Elder Gurksnis Goes to Brazil

I had been praying a lot recently just to see all of our hard work pay off. This week we were definitely blessed with that! We had been working with Junior for about 3-4 weeks and this week he decided to be baptized. He truly has shown such a sincere repentance and has put his life on a new track. Its been awesome to see his growth through the doubts he has had and the testimony he has now of the Book of Mormon. So the crazy story of how we found him was actually through his brother. A member felt impressed to talk with his brother at the gym after seeing him many times there but never conversing. The brother ended up telling him a story about a dream he had. He said that 2 angels came to his house to share a message about the gospel to him. The member told him that we arent exactly angels but that he knew exactly what that dream was about haha. We were able to go and teach this brother and through him were able to find Junior as well. The brother, Elson, is a little tougher right ...

This transfer is flying by! Less than two weeks left seems so crazy. The work hasn't gone exactly how we have wanted it (and it never will) but we've been praying to see our hard work pay off with time. I know the Lord will bless us with continued dedication. We still arent where we want to be with Ari, but we will try one more time this week. But the good news is, we have a super promising guy named Junior. He has had tons of questions, and we've helped him realize that the Book of Mormon is truly another testament of Jesus Christ. It has been awesome to see his conversion which is actually an awesome story that I will tell you guys next week if it continues to work out with him. He has been at church with us 2 times already! But today (this is why my Pday is different) we went to the temple and also had a multizona last week with tons of missionaries in our mission. Through these experiences Ive been able to learn a lot. I continue to have such a strong testimony of t...

This week was a week of good food (one of the families took us to Burger King) and much learning! We faced some challenges finding new investigators, but its been cool being more creative out here in the interior to find new people to teach. We planned to baptize Ari yesterday, but he was still smoking when we went to visit him. He has shown tons of progress but needs to make that final step to stop. We will work with him more this week to help show him how much the step of baptism would help him.  This week we had a cool experience with one of my companions recent converts. She was having lots of doubts, and even one that we struggled to answer a little. We gave her our best answer but told her we would continue to help her. At home, with only a few minutes of study we encountered the right response and were able to share it with her. As a missionary, you almost feel like you can be attacked at times by doubts of others, but in this time I've had here, I've learned that th...

Well I'll start by saying my new companion is pretty awesome. After learning to live with a tougher companion last transfer, I am glad to be with Alvarenga now. He is a cool guy from Manaus (the amazon) and although has just 3 months on the mission is such a good teacher! He teaches with lots of power and truly helps each person individually come closer to Christ. He told me that where he lives, if you want to travel its by boat through the rivers in the Amazon. I thought that was awesome! He said he took a 36 hour boat ride to visit his mom, lol.  Well I went from being in New York City to Prosper, Texas practically. The interior of our mission is much much different. There is no one on the street here! It is definitely a new challenge, but I am ready to be creative and find new ways to find people. Life is a little slower here and people give you more time so that has been cool. Its not as much of a concrete jungle here. We actually passed a real jungle on the bus here which ...

So this week was transfers and lots changed! I will be transferred to an area called Jardim Simus. It is close to a big city called Sorocaba. I'll have to opportunity to be the senior companion with Elder Alvarenga. He is pretty new on the mission, just finished his training, and only has about 3 months here. Other than that I dont know too much about him. I'm humbled with the opportunity and am excited to work hard with him and help shape each other into the best missionaries we can be.  This week our 2 baptisms fell through because they had to travel to Riberão Preto for a family emergency. It was a little sad at first that I won't get that opportunity anymore, but I know God has a greater vision. Maybe they are needing an extra week of teaching. I know there is a reason for it all. But, I'm happy with what I will leave here with Elder Aguiar. At least 5 of our investigators will be baptized here in the next month or 2 here!! My message this week is simp...

Hi all! Hope you all are doing well. So I guess the Olympics started?!?! I'm feeling lost in worldly news, but USA-USA-USA!! It's ok if Brazil sucks in the olympics cause we'll take the World Cup this summer The weeks are fast and good here. We were able to find lots of new people this week. In specific, we went to an area Brasilandia with a few members in order to teach a lady about baptism. She had lots of questions for us and we were able to answer i think very well. At the end she told us everything we said, she already knew was true. She said she didnt feel the information was going to her brain, but to her heart. We explained that this was the Spirit testifying of the truthfulness of these things. It was truly an awesome experience of the power of the Spirit while teaching. I could definitely feel the same in that room!  I have loved to see as i deepen my study of the scriptures all of the Church of Jesus Christs teachings in the Bible as well. We have the Boo...

My goodness the mission is way to good to me right now haha. Last night was a crazy crazy experience, but probably the best day of my mission! I'll start with the crazy part. So last night we are in our house planning for our week and we recieve a call at 9:10pm. Turned out it was the president of the mission! He asked us how fast we could we could at the church to baptize two girls named Thayna and Thalita. Haha so we threw on clothes and ran to the church of course. I have been working with these 2 girls for 16 weeks here. They are super strong in the church and know much there is to know, but there mom has never let them be baptized. But long story short, there was a young womans activity at the church last night and another member talked to their mom and convinced her to allow their baptism. So at 10:43pm they were both baptized and confirmed at 10:59. The whole ward showed up and it was the most people id ever seen at a baptism. It was such an awesome, spiritual experience. We...