Amazing Week

Hi Everybody

 

Man I am doing so good and am so happy, the sun is shining and spring is on its way. We had a fantastic week.

First I want to share something cool and funny, so I decided last week that I needed to work on loving people more and so I prayed that I would have the opportunity to love more. Well the next day my companion and I were getting along but I was very easily frustrated and a lot of things just seemed to bother me. Well I just want to say that it was not my companions fault. I later realized what I prayed for and learned that loving someone is not just something we do when everything is fine and dandy but we need to love people even if they bother us or things are not going our way. Just like being happy, if everything is great and perfect its easy to be happy when in all reality things don´t always go our way. It is an art to learn to be happy in any circumstance. That is one of the things that I learned this week.

Now I want to apply this more specifically to the gospel. For example like keeping certain commandments, I have taught the law of Fasting to some investigators who reply : "oh I can do that I mean there are days when I hardly eat anything anyways" that is no sacrifice. If we keep commandments just because they are easy to keep then we miss the point and the DOCTRINE behind it. In a time when its hard to keep commandments and we keep them anyways we are so much more blessed.

       Enough of my preaching. Here is a miracle. We were driving in our car one day when we felt the need to turn right on a certain street actually furthering us from our desired destination. When we got there we stood confused not knowing why we were there. We made the best of it, listened to the spirit and talked to people who crossed our path. One guy was from eastern Europe and was on his way to school or something but referred us to his apartment building where other students lived, the intention was to talk to one of his friends and hope that he would be interested. We knocked the door and a German guy opens the door and we contact him, he was in a hurry so we did not have much time to talk( a quick side note, when I found out that he was from Germany I was like hey I am from Austria which is really weird to say because we are from different countries and if I were in Germany and I heard someone speak German I would´nt be like hey I am from Austria, I am not sure if you all get what I mean,....anyways.) So we wrote down his info and left. A couple days later we decided to look this guy up the inspired area. On the way to his building a lady passed us with a 20ish old guy and a 5ish year old kid. We talked to them and asked if we could share a message with their family, we walked to their home and there were 7 people in total, 3 generations, friends and a neighbor girl. We set 5 baptism dates and the mom of the family used to go to church and was looking for the church where she lives now. Its a huge miracle. I love you all and miss you.

 

Love Elder Ellis

Hey Ya'll

Hey

 

It has been such a good week. Just so you know we had a Zone P-day today so I don´t have much time.

Well we are seeing so much success as we are obedient to the new way of doing missionary work.

I was on 2 x-changes this past week so we drove a lot. Especially me because I stayed in Rotterdam both times.

It was really cool and so much fun.

So I just want to share a miracle. On Thursday we had a journalist from a well known news paper follow us around to see what we do and write an article about the Mormons. Well the entire day went so good. We had to travel with the Metro which is an underground train system. We talked to people everywhere. He asked if we talk to people on trains or busses if we travel and we told him that we do but we are not allowed to contact people unless we start some casual conversation or if they contact us. Well after we said that I just looked around and a guy a few seats over asked me what it said on my name tag so I started a conversation and was able to tell about the church. The Lord just put the guy there for us. It was so amazing. The guy also asked if we ever come across people who used to meet with us but stopped and I ended up talking to some guy at a tram station who used to talk to the missionaries like 7 years ago. The lord put people like that on our path all day. I sure hope that the guy will write a good story.

Well I love you all and I gotta go.

Love

       Elder Ellis

Thank You

Hi Everybody

 

First I just want to say thanks for all the motivating e-mails from my family and all letters that have been sent to me. I am so thankful for all the prayers that are directed at me and other missionaries.

 

I have had a great week. A couple questions were asked: Yes I am a Zone Leader and my address is: 

Baroniestraat 18A

                                                                                                                                                               3051 ED Rotterdam

                                                                                                                                                                Nederland

 

So Heavenly Father has blessed us with so many miracles, I just want to share a couple. 

We try to talk to everyone. One day this guy passed us and I thought to myself that he is a 40ish year old Dutch guy who is probably not interested in our message. I was looking through the dirty window like President Monson said in a General Conference talk (there is a good video about that on Lds.org). However as I passed I decided to talk to him anyway because who am I to judge. We did and he seemed sad and was interested to learn more about the Book of Mormon, we made an appointment. Towards the end of the conversation that we had with him he started smiling and walked a way with a smile and looked more happy. I know that as we talk to people that the spirit will touch them and they may not know why they feel peaceful or happy but it is because of the spirit coming into their lives.

Another miracle, this one is so tight, we contacted a Mongolian family on the street who spoke a little Dutch but it was hard to understand. We made an appointment. When they walked away and left our sight we typed the address in our phone map and it did not exist, we were so sad because its an awesome family so we ran the direction that they went and chased them down. Down the road we barely saw them walk into a Metro station. We spoke with them again and this time they wrote down their address for us and we had misspelled it by 1 or 2 letters. At the end of our re-contact a Dutch man approached us and asked us a question about the Bible, so we talked to him and while talking to him another girl came and contacted us and asked for some magazines, I talked to the guy and Elder Van De Graaff talked to her. We got both their information and God placed us on their path. It was so amazing. The girl thought we were JWs so she wanted the watch tower, but still. We are being blessed for doing our best.

 

I am also starting to get to know the members a lot better which really helps. I really love the members of the church.

All of our Investigators are doing really good and it is so cool to see them make progress toward eternal life. I love this work. I also love hearing miracles from home about missionary work. I love the Gospel.

 

Today we cleaned the apartment really well which is so nice especially when you get home at night and your tired, you just want to sit down and plan for the next day and be happy. A great missionary from Tonga who used to serve in Bullhead City said in his departing testimony "Be Happy" It is so true. It is up to us to be happy. We need to be happy even when things are not going good. That is especially when we need to be strong and happy. My testimony has grown so much since I came on my mission for the lord.

 

Oh man I found out the name of my new Mission President. Brother Robinson and Sister Robinson.

It will be so sad when President and Zuster Brubaker leave! I love them so much and they are spiritual giants.

 

We also had a Zone Leader Council this past week which was so cool and uplifting. The Ward here in Rotterdam is opening a Portuguese Group in April which will be so awesome because there are a ton of Portuguese speaking people in Rotterdam. That means that Rotterdam will be getting an extra set of missionaries who speak Portuguese. It is an exciting time for all Portuguese speaking people and actually all of us.

I am excited to see what will happen.

 

I am loving my mission and I know how much longer I have so please don´t keep mentioning how much longer I have because it keeps reminding me. I just love it here so much. (I am not upset or mad , I am just saying.) Thanks!

 

I love you all so much and miss you all. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints was restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith. The Book of Mormon is the Word of God and it testifies of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ lives. This missionary work is Gods work. We are all a part of it and are building the kingdom of God preparatory to the second coming of Christ.

Much Love

 

Elder Ellis

 

Another Week

Welll Hello everybody

 

So first of all I am doing very good and am having a lot of fun. My companion is super funny and we laugh all the time.

Well Rotterdam is so big and busy and there are always people outside. There is always so much going on. Traffic can be pretty bad especially with all the small European roads and when there is construction its even worse. I still however really enjoy driving. All the parking we do is parallel parking which I am not too bad at. I have only hit two cars and scraped along side a car. No I am joking! (tap, tap, tap... Knock on wood)

I may have mentioned that we have changed the way that we do Missionary work. We work more with computers now or at least we are supposed to. Its just to map out where people live to make looking up people more effective. We also now focus on looking up people and that talking to all the people that we find in that area. We have seen so many miracles and have had a lot of success but no new investigators. We find  lot of potentials.

Oh one miracle, so we just contacted a guy on the street and he did not have a lot of time so we just exchanged numbers and we called him later to try to get an appointment and he was on a lunch break at work and said "Hold on I am eating right now but you can talk to one of my work colleagues." So we did and we got his information from him and made an appointment. We later shared a great lesson with him. It is just amazing how and where you find people.

Here is another miracle, we were just talking to a lot of people on the street one day when some 26 year old girl saw us from far away and recognized that we were churchy because our clothing gives it away (good thing I was wearing my stinky robe and not my expensive recreation clothes) well once we were done talking to some guy she approached us and asked if we were Jehovah´s witnesses, we were like "NO" jk "no" so she asked but are you from a church and we were like weeelllll.....you could say that, so she asked if she could have some pamphlets or something to learn more because she is looking for a religion. Our response to that was: "Wo don´t just come up to us like we give out free folders or something!" No jk we were like "Uhh.. yeah of course, ( and since that never really happens that someone just asks us for info we did not really know what to give her so we gave her everything we had) here is a Book of Mormon in English and in Dutch and here are these 5 pamphlets with information and here is a Doctrine and Covenants and Mormon Doctrine and Jesus the Christ......" and like 10 other books, she than looked at us all freaked out dropped everything and ran away screaming... Okay no that was all a lie. So we gave her a card and invited her to church and got her number. It was cool.

Sorry if my sense of humor is not that funny, I just felt like writing all that.

We had a really good Zone Training this last week and I as a Zone Leader got to conduct which was fun. Everything went good.

So on a mission you experience a lot of really good things and a lot of things which are really sad like a super awesome investigator dropping you right before they are baptized. It is just so sad to experience those kinds of things. Keep you chin up. I mean it.

I love you all and miss you all and I hope that all is well in Zion where ever you all are. Save me a piece of that corn for later.

Say Hi to all who know me and greet them with a special kiss. (Joseph Smith Translation: Salutation)

I love you all.

 

Love Elder Ellis

Hello

Well.....

 

I am having fun and we had a baptism this weekend which was really nice to see. The guy is so cool and he was just prepared. A few weeks ago he just walked into the church randomly, now he is baptized.

I am also driving in a car which is really nice. I am enjoying it a lot. Man Rotterdam is pretty big and it has a huge harbor. I really like it here so far. It is a lot different than any other city that I have served in.

Well my companion is awesome too. He is the funniest guy ever. We have so much fun and work super hard. There is a lot that we have to do as zone leaders but its nothing that we can't do.

So, we have some new missionaries in the Rotterdam Zone, one of which is Zuster Schwab. She is from Idaho and Steve Schwab from my ward in Bullhead City is her uncle. I have not met her yet but I have talked to her on the phone.

Things are going good. The entire mission is changing its finding tactics which will be fun to do something new. I will also be conducting the Zone Training on Thursday. President will be there and all and I have to conduct. I am very excited.

I am so tired. Since transfers it has been non stop work and very exhausting. I like working my butt off but even today on P-day I could not take a nap, cause this Barber place we went to, to get my Comps hair cut took the learning student over an hour to do a simple hair cut. She did good though.

I have been learning so much and am trying to apply it all to my life.

I am not sure what else to say so I love you all and wish you all the best and I miss you.

 

Love Elder Ellis

Thanks for Your Support

Hello

 

I have had a really good week. I have been learning so much the last 6 weeks. My companion Elder Li is so awesome and such a good example. I am so thankful for having been his companion.

Also, having worked in Almere the last 6 weeks has been so much fun and filled with Miracles and Spiritual experiences. I really loved my time here.

The members here are so great and supportive, the Investigators are amazing and miracles. We have 3 baptismal dates right now and I am confident that they will be baptized in the coming weeks. Unfortunately I will not be able to witness them.... Yes I am being transferred. It came by surprise cause I really did not see it coming at all. I really thought that I would stay in almere for at least 2 transfers. Well I am not and I am very sad to leave but very excited to go work in Rotterdam. I actually had a dream that I left to go be a Zone leader and now it is coming true. That's really weird. I will really miss Almere and I wish that I could have gotten to know the people a little better.

Now, my new companions name is Elder van de Graff. I am so excited that I get to be in a car for the rest of the winter. But that does not matter because I actually love biking and just stopping randomly to talk to people.

Man it was so cool, last week a guy just randomly walked into church and really liked it. There are so many miracles happening everywhere.

I also went on ex-changes in Haarlem which is west of Amsterdam. That was really cool too. I will miss going to Amsterdam for P-days. Oh well I will just have to see what we can do in Rotterdam, which is also a very big city.

So i want to share with you how much our Heavenly Father loves all of us. He loves us. If we love him, we keep his commandments. I am working on loving him more and all of his children. I have been asking myself lately why I am on a Mission and why I work hard or do certain things which help me become a better Missionary. I love God and his Son Jesus Christ. I am learning hoe to love them more and to serve out of Love. "Love is the Key" like our mission motto says.

I love you all and I feel your love for me and for God when I receive your letters and other ways of support. I feel the love and the prayers spoken for me. I am so grateful to be on a mission and to help others come unto Christ.

Thank you all so much.

 

Love Elder Ellis

If you want to write me here is my address:

 

Elder Ellis

Baroniestraat 18a

3051 ED Rotterdam

Nederland

 

Thanks. Love you all

 

Elder Ellis

Hello

Hello everyone.

 

I am so sorry that I was not able to write an e-mail this last Monday. We had a zone p-day and got home to late for us to get to the library on time.

Well I also don't have much time right now to write much so I just wanted to let you all know that I am doing good and am loving my mission. I am also enjoying the freezing cold. It got to -25 Celsius which was freezing cold. I love this work, the work of the Lord. I love you all and miss you all. I'm lovin it.

Well till the next time.

Much Love,

                Elder Ellis