Week 49 - 22 August 2011 Talked in Sacrament Mtg

Hey ya´ll!  This week was a good hardworking week.  On Saturday, we baptized a boy named Pedro. He is the son of a member here who is just now starting to come back and become active again. Pedro is 11 years old, and he’s a really good kid.  The baptismal service went really well too.  It started pretty late, like around 8:30 pm because everyone showed up late from a conference in Castanhal, so it was pretty rushed, but even like that it went really well.  His dad, which is the less active member, gave the closing prayer and started crying cuz he was so happy.  Then yesterday at church, he was able to be the one to confirm Pedro a member and give him the Gift of the Holy Ghost.

Also, I gave a talk yesterday at church.  It went pretty well, I think.  It was about patience, and I talked about the Sons of Mosiah and based it on the scripture in Romans 5:3-5.  It teaches us that we have tribulations to test our patience, so that we can gain experience, so that we can have hope in the Lord.  It went a lot smoother than my last talk that I gave.  I ended up actually going over the limit haha. I think it was about 10 or 12 minutes long.

Oh another cool little thing is that our bishop here, Bispo Pamplona, he knows a girl that lives at a beach about an hour away called Salinas that wants to be baptized. So we might be able to go there to teach and baptize her. Pretty sweet huh? We need permission from President Campos, but it would be a really cool baptism. Everyone says that it’s one of the most beautiful beaches around here. So that would be a fun experience.

Well family, I love you guys.  I hope you’re all well at home all alone without the kids! haha

Élder Andrus

               Pedro's baptism with his father, Celso

                                                            Marcio and Aline family

Week 48 - 15 August 2011 New Baptism Goal

Hey!  Sorry I didn’t get around to emailing on Monday.  It was a holiday here in Pará for some reason and there wasn’t internet.  So President Campos let us use it today on Wednesday.  This last week was pretty broke too.  During the week we worked read hard but it was a touch week for us.  But on Sunday at church, we received some referrals that we’ve been praying for.  We got 3 referrals from the members.  One is a sone of a member here who we’re gonna teach today, and we’re planning on baptizing him this week with the help of hid dad.  Another is a friend of a member who he took to church with him.  And another is a girl that lives at a really famous beach here about an hour and a half away from here called Salinas.  It’s a tourist place here and as missionaries we’re not allowed there.  But there are actually a lot of inactive members there, and we’re gonna ask for permission from the president to go there to be able to teach this girl.  Our bishop lives kinda close, and he’s gonna have a sacrament meeting there this Sunday, and he’ll take the referral there too.  So hopefully all of this works out!

Yesterday, we had a Zone Conference with 4 zones in Belém.  It was way good.  President Campos talked a lot about what we’re doing and what we’re not doing as a mission to help us.  We received new revelation too and have a goal of 250 baptisms per month as a mission.  We’re really working hard here to get a temple built in Belém.  The goal is to have it announced this next General Conference in October.  When President Campos got here as the mission president, there were only 3 stakes here in the state of Pará and Amapá.  He’s really changed the vision of all the members here cuz just in the 2 years he’s been here so far he’s been able to create 4 new stakes (so now we have 7) and there are 2 more that have been sent already to be approved.  Yeah the work here in the Brazil Belém Mission is amazing, and I’m positive that we’ll get a temple here real soon.

Love you guys and have a good week!

Até próxima!

Élder Andrus

Week 47 - 8 August 2011 What is the word in English?

Hey there pessoal!  This week has been pretty slow.  Not much happened actually.  We worked pretty hard during the week but didn’t have too much success.  We had to cut a lot of investigators cuz they weren’t keeping their... compromissos (wow I can’t even think of the word in English, sorry).

So yeah it was pretty lame and chato.  But it’s okay.  This past week at our district meeting, I gave the training there, and it seemed to motivate our district.  We have 2 sisters in our district who work in Castanhal.  

Man this week was really slow and not much happened.  So I don’t have much to write about.  Sorry about the short email, but I’m pretty short on time.

Love you all!

Élder Andrus

Week 46 - 1 August 2011 Playing catch with Elder Farias

Hey everyone!  This week was a good week, especially because last Tuesday I got that package that you guys sent to me with my 2 baseball mitts and a ball! Haha  That was definitely the best package I’ve gotten yet.  It’s been about 11 months since I’ve last played catch...so I have definitely needed a little tune up.  So actually today, Elder Farias and I went out to a nearby court and were playing catch for about an hour.  It was great.  I found out just how out of shape I am and how bad my arm is haha. But it was amazing to be able to throw again.  I had to teach Elder Farias how to throw and catch and stuff haha but he still couldn’t handle my heat!

So during the week, since all of our investigators that were preparing for baptism on the 30th fell threw, we didn’t have anyone ready. But we were searching, and we started teaching a nephew of a member here in the ward.  His name is Júnior, and he’s actually from Manaus, but is living here with his uncle for a while.  He has already gone to church a few times and liked it a lot.  As we were teaching him on Friday, we couldn’t find any reason for him not to be baptized on just the following day. So we were working with him, but Saturday morning, he confessed to us that the only problem is that he has a little problem with smoking.  But we’re gonna set goals with him to stop so he can be baptized this next week.  He has a great desire to follow Christ, so I know he’ll be able to stop without too many problems.  Besides that not too much else happened.  It was a week tranquilo.

Thanks for the package again!

Oh and P.S. Can you guys send me the picture of Rio in High School Musical 3 in an email so I can develop some here?  All of the little girls here in this ward went crazy when I told them my sister was in it and showed them the picture haha.  Thanks!

Com amor,

Élder Andrus

Ouch! 

Pitching in Capanema 

Week 45 - 25 July 2011 Alligator Under the Driveway

Olá pessoal!  Como vai ae?  This week was a good week.  At first it seemed to go by pretty normal and slow, and we didn’t really have anyone firm to get baptized this week last Saturday.  But as it came to Friday night, we decided to go visit the one girl, Andressa, that was investigating the church.  She’s the one that was a referral from a family here, but when she asked her mom if she could be baptized, her mom said no.  So since then she seemed to lose interest in the church.  But Elder Farias and I have been praying to find someone to be baptized this last week, and the Lord answered our prayers by leading us back to her. She seemed more excited, and she told us that she really did want to be baptized.  So Saturday morning, we went to the home where her mom works to talk to her a little about it and to get her signature. She wasn’t really fond of the idea at first, but after we explained things, she agreed and finally signed the baptism form. So then Andressa was interviewed, and I baptized her that night. It was really cool cuz we almost gave up on her as a progressing investigator, but the Lord really does help us out to soften the hearts of the people here.

 
But as for our adventures this week, yesterday something pretty crazy happened. So we live right next to a sewer ditch, and every night we always hear something down inside and under our drive way.  We never really knew what it was, but last night, right when we got back home at about 9:00, our neighbors (who are members too) called us out and said that we finally found out what it was.  It was an alligator. Haha  Pretty legit huh?  So we called the firefighters here in the city to come and capture it and set it free somewhere else.  I got it on video and took tons of pictures.  Who knew that there would be an alligator living under our house here? haha.

Also, this week I have been reading in Alma where Ammon and his brothers are beginning to do missionary work to the Lamanites.  It’s pretty amazing the story of how Ammon was able to serve King Lamoni, teach him, and have the spirit so strong to be able to teach and convert all of his people. Even though they suffered a lot of afflictions, they kept the spirit of the Lord with them to bring so many souls of these Lamanites to the Lord.

Love you guys and have a good week!

Dad, be safe with that new motorcycle license of yours, and Mom, have fun in Kansas City!

Élder Andrus

Baptism of Andressa w/Glins Family 7-23-11

Baptism of Andressa with her friend, Amanda

Alligator eyes under the driveway

Catching the alligator

Close up

Elder Andrus touching the alligator

Week 44 - July 18, 2011 Staying in Capanema

Hola! This week was the last week of the transfer here, and Elder Farias and I will both be staying here in Capanema.  I’m glad to be staying here and not being transferred just after one transfer like in Independência haha.  I’m liking the area here and the church here is growing pretty well.

Speaking of the church growing here, remember that we don’t have a chapel yet and we just meet in a house?  Well on Sunday, Bishop Pamplona announced that the grounds here to build a chapel were finally bought! It’s the area where the house is right now plus the two other houses to the side.  So they will start building it up within the next couple or months, I hope!

As for this week, we had two baptisms parked for this Saturday, but they both fell through. One was a girl named Andressa, who was a referral from a member family here, and the other was a lady named Elizeti who was also a referral from another member. But unfortunately, Andressa´s mom doesn’t want her to get baptized and won’t sign the form. And Elizeti´s whole extended family is threatening her that they will stop talking to her if she gets baptized. Yeah these are tough circumstances. We’re going to continue to help them out though. Besides these tough circumstances, during the week we found 8 new investigators that we started teaching. The only bummer is that none of them went to church with us yesterday. We walked all the way to their house to get them, and they wouldn’t even come with us haha. 

But anyway, that’s just about all that happened this week. Oh, and a returned missionary from Utah that served here visited the area here in Capanema and Belem.  It was pretty cool to see everyone talk to him again after like 3 years. His name is Spencer Esplin from Sandy, and he´s actually working in São Paulo right now. We took a pic together, and he said he’d email you guys haha.

Well, I think that’s about it!  Love ya´ll, and I hope you guys had fun in Arizona during the week!

Élder Andrus

Week 43 - July 11, 2011 Baptism of Ivanilza

Hey there todo mundo!

Como estão ae? This was a good week. Remember that lady I told you guys about a couple weeks ago who saw us on the street and went to church two Sundays ago? Well we’ve been teaching her until then, and we baptized her this past Saturday. Her name is Ivanilza, and she’s got a really big desire to serve the Lord. She has a lot to learn as a new convert to the church because she is pretty...how can I say it...animated when it comes to talking about the gospel haha. But she’ll learn more and more every time she goes to church.

At the beginning of the week, there was a conference for all the district and zone leaders of the mission in Belém. So Elder Farias had to go to Belém, and I stayed here in Capanema for the day with the companion of the other district leader here. So the elder that I stayed with and worked with for the day is Elder Rodrigues, and he arrived here on the mission just about a week ago.  He’s from Argentina.  He’s the first Argentino here in the Belém Mission, and he doesn’t know anything about Portuguese haha. It was kinda funny cuz he speaks with a super strong Spanish accent and about half the words he says are in Spanish because he’s just beginning to learn Portuguese. So I ended up learning a bunch of things in Spanish that day haha. And I noticed just how different the accents of Spanish and Portuguese are different. It was super tough to understand what he was saying at the beginning of the day haha - but it was pretty fun.

We also received a bunch of good referrals from one of the members here who is helping us a lot. We had a Family Home Evening with her and her sister and also her neighbors last Friday, and we taught them yesterday. They really liked it and accepted a date for baptism too. So it seems that our fireside from last week is starting to work to help the members here!

Amo vocês e tenham uma boa viagem!

Elder Andrus

Baptism of Ivanilza 7-9-11