Jacob P. Gubler

Jacob P. Gubler

Sunday, January 29, 2012

January 24, 2012

It has been raining like CRAZY for the past two and half weeks, it still manages to be absurdly hot... the weather here is almost as temperamental as Utah’s, except when it rains here the rain drops are like as big as my eyeballs and the thunder and lightning is insane too! The power goes out every other day and get this the CTM got struck by lightning on the power rod! Great right? I just realized you’re probably all panicked now but I really am more than fine! I love this work, the language is really starting to come and I know I’ve got God on my side. I read the story of Helaman and the 2000 Stripling Warriors a couple days ago and I realized that I may get hurt or injured a little by not learning the language right off the bat but the Lord will not let me anything happen to me. This is His work and I’m so glad I get to do it!  I hope the ward is all doing well and it’s crazy to think that Quentin will be home in like what 6 months or so?? That 6 month wait just about killed me... ha but anyways this week I have gotten into studying the Book of Mormon so much!! That book is like my best friend now and is my outlet and escape from studying Portuguese all day! I have never been this into reading the Book of Mormon in my life and I love it! I feel like I have been missing out on so much for 19 years of my life because you can literally apply anything to us in the modern days! It really is the word of God and I’m in love. I made my own little time line of who had the plates and at what time and all this stuff and have been looking up talks and all this stuff (We get lab time every day and when I’m writing this emails I’m in a lab in the CTM not an internet cafe in the streets of Sao Paulo ha-ha.  It’s not that bad down here ;)) but if you find any good study material or talks I would love it if you sent it to me! But remember if you do decide to send me anything please send it to the Mission Home address in the last email I sent you! :) I am really missing Grandpas Book of Mormon Study books right now!

Oh and more mega exciting news! Elder Neil A Anderson and Elder Ballard are both coming to the CTM tomorrow!!!! :) WOOOO! You’re never supposed to get to see General Authorities when you are in Brazil but we get two in one sitting! We essentially get to listen to them for as long as they want to talk tomorrow and I am extremely excited! :) More exciting news is in our TRC (it’s like a practice teaching thing with Brazilian members who pretend to be investigators) but me and Elder Bodily nailed it this week. The language really is coming! My knowledge outside of Gospel related topics still needs some improvement but we will get there and if God has helped me this much I can only imagine what else is in store the rest of my mission! Also next Monday we get to go out and proselyte in the streets of Brazil! Each companionship gets four Books of Mormon to hand out and I’m extremely excited but also nervous! It’s a whole other ball game outside of our little shelter where everyone talks nice and slow in the CTM ha-ha but we will get there!

That is essentially it for this week and hopefully I made up for last week’s because it was written way bad and was kind of short but remember I love you and you are in my prayers every day! I love this gospel, the people of Brazil and my district!

Oh and I’ve got some homework for you too!  Read ALMA 60:6... I need me some letters!! :)

January 17, 2012

This week overall was pretty great! im still waiting on the watch and your letter but they will probably be here tonight or tomorrow so we should be good there and great news! we had our first "baptismal commitment"!! our "investigator" who is actually our teacher accepted baptism and is going to be baptised on the "29th of January"! pretty exciting right?? especially since they play the investigator role pretty tough so we had to work for it but i just cant wait to get out into the field cuz if a fake baptism commitment from a fake investigator feels this good then i cant imagine how amazing it will feel when you really bring a family unto Christ and His Church. This work is not easy at all but i realized im not doing this for me im doing this for the people of Brasil and if i put in the effort than God will cover the rest. The language will come, the leadership skillls will continue to grow and exact obedience will get easier. He has a plan and it´s our job to bring people into His perfect plan.
On another crazy note you will never guess who i met this week in the CTM. Nate Jeese. As in the Jeese's that grew up and sugarhouse!! it was asbsolutely insane cuz i had seen him a couple of time cuz he just came from prove for three weeks and got here as of last wednesday but didnt recognize him but as soon as he said his first name was Nate cuz the whole only last name thing makes it really hard to feel like you know people on a personal basis. that is one of the things i miss the most is my first name. haha jk but yeah we were talking and it was insane! he is serving in Santa Maria and it reminds me when is Oliver gonna get his call?? cuz im gonna want to hear as soon as he gets his calll!
PS i dont have time to email dad this week cuz im out of time....:( but can you please mail me my line of authority and Dads ancestory? cuz that would be really nice to have :)
i love you all and remember that youre in my prayers every singe day. I hope michael is doing ok and carly can get those grades up. I hope everyone is doing ok and dont worry about me cuz im doing great! i love this work and the opportunity i have to serve for the Lord. and i do kind of miss the personal emails from the kids and letters would be nice too so i mean i definitely wouldnt mind that ;) eu amo todos vocês.
Seus Filho, Elder Gubler. 

Sunday, January 15, 2012

Mailing & Email Addresses


Mailing Address:

Brazil Sao Paulo South Mission
Rua Dr. Luiz da Rocha Miranda, 159
8° Andar
Parque Jaaquara, Sao Paulo, SP
Brazil 04344-010

Email:  Jacob.gubler@myldsmail.net

January 10, 2012

January 10, 2012



We went to a real Brazilian grill today for Pday with our two instructors and the teacher Irmão Zambonie the one that I love! The food was amazing there, it was essentially a Rodizio grill or Tucanos but real Brazilian food :) I thought I would have at least gained a little weight by now thought because we eat a TON of food every meal and I may have gotten hooked to dipping bread in oil and vinegar, amazing I tell you! Probably not the healthiest thing to be eating 3 times a day but its keeping me going so that’s all that counts right now!

This week we got to talk to an American guy that served in Brazil 3 years ago but came back to work here for an internship. It was so nice to just be able to talk to an American and know that no matter how bad you are struggling the Lord will help you and it all works out in the end. You are exactly right that I really am struggling with the language hardcore and it’s hard to not compare yourself to others but I’m just trying to be diligent as repetitive and tough as things get I know that I can do this...

This Sunday was the first fast Sunday that I had here and it was amazing! for one of the first times ever fasting wasn’t a total burden haha fast and testimony meeting was amazing and my first leadership meeting I conducted as AP (I’m actually more like a Zone Leader because I’m just over my district and 2 others it’s just called that in the CTM) and it went really well! I bore my testimony during sacrament meeting and of course may have shed a few tears because the spirit is so strong! The spirit in this place is really just amazing :) I can’t wait to actually get out into the field and teach real investigators and just have the spirit triple even if I still don’t know the language. haha today during P Day an elder in our district gave out a book of Mormon and it was the coolest most inspiring thing I’ve seen in a while! He was conjugating things right and the spirit was there even if we were just in that Rodigio grill place. I’m not even close to that point of comfort to give out a book or Mormon because the language really is extremely hard. I don’t mean to be a total downer here and it really wasn’t a bad week at all! I love my district and definitely had some good teaching experiences so don’t think I’m going into to depression or anything like that! :) I know I can do this and the Lord really will make it all worth it and will help me when I need it.

Just FYI when it comes down to two weeks before I leave, don’t send letters here anymore because they apparently wont make it in time before you leave for the field so in two weeks start sending stuff to the mission home address! Tell Tara thanks for the watch and she better not have just bought a new one!! haha I love you all and I know that I can do this! I hope everything is going good at home, I cant wait to get the thought letter from you because those really are just amazing to get but I’m always thinking of everyone, always praying for you and fasted for you on Sunday.

Eu te amo, seu filho Elder Gubler.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

January 3, 2012

January 3, 2012
The Brazil CTM is absolutely amazing! The rooms are kind of really tiny and it feels like I’m at EFY but the garden and the building compared to everything else around us is extremely nice! I can see why most people of Brazil think that we are "the rich church" because all the church buildings out here are amazingly gorgeous! The temple kind of stands out a little and I love being able to go to that every week! I’m gonna have the movie memorized soon enough haha but yeah the cafeteria is just kind of a cafeteria… nothing too special going on there but the food is amazing! I am shockingly still liking the rice and beans and have that with every meal but I just cover it with hot sauce or cilantro so switch it up seeing as not much changes around here…the same daily schedule may be starting to get to me. I adapted to waking up at 6 alright but just doing the same thing everyday and getting frustrated not learning the language when it feels like everyone else has it down.  That’s when times get tough but getting the banner from the whole family in the mail was amazing! Give Michael crap because he didn’t write on it and I may have been a little bummed about that but I loved hearing from everyone else and seeing Hans Portuguese in action! Its cool how some little thing like everyone writing Merry Christmas can just make your day or your week down here! Mail is like gold and I still get the butterflies every time we open that magic box up haha

Oh have another big announcement! I am now the Assistant to the President! Did not see that one coming at all!! I didn’t think they would dare drop me from being District leader but apparently they did... everyone thought it was gonna be my Comp Elder Bodily (including me), who is great by the way, so i feel like everyone is kind of shocked/ "oh no not again" but i guess we’ll see how things work out. I’ve only had the calling since Monday so don’t have much to report when it comes to that but I’m sure next week ill have plenty to ramble on about!

Grandma and Grandpa Pinegar emailed me last week but I didn’t have time to respond until this week but he essentially wrote the whole thing with scriptures haha they are just the greatest! And I have been using all of grandpa’s books and my district all copied some pages that had all the scriptures by theme plus I used grandmas kite story in my talk during sacrament meeting!

But New Years in Brazil is crazy!! The Brazilians are always on one but even more so when it comes to holidays haha they were all walking around with English music playing and they have no idea what the words were saying so needless to say a few songs were played that definitely shouldn’t have haha gotta love those Brazilians :) but since i was DL I felt like I couldn’t stay up to watch the fireworks because I’m really trying to stick to this whole obedience thing but it is unbelievable hard because they have rules for just about everything and being AP now means I will never be able to have fun haha jk...hopefully. apparently when midnight struck the whole sky was covered with fireworks and people were shooting them down the street and everything so i was kind of really bummed I didn’t get to see all of it but i know it will all be worth it in the end but right now its just really frustrating and I’m not gonna lie it gets really hard at times. Good thing I know I’m supposed to be here or else this would be even worse.

I’m out of time again for this week! So i hope you get better Mom and I really will keep you in my prayers! Tell everyone hi for me :) I don’t know how the whole email thing is working at home if people want to do the individual emails or what but just know I love you all.

Elder Gubler

Sunday, January 1, 2012

Dec. 27, 2011

Dec. 27, 2011
So before I get into all the amazing Christmas stuff I’ve got a few stories so brace yourselves! Irmão Zambonie who is the absolute greatest and is an instructor in the CTM but he is the executive secretary for President Tanner in the São Paulo South mission so he was giving us the full low down on the mission details and president and just everything it was great but get this! there are 16 stakes, 99 wards, and 169 missionaries in the Sao Paulo South Mission and it is by far the smallest mission in Sao Paulo so that means we are gonna be having a good time that’s for sure! And there is a little island off of the coast that only has 4 missionaries on it at one time so that would be great to serve there! Next point: (I may have made a little email outline ha-ha).  Elder Almedia, the crazy Brazilian that loves me left this week because the Brazilians are only in the CTM for three weeks and he gave me one of his ties so I gave him one of mine but I started feeling bad about taking his tie so I snuck into his room to give it back to him and saw that he only had like 5 ties so the people in brazil are just so selfless and so kind! Everyone that talks about the people being amazing is spot on because they are just great and they have the strongest spirit even if they only have been members for five years their testimony is amazing!

We got another Elder from the Provo MTC this week, Elder Bresciano, he is a solid kid but sadly because of all the Provo missionaries that are as far along as we are, when they come to the Brazil CTM they are gonna have to split up our district and I may be a little bit devastating because I really do love everyone in our district! They are just all great :) It’s funny because they are people that I wouldn’t have hung out before but you learn to love everyone down here.

Now onto Saturday, Christmas Eve!! It was amazing I tell you!! :) First off it was essentially just free time for the whole day and second we got to wear normal people clothes again which I missed quite a bit! It was unbelievable nice to just wear jeans again even if they were way hotter than slacks I didn’t feel like a robot for a day ha-ha but we had time to write letters in the morning, played games and watched the Muppet Christmas movie after lunch (which had major potential but sadly the whole thing was in Portuguese with no subtitles so I didn’t catch any other words than "sorry" or "Merry Christmas" ha-ha but we´ll get there) and then they passed out district present so I got to play Santa for a bit and pass out ties for everyone and hair flower things for the sisters :) after dinner we watched a Christmas Carol, the really old one, and that is probably the worst Christmas movie ever but it was just nice to not be studying all day.

Onto Christmas day! I’m not gonna lie going into Christmas I was anticipating me to be really homesick the whole day but the spirit was so strong throughout the day I didn’t want to think about anything other than Christ. I thought it was gonna be totally different to have Christmas in a different country and with people I don’t really know but I realized that Christmas should be the same everywhere because it is about Christ and He is the same everywhere. I was in charge of planning the sacrament meeting on Sunday which was kind of way stressful but rewarding to see the prayers in Portuguese; see my district passing the sacrament, and the musical numbers in action. I didn’t have to decide any of the talks because the Branch Pres decides the day of and I realized that that was purely through the spirit that he decided. The talks that we had were amazing spiritual and so relatable that I may have been fighting back tears the whole meeting. I have never been so grateful to anyone before and as bad as it sounds I have never thought about Christ that much even on the day we celebrate his birth. I’m so grateful for his perfect example to me. For God´s willingness to send his only begotten son, our brother to suffer and die for us to be given the opportunity and the blessing to return and live with him again. I’m so grateful I have for the blessing I have to wear the name of Christ over my heart every day. I know this church is true and I’m so grateful for all that have sacrifices so much for me to be able to experience the blessings that come with this gospel.

I love you all so much! I think about you every day and hope you had a great Christmas!! :)

PS I calculated it and I’m gonna need 6 journals because I apparently am writing a ton and I haven’t been able to find any good ones around here.

I love you all, Elder Gubler

Dec. 20, 2011
I may have had my first major break down yesterday and it really sunk in that I wasn’t gonna see anyone for two years but I really love this place and if I was gonna be somewhere for two years this is the place the be and the work to be doing! Elder Horn said that his Grandparents know Grandpa Gubler so I think that’s where the connection is but how did Elder Bodily’s Mom get your number because that is hilarious ha-ha what did you two talk about?? He really is such a good companion and a way funny kid! The perfect companion in my eyes and actually I’d say I just have the perfect district! It’s hard sometimes to lead by example and always be working because we get along a little too well and may get one plenty of tangents.  Ha-ha but when we go through the temple we watch everything in English but when we go through the vail they ask us in Portuguese but we respond in English thank heavens!! And communication essentially comes down to lots and lots of hand motions and pointing ha-ha I’ve got pretty good at translating so far because the language is killing me.. It’s really discouraging at time but I know this is where I’m supposed to be and the Lord will take care of the rest! Getting up is kind of struggle! But as with anything practice makes perfect right ha-ha but yes please keep me posted on Olivers call! Because that is way exciting! :) I love you so much and pray about you and the fam every day multiple times! I hope you can feel it but time is essentially up! I don’t know if I’m supposed to respond to dads first email too or if you count for him too lol but I love you all so I’m trying to give everyone solid emails! :) I’ll find out what I can about the Christmas call! They haven’t said anything yet so I wouldn’t plan on it but you may have a nice Christmas surprise!

Love you more than anything Elder Gubler.

Dec 13, 2011
So this email this is kind of mega rushed because we only get half an hour and it’s nice and strict but just a nice little run down of the week! I love it here!!!! The flight was quite the adventure and there was a period where I could not feel either of my cheeks or my legs for two hours but who needs sleep anyways :) I hope everyone is doing well and there weren’t too many tears after I left! I kind of lost it when I started reading the letters and lost it on the plane but I can do this and I know this is what I’m supposed to be doing!! It is outrageously humid here! The first couple days were by far the worst when it came to the humidity or maybe I’m just adapting but I do kind of miss snow and I decided there is no way I will EVER use that "raincoat" I got ha-ha, but the food is just amazing!!!! I had some pineapples the other day and just about died they were so good and shockingly the beans and rice is really good but all this meat and fruit is kind of doing a number on me but we all saw that one coming! Ha-ha.  The spirit here is amazing and especially on Sunday! And guess what happened on Sunday..... I’m freaking DISTRICT LEALDER so that should be interesting ha-ha but I absolutely love my district and Elder Bodily the person grandpa knew is my companion and the other one grandpa knew Elder Horn is my roommate so it’s kind of a tiny little world in the Brazil MTC! We are doing the choir with is interesting seeing as I don’t really know any Portuguese yet ha-ha but the language is beautiful and the people are a riot!!! no one can really talk to each other so there is a ton of just hand motions being thrown around ha-ha sorry the letter is kind of all over the place I’m almost out of time and this is kind of mega exciting :) we got to go to the Sao Paulo temple today and will get to go every P day and it was interesting but even when you are performing ordinances in another language the spirit that is in that building is like none other!! :) but oh bad news we aren’t allowed to email pictures or take pictures outside of the MTC or on any other day than P day so I can’t send pictures until I leave the MTC in 9 weeks oh and this is kind of weird but the MTC is called the CTM down here... I love you all so much and don’t know what I would do without you! Thank you so much for your support in my mission and with everything! I know this gospel is true and I’m so excited to finally be able to share the gospel with the people of Brazil! I’m so thankful for Jesus Christ and his willingness to atone for all of our sins! I pray for you all every night and don’t you every forget that! Once I get used to this email thing I will be able to email everyone because the internet is plenty fast but don’t worry well get there :) I’m off to go explore Sao Paulo baby because we get like a two block radius that we can walk around the MTC! Keep the emails coming!!

I love you so much.

Elder Gubler

Family Photo Shoot














Jacob's Pre Mission Photo Shoot