Monday, May 19, 2014

Aldeota, Brazil Week 27

This week was awesome! Things are going very well in the mission office. We received three American missionaries that had been waiting for their visas. They got here on Tuesday so it was great to welcome them to the mission and get to know them. We visited the Federal Police this week with a missionary from Cabo Verde so that was great. Also the mission office is being renovated so we can only use half of the space we have and then pretty soon we´ll have to move everything. But things are going well and my job gets easier and easier as the days go on since Elder Zwick does more and more. He is going to be a great Executive Secretary and I am getting super excited to leave the mission office. I will miss a lot of things but excited to have a regular missionary schedule and be able to visit and teach people all day every day.

We had a great week with Luan. We are continuing to teach him and he is loving it. We visited him with the Stake President this week and we had a great discussion about how we can receive answers from Heavenly Father and how he can guide us in our lives. Luan is doing great and has quickly become a very good friend to us and we are so excited to see him continue to progress. He is consistently coming to church and told us this week that he is learning more and more everyday and is excited to continue to learn how he can follow our Savior, Jesus Christ. We also played basketball with him last week and it was great. We are gonna play later today too with him and his cousin.

We also had some other great visits throughout the week. We started teaching an old man named Melo whom we contacted on the street two weeks ago. He loves to have us and loves to talk about the Gospel. He told us he wants to learn so much more about Christ and why we are here. He is a very smart man and I loved listening to his ideas of the purpose of this life and we taught him part of the Plan of Salvation. We also visited Flavio again with Ismael and we are continuing to help him come back to church. We had a great visit with Jane, Ismael, Jorgy, and Vinicius this week also. We love them and love being able to strengthen them and also be strengthened by them. We visited also a member of the church that hasn´t been to church in about 5 years. We got to know him and his wife and their son. It was great to visit them and be well received by them. We will continue to visit and help them receive the blessings that can only come through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

But beyond everything, definitely the best part of this week was today. This morning Elder Andersen from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles visited our mission!! We got up super early and headed over to one of the church buildings in Fortaleza. He arrived with President and Sister Souza. It was so awesome to meet him and to hear from him. He visited us with his wife, and Elder Mazzagardi of the Seventy and his wife. It was awesome!!! They all spoke and gave great instruction. The focus of Sister Andersen´s words were how much the Lord loves each one of us and how many prayers ascend to our Heavenly Father in our behalf. Elder Andersen gave an amazing training on how we need to teach and help people understand the Atonement of Jesus Christ and to help them apply it in their lives. It was very interactive as he was asking many questions and the microphone was being passed all around. He is great! He spoke with us in Portuguese and the Spirit was very strong. I learned a lot and I am excited to study the scriptures more to understand the sacrifice that Jesus Christ did for each one of us. He also talked about how we all pass through difficulties and how they are necessary for our progression and learning. It was an unbelievable experience and I feel so blessed I had the opportunity to listen to him today. When you are in his presence you can feel the deep love he has for you. It was great!

That was my week. It was a week I know I will never forget and I feel so blessed everyday to have this opportunity to serve the people here in Fortaleza and continue to learn more every day.

I hope all is going well with each one of you. I miss you and love you all. Have a great week!

Until next week.

Love,
Elder Helvey


Basketball at the Church Building with Luan last week!

It rained a ton this week and the lake behind me in this picture is actually 
supposed to be a street haha. But it was a lot of fun!

I will miss this beautiful view of the city and ocean at sunset.

Kickin´ it in a members hamock waiting for lunch 
(I asked if I could help but they said we could just chill out, so I did).

Elder Marcum!! It was great to see my childhood buddy Elder Marcum today at the conference with 
Elder Andersen. Morgan Hill 2nd Ward was well represented today!

1 comment:

  1. elder Marcum here in Brazil my friend you will be missed

    ReplyDelete