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| Gerald and Maria Madalena and their son Junior |
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| This is elder F Santos! District leader of Austin! |
Yello everyone! Great week here in 7 lakes. I've learned a ton here in this area, and the Lord is really blessing the work here.
Well, this last week was a huge blessing. As I was leaving Itabira, I was thinking about how one of my goals for the mission was to baptize a catholic couple that's relatively old. For those of you who haven't served a mission in Brazil, older-aged catholics are almost impossible to baptize. The only strength the Catholic church has is tradition, so older people are completely locked into tradition. Anyways, last week we got a reference for an older couple, that happened to be Catholic :D Anyways, every single lesson we've taught there has been incredible guided by the Spirit, and over the last 2 weeks this couple decided to be baptized!!! The 2nd lesson we got there and the husband, Geraldo, said, "So I have a question, why is it that i need to be baptized if I was already baptized as a child?" As we read 2 Nephi 32 with him, without us even explaining for him, he said, "Ah! A baptism also involves a change of life, so I wasn't even baptized, it was my parents that "baptized me"" It's been incredible with them because they have basically taught themselves why this is all so important. They have a son as well that's been interested and the only problem he has is he's not married to his "wife", they've just been living together for 11 years :/ But, we're working with him towards baptism a little ways down the road as well.
Two days ago we were priveleged to experience another miracle personally. Monday night I started getting really really sick. It was about 5 o clock so we still had a good 4 hours of work left, but I was getting a killer fever. One of those fevers where your muscles start to stiffen, you feel super super cold but are actually burning hot, all this along with a stomach ache and head ache, it was great haha. We had a lot to do so I just stuck it through and tried to focus on the Spirit. All went well with our lessons and stuff, but as we were heading back to the house at 9:30 I was literally like shaking from my fever. Right before bed Elder Da Rosa gave me a blessing, and I climbed into bed wearing a sweater and a big blanket cuz the chills and fever were so bad. I woke up again at midnight with the fever raging just as bad if not worse. As i got a drink and used the bathroom, I heard a voice in my head say, "Take off your sweater, and sleep without a blanket." I was dying from the fever but decided I'd better listen to the Spirit (obviously haha) Anyways I woke up yesterday morning completely fine. No aches, no chills, no fever, it was glorious. Seriously the priesthood is such an amazing power, and it is SO real. To make it even better though, last night we taught an investigator about the Word of Wisdom. He's been really addicted to cigarettes so we explained to him how he was going to need to stop and all that. We could tell he was kinda iffy still , so I explained to him about the miracle that had happened the night before. We then gave him a blessing to help his body overcome this addiction fast, and at the end of the blessing he totally felt the power of the blessing. A couple minutes later he came back into the room, handed us his package of cigarettes and threw his lighter in the trash. Absolutely amazing... I love this work!
Well, sorry that my letter's kinda short. I hope everyone's doing well and that the summer's treating everyone well. Everything is great here in Brazil, and I am loving my mission. I'm so blessed to be a part of this amazing work, and every day the Lord's love and hand is so visible in all of this. I love this church and the things we all have the privelege of knowing and enjoying in our lives. I'm so blessed to have this opportunity, as well as such a wonderful family and friends back home. Love you all!! Hurrah for Israel!!!
-Elder Ballard
Well, this last week was a huge blessing. As I was leaving Itabira, I was thinking about how one of my goals for the mission was to baptize a catholic couple that's relatively old. For those of you who haven't served a mission in Brazil, older-aged catholics are almost impossible to baptize. The only strength the Catholic church has is tradition, so older people are completely locked into tradition. Anyways, last week we got a reference for an older couple, that happened to be Catholic :D Anyways, every single lesson we've taught there has been incredible guided by the Spirit, and over the last 2 weeks this couple decided to be baptized!!! The 2nd lesson we got there and the husband, Geraldo, said, "So I have a question, why is it that i need to be baptized if I was already baptized as a child?" As we read 2 Nephi 32 with him, without us even explaining for him, he said, "Ah! A baptism also involves a change of life, so I wasn't even baptized, it was my parents that "baptized me"" It's been incredible with them because they have basically taught themselves why this is all so important. They have a son as well that's been interested and the only problem he has is he's not married to his "wife", they've just been living together for 11 years :/ But, we're working with him towards baptism a little ways down the road as well.
Two days ago we were priveleged to experience another miracle personally. Monday night I started getting really really sick. It was about 5 o clock so we still had a good 4 hours of work left, but I was getting a killer fever. One of those fevers where your muscles start to stiffen, you feel super super cold but are actually burning hot, all this along with a stomach ache and head ache, it was great haha. We had a lot to do so I just stuck it through and tried to focus on the Spirit. All went well with our lessons and stuff, but as we were heading back to the house at 9:30 I was literally like shaking from my fever. Right before bed Elder Da Rosa gave me a blessing, and I climbed into bed wearing a sweater and a big blanket cuz the chills and fever were so bad. I woke up again at midnight with the fever raging just as bad if not worse. As i got a drink and used the bathroom, I heard a voice in my head say, "Take off your sweater, and sleep without a blanket." I was dying from the fever but decided I'd better listen to the Spirit (obviously haha) Anyways I woke up yesterday morning completely fine. No aches, no chills, no fever, it was glorious. Seriously the priesthood is such an amazing power, and it is SO real. To make it even better though, last night we taught an investigator about the Word of Wisdom. He's been really addicted to cigarettes so we explained to him how he was going to need to stop and all that. We could tell he was kinda iffy still , so I explained to him about the miracle that had happened the night before. We then gave him a blessing to help his body overcome this addiction fast, and at the end of the blessing he totally felt the power of the blessing. A couple minutes later he came back into the room, handed us his package of cigarettes and threw his lighter in the trash. Absolutely amazing... I love this work!
Well, sorry that my letter's kinda short. I hope everyone's doing well and that the summer's treating everyone well. Everything is great here in Brazil, and I am loving my mission. I'm so blessed to be a part of this amazing work, and every day the Lord's love and hand is so visible in all of this. I love this church and the things we all have the privelege of knowing and enjoying in our lives. I'm so blessed to have this opportunity, as well as such a wonderful family and friends back home. Love you all!! Hurrah for Israel!!!
-Elder Ballard
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| is a capybara!! It's the biggest species of rodent in the world, and they have tons that live here in the lakes. |
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| Bored one morning... Everyone always talks about my big smile here |
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