Elder Masulonis

Elder Masulonis

Monday, September 24, 2012

July 8, 2012

Thanks for emailing me mom. 
As for the heat... it is really hot. Our appartment is fairly cool though so at least I can sleep well during the night. We have been trying to set appointments with everyone during the hottest parts of the day, but even so, we sometimes have to go out in the heat. But with that being said, I think the Lord has really been blessing me. I remember back at home thinking that 85 was super hot and too uncomfortable to really do anything outside, but now I am in 90-105 temperatures. But the interesting thing is that it is bearable. I am definately sweating a ton, and the heat zaps your energy pretty quick, but its something that the lord has blessed me to be able to handle. Thank goodness right? I usually just have to think about having water with me more than if we are going to go out that day or not. Oh and by the way, transfers will be this weekend tomorrow, but I will be staying with Elder Stauffer in Knightdale for at least one more transfer. which is great because we are teaching some pretty awesome people right now and we hope to see at least a few of them get baptized. We will see how things work out though. I am super excited. It feels wierd though being 20. I mean, I feel like a missionary and an adult now. I still feel like im a teen ager. But, oh well. Again thank you for sending that package. This week I met my new mission pres. He is a baby doctor. He is alot different from pres. Cotterell. Pres. Cotterell was a head hunter and a business man so he ran the mission in a business style, so i dont know how things are going to work out with president Bernhisel. I love you very much, and hope to hear from you soon.

-Elder Masulonis

July 1, 2012

Dear Mon,
Wow, my birthday really is coming up, that was weird, i forgot all about that. thats crazy about the fires. Elder Stauffer said that his mom also said that there were alot of fires in utah. Well, let me tell you one reason why I probably forgot my own birthday. The work in knightdale has really grown. We had an investigator at church for the first time in a while yesterday and just about the whole ward introduced themselves to him and befriended him. It was awesome. Oh, let me tell you about him. His name is Michael, he is a black 18 yr old and has a scholarship in football for college. He is about as tall as I am, but about 3-4 times as muscly, not exaggerating. He could squish me like a grape, or probably eat two of me. Ware playing basketball with him today. He says that he isnt all that great at basketball, but we will see. I will probably have to go up against him because I am the next tallest guy. Wish me luck. We are working with him and 5 other pretty darn solid people. I'm really excited but at the same time pretty nervous. Not that I will or will not be able to teach how I need to, but wether or not I will actualy be there in Knightdale to see them be taught and baptized. Transfers are next week and I really dont want to leave Knighdale. The whole time I have been here, Knightdale has struggled. But now that it is booming, I may be leaving. I really hope it doesn't.  So this week has probably been the hottest weeks of my whole life. I have thought things were hot before, but this week, there were several days that were 104 degrees. I took a pretty funny video. I will have to send it to you in a thunbdrive or cd or something. I will see what I can do because I can't send videos over email, they are too big. As for the whole politics thing, I was thinking about saying that I was planning on voting Obama, to mess with you, but I think that would put you over the edge and make you disown me, and since my birthday is coming up that wouldnt be to good for me. So as for now I will say that i m voting Eomney ;)  So, to wrap up, things are going great for the work, I feel like i'm in an oven, I'm voting Obama... I mean Romney, fires are crazy along with Jason, I hope you can find my future wife so that i dont have to waste time like him;) I need to send you some videos, and i love you :)

-Love Elder Masulonis.

Friday, September 21, 2012

July 2, 2012

Dear Dad,
things are going great here. things are just now flipping around. we have 4 people with baptismal dates and 2 more on the way.:) i told mom about one of the individuals who came to church yesterday( which was such an accomplishment for this area.) he is about as tall as i am and about 3-4 times more buff. seriously. he is super solid and things are going well with him. it might stink though pretty soon because transfers are next week and i dont want to miss all that is happening here in knightdale. but its not my will that must be met, but rather fathers.and as for my faith growing, i am pretty sure that it is growing. but i feel like since im so focused on other things most of the time i dont recognize the growth as much. i am however noticing that i am able to follow the spirit more, i feel the spirit more, i am talking to more people and striving harder and harder to find teach and baptize which is central to our purpose.

what you said about your high priest group leader, is amazing. thats crazy infact! i have really desired to baptize a minister. mostly because when you get a leader, he has influence over alot more people. i saw this in an area called lumberton in NC. a asian refugee camp just moved into lumberton and got in contact with the missionaries and especailly with the leader of the group. and since then, they have been having about 40 investigators at church a week. it is so amazing. they just opened up a new branch there because of the growth. and just a fun fact, the branch president that covers that area just so happens to be loyd ricks' brother. they look alot alike. anyway, that is some of the things that are going on here. i might be playing basketball with 4-5 black kids today so wish me luck. i hope they dont own me to badly. i love you dad! thank you for writting me so much!

-Love Elder Masulonis

June 24, 2012

Dear mom.
Sounds like there isn't a lot going on at home. That reminds me of something that i learned concerning missionary work. If I am not busy as a missionary, its my fault. My business level completely depends on me. Its kinda funny, as a missionary, we are supposed to be super busy, but in the life back home, we are counseled by the prophets not to be too busy.

At the end of your letter you seemed to ask a question in comment form, and the answer to your question of how I am doing is great! We are still continuing to find new people to teach and help them progress. This Sunday was especially neat. We were talking to this guy who was washing his porch and he really didn't want to hear what we had to say. He said, "I'm baptist and you are barking up the wrong tree." We kept on talking to him in a spirit of persistence. As we were talking with him, the spirit must have really been working on him because within a few minutes he let us in and we had a great lesson about the restoration of the gospel. It seemed like he was trying to hide that he was being blown away from our message. We gave him a book of Mormon and he committed to a baptismal date. We had a prayer and left. But as we were leaving and as he was walking us out the door, he said, (talking about the book of Mormon.) I feel compelled to really read this book and I have some down time so I'm going to read it. I can only assume that he started reading it and the spirit continued to work with him. It was a super amazing experience. It has still blows me away a little now. I'm so grateful for a companion that really helps me to work a lot harder and be better. This past week in my studies I have found myself writing down pages of inspiration so much that by the time study time is over, I have to stop. I then think to myself that I will finish it that night or the next day. But the thing is, that the next time I have time to write anything down, god blesses me with more pages and thoughts of inspiration. I guess that might be one of the forms of the scripture that says that we will receive so many blessings that we wont have room enough to receive them. Its really amazing. I hope I can stay in knightdale with Elder Stauffer for one more transfer.


LOVE Elder Masulonis

June 18, 2012

Dad,
Doing missionary work in North Carolina is fairly difficult and is really pushing me to strive to obey the spirit and truely seek revelation. Without revelation, this work would be near to impossible. In one of the talks I have recently read and studied, the speaker who is a member of the seventy says that when we have true desires to recive specific revelation and act on those desires, the blessings of heaven are poured on us and the holy spirit is more able to influence our lives.  

Within the last week, Elder Stauffer and I have found more people to teach in a single week than ever before. A lucky week for finding new investgators would be about 2 or 3, but this week we have really been blessed because we were able to find 5 new people to teach in this week alone. I know that doesnt sound like much but in the south where seemingly no one wants to listen to you, its pretty good. I have been studying and learning alot about revelation, diligence and the spirit. Once on Thursday, we got told by and older couple that we were going to hell and that they knew that the book of mormon wasnt true and they didnt need to read it because they aready knew it wasnt true. After the conversation that we had with them, we felt pretty down, but then we went and read from the book of mormon and we found peace. I have learned that the book of mormon brings peace into a storm raged life, and thats exactly what happened. We read and we became more motivated than we had in our whole missions. It was amazing. As we went back out to serve god, this kid stopped us while he was driving and started to talk to us. He was baptist and his desire was to convert us. Good luck! We asked him if he knew about the book of mormon. He said that it wasnt true. Did you read it? No. The only way to know if the book of mormon is true or if anything we are saying is true is to try it out for yourself, to study it out and ask god. Moroni's promise is true for every single person in the entire world. If someone reads the book of mormon and prays about it and doesnt recieve a whitness that it is true it is because they didnt not ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, and with faith in christ that he will reveal the truth of it unto you.
Sorry if that was sounding like it was preaching to you. That is some of the message we share with others.
 i love you so much dad.

June 11-2012

Dear mom. 
For your information, because of the mail that I have been recieving lately, I am actually winning the contest in our district. I know that I havent told you of how the mail baseball works, but just to let you know, I am at about 7 points and I dont think that anyone else in my district has more than 5. So thanks.
Jeffery R Holland came and spoke to us. There were alot of things that I can remember about that visit, but the two things that stood out to me the most were that his #1 message to us was that he and the other apostles loved us so much. They are very christ like. and in order to be like christ-like, their level of love must be incredibly high. have randy read this part, it jsut came to mind, he might like it. ( what does the scanner say about his charity level?!?! its over 9000!!!!) anyway, ya, im still a goof ball:) which reminds me of the second thing that stood out to me, and this has to be taken in context otherwise it might not turn out right. He was over the pulpit and he passionately yelled into the mic and pointed strongly at us as he said, "DONT YOU EVER, EVER, GO BACK TO THE WAY YOU WERE BEFORE YOUR MISSION!!!" I think I will remember that for a long time. That's how much he wants our missions to change us. He also said that he had a personal interview with each of us just by shaking our hands and looking into our eyes. Yup, I shook his hand and got interviewed by an apostle.
Thats really interesting that you were studying the talk about how to recieve revelation from Richard G Scott. (by the way, his brother is our temple president.) I have been reading and studying that talk a lot. This morning I especially was studying Revelation. along with studying that talk I also read in 1 Nephi 15, its about when Nephi wakes up from having the dream of his father explained to him through another dream. ( by the way, the reason why I have been studying this subject is because my district leader challegened my companion and I to study and strive to recieve revelation on the question, "what do I need to do to find those who will progress.") and in it, nephi says his brothers say something that my soul has said more than once after he asks them "have ye inquired of the lord?" "we have not for the lord maketh no such thing known unto us." Nephi then rebukes them for not being humble. He then says later , "if ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall recieve, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you." As I read and reread over these passages along with some others, I thought, if I do recive an answer on what I need to do to find those that will progress, will I obey? So right now I feel like I need to truely humble myself and get rid of my hard heart. So, that's what I am working on right now. Humility. The reason being, I really want to see the miracles of God more frequently in my life and I want to see success.

You are right, I have been out for about 8 months, and it has been a great building experience. Sometimes I am able to recognize that I have grown a ton, and then sometimes it seems like I havent really changed since before my mission. I love you. You are an inspired woman and a precious daughter of god. He loves you dearly. More than what I and I would imagine you can comprehend fully. I love him. He wants us to be happy. He is the way. I love you.

-Elder Masulonis