Happy New Year!

Querido família!

Feliz ano novo!!! Can you believe it´s already 2014?? It felt like 2010 was yesterday. It was pretty funny, Elder Pontes was teaching a lesson the other day about making goals. He asked the members to set a goal to pray every day, read the scriptures every day and go to church each Sunday. I started thinking to myself, you know, that´s a really great goal. I´m going to try to do that this year. Then I realized I was a missionary and I was gonna do it anyway. Haha it was pretty funny. New Years was fun! Elder Mcarthur had skipbo, so I kept the card playing tradition going! We stayed up till midnight and watched the fireworks from our rooftop again. The fireworks were better than Christmas, but still not as cool as I was expecting. It was more of just loud noises. It felt like I was transported back to WW2 or somthing! I took some pretty cool pictures of the sunset that night too. I´ll send some pictures.

So this week was much cooler with some rain, so that was nice! I started getting these weird red dots all over my elbow and hand and I thought I had some crazy Brazilian disease. But it turns out, walking in 110 degree weather without sunscreen will give you weird red dots all over your arms. Haha it didn´t hurt at all and they´ve dissappeard now that I´ve been wearing sunscreen. So check off "skin cancer" on my bucket list! 

Other than that, this was an awesome week! We found a lot of new investigators with potential and taught some good lessons. My portuguese is still pretty bad, but it´s getting a little bit better. The words are starting to come, now it´s the accent and grammar that need a lot of work. I am starting to be able to understand people, though! I have to concentrate really hard use every ounce of my brain, but it´s coming! The only problem is, it wears me out so I start thinking about other things and then miss an entire conversation and then I´m completely lost. But it is getting easier so hopefully it continues! 

So investigators: We have a man named Darci who has been coming to church for 20 years, but has never been baptized. He has no legs from the knee down and he is just the coolest old guy. I guess he got some sickness which forced an amputation of both his legs. But he´s still so happy and optimistic! We set a date for him for the 1st of Febuary and he is so excited. The only problem is, he´s been having problems with his legs so he hasn´t been able to come to church. And transfers are in 2 weeks, so I might not even be here! I´m hoping to stay with Elder Pontes for one more transfer, but we´ll see. This week we also found a boy, Tal, who was baptized in Uruguaiana while living with his grandpa there. But now he lives here with his mom who is also a member. She wants to come back to church and baptize her daughter. Tal came to church and brought his non member friend, and his mom and sister will come next week! His friend liked chruch and wants to come back too. Pretty cool, huh? And we didn´t mean to walk by his street, we got lost and took a different route than usual. Just another example of being led by the Spirit!

I finished Jesus the Christ this morning! All 7 hundred and something pages! That book is incredible. James E Talmage is a genius. I could have read the New testament 10 times and not gotten half the things I got from his book. He analyzes every little deail of Christ´s life and gives a whole new perspective on everything. The atonement is perfect and infinite and REAL. Everything he did while on this earth was for the benefit of others, never for himself. Things have been rough for me lately, this language and mission thing is HARD. But reading this book, and also this scripture D+C 122:8 "The ^aSon of Man hath ^bdescended below them all. Art thou greater than he?" 

Next time you have rough times, remember Christ has already decended below it so he can lift you through it! And when you feel like you´ve run into something you can´t handle, or life is unfair, ask yourself "Art thou greater than he?" 

There´s my spiritual thought for the week, and now the worldly thought. WE FOUND WALMART. It exists in Brazil, who knew??? Well, it´s a BIG, but they´re a branch of walmart so it´s basically the same thing. Also, I heard Sherlock season 3 started and i´m dying on the inside...14.5 months.....i can do it...

Haha no, it´s all good, i´ll survive. I love all of you and hope your new year was wonderful! Thanks for everything and have a good first week of school! hehe.

Love,

Elder Weight