Hey everyone,
Well this has been a great week. We have been very busy trying to help this little branch here in Viçosa grow. So lately we have been giving some trainings to the church leaders and meeting with the members, trying to get them excited again. Unfortunately, Viçosa is a city where some difficulties have already happened in the church, and many members have fallen away or just become really unmotivated. Luckily we have some great new ideas and programs that we are going to begin next week to help these people become more unified and remember a few basic principles of what it means to be a latter day saint. I really love my new companion, Elder Ramos, he is carioque (which is someone from Rio de Janeiro). But he was living with his dad in Manaus (the amazon) before the mission. We have already gotten to be great friends. Yet more importantly we are comletely "one" in the work, teaching with the spirit and declaring boldly our message of the restored church.
Each day has been full of incredible experiences and although we are giving alot of time to helping the members and teaching the inactive, the Lord has blessed us to find some great families to teach and people to baptize. I have no doubt that this is the only true church of Christ and that it is led by real revelation through a Prophet of God.
My testimony has been strengthened alot this past week. Elder Ramos is a great missionary, he has helped me to be more bold and rigid when it comes to the gospel. I have learned that there is only one way to do this work and that is the "right way". There are no shortcuts in the gospel of Jesus Christ; everyone must be backed against the wall of faith, and prove that they are willing to humbly submit to God´s will. I think that our personal progress is not a matter of knowing what to do next, but a manner of doing that which we already know; and doing it to the best of our capability. Just a matter of saying, "okay, let´s do this!" We have been so busy this past week trying to get things started, but it will all be worth it come next week. I am already starting to feel the branch here improving, and I am so excited for the next few weeks!
Elder Ramos has been telling me a little about his life before the mission. Wow, he is proof alone that God exists! I learned something just listening to him:-that sometimes we dont always need to live something or face a difficulty to gain experience, knowledge, and become more resistant. I think that is why we are not all faced with the same trials, ..so that we can share our experiences with others and help them not to make the same mistake we did, but to take the long road. That one that leads to eternal life.
Ha, yesterday was a busy day for us and I´m sure that you can imagine how happy I was waking up to a typhoon pouring down over the city (not really, but you get what I mean--ALOT of rain!) Things didn´t exacly go as planned. Yet the Lord had something else in mind for us which led us to find some great people interested in the restored gospel.
I want you all to know that I am loving it here! This is by far the biggest adventure of my life and I am knee deep in happiness here. (also, almost knee deep in water at times) Haha, we were taking a road that led to our investigators house and with all of the rain the road became a river! It made me think, as I was wading through a "river" in a small cobblestone street in the middle of the northeast of Brasil; laughing, and full of a great spirit (as we had just finished a powerful lesson): I realized that never again will I have experiences like this!
I love you all a bunch,
-take care,_Elder Olson
p.s.-here are some pictures of our trip to the waterfall last week (only day of sunshine in months)
