23 June 2014 - Viçosa, Brazil

This weeks e-mail is a great testimony builder as Elder Frogley shares some experiences that show how the Lord cares for each and every one of us, answers prayers, and sends the Holy Ghost to lift us up when the going gets rough. Enjoy! (Oh, and for those non-Utah folks, Kolten is Elder Frogley's best friend from home who is just finishing up a Spanish-speaking mission somewhere... forget where exactly.)

I cant believe Kolten is coming home already!! Weird! Were also giving it all to ´´gut it out´´ in my comps last few weeks. Were both old and luckily were both still working. As shown in excess by this weeks epic progress! This week has been full of trying lessons and some heart ache for some people but some really impressive learning experiences and some personal revalation.

Ill just go through the investigators and say whats been happening because i cant keep the days strait in my head.

Eliza (thought it was Elisia but its Eliza) has had some trying times. We went to visit her on Wednesday and she had some sad news for us AGAIN. She decided to get back together with her girlfriend and AGAIN told us shed rather not follow God right now. Lessons with her are always a growing experience. At first i got a little frustrated with her and had a tough time feeling the spirit. Luckily for me my comp kept a cooler head, and i said a pray and calmed down a bit. The moment we started feeling the spirit we were able to help her. Shes just scared that she wont be able to keep the comandments if she gets baptised and she doesnt want to ´´let God down´´. We talked to her about how we can grow our faith to confront trials in our lives and the difference between studying and reading the scriptures. After we finished she just felt a lot better and we definately felt better. We told her to start calling us every night to have dayly help. The only problem is that she moved to another area so now the other missionaries are in charge of her. I dont know if shell be able to continue after the change. We´ll try to visit her again with the other missionaris.

Oseias is awesome, but his parents are a pain. I think this week God has been trying to teach me pacients. Im getting better but ive never had to deal with sooo many stupid people. Oseias´s dad told him that he couldnt go to church or even English class any more, because he didnt want him to throught his Catholic harratige in the trash. He was really sincere and an actually really calm good guy. We went to talk to him at his work with his wife there and a friend. His wife the entire time we talked just glowered at us and made random little laughing sounds while we were talking. And the moment we tried to teach them a lesson of why the church is important, his friend started FREAKING OUT! He started going off about random scriptures and how hes 70 and more exerienced then us and how were trying to destroy Oseias´s family and all this stuff. He even got up and tried to yell down at us. When he got up and walked over to try to look down at us i lost it a little. I got on my feet too (a much more impressive move for me then it was for him) and honestly i wanted to punch him in the face. I managed to calm down enough to keep a calm voice and play it off like i just wanted to shake his hand. Afterward my comp said that when i got up he honestly thought i was goin to kill the guy. Apparently i give off intese vibes when i get mad. but we kept our cool, more or less. The Dad was a little apologetic after but the old guy was just all smerking and saying things like ´´It would have been good for Oseias to have seen this.´´ We said wed come back when things were a little more calm. When we left we found Oseias outside in the neighbors house. He said that he knew the church was true and wouldnt give up. He even wants to serve a mission. Ever since then his dads been cool with us but his Moms still kinda crazy. I think with some time his dad will let him be baptised.

Heres a sad story. So a really great baptisim that the other missionaries had a little bit ago, caved under pressure and stopped going to church. After she got baptised, her entire street and even her daughter started talking badly about her and her decision. The missionaries went to visit her and her daughter (who hates the church) invited her pastors to fight with them. The missionaries answered all the questions and, of course, ´´beat´´ the pastors. So the pastors suddenly got on their feet, grabbed the missionaires hands and started ´´praying´´ asking God to send these boys away. The other missionaries are two, newer, really short Elders from Peru, and they left crying. The investigators name was marry and by the time the pastors were through with her she was denying everything she new about the church. When my comp and i got home we noticed something wrong and they told us what happened. Naturally we got extremely upset. We marked a day with them to go visit her. When we went, she wasnt home and all of her neighbors were looking at us like we were satanic. We asked some neighbors where she was and made a contact just to spite them. I had been really working on my pacience so i was pretty calm the whole time. I was really praying for it. As we were talking to the neighbors, Mary walked up with her kids. She told us shed decided to stay away from the church and the Book of Mormon. She didnt even want to let us in but we talked to her a bit and she finally invited us in. We talked about all of her doubts, all her fears, all of the people in her life, everything. We were all asking truely inspired questions and the spirit was very strong in the room. She admited that she knew the church was true and that she was just scared to fight against her neighbors and her daughter. Right about then her daughter walked in. She was awefull. She started playing music really loud on her phone right in the room with us, she started laughing as we talked, and she even called her pastors again and started loudly complaining about us. We defended the church and made her daughter mad which made me happy, but in the end, Mary didnt want to go back to church, but promised not to deny her testimony. Even though she didnt agree to come back, we all felt supprisingly good. We left with smiles (before the pastors got there because we didnt want to fight), and all felt like we really did everything possible to help her. I never knew really how much id grown on my mission until that lesson. I really feel like im a more trusting person in doing the will of God. I was really thankfull for the chance we had to help the other missionaries strengthen their testimony and help Mary. it was a excelent experience.

Jessica is doing really well with her family! They believe everything we say and they want to be baptised! Jessica is still smoking a little but shes doing lots better. Theyve really turned into our friends. 

Juliana is still having troubles getting to church on Sunday, so we went to visit her yesterday. She told us she didnt really want to go to church but she new everything was true. We taught her about the Sabath day, and about what happens at church, and at the end she said she wanted to go to church now and shes always excited to mark our next visit.

Ive learned a lot this week. I was reading in the book Dad gave me about doing the will of God and humbling our selves. Its really helped me at this time. I learned something that i kind of always new but didnt understand the significace. God gives us chalenges to help us grow. I always wondered why i couldnt always have that spiritual high we get when were teaching a powerfull lesson, and i learned that if we always had that feeling, we wouldnt strech ourselves to be able to feel it again. We need to keep looking for people to help and teach to keep stretch ourselves spiritually. Im really thankfull for the chance ive had to grow this week, it means that Gods decided im ready to overcome it which means im growing! 

In other news the World Cup is going great!! USA got robbed yesterday. That was our game. We get play by play calls from a member! haha

Love you all and miss you! 

Elder Ian

And yes I got the mony dad! You saved our lives! Thanks!