Hollywood Area 1-26-2015

Elder Nielsen and Elder Brimley playing some P-day dodgeball

FAMILIA!!

Yo, what's up everybody!?! I'm glad to hear Dad is recovering well, and that everyone is doing well! I'm sorry again little sisters, that I didn't have time to reply personally to all your emails. I just spend so much time writing President about all our missionaries! So you just need to write all the missionaries in our zone and tell them to be better so that I don't spend so much time writing about them! ;) I was glad to hear as well that you got my SD card, and that it didn't get destroyed in the mail. I look forward to when I can tell you all the stories about the pics! :) don't worry though I'm not trunky!!

This week was another great week! They seem to be flying by way too fast which I hate!! As I'm sure you know my companion E. Brimley is "dying". (mission lingo for going home). So this upcoming week is his last week in the mission!! It's so weird! He's not trunky at all though so that's good. I'm so grateful to be his companion and I'm sad that our time is almost over, because he has seriously been one of my favorite companions! :,) We've gone so hard, so I'm sure not much is going to change this next week!

Sadly, Alissa didn't get baptized this weekend. We don't know what her freaking deal is. Whenever we meet with her she's so awesome, and she always almost cries cause she feels the spirit so strong but then it's like she just disappears! We're going to dunk her before E. Brimley goes home though for sure! We also had an awesome family in church on Sunday. It's a mom named Shorna, and her 15 year old son Dashean. We found them in the apartments that we've been working lately. Let me describe this place to you. There's about 20 or so buildings, and they kind of make up like a giant circle. The buildings are 5 stories high, and they have 10 doors on each floor. Every apartment is the exact same, 2 bedroom, 1 bath. Around the complexes there are just kids running around everywhere unsupervised, and they always come up and ask us for candy. Haha basically it's just filled with humble people. I love it!! haha it's not the "safest" place ever but the people there are awesome, and we get to talk to so many people since they live so close.

Well, I'm really sorry I stunk at managing time again, and I have literally no time left, but just know that I love you all, and I'm so grateful to be here on my mish!! The church is true! Have an amazing week!

Elder Nielsen

  

Hollywood Area 1-20-2015

FAMILIA!!

I'm glad that you all weren't freaking out that it's tuesday and you recognized MLK day was yesterday. Sounds like everyone had another great week enjoying the snow!! And what the heck happened to Dad??!! I didn't hear anything about him getting surgery last week, but I'm happy to hear everything worked out. I guess that's what happens when you get old! ;)

This week flew by again!! It's weird the days and weeks seem to go so fast, but then looking back you feel like you did so much work, and then it makes you tired just thinking about everything you did. So i just try not to think back and just focus on the now and working as hard as I can! This week there was a huge change in our mission. On Wednesday we had a mission wide conference call, and President announced that the Ft. Myers zone, from the Tampa mission is now in our mission!! So crazy! So our mission just got 30 more missionaries. It will be interesting to see exactly what happens with transfers coming up, if President will leave them over there or if he's going to bring them all over to the "east side" as we now call it. But yeah it was pretty big shocker!

As I mentioned last week we had a Zone training this week. Basically what it is, is all our zone meets at a chapel, and E. Brimley and I give a training about everything that our zone needs to improve on. It went awesome! Our zone is already doing a lot better, and people are being much more obedient and working harder. That was our main focus. Work, work, work. There's a quote by Spencer W. Kimball that basically says, if a missionary works he will have the spirit, and be happy. So it's great to see our zone just going hard!

We saw a lot of miracles this past week in our own area as well. Hollywood is such a good area! haha I literally never want to leave here! Hilda was so packed with work this week that we literally didn't get to see her once. It's crazy how Satan does that, it's like someone has a super spiritual experience and then he does everything he can so that we don't meet with them! But we've still talked with her a lot over the phone, and we have set appointments for this week so she's doing good.

We saw a super huge miracle on Saturday as well. We were meeting with a recent convert named Neville, who is like the most solid recent convert I've ever met. We were teaching his daughter because he really wants to baptize her, but we lost contact. So on saturday we're just sitting there talking, and she walks through the front door. Our immediate thought, "YES!! Let's teach her and get her to come to church tomorrow!" so, that's we did! She came on sunday, loved it, and then we taught her all the commandments yesterday and she is living them, and she's preparing to be baptized this sunday! So solid!

This week I got to do 2 baptismal interviews as well. Honestly, that's one of my favorite parts of missionary work. It's amazing because you basically just get these people to share their testimonies with you, and they are always so powerful! One thing that I have learned on my mission is that the most powerful testimonies are the simplest. We don't have to give some long elaborate speech. The spirit can be invocked in just a 2 senctence sincere, and powerful testimony. I'm so grateful for all that you guys do, and have done for me! I hope you got my sd card with all the pics, because I sent it last week. I'm so grateful to be here where I literally have no worldly worries! It's the best! Have an amazing week! Love you!

Elder Nielsen

Hollywood Area 1-12-15 Happy 20th Birthday!

FAMILIA!!

What up what up!!?? Thanks so much for all the birthday wishes, and the packages!! You all are the best!! Haha I loved the pictures of me as a baby that you sent!! haha I don't know why we have so many pictures of me in the nude as a child, but whatevs! It sounded like you had a pretty crazy week back home with a bunch of different activites and parties and stuff! Good to hear that you're staying busy. I'm gonna have to apologize in advance. I used my time poorly again, and I took FOREVER to email pres this week because of a bunch of stuff that's going on in the mission, and in our zone. But it's chill.

This week was super crazy for us as well! I don't think I've ever been to more meetings in my life than this past week! Elder W. Craig Zwick from the Seventy was here in our mission this week so we had all kinds of meetings with him. It started out on Wednesday morning we had a Mission Leadership Council with him, that went for like 4 hours. Then that same night him and his wife gave a training to all of the Ward Councils that was like 2 hours long. Then on Friday again we had a specialized training with him and the whole mission. It was pretty crazy! It was like 5 hours long as well. So my mind has basically been exploding this week from all the revelation and intense spiritual experiences I've been having. If there's one thing I learned this week it's that General Authorities and their wives GO SO HARD!! Haha they are straight work horses!

In between all of the meetings and other stuff that was going on we were able to have a super productive week. We're teaching some awesome people right now and it's great to see the Lord compensating for our righteous efforts. We're teaching this awesome dominican lady named Hilda. She was the only one who came to church on sunday, but she straight loved it. After church we were talking about her baptism, and she was saying stuff like, "Yeah, I would love to do that!" "Can I do that as soon as possible?" Basically just super elect stuff that makes missionaries hearts leap with excitement! haha.

This week we have to give a zone training on the training we received in MLC, and like I said before our zone has 13 companionships. So I'm a little nervous just because I don't think I've "trained"/ taught something to that many people before, but I'm sure it's gonna be great. Please just keep praying for me! haha I know that sounds cliche, but it's true. My testimony has been so strengthened about the power of prayer. I have received so many answers to prayers so I know that it's real! Thanks again for everything that you do, and have done for me! I'm sorry if sometimes I'm a stinky son to have on a mission because I never write letters, or never send anything home, or never send good emails. BUT you can find joy in knowing that your son LOVES his mission, and is trying to be as focused as possible! I love you all!

Elder Nielsen

Hollywood Area 1-5-2015

FAMILIA!!

What up what up!!?? Thank you all for the incredible emails and pictures!! Those pics were incredible! It looks like it finally got cold in utah! I'll be honest and say that I do not miss the cold! haha no worries it's still 80 here in Florida. I'm sorry little sisters that I did not get time to reply to your emails today. This email is gonna be kinda junky I'm sorry, because I literally have no time!

It sounded like you guys had a super fun new years eve too! Haha not much happened here. We just had to be inside at 7. So we just kinda chilled, cleaned the house a little bit told some stories. The normal mish life! This week was probably the fastest week of my life. Haha we just had so much stuff going on! I thought I had been tired before on my mission, but nothing compared to this week. So at the beginning of the week we just had to go to a bunch of district trainings. So that was a lot of driving, and sitting and listening. But the time that we did have in our area, we went so hard! We didn't let anytime slip by when we were in our area so we were finding, and teaching a lot of cool people. Then the biggest miracle of the week came on Thursday. I had mentioned a few weeks ago about a guy named Pierre who texted us asking about baptism. He was supposed to get baptized last week, but he was just making some lame excuses. So we just decided we were going to drop him, and then move on to other people. So we did. Then thursday he texted us, and his text said something like this. "Hey guys, I'm really sorry for how I've been acting. I know I need to be baptized, and I don't want to postpone it any longer. Can I get baptized tomorow night at 7??" Haha we were so pumped!! So we set everything up, and he got baptized the next day!! So solid! Sorry I forgot my camera. But I will mail my sd card today!

There are a lot of good things going on in our area right now. I love it here in Hollywood! Our zone is doing better, but we still have a lot of missionaries that are struggling so we are trying to do all we can about that. One thing that I wanted to share was a scripture. I don't remember where but Jesus Christ says something along of this, "Whosoever shall lose life for my sake. Shall find it." I know that scripture is true, because I have seen it in my own life. I'm so grateful to be here on a mission to lose my life for the sake of the Savior. And because I have that, I truly do feel like I have found myself. I truly feel happy. Thanks so much for all that you do, and I love you all a lot!

Elder Nielsen

Oh and p.s. about the birthday presents. I lost my cord for my camera to plug into the computer so that's part of why I haven't been sending pics. So if you could send another one of those cords. The camera is nikon coolpix. Also more ties are always good, and maybe one of those things from missionary mall, that expands the collar of your shirts. It's like an extra button thing. Haha don't worry I'm not getting too fat! ;) Other than that there's not really anything I need. Maybe just some more snacks, like granola bars.