Transfers this week will bring me a new Companion

today has been crazy, we will have transfers this week , i´m going to stay and get a new companion Elder C, he was my zone leader in m and now we are going to be zone leaders together here in m. i´m excited .

Elder s, my comp now, fell and hit his head pretty bad yesterday, so we spent last night in the hospital, but he is getting better, seems like he has a stomach bug or something that made him faint, so hes off solid food for a couple of days but he´ll be just fine.

ive spent some money in the past couple months on restaurants and grocereies but i think ive been forgetting to tell you, so should probably check to make sure its all good.

love you all,

-elder Leete

The Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth

hi EVERYBODY!

things are chugging along well here in m, me and Elder S are having a hard time finding some good families to teach that are really interested, but the miracle always happens AFTER the trial of your faith, so we just gotta keep going thrusting in our sickle with all our might.

Parabéns pra seus aniversários! (congratulations for your birthdays!)

we are  all so old now, jennifer is 22, im 20 jessica is 19. . .its really weird to think about.

glad that everythings going well at home, here a year from now that gazebo thing should have a good ivy growth on it it will look cool.

a while ago i finished reading Jesus the Christ, its a really great book. helped me really understand not only the life of christ and his teachings, but more about how he really was the chosen one from the begining. how the history of the bible and the traditions of the jews all tie in and show perfectly the divinity of Jesus as Jehova and how he established his church in EVERY dispensation, including this one

the most annoying thing about teaching people is that literally their heads are just completely full of lies. they think they understand the bible but they really dont. they think they understand their own religion but they dont. most people don´t even know where it was written or by who. i´ve even taught people that thought that God wrote the bible as it is now with his finger in stone.

if only the people just like took a basic history class about the bible our message would make so much more sense. . . .

some people dont even believe in their own religion. the Catholic Church claims to have the pope, wich is the divine successor of peter who then holds the keys to the priesthood and so the catholic church is the only true church. I have only ever spoken to one catholic who actually believes that. everyone else just follows it because of tradition or because they like worshipping Mary. its sad, here she is literally the fourth member of the trinity. . .

but thats just apostasy, i´m so happy that we have the truth restored in the latter days, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. the truth that you can study over and over and over again and always learn something more, the truth that makes more and more sense with every single new bit of information

love you all, untill next week

especially yours,

-Elder Leete

Mother's Day Skype

From the Editor:  We enjoyed a wonderful Skype with Elder Kevin Leete for mother's day!  We had a great time talking with him and seeing him.  All is good in mission-land.  His testimony is strong.  He is working hard.  He is happy.  And we are proud!  

Here are some of the things we talked about:

I asked what the most embarrassing time was so far. He said that it was when he was doing some street contacting and found out the women they were talking to were actually men!

We asked about what the membership was like there. He said the branches and wards were small.  A big percent are inactive. One thing they are working on is going through the ward lists and visiting those they don't know. They try to get that magic number where they can become a ward, then big enough so that they can have a building.   They don't have organs, and maybe out of their whole membership they will have only one person that can play the piano. He said that they sing mostly a capella, or have someone play out of the simplified hymn book, or play with one hand.

When asked what it was like for the members there and what challenges they had, he said that everything was just  worse there for them compared to us  at home.  For example- because of the heat, immodest dress was more prevalent.  He said think of Westview High school and the bad stuff there (language, sex, etc) and multiply it.  He also said that marriage isn't the norm.  Most couples have lived together for years and aren't married- even with children.   He said that if they find  a couple that are married, they jump at the chance and teach them because it means pretty much a guaranteed baptism.

When we asked him to tell us of a spiritual experience he has had, he told us that everything about a mission is spiritual, non-stop. He loves studying the scriptures, prayer, teaching, and conferences with the other missionaries.  He especially liked having Elder Cook visit with them, and loves learning from his mission president, who he said is awesome and was sure that he will be a general authority some day!

Here is the nice note I got today at his normal email time:

Mon 5/14/2012 8:34 AM

i love you too mom!

 you know what´s weird? i will probably be home next mother´s day!

 it was great seeing everybody! but its still is weird, mom´s keeping me all updated on everything so i dont have anything to talk about! i´m trying to get back up some pictures today, so ill try to send you guys some!

 i love you all!

-elder leete

Leadership Counsel with the President

The names of those in my zone that are from my same group.

(have the same amount of time on the mission)

Responsibility means no Excuses

This week has been really crazy for me, being a lider (leader) really takes up all your time, and on top of that we opened a new area here so we have almost nobody to teach. But we´ve been working a lot with some recent converts to complete their families so let’s see if that leads to anything these next few weeks.

One of the weird things now is that I don’t have any excuses to say that I don’t know what I’m doing, I’m a leader now and have more than a year on my mission. If I don’t find any baptisms, it´s my fault, if my investigators aren´t progressing than it’s my teaching that isn’t good enough.

When you are a junior companion it’s easy, you just arrive, throw in your two cents and follow your senior. now it’s me that has to plan out my day all nice and neat, it’s me that has to have results, it’s me that will be found guilty at the last day if I don’t find that one soul the God put here to be taught the gospel, and on top of that I have to watch over 20 other missionaries to make sure they are doing the same things, and it’s my head on the chopping block if something happens to one of them.

It’s weird having responsibility, I don’t think I like it so much.

But other than that I’m doing great here in this new city of M. I owe you guys some fotos but I left my camera in the house so maybe next week you guys will get some. I’ll talk more next Sunday.

I love you all!

-Elder Leete

editors note: Kevin will be skyping me for mother's day!!!!!!!!!