May 20, 2008

Elder Jason Allred
Brazil São Paulo South Mission
Rua Dr Luiz da Rocha Miranda, 159
8 Andar, Parque Jabaquara
04344-010 - São Paulo - SP
Brazil

Subject: Maua! The city of Hills!

Hello Everybody!

Well, today was transfer day. Guess what! Elder Risenmay and I are both staying at least one more transfer in this area! This will be my 4th transfer here in a row, which will be almost 6 months. I remember when I first got the news I was coming here to Jardim Zaíra, Mauá. The Elders that had already passed through here said that after Jd. Zaíra, the rest of the mission is a piece of cake.
I already know this area like the back of my hand. We can´t walked down the street anymore without running into someone I´ve already taught. I was looking at the numbers and I´ve taught almost 300 investigators since I´ve been here. Take that and divide it by the 100,000 people that live within our boundries and that means I´ve taught only 0.3% of the people I should have in the last 4 months. Well, we have at least six more weeks to teach the rest before next transfer.
Actually, this transfer will only be 5 weeks because of when the new mission president is coming. This is our last transfer with President Teixeira. Did you all see his picture on the General Authority page of the new Ensign? That´s my mission president! You all are just jealous.

Do you remember that one family of nine people I talked about last week? Well, three of them were able to come to church on Sunday! Helena (the mom), Naílton (a son- 25 yrs?), and Bianca (a daughter- 13 yrs?) are those that went. They could only stay for sacrament meeting, but next time they want to stay for all of it. They´ve already said that they plan on coming regularly. Helena hasn´t received her answer yet. When we came back the second time to teach her, she told us her experience. She hadn´t had time to read the Book of Mormon yet, but she had prayed that night if what we taught her is true. She said that she suddenly felt a dark and cold feeling that overcame her, and she just felt terrible and could not sleep the entire night. She asked us to help her understand what happened. I felt prompted to read from the revelation in DC where the Lord tells what we will feel "if it be right" and also of the "stupor of thought" if it isn´t right. Then we read in Galations 5 where it talks about faith, love, and peace being among the fruits of the spirit. The feeling that she experienced is not how the spirit talks with us. We explained that the adversary would try to keep her away from something as important as the restoration.
She told us that that was exactly what she was thinking. During the night she felt that the enemy was trying to keep her family away from something good, and so she made a firm decision to come to church that Sunday, even though she wasn´t planning on going because of another appointment she had already marked. Hooray for triumphs! Now she just needs to find time to read the Book of Mormon and get and affirmative answer from the right source. I´m sure she already has, but we´ll find out tomorrow night. Before baptism, Naílton needs to get married with his "wife" Marcia who also lives in their home with their daughter (that makes 5 couples we´re working with now). Marcia was a little skeptic of the Restoration, but that´s why we´re here, right? Right!


Karina and Sílvio (José) didn´t reach their baptism goal. Karina´s family is telling us that she won´t be old enough to make that decision until she´s 18. Sílvio started working and we haven´t been able to contact with him in over a week. It kind of makes it hard to prepare him for baptism when we can´t find him. He usually gets home about 11pm, and we have to be home by 9:30pm. Well, the easiest way to solve problems is to get some miracles, so we´re praying for some.

Well, Goodbye for now!
--Elder Jason Morgan Allred