16 January 2017

Boa tarde! it is a good birthday! my companion made me a cake and we celebrated in the chapel with our district and hot dogs brazilian style. i also got the package from you guys thanks so much! i haven´t gotten to read the cards yet but we used the balloons to celebrate in the chapel. I hope you re all doing well and having a good start to the new year in all of your activities. 

This was a good week. Felipe will be baptized this saturday, he is so great it got the the point where he conducts the lessons witht the prayer and hymn and guesses (correctly) what will ber the next thing we will teach. Jennifer will also be abptized this satuday, a 16 year old girl who is dating a guy in the ward that just got his mission call to Manaus, Brasil! she has been going to church for a year but just this week her dad finally signed the form for her baptism. We also ahev other reall great investigators including Paulina, an older lady whose Husband has Alzheimers so it si hard for her to go to church right now, and Thaís that is a 21 year old girl that has a lot of questions and interest. The work is going well!

A little message this week is based on a mormon video that we have been sharing with people this week about a bush that was big and beautiful , but did not produce fruit. The gardener cut down the bush to the roots and the bush seems to cry saying`` why did you do that to me, I was doing so big and beautiful and now look at me, i am just a stump´´ but then that bush grew again into a big beautiful bush that produced a lot of fruit. I think it is a great analogy for our lives. We may be content with how we are and not want to accept new challenges in our lives, but God (the gardner) knows we will later be even better and produce more ``fruit´´ than before. 

Have a great week!

3 July 2017

hey everyone! wow 9 weeks of missionary homecomings and farwells! sounds like things are exciting in the Kentlands ward. This week was good-- the branch had a ``festa junina´´ which is a traditional party that eveyone does here this time of year. photos included. ALSO-- remember Kessy? well he said that maybe in the future he will be more ready so we  prayed a lot for him and really prayed with faith that he would feel the fault of the gospel and we waited a week and called him just to see how he was doing and without us asking he said that he reflected a bit and felt that something was missing so he want to continue to investigate and search the gospel. Miracles! I don´t remember if i said already but he hasdepression and really wants to fin a path that makes him happy. After a hard slow week we were so happy when this happened yesterday. We literally jumped for joy on the street haha (don´t worry there was no one else on that street) but i hope you all are doing well i love you all wih you all a great week :)

26 June 2017

The sunrise from our apartment is so beautiful every day! It was a good week. Unfortunatley, our most progressing investigators, Kessy, the young man that works at the market and Joice, the young woman that had a baptismal date marked, decided that they did not want to continue right now. It was sad, but free agency is very important. We are going to continue to work with our other investigators and just do our best. I had a great experience this week with the Sacrament. Recently i have been studying and learning more baout the sacrament and also how we can ask God sepcifically what we can imporove and the sacrament is a great oportunity to reflect and recieve these answers. After a hard week, I was excited to participate in the ordinacne of the Sacrament and I could really recieve answers to my prayers and revelation to know what i can do better. i know that when we really take the sacrament with a broken heart and contrite spirit, it is an amazing experience. 

Sounds fun for Nathan and Amy to be in Mexico and Daniel in california! Sounds like everyone is going to have a good busy week. I also found out that i will be able to go to the temple in Porto Alegre on my trip home! I´m really looking forward to that.

19 June 2017

hey everyone. this week i had my last zone conference where i bore my ``last testimony´´ which was so strange. it was a great conference and President Louza told me ``God just need one second to do a miracle and you have a lot of seconds left.´´ i liked that. Then i had a division wiht Sister Soares that was great. Kessy is doing great he went to church yesterday and loved it. He is very inteligent and sincere and has so much potential to be a great member. We are blessed with so many other great investigatros and families and it seems like we are planting a lot of seeds here in São pedro and I hope that we will be able to harvest a few before July 18th! But things are doing great here I am excited for these last few weeks. It´s a little weird because it seems like I will a missionary in brasil forever haha. Good to hear about all your activities, I hope you all are doing great! 

oh, PS happy fathers day dad! i didn´t remember because here in brasil fathers day is in august.... hope it was a good one!

12 June 2017

hey everyone! it was a great cold week! we found an investigator that is really really great and his name is Kessy. he started talking to us in the market where he works and we got his contact and visited him yesterday and he was so prepared. he has a lot fo personal problems but he could really understand how the gospel would help him and after teaching about joseph smith he said that he already beleives that this is the true church. So many miracles! we are workling with a lot of other investigators that are progressing well. The branch is still very small and it will take a lot of work and patience to get back to where it wasabout a year ago (it was goriwing really well but some thins happened that made almost everyone expet one family stop going).

This week i learned a lot about grace because i felt  a little inadaquate and frustrated but i remembered the scripture in 2 Nefi 25:26 that it is by grace that we are saved after all we can do. And all we can do is repent and try tto be better each day. I´m grateful for the atonement of Jesus Christ that literally saves us from everything. I love you all have a great week :)

5 June 2017

hello how is everyone doing? sounds like everyone had a fun busy week with travels and the start of summer. we had another good cold rainy week here. so far, not many people have gone to our english and piano classes, but people are showing interest, even 2 people today in the market called for us to ask about the classes. 

this week had a lo of ups and downs but we really sa a lot of miracles. we founda lady who is very interested and accepted a baptismal date, but we were sad when she didn´t go to church. we also spent 45 minutes waiting for other investigators outside of the church and it appeared that no one would show up so we went inside but as soon as we entered relief society the branch president called for us because a family of investigators showed up! we were so happy, they are really great they a different religion, assembly of God, but they love to go to our church too, they used to attend our churhc in another city. I learned a lot about not doubting, but always expecting and waiting for miracles and then they happen when you least expect it. I think this week i elarned a lot about faith and all the good things that happen when we have faith and faith is what gives us strength to keep going in the hard times.

read alma 44:4 :)

love you all have a great week!

22 May 2017

hello everyone. sounds like ou all are going to have a fun busy week! matthew, congrats on your ne job you will have in finland is it cold there? i hopoe everyone at home ha s fun memorial day weekend. 

saturday the baptism of Jonathan went well, it as very spiritual. He bore a nice testimony and had a lot of famil and friends there to watch that are not members. This week unfortunately Lilian who we marekd a baptism is passing through some serious dificulties and she doesn´t want to continue to be taught for the meanwhile. But this week we were very blessed with other things. An investigator we found named Darci went to church and just loved it. he is great! he is about 75 years old and we met him when we were helping another man with heavy grocery bags and he called towards us and invited us to visit him. At church it was very spiritual because he does not read and the lesson in gospel priciples was about faith and there was a story about a man who wanted to leanr how to read so he prayed and worked hard and was able to learn how to read. He was very motivated by this and wants to learn how to read and has a lot of faith that this is the true church. I als studied a lot this week about really loving and serving and being a Christlike example for others because that is when they recongize that we are representatives of the Lord. I firmly believe that Darci recongized this when he saw us helping someone with the heavy bags. 

29 May 2017

hello! sounds like you all had a very fun weekend! did the nats win? it was also a fun exciting week here with lots of rain. this week we had a lot of creative activities--- we started teaching piano and english classes at the church that we will give every saturday. we also were in the newspaper, a lady interviewed me and sister christensen (we were in a division that day) and they also announced the classes on the radio. we are famous in this small town! we also have great investigators, including a 14 yeard old girl, Joice, that went to a youth activity. at the activity we watched a cool new video from the chruch about the scriptures and the book of mormon and then ate pizza. Joice loved it and shared her testimony too about teh scriptures (she knows the bible very well). Looking forwrd to another great week! 

here´s a quote that i heard and i liked:

``Before you share the gospel with the world, you have to share it with your neighbor.´´

i love you all, have another great week and enjoy the warm summer! 

15 May 2017

it was great to talk to you yesterday! i´m sorry about my englsih. i will practice. it was fun to meet kelly, she seems great. happy mother´s day again mom. i won´t say a lot because we talked yesterday but here are some photos of São Pedro do Sul. or as i like to say ``Sião Pedro do Céu´´ because Sião means Zion and Céu means heaven... have a great week i love you guys!

8 May 2017

hello everyone! i don´t have much time but i have a lot to say! first of all, next week i will try to skpe 6:00 here which mught be 5:00 there. and.... we are STILL in Santa Maria!! we will finally go to são pedro today. but i have a great story because there really was a purpose for us being here. 

On monday, we walked the whole day and then when we started to work at 6:00, EVERYTHING fell through and we were tired and discouraged. It was 9:00 and we were close to home ut now we don´t go home until 9:30 and so there was sill 30 minutes to work. We were tired and wanted to go home, but i was praying silently to find someone and we decided to continue and knock more doors. It was dark and there was no one in the street and after many ``no´´s we passed a house and it called my attention so we knocked there and a young man came out and seemed really interested. it turns out his mom was baptized a year ago and passed away 5 months ago and he listened to the messages before and has visited church. We marked a day to return and teached him the basic steps of the gospel and invited him to b baptized and he accepted, went to chuch on sunday and bore his testimony that what he wants most is to be baptized and that God sent the missionaries to find him again. It was so spriitual and i leanred so many lessons. i learnedthe importance of being obedient and enduring to the end even when we are tired and it is had, because that is when the most blessings come. Also I was reminded that God is always preparing people and he knows where they are so we need to pray continually and always seek to follow the spirit and do his will. God works in mysterious ways and everyhting happens for a reason but i know that´s why we had to stay here for 2 weeks while it was tkaing a while to set up our new house. Miracles happen!

I lvoe yo all, ahve a great week, until mothers day!!

1 May 2017

Hello! so, it was for me to be in São pedro now, but funny story. I got on the bus to santa Maria and arrived at the bus station to find out that they had not yet arranged a place to live in São Pedro so i would stay in Santa Maria for who knows how long until they arranged everything there. SO this week we stayed and worked in Santa Maria which was interesting. It is way different here than the rest of the cities that i served because it is way more urban and there are tons of young, busy people and they are a little bit colder. It seemed to me like the ``New York City´´ of Rio Grande do Sul. We were just talking with everyone and finding new people to teach this week. It was good beause i learned a lot and also i think i learned a lot more about charity and treating others with love. My new companion Sister Costa is awesome she is from Cruz Alta and she is really sweet and fun! It´s fun to have another companion gaúcha! sometime this week we will rpobably get to go to our new area which will be another great challenge! but i am excited! It has also been very cold here this week. Winter is arriving!

congrats daniel with the graduation!! also mothers day is coming up, is there a specific time that i should call you guys? if not, it will probably be in the afternoon sometime.

something that i learned today in a talk that i read is that questions are good. it does not mean that we don´t have faith, but questions allow us to learn and progress, work to recieve revelation and aquire more faith. so whenever we have a question or dificuldade, we should ask God with faith and then study it out and we will be able to learn the mysteries of God. 

Have a great week everyone!

24 April 2-17

Hey everyone! how is it going? Happy birthday to matthew!!! have fun traveling!! 

this was a great, crazy week.  The work was good and Juarez is going to be baptized next week! BUT, i won´t be here :( I am being transfered again and Sister Gartner is going back home to Santa Maria so we are closing the area here and the elders serving in our ward are going to take over our area too. I am going to São Pedro do Sul to open an area that has not had missionaries for a few months and my companion will be another ``short term´´ sister from Cruz Alta! There a few of these missionaries now in our mission because there is lacking in the number of missionaries here.  São Pedro is a small town with a small branch so it will be a good challenge there but i really hope i can make a difference there and learn even more. 

We had a great conference in Santa Maria and I could learn more about a lot of things, especially faith. Presidente Louza talked about EXERCISING faith. He said the exercises are not easy, but they make you stronger and make you feel good and is the same thing with our faith. We can never doubt that we have faith, but always work to strengthen it, and strengthen it by bexercising it. The little things we do in the gospel are really the most important things because they make a huge difference in our atitudde, spirituality, and progress. I love you all, have a great week 

17 April 2017

hey everyone! this was a great week with lots of success and miracles! we founds a ton of great new investigators and the family that i mentioned last week visited church and loved it. some of our other investigators traveled for the holiday so we have to visit them more and prepare them well for baptism. I also traveled to Cruz Alta for a division and there was a ward activity where i could see everyone from my old ward there and it was so great i realized how much i love everyone and i was happy to see many less actives that are active now! Also here in santo angelo there was a stake relief society activity where i could see many of the sister from Santa Rosa, my first area and it was so weird to see everyone from there after e year but they all remembered me so that´s good! 

This week i learned a bit about atitude and things we say because i read in the liahona of this month a very good article ``the war goes on´´ and i learned a lot about the techniques that satan uses. But something specifically interesting that i learned is that satan can not know our thoughts or weaknesses unless we say it out loud. That´s one reason it is so important to never complain, speak unkindly about others or say anything negative. And other interesting tactics to recognize satan´s temptation and overcome them. I recommend the article. But it was a great week and I learned a lot. i continue to learn so much every day, recognize more and more weaknesses every day and learn to trust in the Lord.

10 April 2017

bom dia!

how are you all doing? excited for easter and spring? has anyone seen the church´s easter video?

I am loving my companion, we get along great and its fun to have a companion from here. this week was good, we found some great new investigators from references and we are working with a girl named Dani that went to general conference and to church again this sunday. she is really great but her mom doe not want ehr to be baptized yet so we are working with that. The work is going! And i was able to study a bit more and apply the conference talks this week. I really like the talk about following the spirit by acting immediately on first impressions because they are almost always promptings from the spirit. It makes a huge difference in faith and acting without doubting. I love the gospel and I know that when we look to follow the prophet, the apostles, and most importantly the savior, we are blessed and have peace. 

Have a great week!