Bom Dia para vocês! Espero
que tudo estejam bem com vocês!!
Olá,
This week flew by so fast!
The weeks are starting to feel like days! Last night I realized that today, in
one week Noah will be leavin home for the MTC. That’s crazy!! It has come up so
fast. It feels like yesterday I was in Gama at a lanhouse watching the video of
Noah opening up his mission call!! the time has flowwn by so fast. But I’m
super stoked and excited for Noah and the experiences that he will have!! Atta
boy!!!
Me and Elder Fernandez
worked our butts off this week!! You know you had a good week and worked hard
when come Sunday night you are just exhausted beyond belief. Pday is definitely
necessary, not just to email and write home but also to rest up for the next
week. Our mission has a new rule, of making 100 contacts with people in the
streets per week. We found out Wednesday, and me and Fernandez ended up with
102 contacts! on top of teaching 37 lessons in peoples homes this week!! We try
to do most of our contacts while walking from appointment to appointment or
when appointments fall through and people aren’t home. We normally have to walk
about 25 to 30 minutes from one house to the next appointment. We found 12 new
investigators this week that are really solid and really interested and that we
were able to find and teach this week. Just shows you might have to talk with
10 people, to find 1 good one that is interested. Two of the people we found
are Valto and Conceição.
Thursday night while we
were walkin to an appointment, we walked past a house and I had a strong
feeling to go back and knock on it. So we went back and knocked and "asked
for water". Something we usually do is say that we are missionaries, have
been walking a ton are super thirsty (even when we had just asked for water at
another house a minute earlier) ha. It seems to be working!!
Valto came and brought us
water and he is a super cool guy!! He is in his later 40s and is married. He
welcomed us in and we taught him the Restoration! It was super spiritual and he
had so many good questions! When we answered them, it all made sense to him and
we invited him to get baptised if God answers his prayers about what we taught
him! He was like Of course I would!! and we marked a date for August 31st!
The dude is a stud!!
Conceição was a contact we
did in the street. She was walking by us and when I guess she could tell that
we were gonna talk to her cause before we opened our mouths she said "No,
I don’t want anything to do with what you want to say." And walked right
past us in a hurry. I smiled, kinda chuckled and took this as a challenge!! :)
, So I jogged after her and say "Irmã espera, espera!" She then
stopped and explained to us she is really strong in her church Assembleia de
Deus and that her husband and 13 yr old son happen to be members of our church.
After we were talking for a bit in the street, we started inviting her to
church and asked if we could write down her address and share a message with
her and her family. She said No. After we kept tryin to convince her she looked
me right in the eye and said "Why should I!" Then I just went
off on pure testimony and by the power of the Spirit. It was incredible
experience, the words were just flowing faster and better sounding then I think
I have ever spoken. It was probably better than I would of done in English. She
just had a shock look on her face and I knew she had felt the authority and
power that was behind the words. After I finished, she smiled and told us her
address and said we could come by Sunday night! Sunday night we went over
there and brought Raimundo with us too. We taught the Restoration and it was
one of the best lessons that I’ve had the privilege of participating in. We
invited her to be baptised on September 7th if she received an answer from God,
and she accepted!! The feelings that we had after leaving that lesson are
difficult to explain. It’s a surety that you feel, that you know without a
doubt what you taught is true and you just feel so happy!
Raimundo ended up driving
us around and teaching with us all Sunday!! The dude is seriously a stud!! He
gave us a reference of his friend and took us over there, his name is Augusto.
The lesson was awesome and Raimundo spoke a lot and boar his testimony! It was
such an awesome moment to see the changes that Raimundo has made in the past
two months when I got here. His first Sunday back to church was my first in
Itapoã so we both have 8 Sundays straight!! Him and Ivaneide will get
married at the end of the month or beginning of September, and she really wants
to get baptised the Sunday after! Raimundo and Ivaneide treat us like
family and Raimundo is always wantin to make sure that we are takin care of and
have what we need! It’s a blessing for me to have gotten to know them!!
Augusto (Neymar Jr.) is
still doing great!! We give him readin assignments in the Book of Mormon with
questions he has to answer and he has been doing them! One of the proudest
moments thou, was the other day at his house. We were sharing a message with
Augusto, his whole family, and his mom´s friend. It was awesome while we were
teaching, Augusto would look at me and ask, "Bean, can I explain this
part?" yaehhhhh buddy. haha it was awesome. And then his mom started
crying when she talked about how grateful she is for us and that we were
willing to leave our own families to come find her son! (I almost cried when
she said those words too). She talked about the changes she has seen in
Augusto and it is amazing. Her friend even mentioned to how much Augusto has
changed. She said that Augusto use to be really rebellious, and very
disrespectful and not care about anything, only soccer. When she would come by
the house and ask if his mom was home, he would be really disrespectful and just
not give a darn. He always disrespected people and his mom. But the other
day, she came by the house and asked if his mom was home, Augusto welcomed her
in with a big hug and kiss on the cheek, and then got her a cup of coca-cola
before she could even ask for something to drink. She said that she was shocked
and thought "Is this even Augusto?" He has literally become a
whole new young man!! I am beyond proud of him. Seeing him at church, he goes
around and introduces himself to people he doesn’t know and is proactive and is
signing up to go to EFY (FSY) next spring 2015!!! It is so hard to
explain how proud I am of that kid. It is incredible seeing how much being
a part of the Gospel of Jesus Christ truly does change lives and makes you into
the person God hopes and expects you will become here. Augusto even is workin
on his "Duty to God" everyday (something I didn’t even finish or
focus on like I should of) It will be the hardest thing saying goodbye to
him when I have to leave Itapoã. He has grown to be like a little
brother.
But I am so grateful for
the experiences that I’m having here!! Its incredible how much God loves us!!
This work his true!! Go out and spread the word!!!!
Love,
Elder Bean
 |
| About to start the day |
 |
| Eating Açai |
 |
| Augusto's mom's friend, Fernandez, Augusto, Me |
 |
| Augusto "Neymar Jr" |
 |
| Eu corri means I ran. It's a marathon shirt that Raimundo always wore and I would always tell him that's a sick shirt dude. He brought it wrapped up as a gift for me one Sunday. Love it |
No comments:
Post a Comment