Everyone, hold on to your horses!!! Something incredible and unbelievable has happened. Our District recieved the Transfer updates last night and........NOTHING CHANGED!!! All four missionaries here in Alta Floresta are staying at least one more transfer! Fist time in my mission when literally everything stays the same, and the first time I get to stick with the same companion. YAY!!! I am absolutally thrilled to be able to work here another six weeks, With this next transfer, I will spend a total of 6 months here in this Amazonian paradise! 

But, this week was another week of miracles, and a LOT of work. We are so busy with investigators and recent converts, we hardly have any time to go door to door. What's even more awesome, is that our investigators are all super responsive and want us to teach all of their friends!! Just yesterday, we snatched up eleven new investigators! 

The only thing holding up the work now is the World Cup :( Every time Brazil has a jogo, we have to head home early. It's fairly rediculous. Everyone ends up partying and drinking the whole night long, and just with the first jogo this Thursday there were fireworks every goal, and fights in the streets afterward. But, we're doing the best we can, and we're working, starting at 8:30 in the morning just so we can get some lessons in! 

And, now to share some of the best experiences of the week! First and foremost, we ran into yet another member who had no idea the chuch was here in Alta Floresta! On Wednesday, she came up to us na rua, and excitedly asked, "Are you from my church?" Sure enough, we were. She's lived here for three years all alone, but her testimony is rock solid! We were able to visit her with R and L last night, and she presented a friend of hers to us, and shared a powerfull testimony of how her encounter with the missionaries helped her realize that the Lord hadn't forgotten her!

As for our awesome recém conversos, R and L are super excited, and have accompanied us missionaries to help teach! L especially likes visiting with the missionaries because she wants to be a Sister Missionary one day! A gave his first talk in Church this Sunday, and he did an awesome job. And L finially blessed the sacarament! It was a dream come true to see him and M working together in the Priesthood!

I am basically overwhelmed with gratitude! I can't even express how blown away I am by all that I have been able to see and do. And what's even more incredible, is that I feel like it's just beginning! There is so much ahead of me, and I can't wait to see what the future has in store!

This was a week of learning. Not necessarily because of experiences, but more because of my attitude. This week, I spent a lot of time in self-evaluation. Let me tell you, if you want to be more humble, just spend a good hour or two REALLY evaluating yourself. But before I get to the good, sentimental stuff, just a couple of updates and events.

First off, this week we changed things up, and divided the city so that the two sets of missionaries could work more effectively. For me and Elder Oliveira, that means no more Cidade Alta! How I will miss that hour long hike... But with the new boudaries of our arieas, we now have 6 recent converts to teach, 4 less-active families, and a load of progressing investigators that have accepted to prepare to be baptized. That means that Elder Oliveira and I can pretty much kiss goodbye to knocking doors for a little bit. We have our hands full just following up with everyone that we're teaching. It'll be a lot of work, but we're super excited to get to it!

However, this week, I realized that I was getting cought up in the ritual of missionary life. Get up, get dressed, study, eat, teach, testify, invite, pray, sleep. Bam bam bam, a pattern that works well. It's effective. You get good stuff done, BUT, you miss out on a part of this work that is absolutaly critical, the "by the spirit" part of Preach my Gospel. 

As I talked with and taught people this week, I realized that I need to be more than a "missionary". That's to say I need to me more than just a teacher, or hard-worker, I need to be a friend, an example, a leader. To simplify it all, I need to be a Disciple of Jesus Christ in thought, word, and action. Our brothers and sisters in this world need more than someone to just preach at them. They need someone who listens, cares, and most importantly, feels! 

Placing Christ as an example is tough, because you'll always fall short. But, I'm determined to really try and be more Christlike, and more receptive to the spirit in everything we do.

Pictures are gleened from the Cuiaba Mission blog page.

 

Wow this week is over and done! It feels like I was here writing my weekly letter last week yesterday! This week was just about as normal as it gets. Running around the city, trying to be in two places at once. 

Unfortunately, I don't have any mind-blowing stories to tell this week. One event that stands out, is that we helped in the move of one our members here in Alta Floresta. By helped out, I actually mean that the 4 missionaries here basically moved the entire family all by ourselves. We planned an hour and a half of our day to help out, and ended up working four hours straight! 

The awesome news of this week, is that all of the converts here are staying firm, and progressing even more in the Church! R bore an incredibly powerful testimony yesterday in our little sacarament meeting, and A had the missionaries over for an awesome churrasco. What's more, he invited non-members to introduce to the missionaries, and we had a great lesson with everyone there!  

As for S and the family of A L, one of A L's other sons, W showed up at his mom's house as a suprise this week. Now we are working double time with everyone in that family! W is an interesting individual, and we've got a lot more work ahead of us to get everyone in that family involved and excited about the Gospel.

We are looking forward to this next week, and we've got lots to organize and plan still, but, with the Lord guiding his work, we know that with our continued efforts, we will be able to accomplish even more than we have previously!!

Well this week was a long one. But as always it was full of great experiences, and a lot of hard work. 

The week started off in another city, Sinop. Our district was invited to participate in the Zone meeting on Tuesday. So, we left here Monday night, and got there at 1:00 in the morning. The morning was pretty crazy, with everyone trying to find their way around a city that nobody was familiar with. But, the Zone meeting was great, and afterwards, all the missionaries participated in a "blitz". All the missionaries in the Zone split up to do contacts and find new investigators in one area. It was a neat experience, and we helped out the missionaries in Sinop a ton! 

We got back to Alta Floresta 3:00 in the morning on Wednesday, and we got to work right away. With two sets of missionaries, we're able to work a lot more in Cidade Alta, and we're uncovering a lot of potential there. This week alone we taught a number of families that are super receptive, and six of the people we taught there this week came to church on Sunday!

But, above all, the neatest experience this week was with R and L. R is the mother of L (9 years old) and we've been teaching the two of them for the past 2 months. Both of them have been diligentlly coming to church every Sunday ever since we started teaching them. They both wanted to be baptized, but R has a strong dependancy on cigarretes. L in particular always had a strong desire to be baptized, but due to some new regulations here in Brazil, we needed authorization of the mission president to baptize L. But we explained the situation to President Reber, and he agreed to let L get baptized before R. 

And so, this week we taught L on Friday while R was attending a visit (R has a salon em casa). The lesson with L was great, and she was 100% prepared for baptism. But after the lesson during our day, I felt like we needed to return and invite R once more to be baptised together with her daughter. That night, we returned to her house, entered and sat down. Simply, I asked if she wanted to be baptized this Sunday. She responded, "of course, but I can't." I told her that she knew exactly what was necessary, and that it was completeally possible, and completeally up to her. R turned and looked to look at her daugher. The two of them continued looking into eachother's eyes for what seemed like an eternity. Finally she turned back to us with tears in her eyes and simply asked "do you have confidence in me", we responded emphetacally SIM, and whats more important God has confidence in you. She accepted, and finially agreed with detemination to stop smoking once.

This Sunday was very special for me. Finally I was able to help a mother and daughter enter in the door to the fullness of the Gospel through baptism. It is practically impossible to really describe the happiness that I felt for these daughters of God. R has overcome so much, and she has a lot more to overcome still, but now she's well on her way, with the companionship of the church family, and more importantly with the companionship of the Holy Ghost.

Well, as luck would have it, this week once again ended up being a lot of improvisation and hard work. Unexpectedly, our week was disrupted by a suprize conference. This is essentially what happened...

On Tuesday, our Zone Leaders (Elders W e M) arrived to go on splits with our District. When they got here they casually asked, "so, are you ready to go to Cuiaba tomorrow?" Turns out basically everyone had forgotten to tell me that I was invited to a Special Training in Cuiaba on Thursday. But, since there's only one plane that comes to and from Alta Floresta cada dia, I had to catch the flight Wednesday afternoon, and stay there in Cuiaba until Friday! SURPRISE!! 

But, regardless of the two days lost working in my area, I think the training was worth it. I learned soooo much, and President Reber was able to explain and give some great details on a couple of the changes here in Missão Brasil Cuiabá. 

Of course, after two days far away from my beloved city of Alta Floresta, I returned foaming at the mouth (figuratively of course) to get back to work. So, as soon as we could it was off to Cidade Alta!! My companion and I worked the entire day without much sucess, but finally found an incredible family of five! We invited them to chuch, and this past Sunday three of them came!

Unfortunately, the family that we've been teaching for a good while now, R e L, encountered some difficulties during the week, and once again R was unable to put her cigarrettes behind her. What a difficult and depressing addiction. We have literally tried everything we could, and now this decision is up to her and the lord. We replanned the baptism of L for this coming Domingo, with the hope that her baptism will inspire her mother to really make that final little push that will be necessary to overcome.

But, despite all the craziness, the week ended well. We had great attendance at church on Sunday, and the father (S) of the two girls baptised two weeks ago ( T e C) joined his daughters in the restored gospel. The decision to be baptised meant a lot of big changes in the life of this father, but I know that at least now he is on the path to established an eternaly happy family.

That path is the Resored Gospel of Jesus Christ. I know that this path is open to us through the sacrifice of our Savior. I know that the blessings of this Gospel are real. As is the power of the Atonement of Christ. I am honored and humbled to be a part of making those blessing available to the people here in Brazil. What an opportunity is this!!! 

Elder Johnson

Well, this week was interesting. It just goes to show that when transfer time comes around, everything's up in the air. We were expecting our new companions to arrive on Wednesday morning, and we planned accordingly, but on Tuesday we got a call saying that they wouldn't be able to come until Thursday morning. So, we changed our plans and winged it a little bit, getting everything ready to recieve our new companions on Thursday. Wednesday night we got a call once again, there was a problem with the bus tickets, we were notified that our new companions would arrive 1:00 in the morning on Friday. And so, midnight, we headed on down to the Rodoviaria to greet them, The happy ending to the story is that they got here (finally)!

And, I am more than happy with my new companion. Elder O, from Rio Grande do Sul. He's a little ball of greenie fire! All excitement and determination to get out and get to work, exactly what we need here. I'm priveleged to be training, and I look forward to seeing him learn, grow, and become the best missionary that he can be.

Other than that, the week was filled with work, and lots of improvisation. Unfortunately, it was also pretty unorganized. However, I look foreward to starting off this next week with a solid planning session, as well as splits with the zone leaders for the first time!

Elder Johnson

After waiting all day we finally heard from Justus late Sunday evening.  Aparently he is in the same time zone! Here's what he shared after an animated conversation with him speaking mostly Portuguese...he struggled to speak in English, a good sign of a matriculated missionary.

Hey everyone! I absolutally loved talking with each and every one of you yesterday. It was a great experience, and I am so proud of each and every one of you. You're all growing and changing in little ways. Especially Avery! How fun to talk with her and hear her making conversation.

But, because I was able to talk with all of you, I've really got nothing to say...Just know that I love you guys tons!

And just to respond about the parrots, I see dozens of parrots during the day! But the coolest of all is when you get to see a Toucan! 

Love, Elder Johnson

Hey guys! Thanks everyone for your letters. This week sounded like everyone had some good times! It sure was a sweet week for me. My companion and I worked ATE O PÓ! It was so great. Naturally, that means I just about dead tired today, but that's what P-day is for, recuperation!  This next transfer will be really interesting, and I have high hopes. Finally, we were able to move to a bigger casa (that will fit 4 missionaries) and both me and Elder T will receive new (and by new I mean brand new) companions. So, I'll be District Leader AND a trainer this transfer. It's a lot of responsablility, but I'm super excited to see cada vez mais the crescimento here in Alta Floresta. One again, this Sunday we destroyed the record of church attendance with 34 people, all of whom stayed to participate in the baptismal service afterwards.

One of the best things in the world is to finish a transfer strong. And, for the first time in my mission, the tranfer changes this tranfer were exactly what we were hoping for, but I'll get to that eventually. 

So much happened this week. I'll probably forget to tell half the experiences we had, so you'll just have to check out my mission journal someday :) The beginning of the week was fairly stressfull because we finally found a house big enough and centralized enough to house 2 companionships! We spent part of quara-feira and most of quita-feira moving, and what's more, we did it all by ourselves (no moving elders to help out here). In the midst of this move, we were also running around to confirm and prepare four of our pesquisadores for baptism. 

Regardless of the time lost in the moving process, me and my companion were determined to teach a record number of lessons, a record number of contacts, and break the record of church attendance here in Alta Floresta once again. And so, we got to it! 

Essentially, the lesson I learned from this week, is that dedication, hard work and faith in the Lord make possible what seems impossible. Our capacities were increased, and we were incredibly blessed. On Sunday we were able to help all four of our investigators, A, his wife, C, and the two grandchildren of A L, C and T enter the waters of baptism. And a total of 34 people came to our humble little sacrament meeting. 

Finially, last night, our prayers were answered by the decision of President Reber to send two more missionaries to Alta Floresta. Sadly, Elder T and I are splitting up to be companions with these new missionaries, but we are both incredibly excited to accelerate the work of the Lord.

Pictures:

  -(Baptisms) batismo e nosso reunião batismal!!

  -critters of Alta Floresta

 -when all else fails, buy a watermelon, and have your companion carry it home!

  -goofing off with my camera

  - after a day of running from one end of the city to the other and back again...