August 8, 2011

 Outback! Booo Yahhh ha ha ha! And We had Cheesy fries! Sweetness!

Oi meu amigos e familia! Another week passes in the blur of time. As for my journal, its going great, I might need a new one soon, I dont remember, but I dont think it will last me the whole first year of the mission. And today, we found out about transfers this Wednesday. Drum roll...! I will be... Staying here in Cerqueira César, but will receive a new companion, Elder Souza is my new companion, and he will be the district leader. This means Ill probably be doing more divisions or exchanges now. Im excited, I love this area and the people here are amazing. The Spirit really seems to be there through all the small things that happen. But this past week, on sunday, I really felt prompted to share my testimony, so I did. Who knows if anyone was trully touched, but I know that it at least helped me. So this week, I received 8 letters and was super excited, and we went to the mission office to have interviews and I had 3 more! Thank you so much for all you who send letters. Its so good to receive them all. I actually spent my whole P-day writing letters today and still didn't finish. Ha. The interviews with President went really well. He is awesome. He said that we already have 68 pages of rules and don't need more, so we will be sticking to the Missionary Handbook. So I had the amazing opportunity to eat at Outback! Holy cow it was good. The enviorment was totally American, and the food was so good. The only true difference was the language. It was awesome, a member named Eloi took us. He is really awesome, he is an english teacher and served his mission in Montana. So this week, we were walking on the street, and we had to get back to our apartment. A man called us saying "Elderes," so we thought he must have known some members or something (which he didn't) and asked us to come visit him because he wanted to talk to us because he has a problem. I thought that he seemed really sad, and we took his name and address and left. My companion said that he was drunk because he smelled his breath. I said, maybe he doesn't want to, and wants to stop. Then we went to his house and visited him. My companion said that he was scared the whole time and thought the man was going to kill him. I didn't feel that way at all, ha. I dont know why. His apartment smelled like Norman (Parker Mayberry's daschound) and he also has a daschound. He is really intelligent and organized, and is a teacher of Chess. He plays professionally. He seemed really interested in the Church, and now he is taking the discussions. He has some problems with Drugs and some other things, but he really wants to change. He came to church on sunday, and we will continue to teach him. His name is Mauro. One thing that I really want to emphasize this week is that we always need to be out doing good. My scripture of the week is Doctrine and Covenants 58:26-28. We should be "anxiously engaged in a good cause" and seek to do good of our own free will. In Elder Eyring's (SP?) last talk, he talked about how when we truly are converted to the gospel of Jesus Christ, we go out and help others. We should always seek for ways to serve. Serving people is one way we truly can help our fellow man, ourselves, and serve our God. May we all strive to be a little better this week, and always seek to improve ourselves. I love you all.
Abraço
Elder Tanner Ross Paxman