Marking a Date for Baptism

 

Hello everyone, this week was a lot of work and we said goodbye to my companion Elder Matos. He finished his missions and returned home to Manaus earlier today. Other than that, not a lot of updates this week.

 

BAPTISMIMAL DATE 

This week we marked one of the most important baptismal dates on my mission. We had a family night over zoom with my companion (Elder Pacheco) and his mom and two elders from his hometown. We were talking about families and how families can be together forever and the importance of temples and after Elder Pacheco´s mom understood the importance of these things she accepted a baptismal date. It was such a spiritual experience, and I was very happy to be a part of it. I am very happy for his family. 

 

TEACHING 

The main thing that happened this week was we taught a lot of lessons. With my new companion he has been letting me talk a lot more and teach the lessons, so my Portuguese gets better, and it has been going really well but sometimes people look at him and ask him what I'm talking about. But when people ask where I’m from and how long I’ve been out I let them guess and they all guess the United States, but people have been guessing that I’ve been out longer than I actually have so that's good, I think. But yeah, the language is a lot better and I'm able to make contacts on my own and hold conversations with people.

 

STUDIES 

Studies have been a lot better too. I have a lot of time to sit down and do a good personal study and now I live with the leaders of your zone, so they have been teaching me a lot. With the zone leaders they have been helping me really understand what I can do to be more helpful and really get to understand the people before I try and teach them because one of the most important parts is being able to help people along with teaching them.

 

 

That's pretty much it for this week not a whole lot happened, just a lot of finding and teaching. We have transfers this week on Friday so we will see what happens. 

 

PHOTOS

(don't worry I got a haircut today, so my hair isn't super long anymore)

                                        

Transfered...

 

So yeah, sadly I was transferred last second this week. I found out at 1pm on Monday and left at 5am on Tuesday. Leaving Unaí was very sad, but this new area is great, and I have great companions now. 

 

LEAVING UNAÍ

Leaving was very sad especially because it was so last second. I didn't have time to tell everyone goodbye, but I did make one final soup for the people who could see me off. It was a great first area and I learned a lot, the people of unaí are amazing and will always have a place in my heart. 

 

 

TRIO IN PEDREGAL 

Pedregal is my new area, and it is great. My new companions are Elder Matos (from Manaus) he will go home next Monday lol so not a lot of time with him but he's great. And also, Elder Pacheco (from Argentina) he has 6 months, so he'll be here my whole mission, he is a convert to the Church and has a very strong testimony. The actual area is great, but it has a lot of hills and a lot of walking so it's been a little difficult on my knee but yeah, it's a good area with great people. The members here are part of a group and meet in someone's house so it's even smaller than unaí kind of crazy. 

 

LEARNING EXPERIENCE 

When I first found out I was leaving I was very disappointed because it was so last minute, and I had a lot of questions. I wanted to know why I was leaving where I was going and who I would be with. I didn't even find out where I was going until 10 minutes before getting in the uber. Where I was going and who I would be with were all answered but the why I was going still wasn't sure why. But in the few days I have been here I have learned it was to be with my companions, they are amazing examples, and I am leaning a lot from them. They are helping a ton with my Portuguesa and how to teach better, so it has been a much-needed learning experience. 

 

We also had divisions in a town called Cristalina and had a baptism for Vanessa who is awesome and was very excited we made cookies for her. 

 

PHOTOS 

New roads and companions, baptism, goodbyes, divisions, and the new area. 

                                                

Special Experience

 

This week was a little more difficult than others, but I also learned a lot from the difficulties. We also had the opportunity to hear words from one of the 12 apostles, Ulisses Soares, and were able to do a tour of the temple in Brasília.

 

TEMPLE

The temple was amazing I think it's my favorite one so far. The inside was astonishing, I’m not even really sure how to describe it. But right now, everyone has an opportunity to visit, if you are a member of the church or not. Obviously none of you will visit this one during the open house but if there is every an open house for a temple near you I highly recommend doing a tour it's only about 15 minutes and they take you through all of the rooms and you can see all the details in the design and how each temple uniquely reflects the location and surrounding area? I'm not sure if that makes sense but yeah. One of the best parts of the temple was being able to feel the Spirit, in one of the rooms they gave us a minute or 2 to just ponder where everyone was quiet, and we just had time to think, and it was the most I've ever felt the spirit. I like how one of the missionaries described it as you could hear the silence.

 

ALL OF THE MISSIONARIES IN OUR MISSION

So, with the temple visit and words from Apostle Soares it was with all of the missionaries in our mission. The last I've heard of all of them getting together was probably a year ago. It isn't normal because we have missionaries 20 hours north from Brasília and I think 5 hours south of Brasília so it's just far for some people. But it was great to see all the different missionaries some I have never seen before. It was great to meet new people and see old friends. I also was reunited with half of my district from the MTC (Missionary Training Center), and it was so cool to see that we could all have a conversation in Portuguese and how our language skills have grown. Shout-out to Sister Newman and Elder Grimshaw. 

 

WORDS FROM APOSTLE ULISSES SOARES 

It was very special to hear words from an apostle in person because he knew exactly what each of us needed to hear. He said a lot but there were 2 main things I understand from what he was saying. 1) we have the apostles and prophet praying for all the missionaries around the world. This was really cool to hear because I had never thought that they would include us in their prayers but, they pray that all of us can stay strong and continue to help people. 2) Help others. I never really realized how strong of a word help is, it has so many applications. There are so many ways all of us can help others not just missionaries. And there's so many ways we can help others it could be as simple as opening a door for someone but, the other thing is you never know what someone might be going through and how the little things we do might impact them. But also, maybe not maybe they'll think nothing about it but, that doesn't change the fact that we should do it anyway and allow the opportunity to be present. 

 

PHOTOS

 

I will add more next week lol I’m trying to figure out how to get pictures off of my Google drive.

Lights of Others

 This week was great. We stayed very busy and went by a lot faster than the past few weeks. We had a service project, game nights, and 2 baptisms.

 

BAPTISMS

The baptisms this week were of 2 brothers, Rhysllon (10) and Raylanderson (11). We had been teaching their mom for about a month or so and then this Monday we asked the 2 kids if they wanted to be baptized after we had a lesson about the gospel of Jesus Christ. Right after we asked them, they responded instantly saying Quero which translates to I want, and we were like ok let's do this then. It has been a little difficult to take them to the church and all the activities because it is a 30-minute walk, but they were there at all of them, Family night, game night and church and they love it. After the baptisms we were walking them home and they said that it was really cool, and they wished all of their family could feel the same. It was a great feeling, and I can tell that they have a special light in them.

 

"SERVICE"

I'm not too sure if I would call this service because it was so fun. We were able to break a wall. Yes, just us mallets and a big wall and it was great and very much needed, there's nothing like being able to shatter a wall with a big mallet. The only bad part was the cleanup. We spent 3/4 of the time just cleaning up and taking buckets of broken bricks to the dumpster. I'm not really sure if what we actually did makes sense, but I'll add photos, so it makes sense. 

 

FINDING

This week our finding was great. We found lots of people who were very receptive to our messages. We have a couple we found at the park who after our lesson were asking questions about why we were serving missions and we talked to her for like 20 minutes about what missionary work is. Then we have a 19-year-old who has tons of questions about the gospel and thought what we were teaching him was a little strange but after we answered some of his questions, he felt a lot better and even asked when we were available to come back.

 

FLOWERS

We were doing a lesson at a park one night and we were teaching an older lady who and they came up to us and gave her a flower and me a flower and said God bless and that's all then they went off and continued with their night. After this happened the lady was so happy and you could see her mood change.

Getting to know the Mission President

 

This week was great. I had the opportunity to meet the new mission president a lot. We also returned to Unai with my new companion. Not a whole lot happened, and I don't have a ton of time so sorry if I don't respond.

 

BREAKFAST LUNCH AND DINNER WITH PRESIDENT

Sunday night me and 2 other missionaries had dinner with the mission president and his wife, and they are awesome. He is very funny and loving but also wants us to work hard. His wife made the best lasagna I have ever had. Then we slept there and had sandwiches and juice for breakfast. During lunch he told me to come with him too. I'm not too sure why he wanted me to go with him, but I did, and we had rice beans and beef and it was great. 

 

RETURNING TO UNAI WITH ELDER LIMA

After we returned this week, we did a lot of finding and are trying to do lessons but were having a little bit of a struggle. Elder Lima is great with teaching people and knows a lot about the gospel and the doctrine. My Portuguese is getting a lot better because he hardly knows hardly any English. I started having dreams in Portuguese too so it's very cool.

 

Festa Julina 

I'm not too sure how to explain what this was. There's not a whole lot I could compare it to from the United States but, it was very fun. They had a bunch of food, lots of games, singing and dancing. 

 

PHOTOS

Don't have a lot this week I was waiting on people to send me them, but they didn’t!

Busiest Week Ever

 This will be a little longer then the normal emails but a lot happend. 

This week we did so much we spent about 14 hours of this week on 5 different busses. Received transfers, had a farewell for Elder Haris who Flys home today, had a baptism, went to a giant waterfall, had divisions with the other elders and did district councle in person. It was very fun but very tiring. 

TRANSFERS

So transfers happen every 6 weeks where you have a chance to move areas or switch companions. But i will be staying in unai and will be companions with Elder Lima he is from Brazil and has 2 more weeks then me so it will be fun. I don't think he knows English but I guess well see he gets here tomorrow because he was all the way at the top of our mission boundaries and has a 20 hour bus ride. I am very excited to be with a Brazilian and to use Portuguese a lot more. 

TCHAU ELDER HARRIS

This morning I said goodbye to Elder Haris and saw him off at the airport. He was a great missionary and everyone I talked to always had great things to say about him he always knew how to help people with what they needed most and everyone adored him. He has a 20ish hour travel home so it will be great. 

ANA GABRIELLA 

Ana Gabriella is the newest member of our church she was baptized Saturday and she is awesome. She know lots of english and is very intelligent and all of the members love her so she was very excited to be baptized. The water was very cold but other than that it was great. 

SPAGHETTI 

For ana Gabriellas baptism the members wanted me to make Spaghetti and I agreed before I knew that it would be for everyone there so I made a ton. It was the biggest pot of Spaghetti I had ever seen. But it turned out very good and now they want me to cook for a festival they're having next week. I'm not sure how to feel I'm glad they liked it but i would  rather just cook for 3 or 4 people not 25-30. 

PDAY IN FORMOZA

It is crazy to thing that all of this happened in the past week it seems like so long ago. But we went to formosa for our P-day (preparation day) and went to a giant waterfall it was so cool but we were all soaked. Then we also had dinner with some of the member that elder Harris knew there they were all super cool and the food was great. One of them asked me if I was a Brazilian because I asked Elder Harris a question in portuguese and not English she was confused. 

DISTRICT COUNCLE 

Usually we just do district council over zoom because we are so far but since it was our last one for this transfer we all meet in person and it was way better. It was a lot easier to tell that my Portuguese is getting better because I could understand probably 90% of what everyone was saying so it was very relieving. At the end we did a mini "testimony" thing where everyone in the district shared what they learned in the transfer and a miracle that happened and it was amazing to see all the things going on in our district (3 pairs of Elder and 2 pairs of sister across difrent areas)

PHOTOS

We also found monkeys and cookies better than anything I've had before. 

Scones and Visits

 

This week was great we did lots of finding and are helping prepare some people for baptisms this Saturday so lots of work. 

 

COOKIES AMERICANO AND SCONES

So even though their called cookies americano it's really just chocolate chip cookies but chocolate chips are very hard to find here and are not cheap, so we used other chocolate and they turned out great. We made then for family night and had to wait on one of the members to bring the eggs and sugar, so we started a little late and there were some people who were very hungry to say the least. But then when they finished, they didn't look the best, but they were filled with love so that’s all that matter 

I also made blueberry scones with a lemon glaze (they don't have blueberry’s here, so I used strawberries). So technically they were strawberry scones and I just made them for Elder Haris and 2 other people because some plans fell through. But they turned out amazing and I was very happy I think I'll be able to make them for all the members one of these Sundays. 

 

FINDING

This week we did a lot of finding because we have been traveling a lot and are actually back out 4 hours away from our area again until Wednesday, so we wanted to find people to teach for when we get back. There were 3 days in a row where we spent 3-4 hours straight only doing new contacts and lessons. It went decently there was a lot of people who would answer or answer and tell us to come back other day then not be home the next day. But we found 5 people who were very interested, and we had really good lessons with them. 

Not a whole lot this week but lots of work being done. :)

PHOTOS 

Cursed baby, abandoned apartments, scones, free cotton candy, cookies.