New Mission President

 

View from the bus

June 30, 2014

            We spent the day in meetings for Mission Counsel. It was fun for me to be able to trade ideas on how we can help our areas and missionaries.  It was also great to get to know Presidente and Sister Cabral.  Presidente is a great little man (seriously, he is shorter than I am!)  He is very warm, friendly, and personable.  This is a huge change from Presidente Lima who was an excellent president and an inspired leader, but who is quite rigid and cold.  I must say that so far I am loving the change.  The new president seems to be a lot more in tune with the emotional side of things.  One of the things that he taught was that we should be teaching “with the end in mind.”  We need to focus on helping our converts have the temple in their sights – not just baptizing them and leaving them on their own.  He passed some very specific instructions to help us focus on the quality of our teaching and preparation.

Visual Aids for FHE

At the end of a long day!

I love getting packages with my favorite things!

July 4, 2014

            Today we woke up at 4 am, got ready, sand the national anthem, and then traveled the 4 hours by bus to a our special “get to know President and Sister Cabral” event in Niteroi.  It was a great conference, and once again I was struck by their warmth, humor, and kindness that was shown to all the missionaries.  It’s a big change from President and Sister Lima.

            I got my PACKAGE today!!! Thanks Mom!  Everything in is was just perfect.  Sister B. and I are loving hearing general conference in English! 

            We got home and there was yet another Brasil futebol game, so we jammed out to the conference talks – Sunday morning session.  Once again my thoughts turned to Dad and my family and how this particular conference session was so saturated with emotion.  I was once again amazed by how every single talk seemed so specifically tailored to our needs and worries.  How grateful I am for living prophets and apostles who are inspired instruments of the Lord.

July 5, 2014

            We had a great day today.  We worked hard and taught a lot, and just had a good full day of work.  We ended our day teaching L.  Lessons with him are natural and  casual.  We usually end up teaching through conversation.  Today he was super excited to show us what he learned in Alma 36, and then asked questions about tithing and other commandments.  He is doing really well at avoiding temptations.  He is just one of those people on my mission where I am humbled and in awe that the Lord has trusted me to be here helping him to come unto Christ.  It is the BEST feeling.  Sister B and I always leave our lessons with L. with this feeling.

            A few not so great things happened today:  Our LMA bailed on our meeting, and one of our recent converts is headed in completely the wrong directions and has decided to live a completely materialistic and worldly way.

Flooded streets of Rio das Ostras