I´m doing well. Things here in Faro are running well. We´ve been filtering through a lot of people lately, lots of teaching and finding.
Recently we´ve found quite a handful of new investigators, I could go into details with each one and tell the stories, but I don´t think it´s really worth it, a lot of folks that we taught have already slipped through the cracks. Many have trouble believing that God inspired prophets on the american continent and that they wrote his word. People sometimes are downright scared of the Book of Mormon, only because it´s got a different cover than the Bible. But so be it, those who are prepared will accept it.
We passed the first half of our week doing travels and divisions with the district and missionaries in our zone. We did so with the assistants, it all ran pretty well. We had a lot of 1 on 1 time in some training meetings to help out some missionaries gain experience and learn new things, but most importantly practice. I did a division with two missionaries in Portimão, one is Angolan and the other Mexican, it was a fun combo. The mexican, Elder Angulo, would just do contacts in spanish, but no worries, the portuguese understand haha! It was really fun to meet them and do some work there. They are having a lot of success.
This week we also worked a bunch with Basílio. As you remember from last week, he was finally getting a grip on stuff and was actually doing well to be baptized, but on thursday he drank a cup of wine, breaking the word of wisdom once again. The lesson we had was a bit disapointing, after teaching him so many times and reinforcing the same teachings he still managed to fall through. But, he screwed his head on straight the next day and actually now is doing much better. He came to church again this Sunday and is now progressing well to hopefully be baptized here in the near future!
We have a member here named Elísio who was baptized a couple years back and has 19 years. He´s from Guiné Bissau (Africa) and is a great guy. Fortunately with all my time here in Faro I´ve been able to make a good relationship with him, and this week we got to teach his 12 year old sister, Anci, who recently got here from Guiné. Anci is quite a character. She is smart and funny, and actually went to a church activity too. She likes it when we visit, but it has been a bit hard to teach her because she speaks Creole from Guiné which is rooted in Portuguese but still very different, I don´t understand it at all. She is learning portuguese now, and can get by, but we had to use Elísio to translate a lot of it. Anci was doing well, but her mother (Elísio´s stepmom) is a bit of a grump to be frank, and wont let her come to church or be baptized, so its a bit of a lost battle there. A bit of a shame, her mother wants her to grow up in her church, but doesnt even go to her church... oh well.
This week in a quick street contact I stopped and talked with a brazilian guy, Diego with 23 or so years who was on a bike. I quickly said who we are and what we do, and we made an appointment for the next day. We showed up and we taught him and his brother, Santiago. They enjoyed our message, we talked about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We explained to them the importance of Faith in Christ which leads to repentance and then baptism. They said "shoot, I´ve never been baptized" and we responded "well we can help with that".
In that short lesson we marked them both for baptism, but unfortunately they didn´t make it to church. They work on a farm, lots of manual labor. When we taught them they had recently gotten home from work and were still covered in mud. They were visibly tired during the lesson as well. We came back after church and asked them what happened, they had slept until noon haha. I´m not too worried, they showed a lot of potential the first visit, certainly with another attempt and a bit more preparation they´ll get up and get going well.
Ivanilson is doing well. He´s a bit of a misterious guy. Last week he didn´t make it to church because he had an unexpected travel to do. No worries. We sat down to talk with him in a short lesson, and he just asked questions and we responded. He´s awfully smart and a great guy, he truly wants to know things and know them well. He came to church yesterday, but for some reason left early... I dont know why, he still hasnt picked up the phone, but Im not worried, I guess it´s just what he does!
Yesterday we were walking in a hurry so we stopped contacting people. Suddenly we passed this man (César was his name) on our right who stopped us and said "Hey wait, you guys are the mormons?"
"Yeah, that´s us!"
"Do you guys know where I can get one of those Books of Mormon?" he asked.
I opened my bag and pulled out a book of mormon and said "Well from us, you´re talking to the right people!"
"Oh good." He then pulled out his wallet and opened it up and said "how much is it? I´ll pay right now!"
From there we explained that it was free, but that we prefered to hand it over in person with a short visit to explain what it is and how it can be of benefit to him. He explained that he was curious because he had met in the past many mormons. He accepted a return appointment the next week. It was a cool little "coincedence" that really shows that there are people out there interested in receiving the restored gospel!
Anyways I think that´s basically it. We are always looking and searching thoroughly for those prepared by the Lord. We hope to find some new success in the near future. This week we found some interesting folks who we should teach this next week. Hope all goes well!
That´s it!
Elder Ward
This guy on a bike stopped us and said "hey you guys recognize this dog" "No" "oh okay good luck" and just rode off.
Elder Thompson taught me how to be a hipster
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