MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!!!
Hello family!!! So how is everything doing on this fabulous winter day in Salt Lake City? So first thing first…. MERRY CHRISTMAS! It is hard to believe that we are entering the week of Christmas… it feels about the same as any other week on the mission… and it sure doesn’t feel like I will be talking with you guys here on the phone in about 7 days…. But I am so excited to hear all your voices again and talk to you guys! I hope that everyone has a bunch of questions and you guys are making a big list of stuff you want to know about!!
So this whole week has been a little strange… well to be honest this transfer has been a little strange… so week one in this transfer I found out that I would be training in the office, and that someone else would come and I would be able to leave the office at about 4 in the afternoon and it was a great week… then came week 3….. And we had a problem… a missionary went home and left a threesome in our area so president decided to take the comp that was with me and put him in the area with the threesome and made two companionships there… so this last week I came back to the office again… but the new secretary was needing a little bit more help with figuring out all the stuff here so it might have been a good thing… but during that one week we found some good families and stuff who are progressing and they should be baptized before I leave this area, so that will be a blessing!
This week also we had zone conference were we had one of the most amazing trainings from our president that I have had in the mission! We talked about the atonement of Jesus Christ and how it needs to be the center of our teaching! I learned so much! I feel so grateful for the atonement that was done for all of us! Through the Atonement, I know that our Savior, Jesus Christ, knows each one of us on a personal level!
I have thought through this thoroughly these past couple weeks and days… this is what I come down to...
I’m thinking in Portuguese and I hope it comes down to the same meaning in English….
So in our pre-mortal lives we were presented a plan (the plan of salvation) which our Heavenly Father created for us, so that one day all of us would have a chance to gain a body and have experiences here on Earth, so that one day we could accept God and show Him that we want to return and live with Him one day. In the pre mortal life our Heavenly Father already showed us the plan and what would happen and how it would be. At the beginning of this plan, our Heavenly Father knew that there would have to be a Savior provided and when He said this, the scriptures tell us that 2 people presented themselves to be our Savior. One whose name was Lucifer, and the other one was Jesus. Lucifer said that he would go down and save everyone, but we wanted all the glory of God to be his, for doing this! And Jesus said that we would go down and do the will of God! As we know our Heavenly Father chose Jesus to be our Savior and then there was a big battle in Heaven where 1/3 of our brothers and sisters decided to follow Lucifer and they were cast out of heaven and sent down to hell, never having the chance to return and live with God and have the opportunity we have to obtain a body and experience life here on earth!
So, God started this plan with Adam and Eve and gave them two commandments to not eat of the forbidden fruit and to multiply and replenish the Earth with children. We all knew that they transgressed a law menor to complete a law maior. Or in other world they ate the fruit so that we would have a change to come here, but when they did that they surely would die like the scriptures say. When they ate, two things entered the world the spiritual death and physical death. Which means, that these two things would make it literally imposable to return and live with our Father in Heaven again. But good thing that our Heavenly Father already knew that this was going to happen, which it says in 2 Nephi 25: 24 (if you could read a little bit in 2 Nephi 25!! It’s amazing) anyway back to where I was… the spiritual death and the physical death. Which are our sins and death. That is why our Heavenly Father called Jesus to be our Savior to come here and save us from these two deaths.
Jesus is one of my heroes. Learning and imagining about His life has been such a blessing in my life. Jesus, our Savior, the only perfect human being that lived in the flesh, the only begotten Son of our Father in Heaven, never had it easy. He was born in a very humble situation from Virgin Mary. In a straw manger, He was born along the side of the animals, and who would have thought that someone with such great importance to all humanity would start His life like this. Our Savior lived as the perfect example. The one that we all need to strive to be like, the one we need to follow. He left the example and the path to return and lived with our Heavenly Father.
Our Savior Jesus Christ gave us the perfect example of charity, service, love, patients, and every other attribute. He showed us His Gospel; how there has to be a prophet and twelve apostles and there, in that perfect organizing, their would be the complete truth! He shows that they would have the authority to administer the important ordnance of baptism, and sacrament. I could go on forever but what I really want to talk about is how Jesus is or Savior!
Savior is a strong word and when we think of what Jesus did for us most of the world thinks of the Cross-where he was crucified! Ya that was a super important part of His life, when He died for us, but I prefer to think more of the resurrection, which happened 3 days later! Because of Jesus’ resurrection, He gave us all a present. He made it so the death here on Earth will never be the end. One day every single person will resurrect, its something free that Christ has given all of us.
But something even more important happened the day before Jesus Christ was delivered to the Roman soldiers. And it’s about the event that happen in the Garden of Gethsemane. In that place he suffered a pain that we will never understand. In that place our Savior, He paid for all of our sins. He took upon himself all the sins of the world and gives us the “CHANCE” to be forgiven of our sins. He did everything. Did everything, he suffered so much that he bled from every poor of his body. This was the love that He had and has for everyone here on earth. That is the love that He has for us, his brothers and sisters. He knew that it was His purpose to come to Earth. He had to do that so that He could know us each, individually so that He could help us through our trials and our suffering here on earth!
This is our time to remember Him. To remember or Savior and to remember everything that He has done for us and ask if we are doing everything in our power to show our gratefulness to him. I am so grateful for this relationship that I feel, I have been able to create with my Heavenly Father, and with my brother Jesus Christ. I know that He is always at our side, but most of time it’s us that are far from Him.
I am so grateful for this time in my life to teach about what Jesus Christ did for us. For His sacrifice that He made for us. For Him making it possible for us to return and live with Christ. And most of all I’m so grateful for the chance that I have to help others create a better relationship with our Heavenly Father and our Savior!
Through our wonderful messages that us, the missionaries have, we are able to see that Christ never is far from us. Like I said at the beginning of this message in are pre mortal life we already heard everything that we would need to know to return and live with God. We already knew what were going to have to do when we got here on Earth. But when we got here on Earth we forgot everything. AND THROUGH OUR MESSAGES, WE REALLY AREN’T “TEACHING” WE ARE HELPING THE ONES WE LOVE,”REMEMBER” THE PLAN OF OUR HEAVENLY FAHTER THAT WAS ALREADY SHOWN TO US! That is why sometimes we meet people that the gospel just seams sooo natural to them. Because they remember!
Anyone can receive this help to remember!! And there is no better time than now, in this season were we remember our Savior, Jesus Christ!
I love you all, thanks so much for everything that you guys all do for me! This week is going to be awesome!! Here in about 7 days I will be talking with you guys! You said that you wanted to call at about 9:15 9:20 AM… ok. I will be waiting. I almost forgot, here in about 5 hours we are going to have some more baptism, which is just amazing! What a great blessing from our Heavenly Father!
I love you guys all so much! I can’t wait to talk to everyone! Ahhhhhh I’m sooo excited!!
Love you all!!
Your missionary
Elder Wiscomb
Hello everyone! How is everyone doing on this wonderful day! I hope that all is well and thanks to all of those who wrote me this week! Ah I just love getting letters and knowing that all of you guys are doing just great and enjoying this holiday season!
So first off the Christmas breakfast sounded like it was a big hit! Good job mom and dad! I’m sure that everyone loved it and appreciated all the hard work that you guys put into it. And then the wonderful gift that you guys gave to those three African families, that is really entering into the true spirit of Christmas. Helping others. That was for sure something that those families will never forget and for sure the highlight of this holiday season for them. Never forget the feelings that you guys get when you do something generous like that. It’s such an amazing feeling huh. To see someone be so happy! There is nothing better then that!
But other than that this has been a pretty crazy week… I don’t even know where to start. Today we climbed the mountain, which was fun. But I forgot my camera so my bad hahaah. But other than that, this week we had another situation of an Elder that had to go home early… and president was gone doing Zone conference so called me and asked me if I could take care of it. So I did ha. He got super sick, so this last Monday and Tuesday I had to figure out how he was going to get home from the furthest point in our mission. Uruguaiana.. Is on the border of Argentina. The last thing we wanted to make him do is get on a bus to here, Santa Maria, which is a 5 hour bus ride then another 4 and a half to Porto Alegre… so I tried to get him a ticket on a plan from Uruguaiana to Porto Alegre then to São Paulo…. But there wasn’t any until next week and he had to get home so we all prayed that he would have strength to do the trip on busses and get to Porto Alegre without getter way worse. Well, away we had to go the Rodoviaria at 4 in the morning to get him and wait there with him until he would get a bus at 5 to Porto Alegre… ya that was fun… not ha-ha… but he got home and is in the hospital getting better now which is good!!
Other than that, I have been training Elder Jones to be the next secretary here and he is sooo lost!! He is going to be a great missionary but he is super, super young! He just finished his first transfer here in Brazil. He served in Oregon for almost 2 months so he has almost 6 months in the mission but he is having a little bit of a hard time understanding what to do because he doesn’t talk that well. And he is getting scared. But just tell him that the Lord will bless him in ways that he will never believe. The Lord will help him with learning! So it’s been pretty fun to do that!
And besides that I have been working with a different comp this week Elder Silva Santos. He has about 5 months in the mission and is been a good week! We have been leaving the office at about 4 so it’s not a full day in the field but we have been working super, super hard! The first day that we left and worked, we taught 6 lessons, 2 with members. We knocked on about 40 doors each and we found 2 pretty good families. With the total of new investigators of 12. And marked 3 baptism dates!!! So that was pretty much like an amazing day!!!! But the Lord blessed us with that day because the Wednesday was a holiday here… some holiday of a saint or something like that, I don’t really know… but it was a super hard day. We worked and worked and knocked and knocked and entered 2 times into houses…
You got to love missionary work!! Last week I said that I was feeling like a “greenie” again because of like the fire inside of me to work again hahaha! I just want to get out there and work! But its going to have to wait for a little bit because I am going to have to help Jones a little bit more then was planned but that’s ok!!
So anyway the work is going just great! Even when you have these days when you go and knock and knock and knock and nothing goes according to plans. You always get back into the house tired but with these feeling that you did your best that day! I love that feeling, there is nothing like it! I know that this church is true and I'm sooo grateful for the blessing of the gospel in my life! I am so grateful for this holiday season, although, to be quite honest, it doesn’t feel like Christmas or December or anything like this… it just feels like another day or another month… but I'm grateful for our Savior, Jesus Christ! For His life here on Earth and for His examples that He has given to us! I'm grateful for the chance that all of us have to return and live with our Heavenly Father! And I'm so grateful for the wonderful blessing that He has given me with, my family and His love that I have felt so strongly! I am so grateful for you all and I love you all, thanks for everything you guys do for me!
Elder Wisomb
PS. I almost forgot a while ago on the 30 of November I finished the Book of Mormon like I said I would and I started again I hope that you started mom and whoever else that is doing with me too!
P.S I almost forgot to tell you guys the funny story of the week. So this week in the office I have been with Elder Jones helping him for a little bit… well anyway he has the worst gas in the world sometimes. It truly is horrible hahaha I almost die when he farts… but anyway Felipe and Silva Santos they get sooo pissed too and they left to go to the bank while we did some stuff here! Anyway when they came back they knocked on the door and Elder Jones Riped one right in front of the door hahahahahahaha (he was saving it for them). Oh man it smelled so bad and he waited for like 10 seconds to let it spread so It made with worse you know hahahahaha… then he opened the door and………………………………. Hahahahahah… It wasn’t Felpie and Siva Santos hahahahahahahaha… it was a different person that is super important and he just looked at Elder Jones and started to laugh and Jones got all red and I was dying almost on the floor hahahahahhaahhaha… oh man it was super, super, super funny!!! Pretty bad but funny!! Well that was story of the week!
Love you family!!
Elder Wiscomb
Hello everyone!! How are all you guys doing on this fabulous winter day back home! I hope that all is well and that you guys are enjoying that cold weather there, because here it’s literally ridiculously hot! You seriously leave, and when you get to the road and you just start to drip! I am taking advantage of my last couple days here in this air conditioning office!! Yes you heard it. I am coming to an end here!!
So there is now not an official day for transfers. It’s whenever and whomever president feels inspired to change at a given moment. He decided to show everyone that this last week. This last week was transfers. And we are having another big one this week… and the new secretary is coming here! I am getting a new comp his name is Elder Silva Santos and we are going to go to the road! Wahoo!!!!!!! The entire day of working in the field! I feel like a greeny heading out for the first time again. I will fry and sweat again! It’s going to be great!! I truly am super excited. So that was the new news that I found out today!
But lets talk about the week.
Well, this last Saturday we went and played paintball with the young men in our church. Long story short it was so fun and we dominated. Usually we wouldn't be able to go but we took 3 guys who are investigators and it was in the morning so we went. Something happened though, which was pretty funny.
Most of the people who went paintballing, it was their first time and at the end of the game the people who had a couple balls left they starting to empty their guns just shooting at a car that’s in the middle of the field. After one of the kids looks at me and said. Look elder Wiscomb all it does now is shoot air and pointed it at my arm from point blank and shot my arm but if that wasn’t enough he shot pulled the trigger twice and then in the leg.... but not with just air… hahaha… ya there were two more balls left that he didn’t notice and it got me pretty good and ya it hurt. But I just laughed it was pretty funny!
Also it’s been a week pretty crazy… it was another one of those weeks we lost some really good investigators… I don’t know if it’s because of transfers of what. But it just felt like nothing was going good for us hahaha… but that’s ok. The work sometime goes like this.
We went back to that family where were went with president and we taught the Book of Mormon! They loved our message and the women said that she will read the part that we marked for them and then after they started to tell us about their history… we knew that they were catholic but we soon found out that the grandparents built all the churches here and the man who we were teaching was some president or something. They just loved us and were intrigued… well long story short we taught and she, the women said she would read. So I hope that she reads because we will just let the Book of Mormon work then… the Book of Mormon is one of the most amazing tool to watch work!!! The spirit just flows from it!! I hope that she reads!!
As for our other families, we just haven’t had time to pass by… it's crazy… I can’t really believe how busy we have been. So it’s been way too long of time without contact… which is bad…
Well that’s pretty much our week… I am looking outside and it’s going to rain cats and dogs right now… oh man… we are going to get wet hahahahah awesome huh!
Well family I just want to say that the church is true!! If anyone has any questions about it just ask God, He, though the holy ghost, are the only ones that can truly show you that it is…!
I am sooo grateful for the prayer, actuall prays that I have done!! There is no doubt in my mind that this church is true and everyone can have this confirmation! I love you all!! Have a great winder day!
Elder Wiscomb
Hello family! How is everyone doing on this fabulous day! It sounds like it’s been quite a week. A weather warning about the biggest storm in the history of Utah or something like that... ha-ha... everyone running crazy to supply the 72 hour kits... pretty crazy! I'm just glad that it didn’t turn out as bad as everyone thought that it was going to be! It sounded like all of you guys had a great Thanksgiving, pretty calm but good! I’m just happy that all of you guys are doing just fabulous!
As for me… first of all let’s just talk about Thanksgiving. Ha-ha nothing went down. Well nothing out of the ordinary. It consisted of a lot of lessons, which was good and walking. But that’s just about it. A life of a missionary usually doesn’t change… its just the same thing. Especially when you’re in a county that doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving ha-ha. Something pretty fun though… is at night we called our ward mission leader who is a 24 returned missionary that is waiting for is girlfriend to back from her mission. He came over and brought a pretty good desert and we ordered pizza and we sat there talking… until 10:30 that is. Then we had to go to bed ha-ha!
So that was my Thanksgiving nothing to special!
So lets start from the beginning…. Last Sunday it was pretty crazy. This whole last week we were with a missionary that, because of something that he did… he was transferred missions from the Brazil Londrina mission… so he was with us working which was pretty cool… anyway us three headed out to start working on Sunday… for those who have served here in brazil I don’t know if it’s the same everywhere, but all parts of Brazil but Sundays are days that are usually pretty difficult to teach, especially when there is a soccer game passing on the TV… ya everyone is in a house, the families are together… but no one wants to accept two, let alone 3 missionaries in their house… but the work just keeps going right haha…
So anyway it was a rough day. Pretty hot, we got in about 3 housed the entire day and we visited some less actives real fast too. But then, close to the end of the night we are walking up by the mountains in our area… super, super far from everything ha… and we see a road that leads up to something, a road that we have always seen but never gone up. So we said lets just go up it…
Up at the top, was this old farm that was really, really cool! Oh man it was awesome! With a huge entrance. We sit there for a little bit thinking if we should go in, our hit our hands from there so we decided to stay there and just hit our hands…. Ha-ha. And you guys will never imagine what happens next hahaha… about 10 dogs come running at us… hahaha ya it freaked me out… I'm not even going to lie, I ran hahahaha, (5 days before I was bit by a dog so I was just fed up with these dogs haha) and then we are a little bit down the road and we decide lets go back so we go back and we hit our hands again and this time the man with his dogs coming and we wait for literally about 3 minutes for him to get to us… we talk with him and he is awesome old man oh he is so cool! He invites us to come in and we sit outside on this beautiful land and teach the first lesson through the Apostasy and we stop!! And planed to go back in 3 days…
So the three days come around and guess who we invite to go with us… ya the one and only… President Ribeiro … so that was it…. We though this family is super cool we need someone to help us!!! We invited him to come and then we gets there and we are soooooooooooooooooooooooooo scared hahaha… teaching with the president is scary. He just said to teach until we wanted to stop, and then he would take over. So were like ok. Haha. So the whole car ride up there, I'm pretty much shaking… my whole body hahaha… and we get into the house and I just say a little pray to calm me down and it was like president wasn’t even in the room…we taught for about 35 minutes. What he wanted us to do..… And then we are like. Alright baleza, lets just throw it to president now… so we did he said 3 words and threw it back at us, I was like huh… what’s going on… ha-ha I guess he wanted to see what we do under pressure…ya well the message was good… and they understood…. But they are super strong in the Catholic religion. So it’s going to be a process and maybe a long one. But a good one at that too!!
The other families that we are teaching are going good too we are hoping that they will all go to church this weekend! It will be amazing if they all come! Something always happens that makes it so they can't come. Which is difficult… but we are praying that this one goes right!!
So family, that was the experience of the week… the work is going! It’s moving forward, which it always will do! I am so grateful for you all and all your love! For the chance that I have to be here on the mission, and to learn and grow!! I can’t believe that it’s already entering into December! Its crazy! In one month I will be here your voice! How crazy is that!
Family always know I am here for all of you if you need anything! Ok?
Love you all with all my heart, the church is true, and I know we are an eternal family, the thing I am most grateful for! Something, which is only made possible through the gospel that we all love!
Love you all!
Love your missionary, son, bother, and grandson.
Elder Wiscomb
Week 67 November 19, 2010
Hello family how is everyone doing on this wonderful Friday afternoon! I hope that all is well and that you guys are staying worm ha-ha. I hear that its starting to get pretty cold there, quite the opposite of here. Here its starting to get hotter than ever and it's not even summer yet... here in Santa Maria it's one of the hottest places in our mission because its like a hole... we are surrounded by mountains.... and here it truly is starting to look, not feel, but look like Christmas... the decorations are going up. In the center and in the shopping and everywhere the Christmas trees are raising ha-ha! It’s getting pretty cool! When it gets all ready, I will take some pictures and send them to you!
Well this week, can you believe that another week passed by! First of all thanks so much for the emails of you guys! Ever week I feel so blessed to have such an amazing family! But thinking back on this week so much has happened it’s been pretty cool!
So this last Saturday we had another amazing lesson! We are teaching this family of 4, its a dad, his wife and 2 daughters. They are really good investigators and they like our messages and they have gone to church a couple times the mom and one of the daughters... but its been pretty difficult to take the dad to church... so we decided that we needed to teach the restoration again and pass the film... so we did and the spirit was sooo strong! The dad liked it so much and during the film he started to cry and said that he believes... well he believed but that next Sunday he already had some work arranged that he had to do. He is like the handyman. He is a workaholic ha-ha.
This last week we have been helping a little bit... with some service projects. We helped him build a patio. Lay cement and stuff which was pretty fun but we didn’t really get a chance to teach him because it took so much time. Well after we helped him 2 days ago we were talking to him and he said this weekend I'm not going to nothing, I am going to just relax and go to church!!!! I thought that we weren’t going to have any progress with him because we didn’t teach but then the thought popped into my head "God helps those who help"... "Deus ajuda aqueles quem ajudem" it's so true! Through our love and help that we showed him, he felt the spirit and the love we have for them. Maybe that was the difference, maybe that is what he needed to show that we truly carry the message that can change people’s lives!
Also something pretty crazy happened this week... it feels like everything that we ask our Heavenly Father he blesses us with it! The other day we were sooooooooooooooooooooooooooo far away from everything... we had to go to an investigators house that was about and hour away from everything we were so far that we didn’t even have service on our phones and we always get service... well anyway we had another appointment at 7:30 and it was 7:10 and we were so far away... and we started to practically run back... and I was thinking I will just say a pray that a member or someone we know for some chance would drive by here and give us ride.. Well I said a prayer and not 1 minute later there was car that was coming strait at us and Elder Felipe said jokingly "olha... não parece o carro de João o careca" (look, doesn’t that look like bald headed John?) and then the car started to come strait at us like it was going to hit us. And who was it.... it was bald headed John in our ward... I truly didn't believe it!!!!!! The Lord is blessing us in every way even a prayer for a ride!!!
I am so grateful for everything that I have in my life! For you all at home, my family, for this work, for the gospel, for the chance we all have to return and live with our Heavenly Father again, for my friends, the friendships I have made in the mission, for the chance to see changes, for repentance and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, I could go on listing everything that I am grateful for but this email would probably turn into a book! I hope that all of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving!! It's going to be a special day and don’t forget to thank our Heavenly Father for everything that you have!
I love you all so much and you guys have a great week!!!
This church is true!
Elder Wiscomb
Hey family!!! So how is everyone doing on this wonderful Friday afternoon! I hear that it's starting to get a little colder, starting to maybe look a little bit like Christmas or Thanksgiving hahah. I also hear that this was a pretty rough week for the football. The Utes and east. It’s a bummer that it sounds like neither of them showed up ready to play… but there's always next year ha-ha. It’s not the end of the world…
Well family this week was a great week! Saturday we had some more baptisms!! It was such a special day! I will never forget the reactions of Claudio and Juliana. I will never forget the way they looked at us with such great fullness and love in their eyes. It was such a great treat to be able to see one of the people that I had the opportunity to baptize, baptize someone else. It was truly something that I will always carry with me.
This week was also pretty crazy! It was the council of the leaders so everyone was sleeping at my house… this one was with all the LZ and the LD so we had about 35 people in our house it was crazy and so awesome to see all my buddies and then going to the council with them!
So the things that were taught there… we practiced the lesson… talked about the mission and how poorly it is doing… me and Elder Felipe found out that we are in the top 3 companionships of baptizing… President used us as an example because we have about 3 to 4 hours on the road every day and we are baptizing more than everyone in the mission… it just shows how much the Lord has blessed an individual or a companionship when you are doing right things, and just working…. Also we talked about secret combinations… and president referred it back to the work in our days… it was amazing
But other than that, we have been working super hard! Something pretty cool that happened this week is this….
So there is a road that has sooooooo many members on it and to be honest it's like a street of families where some are members and the members always say that the work can't go on that street and what not because it's already been worked on or whatever… so yesterday some stuff fell, and we were like "let's just knock on the doors there"… so we went to that street and started knocking. We played dumb. Like we did't know who lived there and we were excepted to enter… so we enter and taught the first part of the restoration and the loved it!!! We are going to go back there on Monday so I hope that goes good! I think it will be!
As for that family I told you about last week. We will be going back today… so hopefully that they will be going to church this week!
Always family I just want you all to know that I love you guys so much! This work is so important and the Gospel is true! It Is truly what brings us such happiness! I am so grateful for the Gospel of Christ in my life! I’m so grateful for the love of Christ in my life! And I'm so grateful for you guys! Thank for everything! Have a great week
Elder Wiscomb
P.S. Oh I almost forgot… I was sitting here working yesterday, and President walked out of his office and just stated to talk to us normally, then he looked to me and said… Elder Wiscomb, I know that you we said you would like leave after this transfer… but sister Ribeiro said that she will not allow me to let you go before Christmas… so what do you think. Can you handle one more here in the office…” oh man………………………………………………… so ya…. That’s what’s gong to happen I guess I am going to be here for Christmas too………………… you want to know how much time that is going to be in this area…. Almost 8 months. Oh my gosh hahahahahaha but that’s all right I love this place….
Love you guy
Hello family how is everything and everyone doing? Thanks so much for all of your emails and the updates! You all sound so happy! It sounds likes this weekend and week will be a big one their in the Utah area!
So family so this week was super crazy! So, it was the week of renewing the visas for some Americans and also on Tuesday it was a holiday here… the day of the dead. So I called some people in from the different cities to do it (renew visa’s) and who would have known the federal police station was going to be closed on Monday too…. So that was just the start of a long week… because of that, we had 5 elders here with us for about 3 days. So we did a bunch of divisions and stuff, which was fun!
Then when we went back Wednesday we just walked in and the people like freaked out at us… saying “ah no, we are without time to do you guys today… there are a bunch of Brazilians here and they have priority before you guys… you guys need to come back in the tarde.” So ya… know what, I’m not going to lie I was kind of frustrated I wanted to say some stuff to them because they seriously were soooooooo rude to us their… I don’t know why… its got to be the church or something, or maybe its because we are Americans but whatever… that’s alright… so I went back and president saw I was pretty frustrated and he called me in and was like what happen… I talked to him and he said that he wanted to go with us later that day… so he came and they were totally different people it was unbelievable…. Huh… I was thinking. Maybe I should wear my suit or something, look more official if you know what I mean ha-ha. Who knows maybe it would help.
So we got that all figured out which was a blessing! And with the work this week it’s been pretty good too!! As you guys have seen we had another casamento (marriage) today! What a blessing this one was! Claudio and Juliano, it’s a long story with them! We found them about 6 and ½ months ago. When we found them he was just stopping to use drugs and alcohol and Juliana smoked about 2 packs of cigarettes a week! So many times we thought that it was going to be a lost cause, that they just liked our presence in their life and in their house… but the Lord really worked a miracle in their lives!! We taught and taught and re-taught all the messages and they sunk deep into their hearts! They are sooo strong it is amazing! I love these two with all my heart and tomorrows going to be one of the best days in my mission for sure!!
Tomorrow there is going to be their baptism! I am going to see someone that I baptized, baptize his best friend! Have you thought about that!! Oh my gosh!! How amazing is that! I can’t wait, it’s going to be something to remember!
We are also planning on bringing a family that we have been working with for a little bit to the baptism as well! A family of 4, which is awesome! I hope it all goes great.
The work here in Ala Centro is going so well! Besides all of this the families that we are working with and stuff, I had a great experience this week. During one of the division we were doing this week, we were going to some meetings that we had marked… well long story short they fell…. Everything… WELCOME TO MISSIONARY WORK EVERYONE hahahahaha… we have these days sometimes but you just have to laugh and keep going… well anyway, I remember a street in our area. Is the only street in the entire area that I haven’t knocked? I don’t know why I didn’t have the chance to knock it but we always just passed in front of it running between meetings… so I thought lets go there.
We started knocking… we knock and knock and the road started off normal. Getting rejected door after door hahaha. Then we get about 3/4ths of the road and this women comes out smiles and invites us in… a little after about 5 minutes her husband gets home, and a little bit after that their son gets home… I was with Elder Witt another American and I not going to lie. It wasn't the prettiest of lessons…. It was hot and we had walked for about 3 hours and to be honest my mind was tired… but we taught and got our point across and they understood and loved it…
Anyway the Spirit of the Lord was really, really working that day… after the lesson the husband looked at me and said “how did you get here, who sent you guys here?” and I said that I have always wanted to knock on this street and I just hadn’t had the chance yet… and he said “I don’t believe that you guys came here just to come, I believe that you guys came for a reason” it was like that family was waiting!!! What a blessing it is to have the Lord on our side working threw us!! The Lord is the best teacher in the world! He knows all! Knows His Gospel of course better then anyone else… knows how to teach, He knows his children (us), He knows where they are at all times and who is prepared and is waiting for the truth in their life…. He knows in what ways His children are going to need to be taught by the Holy Ghost. He knows show to show His children that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is His church on Earth! It’s a blessing to have Him on our team! We are going back to that family in about 5 hours so it should be good!
I love you all so much and I know that God has the power and is just waiting to show whatever type of person that what we do is true. He is waiting to show everyone were to find happiness and eternal life! That is the blessing that we as missionaries carry with us. It’s why we leave for two years and embark in the amazing work with the Lord!
Fam, I love you all so much! You guys are the best! Always remember I'm praying for you guys always! Have an awesome week!
Elder Wiscomb
