Week Fifty Three.

Hello there everyone,

Another week has come and gone and here I am writing you guys again. This week has been very rewarding, but the rewards came after a ton of hard work! The start of the week was pretty hard. It is differently entering into summer here and we had a few days of super-hot sun with walking a ton and some of our areas are really far away. I forgot to use sunscreen, so I got pretty nice sunburn too! So because of all that we were both pretty pooped the rest of the week, I was finally able to rest a bit today. But we have really been wanting some baptisms in our area especially because this week is the last week of the transfer period, so we are trying to push through. We have been praying a lot and trying to put in a lot of sacrifice. Because of that we were able to find some miracles this week too.

We were challenged to invite people to be baptized at least once every day, and because of that we were able to get 3 baptism commitments!!! 2 for this week and one for the week after. We were truly blessed. There is an ex-pastor that we have been trying to teach who has been going to church for over 5 months, but in a different ward! It is always super hard to find him in his house. But we were passing by there and decided to try, and sure enough he was in there. We still hadn´t invited anyone to be baptized that day so we decided to invite him. And sure enough he accepted! And will be baptized this week. We were so excited. We then received a reference that the elders gave to us. We called him met with him the following day. He is dating a girl in another area and has been going to church for at least 2 months now, and wants to be baptized before the 4th, we were like: we can make that happen, how does next week sound! (This was the day following the other baptismal commitment) So we were pretty excited. He has a ton off questions and is more gospel literate than a lot of members that I know. The other was at church where a member said his nephew wanted to be baptized! So we set his baptismal date for next week. What a week of miracles we are so excited! We really tried to do everything that we could this week, and because of that we were able to finally commit some investigators to baptism, and we were able to meet all of our goals.

This Sunday Our mission president came and visited our ward, we were not advised beforehand, and were in a state of panic. Our investigators were visiting other wards and we didn’t have investigators in our ward. So we snuck out and started calling everyone. WE had some investigators that lived super close and we went to their houses to get them to come to church, but none of them were home. We then started inviting everyone that we knew in the street to come to church. But sadly enough no one came; we realized we just had to face the truth. But the president met with us after wards and really just wanted to know how the ward and the area was doing, so it was all good.

But this week was very hard, but I think it has been the week that I have seen the Lord’s hand and received more  blessings than anytime previously in my mission. I am very grateful to be here serving the Lord. Thank you everyone for all your support and your prayers. Next week is transfers so we will see if anything changes, until then, I hope everyone has a great week.

Love,
Sister Rebecca Nelson

Week Fifty Two.

Hey there everyone, 

This week was again pretty uneventful, but there was general conference this weekend, so it threw a mix into things, which was pretty great. But this week, we were finally working back to normal speed from my companion being sick, which was great. But it was a pretty normal week. We were just trying to get back into the swing of things from not visiting people in about 2 weeks, so we were just trying to get out there and visit people. The Elders even came to our area to try and help us find new people. But we are really trying to push for getting some baptisms here in this area, my companion and I are really trying, so we are going to work really hard these next two weeks.

But this week was general conference. It was pretty interesting this time because we had to go to the stake center, but the stake center is a bit far away and its super hard to ride a metro bus into that area. We went there for the first session and just stayed until the second session finished. On Saturday not many people were there. It was mainly the missionaries and some of the people that lived close by. But we were all shocked about the age change for the missionaries, especially for the sisters. But between the sessions some of the elders had a baptism. Right before it started they asked if my companion and I could sing a special number. I said sure. But I was dreading it a bit, because I knew that my companion does not sing, so it would be mainly...ME. Well she said she would, we quickly picked a song and went up there to sing. When we started I was the only one singing, she started to chicken out, but joined in on the second verse. I was so nervous; I have never sung a solo in front of people, until then, ha-ha. But I thought it went well. After the last session ended (which was 7pm here) the elders took us to the bus stop because it wasn’t in the safest part of town. Well right in front of the bus stop was a huge fire and we were all being smoked out, couldn’t see or breath very well. We gave up waiting for the bus (which only passes once an hour, and one passed right by us without stopping) and called a taxi. It was quite a night.

Sunday was a lot more relaxed and had a bunch more people attend conference. However it was Election Day here in Brazil, and everyone here is required to vote, so everyone goes crazy. There was little paper fliers ALL over the ground. When we got home at night after conference everyone was celebrating the winners of the election. There were people drinking in the street and it was like one huge party with fireworks and a ton of honking horns and everything, so we went right into our house. But conference was great yesterday; a lot more people were there too. During the break I went and played with a lot of the little kids that were there; it was pretty fun. But that is pretty much my week. This week we are going to continue to work hard and make things here in this area. Hope all is well with everyone else. Until next time.

Love,
Sister Rebecca Nelson

Week Fifty Two... ONE YEAR!

Hello there everyone,

So this week I have a bit more time to write, but unfortunately I still don't have that much to say. My companion was still on recovery and still a bit sick. Some of the days we were able to leave but we were working at less than half speed and only visiting the most important people. So work this week was pretty slow. But I have faith, and I know that it will get better. :)

This week both my companion and I, sister Rodriguez completed one year on our missions. I cannot believe how fast the time has passed. Time has just flown by, like really I do not know where a year has gone. It is super crazy. We were both excited and sad at the same time completing a year, because we don't want it to be over in 6 months. But it was good, I made a cake for us and we celebrated a bit.

Not much has happened in the last little while since I have emailed you. We went to the temple and brought with us a less active member that we are reactivating. She and her little son loved it, we played around with them for a while too on the temple grounds. The temple in Recife has such a calming spirit to it. The city is super loud and even smelly, but the moment you walk in the gate it all goes away, seriously (all but the occasional siren). I love going to the temple here. I stayed in there for a long time this time when I went in. 

Other than that we were able to make a few visits here and there and the other half of the time my companion was resting and I was studying or catching up on stuff that needed to get done. We helped do a blitz in another area, where we went with members inviting less actives to the ward conference. I went with this lady who had served a mission a little bit ago, and it was way nice talking to her. 

Yesterday we were able to watch the woman's session of conference. It's weird here because they broadcast it live, so it was actually super late at night. It ended at 10pm, so everyone watched it the next day. We have to get on a bus to go to the stake center to watch all of conference. All of the Brazilians say it's fun because everyone stays there and its super fun. II really enjoyed President Eryings talk. 

That is about it for me, I hope that everyone is doing well. Send my best wishes to everyone.

Love.
Sister Rebecca Nelson