Elder Helvey: Beira Rio, Brazil Week 5

Hey everyone! This week was quite the week. It was a sad week but also an exciting one. The sad part was that we said goodbye to President and Sister Souza. We had a mission wide conference on Wednesday. It was so awesome to all be together to enjoy one last conference with them. It was a great conference filled with the Spirit and some awesome trainings. Elder Allen and Elder Lopes gave an awesome training on the importance of working with members and how we need to work with them. President and Sister Souza both talked and both gave their last testimonies. It was such an awesome experience. At the end of the conference as we were all singing "God be with You till we Meet Again" (in Portuguese), I was looking up at both of them on the stand and was very sad that they would be leaving but also SO grateful for the opportunity I had to work so closely with them and learn SO much from both of them. They are such a great example to me and I feel to blessed to have had the time I had with them. I love them! They left on Saturday and now our mission president is President and Sister Bonini. I have not met them yet but we will have another mission wide conference this week to get to know them and then we will have the Mission Leadership Council that day too so I am way excited!

This week was a great week for Elder Pedrosa and I. We started teaching a new family. Junior, is a less-active member of the church, and his wife, Elizangela, and their two kids, ages 12 and 10, are not members. We visited them for the first time on Friday and the Spirit was so strong! She told us that she had been praying and looking for something more in her life to help her and her family and she said she feels like this is it. They both came to church on Sunday and loved it! We are having Family Home Evening tonight with them in the house of a family in our ward. I am way excited to continue to visit them and see the change take place in their lives!

We also had Bruno our investigator (age 20) visit church this week and he loved it! He talked about how peaceful it was and is excited to continue to come, although he will be traveling this week. But he is awesome! Graziele (age 13) also visited church. She is a friend of a recent convert and really loved it. It was an awesome Sunday, yesterday, and I am super excited for the progress that some of our investigators are making. This gospel truly does change lives and I feel so blessed to be a part of it!

Thank you all for the love and support. Oh I almost forgot, Brazil keeps winning, and it just keeps getting crazier and crazier here! Brasil will play this week here in Fortaleza so should be nuts! Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Helvey

The board to welcome President and Sister Bonini in the Mission Office.