week but at the same time it has flown by. Skyping is going to be really quick only 15 minutes because there are so many missionaries here but I'm excited to talk to you guys again. love ya I'm doing great.

Elder Mountain

Email letter that we received on May 18, 2014, once he arrived in Rio! A sure trial of our patience! He arrived in Rio on Tuesday (13th) and the email came on Sunday......but he's there!!! :)

VISA!!!! VISA!!! Time to say goodbye to AZ :(

Email from Gilbert Arizona Mission, received April 23, 2014

Brother & Sister Mountain,

We wanted to give you a heads up that Elder Mountain’s visa to Brazil has cleared and he will travel on Tuesday, April 29^th.  Attached below is the entire itinerary.

 

When he’s at the Phoenix Airport, he is allowed to call you if there is time before boarding.  Also, it looks like he’ll have a couple of hours layover in the Atlanta airport, where he may also be able to call you at that point before boarding the plane for Rio.  If you have a preference on when you’d like him to call , or if you would like to get a message to Elder Mountain, email me back and I’ll get the message to him.

 

Elder Mountain is a fine missionary and we have thoroughly enjoyed having him here in the Arizona Gilbert Mission!  Actually, we hate to see him go!  We believe he has grown, and hopefully having been in Arizona will be a treasured memory for him also.  Thank you for raising a fine son.

Sincerely,

Sister Cathy Thornock

Mission Secretary

Arizona Gilbert Mission

A text picture we received from a family in AZ. Elder Mountain was on his goodbye tour! 

Weekly Email - April 28, 2014

Man what crazy news, I never thought this visa would ever come. So you guys found out on Wednesday? I didn't find out till Saturday night. I am really excited, hard to leave here I have been in this area so long, it's like leaving home all over again. I am really excited, a little nervous about the language and all but really excited. How I found out about my visa is a kinda funny story. I guess President Nattress was supposed to call me on Friday to tell me, but he forgot. On Saturday evenings the Thornocks who live in Highland ward and also are office staff for the mission have all of the missionaries in the area over for root beer floats. When Elder Ramon and I got there (we were on exchanges that day), Elder Thornock asks, "So you know right?" "Do I know what?" "Are you serious you haven't heard?" "I haven't heard what?" I thought he was pulling my leg, Elder Thornock is a funny jokester kinda guy and I didn't even suspect that my visa came. I hardly thought about my visa at all to be honest. Then he tells me "Your visa came Elder Mountain, you will be out of here in 3 days!!!". I couldn't believe it. I still can't believe it. It is going to be a lot of adjusting I know, but I am excited for it. It's going to be hard to leave the members and missionaries that I have gotten to know here. I am so grateful for the opportunity I have had to serve here. I was quite lucky to be able to be a part of the temple open house and dedication here. That was incredible to be a part of. I am definitely going have to introduce you guys to a lot of people here afterwards. So today and tomorrow are going  to be some crazy days. I have a lot of the packing done already but it's gonna be really close to fitting into the 50 weight requirement. The type writer definitely can't come, haha. I was able to say bye to a lot of people yesterday and hopefully be able to see some more today. They announced that was leaving in Monterey Sacrament meeting, which took me by complete surprise. There are so many members I am going to miss. Today I hope to see T--- one more time and E--- is going to take elder Jewkes and I out to eat. It will be great to see him again. Other than the visa news the week was great. There was an expanded Zone Conference for our stake and the stakes around us where all the missionaries plus all of the members in the are are invited hear Pres Nattress speak to us. It was really awesome. Every time I hear him speak I feel like I'm in the presence of an apostle or something, haha. He just radiates with the Spirit, haha. So this evening I will be picked up by the assistants and will spend tonight at the mission home and then fly out in the morning. I am super excited!!! 

love you guys!!!

Elder Mountain

Elder Mountain and Elder Ramon, great friends!!

Birthday and rumors of transfer!!! oh, and another baptism!!

Weekly Email - April 21, 2014

Elder Mountain's birthday dinner & cake with this amaZing family!!! I love them!!!

Hey family thanks for the happy birthday wishes. Thanks for the package and all of the cards, been a great bday so far. The sisters in the district are making me a cake apparently, haha, and we ate at Sonic after we went shopping at Walmart. I have been recording every night what happens with the recorder I got last week. C---'s baptism was so dang awesome. The ward supported him really well there was a lot of youth there. His friend McKenna, who gave him a book of Mormon with her testimony in it a couple months ago, gave a really good talk on baptism. The spirit was so strong there. The baptism pictures are on Elder Jewkes' camera and he forgot it so I will send some pictures of it to you next week. C--- was confirmed on Sunday, it was pretty neat to happen on Easter Sunday. We missed Monterey Sacrament Meeting because both of our wards now start at the same time. They will fix that during transfers I'm sure. Interviews with President happened this week, interviews are always so awesome. We all had about 15 or so minutes. He hinted that I will be leaving the area next transfer, I have been here a while. I would like to stay if I can but change is good too. Went to the Easter Pageant with C----- this week. The pageant was incredible, it is so well done. It was crazy how many people were there. My guess would be 5000-7000 people, if not more. It was absolutely packed. It was a really good experience for C-----. On Sunday we had a investigator come to church out of no where. C--------, who was baptized about a year ago and is 17, also just turned his papers in for his mission, brought his mom to church. We have been trying to meet with her for a while. She really wants to meet but is busy with work because she is a single mom. Hopefully we can meet her this week. She really liked church. Did you guys see the "Because of Him" Easter video the church released. We shared it in a lot of our member visits this week. It's a great video. Also have you guys seen all of the bible videos on lds.org? Watch those if you haven't. they are incredible. We share them once and a while. Elder Parsons and Ramon both were pretty sick this week. Elder Ramon had the flu and Elder Parsons has pneumonia. It was a pretty sick apartment, haha. Luckily I have felt fine so far. It was a pretty good week otherwise. Can't believe it's the last week of the transfers. Love you guys!!!! Thanks for the package and all!!!

love

Elder Mountain  

Elder Ramon posing in front of Nate's flag.

View from Gilbert apartment! Elder Mountain spent 7 months living on Guadalupe Road :)

Saying goodbye to a favorite member missionary!

Baptism coming up, conference recap and helping out with Special Olympics

Weekly Email - April 14, 2014

Love that Elder!!

Hope you guys are doing well! Looks like the trip was Vogel was a lot of fun. Those were some fun trips there playing in the river. Glad you guys were able to bring Solo, I'm sure he was happy as ever fishing. Too bad you couldn't catch anything. Thanks for the video you sent Ali, I sure loved playing baseball with him. This week was great. C--- is good to go for Saturday for his baptism, he will have his interview on Wednesday. He is really strong and committed and the ward's youth have really been great supporting him. He is really excited to be baptized. We attended the new Highland Ward on Sunday. Trying our best to get to know as much of the new members as we can. We got a new Elders Quorum President, new YM President, YW President, Sunday School President, and going to have new ward missionaries. So it's kept us really busy meeting them and helping them out however we can. We missed Monterey Ward's Sacrament because they now both start at 10am. I heard from bishop Sunday evening that E--- came to the ward and bore his testimony, sad I missed that. On transfers they should fix that. On Saturday the mission helped out at the Special Olympics which was really cool.

Special Olympics

Most of the mission was there so I got to see Elder Macfarlane and Elder Davis, which was nice. It was their track and field competition so there was no softball like I helped Albert out with but we got the athletes water and set up and took down equipment and cheered them on, it was pretty neat. We had some good lessons this week. Met with C-----, hopefully will be going to the Easter Pageant this week with him and his wife. Found two new investigators, P--- and B-----. They are close neighbors of Brother Gaytan. We met them a couple weeks ago doing service for them and we gave them a Book of Mormon, then we caught them outside again and they invited us in for a lesson. They are older (75 maybe) B----- has read quite a bit of the Book of Mormon a while ago and P--- has started to read it. We are pretty excited for them. Brother Gaytan took us out to lunch on Friday to a sushi place, man it was good, didn't know I was a fan of sushi but it was pretty tasty. He is really busy with his work as a police officer but he is a great ward mission leader, always goes out with us when he can and does what he can to get the ward missionary minded. Went on exchanges twice this week, both times with Elder Ramon, one time in our area and one time in his area. He is a great missionary, really good teacher. I learned a lot from him. Going to get a voice recorder/mp3 player (that's popular with missionaries) today with some money I saved, will make keeping track of what happens a lot easier. Anyways, I'll get the letters in the mail to you guys today, it's hard to remember everything emailing.

Love you guys!!!!

Christ lives! I know it.

love

Elder Mountain

Elder Mountain & Jewkes enjoying a delicious meal thanks to Brother Gaytan!

Weekly Email - April 7, 2014

Hey guys! Hope you guys are doing well. Vogel is sure going to be fun, that will be a blast with Solo. This week was great. Conference was amazing, it was all great there are some talks that really stuck out. Priesthood session was my favorite, it was really neat all of the first presidency spoke. I really liked Elder Ballard's talk on Sunday about following up and about missionary work, he is all of the missionaries favorite because you can count on him talking about sharing the gospel. It was really neat to hear from Elder Aidukaitis. He actually spoke to the Tempe Mission not too long before the mission split. His son served here in the Tempe Mission and about a month ago while we were knocking doors a guy came up to us who was painting a house and told us he was a convert and Elder Aidukaitis' son taught and baptized him. He told his story about how he struggled keeping employment and had a bad drinking problem and now that he has the gospel he has started a business and can provide for his family, it was really neat. Pres Utchdorf's story about him about to take off in the air force one jet in priesthood session was really funny. It seemed they talked a lot about service this conference, and building your foundation on Christ. Helaman 5:12 was quoted or referenced 3 or 4 times, which I thought was interesting. ( "And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall" Helaman 5:12) Our foundations have to be sure, small things like prayer and scripture study build it, we cannot neglect those small choices or something hard will pop up and it will be too late. We watched all the sessions but one at the Stake Center. Because of Highland boundaries changing we gained an investigator who was being taught by the sisters in the area that became part of Highland. His name is C---, 17 years old, and is scheduled to be baptized on the 19th. He has a really neat story, he has been taking the lessons since January, when his friend from school invited him to take the lessons. He knows all of the youth in the area really well because they play basketball together all of the time. So he started taking the lessons and his parents weren't happy about it at all. He told them he wanted to be baptized and they said he had to investigate 2 other churches before he can be baptized. So he went to a non denominational church and some other one for a bit and he said it strengthened his testimony even more to see the difference. We are just getting to know him, we saw him a couple times this week. We watched the 2nd session on Sunday with him at a members home. The new part of the ward has been really awesome to us already. They haven't had elders in a long time so they are excited about that. We met the man who portrays/plays Jesus and the apostle Paul in the Mesa Easter Pageant (a pageant put on by the church each Easter, approx. 150,000 people watch it each year!), they are actually next door neighbors in that new part of the ward. This evening we are going with the Highland Relief Society President and some other members in the old part of Highland and going to deliver cookies to all of the new members, so it will be a great chance to meet everyone. Got the chance to see E--- between sessions at the Murphy's. It was great to see him, it had been a while. He is going super strong, he teaches the Gospel Essentials class and is a ward missionary. He has had some trials, namely going through a divorce since he was baptized, but man he is strong. T---- is doing good wasn't able to make it to conference though. T--- is also doing good, super busy with work and school. He got a new truck that I like this week a '92 F150. He sold his little Toyota he had within 2 hours of putting it up on craigslist. Anyways, his 18 year old step daughter who isn't a member was in town from Utah this week with her boyfriend. They were pretty nice, we were able to have a pretty good lesson with them. Thanks so much for the letter Rae sent and the package, that always makes the day to get mail. The garden looks great. It's getting hot here already, supposed to be 97 by Wednesday. Oh, it was also neat to hear from Elder Walker at conference., he is the seventy over Arizona, I'm pretty sure and was here for the temple dedication. 
Hope you guys have fun on your trip send some pictures! Love you guys!!!

love

Elder Mountain