2nd Week with Sister Almeida- Jaú, Brazil

"Bi-Polar States" 

So São Paulo just decided to become Utah out of no where and my missionary wardrobe is just glaring at me for not coming out here just a little more prepared. The last three days have been absolutely freezing with rain and strong wind, so I'm not sure where Brazil went, but I can't complain because I was complaining about the impressive heat before that.

But anyway, it was a pretty good week.

Tuesday we had a Bible study at the house of a member to celebrate his birthday and we invited an investigator, Vinicius. When we asked him what he thought of the activity, he told us that he loved it because he felt like when he spoke the others understood and where always welcoming to his point of view. We've actually invited him to be baptized - We've taught him the Restoration and invited him to pray about the truth of what we said - but he said he doesn't feel prepared. In fact, he told us that he didn't do the prayer he said he'd do because he said he doesn't actually feel prepared for the answer (guys, I think he already knows, but is afraid to have it confirmed by God Himself). So we're still working with him on this...

We started teaching a very large source of part member families Wednesday. Arruda is a member, his kids are all inactive members, and none of his grandchildren are baptized. So we've been trying to teach them and help them develop a desire to make this covenant, but my heaven, his grandkids are a shy bunch. They're warming up - his little granddaughters love us - but still. They've got hesitation towards invitations to church and for baptism, so it's a slow process, but it's moving

Friday was kind of a funky day. We started it out with one expectation and ended it completely different. We walked to a pretty far neighborhood - not the farthest, trust me - did a few visits, then stopped to visit a recent convert in the area. He gave us nearly a 1 1/2 hour rant about how the members are close minded to hymns from other religions, how it's deceptive to have an electric piano that sounds like and organ, and that we should make out bible study more like a sacrament meeting, etc. Anyways, when he was done he decided to give is a ride to our next visit. We told him to drop us off at a supermarket so we could do a phone call, which went well. After the call we started some language study and out of no where this guy came up to us and began talking to us. The conversation didn't go anywhere, but we left him a book of Mormon and he went on his way. At this point it was pretty dark, so we decided to head closer to home. On the way, we passed a group of people eating Churrasco (Brazilian barbecue). As we passed, guy out of nowhere said, "Hi, Sisters."

Now that's funky, because "Sister" isn't a word used outside the church in Brazil. We kept walking, then Sister Almeida decided to go back. We discovered that he was an inactive member. We talked to him for a bit and he ended up buying us Churrasco.

So nothing went how we planned, but it was a good time.

Sunday I gave a talk, and for the first time in my life I did it without reading the entire thing. It was really scary, and it wasn't very long, but I did it. Everything worked out. Thank goodness the people in this branch are nice.

Well, that's all I've got. For this week.

Keep Vinicius in your prayers. He really needs an answer.