Monday, December 28, 2015

Christmas in Portugal 2015 (pics!)

Dear Family and Friends:

Lee didn't have much time to write today, so I thought I would post 
just a few pictures from his Portuguese Christmas.  We were able to talk with him
on Christmas day and it was great.  He sure appreciates those of you who have taken the time
to keep in touch.  Thanks for your love and friendship!


 Elder Holmes with his companion, Elder Macedo.


 "At our Mission conference, we had a bunch of musical acts and then all the zones did a skits. Elder Macedo's and my part was about how the sun melts the snow men haha. So I made us these wigs out of paper and all and let's just say it was a hit! Guess you just had to have been there!"  




 These pics are from the P-Day we had when Elder Madsen was with us.  We went to Lagos.  
Such a cool place.  





A few Christmas pics at our apartment in front of our Christmas tree!  



 And finally, a shot of Elder Holmes skyping home on Christmas day! Oh how we miss him!


Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Feeling a Bit Better!

Date: December 14, 2015 at 7:40:13 AM MST
From: Lee Holmes <lee.holmes@myldsmail.net>

Olá Familia!

So this week was still a little tough getting over my sinus infection. We didn’t do much all week until Thursday or so, as I started feeling better. Still was having severed headaches but the last 3 days I have felt pretty good! Tough just sitting in the house! Once we started getting going again, we taught another lesson to our friend Domingas, along with a a member of the church Emaneul. He has some struggles right not too, as we are trying to help him quit smoking again, but it´s kinda cool teaching his friend Domingas, who is helping Emanuel’s testimony fire up again, as well. She has loved the two messages we have left with her so far, but she doesn’t have a phone so it is tough getting in contact with her. She said she would come to church with us this week with Emanual, but when we arrived at her house on Sunday, she had left for work and Emanual had gone to the beach to fish. Bummer!

Taught a lesson with a man the Elders before us were teaching, Fernando. His wife couldn’t make it to be with us. But they made it to church. He has a little hard time understanding what we are teaching at times I believe, and then our member who was teaching with us started talking to him in criol, which is a little difficult for me at least to understand! It was good though. They can only meet on the weekends and aren´t married. We will do our best. 

Friday one of our members Nato, who has a lot of fire to do activities with our branch, put on an activity where Elder Macedo and I and then the sisters, Sister Olsen and Sister Andrade, did a Spiritual thought. Had a nice object lesson that is a little difficult to explain over email but it went well. Talked about the world we live in, the things we can use to overcome the wickedness and become clean and perseverar ate o fin!

This week I read a lot of conference talks from the past general conference and decided to start Elder Durrant’s challenge to ponder a scripture every week. To put it in a place that we will think about and then talk about your scriptures to others. I was reading in Mosiah, when Alma the younger went from one wicked kid to an incredible righteous missionary, and what he said when he truly had a change of heart. My scripture this week was Mosiah 27:26… I have it memorized in portguese but can’t quote it in english! haha It talks about us becoming new creatures in this life, and unless we do this, it´s going to be hard for us to return to our Heavenly Father’s presence. I thought a lot about how we truly are here to change our habits, our natural man habits, and become better people. Better disciples of Christ. Trying to become perfect, even like our Father in Heaven is perfect. Of course in becoming a´´different´´ creature, I know I´m not going to change from a human into a dog (as much as I´d love to turn into a dog like Cosmo and have everyone give me all their time all day long! hahahaha) but that “different creature” will be a new and improved ME!  We can change ourselves. Who we really are. I enjoyed sharing this scripture with my comp, and some other less actives and members throughout the week. 

Today we are headed to Lisbon and tomorrow we are having a Christmas party with our entire mission. Should be fun! We are doing a secret Santa so we all bought presents to exchange. I´m excited about. This week, I think up until christmas, I believe Elder Madsen, the AP will serve with us which I´m excited about. The president just has the AP´s now doing week long divisions with missionaries. Kinda cool and excited to see how he works. 

Excited for Christmas. Sorry that I´m not so good with the details! I am so slow at reading and try to read all your guys emails and respond as well!


Elder Holmes

Monday, December 7, 2015

Nothing like Being Sick in Sacavem! (with pics!)

A few pics of Lee in Sacavem, taken before he was transferred.
  • Lee and some of his investigators in Sacavem
  • Lee with his companion, Elder Leung, in Sacavem.  
  • Lee even mastered Steve's rice pudding recipe!
  • A few views from his apartment! 




           









So this week was pretty uneventful - except for monday! We visited a less active and a friend was there, as well, so we ended up teaching her! Domingas! She really loved our lesson and was happy for us to come back in a few days. Unfortunately, Elder Macedo and I got sick. I started feeling better around wednesday or thurdsay, but then began having these really bad headaches. Sister tavarez decided that the Roberts, the missionary couple here, should take me to the hospital. So we went to the hospital Friday night and figured out that I have a sinus infection, sinnosidis or something like that. The rest of the weekend until today we have literally just been chilling in the house and my head feels like it’s about to explode. It´s kinda hard to read and type so sorry that I´m going to be pretty short with all of you guys today! (I’ll include some pics instead). It wasn´t that exciting of a week anyways, but hopefully I can start feeling better! The headaches are like in the right side of the head and it feels like all this pressure is in my teeth. I could barely sleep the last two nights. I feel bad too because Elder Macedo, being his first couple weeks here, is just kinda chilling in the house with me and we aren´t really doing any missionary work. Big-time bummer! Hope to get better soon|


Elder Holmes