Transfers

Hi Everyone!

This week we had transfers! On Wednesday, we drove out to Hagerstown to drop off Elder Wilson and pick up Elder Harris. On the way there we stopped at Jimmy John's, and ran into Elder Page! I had never met him in person before so I was super excited (if you don't remember who Elder Page is, he is the Elder I teach English class with). Also, I found out Elder Harris was originally assigned to the Brazil, Goiânia mission, so that's pretty cool! We have been having a lot of fun and we all get along great. 

Sadly, the work has slowed down quite a bit in our area. We haven't had contact with Tatiana in over a week, and Debbie texted us saying she doesn't want to meet anymore. It was pretty disappointing, but that's how it goes sometimes. But, we were able to get back in contact with someone I taught when I first got here, Teri, so that's good.

Spiritual thought: Mosiah 3:17 "And moreover, I say unto you, that there shall be no other name given nor any other way nor means whereby salvation can come unto the children of men, only in and through the name of Christ, the Lord Omnipotent."

Christ is the only way, follow him

Things I like: We got to go to Jimmy John's. Also, we have been able to go on some nice walks, and last pday we did the Maryland Heights Hike again. It's so pretty here in the fall

Things I hate: The landlord had a dying pine tree cut down in front of our house, which is nice except all the Ladybugs from said tree have now moved into our house. They are all over the place haha.

Photos!

1. Last P-day hike

2. Walk to Jefferson Rock (Thomas Jefferson stood on this rock)

3. A big cannon

4. The new trio

5. Sunrise from our townhome window

6. Meeting Elder Page

7. The old trio

Transferências e Divisões

 Hi!

This week we had exchanges, zone conference, AND we found out about transfers. We'll start with exchanges. I got to stay in my area with my zone leader Elder Baggaley. He is a super cool guy and we had a blast. It was kinda nice to be out of a trio for a day. Trios are fun, but kinda hard when trying to teach people. Zone conference was great as well. It was our first full-zone in-person conference since quarantine!  Saturday night, we found out that Elder Wilson will be leaving, and Elder Dixon and I will be getting a new third companion, Elder Harris. It'll be good because Elder Harris speaks Portuguese, so we can all practice more.

Other than the things mentioned above, things went pretty slow. All of our appointments fell through, except 2 lessons with Debbie, and a couple member lessons. In our lesson with Debbie, we tried to mark a baptismal date, but she still isn't ready. We are trying to help her realize that revelation only comes after much prayer, scripture study, and church attendance. But, it's hard to help her keep commitments. Since we didn't have many lessons this week, it gave us a lot of time to make videos. We have an awesome one coming out tonight, so go check it out on my Facebook!

Spiritual thought: 2 Nephi 20:15 "Shall the ax boast itself against him that heweth therewith? Shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it? As if the rod should shake itself against them that lift it up, or as if the staff should lift up itself as if it were no wood!"

We are like tools in the hands of God. The good we have and do isn't because of us, but because of God. Tools can't do anything without someone using them. We shouldn't boast of ourselves, but thank God for all we have.

Things I like: The leaves are starting to change and it is getting colder. It's finally become more like fall!

Things I hate: Sprickets (Cave Crickets). I keep finding them all over my house and they're nasty

Photos!

1. & 2. we did service sealing a basement wall for a food pantry

3. A Chilean member made us a box of delicious empanadas 

Weekly Sacrament Meeting!!!

 Hi there!

This week we had an exciting thing happen, we found out we can go to church every week, and that there can be 100 people at church! It will be super nice because then we can invite people to church every week, and meet more of the members.

Tatiana was supposed to be at church, but she was feeling sick so she had to watch it from home. We were able to have a couple lessons this week, which was good. Our friend Debbie watched 30 minutes of conference, and she told us what she learned is that she probably should be baptized! It's crazy because when we originally called her she was like "I'll never convert, but you can share messages with me". She is unsure about baptism still and wants a confirmation that that is what she needs. Please pray that she can receive that. Debra, who we taught last week, canceled on us so no progress there.

Spiritual thought: In conference, I noticed many people talked about Joseph Smith being in Liberty Jail. In his darkest moment, when he thinks God has forsaken him, God speaks to him saying "my son, peace be unto they soul". Many people are going through hard times, but Elder Godoy talked about how we can be an angel to someone else, an answer to their cry to God. We can be ready so that when God needs to tell one of his children "peace be unto thy soul" we can be his mouthpiece. I invite you all to pray for the opportunity to be an angel in someone else's life.

Things I hate: Sharing a car with the Elders that live 15 minutes away. But...

Things I like: We got our own car!!! It's a brand new equinox that had less than 100 miles on it. It's pretty nice.

Photos! 

1. We walked down to the river this week

2. The old railroad and Catholic church

Conference Weekend

 E aí bom?

This week was great! We were able to stay pretty busy, which is always a good thing. For service, we went to the food pantry and helped seal cracks in their basement walls. It was my first time working with cement so that was interesting. Also, we were able to find a new person this week, which is definitely a miracle. Her name is Debra, and she is actually in California right now, but she lives here. We told her about the Book of Mormon, and she was super excited to hear more! We also were able to get her to watch conference! She seems very interested, so pray for us that all goes well.

Another cool thing that happened this week was we started a zoom Book of Mormon class for our ward. We only had 3 members this first class, but we are working on getting it to grow. It was really fun and I'm excited to keep doing it. The best part of the week though was definitely general conference.

Spiritual thought: There were so many great talks this conference about loving everyone, and making ourselves better every day. I especially loved President Nelson's talk about Israel, and how it means let God prevail. He asked us to pray to find those who will let God prevail. I invite you all to do this with me so that missionary work can continue forward through you and me.

Things I hate: It's funny, every time I type "things I hate", "mosquitos" pops up on my recommended words to use. It is true, they are the worst. Nothing really bad this week though so that's good.

Things I like: Conference. Also, we found some cool places on our walks in between conference. The weather has been great this week.

Photos!

Quick story, Elder Brady gave us a potato like 2 months ago that some other Elders gave him at transfers. We named it Elder Brady and kept it in the fridge until he finished his mission and went home, then we shipped it to him haha. So that's what that photo is.

The others are photos from our walk around Harper's Ferry between sessions on Saturday. There was a cool foundation of an old Civil War era grain mill and a historic farm with cool trails all the way down to the Potomac. 

Also, I forgot to tell you that we get to meet in-person for Church every week now with up to 100 people in the meeting (which shouldn't be a problem for our ward). I am so glad we get to start going to church again. Maybe it will remind the members that we missionaries are here and need there help in spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ. (And a dinner or two brought over wouldn't be bad either)

Elder Brady received his potato back home

Walking Down Country Roads

Como vai pessoal?

This week turned out to be a good one. On Thursday, we got our new trainee Elder Dixon. He's from Lehi. Turns out I went to Highschool with his cousin so that's kinda cool. We have all been getting along well and having a good time. Sadly, our lesson with Tatiana got canceled this week because she was busy getting her cat out of a tree. She wasn't responding to reschedule, so we didn't get to teach her this week. It was funny though because when she told us her cat ran into a tree, she made a typo and said her car ran into a tree. We thought she had gotten in an accident until we saw on Facebook that it was just the cat. Pretty funny. 

Yesterday, our ward boundaries changed and we lost some of our favorite members, which is too bad. But then, Brother Graff called us and asked us to come over and give his friend Andrew a blessing! We were excited to get out of the house. We didn't have the car, so we had to walk on the West Virginia back roads. But, we got to cut through a civil war battlefield to make it faster so that was cool. Anyways, Andrew is super cool, and open to learning more about the gospel. We could feel the spirit while we gave him a blessing and he really liked it. Brother Graff taught a lot, he is super awesome. He sent us off after with 2 pizzas, and some venison sausage. It was definitely the most exciting night we have had in a long time.

Spiritual thought: Romans 8:38 "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

God will always love you no matter what! Remember that! Also, watch conference this weekend.

Things I like: we saw a couple of bucks fighting, so that was pretty cool.

Things I hate: sharing a car. It's pretty annoying because we can't really do as much the week we don't have the car, because we live far from service and stuff.

Photos!

Our trainee, Elder Dixon

Transfers...already?

 Hello!

I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is my trainee is getting here this week!!! And we found out he's learning Portuguese! We are so excited. The bad news is they changed some district boundaries so the new Elders in our district got cut out. We had a district activity with them today, the first and the last activity with them.

We had a lesson with Tatiana again. She hasn't been able to pick a date for baptism yet, but we have some plans to help her. Not much progress in the work. But, we're working on it. We got to do a mission prep class for the teachers though, so that was fun. Also, I got to talk in church in Sunday. There were only 7 people, but it was good.

Spiritual thought: General conference is coming up this next week, so I just wanted to invite you all to listen to conference with a question. I know as we have a question in mind, God can reveal things to us through his servants.

Things I like: Fall is really starting! The weather is so nice, we haven't even had to turn on the ac for a couple days.

Things I hate: not really sure what to put here this week haha.

Photos

Elder Wilson hit his year mark. He burned a tie because all his shirts are still nice. But hey, we burned something haha

Finding things to do

 Hello everybody!

This week has been pretty slow for us, but a couple of awesome things happened. On Wednesday, we had a lesson with Tatiana. Her father-in-law and son are members, and they participated, as well as the relief society president. The whole lesson went so smoothly, and we invited her to be baptized. She said yes! She said she has been wanting to be baptized, but she just didn't know when because all of the covid craziness. We are only allowed to have 6 people at a baptism, and she said she wanted all of her friends and family to be able to watch. We explained how we could broadcast it on zoom, and asked her to pray about when she should be baptized. So, we should be marking a date with her soon. We want to be able to reactivate her husband so they can make it to the temple to be sealed some day, but we haven't been able to get him on the calls. Please pray for them that all works out.

The rest of the week not much happened. We have been spending some time brainstorming what we can do to find more people, and what types of Facebook videos we can make. So yeah, not anything else that is too exciting.

Spiritual Thought: In the beginning of 3rd Nephi chapter 11 (this talks about when Jesus Christ visited the Americas), there is a part that talks about how all the people were gathered and talking about all the crazy stuff that had just happened. A still, small voice speaks, but nobody hears it. It happens 2 more times, and then they finally understand it, it announces the coming of Jesus. I think often times, we are distracted by the things of the world, and we dont listen to the still, small voice of the Holy Ghost. But, when we stop to listen, the voice can "pierce [us] to the very soul, and... cause [our] hearts to burn." It tells us what is good and right. We need to listen to it.

Things I hate: we opened the silver ware drawer and the mouse was in there. It pooped all over all of our dishes, and ran through all of our pots and pans. We had to wash everything.

Things I like: We killed the mouse. I got my name tags I ordered, so now I finally have a magnet tag! I've wanted one for so long haha.

Dont have many photos, but heres one of Elder Wilson and I with all of our tags on lol. Oh, and also our last district council with the sisters.