Elder Tyler Olsen

26 Jan 2011

2011-01-26T16:11:00.001-08:00

t's a strange feeling writing my last email on the mission. I prayed everyday that this moment would never come. I don't want my mission to come to an end. But, everything has a purpose.
I don't know who I would be with the mission. The things that I have learned during these 2 years have changed everything about me. It has changed the way that I am, the way that I think. The mission really opened my eyes on what is important in life, and what isn't. I have never been more thankful for you, the family than I am now. I know understand what I always took for grantee. The best part of my life is my family. After meeting so many people with run down homes, I finally understand how impossible it is to have a happy home without the teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The world is to hard, there isn't anyway to overcome the hardships in our days if it isn't for Jesus Christ. I am so thankful for the wonderful helped that I have recieved from all of you over these 2 years. The countless emails, letters, paackages, and pictures have helped me so much.
The biggest lesson that I have learnd on the mission is that the Savior Jesus Christ lives. That he loves me, and that he paid for my sins. I learned for myself that the Savior Jesus Christ knows me. He knows who I am, He knows what I need and what my problems are. I know in a very real way that the atonement is real. That we can recieve forgiveness for our sins. I love you all, i hope that we can have a eternal family. I love this gospel, I look forward to starting my next mission.

Hurrah for Israel

Elder Olsen

18 Jan 2011

2011-01-19T12:31:00.000-08:00

Hello,

well i dont have a lot of time today, I will be going to the temple today, somebody that i baptized in my first area will be going through the temple this afternoon. I am really happy, she is also currently serving as President of the young women, she is a really special lady. This week we had 3 baptisms, it was great. I have the privillege to baptize 2 of them. It was really awesome. I love this gospel so much. I love you all.

Elder Olsen

18 Jan 2011

2011-01-19T12:27:00.000-08:00

12 Jan 2010

2011-01-13T15:22:00.002-08:00

Family,

hello family. I am really excited. I have never seen so miracles in my entire mission. I am so blessed!!!! This last weekend Liliam was baptized, it was amazing!! She is definitely going to be a firm member of the church. On Sunday President Tanner went to my ward and talked, and Sister Tanner as well. It was a really good sacrament meeting. I talked, then sister, then president, all about missionary work, it was a great sacrament meeting. After i received 3 referrals from members, it was really cool. We are going to have 3 baptisms this week!!!!! I am so happy. Robson is by far the biggest elect i have ever met in my entire mission. He is amazing. I had a life changing day with him on Monday. On Monday we had a family night at the chapel with 4 families. and we left about 930, so i called Robson and told him we wouldn't be able to pass by his house, he was all no no you have to come by i need to talk to you urgently. So we went to his house we got there really late, it was funny, as i was walking, i am just going through my head all the things that i could use scriptures and stuff. I was totally ready to use "my knowledge" to help him be baptized. We got to his house and he said please sit down elders. He sat there quietly, and said, "elder's i have something to tell you, I just want you to know, i know that this is the true church of God, I have received a testimony..." he went on a bore his testimony to us about how he gained his testimony, he is already half way through the bom, he read the entire gospel principles book. he bore his testimony, started crying and said, i can't wait to be baptized on Saturday. It was an extremely special experience for me. I loved it, it showed me that I am nothing, i was getting all ready to show my missionary knowledge, and i realized that this isn't my work, it is the Lord's. he is in charge of this work. He leads and guides it. He prepares the hearts of people to hear the gospel. This week we are going to see a lot of miracles as well. We have 3 great baptisms. Robson, William, and Gisele. I am so happy. I am enjoying working with my new young comp. Elder Durate. Haha, he is really funny. President Tanner calls him the assistant's assistant. He really is excited. He is young and fired up. I am so thankful for all the blessings that I am receiving on the mission. I love the mission, it is going amazing. I need a lot of prayers. We are teaching a man named Aparecido, he has been going to church for 13 years, his wife and children are active members of the church. well he has never wanted to receive the missionaries. well his wife had a dream that i baptized her husband. well i told her, sister, for that to happen he would have to be baptized in the next 2 weeks. She said she really felt that it was a sign from God, well i went to her house and her husband said, you can enter... well we taught a powerful lesson. He accepted to work towards a baptismal date. He is going to need a lot of help.. so please everyone pray for him. I am really nervous... he is already an active member of the church, he just needs to be baptized. I need the Lord help a lot with this man. I love you all.

Hurrah for Israel

Elder Olsen

5 Jan 2010

2011-01-13T15:22:00.001-08:00

Family,

Wow, i am really happy to be a missionary. I can not believe the blessings the Lord has given me. I have so exciting news! I recieved a new companion! I have been spending alot of time with President making plans for the future leadership of the mission, especially the role of the assisents on the mission. So we both felt the assisent would do better if they had jr companions and worked in seprate areas. So my companion Elder Hansen moved areas, to a area close by, and I am staying here in costa e silva, with a newbie. His name is Elder Durate, he is brasilian. He is really cool, he is in his 2nd transfer on the mission. it is going to be a lot of fun the new model. This way the assistents will be able to grab a nwebie and train him up alot for a couple of weeks, then he can become senior after that. So it should be a lot of fun. Things in my area are going great. We are really seeing the Lords blessing here in my area.Lilam is going to be baptized this saturday. its all set. She is amazing, defintely the future relief society president. She has been going to church for about 6 months now. Also we are teaching a man named Robson, I can not believe him. So we found him last saturday, we taught him, and he loved it. He accepted all the inviatations. I gave him my number to confirm that he would be able to go to church. Well we left his house, about an hour later i recieved a phone call. "hey elder, it is robson, hey i read and prayed about the book of mormon, dont worry it's true, i'm going to be baptized!" Then the next day, we went to pick him up to go to church, we said we would be there at 845. we were about 5-10 minutes late. he called me, "hey where ya at? I dont want to be late my first day at church!" he is awesome!!! He went to church, made a ton of friends, he is really smart, he is psychiatrist. really smart. He is going to be baptized on the 15th. We are really excited. I am really happy to be a missionary. I kinda get sad a frustrated sometimes, i mean right now i feel i finally got it, i am finally the missionary that i needed to be all along. I know to how find, teach, and baptize. and now i have to go home? not cool. But I am praying alot so that the Lord will help me understand that. I love this work, i love serving. I have gained a real testimony on service. I know that it is amazing to serve others. I love you all. Pray for me.

Hurrah for Israel
Elder Olsen

29 Dec 2010

2011-01-13T15:21:00.001-08:00

hello family i am so thankful for the wonderful family that I have! It was great to talk to everyone on the phone. Wow, everyone seems to have changed alot. I can't believe it. It was good to hear sammy tell me that I am still his best friend, and that mikey is still in second place. Haha, if i can matain my best friend mantle from another country game over!! when i get home we will still be best friends. I hope that Justin is good. I have been praying for him alot lately. This week was great. We had a baptism on sunday. Benedito was baptized. our third companion Elder Carlstrom got in the water for his first time on the mission! He was really excited. It has been fun working with a third companion, especially a new american. It has reminded me how much i have grown in 2 years. The struggles that I had to go through. the langauge, the food the culture, I had almost forgotten what it was like. Unfortunely we will be losing Elder Carlstrom this week.. A missionary will be going home tomorrow due to sickness, so he is needed else where. But these 2 weeks were alot of fun. I am really enjoying working hard at this time of season, the Lord has preparerd alot of people for the gospel this given time. I really hope to be able to help alot of people these last weeks of my mission. The Lord is so great. We are doing alot of training meetings on the mission, and alot of exchanges with missionaries, so time is going by even faster than normal. I sure dont like that. It is strange. My companion and I are doing great, I love him like a brother, we get along great (just like 2 brothers we get in alot of heated discussions, but that is what makes it fun.) He is a great missionary. We have alot of amazing people that we are teaching right now. We should have around 8-10 baptism in January. We are really excited. We have alot of special people. Especially Liliam. We already baptized her family, but now it is her turn. She has been waiting for her wedding papers, and now they are down after the new year, so she will be baptized on the 8th. We also have William, Henrique and Robson, who will be baptized on the 15th. They are all really special as well. I have seen the blessings of forget yourself and go to work. It is an amazing feeling. Serving others is the cure to all problems. When we serve we really can feel the Lord's presence. I got 2 new ties from recent converts, that was the best christmas present I have ever gotten. They are a very poor family, but to see them give away 2 ties was just a special moment, they have really embarced the gospel. I love them alot. I love you all, you are the best. I am so proud of my family, I consider it the best and most important thing in my life. I love you all. Please pray for me in all moments, so that I can continue to learn and grow as a person and missionary.

Hurrah for Israel

Elder Olsen

15 Dec 2010

2010-12-15T11:29:00.001-08:00

Family,

this week was a pretty busy week. filled with lots of exciting changes in the mission. We had 2 traning meetings and others preparations for the transfer that is coming next monday. The last 2 weeks of the transfer are usually filled with lots of meetings with President and other mission leaders. We are starting to establish a teaching pool in our area, we are really excited about all the people that we are meeting. We have a great group of people that we are teaching. This week we had a great activity here in the center of the city. We all put on santa hats and went and sung hymns, we had a table out with tons of flyers about the church. So while 4 of us sang, the other 4 were out writing down address's and talking with everyone. It was a great sucess. we got over 200 adress's! It is going to bring in alot of results for the center's area. It was alot of fun. It is really interesting the christmas season here in Brasil isn't nearly as strong as in the states. Very few families put up christmas trees, nobody knows christmas hynms. it is a different culture. In our ward there are alot of wealthly people, so they all have a "normal" american christmas. but it the poor neighboorhoods, it is very normal for people to work up until the 24th of december and then start working again on the 26th. It is defintely a very different christmas. It is raining alot here. I think it has rained everyday for 2 weeks straight! Let's just say i am wet all day.
The mission is amazing. It is so amazing to feel of the spirit of the Lord during this great time of the year, I love you all and hope that we can all find a way to show our graitude during this wonderful season.

Hurrah for Israel

Elder Olsen

13 Dec 2010

2010-12-13T18:19:00.000-08:00

Hi Hansen and Olsen Family!

I just wanted to share a few pictures of your cute sons.
Yesterday we had our ward Christmas party with a huge bbq and I got a picture of all of us (my husband and I are the ones on the left closer to Elder Hansen) and today I brought my camera to church to snap a few shots.

They both are doing a great job and working really hard to teach and baptize. I know their old Mission President, Pres. Castro Deus (He is my Husband's brothers father-in-law) and I've heard good things about the new President. Both elder Hansen and Elder Olsen have really been having a lot of success in our area and everyone loves them!

The area they are in is a great area, the ward is awesome and everyone is super sweet and has strong testimonies of the church.

Thanks for sharing your boys with us!
Enjoy the pix and happy holidays!

Brooke

8 Dec 2010

2010-12-08T14:20:00.001-08:00

Hello family!!!

This week was amazing!!! We saw alot of miracles in our area!! Adilson was baptized on saturday. It was a really great baptism. Now the entire family is baptized in the church. They are really excited. They are all really excited to enter into the temple here in a year. They are a really good family. I really love them. We had 8 investagators at church. They all should progess until baptism!! We are really excited about a few investagators in special. William and Iago should both be baptized this month, and we also marked a wedding for a lady named liliam, she will be baptized on the last week in december. we are really trying to work really well with the members of the church, so that we can really edify the church here in this ward. I am loving the mission. we are going to have alot of sucess if the Lord continues to bless us like he has. Yesterday and monday i was in another state, minis gerais, it is the last zone in our mission, it was really cool to go there, it is a really different place then here in campinas. I am really excited about this month, the Lord has prepared alot of people for us here in the area.

I love you all, thanks for all the love and support.

Hurrah for Israel

Elder Olsen

8 Dec 2010 Adilson's baptism!!!! It was awesome

2010-12-08T10:13:00.001-08:00

1 Dec 2010

2010-12-01T07:54:00.002-08:00

Here are the pics from the 5 baptisms this week! Love ya lots!!

Aniley and her mom and brother
jose and aladia and the members that help work with them
rosangela and leticia together with wesley her son who is already a member.

love ya lots!!

enjoy

elder olsen

1 Dec 2010

2010-12-01T07:54:00.001-08:00

Family,

This week was fantastic. I am loving my new area, and me and my companion are doing great together. This week was an extremely cool, we had 5 baptisms in our area. The Lord has truly blessed us. We saw 2 families enter into the church. Jose and Aladia are like my grandparents now, they call us their grandchildren, they`re 77 and 75. It was by far one of the coolest baptisms on my mission, since she has cancer and a broken back, it presented certain problem to baptize her, we had to overfill the font, and then really heat up the water, it was the temp of the temple fonts, it was cool. Then she was baptized by 2 people, to make sure she didnt get injured. They are awesome, Jose is a really sucessful businessman. He owns a lot of tire companies here in brasil, he lived in england and the us for a while, she has a MD.. he is REALLY weathly, i was nervous when we taught thithing, but he accepted easily. He says that as a retired man he still earns over 1 million a year, haha. He is awesome. Rosangela and her daugther leticia were baptized as well. she has a son that is already a member, which really helped the process, the dad Adilson wasnt baptized on saturday with them because he works every other sunday, so he couldnt be confirmed on sunday, but he will be baptized this week and confirmed this sunday. They are a great family as well! and then anily was baptized as well. she is a members sister, she is 15. She is really a great young woman. Her mom and step dad just need to get married to be baptized.. but the process is really slow here in brasil, so it may take awhile.
This week we have 2 more baptisms. Adilson (rosangela`s husband) and william. a members brother. We also are being really blessed with a lot of elects. We have a ton of people to teach and baptize. We are really working hard. I love my area, and I love the mission. Yesterday president told me that I will be staying with my current calling on my last transfer. I am happy to serve with whatever calling, but i kinda wanted to train again, but it is the Lord`s will not mine. Pray for me so that we can continue having success here in our area.

Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

24 Nov 2010 Here is the pic from the baptism!!! :) Families can be together forever!!!!

2010-11-30T09:30:00.002-08:00

24 Nov 2010

2010-11-30T09:30:00.001-08:00

Hello family,

wow this week was incredible!! I am so lucky to be a missionary. I will not lie, i love being out of the office alot, as a leader i feel i can accomplish alot more being a good example, instead of preparing a training or something like that, so i am really happy. This area is amazing. I love the members already and the investagators that we have, the lord is really blessing us alot. This week we saw one of the best baptisms on our mission. Brother Wesley and his whole family were baptized on saturday, what a special family!!!! the have the cutest kids in the whole world, the have baby twins, that are 1, and also have a daugther that is 8. WOW! the baptism was amazing. President Martins (a man in our ward, he is AMAZING!! ex mission president, fantastic member of the church) he baptized the dad, i baptized the mom and my companion baptized the daughter. it was awesome. The dad wesley went to his baptism in a suit and tie, he was just really prepared to be baptized. They were confirmed members on sunday, it was awesome. We are working A LOT, i cant remember ever working so hard in all of my mission, but the Lord sure is blessing us. We had 13 investagators at church on sunday!!! 2 full families, and a lot more people as well. This week we are really blessed, we will have 6 baptisms this saturday. Jose and Aladia are amazing. they are a older couple, the oldest i will ever baptize. they are 77 and 75. they have been going to church for ALONG time, but nobody seemed to be able to mark their baptism. Well they really liked us, so the first time we went to their house they accepted baptism for this saturday, they are awesome, they gave us lunch today, the wife has cancer, and she is going through kemo threapy right now, but she is strong enough to be baptized. We also have Adilson, Rosangela and Leticia. They are another family, their son was baptized about 6 months ago, but the parents didnt want to at the time. Well we have really been blessed to touch the hearts of alot of people in these 3 weeks here, all 3 accepted baptism for this saturday as well. We also have a Anielly, she is a young women, a member's sister, she is going to be baptized as well. We are really excited and really happy. The ward members are excited to see so many families entering into the ward, so we are planning on recieving a lot of referals from the members. I am so thankful for this great opportunity to serve the Lord. I want to baptize alot more people before my mission ends. I have to reach my goal. The Lord will bless me. I am so thankful to be here, I couldnt imagine doing a more important thing than working in the Lord vinyard. I love this work, I love this gospel, i love helping these people.
Have a great thanksgiving!!!!
Elder OLSEN!!!!

17 Nov 2010

2010-11-17T09:19:00.001-08:00

Family,

That is pretty cool that now justin has been to brasil as well, i know that he is jealous because brasil is the best country in the world(alright its still behind the big usa, but it is close.) this week was a fantastic week. i am really motivated to work as hard as i possibly can. me and my companion are getting along great and working really hard. we had ALOT of sucess this week. our new ward is amazing. everyone is amazingly excited that we are here. our president helped us out a little with a phone call to the bishop saying that he was sending his aps to the area, so now the whole ward knows we are the assistents, so on sunday we were recieved really well in the ward. we recieved over 20 member referals during the week, all of families, and we marked over 10 baptisms!!! we recieved a referal from a fantastic family, that has already been going to church.... their names are wesley and luciana. they have 3 children, a set of twins that are 1 and way cute, it is an amazing family. they have already been going to church, but the missionaries before had never taught them! we taught them, and they already know everything about the church. so they will be baptized this saturday! they are a special family!! their 8 yr old daughter will be baptized as well!!! it is going to be amazing. We are also teaching another part member family, where there are 3 non members in the house. the dad never wanted to accept the missionaries, but for some odd reason he met us and really liked us, he accepted to be baptized on the 27th. we are extremely excited. and we are ready to work like crazy!!! we have to baptized alot this transfer, the lord wants us to!! I LOVE this work, it is amazing!!!
Please pray for me.

Hurrah for Israel!!

10 Nov 2010

2010-11-10T12:33:00.001-08:00

Family,

I am so excited!!!!! Today is my first full day out of the office. And I am loving it. I have really missed serving full time, but at the same time I am very thankful for the opportunity that I had to serve in the office, I learned alot. But now I feel like we will be able to be more effective APs being in the field full time. During our visit that the area presidency made he had told us the importance of the aps being examples in the work, that we need to be baptizing the most on the mission, and so it was hard to really establish a teaching pool while only working limited hours, now working basically full time we will be able to have alot more success. I am really excited. Elder Castleton my old companion went home on monday, it was hard to say goodbye.. we worked for 3 months together and he really became one of my good friends. I gave him our address and he is going to stop by this month and get to know the family. Elder Hansen is my new companion. He is awesome!!! He is a little nervous to be ap, but he will do great. He has about 1 yr and 5 months on the mission. I cant believe i only have 2 more transfers. it is crazy. I get a little sad sometimes thinking about how fast time goes by. but i am really excited to be here. This area is called Costa e Silva. It is a really good area. It hasnt had alot of success. Only 3-5 baptisms in 8 months, but last night we got here for the first time and we talked with the bishop(he served a mission in the states speaks english) and the ward mission leader and they are both really excited. We are going to baptize alot of people. Our goal is at least 20 people this transfer!! 4 families!! we know that is possible. I really want to end my mission just going all out, working as hard as i can. I am really excited. We got here and we had to break into our house, and then there was nothing inside of it, so we had to sleep on top of matresses on the ground. It was awesome. well i loved to read justins letter. I laughed alot.. i love him so much. It was weird i started crying reading justin's email.. I just couldnt help but feel like alma in the book of mormon. I felt such joy hearing my little brother tearing it up in the mission field. I felt so much peace, i just started crying. I love this work, i love serving the Lord with all my heart, to just be here working and serving the Lord. I love you all, i love this people here in brasil!!! I love my Savior Jesus Christ!!

Hurrah for Israel!!!

Elder Olsen

3 Nov 2010

2010-11-03T12:31:00.001-07:00

This week was great. We have been working really hard with the transfers coming up. My companion Elder Castleton is going home next monday. So my new companion is going to be Elder Hansen, he is a good young missionary. He has about 1 yr and 5 months. It is going to be fun. I have really enjoyed my time working with Elder Castleton, he has become one of my greatest friends on the mission, we have had a lot of great experiences together, i am going to miss him alot. I have given him my home address and he said he is going to go visit the family, he lives in sandy. I am really excited to be working this next transfer, I have the greatest blessing. After our visit from Elder Soares from the 70, he told us that the assistents should NOT work in the office, he said that they should not be office elders, but should be working and training elders. So starting next transfer I will not longer be working in the office as assistent. Instead we are going to work in a nearby area called Costa e Silva, this way we will no longer lose time doing office work, but we will just focus on training the missionaries on how to work and baptize. I am so excited about this, because it has been real hard working in the office, it is sometimes really boring work, so it will be alot of fun to be working all day everyday again. We will still have to have meetings, and trainings and stuff like that, but we will no longer live in the office. So please pray for me and my new companion so that we can work really hard and so that we can baptize. I really want to have the greatest last 2 transfer ever. I cant believe that i ONLY have 2 more transfers, it can be really sad to face that fact. so please pray for me family, i still want to accomplish all my goals that i set at the beginning of my mission, and the Lord has blessed me with amazing miralces throughout my mission, I have seen his hand in this work, and I know that if everyone continue praying for me, it will help me become a bigger instrument in the Lords hand. I love this work, it has changed my life. I know that they are many people waiting for this message!!
I love you all,

ELDER OLSEN

27 Oct 2010

2010-10-28T09:29:00.001-07:00

This week was a great week. We had alot of great experiences. We are preparing for a new transfer, which is going to bring in alot of changes here on the mission. I will recieve a new companion and a new area... I am really excited. This week we saw the miracle of Brother Henrique being baptized. He was baptized by his good friend a member of the church, it was fantastic. I am so grateful to be a missionary. Things are really busy and great here on the mission. I love being here in the field. Things are going great. Please pray for me, I want to do excellent things here during this short time I have left. I love you all so much.

Love,

Elder Olsen

20 Oct 2010

2010-10-20T14:54:00.000-07:00

the first of our temple trip with luis and aline
then a pic of the baptism, the two ladies are aline's mom and sister (our next baptism :)
then just a pic of them
a pic of their wedding. the couple with them is the couple that introduced the church to them.
and then elder soares and his wife.

20 Oct 2010

2010-10-20T14:53:00.001-07:00

Family,

this week was increible! It was defintely one of the best weeks in my mission. It was just great. Last wenesday we had a special visit from Elder Soares, the area president, and also a member of the first quorom of the seventy. He came here in the office and visited with us, it was really awesome! He asked alot of questions about our mission culture (the type of work we do) and also about our mission design, or how we work. I learned alot with him, he knows alot about missionary work. He served a mission and was a mission president in Portugal. so he knows alot about the work. On thursday we had a zone conference with him with half of the zone on the mission. It was fantastic. He really motivated the elders and sisters to work. He is a powerful man. We also had another zone conference yesterday with him and his wife with the other half of the mission. They are incredible people and really love the missionaries. I learned alot with him about missionary work and how to lead. We had special leadership meetings and he really did teach us alot.
Also this week we had the amazing blessing of Luis and Aline's wedding and baptism!!!! It was the best i have ever had on the mission. It really was just great. They are so happy and they so happy to have the gospel in their lives. Their wedding unfontunetly we didnt get to watch. we had a meeting with Elder Soares, but we sent the secertareis who took alot of pics for us. On saturday, we went to the temple with them during the afternoon! It was really special, we had their baptismal interviews at the temple, and we talked about sealing and eternal families, they loved it alot, and are really excited to enter into the temple here in one year. Later that day on saturday was their baptism. It was awesome. they were really happy and aline's mom and sister watched too!! I am certain that here in a little they will be baptized too! On sunday when they were confirmed Aline cried alot, they are just so special.
This week we are really blessed to have 2 baptism again! Henrique who we have been teaching for a while is really ready for his baptism. and we also had a huge miracle. A young woman called me on friday. I answered my phone and didnt know who she was. She said hello my name is Rieza, i was being taught by the missionaries, and now i want to be baptized! haha. It was increbile! She is a member's girlfriend (the member lives in another city) and she has been going to church for a year with him, but never wanted to be baptized. Now she wants to. We didnt even really need to teach for anything, she had already been taught by the missionaries for 8 months, and has been going to church every sunday for a year, and all of the institue classes too. So she is super ready for her baptism. It is what we like to call a miracle!! I love being a missionary, the blessings are so amazing. I have never seen so many day-to-day miracles in my entire life. It seems like everyday something just happens, that i never thought could happen before. Somehow some way the Lord just blesses us with miracles. I love this job!! haha.
Thanks for all the prayers and support that everyone gives me. It makes the difference. Everyone please pray for Henrique and Rieza. I LOVE THIS GOSPEL!!
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!
ELDER OLSEN

12 Oct 2010

2010-10-12T21:16:00.001-07:00

12 Oct 2010

2010-10-12T21:15:00.000-07:00

Oi,

Hello family. I am so grateful to be a missionary! This week might possibly be the most busy week of my mission, but i am really excited for the upcoming events in the next 7 days. It is going to be amazing. It all starts tomorrow. The presidency of the Brasil area is coming to visit our mission. Elder Soares, who is the President, comes here tomorrow. We are going to have a long 4 hour staff training, and he is going to interview us! Yikes! But it will be incredible. Then we are going on a mission tour, on thursday we are going to have meetings with half of the mission, and then next tuesday with the other half. He hasnt given us or our President any details about what is going to happen during the meetings or training, so we are preparing for everything and anything. It should be a real blast. We have been working on cleaning up and organizing the office, and putting together mission stats and stuff like that. So we are having to prepare all this stuff for the meetings that will happen this next and early next week. But it is alot of fun.

This saturday we had pedros baptism!!! It was a really special service. Pedros dad is totally reactived in the church, and we are really happy to see him come back. He bore his testimony during the service and started crying alot, he has had a rough life, he lost his wife in an accident 5 yrs ago. They were a strong active family in the church, but he couldnt overcome the death of his wife. We have talked alot about eternal families, they are a special family. I really hope that Richardo (pedros dad) can find a new wife, and get sealed in the temple. He is a special man. He went to church in a full suit and everything on sunday for pedros confirmation. The bishop interviewed him to a new calling! We are really excited!

Also this week, we have Luis and Aline's wedding!!!! On thursday! I am so excited. It has been a long time since we started teaching them. Almost 2 full months. Here in the city of campinas marriage takes longer than in the surrounding cities, so we are very anixous to have their wedding. Unfortunetly we are not going to be able to watch the wedding. :( we are really sad about that, but it is marked exactly during the time of our meeting with Elder Soares.. but the ward member will be there to do the wedding, so it should turn out great. Also we will have their baptism on saturday!!!! we are so excited. It was so funny, on sunday at church they got up in sacrament meeting and asked everyone to go to their baptism. The members are really excited about this family, every member wants to go out with us and visit our teaching group because we are being blessed with alot of families right now, which is great. On friday we found a new family, which was incredible. Me and my companion established the goal with Heavenly Father that we would talk with everyone that crossed our path, but the Lord would bless us with a extremely special family. So on thursday night we were talking, and this young couple went by with a baby boy in a stoller, and my companion talked with them, and we felt that we should invite them to be baptized on the street. They got really happy and accepted!! They are a special family Araujo and Patricia. Like Luis and Aline they're not married.... which is a bummer.. but they are extremely excited to mark their wedding. We also have brother Henrique. He is great. He is just pure elect. He went to the baptismal service on saturday and loved it. He always talks with the members about his baptism on the 23rd. We are really excited about him, he has alot of potencial to be a future leader in the church. He just needs to get married. Which we are already working on finding him a wife :) haha.
The Lord is bless us more than i could imagine. We are teaching alot of people in just a short few hours. The Lord is blessing us alot with prepared people, that want to hear the restored gospel. Aline's mom and sister are progressing really well! They were going to get baptized together with Aline on saturday, but her mom(Neide) suffered a car accident on saturday and is in the hospital. But she is out, and is going to watch Aline's baptism this saturday, we are going to work with them both to be baptized on the 23rd.
I love being a missionary. I see miracles everyday. It is incredible! The Lord truly blesses his servents. We are seeing alot of progess in such a short time, I am so thankful for the Help the Lord gives to me. I know that He loves me. and that he wants me to succed as a missionary, and as a child of God. I know that all things are possible through faith and hard work. I love you all, your prayers and letters help me with encoragment and exciment for the work. I talk about my family everyday, people just love it. I can truly testify of the importance of the family and of unity in the family. I am so thankful for you all. the great love that you give to me. Continue praying, it REALLY does HELP, and ALOT!!!
I love you all!!!
Elder Olsen!!!!!!!!

6 Oct 2010

2010-10-06T14:13:00.001-07:00

Hello!!!

Well this week was a great week. We are really happy with all the blessings the Lord is giving us. We are seriously being blessed alot, and I know that we really need to work a lot harder to show apprecation for these blessings. This weekend we were really blessed with alot of investagators at conference, and all of them loved it. We had luis fernando and aline, who are just as excited as ever for their wedding and baptism this next week. we also started teaching aline's mom and sister, who live really close, they both went to church and loved it too. we marked their baptisms for the same day as aline and luis, which is going to be great. we also had pedro at church again, he is a member's son, and is really excited about his baptism. he is going to be baptized on saturday! We are really excited about that. We also had brother henrique, he is a single man, about 35 and great. he has been reading the book of mormon nonstop, and loves it. we marked his baptism for the 23rd of this month. we have really firm baptisms for every single week this transfer. we are really excited, and we are going to continue working hard to be able to do even better. we established a HUGE goal for this transfer and we know that it is possible. we are really excited, we want to work really hard. The Lord is blessing us alot.
Hey, cool story, i totally got to drive our presidents car!!! haha, that has never happened before, no missionary has ever droven a car on the mission, but yesterday president was here in the office and needed the car moved but he was busy, so he gave me the keys and said go crazy elder. haha. it was awesome. one of the coolest things that has happened on the mission, just kidding, but it was really cool.
well i am really happy. I love my companion, we are getting along great. he is a great man. I am really liking my area and all the investagators that we are teaching. i am really thankful for this work, it is amazing to be a missionary.
i love you all, thanks for all the prayers and support.
Hurrah for Israel!
Elder Olsen

22 Sept 2010

2010-09-22T16:41:00.000-07:00

22 Sept 2010

2010-09-22T16:38:00.000-07:00

Dear Family

Wow this week was amazing. We really saw a lot of miracles, and the Lord has been blessing us so much. First of all Dalila was baptized! It was amazing! On Saturday she was baptized, it was really amazing. The service was really special; the spirit was really strong throughout the entire service. The coolest part was that the family had such a huge role in the baptismal service. The dad said the prayer, the mom gave the message, and Joyce who was baptized just last week bore her testimony in front of everyone! It was amazing to see how much this family has changed during this past month. What a blessing! We had a pretty amazing lesson with her and her family, in which the whole family cried a lot. It was probably one of the greatest lessons on my mission. Dalila loved Amanda’s letter. She really did, she and Joyce are extremely happy because of Amanda and Janessa’s letters. It is awesome that my sisters made the difference with them!
Luis and Aline are great! The wedding is all set for the 14th, and the baptism on the 16th. I am so excited! It is going to be amazing! They are already members. They know everyone in the ward, and they are really excited to work in the church, they are going to be a major blessing in the ward and in the church. Well my companion is going home this week. I am really thankful for everything that I learned with him, he really was an amazing companion.
This week I had to travel to the furthest zone in the mission. I left the state of Sao Paulo, and went to Minis Gerais, which is about 4 hours by bus! It was pretty sweet there; it is a beautiful city. Unfortunately the church is very weak, it is only a district, and we only have 8 missionaries there, which don’t baptize a lot, but it was cool to visit the district and to do some teaching, the people that live there are all catholic. So, it represents a different type of challenge on the mission. I got back at midnight after two days there. It was a fun trip.
Our mission has two districts, both are really weak. So this week I really wanted to get to know the districts and the attitude of the members and missionaries, so tomorrow I am going to the other district, we is on the opposite side of the mission, and is also 4 or 5 hours away by bus, but it should be a fun trip, where I will be able to get to know the mission a little bit better.
I love the mission, it is amazing, I can’t believe that the Lord has given me this opportunity to be a missionary. It is the greatest time of my life. It has changed who I am, what I believe and what I think. I can’t believe how grateful I am to be a missionary. I love you all, thanks so much for the prayers, they mean so much to me, I can really feel them, and they work!!! Keep praying!!!
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL
Elder Olsen

15 Sept 2010

2010-09-15T14:16:00.001-07:00

Hello family,

so this week was amazing, it was really full of lots of miracles and lots of experiences. The greatest news of the week was that Joyce was baptized, it was a great service. We had lots of ward members there, all young women of the ward sung the young women song and everything, it was an amazing service. It was really rough, because Dalila was there, and she didnt want to be baptized, but during the service she cried 2 times!! AH!!! it is so annoying. she knows it is true, she is just so scared, i was so torn up during the service, because i felt that she wanted to be baptized, she just didnt want to be humble and admit to it. Joyce was glowing after the baptismal service, she was so happy. it is amazing how much she has changed in just so short of weeks. when i first meet her so was totally against the church, now she is so happy, and just loving the reading in the book of mormon, it is so awesome. I am postive that dalila will be baptized this week. she will follow her sisters example i just know it. she came up to me after church, and said "elder olsen i will think about next saturday ok?" haha. she is just playing hard ball, but i know that she is going to accept the truth. :)
I am really liking the office, i mean as much as i can, it is a completely different type of mission, but hey, i am working with what i have. We are starting a program to try and get everything done and ready to leave the office everyday at 4 oclock, instead of 530 or 6 which is when we normally leave. We are also going to start doing some different things. we normally spend very little time in the field. so i really want to spend the maxuim of my time in the field helping the elders and sisters be better missionary. My companion elder gabriel is ending his mission. he is a really good missionary, he reminds me alot of mikey. he has been ap for about 9 months. he is a great missionary, i really love him, when i am working with him, i think of how it would be to work with mikey, he actually looks alot like mikey too. haha he has gotten really fat on the mission. i dont know if mikey got fat or not, but elder gabriel did. he reminds me alot of mikey, when you guys come down here you will have to meet him. he lives her pretty close in rio de janeiro. which is about 5 hours away. i have alot of friends her in the office. elder garcia is the fin. sec. i was his comp for 3 months in anhanguera. is has been in the office for 1 year!!! he is extremely smart, he was like the greatest sectercary ever. elder castleton is the other ap. we are going to be working together next transfer when elder gabriel goes home. his is a great missionary too. this next transfer will be his last on the mission. it is way lame that everyone around me is ending there mission. time goes by way to fast.
well luis fernando and aline are doing great. we went to the city center and we marked their weding for the 15th of october. i have offically became the wedding planner on the mission. haha. it will be my 6th wedding on th mission! it is awesome. but luis and aline are amazing. they have been to church 5 times, they always go alone, they have been giving us referals. We are teaching alines mom and sister too. they accepted to be baptized together with aline on their wedding day. we are really seeing miracles in our area. we had 6 people that went to church on sunday, and all of them have baptismal date. it is going to be a great month. yeah! oh yeah i dont think i told ya guys, rimundo and nelma from jd amanda the couple that i was teaching there, this past week they were married and baptized. it was great, i wasnt able to go, but they sent me pics. i love this gospel, i love the mission, for the experience that i have. i love my mission president. he is truly a man of God.
Thanks for the love and support that you all give me. it really helps me.

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!
ELDER OLSEN

15 Sept 2010

2010-09-15T14:15:00.000-07:00

9 Sept 2010

2010-09-09T19:48:00.001-07:00

9 Sept 2010

2010-09-09T19:45:00.001-07:00

Hello family,

wow this week was amazing. I am so thankful for the amazing experiences that I have on the mission. I am so thankful for the spirit that guides me and helps me overcome my difficulties and problems. As you all know I have been teaching the 2 daughters of members. Joyce and Dalila. It has been really fun, but difficult. They have been a little resistent in fulling with appointments and accepting our invitatitions. On friday we left a lesson with them, and it just didnt seem to be getting into their heads the importance of our message. I was really down, i really wanted to see the miracle of them accepting the gospel in their lives. So, in that moment i said a silent prayer that the Lord could help me know what i needed to do to help them overcome the problems that they have. In a type of vision or revelation, the Lord showed me. I saw that i was giving joyce and dalia a letter from Janessa and Amanda, and then i saw them being baptized. I thought it was a really weird thought. That why would they want a letter from Janessa and Amanda? I continued doubting, but when i thought about that i felt alot of peace overcome me, and i know that it was what the Lord wanted. So i followed. I send a email to dad, and then he sent me Janessa's testimony in an email. I translated it, and then on our next visit i went to give it to them. It is funny how the natural man works, up until the last minute i was doubting the answer that i had recieved from the Lord. So i went to their house and we started our lesson like normal with a prayer and hymn.. i just didnt want to give them the letter, i thought there was no way that they wanted a letter from some random girl in the us. haha. well i finally was overcome by the spirit that i just HAD to give it to them. I gave them the letter and explained that it was my sisters testimony, and that she really wanted to share it with them.
Joyce read the letter outloud, and everyone was really paying alot of atention. The spirit was SO strong. Joyce was basically crying while she was reading the letter, she chocked up varias times during the letter, after she read love, janessa. she sat in silence, thinking, and really feeling the spirit. then she looked at us and said "can you mark my baptism for this next saturday?"!!!!! WOW!!! it was amazing. I didnt believe it. I was so happy.It really was an amazing blessing. to see a complete change in her in just a matter of mintues. she said the closing prayer thanking the Lord for the letter she had recieved and thanking the Lord for preparing the way for her to be baptized. It was just what she needed! I am so thankful that the Lord knows the hearts of every single one. and that he knows their thoughts and feelings and desires. The Lord knew that Joyce would connect in a special way with Janessa. What a special blessing that was to me.
I am so thankful to be a missionary, for these amazing experiences that change my life forever. That helps me know that God knows his children personally.
Janessa, you are the best. i know that maybe you think that you just wrote down the first thing that came to your mind, or the only thing that you wanted to say. But i know that what you wrote was what Heavenly Father prepared you to say. You were prepared to recieve sacred instructions from the Lord to help one of his daugthers enter into his church through the sacred convent of baptism. Joyce is really happy. she wrote you a letter, and is going to send it with a picture of her baptism.
That is why i need one more thing. Dalila is still in doubt. she isnt sure if she wants to be baptized. I need a letter from Amanda. because they are both 12 and it will be the exact same thing that happened with Joyce, i know it. Amanda please write dalila a letter, bare your testimony about your baptism about your life.
I love my family. i love you guys so much. thanks for all the love and support that you all give me. I love this gospel so much. Luis fernando and Aline are getting married the 25th and baptized on the 26th!! I am so happy.
I LOVE MY JOB!

ELDER OLSEN

2 Sept 2010

2010-09-01T23:13:00.000-07:00

Family,

Wow! Today is the big day. Justin is going to the MTC. I am so happy for him. I cant believe it. It is going to be such a great experience for him. It is amazing, the mission is the greatest thing that has ever happened in my entire life. I love it so much.
This week was amazing. We are seeing real miracles here on the mission. Luis Fernando and Aline are amazing. They the defenitly going to be the greatest baptism on my mission. This week we visited them with the bishop and with a lot of other ward members. They are really excited and really wanted to be members of the church. They went to church again this week, all alone. 3 straight weeks they have been to church alone. We marked their wedding!! We are so excited. They are going to the city center tomorrow, and their wedding should be on about the 27 or 28th of setember. The whole ward is getting really excited and we are defintely so thankful for this huge blessing. Luis and Aline are amazing. I was sitting by them at church, and the sunday school teacher talked about the list to clean the chapel, after church aline asked me if i could grab the list that her and luis wanted to help clean the chapel. haha, they put their names down the this next saturday!! they arent even members and they are already going to clean the chapel. We are really excited for this family. Aline is pregnant too, which is really excited, and she already has the cutest little girl, that is 2 yrs old.
We had to postpone the 2 baptisms that we had this last week. Dalila and Joice werent ready. It was a little bit of our fault, because this past week we had meetings every single day of the week we werent able to teach them during the week. But we marked their baptisms for this week, and we are praying that we will be able to prepare them for this day.
It is a really different life in the office, alot of traveling and meetings. The weeks go by CRAZY fast. it seems like yesterday i got here, and it has already been 3 weeks. i cant believe it. My companion Elder Gabriel is ending his mission, it is his last 3 weeks. He has been a great friend and example to me on the mission. I have really enjoyed being with him. I am learning alot. I also am with Elder Castleton, who next transfer will go home, i have known him for a long time on the mission, he is a great missionary.
I am really learing alot. it is cool to see alot more training meetings and to talk alot more.. Like just yesterday i recieved the assignment to go to a different zone and i didnt get back until about 8 at night.. so life is a little bit rushed.
On the good side i think i will defintely get fat. I hadnt eaten fast food my whole mission, (because it is hard to find in other city, only the main city has it) but already i have eaten at Mcdonalds 3 or 4 times and Burger King like 4 times too.. so i think i will get alot fater here. The next few weeks should be alot smoothly here in the office, we dont have any big meetings left. we just have a meeting next monday with all the zone leaders, and then thats it until the transfers on the 27th.
I am really loving being a missionary. Today i had to go the the police station and declare my last 5 months there. wow times goes by way to fast. i cant believe that mikey goes home this month and that justin leaves today. time seems to fly by here on the mission.
I love this gospel. it changed my life. I hope that i can help changes others too.

ELDER OLSEN

25 Aug 2010

2010-08-25T17:17:00.001-07:00

25 Aug 2010

2010-08-25T17:16:00.000-07:00

Dear family,

Hello! Wow, i am really happy right now, i am so thankful to be a missionary. This week we are having miracles!! I don’t think that I have ever worked so hard in my entire mission. It is a different type of work, but I like it a lot. This last Thursday we had a special training for all 2nd transfer missionaries, we talked about the mission, and how to have success on the mission. After that, this week we started 5 days of training with all the zone leaders, district leaders and trainers on the mission. It is a whole day thing, it is crazy. We are passing to the mission a new program from the first presidency. We are teaching the new program to them, it is a lot of work. We are presenting 2 lessons a day, and we are doing a lot of practicing and teaching, it is actually a lot of fun, but a lot of work. It is weird; sometimes we don’t really have time to sleep this week. ha-ha. I am so tired!! But it is alright, the training is going great!! We are having a lot of success in training the leaders.
It has been really hard to teach in our area. Since the training goes until 6, by the time we get to the office and get everything settled.. it is already about 7 o’clock. So, we have very little time to teach.. I am really starting to miss teaching all day, but at the same time the Lord is blessing us richly. I have been praying a lot ever since I entered into the office, that the Lord could prepare elects for us, so that we can help the faith of the mission grow. WOW, Heavenly Father is so caring and loves us so much. This week we meet a new family that is incredible!! Luis and Aline. They’re amazing. They are the type of family that every missionary dreams about. They are a new couple, young and wealthy (haha.) which doesn’t matter of course, but it is good, because he will definitely be a future leader in the church. He owns his own business, and they have a little baby daughter that is 2, and Aline is pregnant. The only bad part is that they aren’t married.. but they are willing to get married. So this next week we are going to mark their wedding. They went to church all alone. We didn’t even have to call or anything.. they just showed up. All ready, dressed up and they took the book of mormon with them!! J This Saturday we are going to take them to the temple, and we talked to our president to go with us to do the visit. Haha. A trip to the temple with our mission president and a beautiful family (the office has its perks. J) But that isn’t all. The Lord is richly blessing us. we really wanted to show the mission that miracles are real, and that the Lord can do anything and everything. So this last week I asked my companion for anybody that could be baptized.. he talked about everyone but nobody was really ready. So the week past. But on Sunday I saw a recent convert family at church, and they have 2 daugthers. Well I was talking with them, and I found out that the daughters are not baptized!! I went crazy, they are young 14 and 12, they parents were baptized 2 months ago, but the daughter are really rough and didn’t want to be baptized. I got all excited. But my companion told me that they had tried everything, and that they just didn’t want to be baptized. Well last night I convinced my companion to finally go there with me. I prayed A LOT that the Lord would guide me. We got there and had a fantastic lesson!! It was amazing!! The spirit was really strong. And the best part is that the 2 daugthers accepted to be baptized this Saturday!!! Miracles are real!!! The Lord is amazing. So this Saturday we are going to have 2 baptisms, I am really excited!!
Well today we went to the temple with all the mission leaders in the mission; together with our mission president and his wife it was amazing. It was really cool to have 55 elders and our president in the celestial room! I love being a missionary. I love being here and for all the blessings that the Lord gives us. I love you all, thanks for all the love and for the prayers.
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!
ELDER OLSEN

18 Aug 2010

2010-08-21T06:39:00.000-07:00

My dearest family!

I am so thankful to be a missionary in the true church of GOD! I love this calling. i love being a missionary with all my heart.
This week was crazy busy. I have never done so much in little time. The office is COMPLETELY different. There is alot of stuff that we do in the office, and very little that we do in the field. This week was especially busy since we had transfer meetings with President every single day. This was the first transfer for President Tanner since he was called President here on the mission, so it was a really big transfer. President Castro our old president hadnt made alot of changes in the past transfers because he wanted to let President Tanner do all the changes. so what ended up happening is that we changed almost 100 percent of the areas. only 8 sets of missinoaries stayed the same on the whole mission. we change 76 areas out of 84, which was alot of work. we meet every single day this past week. it was pretty hard, i have had a non stop headache this week, but i am really love the revelation that the Lord gives me. On our first meeting, i was a little nervous to make any comments in the meeting. well there was a point where we didnt know what to do with a certain elder, they were talking about putting him in another area but the spirit whispered that he needed to go to a different one... i was nervous but i said my thoughts, and everyone agreed, and it was done by the spirit. It was really awesome, because ever since i have been called i have been able to feel the spirit really strongly. It is amazing the spirit is REAL he can literally guide our thoughts and help us know the will of the Lord in EVERYTHING that we do.
On monday was a sad day, the elders went home that ended their mission. It was a pretty "trunky" day, here in the office there were 7 elders going home, and all the wanted to talk about was girls and stuff, it was different.. i can say that the office life is defintely going to be way different. Elder Greener went home. he really was one of my best friends on the mission. he is going to call mom this week, he wants to go by and see you all.
on tueday was awesome. we recieved 11 missionaries in the field. it was crazy! we ate lunch at Presidents house, and then we gave training to them. it was pretty cool to give training... haha i gave a part about street contacts ( my favorite part on the mission!!) and so we practiced... i told everyone that it is a new rule on the mission to invite 5 people a day to be baptized on the street! all the greenies thought we were crazy, but after some practice they'll get it down.
we are doing alot of meetings with President, because tomorrow we have another!! training meeting with all the elders and sisters that got here in the last 2 transfers. and then next week we have this new 5 day training!!! which is going to be crazy, for 5 days every ZL, DL, and trainer will have a training meeting with us and President. we are going to put in to practice the new program of the mission field, and it takes 5 days to start. it is going to be over 60 missionaries on the mission in the same chapel for 5 days. and i have to teach them all!! haha i am a little nervous, but i know the spirit will help me.
There are 2 things that are going to be a challenge. first is that the area that i am in is completely dead. the elders havent worked in the area for 3 months!! because the mission president changes the past 2 APs were basically mission presidents, they had to do everything. so it is dead. they have been teaching only about 3 lessons a week; because they had to travel to interview evey zone, and do all the stuff with President Tanner.. so in the past 6 months the APs area has 2 baptisms.. haha.. well that just isnt enough for me. so i am going to work really hard to help build up this area. When i was interviewed by president that is one thing that he told me. is that he wants me to bring a work type of attitude to the office. I am going to do my best. the second thing is that it is going to be hard to not get fat. they only eat junk food here. because the meal that the members give here in brasil is lunch, and at lunch we are always doing something for president, during the week we dont have lunch with members, we have to buy something to eat.. well something usually is something fast and easy.. but not always healthy.. but i think maybe it will be a blessing, in my last 6 months i had lost 12 pounds!! i am stick and bone right now, i weigh about 125 or something. i am really skinny.. my 6 months in Amanda i ate well, but walked and worked alot.. so that is why i got so skinny.. now i am hoping to put on some weight.
I am going to love working with President Tanner. He is exactly the type of man that i want to be. He was a lawyer for over 20 years!! He is amazing. It is crazy, i know that working on his side will be a huge blessing for me. I know that I am going to learn ALOT. i am going to learn alot more than i teach.
i love being a missionary. i love this work, it is so amazing.
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!!
ELDER OLSEN

11 Aug 2010

2010-08-21T06:36:00.000-07:00

Hello family,

well this week was definitely the most interesting on my mission. I am seriously lost on where to start.
well on the first note we found and continue to work with all our new investagators. We continued to work with over 40 investagators in our new area, which was amazing!! We are being blessed beyond belief here in our area.
On sunday we had 16 investagators at church!!! It was amazing! 3 complete families were there, it was awesome! After church is when the riot began.
Elder ------- who lives with me, his companion got really sick... he was complaining about heart problems and that he was feeling really sick. So we went to lunch after church, and he got worse, so we ran to the local hospital with him... they told us that he was having a heart attack! and since it is a local hospital they dont have the resources to take care of him, so the sent Elder ------ and his companion by ambulance to the other hospital in a near by city. then I went with a brother from the ward to the hospital. when we got there, they told us that he was in serious condition and that we needing to go to a different hospital in campinas ( one of the best in the country) so we ran there. (I got to ride in the ambulance!!! :) so we got there in campinas and it was already like 830 at night, after all the traveling that we had done and stuff, so we got there and he was admitted. We was put in the intensive care unit, and they werent going to let anyone stay with him. I talk with the doctors very nicely and they let me stay the night in the ER with him. well that was a huge adventure.. elder damilda (elder greener's companiion) was pretty bad.. he did tests until 130 in the morning and then at 330 in the morning he had an attack, so i ended up staying up ALL NIGHT! it was crazy, i didnt sleep at all. then at 6 in the morning 2 elders came and picked me up. i called President and we both felt that there wasnt any problem for the elder to stay alone while he is in the ER. so i went to the office. I got there about 815 or 830, and i was just beat. i really couldnt do much but just stay awake. so i took a shower in the office and sat down, and about 915 President Tanner got to the office. We talked about E. Dalmeida, and how he was doing, then he looked me in the eyes and said Elder Olsen I need to talk to you. he called me in his office and told me that he really trusts in me, and then told me that i am being called as the new AP on the mission. And that i was so start imed. to help with the transfers this next week. It came as a huge shock to me, and i really wasnt expecting that at all. i am telling you this dad, mom, steve and mikey so that you can all join in and pray for me. So on monday i went right to work, and on tuesday i had my first meeting with President, we started the work on the transfers.. wow, i never realized how big the mission is. we are going to recieve 11 new missionoaries, and we have alot of changes on the mission that need to happen. How our President is new, he needs alot of help to know which elders are good and which arent. so it really gave me a headache yesterday. but at the same time i was really happy to know that the Lord loves me so much to trust me with such a sacred calling, at first it all past in a blur, i really didnt believe it... but now i am realizing how much the Lord expects from me.
Today i had the great opporunity to go to the temple and seek for further help, and it was amazing, i really felt the spirit strong and i felt the spirit testifying of what i need to do to become better.
I love being a missionary, i love being a servent of our Heavenly Father. I know that he loves us and guides us in everything that we do. I know that he will help me become better.
Please pray for me, I am really needing the help from the Lord in this moment.
I love this work, i love the mission, it is the greatest time in my life.

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!

ELDER OLSEN

28 July 2010

2010-08-21T06:35:00.001-07:00

so this week was really good, we are really working alot. so this week we had a miracle and it was amazing. Marcelo and his family that were baptized, well their oldest daugther wasnt baptized with the family, because she had a boyfriend, well she has been going to church and everything, but didnt want to live the law of chasity, well on thursday we went there and had an extremely spiritual lesson, and she accepted to be baptized! so we prepared everything and on sunday she was baptized! It was amazing! It was a really special baptism. because the whole family is now baptized, and they are already talking about going to the temple in 1 year. it was a really special day.
it was a crazy week filled with alot of spilts in other areas. our zone had 10 baptisms this week so we had to do alot of interviews and so we traveled alot.
so after kayla was baptized, that basically leaves us with no one to teach, so this week we are starting from nothing. it is going to be really fun.. we are going to work in a place where missionaries have never worked before. we are just going to basically work with all the members there and try to get alot of new investagators.
this week is going to be alot of fun too, tomorrow we have intreviews with our new president, i am really excited to work with him, i really hope to get to know him well.
we are teaching a new family that we way awesome. there names are Rimundo and Nelma, of course since i am in Brasil they arent married haha but thats alright, they always wanted to get married. so we went and taught them ( they were a referal from the bishop.) when we got there before we taught we asked him if he had anything that he would like to ask Heavenly Father in the prayer and he said, well i want to ask that me and my wife can be baptized in your church and that we can follow it well for the rest of our lives.. haha lets just say missionary work is easy when you are teaching people like that. so they went to the ward activity and everything and next tuesday we are going to mark their wedding... in the middle of august they will be married and baptized. it is going to be a great family.
it is really fun leaving in 6 missioaries, we are able to have alot of success together, and at the same time we are able to have alot of fun. I live with a really funny and great elder, elder greener. it is his last transfer. but he is a great friend already, he is going home in 2 or 3 weeks, and says that he is going to visit our family when he gets home.
I love being a missionary it is great. the blessing of the gospel are for everyone!!!
Elder Olsen

4 Aug 2010

2010-08-21T06:31:00.000-07:00

wow this week was wonderful, we had alot of neat experiences. we are really working hard. i am loving being a missionary and serving here in Jd Amanda. Well, this week we offically opened up our new teaching group. we went to the new neighboorhood and had alot of sucess. we found over 35 new investagators in 5 days! It was really awesome. We found 4 new families, and we taught 10 first lessons. It was really cool. We were able to really work hard. It is a little bit of a far walk to get to the new place where we will be working, it is about 45 minutes when we walk.. but it is worth it. It is really awesome to go to a place that has never seen the church. So we worked really hard and it paid off. on sunday we had 4 cars full of investagators.. and we were able to have 9 investagators at church, the Lord really blessed us. All 9 of these people have baptisms marked for this month!! So we are really excited. The Lord is really blessing us. we are working hard, my companion got really fat of the mission (he had gained over 25 pounds..) well in 2 month he has lost 10 :) haha so i think it is having a good effect on him! We are going to work even harder and harder this week.
This week we also had interviews for the first time with our new Presidnet, P. Tanner. He is really awesome. I already really do love him. It was really fun to talk to him, he is like exactly the type of man i want to be haha. he went to law school at byu, was a lawyer in California, and was a stake president for 10 years!! He is really awesome. I am defenitly going to learn alot with him. We got along really well, we talked alot about life and the work of the Lord.
He interviewed our whole zone, and is really happy with the work we are doing. This past month our zone was richly blessed with 30 baptisms!! over 12 more than the next closest zone, so the Lord is really blessing us. We set the goal to baptize 60 people this month, everyone is really excited and ready to work!!
Then on monday we had a zone leader meeting at presidents house. and it was really awesome. I am sure learing alot about being a leader in the church because of the mission. I have learned so many things about how to lead people and help them accomplish their goals through the mission. It is weird... i feel like as a leader i am learning more than teaching.. but hey that is part of the trade.
We have an amazing group of missionaries in our zone, i love them all like brothers. I am not sure what is going to happen this next transfer.. i am a little nervous that i will be transfered.. i already have 6 months here in the area. In 2 weeks we have transfers.. on the 17th.. and i am nervous. but it will be in the Lords hands.
Sounds like everyone at home is doing great. I love being a missionary so much, this has been the greatest time in my entire life. Everyone i can feel your prayers and your support for me. It really is something special, to know that i have over 70+ olsens praying for me. and that all the friends and neighbors too it adds up to alot of prayers!!
i am going to need alot of prayers in the next few days, i really hope that everyone can please pray alot for me, so that i may be able to fufill all the Lords wants from me, and that i will be able to support whatever calling the Lord has in store for me.
I love you all. i love this work, the Lord is on our side! He loves us, and cares for us.

Elder Olsen!!!!

21 July 2010

2010-07-21T13:00:00.001-07:00

hello family,
this week was really great. we are starting to form a new teaching pool right now, and it is going to be really rough, but i am excited for the challenge. we are going to change our neighboorhood where we teach, we are going to start working in a neighboorhood where nobody has ever worked, it is going to be great. i am really loving being here in this area and this zone, it is a huge blessing for me. i am really loving being a missionary, it is great. this week we went through some hard times, we are having to leave alot of our investagators because they dont want to fulfill with appoinments. but, i know the lord is on my side, and is ready to help me overcome everything that i need to go through on my mission.
this week we are going to try and do somthing never done before on the mission, we are going to try and really start an explosion of baptisms in our zone, so we are going to work really hard. please pray that this week we can see a miracle and baptize 20 people in our zone! we need lots of prayers. so please pray for us.
I love you all, thanks for all the love and support!

Elder Olsen
Hurrah for Israel!!

14 July 2010

2010-07-15T10:44:00.001-07:00

14 July 2010

2010-07-15T10:43:00.000-07:00

so this week was amazing, i am really happy for all the blessings the lord is giving me right now on my mission.

This week we saw a true miracle, Marcelo and his whole family were baptized!! It was a truly amazing experence. On thursday they were married in the chapel, it was awesome. marcelo used my suit, and he looked right stunning haha. and i bought a tie that matched his wife´s dress Marina. She was really beautiful as she walked down the aisle and everything. i was supposed to be best man, but it didnt work out, because i would have had to walk down the aisle, and here in brasil you have to give the bride a kiss... and well since i am a missionary that really wouldnt work out. so we chose a member to be the best man. it was really awesome. i took alot of pictures i will show yall some day. On saturday the whole family was baptized. it was awesome, i got something that every elder has tired to do, the bishop baptized! haha, he is like dad, fat.. so he never gets in the water. well after this family we got it. he baptized marcelo and his wife. it was awesome. it was really special to see another family being baptized. the lord is blessing us so much right now it is amazing. i love this work. we are trying our hardest to baptized every single week this transfer. so everyone please pray for us. i love being a missionary.

hurrah for israel!
Elder Olsen

7 July 2010

2010-07-07T11:24:00.003-07:00

so this week was really great, and i have alot of good news. the first is that i am going to stay here in Jd Amanda. it is going to be awesome. I am so excited. I stayed with my companion, Elder Feitosa, so we are going to work really hard together. I got to meet my new presdient, President Tanner, wow he is really awesome. he is a great leader in the church. he was in a stake presidency for 18 years in california, so he knows his stuff. when he got here he brought alot of change from the first presdiency, all about the new mission. alot of stuff is going to change on the mission, there is a new method of teaching and alot of stuff. I think Mikey has already been working with this stuff for a while, but this week it is all new in brasil, so it is going to bring alot of change here on the mission. it is going to really focus on preparing the missionaries to teach and testify, so alot of missionaries are going to get better. also, some exciting things happening with the zone... it is now even bigger!! i am not sure what is going on, but we received 2 new areas, so we now have 12 areas in our zone haha, it is huge!!! 24 elders just in our zone, with only 3 dls. so it is alot of work. i am working alot in spilts and with the dls. and i know the Lord will help me. I recieved a big help Elder Greener who was the assisant, is ending his mission this transfer, he is going to train in my zone, and so i will really learn alot from him. we know have 6 elders that live in our house. our area is having alot of success, so there is going to be 3 (sets?) of missionaries working in the 2 wards here in Amanda. it is going to be alot of work. This week is going to be really special, Marcelo is going to get married, and he has chose me to be the best man. he is going to use my suit for his wedding, i bought him a great tie to go with it. on thurday they are going to get married, and on saturday they will be baptized, it is going to be awesome!! The 2 children will be baptized, and the oldest is going to have to wait another few weeks, she is having problems with the law of chasity. but i have faith that she will stop. My companion took them all to the temple to visit, and they loved it. i was sad i couldnt go, i had to open up a new area, which is alot of work. new beds, desks, phones, and zero investagators. so i went there to open up the area and it was awesome, in 1 day we recieved 20 referals and marced alot of baptisms. so the Lord is really going to bless this area. I recently found out that this stake, the Hortolandia stake is the 4th fastest growing stake in the world. WOW! what a blessing that i have to be here. the stake presdient is awesome and all the bishops too. I have been working in this stake for a long time!! (my whole mission exvcept 3 transfers..) so i know alot of the members and basically everyone in the stake, and it is really awesome to see the work move foward. In august it is going to spilt, so it will be really cool too see!!

my presdident is awesome, he is a lawyer, so that will really help me. i am already going to start talking to him about how to get into the business and everything. his wife doesnt speak any portuguese, it must be really hard for her, but she is really smart, so i am sure in not time she will speak. Well i love being a missionary, it is the best time in my whole life. i love this work so much!!!

Hurrah for israel!!!!
Elder Olsen

30 June 2010

2010-07-07T11:24:00.001-07:00

Well this week was a really good week. we didnt have any baptisms... again.. wow it has been rough these last 2 weeks. we have alot of investagators, but non of them want to comitt to be baptized. but hey, it is part of the plan, everyone has a choice. But, we are still with a beautiful family Marcelo and Mariana, and their 4 children, and will able be baptized on the 8th. They are already getting ready for the weeding on the 8th. Marcelo is going to use one of my ties and shirts haha he is really excited. Their children and really great, the oldest daughter Kayla is being a little difficult about baptism on the 8th... so everyone please pray for her, she is 18 and has a really annoying boyfriend that is trying to stop her from living the law of chasity. But, i know the Lord will prepare the way. Well this week is week 6, so we are going to have transfers this week, i am not really sure what is going to happen, because my President is leaving today, and then we are going to have a new President... i dont know how much he will be able to change in 4 days.. but you never know. I just am praying alot that i will stay here... i really want to see Marcelo get married with his family.
I am really sad these days about the change of President.. it is going to be really weird.. i really am not sure how to act, probably alot of going to move and stuff.. so i am not sure what to do. but hey, the Lord will help me. Everyone is really weirded out about how it will be. so we will see.
Things with my companion are alright, he isnt the type person i would want to marry lets just say that, but hey we work hard and that is all that matters.
I am glad to be a missionary. Everyone pray alot of me, so that we can organize a new teaching pool.
I love you all. everyone also needs to pray that Brasil can lose in the world cup. haha, it is getting in the way of everything. The entire country is shut down while the soccer game is on. Our President gave us orders that during the game we need to have a district meeting or a zone meeting, so like 2 times a week we have meetings. they are going to play again on friday in the quarter finals, i hope they lose so our work can go back to normal. But at least i am seeing things i never thought i would see. On monday night after the game, a flood of drunker people went in the streets.. it was about 2 thousand people... the police had to come and throw gas and beat up alot of people haha. and of course some missionaries were right by it when it all happened. so they got to see some cool sights. it is crazy how much they love soccer.

Well i love this work. i love being a missionary.

Elder Olsen!!!!!

22 June 2010

2010-06-24T08:34:00.001-07:00

22 June 2010

2010-06-24T07:59:00.000-07:00

23 June 2010

2010-06-23T09:40:00.000-07:00

so this week was a little rough, but it had some bright spots. Edson and his family were not baptized, Marcia the wife is really really sick, so we are going to wait to see if she gets better.. she has been in the hospital, so everyone please pray for her to get better. this family is amazing, they are really special and we really want to see them be baptized. We also had a great thing happen. We took a family to the city center to get married!!! Marcelo and Mariana, we have been working with them for awhile, but they really didnt want to get married, they have already been to church 3 times, but they really dont want "commitment" ( oh by the way the have already lived together for 14 years and have 4 children!!!!") so one day we didnt know what to do, so i went there and just told them all about the blessings of seeing my parents married and happy in life... Mariana started crying, and said she wants to get married.. so we took them on thursday and marked the wedding!!!! on the 8th of July they are going to get married!! It is going to be awesome! everyone in the ward already knows them, so we are going to have a big party in the church, with everyone, and i am going to be best man!!!!! haha :) it is going to be awesome! They have 4 children, and 3 are old enough to be baptized (11 yrs, 15, and 18) and they are all going to be baptized together on the 9th of July!!! It is going to be way amazing. me and my companion are fighting aobut who is going to be here (transfers are on the 6th) but i am like 99.99% that he is going to leave and i will stay :) haha. but it is going to be way cool. we had 3 confirmations in church on sunday, and that was really cool, Elis and Tulio who were baptized are really excited, Elis already went to choir practice of the ward and is going to sing in the choir, and tulio went to church in a blue shirt and tie!!! ( i gave him a awesome tie on his baptism) things here are really going amazing, i love being here and i love this area. please everyone pray for Edson and his family.

Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

16 June 2010

2010-06-16T19:25:00.000-07:00

Wow, so this week was amazing. i have never been more blessed on my mission than i am being blessed right now. we are really seeing the Lord in our work. So this week we had 2 baptisms!! I have already talked about them, Elis and Tulio, they are the mom and brother of tales, who we baptized like 2 months ago. after 5 times in the church we finally were able to baptism them. The mom was really hard, she had been hiding something from us, but the spirit lead me. On sunday we were all ready to baptize just tulio.. because she had said that she didnt want to be baptized this week.. so we decided to just baptize tulio.. well i was filling out the forms with her about her son, and i just bore my testimony about the word of wisedom, and about eternal families. she started to cry, and said, "do you still have more white cloths?" haha wow, it was amazing. so she and her son were both baptized. she had been drinking coffee and didnt want to stop, because she didnt understand why she needed too. but she was to nervous to tell us, so every time we asked, she said she had already stopped. the spirit is amazing!! I totally thought the problem was the law of chasity, but the spirit knows all things, and lead me to know the truth! I love the spirit. This week is going to be just as special too!! Edson Marcia and Danielle are going to be baptized! This family is really special, and they are going to change lots of lives in the future. we are going to visit the temple with them tomorrow and go on a tour of the temple. they are all set for this sunday. it is going to be awesome. i am really excited and loving the area here. i really hope that i can stay here for like 6 more months or so. but who knows, we will have a new president here in 2 weeks, and i hope he doesnt take me out of here.
things with my companion are going good, he is a good elder. i like him. i just think all these blessings that we are recieving are going to his head a little.. i try to remind him that we are doing nothing, that it is all the Lord, but i think he might be getting prideful. in our zone meetings he talks himself up in front of the elders.. yeah, i am a little worried. i think that he suffered so much in the beginning of the mission (6 baptisms in one year) and now in two week he has already doubled that. he thinks that it is because of him.. ahh... the enemy works really well. he knows how to try and stop the work.. but it will all work out great.
I am really excited to work in the field. i love being a missionary.

Thanks for all the love and prayers!!!

ELDER OLSEN

9 June 2010

2010-06-09T09:26:00.000-07:00

I agree with Mikey, when you get over 1 year on the mission it looks like no one likes to write anymore, but hey its part of the deal. This week was amazing!! It was one of the greatest weeks on my mission. It was really awesome because we had 4 baptisms!!!! It was really amazing! I had alot of special expeineces this week that really changed my life! Well i will share two really quickly. first is that on friday i went to anhanguera and did some interviews, anhanguera is my first area, where i stayed for 8 months. well i am not sure if you all remember jose milton and his family.. they are the family of 5 that i baptized when i was there towards the end, well when i was there i didnt baptized one of the daugthers.. she had had a problem and didnt want to be baptized, and how it was the first transfer that i was senior i wasnt a very good missionary so i just let her go and just baptized the parents and the other 2 daughters. well on friday when i was in anhanguera, all the appoinments feel through, so i decided that we could go to their house and try and teach the daughter. the elder told me that they had already try lots of times, and that ever since i had left the elders had been going there to try and teach her, but she would never accept anything. but i told him that that day she was going to accept. It was a really crazy thing, because i have already dreamed alot of times with this family in the temple, and every time that i have this dream the daughter was never there, and then when i leave she is on the outside and she starts crying and telling me how because i didnt help her be baptized her life was runied. and alot more stuff that has happened since i left anhanguera. so i have always felt really strongly that it was my purpose or calling to baptize her and her family. so we went there and when i got there they didnt believe that i was there. they said that they had been talking about me that day, and all the things that i did to help them. we started of the lesson singing a hymn and then the elder bore his testimony and then let me talk. the spirit was really strong as a testfiyed of eternal families. after teaching about the importance of following the savior, i invited her to be baptized on the next day on saturday. she accepted. it was amazing, everyone was crying so much. so on saturday she and her family went to my area in Jd amanda and i baptized her. it was really awesome!!! the whole family was really happy to see her be baptized. now the whole family are members of the church! I know that they will enter into the temple!!!
On sunday we had 3 more baptisms. It was really amazing!! We have been teaching a part member family for a while. the husband is a member, and his wife was from a different church, and she would always go to church but didnt want to be baptized. on wends. i went there with a member and we taught about the book of mormon, the spirit was really strong and she and her child accepted to be baptized on sunday and they were!! The husband was so happy!! haha, he hasnt recieved the priesthood yet so i had to baptized them, but it was still really amazing!
And Reginaldo was also baptized on sunday. he is sergios friend. sergio is our recent convert that is amazing. he is really excited about the work. our teaching group is basically his friends and family that he has. we are going to try and baptize all of them.
this week we have 3 more baptisms. we are going to help complete another family of the ward. it is going really awesome.
We also have a family of 3 that will be baptized on the 19th. defintely the most beautiful family i have taught. they are way ready for the gospel. they are well off and have 2 children (12 yrs and 4 yrs) on saturday we had stake conference and the dad of the family Edson, he went in a white shirt hhaha, his wife went in a skirt and all dressed up. it was really awesome. they are going to visit the temple tomorrow night with us, and we are going to enter in there with them in one year. they say they cant wait to be baptized.. really they were prepared to hear the gospel!!
I am loving my mission. i am loving everything about my area. please pray for:
Edson, marcia, daneile, elis, tulio, valeska, marcelo, mariana, kasia, maria and carlos. all them have a date for this month, but they will needs lots of prayers!!!!

Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder Olsen

This is another one out of order sorry 26 May 2010

2010-06-04T07:52:00.001-07:00

Wow this week was really exciting and filled with new news. This week we had one bapitsm. Henrique was baptized. I was really awesome to have one more baptism with Elder Standage... in 8 short weeks we accomplished alot together.. we had 10 bapitsms which was really great. Then on Sunday night he was transfered. And I recieved another companion.. Elder Feitosa.. Brasilian. It is the first time that he is going to be zone leader too.. so it will be the 3rd time i will train a zone leader haha. i think i found out what my calling on the mission is. He is a great Elder. He has 1year on the mission and works really hard. The only thing that will be different is that he really hasnt baptized alot on his mission.. haha he only baptized 1 person in the first 8 months of his mission, and in total he has about 6 or 7 baptisms.. so when we sat down and i told him that we are going to baptized at least 10 people together.. he really didnt believe it.. So, it will be a great adventure to help him get a great vision on baptizing. He works really work, and is really dedicated.. he just needs a little help baptizing :) our zone had alot of changes too, so it will be a interesing transfers for alot of reason.. this transfer started out with President Castro Deus and is going to end with a new President.. President Tanner.. he is going to be here in about 4 weeks.. so it is going to be really weird to move presidents.. i am not sure if i am really ready.. i am so used to working with my president, but i know that it is going to be a great opportunity for me. President Tanner sounds like a really great man. We will see what we can do together.
This week we have 2 baptisms that are going to be great. I dont know if ya'll remember when i told you about Tales.. the young man that we baptized.. that basically lived on the streets because his mom was never home.. well he has changed so much because the gospel that his mom and brother have now been to church 3 straight times!! On sunday we taught his mom and she started crying, thanking us for all the changes that have happened in her life and her sons lives... it was a really special moment for me.. to see the changes that happen in peoples lives through the gospel.. she and her son are going to be baptized this week :) it is going to be really special. There is going to be alot of work this week. My companion needs to learn to work :) and learn to bapitze. So, i dont have alot of time. but please pray for me, that i can have the strength to always work hard and never give up... :)

Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder Olsen

Sorry I have been slacking because of my broken arm.. 2 June 2010

2010-06-04T07:49:00.000-07:00

Well it was great talking to everyone. I cant believe how grown up the kids are. I cant believe that Sam, Andrew and Adam all sounded like they were 10 now!! They are growing up alot. It sounds like everything at home is going great. I am so thankful for my wonderful family that supports me. Today I just wanted to tell you all how much I love you, and how i am so grateful for every single person in my family. I am so very grateful for all the examples that you are to me. I am so blessed to have been born in the gospel. To have been raised in a family where I could feel the Lord in my home and with my family. I dont think that I ever appreciated the blessings that I have been given until i came on a mission. I know that the blessings are real. I know that the Lord has blessed our family alot. I am so humbled by the feeling of love the Lord has shown our family. I am so grateful for my calling as a missionary, for the opportunity that I have to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.. I know that he lives, and they He loves me and trusts in us. I am so happy to know that he wants us to be happy here on the earth.

This week was really great. Yesterday we had a great district meeting. I left the spirit really strong as it guided me on what I needed to say to the zone to help every missionary know how much I love being a missionary. We had a "fire demostration" it was really cool. I used the story from 1 Kings 18 as part of my message to the zone.. haha you will all have to see the video after the mission, we got it on film. Afterwards I made a soap box.. which was really cool, i painted it and it is beautiful. It's blue and says on it "what would Christ say.." then we went to the bus stops in the city, and a few Elder's had to show their faith and climb on the box and preach to everyone.. I know that every single one of them will remember it forever! It was really cool. I got the idea from Steve. haha. We also got it on film. I will show you all after the mission.

This week we are preparing alot of people to be baptized. It is oging to be awesome. But, we are going to need miracles in our zone. We have established the biggest goal in the history of the mission in one week. The record is 19 baptisms in one week... This week we want to baptized 41 people!!!! We need ALOT of prayer and fasting. We are working hard then we have ever worked before!!!

I love this gospel. The Lord is preparing the way for us. He is with us and loves us.

Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

2 June 2010

2010-06-02T12:26:00.002-07:00

hello,

hello family. This week was a really good week for us. We had alot of work that we needed to do with the transfers and stuff, so it was alot of work, but it wasnt too bad.. after awhile you get used to this type of work. something really weird happened this transfer.. i have offically been a zone leader for longer than i was a regular missionary. 6 transfers as zone leader and 5 as a normal missionary. wow, that is really weird. It really is no fun getting old on the mission. I am the oldest missionary in my zone.. wow that is terrible. but my zone is really young so that is my excuse. We have some exciting news that is going to happen in our zone this week. We are going to open 2 new areas in our zone. One ward is going to spilt this week, and the other our stake is going to recieve a branch that is really weak right now. So we are going to have 12 areas in our zone now haha. i am not sure what i am going to do. It is really hard to keep up with all the interviews and stuff. I hoped that our President will call another dl to help me. because i am basically having to do spilts and interviews like 3 days a week.. leaving hardly anytime for me to work in my own area. But, President said that for now i will have to continue working as we are, so pray for us alot that we can still find time to work in our area.
This week our zone had 8 baptism. in my area all of our baptisms feel through, we had to move them to other weeks. Elis and Tulho were all ready to be baptized, but on friday i had to go do an interview, and my companion went to their house and "felt" that they needed another week.. so he re-marked there baptism for this week... ahh.. it was a little frustrating. but, i know that it is all going to work out. My companion doesnt really know how to baptize alot of people.. so he is a little stressed out, he is not sure how to do it right. but, with time he will learn. Exciting news, we found 2 new families!!! Edson and his family of 3 and Marcelo and his family of 7!!!! It was amazing. Edson and his family went to church, and they loved it. They are legally married and really a special family. we left the book of mormon with them and when we went back they told us that they felt that they should read the book in family, so they all read together. I asked the 12 year old daugther what part so liked in the reading and she said "i really like ver. 29. because it said that we should not contend against others I know that this is true, and i know that when we are fighting heavenly father is not happy with us." yeah. really EXTREMELY specail family. I didnt even believe it. Marcelo isnt married, but he has 5 children and they always wanted to get married.. so i am sure that they will be married quickly. They are really excited about the church and want to change their lives.
I love my mission. I am so excited to be here. Brasil is amazing. I am loving every minute of my mission. I hope that everyone is doing good. Please pray for: Reginaldo, Luis, Elis, Tulho and Valeska.. we need to help them be baptized this week!!!! I love you all.

Hurrah for Israel
Elder Olsen

26 May 2010

2010-06-02T12:26:00.001-07:00

Hello family,

Wow this week was really busy for me and my zone. We did alot of working and alot of teaching. But thats the best part about missinoary work. I love being a missionary, it makes my blood race. Well this week we had a pretty good week in my area. It was supposed to be alot better, but we still managed to have 1 baptism and we had 8 people in the sacrament meeting. It was a ok week. We baptized Igor, a friend of a member here in the ward. Well our zone we had only 6 baptisms... it feel alot this week.. but its alright, something that i always say to the Elders.. it doesnt matter what we do.. we could ruin everything about this zone and mission.. and still the work of the Lord will go foward.. But we need to work to be able to be part of the great work of the Lord.
We are teaching a really great family. John and Apercida. They are about 65 and 60 years old and really great. they went to church and are really excited, but his wife is really sacred.. she has been cothlic her whole life and is scared to change.. but this week she accepted baptism.. so we are going to prepare everything to help them, maybe they will be baptized this week, or maybe next we are sure.
We also had a great family night this week with our recent converts.. Sergio was there with his family, and confessed that he wants to have another kid.. that is going to be awesome. He also had an interview with the bishop and will recieve the priesthood this week.. and has already been planning his sealing in 11 month. He told me that i have to come back, or else he wont enter. haha so me and my companion have already started plans to return to Brasil in May 2011.
I love this work.. this week we have transfers again.. wow its amazing how time goes by so fast.. its weird to think that i only have 5 more transfers... wow i really dont like to think about time.
I love my calling. Thanks for all the love and support.

Love,
Elder Olsen

19 May 2010

2010-06-02T12:23:00.000-07:00

5 May 2010

2010-06-02T12:22:00.000-07:00

Hello family,

wow this week was amazing. We really saw the Lord is our area and in our zone. I feel really blessed to be here in my area, i feel like i am a new missionary here. I am really loving my area and my zone. This week we had a great week. It was really awesome to see the Lord in our zone and in our area. This week we had 2 baptisms here in our area. The first was on friday, a man named Jose. He is really awesome. He is like 55 or so, and his kids are already members of the church, but he was never baptized. So we have been teaching him for like 3 weeks, and every single week he goes to church, and every single week he reads the book of mormon, but for some reason he didnt want to be baptized. so on thursday night we taught him, and as we were saying the opening prayer i felt the spirit guide my thoughts in a really amazing way. So right when my companion said amen, i took of my name tag and held it in front of his eyes. And i asked him he if knew the importance of my calling. I told him all about my calling as a missionary in the Lords church, and talked about Christ and his Atonement. He started crying, and i told him that he needing to be baptized the next day.. he was! It was really cool. I have never done anything like that before, but it was really aweseome to feel the spirit leading my thoughts and actions. On saturady we had another baptism, Tales, is a friend of one member here. He is a young kid, he is 14. But he is really awesome. Him and his brother basically live alone. There dad left the house a long time ago, and there mom is kind of a work-a-holic. so she is never home, she works every day 7 until 10 at night. So it was good to help tales get off the street. Now he is taking seminary and going to church. His brother is 16, but he is a little harder. He is already caught up in some bad things of the world. So it will take a little bit more time to baptize him. it was really special, because his mom supported him being baptized, but said she wouldnt be able to go, then at the last minute she showed up and cried alot. then on sunday she went to a part of sacrament meeting. so we are hoping that through Tales example his whole family will be baptized.
My zone is going awesome too. We had 9 baptisms this week! It is going really well. Our goal is to bapitze 65 this month! It is going to be amazing!!
I love my calling. I love being a missionary.

Hurrah for Israel!
Elder Olsen

28 Apr 2010

2010-06-02T12:20:00.002-07:00

28 Apr 2010

2010-06-02T12:20:00.001-07:00

i love this work. it is the greatest thing in the entire world!!!!! This week was amazing for me, it was one of the greatest weeks of my mission. We had 3 baptisms this week, and they were all amazing. Brother Sergio was baptized!!! It was a miracle. President came to our ward on sunday and interviewed him, after the interviewed we all gathered together with president in the room and he told us that Sergio was REALLY prepared to be baptized. and that he felt that we should not wait any longer. He said that he needed to be baptized that day. So we threw together an amazing baptismal service for Sergio and his Daugther ( we had already baptized last week the son Thayan and the Wife Neia.) and they were baptized!!! It was amazing. It was seriously an spiritual experence. The Lord really blessed us with a special family, i have no doubts that here in one year this family is going to be in the temple!! It was really special. Last night Neia (sergios wife) was interviewed to be called the new visiting teacher leader of the ward!! haha!! amazing! The bishop has already interviewed sergio to recieve the preisthood this sunday, their daughter thaya is going to seminary everyday, and the son is loving the primary! It was seriously an amazing blessing in my life to see this family be baptized. I think that they are as special as Marcos and Elisangela which i baptized last year.
We also baptized on saturday a young man named Paulo. He is 20 and way cool. He is going to go on a mission. He lives alone, and he already said that here in 1 year he is going to go on a mission. It was seriously a great week for me, the Lord is really blessing us.

The zone is also doing really awesome. we had 26 baptisms in april. the highest on the mission! It was cool. He have set the goal to break the record of our mission in may and baptized 65 people!!! We are going to work ALOT!!!
This week is going to be really great too!! We are going to baptized the dad of a member, jose, he has been to church 4 times now, he is just wanting to play hard ball with the Lord, but he will be baptized this week. and we are going to baptized Tales, he is a friend of a member. and Antonia.. she is our hardest one.. she is the wife of a member that just doesnt seem to stop smoking 1 ciggarte. she smoke 1 a day.. ah how annoying!!! every day she just smokes 1.. she just cant seem to stop..any ideas

I love this work, I am really really happy. I am way happy Justin is going to go on a mission.. I know where he is coming BRASIL!!! But i think that he will go to a different mission... Salvador South, Brasil Mission, he will enter in August 15th!!

This work is amazing, i love this gospel!!

Hurrah for Israel!
Elder Olsen

21 Apr 2010

2010-04-21T10:28:00.001-07:00

Family,

wow i am so happy to be a missionary! It is the best thing i have ever done in my life. This week was really awesome, we had one baptism, Thayan. We had 4 people to be baptized, but Sergio, he didnt pass the interview, he is going to need to be interviewed by President. so him and his family were not baptized. But i am sure that they will be baptized this week or the next, it just depends on President and his schedule. This week we have 3 other baptisms, and it is going to be awesome. Thayá, Paulo, and Jose. It is going to be a really special week for us. And if everything goes right Sergio will be baptized too with his 2 daugthers this week too. so it could be a really special week for us. We are really trying to make our area the example of the mission. We are trying to work our hardest to show our Savior we are grateful for him. My companion is still Elder Standage, we are going to work together this transfer too. It is going to be really good. Our goal is to baptize 20 people in May. haha, and i know it is possible. We are going to really work like we have never worked before.

Our zone is doing great, but it is going to get better. We have already baptized 19 people this month!! And we have 8 more this week, so we are going to baptize about 28 or so this month in our zone. It is going to be amazing in May we have set the goal for 65 baptisms in our zone. haha it is possible. everyone is really faithful and ready to work hard.

We are really seeing the Lords hand in our work. I know the Lord loves me, and he takes care of me. I am so happy to be a missionary. I have never know the Master Savior until i served a mission.I am growing so much.

Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder Olsen

14 Apr 2010

2010-04-21T10:27:00.000-07:00

this week was great. we are working like crazy to try and do everything that the Lord wants us to do. We are going to have a great week this week. This week we have two baptimal services, saturday and sunday. This saturday is going to be one of the most special baptisms on my mission, the Lord blessed us with an amazing family of 4, 3 of them are going to be baptized, the other already was. Sergio is a great man, he is probably going to be bishop in the future. And on sunday we are going to baptized 2 people that are really amazing too. We are going to baptized Antonia, a senhora, she is great. Her husband is a member for some time, but she could never seem to stop smoking, well this week she stopped after alot of prayers. And we are going to baptized Paulo, a young man who is amazing. He is 20 and is defintely going to go on a mission. He is great. We are really excited. We are working like crazy, and teaching alot. I know that the Lord is blessing me more than i have ever seen on my mission. We are going to be really blessing in these next months. Dont have alot of time, the work never stops!!!

Thanks for all the love and support.

Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

31 March 2010

2010-04-21T10:26:00.000-07:00

well this week was really good. I had an amazing week.. everything was going great in my area, we were able to take 8 people to sacrament meeting and we have 5 people that are going to be baptized this week. I was extremely excited and happy, when monday morning i got a phone call from President. he told me that everything was going really great in our zone, and that it was growing alot. so after alot of pray he decided that we are going to put together 2 different zones and work in one huge zone. ZONA HORTOLANDIA. it is going to be amazing. so i was transfered... to a area called Jd Amanda. My old area Portal Bordon is going to be re opened with 2 new elders, my companion Elder Philipp was transfered too... It was a really big shock because we have 10 marked baptisms in Portal Bordon but President said that he felt the spirit really strong that it had to be fast that we put the zones together. So i trust in my president and now it was the work of the Lord. Now i am in Jd amanda with Elder Standage.. yeah another american haha, i never thought i would work with americans again, but now all i have is american companions. He is from Mesa Arizona, and a really good Elder. He has 1 year and 4 months on the mission. and we are going to be ZLs together. It is going to be amazing. We now have the biggest zone in the mission. 10 areas. wow, alot of elders not one sister. So just 20 elders in our zone. It is going to e really good.
So after i was transfered my zone is still going to have PB in it, so i went on spilts and showed the new elder the area. It was really sad because i really loved PB alot, i only stayed there for 2.5 weeks, but in those 3 week i really felt good in the area. They are going to baptize a really beatiful family this week that I wont be able to be there to watch. Regiane is a lady that we found 2 weeks ago, and she is really excited about her baptism this week. The elders have alot of luck, i left 10 people ready to be baptized. but hey you dont always see the fruits.
This zone is going to be amazing, i am really excited to work here now. This area is really blessed, and really good. We are going to have alot of success here in this area. My companion is really good and really cool, we have already know each other for awhile, so now it is going to be really fun.
I am so thankful for my calling, I love my calling, it is amazing. Pray for me ALOT.
Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

7 Apr 2010

2010-04-07T11:35:00.001-07:00

wow this week was amazing and really busy. I am really loving my new area, it is really great. My companion Elder Standage is really cool and a great Elder. It is fun to work and train new missionaries, it is his first time being a zone leader. We worked really hard this week. His last companion and him werent able to really establish a big teaching pool, so we worked like crazy this week. And we had alot of success. We were able to mark 11 baptisms and find 23 new investagatos. I really am loving my calling as a missionary.
We also saw some miracles. I really wanted to baptism our fisrt week together. So we worked like crazy with all the people that had already been going to church and on saturday we were able to help 2 men be baptized. They have been going to church for like 2 months, but never wanted to be baptized. We taught them and the accepted. On saturday after the first sesson of conferece we were able to bapitzed them.
It really was a big mircale. We found some really amazing people this week, that are defintely going to be baptized. We are helping the wife of one member be baptized. She smokes ALOT, but we worked all week with her, and last night i went there, she only smoked 2 cigarettes. So this week she is going to be baptized. We also have some other people that are preparing for baptism this week. It is going to be a great week. Our goal is to have 3 baptims this week, and 12 this month!! We are going to work really hard.
I am really loving the new zone, but it is really big!! 20 missionaries is alot of people. We had a meeting yesterday with all 20 of us, and i could just feel the power that we have. It is amazing. This week is transfers.. (normal transfers) so we are going to probably recieve some new missionaries in our zone. maybe my companion is going to leave, he already has 6 months here... but we will see, I hope not, i really like working with him.
This week we found someboday really special, that is defintely going to be a bishop one day. He has already read the Book of Mormon, and he is already inviting everybody in his family to be baptized. He is going to be baptized on the 17th, his name is Sergio. He is awesome, his wife is a less active member, who is going to a different church now, but we are going to help her come back, and baptize the whole family. they have 11 children, but only 1 lives with them.
I am so grateful to be a missionary. I am so happy to be here and working in the Lord´s work.

Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

31 March 2010

2010-03-31T08:29:00.001-07:00

Hello family,

well this week was really good. I had an amazing week.. everything was going great in my area, we were able to take 8 people to sacrament meeting and we have 5 people that are going to be baptized this week. I was extremely excited and happy, when monday morning i got a phone call from President. he told me that everything was going really great in our zone, and that it was growing alot. so after alot of pray he decided that we are going to put together 2 different zones and work in one huge zone. ZONA HORTOLANDIA. it is going to be amazing. so i was transfered... to a area called Jd Amanda. My old area Portal Bordon is going to be re opened with 2 new elders, my companion Elder Philipp was transfered too... It was a really big shock because we have 10 marked baptisms in Portal Bordon but President said that he felt the spirit really strong that it had to be fast that we put the zones together. So i trust in my president and now it was the work of the Lord. Now i am in Jd amanda with Elder Standage.. yeah another american haha, i never thought i would work with americans again, but now all i have is american companions. He is from Mesa Arizona, and a really good Elder. He has 1 year and 4 months on the mission. and we are going to be ZLs together. It is going to be amazing. We now have the biggest zone in the mission. 10 areas. wow, alot of elders not one sister. So just 20 elders in our zone. It is going to e really good.
So after i was transfered my zone is still going to have PB in it, so i went on spilts and showed the new elder the area. It was really sad because i really loved PB alot, i only stayed there for 2.5 weeks, but in those 3 week i really felt good in the area. They are going to baptize a really beatiful family this week that I wont be able to be there to watch. Regiane is a lady that we found 2 weeks ago, and she is really excited about her baptism this week. The elders have alot of luck, i left 10 people ready to be baptized. but hey you dont always see the fruits.
This zone is going to be amazing, i am really excited to work here now. This area is really blessed, and really good. We are going to have alot of success here in this area. My companion is really good and really cool, we have already know each other for awhile, so now it is going to be really fun.
I am so thankful for my calling, I love my calling, it is amazing. Pray for me ALOT.
Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

24 March 2010

2010-03-25T07:08:00.001-07:00

Hey family, this week was a really great week. I am really loving being here in my new area. It is all really going amazing. My bishop is probably the best bishop in the mission, he is really excited to baptize the whole world, so we are defintely going to have alot of baptisms in the next month. This week we had 2 baptisms, Elen and Guilherme. The are all family of members, we are going to work alot with this family. Elen is 20, and she is really cool, i think she has a crush on my companion haha, so we had to really be careful when we were teaching her. This family Valnez and Rosana are really cool, they are recent converts, and they have alot of referals for us to teach. At the baptismal service we had more than 10 investagators there watching, so we are going to see alot of baptisms in the future. I am really excited to be here with Elder Philipp, he is a really good missionary. He has like 6 or 7 months on the mission, and is really excited to work. He had some troubles with the other ZL that were his companions, but i think he is liking me. It has been really tough for him because he entire mission his companions have always been ZL or DL, so he hasnt ever really know what normal missionary work is.. so we are going to work really hard so that next transfer he can be senior. He is from Alpine or close by... he went to Lone Peak.. that is about all i know... I dont really like talking with my companion about our pre lives.. ha i just like to work. We have a really amazing family of 5 that we are teaching, her name is Regiane.. she is really amazing. We marked her baptism for the 4th, and together with her 4 kids they are going to be baptized.. everytime we go to her house she is always talking about her baptism, when we take members with us she says, hey did you know that i am going to be a member of your church on the 4th haha she is really prepared, and all of her children love us too, so it is going to be a really special family. I really feel blessed to be here, i have a feeling that i am going to be able to help the kingdom of the Lord ALOT in this area, there is some much room for growth. there is going to be alot of baptisms in April.
I love this work, i love being a missionary!!! Pray for me!!!
Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

3 March 2010

2010-03-19T07:20:00.001-07:00

Wow,
this week was really awesome and really hard. We are having alot of trouble with our bishop, he really doesnt like the missionaries, he is passing alot of blame for the problems in the ward to the missionaries... so it is very hard, but i know I will be able to over this. I was able to go on spilts with the AP this week here in my area. It was good to talk openly about the problems here in the area that we are having. After alot of success that we are having using our own strength, I think that President has had enough... it looks like my area is going to close. We are able to baptize alot here, but the problem is that the bishop is driving alot of RC away.. so it looks like this will be the last week here in the area.. I was able to have alot of experencies this week with my zone. I stayed with every single area this week, helping the missionaries find more people to teach. We are really starting to look into finding people that WANT to be taught.. because sometimes we teach people that dont want to be taught, so i thought of a new plan to find the people that want to be found... and it is really working! This week we have a record of baptism set. We have 20 baptisms in our zone.. it would be the new record we can are able to help all these people be baptized. we have 3 baptisms here in my area. It is going to be really awesome week. Just on saturday we have 14 interviews!!! haha, we are going to travel alot this week.
I love being on a mission, it is amazing to be an instrument in the hands of the Lord.
Pray for me ALOT!!
Elder Olsen

11 March 2010

2010-03-19T07:19:00.001-07:00

Wow this week was really good for me. I am loving my mission right now. This week we had a record week in our zone. We had 14 baptisms just this week!!! It is a new record for our zone. It was alot of work, but it was worth it. The missionaries are really excited about the work in this stake and zone. We all really fought hard to work our hardest to accomplish our goals. On sunday night at midnight I was transfered... for the 2nd time on my mission I was transfered. And as I guessed, my area shut down, but it was really a great time in my mission. I learned alot through the struggles that we had with our leadership in our ward. At least now I know what I need to do better to work with stake leaders and ward leaders.
So, I was transfered to be zone leader in the zone sumare, in a area called Portal Bordon.. it is a great area.. but the zone and area are going throught alot of hard times in the past 3 months. in the past 3 months the ZL only baptized 1 person!!! wow, that is pathetic.. this past month the whole zone only baptized 5 people... so there is alot of work to be done here in the zone. They were having alot of trouble with confidence, so when I got here I really went wild. They have alot of investagators that have already been to church more than 3 or 4 times.. but they were afaird to invite to be baptized. So the first night i got here, I invited a family of 3 to be baptized this saturday. All of them accepted! So it is going to be really fun to work here, we are going to baptized alot of people.
The zone is a smaller zone, only 5 areas, so I am the only zone leader. My companion is Elder Philipp, from Alpine utah. Ha, yeah my first american companion in 1 year!!!! He is a great young missionary, with alot of potential in the furture. It is going to be funy working with him here, and learning with him. Our zone is going to be awesome, because it is a smaller zone, we are going to be able to help all the missionaries at the same time. there is also a DL in the zone, so we will be able to plan alot of spilts and fun finding actvities. I am really excited to be a missionary. I am loving my mission.
Something really cool is that Anhanguera is in my zone. HAHA. so I will be able to return to my first area and really light a fire. The area has been really struggling since I left.. I found out from the Elder that is there that the ENTIRE relief society presidency is people that I baptized!!! Elisangela is the 1st cons. Andreia is 2nd and Gisele is Sectar. haha, wow it really was awesome to hear that. I love the gospel for this purpose. In 6 months these people completely changed their lives, they are now active members of the church of God. I am so happy to know the TRUTH.

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!
Elder Olsen

17 March 2010

2010-03-19T07:18:00.000-07:00

wow this week was an amazing week. I read Mikeys email, and it sounds alot like my week. We had alot of miracles happen in our area here. I am really liking it here in Portal Bordon. I know that the Lord has called me to work here in the area. We were able to help Patrick be baptized this week, he was invetagator they had been teaching for ALONG time, so we were able to help him see the blessings of the gospel. I am really excited for this area. Were were able to find alot of new families, but we found one family, that was really special.. it is a family of 6!! We taught them on saturday night right before our baptism and quickly invited them to church. When we went there on sunday, they were all there waiting to go to church!! The whole family went and loved it. Last night we set there baptism date!! It is a really special family!! This week I was also able to go to Anhanguera, I went on spilts with the Elders there, and it was amazing. Elder Larsen (my trainer) he is here in brasil with his dad visiting... well we had a family night together with Marcos and Elisangela that we baptized. It was really cool to see everyone again in the area, but it was sad too because the area is really struggling, so I am going to have to really help the ELders there. My new companion is really cool, he is already speaking really well, watching him speak portuguese reminds me of when I was starting on my mission, wow portuguese can be a really big pain. This week we have 1 baptism. Ellen, she is going to be baptized. She is a cousin of a member family, she has been going to church for a month, but this week we are going to help her be baptized. It is going to be really cool, because this member family has alot of referals, but they are scared that nobody wants to recieve the message, so now they are way excited that their cousin is going to be baptized, so now they invited everyone to go to the baptism, we are expecting at least 15 investagators at the baptism. It is going to be way cool.
Well I love being a missionary, I have never been happier in my life. It really is the greatest blessing in the world to be a missionary. I really taught it was way cool that mikey is teaching a brasilian family!! I wanna send him my testimony in portuguese.
I love you all so much. I love this gospel with my whole heart!!!
Hurrah for Israel!!!
ELder Olsen!!!!

24 Feb 2010

2010-02-24T11:43:00.001-08:00

Well this week was a very interesting week, we are facing alot of challenges with our Bishop.... soo.. the work is really interesting. Our ward is stopped.. Because we will have a new branch that will open, and so our ward doesnt want to work at all until this branh opens, because most of the missionaries in the past worked where the branch will be. So the members not really want to help us at all. Well this past week we had a great family at church, a family of 7 people, at the end of the meeting i showed them around and talked with to them with the bishop. The bishop talked to them and liked them alot, the mom of the family said.. can we always come back? haha a family beautiful. but, after the bishop said to me, Elder we really dont need to baptize this family yet, lets wait until the branch opens, and then they can be baptized. HAHA. wow, so I about lost it with the bishop. Nobody in the ward really is doing anything, they are all waiting until the branch opens.. so we are really having some problems.. We are meeting alot of people with our own forces, alot of people, but it is like President Hinckley said the best way is for the members to invite the investa. to go to their houses, well this isnt happening. So we are really looking for ways to build the trust of our bishop and the members. I really want to make a DIFFERNCE in this ward, in this area. I dont want to just be another Elder that past through the ward and baptized some people. I want to leave a mark, so that when the next missionaries come here, the members say hey why arent you baptizing families, thats what Elder Olsen did... I really want to leave the kind of differnce in the area that will leave a last affect. So I am really praying alot to know how to do this better.
We are really seeing alot of miracles, like a said we have a family of 7, we are teaching them, they love the church. The dad smokes alot, so that is one problem. Last night we had a mini family night, and it went really well, they love the BOM and love the gospel. I really hope that I can see them be baptized.
This week we have Rodrigo, he is going to be baptized. I am thankful that the Lord is always blessing me with opportunties to be an example.. it is really fun to help other people. I love doing things I would never do if i was somebody normal and love talking with everybody. Ha, I decided that this whole next year I am going to walk everyday with a BOM in my hands. haha, the missionaries in my zone think I am crazy, but it is really going well, I am able to always talk about this amazing book.
I love this work. It doesnt matter what happens, it will never be stopped. I love being a missionary.
Elder Olsen
Hurrah for Israel!

10 Feb 2010

2010-02-18T09:19:00.000-08:00

This week was awesome. It was really an amazing week. Last wendesday I had surgery on my toenail.. so I had to stay at home all day wendesday, it was really lame. but my toe is already getting better. I am able to walk already and do everything, I am just working with sandles for now.. I will probably work in sandles for the next week or 2.. but it was painless.. but part of my toenail is never going to grow again. blessings from the mission.

This week we saw the miracle of FERRARI. he was baptized! After working ALOT with him, he was baptized.. he felt the spirit so strong he knew that he needed to be baptized. He knows alot of people in the ward, so we had a baptismal service really awesome. It was really awesome to see him be baptized.

I had an interview with my mission president, and I was really needed for a long time.. I was never able to have an interview with him, so it was really good to talk with him one on one, and open up my heart. It is amazing how emotional missionary work is. It can really take alot out of you. My President gave me some good words of advice, and is going to help me be a better missionary.

This week we really need some miracles. Denilda, who has been going to church for almost 2 months still hasnt been baptized!! So we really need alot of prayers so that she can overcome her fears and doubts and be baptized, she is facing alot of opisition from her family, but i know that she will be able to overcome all of it and be baptized this week.

I am loving Brasil, it is an amazing place, the people are open and they are so willing to hear the gospel.. We found an AMAZING family!!! If they are as good as we think, there is going to be ALOT of baptism in the next month. I talked with a lady named Beth on the bus, and still was been taught by the missionaries 6 years ago, but then she moved. Will she has NEVER found another church that she liked. When I talked with her on the bus, she was crying, we set up an appointment with her she said she is going to invite everyone in her family. she has 4 kids that are all married, and 4 grandchildren above the age of 8. I am going there tonight to teach her, I have never been more excited!!! PLEASE pray that tonight I can teach the best 1st lesson ever!!! And they can all be baptized!!
I love this week, I have never been happier, or closer to the Savior, I love him.
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!
ELDER OLSEN!!!

27 Jan 2010

2010-02-01T19:44:00.000-08:00

Hello Brother Olsen.

You probably will not remember who I am, but, I am the young man who
lived at the Gaetner's house on the winter of 2002, I even went on the
Lake Powell trip with you and, the young man from your ward.

As you know, your son Elder Olsen, is serving in one of the wards of
my Stake. He is serving on a city close to the one I live, so
yesterday I drove to the Chapel he attends Church meetings and,spent
some time with him during Church services.

I can tell you he is doing great, the ward loves him.

The members care for him and, I only heard good things about his
service as a missionary. You can be sure your son is a great
missionary, it is very clear that he knows what he is here for, he is
always smiling , he is very polite, and, he brings light to everyone
he talks to and every place he goes to.

I must say, he is speaking Portuguese very well, he speaks a lot
better than many other foreign missionaries that are about to return
home. He also cares a lot for the people he teaches.

I own your family a lot, specially your brother Andrew, for all the
support given me at the moment I lived in your neighborhood.

Because of that, you can be sure that Elder Olsen has all my support.
He has all my phone numbers, and, I told him he ought to call me at
any time if he needs anything. Since I know a lot of people on the
mission area ,I told him that if I myself can not make at that moment
he calls me, I will find someone who can make it and help him.

I attached to this email a picture I took yesterday with Elder Olsen,
I hope you will enjoy it.

Please send my remarks to your brother Andrew, and, also my
congratulations on the born of his second daughter.

Best Regards

Yuri Ribeiro

27 Jan 2010

2010-02-01T19:43:00.000-08:00

Wow this week was way better than the last week. I really feel like there are some things that the Lord can teach me throughout the difficulties on the mission. This week we saw the miracle of Raul, who was baptized. It was really great to see at least one baptism this transfer. I thought maybe I wasnt going to baptize somebody in a trasnfer for the first time on the mission, but the Lord gave us a miracle. Raul is great. He is defintely going to go on a mission here in a little bit.
Well, I stayed in Nova Vinhedo, I wasnt transfered. And my companion wasnt too... so we are going to stay together one more transfer. The first thing I did when I found out was I told him we needed to talk seriously... so we had a giant talk, and we decided to work more closely this transfer. Our zone recieved some awesome missionaries. So we are really going to work hard now, we dont have any more excuses, now we are going to start baptizing ALOT!!
I dont have alot of time, today I have to go to the doctors office, they are going to cut off my toe nail... its been giving some real trouble, so i decided to just cut it off so I can continue working.
I love the mission. This week we have 2 baptisms!! A man named Ferrrari. haha. yeah how cool is that. And another man named Alex. The Lord is really blessing us. We need to stop being so prideful is what I told my companion, and when we accepted that, we started to see the miracles.
Well please pray for me, alot. So that my toe doesnt get in the way too much. So that I can work hard.
I love you all. Thanks for all the love and support.
Love,
Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder Olsen

20 jan 2010

2010-02-01T19:42:00.001-08:00

Wow, this week was really rough, I defentily am going through a trial of my faith. We had ALOT of people to baptize this week, and we werent able to baptize anybody. We made alot of mistakes, and did alot of things wrong personally, and so our baptism feel, we werent able to help the people that the Lord gave us. I was really sad on Sunday, it was probably one of the hardest days of my mission. We had two people to be baptized... they were at church and everything, but because the other Elder didnt pass them on the interview, they werent baptized. I was really sad, it was a really big lack of vision on the part of the Elder. One man left the interview crying he wanted to be baptized so bad, he was literally crying saying that he felt that Sunday was the day that he needed to be baptized... and still the Elder didnt understand.. i was really bummed, and it was probably the first moment in my mission I felt mad and angry... and I really didnt like it, it was really hard for me. The hardest part is that I live with this Elder... so i had to quickly overcome the Natural Man..
But this week we can all shout for joy because we are DEFINTELY going to baptize this week. I am really excited about my area, and I am praying that I will stay here another transfer... but it is all in the Lords hands. It is week 6!!
Well something that is really cool, is that I have an investagator her name is Denilda. She is a single mom and really awesome, and I really want her to be baptized, but she never really knew for sure that the church is true. So I fasted and prayed alot for her, and yesterday she told me that she had a dream, and God showed her that the church is true and that she needs to be baptized!! WOW!!! Heavenly Father is amazing, he seriously helps us so much her in the field!!
I am so grateful that I am here in Brasil, for the people that I am getting to know. i really hope that I stay here in Nova Vinhedo, or that I am transfered to the new branch Louveria that is going to open in 2 weeks. But whatever the Lord wants, I will do!!!
I love this work so much, I am so grateful for the gospel in my life.
Thanks for all the love and all the support, IT MAKES A DIFFERENCE!!
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!!
ELDER OLSEN

13 Jan 2010

2010-01-14T17:16:00.000-08:00

This week was awesome. I am really happy to be a missionary.

Well, this week should have been the best week ever, we had alot of people to be baptized, but, thanks to a big mistake by my comp, it didnt happen.
We had some interviews in our zone, that we had to do, and our zone is HUGE, so it is like 4 hours away by bus, well, my companion missed the bus, and so I ended up having to shut our area for 2 days to go there and do some interviews. It was really rough. We ended up having a great week, but without baptisms.. I am really happy that we had 12 investagators at church!! And 10 have a baptismal date. This week we are going to baptized ALOT of people. It is going to be a great week.

What is really awesome is that we have finally accomplished my goal of having to separte teaching groups!!! Every single day we go on spilts with members, and I go to one part of our area and my companion goes to another. What is going to be really awesome is that this week we have 3 baptisms, and my companion has never taught them! ha, it is going to be cool, on saturday my companion is going to "my area" and he is going to interview our baptisms. HOW COOL! haha, it is something that I always wanted to do, and this week it is going to happen. I have never worked harder in my life, I am defintely sure of that, I am exhusted every day, but at the same time I barely feel tired.

This work is amazing. I love be a zone leader too, I am really finding that the Lord blesses us with revelation when we need it. The coolest things happen to me in my study time in the morning. I will be studying and all the sudden I feel exactly what I need to do to help my area or zone, and I just stop and start writing.. And it is amazing, I am really starting to understand the mantleship of zone leader and of revelation.

This week we found alot of people that are needing the gospel, and most of them are going to be baptized!! This week we are going to need alot of prayers. This week we are going to baptize ALOT of people, so if everyone can please pray that Danilda, Ferrari, Lucas, Raul, Samoel, Simone, Carliane, David, Bruno, and Claricida can be baptized this week!! We are going to work our hardest to accomplish our goal of 10 baptisms!! Please pray for me and my companion, we need to be one in purpose and one in thoughts.
I love you all, thanks for the prayers, I know that they help, I really feel my familys prayers.

LOVE ELDER OLSEN!! VAMOS LÁ! OREM POR MIM!
SEMPRE FIRME!

6 jan 2010

2010-01-14T17:15:00.000-08:00

Wow, this week was really great, we are seeing the Lords hand in our work. I am really sad this week because we werent able to baptize anybody :(. I really feel like the Lord is testing my faith, I have never worked harder, or tried harder in something in my life, and yet I am still not able to baptized as many people as I want too here on the mission.
At least there is a lot of hope, and alot of miracles on the way!! We had 11 investagators at church, and most of them are progressing towards baptism.. The end of this month is going to be amazing. There is one man we are teaching named David, he is 20 years old, and really wants to be baptized, he asked me what he needs to do to be a missionary, I told him, be baptized. Ha, so he is already going to be baptized!! What a miracle!!!
I am really happy on the mission, I have set some EXTREMELY high goals for 2010!!! It is awesome to think that for one whole year I am so going to be a missionary, wow what a privillege!!!
I am going to work harder than I have ever worked before. I am ready to work really hard!!!
Thanks for all the prayers, it really makes a huge difference in my mission, I am positive that I have more people praying for me than any other missionary in the field(well me and Mikey) And I know that it really is the biggest difference in my mission, sometimes missionaries ask why I have such "luck" I just tell them that it is the blessings from my family. I love you alll... I love this work.
The greatest experences on my mission happened this week, when I taught the first lesson to 22 people!!!! 20 of the 22 accepted to be baptized in Januray.!! What a HUGE blessing this is!!! I have special permission from the Presdient to teach until 10 oclock at might because we are teaching so many people!!! Things are going awesome!! Please pray for the Santos family, in total there are more than 30 people in there family that live on the same street!!!One of them Danilda is going to be baptized this Sunday, we are hoping the rest will be in the next two and three weeks!!! Pray alot, we are going to need it!!!!
I love you all! Thanks for all the prayers and letters!!
Love ya

HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!!
ELDER OLSEN!!!!

30 Dec 2009

2009-12-30T23:00:00.000-08:00

Wow,
well i am a little bit embarrased to write, after the whole phone conversation i am a little bit worried about my english. It was by far the weridest thing that I have done in a long time was talk english. It was like really hard!!
But it was great to hear from everyone, it sounds like everyone is doing awesome! I cant believe how grown up everyone got, I thought sammy was andrew and andrew was adam. It was way weird.
Well this was by far one of the greatest weeks of my mission, it was extremely amazing to see the miracles of Christmas in my area! We found 32 new investagators, and 26 accepted to be baptized!!! Most likely not all of them are going to be baptized, but we planted ALOT of seeds this week, and we had 11 people in church on Sunday, so it was an amazing week for me. I am so thankful for all the blessings the Lord gives us when we are obedient.
That is way awesome that the Pradera family is in our ward. I actually knew a while ago that they were moving there. HAHA how weird right? Literally one the other side of the world, and they moved to Canberra Utah haha. SMALL WORLD!! He called here on Sunday at the members house where we were eating lunch and said do you live in the Lindon 17th ward??? haha what a small world. Tell them hello, and that they are going to miss the best month in the history of Nova Vinhedo!! We are teaching alot of amazing families right now. I have never seen anything like this before. I am so excited, but I know that it is a huge responsibility, I have alot of work to do!!!
Well I love you all, please pray for me!!! I am going to work hard this next month than I have ever worked in my LIFE!! We are going to go crazy!!!!
LOVE YA ALL!!!
HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!
ELDER OLSEN

23 Dec 2009

2009-12-25T02:19:00.001-08:00

Hello family!!! How is everything going? I hope that everyone is AMAZING!! Things in Brasil are HOT!! ha, it is really hot here right now, but I am loving it!
This week was really awesome, we are having alot of success in our area, and I know that the Lord will continue to bless us.
Yesterday, was one of the most spiritual days of my mission. We had a mission conference, and our President was on fire, he was really amazing, he talked about the price to pay to baptize. And how our mission needs to step it up.
I am really excited about our zone, we are going to have alot of success in January. I am using my birthday (the 3rd) as a way to motivate all the missionaries. They all were asking what I want, and I told them that I want every area to bapitze haha!! So everyone is going to work really hard this week and next to baptize alot of people. I have a huge goal to baptize alot of people on my birthday. we are working with alot of people to be baptized.
I am so grateful to be here in Brasil, it is amazing how many people are looking for the gospel.
This has by far been the greatest year of my entire life. Looking back it is incredible that it is already December. Time is flying by. I am So grateful to be a missionary. I am receiving alot of blessings in my life.
FELIZ NATAL!!!
The tradisions here are way way different, but christmas is going great here. We are working with alot of ideas to meet new people just this week, using the MUNDO FELIZ movie of the church and alot of hymns on buses and singing in hospitals. It is going awesome.
Love this work. Love this country.
Personal challenge for everyone at home...
Look for 2 ways on 24 and 25 to serve someone how Christ would serve if he was in our places.
Love you all!!!! Pray for me ALOT, I am really needing the prayers.

Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder OLSEN!!!!

16 Dec 2009

2009-12-16T14:03:00.000-08:00

Wow, this week was awesome. Things are really going awesome. It was really rough to send Elder Nunes home, but it was awesome all the things that I learned with him. He was a great example too me, of the blessings of the mission. I know that he was one of the best missionaries on the mission, and I really learned alot from him!
This week was really awesome for our zone and for me. 7 of our 8 areas had baptisms!! It was really awesome, to see all the missionaries see the blessings of working hard. The zone is great ready to explode! I know that here in a little bit, were are going to baptize alot of people!!!
Elder Silveira is awesome. He is really short. haha. I really have missed americans. haha. something that everyone jokes with me is that americans dont like me, that is why I dont work with them. I know have had 5 straight brasilian companions... so I am sorry that I am probably going to not know how to speak english anymore.
We had the great blessing of seeing Alcino baptized this week! It was a true miracle! He is a great man, and this week we are working with his wife and 4 children. It is awesome to see the dad of the family be baptized first, now all the family is going to follow..
It was quite the funny experience.. it took 5 times for him to be baptized!!! somebody in our ward named John, who is an older man, who had never baptized somebody before, baptized Alcino, but they are both bigger than dad, or in plainer words fat!! haha, so in the end I ended up having to get in the water too. wow, it is a funny story that I will tell you on christmas.
I am really excited to be here, in Brasil. It is really a country really blessed to hear the gospel. They are a people that accept so easily the gospel of Jesus Christ.
I love being on a mission, i am loving life.
I dont know how everything will work out with christmas mom, I will know next week.. but i think that you guys will have to call me.
Well I love you all, i am SOOOOO glad to be here in Brasil in CAMPINAS!!!
I love you all so much!! Pray for me,

Elder Olsen!!!!!

2 December 2009

2009-12-07T13:36:00.001-08:00

Wow,

everything is great here, I am loving the mission. The area is great. Elder Nunes and I are working really well together. I have proabaly never worked harder on my mission than right now, and I am defintely feeling the blessing of the Lord because of it.

This week was really awesome. We had one baptism. Murilo was baptized. It was a true miracle to see him get baptized. To see the miracles that the Lord prepared for us to find him. The craziest part about him, is how we meet him. We meet him, because he talked to us! We were walking, and he said to us, I wanna stop smoking!! haha, so we turned around and asked him how much he smoked and everything, and he was baptized yesterday. haha. Truly a miracle from the Lord.

This week I think I went through something that not very many missionaries go through on there mission...
I dont know if you remember Sister Fatima... she is a lady that I baptized her and her two daugthers.... Well last week Elder Garcia, my old companion, who is financal sec. now, he called me and said Elder... Fatima passed away today...
It looks like she had a heartattack or a stroke, and she died.. she was only 50 or something.. way young, and she left behind a daugther that is only 12... Well that same night I called President Castro Deus, and he told me that we could go to the funeral.
So Elder Garcia and I went to her funeral... It was really rough... To see her in a cofin is something that I never thought I would see on my mission... It was really good to see all the members from the ward there... and everything was crying ALOT. It was really hard.. I just couldnt believe that somebody that I baptized, I was at her funeral.
Well, after it was really good to see her two daughters, Gisele and Rita, they were less sad than the rest of the family. Rita is 12, and she was really sad, she couldnt even watch. It was really difficult. Gisele is 23. She was crying alot too, but she was lot better than everyone else. I cant help but think that she died for a purpose... so that her family can come into the church. She was a really popular lady, so her funeral was way packed. And there was only us and like 10 members.. so we made alot of contacts and were talking with alot of people... But it was really rough.. It is so great that we know the plan of happiness, that she entered into the church at the perfect time in her life!!! That she was baptized so that she could enter into paridise. Pray for her family everyone, they are needing alot of prayers.
I hope that all is well at home, and that everyone is trying to be like Jesus.

Love,
Hurrah for Israel!!!!
Elder Olsen!!!!

25 Nov 2009

2009-11-26T19:44:00.001-08:00

Wow, this week was really awesome. I am really loving my new area, and really loving being a missionary. I am learning alot being a zone leader, and at times it can be a little rough emotional, but it is alot of fun. Our zone is progressing really well, but we are having some problems with one of our areas... they are REALLY trunkie. So we are working on this.. Our zone is huge, it has 8 areas, so it is really big.
Well our baptism didnt go right, he backed out on the last minute, and wanted to wait 1 more week... so I have now been without a baptism for 4 weeks and I am DYING!!!! but this week it will all stop, we are going to baptize 4 people!
We had A LOT of miracles on Sunday, we have 14 investagators at church, and it was extremely spiritual, all the members LOVED it, they all had to do there part to make the investagators feel at home. So we were really blessed with that.
The Bishop of our ward is new, he only has 2 months being bishop here in the ward, and he really doesnt like our Mission President, so we had some rough patches with him, but after serving ALOT and work REALLY hard we finally won him over, he was WAY excited Sunday. We had 238 people in sacrament meeting. It was amazing, normally there is only 130... so the ward is going to spilt here in 2 weeks!!!
It is amazing how much we are blessed by the Lord. Elder Nunes and I are loving working together... it is a shame that he is going home at the end of the transfer, because I know that I will get a new companion.
We are trying to break the record in our zone and our mission for most baptisms in one week, so please pray for us ALOT!!!! We are really needed alot of prayers and alot of help here... I am loving serving a mission. It seems like everyday I learn something new about our Savior because of my mission. I am Totally dedicated to this work. It sounds like everyone at home is way good.... it is weird that tomorrow is thanksgiving... haha here in Brasil thanksgiving doesnt exisit... so tomorrow will be a normal day for me... weird.. haha. But oh well.
PRAY FOR ME!!
Love you all,
Sempre firme na fé!
Elder Olsen

18 November 2009

2009-11-18T09:41:00.001-08:00

Well I dont have much time today, we have a meeting today with all the Zone Leaders. Ha it was amazing. Our mission President is truly an inspired man of God. It is amazing the things that he recieves that are exactly what the mission needs to do to have more success.. That is one thing that I am so grateful to know, is that we have the right to recieve revalation in our own lives.. or in our areas, or our zones, or wards, or stakes... when God calls us to do something, he provides the way for it to be done!

This week was awesome! We are truly seeing the Lords hand in our worK! We are continuing working really hard to find 1 family everysingle day. And it is getting complicated in the good way... haha. our teaching group is HUGE!!! we had over 20 new investagators each week in the past 2 weeks.... so we are teaching ALOT of people. The hardest thing is that we are depending alot on the members.. we are going on spilts everyday.. I hardly ever see my companion... our goal this week is we have 2 baptisms... I am going to do the interview of one of them hahaha.. I am going to baptize somebody that I have never taught!! It is really awesome. We are really starting to see the Lords hand in our work.... The thing we are realizing is how much we depend on the Lord in this work... If we arent worthly to recieve his help, we are going to baptize NOBODY... if we have the Lords help, and we are worthly to recieve it... EVERYONE can be baptized.. WOW, haha I am really excited to be a missionary.

Well I must say that being a Zone Leader has its perks... I have a washing machine. haha. every zone leader has a washing machine, because on pdays we have a meeting with President, so they gave all the Zone leaders washing machines, it is really nice. But, at the same time, it has a lot more responsibilities.. yesterday we had to go to a district meeting.. and our zone is huge.. not geographically, but because of the way the buses work here, we spent 6 hours on the bus yesterday, 2 hours in a meeting, and we didnt have time to do anything in our area.. so being a zone leader also has some sacrifices..
Elder Nunes and I are getting along great. He is a huge example to me. and I am learning alot with him. I am really thankful for the opportunity that I have to work with him...

11 November 2009

2009-11-11T10:52:00.000-08:00

I hope that all is going amazing for yall. Things here are amazing!!!
I am loving my new area, my new companion and my new calling, I LOVE
THIS WORK.

This week was extremely eventful, and we are working like crazy! Elder
Nunes and I are trying to work at every single moment with all we
have! We made a plan of action with the Lord, and we are really trying
our hardest to find the people that we know the Lord has already
prepared for us. We found a alot of new families this week, and it was
awesome to see the gospel in their lives. We have made a plan with the
Lord, that if we work our hardest that every single day we will find
at least 1 family that is ready to hear the gospel and be baptized!!
It was a really awesome goal, and for the first 3 days the Lord has
fulfilled his part, we found 3 new families, 9 people in total that
were already to hear the gospel when we found them, and were so ready
to hear the gospel and accept baptism. In the last 2 days we have
marked 9 baptisms!! I know that as we contintue to do our part the
Lord will too!

Well on Sunday was my first day in the ward, and the Bishop asked me
to speak.. I gave a talk on sacrifice and service. And it was really
good, I think that the members really like it.
This ward is amazing. It is basically like we have 2 teaching
groups... because every single night we have spilts with the members.
Ha, it is awesome. So we have the goal that I will interview Elder
Nunes's baptisms and he will interview my baptisms. Haha we have alot
of investagators that I dont even know, because Elder Nunes teaches
them every day, and I will interview. IT IS AMAZING!

So when I was transfered I went from a really poor area, to the
RICHEST area on the mission.... every body here is WAY rich. haha. It
was funny on Sunday in my talk, I said that I am from a city that
probably nobody knows Lindon, after the sacrament meeting like 4
people came upo too me.. "Lindon, what are you talking about???
everybody know lindon... next to orem, af, alpine..." haha. We have 3
ex mission presidents in our ward, and like everybody speaks english.
Alot of the members have already been to the US, and studyed at BYU,
or go skiing every winter in PC. So it is a home away from home....
The parking lot of the church on sunday was loaded with alot of nice
cars, that you would never see in Brasil on the streets everyday. So
it is a really blessed ward. I am excited to be working here. Elder
Nunes is awesome. I am learning alot from him.. He was AP for 10
months, and almost his whole mission he has been a leader... this is
his last transfer.... so he will be going home soon.. But he still
works hard than any other missionary.
Thanks for all that you do for me, and love you all so much!! I am so
grateful for all the blessings that I am seeing in my life because of
the mission... I am loving life!!!
Pray for me!!!
Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder Olsen

4 Nov 2009

2009-11-04T08:43:00.000-08:00

Well this week was really exciting for me, and ALOT happened.
On thursday Elder Jensen came to our mission. We had a 3 hour meeting with him, and it was way awesome! I really learned alot about things that I need to change in my life and my mission. It was really awesome to see that he is just really calm and talks really slow and always thinks about what he will say before he says it.
This weekend was really busy for me, I had alot of interviews in my district and so I did alot of traveling.
Well Sunday I had a great present!!!!! On sunday Elisangela and Andreia.. two people that I baptized, were called to the presidency of the relief society!!!! WOW!! It was way cool. Elisangela 1st con. and Andreia 2nd. It was a huge going away present for me. I am so thankful that I got to stay in my first area for 8 months. Because I got to see the change that happens after baptism too! It was really cool.
Well too no surprise I was transfered...
I left Anhanguera. And I was called to Novo Vinheado. It is a great area.. I was called to be Zone Leader with Elder Nunes!!
Elder Nunes is brasilian from Sao Paulo city. He is an amazing missionary. I am going to learn ALOT from him. he was AP on the mission for 10 months, and he is probably the best missionary on the mission. Our President loves him, and he is defintely going to be a great companion for me.

I am really excited about this transfer! Our mission has the goal to break the record for baptisms in 1 month! So we are going to work really hard!

I hope that everything at home is going great! Halloween here is way lame! Nobody dresses up or anything, they dont even celebrate the holiday, I talked to alot of kids on the street and nobody even knows what halloween is.. So that was a little bit different.
Things are going great mom, I am not needing anything, everything is fine, I still havent bought new shoes, the only real place where there are shoes that are good is in Campinas city.. but I dont go there alot, so I am going to wait until I go there next until i buy new shoes.
I had a ingrown toenail which was pretty ugly, but I bought some pillers and ripped off my toe nail. haha, I made a video, it was pretty awesome. Well I love you all, and I hope that everyone is doing great.
Please pray for me ALOT!!!
Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen.

28 Oct 2009

2009-11-04T08:41:00.000-08:00

Wow, this week was really great! We are really seeing alot of miracles here in the area! It is week 6, and well, I am starting to get really nervous that I might be transfered. After 7 and a half months, i think that I might be ready for a change.
Elder Aragao my son, is doing really great. He is starting to get into the hang of missionary work, and is starting to really like it. There are alot of teaching moments that I find with him, and alot of opportunties to learn.
He really doesnt talk that much about home with me, but I can tell he really misses his family. I found out that his mom isnt a member of the church, nor his dad. So that defintely must be really challenging. He has an older brother, that is going to start his mission at the end of this year too, so that is cool.
We are working with ALOT of people right now in our area. Our teaching pool is huge!! We have a ton of people that we are teaching and alot of them are progressing really well. We are meeting alot of special people this week, and I am nervous that I wont get to see alot of them get baptized because of the transfers. I am trying not to think about the transfers, because I dont want Elder Aragao to think that we dont need to work this last week. I told this that we are not allowed to talk about the transfers until Sunday night after planning.. haha, so we dont talk about the transfers. Tomorrow we have a huge blessing here in the mission, Elder Jensen of the seventy is coming to our mission!!!! It is going to be amazing! I am hoping that it is a full day event, but they aps arent really saying too much about it. Training has been a huge new experence for me, I really did like it, but I am not sure if I want to do it again. I know that I want to continue working my hardest and putting my trust in the Lord.
This week we are going to help Isabel and her daughters be baptized! It is going to be awesome! We have 3 baptisms this week, and they are people really special, the Lord is blessing this area so much! In 3 weeks the ward is going to move to a new location, where is it going to be amazing!!!! It is a new warehouse, but it is huge!! It is going to be about twice the size of the warehouse we use right now. There were 93 people at sacrament meeting this past week!! The ward only need 7 more people to recieve a new chapel!!! It will be amazing here in the area when they have a chapel, the work will explode!!! When I started here 7 months ago only the ward only had 60 people that were active, they ward was lost. It is so amazing to see the ward so happy and ready to recieve the blessings from the Lord. This past Sunday we had a ward council meeting, The Bishop asked me to give a talk about the importance of missionary work and establishing a ward missionary plan. After about an half hour talk, we all talked about the strengths and weakness of the ward, and the ward decided to set some really amazing goals for the ward! The goal is at the next stake conference, recieve a chapel!! So the missionary have to baptize at least 4 people every month, and re active 2 families!!! It will be AWESOME!! The work here is going awesome! I love Anhanguera, this ward defintely is my family!
Please continue to pray for me and my companion, that this week we can finish our transfer strong and be blessed from the Lord!
Hurrah for Israel!!
Elder Olsen

17 Oct 2009

2009-10-20T07:11:00.000-07:00

This week was a great week! I am loving being a missioanry! This week we had a baptism! Marcela was baptized! It was really awesome. After 20 years her Mom returned to the church, after ALOT of work, and now her daugther was baptized! It was a really special baptism for me. We also saw the greatest of the work unfolding before our eyes! We found 3 new families amazing!!! Peterson and his family are amazing, Maria and her children, and Simone, and her family. They will all go to the temple to see it, and make a visit there. It is going to be really special. I am so excited! My "son" Elder Aragão is doing awesome. He is finally getting in the hang of the mission, the rules and hours. It is awesome to see the progess that he is making. He is really excited about the work here! Well I have alot of stories that are really awesome that are happening in our area, but I dont have alot of time. Just know that things are amazing, and that Heavenly Father is pouring his blessing over our area. I am so excited to be a missioanry! Thanks for all the love and prayers, I know that it is the biggest difference in my area. So continue praying for me and my area, that we can continue to find the people who are praying for the blessings of the gospel. I hope that all is well in the USA. Here is Brasil, it is going great! Love you all.
Elder Olsen

5 Oct 2009

2009-10-07T20:27:00.001-07:00

Hello Family,
Wow this week was really awesome! It is really fun to be a trainer! Things are really alot harder when you are training... Things are alot more emotional.. I am trying to be really a good trainer.. but sometimes I dont know what to do. We were practicing some lessons in our study one day, and I was just telling him what he can do better, and he just starting crying, and asked for some alone time.. It went over really smoothly.. After we talked and I just have to be more patiente with him. I just forgot that there is the physical and mental side to mission work.. Elder Aragão is a really good missionary.. he will defintely be a great leader on the mission. He just needs to overcome he shyness... It was really funnny. I told him that we have a rule that everytime we are on the bus, he has to talk in the front of the bus.. The first time, I will not lie it was funny.. he was sweating nervous, and couldnt talk really well, now, he is alot better, he talks. and he is willing to try and talk to everyone in the streets with me. He is defintely not going to stay shy with me. I am making all these really funny goals with him, that are way hard to do, things that he has to do every single day to overcome his shyness. He has to invite at least 3 people on the street to be baptized. talk with at least 12 people everyday. Shoot for joy at least a few times on the street. and we are doing things really funny. He is starting to really like it. At first he didnt like me very much.. he is alot more calm then me, and more shy.. but he is coming out of his shell, and he will be a great missionary. Mikey and Steve I must say that training is like the best thing on the mission. I basically can set the standard of this missionary for his whole mission. So it is way important that we baptize ALOT of people this transfer, to really help him set a high goal on his mission. Well we had one baptism this week, Arthur was baptized. It was really awesome to see him really happy. We have now baptized everyone in his family.. We are now starting to work with his uncles and neighbors. The great thing about the gospel is that everyone sees the difference, so the people always ask, what do they have that I dont.. after they ask this, the work is easy. We have really decicded to work on the families that we already have, and using the people that they know, families, friends, neighbors, and to really help everyone that we baptize have the chance to share the gospel. Milton and his family, gave us some awesome referals, of some uncles and aunts that live on the same street. They loved our message. and loved the church. We are going to baptize 4 of them this week. We are going to just start baptizing one street at a time. haha. Just kidding, well at least we are going to try too. The best moment in missionary work, is when you can leave one appointment in one house. walk next door and teach the next, then the next.. it is really awesome. We are really stressing referals of all our recent converts, and using their familes, friends etc. I am loving it here in Anhanguera. Everyone in the ward was really happy that I stayed one more transfer. I will have 7 and a half months in the same area.. it is crazy. It is crazy to think that I still havent left my first area. I have 8 months on my mission and I am in my first area haha. It is amazing. I love the mission. I am the happiest person in the world, I love this work, Christ leads and helps us when we need it or not, he is always there. Thanks for all the Love and Support. LOVE YOU ALL!!!
Elder Tyler James Olsen.
Hurrah for Israel!!

Elder Olsen E mail 7 Oct 2009

2009-10-07T20:21:00.001-07:00

Family,
Wow, this week was really interesting for me and my companion! I am loving traning but it is defintely alot harder than I thought it was going to be. I am seriously having a great time in Anhanguera. It has been 7 months that I am in the same area, ALOT of time. Conference was really amazing, for what I got to watch, I am learning to be a leader is alot more hard than I thought it would be. I have 8 different people, that any problem that they have, they call me. Wow, it is really hard. Saturday, we were watching conference when the sisters in my district told me, that I need to run to a house with them and interview somebody who would be baptized the next day. So I didnt get to watch conference on Saturday, and the worst part is that the person wasnt even baptized; so it was a little disappointing. And the same thing happened on Sunday, on the afternoon session, I had an interview during it, so I didnt get to watch Elder Hollands talk. But everyone told me it was amazing. I really loved conference, it was great to be spiritually uplifted. Well, conference works alot different here than in Utah. They only have one chapel that you can watch conference, and they ward doesnt rent a bus or anything to take people to the other chapel... so it was extremely hard to plan how our investagators would go to conference, we only have 5 people watch conference with us. It was an opportunity so golden to here the prophet for our investagators, but, sometimes, things dont work out how you want them too. We were unable to baptize Marcela... her Mom Dalva, who was already baptized got really nervous about her baptism, so she wouldnt let her. It was extremely sad, because Sister Dalva is awesome!! She just nervous at the last second to let her be baptized. Milton and his family werent able to go to conference, so they cousins werent able to be baptized too! It was really hard... They live about an hour away from the other chapel we had to go to, and in our entire ward we only had about 15 people watch conference, it was extremely sad. But the work will go on. We are going to mark all the baptisms again for this week, and work with everyone to go to church, and have an amazing week!!! Training is extremly hard!! It is such a difference for him and me, he never lived with an American, so we are completely different, but at the same time really similiar. He wants to be a judge when he grows up, so he is really like me, he wants alot of control, and he thinks he know ALOT about missionary work. We are both working on being more humble and work harder to help each other out. I love being a missionary. It is amazing, nothing could ever be better when you see someone for the first time pray, read the book of mormon, or recieve a testimony about Joseph Smith, these are the moments that help me want to be better, strong, more spiritual and to work harder. I love this work. I love all that happens everyday. I love being a member of the only true church on the face of the earth. Thanks for all the love and prayers. Everyone please pray for Marcela, Dalva, Luana, Maria, Milton, Davi, and Alexzandro. I love you all!!!
Hurrah for Israel!!!
Elder Olsen

23 Sept 2009

2009-09-23T10:19:00.000-07:00

Wow this week has been amazing!! Saturady we saw the miracles of wallace and Paula be baptized!! It was extremely spiritual and an amazing addition to the family. I am really excited for her. She has gone through some tuff times in her life... but now she is finally happy and loving life. I have been teaching her for 6 months, so it was a great reward and espiritual experenence to see her baptized with her children. She has two more kids that need to be baptized, but they live with the dad, so we are going to work with her to be able to help them move in with her... she is the investagator that I talked about on mothers day that was straving to death.. and so we helped her out that one day with food and clothes for her kids.. and now she is working full time and is having an amazing blessings from the Lord. It was week 6 of the transfer and after 6 months I thought for sure that I would be transfered.. I was really nervous monday night.. But Elder de Araujo was transfered, I will stay for at least 6 more weeks!! I am way excited. I love my area and ward, and I am really excited to stay here and work hard. I was also called to TRAIN!! I have my first kid here on the mission. HIs name is Elder Aragão which is way awesome name. He is REALLY smart. Well I am not sure if he is really shy, but he is defintely shy... so as we were catching the bus with all the things he had, 2 suitcases and everything. I asked him, do you have a testimony about mssionary work.. haha he said YES.. so I called everyones atention on the bus and that Elder Aragão was new and had an amazing message for him.. haha it was awesome.. I am defintely going to work REALLY hard, hey its his first area, he needs to become an amazing missionary.
Things are going amazing with the work... we have 2 more baptisms this week, and we are really trying our hardest to find somebody EVERY SINGLE WEEK. Something that I have been thinking alot about it that to baptize every week I only have to find for the least 1 person every week that wants to be baptized.. Well if I talk with 100 people, probably 1 or so will be baptized.. well I thought if I talked with 200 and my compaion too. that is 400 people and that is 4 baptisms every week. Well, I am pretty sure it is that simple. I am really not sure, one thing that I learned with Steven is just work!!! Dont think about anything else, just work and work, and Heavenly Father will do the rest. I am really excited. Well I have to run my kid has lots of things to do. I am really excited to be here in Brasil. I love it here. Things are amazing. I am so grateful for all the blessings that we recieve when we work our hardest and do our part.
D&C 100: 8-9; it is amazing.
Love YA ALL!!!!
Elder Tyler Olsen!!!
Hurrah for Israel!!!!

16 Sept 2009

2009-09-16T12:32:00.000-07:00

16 Sept 2009

2009-09-16T12:31:00.000-07:00

Wow family,
this week was amazing. I am loving my life here in Brasil!!! This week we saw alot of miracles, and we are really excited for this next week!! Well sunday was amazing!! Milton and 2 of his daughters were baptized!! It was an amazing spirit. Almost all the ward stayed for the baptism and was really happy with our work. It was a little funny, because the Mom Ceclia was baptized 16 years ago, and now she is so happy that her family and daugthers are now members of the true Church of Christ. It was a little sad at the same time, Luana, the oldest daughter, who is 14, when the bishop announced that after the meetings we would have baptisms, she got really nervous and started crying, and started saying that she wasnt going to be baptized. AH!! it was so annoying, I was trying to talk to her with my companion about the importance of being baptized with her family, and accepting the sacrifice of Christ, but all the members were saying, oh if you dont wanna be baptized just wait... tal tal tal, ah, so the members did not help. So Milton and Ceclia were a little bit sad because Luana wasnt baptized with her family... It was a little funny, i mean, it really was, because i just pictured Janessa or Amanda crying not listening to their parents and not wanted to leave the bathroom.. So only the 3 were baptized, but it really was a great story.. all the members of the ward are really happy with the work of the Lord in the area... we are really seeing miracles every single day. I am so happy to be here in Anhanguera.. I am a little nervous, it is week 6.. and i have been here for 6 months... so I am really praying to stay here in the area. I LOVE IT! I know it is my first area, but still i wanna stay here!! I love it here so much. All the members are going to pray that I stay here haha. I am like a child to all the members. They all love me, and it would be extremely hard for me to leave the area.. But it is in the hands of the Lord. We are working with alot of people right now that are ready to be baptized in the next couple of weeks. They are all really special people, and we are finding the best ways to help people accept the gospel in their lives. The members are trusting us with their friends, realitives, and neighbors. We are really starting a boom here. When I started here, the average sacrament meeting was about 55 or 60 people. They past two weeks we have had 94, and 98. WOW!!! The work of the Lord is real!!! we have seen so many miracles and so many people move their lives. In two weeks the ward will move to the new warehouse which is bigger, and move spacious, with a soccer field in the front. The members are excited and really helping us. For example, yesterday we had 4 lessons with members present, and tomorrow we have 5 different members that are going to go on spilts with us. During the week we have members calling us "Elder,how are your numbers.. how are your baptisms, investagators." It is awesome. So everyone please pray I can stay here in Anhanguera! Please pray that I can prepare for all the things we have to do! We have 4 more baptisms this week!! The work is amazing. I love it!! I have never been happier, never been more excited and motivated!! I love you all, thanks for all the support, love and prayers. This work cant be stop! It is like a rock rolling down a mountain!!
Elder Olsen

9 Sept 2009

2009-09-09T10:41:00.000-07:00

Hello Family!!!
Wow, the church is true! I am so happy it is amazing. This week was amazing. We are seeing so so many miracles here. Some times I wanna ask why I am so blessed to see so many miracles, but I really dont have time to stop and think about it. Sunday, we saw Maria recieved the gift of the Holy Ghost and be confirmed. And we also saw Rita be baptized! It was really a miracle. She is really excited and happy, after alot of years of searching she found the true church. It was really amazing to see the miracle of Rita's baptism. It was really sad that Erismar wasnt baptized with his mom. After alot of searching we couldnt find a river that would be a good river to baptize somebody, so our Mission President told me that if they have a testimony they will be baptized. Well Rita has a testimony, and Erismar still needs a little bit more time. We are working with him and trying to establish goals so that he can be baptized before the end of the transfer. We also saw the miracles of Ceclia and her family! Ceclia was already batpized along time ago, and now she is wanting to come back to the church after alot of years. She has three daugthers, 11, 13,and 14. Yohana, Jeovana, and Luana and her husband Milton. Dad, you would LOVE Milton. He is exactly like Dad, he is a owner of a contruction business, he is a little bit bigger(ya know.. fat.) and he is extremely spiritual. During the first vision, he was crying like a baby, It was extremely spiritual, defintely the most spiritual first lesson I have had on my mission. They all are going to be baptized this next Sunday. They all were at church and loved it. They wanted to be baptized with Rita at the same time, ha but I told them that they need a little bit more time to prepare, so they asked how fast they could be baptized, I told them the next sunday. So they are already going to be baptized, but they are extremely prepared. They all read the book of mormon everyday, and this Saturday we are going to the temple with them and their family. They have an interesting story, and they are defintely a miracle of my mission. I dont have any doubts that in 1 year I will enter the temple with them.. It was extremely a blessing to meet this family. We are seeing alot of miracles right now, and alot of people interested in our message. We had 12 investagators at church. And 8 of them have a baptism marked for this month. We are truely being blessed with alot of miracles. Me and my companion are working on staying humble... Because we are both young on the mission, he only has 3 months, and this is only 7 for me, and my first transfer as senior, so we are working on being humble. I hope that we can continue being humble and working hard. Sounds like everything at home is going amazing, I wanna see photos of the basement! Keep me in your prayers, and keep up the faith!!!
Love,
Elder Olsen(Tyler)

Tylers Mission Pic

2009-09-08T23:56:00.002-07:00

5 Aug 2009

2009-09-08T23:56:00.001-07:00

Wow,
This last week was amazing! I am so excited!! This week we have 5 baptisms I am way Excited!! Jasmine, Arthur, Fatima, Gisele, and Rita, 2 different families I am way excited. Well Jasmine and Arthur are the kids of Hilda, and they are going to be baptized on Saturday, they are way excited, and everyone in the family is loving the church, the visits from the elderes and the Bishop, the only sad part of the story is that the Dad, Amilka, he ran away or something. We thought that things were finally starting to change, he didnt drink for 4 days, he worked for 4 days, and then just one day we recieved money from his work, and he just left. Without a doubt he is just way drunk in some bar in the middle of no where. We are trying to help Hilda realize that she and her family are better off without him, Edimilson their son that is 18, found work and is working to help the family. So they are working on moving on without Amilka.
Fatima, Gisele, and Rita are a family that is amazing!! They were difentely prepared before this life to be members of the church. 4 weeks ago we talked to them on the street, we marked a appointment to pass by their house, and now they will be baptized. It was like the easiest baptism in the world. They have no problems, no difficulities, the only thing was coffee, which they stopped after one day. They walked to church on their own without anyone, it is quite amazing. They serious are amazing. Fatima is the mom, and she is awesome. She has 2 other kids, but one lives in a different city, and the other is 19 and he is rebelling against his mom right now. So he isnt really interested. I hope that after he sees the difference the church has in their lives he will want to change too. Elder Garcia and I are way excited to work really hard this week. Without a doubt one of us will be transfered next week. (It is week 6 of the transfers ALREADY) I cant believe how fast time flies by, it is amazing. Yesterday was my 6 month anniversity here on the mission. Missionaries are way weird, so they have(had) this tradition where you burn a tie on 6 months, one year a shirt, and 1 1/2 pants. So I thought that was way stupid so I didnt do it. Elder Ficklin(an Elder that started with me.) was way disappointed that I didnt do it, but it sounded way lame too me. The mission is amazing!! I am way excited to work here in Brasil, it is defintely the 2nd best country in the world. I love this work, and love that everyone here loves Jesus Christ. Brasil has by far the most churches in the world. There are 10 on every street. Just one the street where our chapel is there is J.W, Quadrangular, Assembleia de Deus, Deus é Amor, Congregação, Igreja da Graça, Nasarath é Belem. So, it is quite funny. Everyone we talk to has a different opinion. But it is great. It is a great starting point for the church. I have only meet 1 person that didnt believe in God, so I think it is really awesome here. I am way excited for the ward here, they are starting to get really excited about missionary work. in my 3 transfers here I am been really blessed to help the ward here alot, this weekend with be 17 baptisms here in 4 and a half months. So the ward is really starting to love missionary work. This ward the first 4 months of this year baptized 2 people. There was some major slacker missionaries here, so the trust of the members was lost, but now finally the members love the missionaries again. Every single day we have the brothers of the ward wanting to go on spilts with us. It is awesome. I am way excited for the work here. Pray that I will stay here. I really wanna stay here in Anhanguera. I love it here. Well I have to run, Love you all!! Thanks for all the prayers, and support.
Matthew 16:24-26
Elder Olsen

26 Aug 2009

2009-09-08T23:47:00.001-07:00

This week has been amazing! I am so excited to be a missionary! I am loving my area, Anhanguera is amazing. This week we had stake conference, and they annoucned that our chapel will be moved.. This next month we will recieve a new warehouse that is like twice as big and has a parking lot and everything! So we are way excited, because it is on the main road of the city, so we will be able to do alot of work there, I am so excited. We had an awesome stake conference, and we had all 6 investagators that will be baptized this week there. Erismar, Rita, Agnaldo, Maria, Arthur and Bia are way excited for baptism this week. We had some rough patchs this past week with Maria, so we moved her baptism to this week, but she is really excited, and she choose the bishop to baptize her, so it will be really awesome. Well last night I went to teach Erismar and Rita and Agnaldo, and they were being really weird about their baptisms this week, so we asked if everything was ok, and turns out, that Erismar has this dream where he wants to be baptized in a river, like Christ was... So last night we made some phone calls, and this week we are going to go to a river, and baptize Erismar, Agnaldo, Rita, and probably Arthur and Bia at the same time. Haha, so that will be really awesome. Everyone please pray for us, for 2 things, that we can find a river, haha. and 2 that we will be able to do everything that we need too, to have a great baptism in the front of the river. Erismar, Agnaldo want me to baptize them, so I will baptize in a river! ha, I am way excited. We have a ton of work to do!! No one knows where a river is, or anything, but he said he wont be baptized without a river, so we are going to find a river. I dont know how, but we will find one! Things here are great, my companion Elder de Araújo, he is a really good missionary. He is really excited, and he wants to baptize alot like me!!! So we are going to get along great! I love this area, I know almost everything about it, after 5 months, I know everything, It is great, I hope that I can stay one more after this too, because I love it here. I am so grateful for the example I have in my life, Mikey and Steven really work hard, so I am trying my hardest to learn from their examples and be a GREAT missionary. Mikey sent me a letter in the mail... well he sent it a long time ago, but I got his letter this week and I am defintely motivated to work extremely hard. I am going to start running and trying my hardest to be the BEST missionary on the mission. We are really loving this work, and it is going great. I love this work, I love this country and I love this church! I am so thankful for all the blessings we have in our lives, and the opportunity we have to be members of the only true church on the earth! I know that everything is possible with the help of the Lord... Something that I have learned on the mission, is that if we want miracles, we need to ASK. Sometimes we just sit there waiting for the miracles to come our way, but if we want miracles, we need to ask for miracles, and he will give them. I dont have any doubts that miracles exisit in our days, i see them every single day! Justin, I hope that boot camp wasnt too hard, and I hope that you didnt kill anybody yet. I hope you know how to work a gun know, and at least dismantle it in 15.43223 seconds. Justin, write me an email about the marines.... I am really interested in joining...
Elder Olsen, thanks for all the advice you give me. Keep tearing up NYC!! I know that all NYC we change their lives because of you! Kids, I hope that all your studies are going great!!!
Mom, thanks for all that you do for me. I love you so much.
Dad, thanks for your letter. I got a letter from you, your words really are insipriring.
I love you all, keep praying for me.. Pray that we can find a river, and that we can make everything go smoothly..
Prover. 3:5-6

Elder Olsen
BRASIL!!

12 Aug 2009

2009-08-23T11:02:00.000-07:00

Wow, this week was a week of miracles!! I am so excited! I will start at the beginning. This past week we had 4 baptisms! Fatima, Gisele, Rita, and Jasmine were all baptized! It was an amazingly spiritual! With the help of our members, we had something called "Minha oferta á Cristo" It is were you need to fulfill all the goals of the mission, it was awesome. We had an extremely succesful week! Arthur wasnt baptized, because he is only 8, and his mom is a member, so the bishop needs to do the interview, so we had plans with the bishop for him to be baptized on Saturday with Jasmine his sister, the only problem is Bishop wasnt there, he said that he forgot... So Arthur didnt want to be baptized Sunday either because he didnt want to be baptized alone.. So it was a little frustrating on our part. But we will see what happens with him. I hope that he will be baptized soon! Fatima, Gisele, and Rita were all baptized Sunday after church, and it was really amazing. All the members really love them, they are extremely elect!! They seriously love everything about the church and dont have any difficulities, or problems. Alot of members of the ward stayed and watched the baptism. So, I baptized first, and then Elder Garcia baptized Gisele, so as he was baptizing Gisele, he forget to spread his feet wide, so he slipped, and feel in the water too! So really he was baptized too!! After and he slipped his foot hit the ladder!! It was extremely funny, everyone was laughing really hard. So as he climbed out of the water, he looked at his foot, and he cut in on the ladder, and it was deep. So we had to go to the doctor and he got 3 stitches! It was extremely funny!!! So our week was really amazing. And Monday was worthless, because he said that he couldnt walk... I love Elder Garcia, but I must say that I am so glad that I am an Olsen, but people just dont know the meaning of pain.. He was crying Sunday night, and Monday he said he couldnt walk or work because of hit foot... it was only 3 stitches.. I tried explaining how much pain I have already seen my brothers, dad, uncles, myself and every Olsen deal with.. but he wouldnt hear it. So... Monday was the first day on my mission I didnt work. And wow it was terrible. I just read the scriputures; finally at like 4 I convinced him to at least walk a little, so he walked to an apartment were so members live and visited them.. but he wouldnt use a shoe, he kept his sandel on while we walked in the street, and he was walking with a gimpe like he broke his leg.. It was extremely embarrassing. I am so glad that I am an Olsen. Monday night we found out who was transfered and.. I stayed here! I will now stay here in Anhanguera for 6 months like Mikey just did in his area! I am way excited. I recieved a new companion, and I was called to be senior companion. I recieved Elder Araújo, this is his 2nd transfer, and he is way excited! So I am really excited to stay here and work another 6 weeks! I cant wait to get to work and stay here. It was funny yesterday 3 members called because they wanted to know if I stayed or not. So it is really awesome, everyone here in like family, and I am way excited to be here still. I am nervous about the teaching, because with Elder Garcia we both knew the lessons so well it was easy to bounce back and forth. I know that Elder Araújo wants to work really hard, so I will defintely help him and learn alot of portguês with him! I am excited to work here still! Mikey that is crazy that you are living in the same pad as 50 cent haha!!! I cant believe it! When you talk to ELder Carcasdi next say "ai cara, beleza" he will laugh alot! I cant believe he is in your zone that is way funny, I talked to his dad in the CTM, and he was a powerful man, so I am sure that his son is an exelent missionary too! Well everyone pray for me!! I really want to be the best senior companion i can be. I pray for you all every single day!!
Hurrah for Israel!
ELder Olsen #3
Falou!

19 Aug 2009

2009-08-23T11:01:00.000-07:00

Dear Family,
Well things here are amazing! I am loving it here in Anhanguera! I am really excited that I will stay here one more transfer! Things with Elder de Araújo are great! He is a good missionary. This is only his 2nd transfer, and I think that he trainer was a bit of a lazy missionary because he study ethic is pretty bad, but he is really ready to work hard and learn things. Being senior is a lot different then junior. Well with Elder Garcia we both have the same amount of time on the mission, so we worked really well together.. Well we tried to work our hardest. With Elder araujo it is so different. If something in the lesson isnt going right, or they have a question, he just looks to me.. So it is a responsibility alot bigger. I cant believe how fast time flies. Every single day goes by so fast! This month we have some amazing goals in the area here. We have alot of people that we are working with to be baptized this month! This Saturday Maria will be baptized. Next week we have alot of people to baptized too! So we are really excited here in Anhanguera.
Yesterday I had the opportunity to listen to Elder Ellis, he is an area 70 here in Brasil. He is from Burley, Idaho. He is really awesome. We have a meeting with him for like 4 hours yesterday and it was awesome.
Well this last week we had alot of success meeting new people. We meet a new family of 15 people!!! Wow, it was amazing. Ha, it was funny we were walking and it was pretty late and our appointed wasnt home, so we made some contacts and knocked doors, we knocked on one door and it was a lady, and she has 5 brothers, they all are married, her mom, and grandpa.. it was never ending of people. It was my first lesson with Elder araujo, and we had never had the opportunity to practice yet, so it wasnt really organized how I would have liked. but It was really good at the end the spirit was really strong. So wow, if we can help this family be baptized.. 15 baptisms.
Something really strange happened here. We meet this old couple and we were teaching them with Elder Garcia, well I went back there with Elder araujo and well the man Flavio past away.. it was a shock.. The wife is really sad, and doesnt even wanna talk to us right now. I just hope we can help her understand the plan of happiness.
I am so happy. I cant believe that I am a missionary. Sometimes it hits me harder than others. When I have the opportunity to look someone in the eyes, and invite them to be baptized. It is a feeling of peace that I have never had. When you can look someone in the eyes and say to them. I know this is the only true church on the face of the earth. It is a statement really bold, and the spirit is testifying with us missionaries, and we know that we are right. It is something amazing. 7 billion people on this planet and only 13 million are members of the only true church.. WOW!! We need alot of missionaries!! I love this work, and I love you all!
Keep me in your prayers!
Elder Olsen

29 July 2009

2009-07-29T10:52:00.001-07:00

Wow, what a great thing it is to be a missionary! I love it here in Anhanguera, Campinas. Things here are really cold!! This past week was a record week for rain here in the city. EVER! It literally rained all day friday, saturday, and sunday. All day. It never stopped. It was crazy. Luckily for me a brought SO many sweathers and umberellas. (I really didnt bring a single one.) So I have been soaked head to toe for 4 days!! I love it. The work really goes better in the rain, people dont have anywhere to go, they just stay in the house the whole weekend. So this weekend we meet alot of new investagators here!! The only problem was that it was almost impossible to convince people it was worth it to walk to church in the rain.. So we only had 3 investagators in church on sunday. But it was good compared to the ward, there was only have 50 people in the ward in total.. But on Sunday something amazing happened here!! The Bishop announced that the Stake President sent in the papers for the ward to start building a chapel here!! Everyone is way excited, we really hope that Salt Lake approves it. Hey Mom, tuesday I recieved some letters that were really old, from uncle Dan, Mandy, and you.. it is because you guys sent them to the MTC in Sao Paulo!!!! So it is taking for ever for your letters to get here, I got a letter like a month and a half old haha. So you need to send them to Campinas, it is really funnny actually, but yeah my address is
R. 10 de Setembro, 38
Cambuí 13023-100
Campinas-SP
Brasil
You should defintely send them to this address, or else it will take forever for me to recieve letters. So the maple you sent me is amazing mom thank you!! I am loving it, and making french toast every day now, Elder Garcia loves it. It is pretty awesome.
So Hilda, and her kids are doing great. Elder Garcia went there yesterday to talk about baptism with them for this saturday.. well, the kids really want to.. but Hilda was being really shy and hiding something, so Elder Garcia used some great questions, and found out that about 2 months ago Hilda recieved some help from a local church with food and stuff too. Well one of the conditions for the help was that her kids needed to be baptized in the church. The church actually made Hilda give all her money she had to "pay for the salvation of her kids" So she feels obligated for her kids to baptize in that church, because she and her family didnt have any food, and that chruch helped her. Well, I wasnt there, so I dont know how it is or anything, but Elder Garcia said today that he isnt sure if they will be baptized. So we are going to go there today and talk to them about this and see what we can do. I hope that they we can help them through there struggles and see that they need to be baptized.
Next week we have 3 baptism! Fatima, Rita, and Gisele are a family that is amazing!! They already have been to church 2 times, and are loving it. They really enjoy the church. Fatima is the mom of the family, and she is amazing. She has two other kids, but they are kind of rebellious, so they dont go to church or anything. But we are really excited for them to be baptized. But we are really excited for them, and they are amazing, the best part is she loves being a missionary already! She wants everyone she knows to hear our messages, so the referencies are starting to fly in!! We are way excited! Well this is week 5 of the transfer, and i am really excited to finish this transfer with some baptisms!! I dont know if I will stay or not, I dont wanna think about it. I just wanna concertrate on the work for now, and whatever happens happens

22 July 2009

2009-07-22T12:03:00.001-07:00

22 July 2009

2009-07-22T11:54:00.000-07:00

Wow, This week was a week of miracles!! I love the work of the Lord so much! Every single week I learn so many things it is amazing!! Well Hilda(the h is silent in portuguese, so i always thought that her name was Ilda, but it is Hilda.) She and her family are doing amazing!!! After a long talk I had with the bishop he agreed that the ward could help the family more than he had.. So on friday and saturday tons of colths, food, blankets, and toys were delivered to the family!! It was so amazing!! The best part about it was the whole family went to church on sunday and loved it!! They were all smiles and everything went great! I had a family night there last night, and it was the first time I had seen there house after all the help we had done, and wow, every changed so much!! They house is TINY! but, now that they have things, they are actually keeping care of the things the have. They hung up sheets to seprate rooms, and are using toys as decorations in the house. They are sweeping the dirt. The whole spirit of the house changed. Before it was dark and gloomy. Now everyone is smiling and laughing and loving life. Yesterday in our family night, I took popcorn and soda to watch a movie!! They loved it. They have a tiny tv, and a ghetto dvd player they borrowed from the neighbors, but the only problem was that it didnt have a remote, I was all bummed out, because the film was in english.. but they kept up the good spirits, and I translated "The Restraution" into portuguese for them, it is a totally different family. They still have a major problem.. Nobody in the house is working. So they really have no way to maintain living. On sunday, a member offered a job for Hilda, and she will start working this week. And the teenger "De" will start working this week too! So things are really getting better there! They have two children that werent baptized, that will baptize next week! So that is way exciting. I am really excited about this family. They were so lost and without purpose in life, they found the purpose of life again through the gospel! We still dont know what to do with the Dad... He is still drinking. Not alot.. but he drinks still.. It is such a hard habit to break. Any ideas on scriptures or lessons we can teach? It is a blessing of the Lord we found this family. They are going to be an amazing addition to the ward.. and they have alot of references for us too!! Hilda's brother and Mom accepted baptism for the 8th. Their neighbors are a really big possibilty for the 8th too! So, the Lord is really blessing Elder Garcia and I!! Missionaries are so blessed! The Lord blesses me every single day. It seems like every single day we find somebody new that is so ready for the gospel!! We meet a lady named Fatima. She is a single mom with 4 kids. She went to church of Sunday, and was crying the whole time, she felt the spirit so strongly!! She is going to be baptized next Saturday!! We are so excited. This area is so ready to just explode. They lack about 15 or 20 members in the ward for the Stake to sign off to build a chapel here. So after the succeses that we have had the past 3 months they are way excited. They members are starting to really help us, and the work is going to move forward like crazy here! It is week 4 in the transfer. So we have 2 more weeks to really work like crazy!! I love you all, I hope that every single one of you is blessed with opportunities to share the gospel. It is the best feeling in the world!! Keep praying for me and my companion!! We need more miracles and people ready to hear the gospel!! I love you all!! Thanks for all the Love and Support.
Elder Olsen #3
Jesus Cristo Vive!! Ele é Nosso Mestre!!

8 July 2009

2009-07-08T12:19:00.000-07:00

Wow, things are so great here! I love Brasil. Things are so amazing here in Anhanguera. Elder Garcia and I are having so much fun, and working really hard to find as many elect people as we can! This week has been extremely emotional for me and the area, it has been a extremely spiritual and difficult week. I don't know if you remember Sergio,Sema, Nicolle, and Kaique.. there were the family with a baptism date, but we found out they weren't married right.. well on monday night we had an extremely spiritual lesson with them. the lesson was extremely powerful, we were really trying to help them understand the importance of marriage, Well, at last I finally committed Sema to marriage with Sergio, and she started to cry... bawl really.. and she just went off, she was talking about how she is extremely unhappy with Sergio, and she really wants to leve him, but she can't because she doesnt have the money.. how she has never been happy with him, but she was just trying to fill in the gaps of her dead husband.. and she just went off, right in front of his face, it was really rough... so they will defintely not be marriage.. now we have to help them separate or something, the whole family is a mess... The church is the only thing keeping them from falling apart.. So we really need help them improve things there.. Any suggestions? It is extremely hard for us, because we have never been married, or passed with these types of difficulties, but the only things that keeps us knowing we can help them is because we are missionaries for our Savior Jesus Christ.
Yesterday, something crazy happened. We were on the bus, riding home from our district meeting, and I was standing next to this guy with sun glasses near the front of the bus.. Well, I really wanted to talk to him about the church, but for some reason I didn't(further explantion coming.) So I was standing next to him, and I "randomly" decided, to go the back of the bus, not 3 minutes later that man with sun glasses pulled out a gun, and robbed the driver of the bus!! He jumped the gate and the front of the bus, and robbed the man and the bus! It was so crazy! There was probably about 25 people on the bus at the time, but it was pretty crazy, I almost talked with the man that was robbing the bus. I know that it was no accident I didn't talk with him, God protects his missionaries!
This week Marcos and Elisangela went on vacation with their family to the interior of Brasil, where they have never heard of the church, to visit Marcos's family. So Marcos really wanted his family to know the church, so we made a video, of the first lesson. It was so awesome. ha, Elder Garcia and I will be famous in the interior of Brasil. We taught the first lesson of the video, and with the help of the bishop we gave him about 8 book of Mormon's and 300 pass-a-long cards. So he is going to convert the entire little city there in the middle of no where, so that was pretty cool. Our God is a God of miracles, It is really something awesome to see! Everyday we find new people that are searching for the truth in their lives. We really are trying to work our hardest every single day, because time is passing way fast! I can't believe it! How weird is it that I almost have 6 months on my mission! Time flies by. I love my mission, it is the best thing in the world. Look for opportunities to share the gospel.. there is no greater joy in the world than talking with someone about the gospel!! 1st Corthians 13:1-8. A message for all of us!! I love you all. Keep me in your prayers!! Elder Olsen#3

Pics from the baptisms, it was amazing! Also, a picture of me and isabelly, the daugther of Marcos and Elisangela. She is so funny! Love Elder Olsen

2009-07-01T09:58:00.000-07:00

July 1 2009

2009-07-01T09:57:00.000-07:00

I have no doubts that the Lord works miracles in our lives everyday! This week was so amazing! It was great to see the work of God in our lives. Saturday we have the baptism of 4 people! Andreia, Matheus, Adriana, and Cristiane. It was really awesome! The spirit was really strong! It was really funny, It was on Saturday night, and saturday afternoon it rained non stop! The worst storm I have seen here in Brasil. It was crazy, so we thought that no one would come to the baptisms. So it was like 645, and a herd of people showed up all wet and excited to watch the baptisms! It was really awesome! The water was extremely cold!! And because it was raining it was worse, but the spirit was really strong, and no one complained. It was really awesome! Sunday was really awesome too, I was almost positive i would be transfered, and so i was really sad, I love this ward and this area. But sunday all the members were really sad, and really were praying that I would stay. It was awesome!! Monday we received a phone call that Elder Garcia and I will continue our work here, and that we need to work really hard here! It was really a miracle, the members are way excited, and are way excited to help the work move forward. I think the members really trust Elder Garcia and I, so it really helps. We have alot of references, and alot of work! It is awesome! We are working non stop with about 10 people right now that should be baptized this month! Last night we made our goals for this transfer and we are really excited to work really hard together for one more transfer! I love this work so much! The spirtit is such an amazing tool. I have learned so much about the spirit on my mission! I can´t believe that I have 5 months on my mission already! My companion told me today, "Elder, how much time do you have on your mission," I realized i already have 5 months here in 2 days! I cant believe it! The work here in Anhanguera is going to start a fire here! We are so ready to work really hard together! I am so excited to be a missionary, It is a huge privillege. I learn things everyday! I can´t believe how blessed we are to have the gospel in our lives! I hope that everything is good, I hope that all of you have the best times of your lives! Remeber pray for the missionaries, trust me we can feel the prayers, I swear I have the most miracles in the mission, because I have the most people praying for me. Thanks to the hundreds of Olsen´s around the US! ha, It is a huge blessing! I read this scripture today and loved it! D&C 128:22-23!!
I love you all, I pray for you all to have missionary experiences everyday!
Love Elder Olsen!!!#3!

Elder Olsen 24 June 2009

2009-06-24T11:32:00.000-07:00

Hello , it sounds like everyone is doing really great on the vacation. I wish I could say that I am jealous... but I am having the time of my life here in Anhanguera! My area is really great! This week we had something really sad happen. Sema, Sergio, Nicolle, and Kaikee will not be baptized this week. The day of their interview, we found out that they were not really married. They have a marriage contract, but it is not valid our President said, so we are not going to baptize them for awhile. The hardest part about it, is that they probably will never be baptized.. I have a lot of faith, but the problem is that Sema, she receives a pension for the death of her husband, if she gets married again, she won´t be able to receive it anymore. So, today we are going to talk to her about marriage.. so everyone please pray for her. They live off this pension, it is the only money that they receive, so it will be really tough, but I know the Lord will provide a way. Well, this is week 6 of the transfer, I am really nervous, I wanna stay here so bad, but I am not sure what will happen. This week we have 5 baptisms, So to end our transfer together will be really good, but at the same time, I am really sad, we had such potential to baptize the whole area, but I learned a lot this transfer with Elder Garcia. Elder Garcia is still sick... It is frustrating at times, but I am not mad at him, because he can´t help it.. but he is really sick, it is a huge testimony to me, he is still working hard and hard.. But something is wrong with his health, everyone continue to pray for him! Andreia, Mateus, Cristiane, Adrianna, and Maria are going to be baptized on Saturday, and we are really excited. Andreia and Mateus were really tough at the beginning, but now they are great. I love the opportunity to get to know all these wonderful people. I love it! Well yesterday I was in division with my Zone Leader. It was a blast! ha, I really had alot of fun. It was awesome, we tried alot of different ideas to meet people. During the spilts with him, I think that he was thinking that since | was a new missionary I wouldn't talk with many people, so I wanted to prove myself, ha. So we were on a Bus, and it was way way crowed. there was about 50 or 60 people on the Bus. Well, I decided to use my best gift I have, my loud voice and talk with everyone! So, I started talking really loud. "Good evening everyone, my name is Elder Olsen, I am a missionary for the chruch of Jesus Christ! We have a message that is changing the lives of millions of people around the world! We are here to move your lives too! We will be walking around, if you can have your address ready, we will share a message that will change your life." haha, it was way funny. We got about 20 addresses, and everyone loved it. So after that we started just talking with everyone we saw. I got about 50 addresses yesterday, so it was an awesome day. It was a good reminder for me that missionary work is fun, we were laughing all night about it. Well, I love the work here, I am praying that I will stay here one more transfer, but I am not sure, I really really wanna stay here, but I will let you know next week what happens. I love this gospel. I love it so much! I am on a spiritual high every single day! One thing that I have been studying a lot is about the book of life in the scriptures. EVERYONE, write in your journals everyday! It is sacred. It is a commandment, one thing that I have learned here is this. Also, it is important because it is scripture, we need to seek Sacred Spiritual Experiences every single day. Have you ever thought where we would be if Joseph Smith didn't keep a journal? or Nephi? Moroni? We need to seek for scared spiritual experiences everyday, that we can fill our journals with scripture. I love you all. I love this gospel. I feel I learn a million new things everyday. Pray for me, I love you all. Remember Luke 18:27-30
Love you all!
Elder Olsen #3

Elder Olsen 17 June 2009

2009-06-17T12:32:00.000-07:00

Hello Family!!
Wow this week was amazing!I really had a amazing week, the Lord is really working here in my area, we have the spirit with us at all times right now, I am probably on the most spiritual high I have ever been on in my life!! Sema, Sergio, Nicolle, and kaike are set to be baptized the 28th! And we are so excited, they went to church on Sunday, and LOVED it! Yesterday Sergio said that he is already missing it, and can´t wait till next Sunday, they are golden! We had an extremely spiritual lesson on Friday night, everyone was crying it was amazing! The Lord is really working miracles here in our area, Friday night, it was way late, and we had an appointment on a street in the ghetto I had never heard of, so I asked this lady if she knew where it was, and after talking for a little I asked if we could teach her a lesson on Saturday at 130... the only problem is that our English class starts at 2... so Saturday we were running to her house, and it was 135... I was not sure if it was possible to teach, and still go to the chapel... but time with the Lord is amazing... we taught the first lesson, marked her baptism for the 27th and made it in time to teach our english class! The Lord is amazing. He is preparing many many people to be baptized here on the 27th and 28th.. We had 7 marked baptisms for the 27th 4 for the 28th... we are really really trying to work hard to make sure all stay firm! It is a huge responsbility, we have to visit every single one every day, but, with the Lord everything is going great. Cristiane, Plautilditis, Andreia, Mateus, José, Sharlene are set to be baptized on the 27th. And Sema, Sergio, Nicolle, and Kaike are going to be baptized on the 28th. And we have about 4 other really really people that are really possible, so everyone please pray for us, our bodies are weak, my companion is going to a specialist today for his stomach, he has lost about 19 pounds in two weeks, and isnt eating very much.. things are really poor with his health, but yet we have never been more happy. God is preparing miracles for us here in our area! I am not sure how we will be able to do all that we need to do over the next 2 weeks, but I know that with the help of the Lord we will be able to baptize alot of people here! I love this work, I have a blast every single day, It is so much fun! I am loving my area, my companion, and the people that are serving me. Every day the Lord prepares hundreds of miracles for us here in our area, I know that without him we would be doing nothing here in our area. Transfers are in 12 days, and I really want to stay here with Elder Garcia, but we will see what happens! Wow, I hope everything back home is well, I love this work so much! I am having the time of my life! Thank for all for the prayers, they are WORKING! God is preparing people here to recieve the gospel! I am loving every minute of my time here! I just pray that my companion´s health is ok, everyone pray for Elder Garcia! I love you all, thank you for the love and support, Remember we are all enlisted in this battle against SATAN, everyone must prepare! 3 Nephi 6:20!!! I love you all!
Um Abraço!
Elder Olsen #3

Elder Olsen 12 June 2009

2009-06-12T08:13:00.001-07:00

Wow, missionary work is amazing! I am having the time of my life here in Brasil! I literally love Brasil, It is an amazing place. I love the people here so much, they are so much different than the people in the United States of America. But a good different, everyone is nice everyone is willing to talk to us, and everyone is willing to listen to our message! This past week has had it´s troubles... We have alot of people that love our message, and love us the missionaries, but do not want to act on the feelings that they feel. They are not willing to go to church or set a baptism date, it is really frustrating. When someone has a testimony, and you know they know the Book of Mormon is true, and that Joseph Smith saw God and Christ, It is frustrating when we pass by their house on Sunday morning and they are not willing to go to church, It is really difficult. We are teaching a new family that is really amazing! Sergio, Sema, Nicole, and Calique! They are really good family that is already married! The only problem is that Sema had a husband for 13 years... and 2 years ago he passed away in a car accident.. we thought that the plan of salavation would be perfect for them, and it was.. for Sema, but the problem is now she is talking alot about her husband who passed away... and giving little time to her current husband here Sergio, so Sergio is struggling now, because he thinks that she talks to much about her old husband, and yeah, it is troublism in the house. But, even with all this problems I know the gospel will bless their lives, I am about 98 percent sure they will be baptized 27th! Steve, or anyone, what can we do with this situation? The kids are really depressed I think. Nicole, she is 13 years old, she barely barely talks, Calique, he loved our first message, but after the 2nd lesson he really isnt interested anymore. Yesterday we had a family night with them, and I prepared some food and we had fanta, and all sorts of good things, but still the kids were liked depressed. During the lessons I really try to involve Nicole, he answer for everything is "Tudo Não é?" That is all.. so what can I do, obviously it is hard, their dad passed away, and there Mom is struggling, the New dad is awesome! But i think they are scared because he was hit by a car 7 months ago, and nearly died, so I mean, this family has bad luck with cars, so he can´t work, or leave the house, or anything, Sema, she has a disability with her feet, so she can´t walk either, but this family is amazing, they are so ELECT! I just need a little help, anyone have ideas? Other than that we have some other investagators that are doing really well too! Andreia and Mateus will be baptized the 27th, and have about 3 or 4 others we are trying to mark for that day too! We are trying to really baptize as many people as we can together, because we are almost certain I will be transfered from what President said too us... so we are trying to work hard together becasuse we work really really well together! I love Elder Garcia, he is so amazing! Well sounds like everyone is doing well, I love the fact that you are on a two month vacation, such an Olsen thing too do! Nobody takes a two month vacation! NOBODY! but I love it, When I tell people about my family and the things we have done they think we are crazy, in the good way, but crazy! I hope Justin is good, I can´t believe he is a MARINE! that is nuts! I hope you have a great time family! Thanks for all the letters, love and support, I really love the fact that I have a family that loves and supports me so well! I love you all, I love our Savior Jesus Christ! I am so glad to know the fact that the truth is with us! That we know where the true church of God is on this EARTH! I love you all, keep praying for me, I pray for you all, Remember the sacredness and holiness of our calling of members of the church in these LAST DAYS! Remember, the Savior is coming, we must do all we can to prepare us, and everyone around us! Thanks for all the Love, Eu enviou um grande abraço de Brasil. Eu amo vocês muito! Eu sei que esta Igreja de Cristo, com um Profeta, Doze Apostoles, e Autoridade de Deus...que Bênção! Remember Matthew 25:40! Search for opprtunites to serve others around us!
Love Elder Olsen #3