Brazil Sister: general conference

What a WONDERFUL WEEK! I have a lot of reasons to be happy. My first reason is the miracle that occurred yesterday. We invited a lot of people to general conference, which we watched in another church building. Saturday- no one showed up. But Sunday, we had 6 people that watched conference, and all had friends who are members! I am so excited, because they are all showing progress and have a lot of support. We are teaching men, families, and young adults. It’s so wonderful to see the blessings of the Lord after a period of trials. This area hadn’t been baptizing or progressing much until Sister Mares (my first comp here in Mangabeira) showed up. They had a few baptisms. Since then, I feel that this work is ready to go forth in this area. We are in charge of a Branch and a Ward, and have great investigators in both areas.

One man that is visiting the church is named Segundo. It´s actually a funny story how we found him. The night of Carnaval, we were out on the street trying to work, but it was difficult on the biggest holiday in Brazil. My companion was complaining `What are we doing here?? No one will listen to us! Let´s just go home..` But I said `No. We will stay here. Who knows? Maybe someone will see us and want to learn more.` I started praying to have the Lord send someone that night, or that we could make a difference. I said Hi! To everyone on the street but hardly anyone listened. A man passed, then returned and started talking to me. I thought he was just a flirt, (because he was really flirty- which isn’t anything new. Being American and blonde here attracts that). We talked, and invited him to church. Now he has been coming every week and we are teaching him. He said that that night, God finally touched his heart and he noticed something different about us. He likes the church, and i hope will be baptized soon.

I really enjoyed the conference talks. The funny thing about Elder Bednar's talk- When he visited here, he was with my mission president and his wife. While they were touring Joao Pessoa (where the sun rises first here in Brazil) he stopped everything and began to write. After a little while, he said that he had received revelation about his new conference talk. Yesterday I understood that of course he would talk about the sun after visiting here!

I am so grateful for all the blessings the Lord is showing us right now. I am so happy to be here and help this area. These people here take such good care of me that I dont even have time to be homesick! I love you all and WRITE LETTERS! I want to know how you are doing!
Have a great week!

My Teva sandals after a year.....just had them resoled.

So I promised a more interesting email this week. I hope you will like this. I can feel myself starting to turn into that churchy missionary who only has a testimony to bear and nothing interesting to say... o No!!
But first I must be this missionary and say that I LOVED General Conference. Unfortunately/fortunately I watched 3/4 of it in Portuguese. I still learned a lot and enjoyed it, but the one session in English was much easier to feel the Spirit. It is so much different watching conference when you are a missionary! You have your investigators there, or you are thinking about them during the talks. You realize the importance of having modern day prophets and apostles. You feel the spirit and totally pay attention. And it goes by so fast! I always want to be a missionary during conference, it is so uplifting. I hope you all learned a lot and didn’t sleep too much!

I will tell you about an investigator we have. I think I have already talked about her, her name is Thais and she is 18. It’s been months now that we have been working with her, and after all this time we still are on the first lesson, teaching her about the importance of the restoration of the gospel and how important the priesthood is. Of course, we have talked about a billion other things, but it’s been a trial of faith. She was raised Jehovah’s Witness, and has some pretty interesting points of view. But she is really open to learning about the gospel. It finally came down to her realizing that she was looking for the gospel of Thais, and not the gospel of Christ. The gospel of Christ means sacrifice, work, faith, and most of all happiness. She says she hasn’t received a testimony, but we all know she has. Last night we were finally able to mark her baptism, with her hesitance, and are so excited to prepare her for the next two weeks. She is so awesome! She even was talking about how she would like to be a missionary like us someday. It’s such a wonderful feeling. The story about her is so much more detailed, and so funny, but I don’t have the time to tell everything. Maybe someday!

It’s been getting HOT here. Everyday about 10am we are totally sweating with our fan on in the house. I don’t know how people like to live like this! You are always dripping sweat, it’s so wonderful. Today I calculated that I´ve taken about 160 cold showers here. Most of those were painful, but lately it´s so wonderful. We shower about 3 times a day here! My goodness! I seriously need you to pray that I won’t die here in the heat, because I’m starting to believe it. Every time people say òh this isn’t hot. Just you wait- it´ll get hotter!` I want to cry!! I keep thinking of a scripture in the Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 3:7- “And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them.” The Lord called me here and he´s prepared a way for me to survive here. I don’t know how, but I will!

Well life is starting to feel normal here. It´s weird how you start to forget life at home, but at the same time you miss your life at home. I heard some Guns and Roses playing on the street today, and I had the strongest desire to play some Rock Band. But, now isn’t the time! I love being a missionary, and I am realizing how important this work is. There are people here that need me, and I am excited for the year and a little I have left here.

Thanks for your prayers! As it’s getting hotter, we are seeing more and more cockroaches running around. Soooo I hope I don’t have any interesting stories about them for you next week!

Love you all and thanks for your support. Eu estou orando por vocês! (I am praying for you all!) Tchau!
Love, Siiiister Melting Gordon

A note for future missionaries going to Brazil… They are having a HUGE problem with American missionaries getting their visa. I would be worried about it. This next transfer we only have one American coming to the mission. They changed the age limit for young men missionaries here to 18yrs old because they need missionaries so bad.

NOTE from Jenn: I sent a package on July 25th and she just now received it. So if you want to send anything for her birthday, December 4th or Christmas,do it now.Ha!