Transfers

Change, change, change! This transfer is gonna be a lot of it. Élder Pontes is being transferred to the area right next to us and will be our district leader. Elder McArthur will be transferred basically to Argentina. Elder Pereira´s new companion will be someone who already served in this area like a year ago. And I will be...TRAINING. Yep. One transfer and I´m already training. This´ll definitely be a major learning experience haha. It´ll be good and it´ll force me to learn the language a lot quicker, but it´s gonna be hard. Luckily, I´m staying in Santa Maria so I won´t have to learn a new area on top of everything. I´m just hoping and praying my new companion isn´t an American...

This week was wonderful! Probably the best week I´ve had here in Brazil. Tuesday we did an exchange with the district leader Elder Jensen. I went to his area with his companion, Elder Barros. It was fun to see a new area and see what other parts of Brazil are like, but I definitely have the best area. If there´s one thing I´ve learned from my mission, it´s that I´m definitely a city boy. Walking through a city is just so much more interesting and exciting than walking through the country. So I´m grateful to be serving right here in Santa Maria. So before this week, the language had been a major struggle. Well, it still is, but I think I was being way too hard on myself before. I wanted to be perfect in just one month which just isn´t possible. During this exchange, I realized I really was learning. Elder Barros basically doesn´t speak a word of english, and we could communicate! How amazing is that? Yes, I didn´t understand every word he said. Yes, I couldn´t say everything I wanted to say to him. But we could still talk and understand each other! That right there is a miracle. So yes I´m not perfect. I probably never will be. But I´ll just keep working and studying and learning and it´ll come! Also, I was talking to Elder Barros, and he said Elder Pontes is probably the fastest speaking missionary in the mission. I hadn´t been around too many other missionaries, so I didn´t really realize it, but man, now that they pointed it out, it´s true. And now I can understand basically everything he says, so there´s another miracale for ya. Gift of tongues is real, yo.

Let´s play: Weird things about Brazil, pt. 2

1. Rainstorms come out of NOWHERE here. In the morning it´ll be 100 degrees without a cloud in the sky, and by 4 o clock it´s raining cats and dogs. That only happned to me three times this week...

2. The numbering of houses makes absolute no sense here. You can be waking down a street and have 47, then 258, then 2, then 60, then 934. No joke. It makes life as a missionary pretty miserable haha.

3. I don´t know why or how, but people love to wear American shirts here. Like english sayings, american air force, sports teams, etc. I guess all the shirts americans don´t want get shipped down here? I don´t know. I saw a guy with a Utah Blaze shirt on the other day and I started laughing pretty hard.

4. If a baby needs milk here, the baby gets milk. There´s no blanket, no discretion, no privacy, nothin´. They just pull the shirt down and go for it. Yesterday in church, a lady was milking her baby and she was given a calling. She stood up without stopping, showin off to the whole ward! Man. Gotta love Brazil.

This week we received a referral from some other Elders. This 18 year old kid has been going to church with his girlfriend in the other area, but he lives in our area. So we went to teach him and he said "Hey, I´ve already been to church a few times and I know it´s all true and I want to serve a mission. What do I need to do?" So we taught him about baptism and he will be baptized this Saturday! We´ve been teaching him basically every day and he is just golden. He´s studying at the university right now, has a car, and is not living with his girlfriend. It´s pretty hard to find people with all three of those things here haha. The Lord is preparing people everywhere, I´ve seen it again and again on my mission.

One thing I´ve been studying a lot about on my mission is grace. I´ve always been confused about grace and what it means for me and my salvation. It seems like every other Christian sees grace as Jesus did everything for us, so we don´t have to do anything, just say "Thank you Jesus!" and you´re good! But on the other hand, it seems like a lot of Mormons see grace as something we have to earn. That we have to do everything on our own and THEN Jesus´ grace helps us. So studied a bunch of scriptures and I was still confused. But then I found a talk which just makes everything clear. So whoever is reading this, if you are confused or if you have a friend/child/student/investiagtor/member/anyone look up this talk: "His Grace is Sufficient" by Brad Wilcox. Look up the full version on lds.org, and all your questions about grace will be answered. It´s the best. Go read it, send me an email with your thoughts, and I´ll give you a high five. Jesus´ grace is sufficient and "free" in a sense, but Jesus then turns around and requires repentance and works so that we can learn and change. Then when we return to God´s presence we will want to stay there because we have changed! He explains it better than me, so go read it.

Well, I love you all so much. I hope you have a wonderful week and send some of that cold weather down here cause I´m dying down here. Keep being good boys and girls and I´ll talk to you next week! 

Love,

Elder Weight