The Work is Moving Forward

From Video Chats this week:

Elder Nielson didn't write an email this week. He just sent some pictures, so I thought I'd share some of them.

This is a young man named V----- J---- who was baptized last week. He is one of a group of young men the missionaries have been working with and the first to be baptized.

This last Saturday, this young man was baptized. Elder Nielson refers to him as a Brazilian Napoleon Dynamite, but the young man really doesn't know who that is. Give him some gold aviator frames and teach him to smile less and say "Gosh" more, he could pass as Napoleon. He is a great young man who has a strong testimony of priesthood power and the responsibility priesthood holders have to live worthily in order to exercise the priesthood.

Here is Elder Nielson with a home town missionary from Springville, UT. They are both from the Hobble Creek West Stake. It's always nice to see a familiar face from home. Elder McConnell is a good missionary.

Elder Nielson also reported that they have 5 people marked for baptism, and he and his companion are hopeful that all 5 will be baptized in a couple of weeks. One lady who has been living with her boyfriend has started making arrangements for him to move out so she can join the church.

Elder Nielson also reported that he bought himself a new pair of shoes this week. They are low top army boots that he bought from a "buff" military guy that sells military gear in his store. He thinks they will be able to withstand the rigors of missionary work until he returns home in October. He was showing us his shoes last week and both pairs have been patched with Shoe Goo with big splits in the soles. Not good for walking through rain-soaked streets So we were happy to see him get some new kicks.

Elder Nielson also got to call home for a few minutes on his dad's birthday. An added bonus.

He is healthy and happy and enjoying the hard work. We can see great growth in him... both spiritually and level of maturity.

Batismo!

Olá!

Today we will have a baptism! J--- V----- has been preparing for the last month, but something was not quite right. We persisted, and we finally found the root of his problem. He was able to resolve it and move forward.  It was a miracle!

This week I was companion to Elder Price.  His companion got his Visa and left late Sunday night to go to his mission in Mexico.  So Elder Price stayed with me in he office, and we just kind of floated between our two areas until yesterday.  It was pretty tiring -- one day sleeping in our house, the next his. So it took a lot out of us this week.  He will be companions with my brother, Elder Duarte (who was also trained by Elder Carrari).  I think here is a picture attached of us together. 

We are excited to see how many more people will be baptized in the near future.  There are some that are marked with a baptismal date, and they seem to be ready to change their lives for the better.  I hope we can help them do just that.

I hope you all have a great week! 

Love,
Elder Nielson

Baby Bryan

I would like to share an experience that happened yesterday.  I hope that all can learn something from the example of the little boy I met yesterday.  I hope we can all see how blessed our lives are, and that we can be happy with what we have.

In a letter to President Houseman, I explained this experience:

We had the chance to give a blessing last night to a baby named Bryan.  He has a rare muscle disease.  Where his brain isn't able to control and fire up the muscles.  So he needs a respirator that gives the pressure in his lungs that the diaphragm would give him to be able to breath. He is 9 months old, and he has been in the Hospital Portuguese for the last 7 months.  He is a super animated child, and he is able to communicate with his eyes, which is pretty cool.  It was interesting to see how he, even with so little time in this life, is able to be happy despite his difficulties.  As he was preparing to leave the hospital last week, they took the feeding tube out of his stomach, and it got infected.  So he is still staying there until they can get rid of the infection and close the hole up.  His stomach acid is, however, causing some problems with the closing.

It makes me see that really I don't have anything that I can complain about in this life.  I have very few difficulties.

His mom also showed great faith in God.  She said, "I don't really know God´s purpose for Bryan here on earth.  I don't know if it is his will that he is cured, or that he grows up.  Maybe it's his purpose to come here for a short time and be an example to everyone he knows, teach me and my family very important lessons, and be brought back to God's presence as a perfect, sinless child.  Many people can think that that is something horrible to say, but if it is God´s will, I accept it."

I really cant explain how deep that quote is.  She has such spiritual trust.  For a person to be able to see so many ways that God is working, even amidst the trials, is incredible to me.  I really learned a lot yesterday as we had the opportunity to give Baby Bryan a blessing.

We have a new missionary in the office. Elder A. Ferreira will be the new Housing secretary. Elder Nunes will train him this transfer.  He is from Rio, and he is a great missionary. So the office staff will be a threesome again for a transfer. I look forward to working with him.

I hope you all have a great week, and that you see the good around you, and be happy for all that God has blessed you with.  Even the small things like health, safety, etc., that often pass unnoticed.

Elder Nielson

P.S.  Like my new cup, Riley?

Crazy Week

Hey Everyone,

So this week was super crazy. It started off by us and the AP's having 13 investigators to church, so that was great. We also rounded up a bunch of 12 year old kids and had them come to the meetings which was a disaster. Never again. They got bored during the second hour (Sunday School) and left the class. But they didn't go home. They hung out at the church and started playing some loud music. We had to admonish them a couple of times that they needed to either be in the class or head home. But they had come with our ward mission leader who uses his VW minivan to round people up and bring them to church. So they had to wait for a ride home. We did get them back into the class, but when it was over, they were the first ones to the minivan and everyone else had to wait until they got dropped off. Who knows what might come of it, but right now it didn't seem like a positive experience.

We helped two sets of missionaries move to new apartments back to back on Monday and Tuesday. One was a three hour one way trip into the interior. We saw some cool landscapes that reminded us a little of Africa (or at least the movie The Lion King). During one of the moves, I was carrying a stack of boards and went past the apartment. As I was coming back down the stairs, my foot slipped and I bounced down the stairs on my back with boards landing on top of me. Fortunately, my head didn't hit every step on the way down, but my back is feeling a little stiff. But I'm okay.

Wednesday was a holiday, so everyone was avoiding work. Everything was shut down. However, we needed to hang a whiteboard in an apartment, but when we got there, the doorman told us we couldn't use a drill in the apartment because it was a holiday (people sleeping in, I guess). After some discussion, we said we needed to do some other things as well and went up to the apartment. It was on the top floor so there were no sleepers above us, and the doorman would not be able to hear from the first floor. We checked with neighbors on both sides who had no problem with us drilling. So we quickly buzzed 8 holes and go the white board hung without disturbance or incident..

Thursday I went to the Federal Police to renew 4 visas. While there, I ended up helping a man from Texas do a first register to get home. He couldn't understand Portuguese and apparently didn't have all the paperwork he needed. I was able to translate for he and the agent. He had his computer and a heat printer (no toner required) and was able to print out what he needed. He was very grateful and I was sad I didn't have an English Book of Mormon. But I have his address and I'll see that he gets one. He has a wife and two kids, and I could picture them dressed in white. He is a welder working for a large U.S. company.

Friday I worked in the office trying to catch up with everything that we missed earlier in the week.

We have been finding new people to teach, including a man named Pedro. His nickname is Fofinho (little cutie) that some little kid gave him and it stuck. He is super interested in the Book of Mormon.  He and his wife are legally married, and we are hopeful that they will come to church tomorrow.  We will go over there right now to try and teach him.

Overall, a pretty crazy and productive week. Hope you all have a great week.

Love,
Elder Nielson

Leo and his mother Rosangela

Our lunch today.

Apartment buildings of people we are working with.

Productive Week

FROM THE VIDEO CALL - Elder Nielson reports that they had a productive week this week. They had 7 investigators to church a week ago and were able to set baptismal dates for 4 of them. L--'s mother wasn't able to come to church due to work obligations, but she is progressing well and should be baptized soon also.

He confirmed that he will be staying an extra transfer due to the government extending missionary visas. He is excited about that. So he will arrive home October 16th instead of September 3.

As part of his duties in the office, Elder Nielson helps schedule flights home for missionaries. He was dealing with one stake president who wasn't happy about the arrangements that had been made for one of the missionaries, but it was the best route available. It could be the missionaries family was putting pressure on the stake president and he was representing the family's concerns. So he was trying to figure out the best way to handle things to resolve the issue.

Janice was in Logan this weekend with Maci for a choir concert. So Elder Nielson got to chat with Uncle Wayne, Aunt Shellie, and Grandma Caldwell was there also.

This week is sounds like they will be doing some moving of missionaries to new apartments.

It's a blessing to be able to see and talk with our missionary. He is healthy and happy in the work.

Easter

This week was pretty normal. We were pretty blessed to see some of our investigators progress throughout the week.  We hope that all that have committed to go to church this week can make it.  We will go searching tomorrow morning to try and bring as many as possible.

We had Zone Conference and there were several talks that really spoke to me.  We had to prepare talks on fasting and the pre-mortal plan for the conference. That's something that President Houseman does. He has everyone study a topic and come prepared to teach about it if called upon. Sister Houseman spoke about our priorities and used a pretty cool visual. Our training was about planning.  President talked about teaching accordingly to each individual investigator.  It was really a great conference, and I had a great experience.

I finished the book "Saints". It is such a great history of the Church. It's incredible to feel so inside of what was happening. I was really happy with the work that was put into it, and it got me excited to read the next one when it comes out.

We got a white shirt and tie for L--. The shirt was left by Elder Price, and there is a local store that sells pretty good quality ties for cheap. So I called L-- and asked him what his favorite color was. He said black. I asked what his second favorite color was. He said red. So I bought him a red and black tie. He was really excited. The shirt fit like a glove, and we helped him tie the tie. His mom kept telling him to take the shirt off before he got it sweaty, but he really liked it and kept it on.

Other than this, it was just your usual week.

Love,
Elder Nielson

Howdy!

This week was pretty good.  We couldn't get anyone to church, and that left me a little sad.  I got to thinking of how many people live here in Recife, and how many that the Lord surely is preparing.  I started praying and searching for help to find these people, and the Lord gave us a miracle!  We were walking down the street this week and a man in a wheelchair called out,  "e ai Elders!" We stopped and started talking to him.

He is a member of the church but moved about two years ago to Recife, and hadn't gone to church since.  But he said he never stopped living the principles he learned.  He doesn't drink coffee, he doesn't buy anything on Sunday.  He explained that he had been preparing some families that live in his building to hear the gospel.  That they had been asking why he doesn't do these things, and he was waiting to run into the missionaries to invite them over to meet with them.  As we were talking more, he told us that he also wanted us to teach his son.

His son doesn't drink, doesn't smoke, doesn't drink coffee, and doesn't live with his fiance. He also invited us to teach them and help them to be married in the temple for time and all eternity.  He bore a strong testimony that he knows the church is the only true church of Christ on the earth.  We will go there tonight, and we will meet all these people. 

Heavenly Father is so good to us!  He hears and answers our prayers.  He does the little things, and we need to learn to be grateful for that.  I can't explain how happy I was to meet someone that in spite of not knowing where the closest church was, set an example and taught of the truths to his neighbors. 

That is my cool story for this week.  Here are some pictures of Leo´s baptism.  (my camera was in the Houseman´s car, so I couldn't send them last week)  Hope you enjoy!  I love you guys!

Love,
Elder Nielson