Week 91- Section 59 ( 2 months/ 8 Sunday's left )

Hey everyone! This week was interesting enough. We had two divisions this week and it was a bit crazy because I left our area for both, so that was fun. The one day I was in my area we got stopped by some guy in a car and started asking for our address to stop by and give us some referrals. We both thought it was a bit weird so we told him we would meet at a near-by supermarket. We talked a bit more and found out he´s actually from another state... which is a bit weird here in Brazil. Turns out he gave us some awesome referrals while I was gone. I really don´t know any of them yet, but Elder Nielson got pretty excited about them all. 3 Came to church yesterday and seem really elect, we´re hoping they´ll be baptized this week. 

Um, I went on the splits and the Elders are doing good, but one when we were walking home at night turned to me and said ´Oh, just to say, a crazy guy jumped out here a few nights ago and chased us with a 2x4, so just be ready to run´. He said that while we were walking on the edge of the city, close to the ´forest´, so that kinda freaked me out but we got outta there fine. Thanks for that bro, ha ha. 

The other division went off without any sort of craziness, just a few baptismal interviews and a lot of walking as always. 

Some Elders from our house were really poorly mugged it looks like last night as well. I guess robbed is more of the word. A guy stopped them, they talked for like 10 mins and at the end of the conversation ordered them to give him their phone. Little did he know our phones are crap, ha ha. They gave over what maybe values 15 dollars and left. They dude didn´t even pull a knife or anything and seemed drugged they said. Kind of a funny way to get your phone stolen, ha ha. 

We´ve also had a bit of a card game tournament going on at night in the house, ha ha. Winner will get his pizza payed for at a buffet tonight by the rest of us. I got knocked out in the semi-finals and the thinnest kid in the house won! He´s only gonna eat like 3 pieces anyway! It was fun though, lots of bro-bonding.

For a spiritual thought I guess I could talk about Section 59 that I read today. I gotta go here quick so I would suggest give it a look see and think about the blessings we get from going to church simply. 

Hope you all have a good week! Tchau! 

-Um no exérctio de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 90- Section 67

Hello again! 

So this week was good until about Thursday... but I´ll get there in a bit. 

First we made some awesome lunch last Monday using our fire-pit in the apartment which was sick. I also made a pie of course which was great it not huge. We didn´t have a pan to make it so I bought one but it was a little big you could say. Also we then made some ´doves´ out of origami and then tried to get the Levite in our house to offer them as a ´burnt offering´ but ended up just buring them ourselves, ha ha. What happens when missionaries get bored.... 

We also had interviews with president Wednesday so we also did district meeting that day. It was cool to see him one last time. He said that it would be our last interview together, but the secretaries called and asked if I wanted him to do my final one as well and I said yes. They didn´t make any promises but I might have it with him. We talked about goals and what not and in the end we man-hugged it out and were both a bit sad. 

The next few days we were tearing it up. We don´t really have very many investigators so we just kinda went crazy and hit a ton of doors with members and taught tons of lessons we also had the young men out with us so it was a pretty good blitz. Then.... it happened. We were both a bit hungry so we decided to go get some Shish-kabobs somewhere, so we got some from an old guy cookin´ em up on the street.... not our best idea. 

We spent the next two days in the house. I´ll just say that. Our poor toilet...... 

Our week was at least pretty good even with the sickness, we just did some interviews for some baptisms and then got our two ready for the week. We baptized these two: 

They are both super cool. The black guy was the one that stopped us on the street and the girl was a investigator that has a cousin in the church. Her friend baptized here to the left there. Blessings from Gob the two of them! The water was so cold I literally didn´t feel my feet after the 30 seconds I was in the water. The poor Haitian guy literally ran into the bathroom afterwards to change out. It was a good baptism though, both were super prepared. 

I then chatted with the family for the last time on the mission..... I´m so old in the mission! It was fun and the sister kept bringing us Brazilian doughnuts and stuff. We also had a little talk and I translated for everyone. A great time in all. 

So this week I learned a little about preparation. I was supposed to talk to my family on Saturday but the computer didn´t have a mic or enough power to really run Skype. It was really frustrating and we ended up wasting a good few hours that could have been used a lot better. I really should have made sure everything was good to go before, I would even call it a spiritual prompting I got to check that the laptop was good to go before we started but I ignored it and well... this happened. Just for the future, always follow the scout motto ´Be prepared´. The scriptures say ´ if ye are prepared ye shall not fear.´ and ´gird up your loins and be prepared´ in D&C 38. 

That´s all for now. Everyone have a great week and prepare for my glorious return!

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 89-- Section 79

This first week was pretty awesome I think you could say. It was  a bit of a surprise from the start. We got to transfers this week and I went and found the guy who has been my ZL for about 4 transfers or so while I was in São Leo, Elder Nielson and I saw that he was in the same transfer group as me. I looked at him and said, ´Do you think we´ll be comps?´ We then both thought that would be impossible and laughed a bit until I got the envelope with my zone on it. He was on it.... And well, you can guess what happened, we´re companions now! After this we´ll be staying in the same complex at BYU as well..... yeah I guess that we were just long lost brothers or something, ha ha. He´s really cool and we are tearing it up in the area. We are the ZL´s of one of the high baptizing zones, so President and the AP`s are expecting a lot of us. 

The area is pretty good but we mostly just work in the ghettos. It´s not dangerous, just really dirty, smelly and a bit hard sometimes to see all the poverty but it´s going well. Just from the last week we had 6 baptisms just in our house. Oh, yeah, we also live with not one but two other companionship's in our house, ha ha. It´s way bigger than the other houses in the mission but still very small for american standards but it has two bathrooms at least and two bedrooms. Here´s the whole gang: 

​So we got Elder Barnes on the far left, then his comp in front of him, Elder Sacramento, then our two beloved Cariocas (people from Rio) Elder Dos Anjos and Elder Vicente then me and Elder Nielson. Elder Nielson and Barnes go home this transfer and I go home the next one..... We are  ´house of the dead ones´ to translate, ha ha. 

So this week we went to leadership meeting this week, which was cool. President had some fun comments like ´I´ve made it. I´m a zone leader, how cool´ and talked about fishing for men and stuff like that. He sure is one great man. Everyone here loves him and he always leaves us inspired. He made a interesting point about how soon we are going home. He said `you are all going home tomorrow. You don´t realize it, but you are. This time is short´ he made some points about how after all the time he had lived the time on the mission seemed way shorter after it was done and how we should leave it all here if we can. Very inspiring. 

We had a cool investigator this week that showed up. His name is Jean and he is from Haiti (I say that because I have no idea how to spell Hai-shun.... don´t judge me) and he almost scared me to death. He called out to us from behind a tree at about 7:30 at night and being a big black man how´s worked construction all his life, he´s pretty formidable. I thought we were gonna get mugged but he just invited us to teach him because he had been studying with missionaries about a year ago in São Paulo. He´s so cool but speaks very littler Portuguese but is fluent in french and we were lucky to have a French BoM in your house to give him. We think he´ll be baptized next week :). 

Speaking of baptisms, we baptized a fairly portly man name João this week. He´s at least 270 and we had to get some special pants for him, but they turned out to be way too big for even him. We put this Karate style belt on him but that didn´t help, so we ended up baptizing him together for me to help Elder Nielson bring him back up and to hold his pants up with he went down..... one of the most interesting baptisms I´ve had to date, ha ha. 

Well, that was my week, hope you all have a good one! If you missed the spiritual stuff look just below the photo a bit, about President. 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 88-- Section 80

Hey everyone! This week was a bit slow because my comp was a bit sick but I've still got a few stories to tell, ha ha. 

So this week we found some cool people that are really prepared. One is evidently the grand-father-in-law of the bishop and is pretty cool. We also found a cool woman who evidently already checked out the church but wasn't baptized for a unknown reason but she is super cool and ready. 

Another thing we did is that we went to a pizza place to celebrate the transfer ending. We got the buffet going and had a competition of who could eat more pizza. Elder Lago ended up champion with 31 pieces, Elder Ramirez with 29, Me then with 23 and finally Elder Sanchez with 18 (he said he got 22 but still had 4 halves of pizza left on the plate so I didn't count them). The best part I guess was after we started heading home and Elder Lago was bet over and almost died on the way home along with Elder Ramirez. The two sat there and every time the other asked for a piece the other was like "one for me too!!!" It was super funny. 

After that we had a bit of a funny moment at church. The man I wrote about a bit last week told everyone in the elder's quorum that "the pig is a cursed beast".... We both about died laughing at that but managed to stay quiet. It was sure strange.... he's always doing something like that, ha ha. 

We've also passing all of our favorite families and stuff, so I have some good pics of them. One of them gave us a fruit called a Conge Fruit. It's like this weird mix of a banana and a pineapple that is super sweet and stuff like that. It's pretty much a dessert really.  

So just to finish up I forgot to say that I am being transferred and that I was called as a zone leader. It's pretty exciting, another area and another companion and yet more responsibility in the mission. I thought I would end district leader but looks like the Lord has other plans for me. Just gotta keep on working and see what happens here. Should be good. 

So you all have a good week, until next time! 

-um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela

Week 86

Yo! How´s everyone doing?! 

So this week I almost died, and by that I mean I was just sick for about 3 days and hung out with the cool members here and stayed in the house. It wasn´t very fun, just sitting around doing nothing. It was a bit better here because the members here like to post stuff on Facebook so a few of you might have seen me a bit this week. The good news was I finally ate some pancakes! I was sick so I almost threw them back up but it was SO worth it. One of the coolest members    I´ve ever known here knows how to make them, so it was great. 

​Said pancakes ^

Um, so yea, so we did just about nothing for a few days. After that we had a division with some Elders here in the district for an interview and it went pretty smoothly. It was a young woman who was super nervous it seemed, ha ha. I guess ´The Lord´s servant´ as we call the interviewers here scared her a bit. She knew everything and didn´t have any problems so she passed just fine. I took the chance to talk with them a bit more and find out some problems that they were having. Hoping to see some more of them this week! 

Also had two more interviews with some other Elders and the first was a cool kid of 11 years who is super excited to be baptized. He SUPER elect. He told me on the way to the interview that he wanted to be baptized and go on a mission like us. He knew everything as well (which is a bit rare for kids, usually we need to help them remember a bit) and was super cool. 

The last interview was a bit fun. We talked but he was nearly deaf and not understanding me hardly at all. We finally got through it all and I asked him if he was excited for him baptism. He was like `I´m being baptized tomorrow? But I´m not ready!` I was a little taken aback and almost laughed a bit. I talked to him a bit more and in the end he felt ready to be baptized, it was just super funny that he was like, ´What?´. 

Um, other than that we just worked like crazy and didn´t have anyone come to church which wasn´t fun but what can you do? 

Oh, a crazy guy asked me to give him my watch this week. He´s a relative of the stake president and comes to church more or less frequently. He sells the stuff he gets from people to buy drugs...... sad case. But after that we left to go grab some BoM´s for a class and when we got back we found out that he was debating that the Catholic church was the one that was restored, not the church we have today. He kept asking when Peter kept his keys and stuff like that. We shut him down pretty quick after that and then he left and came back dressed in street clothes like normal and spent 20 mins or so going back and forth and around and through the building. He then spoke with bishop and left. I asked him on the way out what happened to his church clothes and he said ´man you know, I went to the bathroom and then they were just on me like nothing.... it was weird´. Sure was weird alright.... ha ha.

Sunday was basically nothing. It was the equivalent of the super bowl this weekend. Something called Gren-al. It´s when the two rival teams here play. It´s also the state semi-final, so no one was in the streets or accepting visits, so we kicked with our buds and recent converts that day. Pretty good in all.

This week I was reading a bit in D&C for my little count down and I learned really that modern-day prophets are really legit. Joseph really restored a lot of lost knowledge that there is no way he would have just made up or picked up from the Bible. Everyone should really study up on the prophets, they really are inspired men and they help us understand all of the deepest questions we have (like whether or not Adam had a belly button, the answer is yes, he did). 

The church is true, the book is blue (for now, it was red for a bit and then had a picture of Moroni on it)! Have a good week! 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 85

Hey everbodys! 

So this week I have decided to try and write this email first to leave enough time to actually go through the week like I should. 

So last Monday we worked like normal because we traded our P-day for the temple. We would have worked that is but I had some business with my foot..... It was hurting pretty good so we called Sister Wright and she told me to take it easy, so we spent most the day just going from place to place and not walking very much. While we were resting like that at a part member family´s house Elder Lago started philosophizing (that´s a word right?). He said ´the wind that blows there, blows here´ (o vento que venta lá, venta cá) From there on out they debated out the topic and then started changing the words to songs to sing about wind..... it was all a bit weird but we were all dying laughing in the moment, ha ha

. 

The next day we went to the temple and that was an adventure in it of itself, ha ha. Let´s just say none of us really knew where we were going but we managed to get to the mission office to pick up a package for Elder Lago and then we went to the temple by taxi which should have taken 15 mins but took half an hour because the dude had no idea where the ´giant Mormon temple on top of the hill on the road Salvador Pineiro geral´ was. He agreed to just have a us pay for the 15 mins that it should have been though, so that was good, ha ha. 

Then at the temple I met up with my homies from the MTC Elder Francom and Elder Collett. Heres a pic we took: 

How´s that for a pic? Ha ha

Anyway something that never happened before that I know of.... well happened. The temple lost power half way through the session! It was really weird, leaving half way through but we sat in the dark for half an hour and they couldn´t get the generator working so we had no choice but to end the session. So we just had to leave after that :(. 

But that wasn´t the end of the weirdness, our chapel then lost power! Someone ripped out some wires or something (apparently they sell the copper within) and we had to go help the bishop set it all right the next day. It was raining and we didn´t have any appointments that night so we went there to help out. We got it all right and they we had a short meeting to get all our stuffs ready for the baptism this week (SPOILER). 

Yeah, the next crazy thing that happened is that the people for the wedding place started making up some rules for us. They called the couple that was to marry and then told them that they had to ´register their witnesses´. This sent him into a bit of panic and he called us up. We quickly called on the couple we had lunch with and they agreed to help out and brought their very energetic daughter, who is about the sweetest little thing ever. The witnesses had to be Brazilian so I couldn´t do it but when they handed over their BRAZILIAN ID´s the woman asked 5 or 6 times if they were Brazilians. I swear, some people are just straight up dumb. They don´t even have accents or anything for heaven´s sake! 

The next days this happened! 

Wedding!

​

Spiritual baths! 

It was super cool! Them and the boy we baptized last week were all confirmed Sunday! It was a great week really. We were super blessed with these two families. 

So that was basically our week summed up, hope you all love it :). I kinda forgot to think on a little spiritual though so I´ll just end with a shout out to my little bro who just opened his mission call going to Cabo Verde Praia mission speaking Portuguese as well! WHOA! Yeah, now we have an official bro language and we´ll have someone to practice with for the rest of our lives! It´s pretty cool! Excited for ya bro, see here in a few months and we´ll see if we can´t learn you a bit son! 

Have a great week everyone! 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela

Week 84

Hey! 

So this we rocked my socks off. We Had a baptism, ate some cake and some guy walked into sacrament meeting and shouted ´Is Clarice here?!´ in the middle of a sister´s testimony. But let me start over with this and put that all in order. 

So to start off we had a really cool FHE with a family Monday night. They are pretty much our best friends here and we actually had another FHE with most of the same crowed last night as well. It was really fun and every had a good time. I´m throwing a photo in here really quick so you can see them all:

So this week we pretty much spent teaching a kid we found in a part-member family that the last elders baptized his brother (that sentence makes sense in Portuguese).  He is super cool and when his mom joked with him that he couldn´t be baptized he almost cried. We also get a lot of food at their house so they are pretty much doomed to be passed by elders the rest of their lives, ha ha. His mom asked if we would stop passing by because he as baptized now, we asked if we´d still be welcome and she said yes and so we then made our point about the food. We basically went to his house everyday to make sure this wouldn´t fall through. And well, Just look at this pic: 

​

Not sure why he was making that face but the kid is great :). I played the piano at his baptism and it was the first one here in 2 months. It was great. 

So we have a ton of great member-missionaries here. One guy invited us to teach a friend of his in his house and then brought 2 more to church Sunday! Also we get referrals almost every lunch we have. It´s pretty awesome because this is really what moves the work forward. EVERYBODY GIVE YOUR MISSIONARIES REFERRALS. You always have at least one friend who is interested, I know that. Think and pray on it and it´ll come it you. 

So for some spirituality I will steal from a cool talk I listened to called ´Give us this day our daily bread´ by Elder Christofferson. He said ´Many times we conquer big tasks in small parts´. If our life seems to hard or too crazy we need to just break it down. Some times I find myself just thinking ´I just need to get up this hill´ or ´Just 3 more contacts´. These smaller steps help us feel more capable and makes these big tasks seem more manageable. I remember when I was getting ready to leave on my mission I was in the couch talking to my mom and I said ´but it´s TWO YEARS´ but after 20 months of that two years I feel as if it´s not even been 2 weeks. I just took it day by day and week by week. I found joy in every day and every baptism and lesson and now it´s almost over already. It really has been great. 

Well, I´ll leave you all with that for this week. I hope you all have a good week! 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 83

Hey whole world (as they say here)! It been a pretty good week in Monte Negro here and I´m still alive so I guess things couldn´t be better. 

So some cool stuff that went down this week.... I guess we could start with Thursday because I had my first district meeting then! We had to get up bright and early at 5 to get to São Leopoldo by 8:30 and start up because we were also having interviews that day. We got there just in the nick of time and started up just fine. We have 6 in our district plus one ZL is always there at least and it went well enough I suppose. It´s the first time I´ve given one of these things in Portuguese so it was a bit tough but I got the point across still I think. At the end we did a little get to know you stuff and I told everyone they had to pick a spirit animal, so if my district were a pack we would be (including one ZL): 

A lion

A wolf

an eagle

a falcon

a (flaming) horse

a cockroach 

a Honeybadger (yours truely) 

It´s quite a bunch, ha ha. I think it would make for some sick zone/district shirts though, ha ha. 

Also I brought some apple pie and spread the love a bit to the zone and to Pres. and Sister Wright. One other Elder also brought some ´ little rolled Cinnamon breads´ as we translated it, ha ha. Sister Wright was so shocked and excited that she gave us both a good strong arm-hug thing and started laughing, ha ha. It was pretty great. I think Pres. just might move me up to the office now just to make some more pies for them, ha ha. 

After all that happened some pastor-man showed up out of nowhere in the church. he had this big bock-hat thing on his head and was dressed in black and purple. At first glace I thought he was some sort of pagan priest of Baal or something but then he introduced himself as Brother Paul. He wanted a hymnal a Book of Mormon and to pass out some planphlets of his. He´s some kind of reformed catholic I think judging by the pamphlet. Anyway Sister Wright went and talked to him and gave him all that he asked and a gospel principals manual. She bore a simple and powerful testimony to him and thanked him for his pamphlet and he went on his way. 

It was interesting to feel how the spirit changed when she talked to him. I at first was a bit put-off by his boldness, entering to the house of another faith and giving pamphlets and stuff. But the way Sister Wright treated him with nothing but simple kindness and testimony. Sister Wright doesn´t speak excellent Portuguese but that seemed to even help her case. Her simple language and pure intent to help seemed to disarm the man and when he left the spirit was palpable. I was stunned by her example. There was never really a debate or anything hostile but it area seemed much calmer as she started talking. It went from a situation I wanted no part of to a rich spiritual experience. These two little old Americans in Brazil really are called of God, I say that calling in action. 

I bet you were all betting on hearing a bunch about general conference which was great and very uplifting. I just was very impressed by that one experience this week. It was a bit funny but I really left there edified. 

Well, I guess we can called that good this week. Just one more thing, I want to give a shout-out to my little brother Kyle who got his papers all sent in this week! I´m sure you´re gonna love where ever you go bro. I served both in the states and outside and I can promise you that it´s the same. Don´t feel bad if you don´t leave the country and don´t even those who do. The work is the same and there are plenty of crazy stories in the world to go round. You´ll have the time of your life and some of the hardest moments but you will come to know God as you preach his gospel. 

Have a good week everyone! Keep calm and drink açai juice :) 

-Um no exécito de Deus

Elder Teela

Week 82

So this week has proved to be a bit more than I was expecting. I was transferred within the zone to a place called Monte Negro (Black Mount) where we go to our Zone training meetings usually. Basically I´m a hop and a skip from my old area and still have the same ZL´s, I´m just in the other district, ha ha. It´s all good though, I think I´ll ask to do a division with them sometime this transfer and go back to visit Sapucaia, ha ha. 

My new companion is Elder Lago (Lake/Pond) and he is from the north so he has a bit of an accent from there.... actually it´s a lot of an accent and he is bent on helping me kill mine, so if I come back talking back like a ´nordestinho´ for all my Portuguese speakers, it´s his fault, ha ha. He´s been out about 6 months and is new here too. Yeah, we´re kind of whitewashing this place. It´s been fun this week walking around without a comp that knows the area and having no idea where the people they were teaching live..... So it´s been a lot of street contacting and knocking doors. We´re lucky becuase the members here seem to like us a lot and we´ve already done a division but still it´s a bit different than having a missionary in the area before. 

So one kinda weird and funny thing that happened is that when we got on the train to go to transfers an old evangelical man decided he would preach to his captive audience. He started going on and on about churchy stuff and then when he got to us he saw our name tags and started saying stuff like ´Christ is not in the plaque of the church´ and ´we need to fight for Christ, not the plaque´ we all started laughing a bit on the train and the man seemed a bit offended because of that and went back to the other end of the train. All to be expected in the life of a missionary. 

The when we got here we went to straight to work and got lost, ha ha. It was kinda hard at first to find our way around but now we´re getting the hang of it. We live with two other Elders, Rameires and  J. Sanches. They´re pretty cool and both from Peru and work in the other ward near-by. We don´t really see much of them though because the other area is a bit far.

So a little spiritually thought for the day I had was shared on Sunday in our combined class for the 5th Sunday. The Bishop showed us a video that I have seen a few times but always love to watch called ´Only a Stonecutter´. It´s the story of a great Latter-day saint named John Rowe Moyle who always ´acted instead of being acted upon´. I like that view of life, living and overcoming your circumstances in place of letting them dominate you. We are made to create and over come. We are not as the animals in the fields that we dominate and determine what they will do, we have power over ourselves and our destinies. As another quote states ´a wise man creates more opportunities than he finds´. Let that littler adage sink in a bit and marinade, it´s one of my favorites. 

Well that´s it for now. Miss you all and hope you all and hope you have a good week! 

-Um no exéricto de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 81 ( Section 122 )

Well, once again I left all my time looking up pretty young women on Mormon.org ..... Kidding! I´m just kidding, just wanted to make sure you were all still a bit interested in these emails, ha ha. Anyway just want to say this week was really great to start off. I know I say that a lot but this week was even better than normal :). Just to say I know nothing about transfers for now except that they closing my area here and leaving only one companionship in the ward and that I am called as District leader this morning. It´ll be interesting to say in the least for my poor district, but I am honestly very excited for this new calling. 

So some fun stuff that´s going on this week. I got a sign language book from our deaf investigator and have been studying it a lot. Turns out it´s from the Jehova´s Witnesses...... So it´s full of cool drawings and a bunch of apostasy, ha ha. It says the way you say ´cristian´ is ´JW´! But anyway this Thursday I was actually able to talk to her all night about some random stuff and understand her almost completely without interpretation. It was pretty cool, she was  really surprised that I picked it up and I honestly was as well. 

We had a crazy guy tell me I was an American spy and that I need to go Venezuela or something like that. He also made some illusion to marriage in São Paulo Temple because my comp is from there.... It was fun I guess. I was nice to him and asked him if he believed in God and he told me to prove to him God was real in the moment, so we left him there and invited him to come to the church some day. He then shouted a bit more about American spies and some other random stuff..... Only happens on the mission I guess. 

This week we had an awesome woman drop out of nowhere! She is the mother of one of the other mission´s investigators and this woman, Tania, and her daughter and future-son-in-law all were baptized this weekend! It was super cool! They were all super happy and Tania went from not wanting to be baptized to asking me to baptize her! It was a really great miracle to see in her life and in ours. I know they will all be a great strength to the ward and that I´ll miss them all for sure. 

Sorry it´s short this week but I need to leave you all with a little spiritual thought. I was thinking about how God always provides a way. Seeing as we would have a baptism this week we were looking to complete the standards of excellence of the mission this week, but were heavily lacking in lessons with members with only Saturday and Sunday left. But out of nowhere we had tons of friends of members over to their houses when we weren´t really expecting anything. We just went and worked and hoped for the best and the Lord really did the rest! It´s like Gideon in the bible (if you don´t know that story go and read it, you´ll learn something) in Judges 6 and 7. I´d quote it but it´d be a bit long, ha ha. Check it out and you´ll see the parallels. 

The church is launching something called ´becuase he lives´. Everyone check it out and share it!  Have a good week! 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela  

Week 80 ( Section 129 )

Hey everyone! This week has been full of fun, the spirit and missionary whimsy. We´ve been a little short in the baptismal department but that´s okay, we´ve got some awesome people who are looking to be baptized this week. It could be up to 5 in one day! Whoo! 

But I really procrastinated writing this until the end of my time (stupid mormon messages are always way too addicting) and I´ll have to be a bit breif here. Not that every really waxed eloquent on you all before but one day it just might happen. 

Anyway this week we had a few great nights. The first was the baptism up of an eight year old in our ward which had more than a few investigators. It´s always good for them to see a baptism before they themselves get in the water. It also meant a ton of free food that could even satisfy a missionary´s hunger, haha. It was her birthday party as well so that was fun. 

The next night we had our ward FHE thingy. It was family histroy night and I´ll add a picture in here so you can all see what happened:

Yes, that is three missionaries in old school get up (I think you´ll be proud of me there Dicie). We thought it´d be fun to get into the spirit a bit with some of the people there. This is only a tiny bit of the people who showed up but only we were dressed in the spirit of the night you could say. 

Me and my comp also had a fun FHE with a famliy in the ward but we kinda got the time off... we got there half an hour early and ened up tracking after sundown and I´m fairly convinced we scared some poor people half to death showing up out of nowhere all dressed up but it was funny :). The FHE Went well too. The family weill be getting sealed here on friday which is SUPER cool! 

Sunday we went to a birthday party for a yound man in the ward. He insisted on some apple pie and I was more than happy to practice the old art so we went and had a good time there, but had to be home by 7 due to some protests that apperently were supposed to happen..... oh well, I made us another pie to enjoy, haha. 

I was thinking a little bit this week about some phrases I think we´ve all heard ´know thyslef´ and the other classic of ´what´er thou art, act well thy part´. These are some good old age wisdom I that I like. We need to know who we are and then figure out our best way to help the world. I always thought that for sure I´d be some huge baptizing AP that made everyone else look in awe at my awesomeness. But is not my part here in the mission or really even in life. I´m still not %100 sure what my part is but I am determined to go after it with everything I´ve got when I do find it. I´ll be the best whatever I am for sure when I get home. I think for sure I want a Moroni-like figure but maybe I should just be like Nephi (the 3rd) who was hated by everyone for being rightous until he was called as one of the humbke 12 in the BoM. Who knows, but we should all do our best to fulfill these two phrases I think. 

Have a great week everyone! 

-um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela  

Week 79 -- Lamenting my oldness

Wow, next week will be week 80 of my mission.... That´s crazy. I´m on the way down for sure, but I´ll get on to the week rather than lament my oldness, ha ha.

First off we had zone conference which was cool. Just a big old ball of spiritual coolness really. The mission President said something interesting.... ´chastity is exhaulatation´. Food for thought. 

So a few cool things are going down here. The woman we are teaching in who is deaf gave me a book of hers to try and learn a little sign language but it´s not very much still. Step by step I guess. I think it´s not ASL either which could be a little harder but we´ll see how that goes. It´s cool though, learning new stuff. I´m not sure if I´ll be using it too much when I get home but it still feels cool. I just wish I had learned more when I was with Elder Shamo, who was an ASL elder.... Oh well, too little too late. Also they made it to church last week and their daughters (11 and 10) want to be baptized! It´ll take a little convincing of the dad and some strong spirit but I think he´ll let them here soon. 

We had a cool ward FHE this week about BoM knowledge. We divided into 4 teams, one for each elder. With 3 elders out for more than a year and a half and one greeny (my comp) one poor team was a bit short handed, ha ha. We had a good night there and we had an investigator who walked there with us with her two little cousins. She liked it enough but didn´t quite get what was going, which is justified I guess, seeing as she never has read the BoM. 

We also had a cool lady just drop out of nowhere. She is the future mother-in-law of one of the members here. She just came to church last week and lives with her daughter (future sister-in-law of the member) and we didn´t get much of a chance to talk to her but she seems pretty open to the church. I think we´ll be seeing between 3-5 baptisms these coming weeks in our area alone. 8 in total in the ward! Should be quite a sight to see! 

We helped a member kill his grass this week the old school way. We had these hoe-like things that they call ´enchadas´ which being interpreted is ´swollens´. I guess they looked at their hands after they were done and gave em´ the name, ha ha. It was pretty brutal work but cool at the same time. I think everyone left with some blisters due to the pansy-ness of missionary hands. I need to hit a weight room again to toughen em´ back up.... 

So this week I said something that I kinda gave a second thought to... It was something like this to an investigator ´yes, Christ will give you a new heart, but you have to give Him yours first´. It kinda hit me when I put it that way. It gave new meaning to what king Lamoni said ´ Yea, what shall I do that I may be born of God, having this wicked spirit rooted out of my breast, and receive his Spirit, that I may be filled with joy..?´ to me. We need to literally rip out our old ways to give more room for the new ones.... Much different when I thought about it that way.

Hope you all have a good week. Keep calm and pray on! 

-Elder Teela 

Week 78-- Less Than 5 Months People!!

So now begins the countdown my friends.... The home stretch, the final run and end of the line. This week I´m gonna start something called the D&C countdown. Everyday you read one section of the D&C starting with section 138 and working your way down to one and that last one should be the last non-pday of the mission. I start Friday...... I´M SO FREAKING OLD!! 

But for this week we had a good one. Monday was fun as a P-day of course so I´ll get to the fun stuff this week. We had a cool activity in the church that our WML called ´project multiply Sapucaia´ which was basically a huge FHE. We ate some pastels (some sort of fried bread filled with meat and stuff) and played that ´what am I?´ game where everyone has a card with a thing on their forehead and need to find out what it is. It got a little loud with about 40 people but went pretty well I think. Everyone had a good time and some investigators showed up, so it was all good. 

It also rained a lot this week. We got home one day after lunch and it had been raining a bit so we thought that the storm had pasted by about 2:30 so we went out and left our umbela´s in the house. The rain came back around 5.... and you can guess what happened there. We took shelter with some old lady near by who turned out to be sweet as the ice cream she sells. She wasn´t too interested in our message but we did have a good talk about church and stuff for a while and said a prayer. We then went to a recent convert´s house to dry off a bit and drink some good old grass tea (Chimarrão). 

We then had an awesome less with a family that seems really prepared, the only problem is that the parents aren´t married so that could put the whole baptism off a few months. It takes at least a month to marry here in Brazil from the day you submit your papers. I´m still not entirely sure why but it´s whatever. They are super cool and they´re kids are pretty funny. 

We also discovered this bakery that makes awesome cake :). Only about a buck fifty for a huge slice.

Also our fridge broke.... I had the great idea to try and break some of the ice that was building up. I ended up making a bit of a mess of it all.... Not my smoothest moment, ha ha. I left some milk in there over the weekend and literally none of it came out as liquid this morning when I poured it all out.... yummy. 

In other news my workouts are going well. Ladies beware! By the time I get home I´m pretty sure no one will believe it´s really me, ha ha. My comp also cut my hair too, which didn´t go so well... He cut it WWAAAYYY short. Good thing mission conference isn´t for a while still, I´ll have a bit of time for it to grow out before Pres. chews me out. 

To end it all this week was stake conference which was great. Pres. Wright made it out with his wife and so did a counselor in the temple presidency! It was really cool to hear their talks but the temple president made some awkward moments for our investigators. He kept asking ´do you want to be Gods one day?´ Which really threw a few people for a loop, ha ha. That took a little explaining. Then the stake president did a bit of work... He had some stuff to clear up and basically spent his time calling repentance on a few things. It was the first time I´ve ever seen anything like it in a meeting like that. 

We finished the night at a long earned baptism. Not from our area but it was a kid I´ve come to know pretty well and I was happy to finally see him baptized. He´ll be a real strength to his family in the times to come like his brother was before him when he was baptized. 

In the end I think I´d like to quote Churchill on one thing. He said this: 

`Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be´ 

However long and hard the road may be is a phrase I have fallen in love with. Everything in the end will make it worth it, that´s just what I keep telling my self when the days get long and the lessons fall through. Keep that in mind and it will pull you through anything. 

Have a good week everyone! 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela 

Week 77-- I started a war

Hey everyone! Thanks for all the suppor I´m getting still guys. It really means a lot to have so many good friends. I love getting your emails and I respond to them the best I can but sorry if I miss a week or two here and there. Thank you all so much :). 

So this week went by pretty quick for me. Monday and Tuesday had some rough beginnings though because my companion was sick Monday (so no B-ball :( ) and Tuesday I was sick. I made a resolution that day that I would work anyway but only lasted till about lunch. We got there by bus which was just fine until we ate and I pretty much passed out then and there, ha ha. They said I was super red and looked like I was about to die.... so we went home and I napped all day pretty much by orders of the mission president´s wife. 

Wednesday I was better-ish. I didn´t do my normal intense workouts but we managed to actually do some missionary work without a problem. We had a good day but I really don´t remember it, ha ha. I was pretty exhausted and hit the hey hard that night. 

 

Thursday was district meeting and I about started a war. Every meeting we usually have ten minutes of language study with the district. Most of these involve games and I did ´Scatta-gories´ if anyone is familiar with that. I did Elders against sisters too..... Wrong move, ha ha. The sisters basically complained a lot and everyone kept using Brazilian fruits as words which I didn´t count and that got everyone going pretty well, ha ha. The sisters ended up winning by a bit but basically it was a war in the church, ha ha. That night we also had a super cool FHE with a member where his mom and sister made a TON of pizza for us. We almost got it all down but even four hungry missionaries after a good long day´s work wasn´t any match for how much pizza there was. For those of you who know a missionay´s appetite that should be pretty surprising.

Friday we had lunch with the ward mission leader and almost got kicked out because me comp was dogging on his soccer team too much, ha ha. It gets real down here people. I swear it´s crazy. Elder Lima here told me that at home people get shot over games and often there are fights after a big win. It´s pretty nuts. That day also started the rain that is still hanging around here. It´s been raining off and on for the past 4 days. It´s nice though because it cools down the weather a bit. At least we´re not kissing 100 (38C) everyday. It´s nice not to sweat until I die everyday now. I only drink a liter of water when I get home now a days as apposed to the usual 2, ha ha. 

Saturday we found a cool family. The dad is a delivery driver for a big drinks company here so he gives us a lot of soda and the mom is deaf, but she seems really cool we learned a little sign with them and they seem pretty cool. They have 3 little girls, like the gospel and accepted baptism already! It was pretty legit how we found them too. We were there for another appointment but as we were at the gate their little girls kept giggling and hiding from us so we deiced to hit them up. 

So a little spiritualism here. This week I´ve been really focusing on change. What final changes I want to make before I get home and shock the world with how awesome I am, ha ha. I´m sure physically we´ve all made a goal at some point but also I´ve been thinking a lot about myself really. I´ve realized that really the only thing that gets in the way is our pride. Just the fact we think that the way we do it is justifiable or that we know better, but in the end we just need to let go of that and honestly just be who we know we should be. It´s so simple but so hard isn´t it? 

Well, that´s it for this week. Have a good week everyone! 

-Um no exército de Deus

Elder Teela