Obedience is the best thing ever! :D

Really great hearing from everyone this week! Glad to hear that all's well.

   Dad - So the other day I was randomly walking down the street heading to an appointment and started chuckling out loud, my comp asked what it was, and I was laughing cuz I randomly remembered that ChristmasEve talent show where you conducted that Big Band sound file :D Haha, even though it's a good 8 months away, I'm excited for the good old Ballard Christmas Eve. It's funny cuz I think every companion that I talk to about you, every one of them says they want to meet you. Another really good memory, remember that one sunday when my belt broke? So I ended up grabbing one of those black tie down straps in the garage and used it, and that day at church it just happened to be the day when the Priesthood lesson was about personal appearance and we both just looked at each other and I tried to hide the "belt"? Hahahaha... man that was classic.

  Family - I was thinking the other day, remember how funny Austin's farewell was in the IF airport? The way that we all stood there with our faces against the glass just sobbing completely uncontrollably :D Hahahahaha... so funny. I'm glad that mine wasn't so painful and tearful haha. Goooood times.

  So this last week President Parrella, as he was doing interviews with all the missionaries on the mission, started finding some slackage in some of the rules, little stuff like leaving the house at 10:03 instead of 10:00, staying at a member's house for an hour and 5 minutes for lunch instead of just an hour, and he advised everyone to just buck up and keep ALL the rules with exactness, and it was such a cool wakeup call. Not that we were having any major problems, but it was just so cool seeing the difference that a more conscious effort is making. Just as the scriptures say, little things bring about huge differences. The Spirit is way more present in our work, we're seeing amazing changes and miracles in the lives of our investigators, and this week is going to be wonderful. I don't have a lot of specifics to report this week, but man... I just love obedience. I'm learning so many important lessons out here. Me and my comp were talking about rules where we don't understand the purpose, and I realized that many times the Lord will give us commandments that we won't understand the "why", simply because He doesn't want us to have any way of justifying! In 1 Nephi 3:7, Nephi never used the word why. He isn't worried about the "why", he's just worried about him doing his part and fulfilling the commandment. If the Lord clearly explains the 'why', yes it can be a big motive for us to obey. But, if we aren't needing that motive at the moment, we'll justify and not obey! We all know that temple attendance will help our families be more united and happy, but if we think, "Ah, my family is doing really well right now. Everyone's firm in the chruch, everyone's getting along, so... I think I'll go to the temple next week, cuz we're doing ok ourselves." Ehhhnt (<- imitating a buzzer sound), wrong. It all makes a lot more sense doesn't it? Obedience isn't just to gain blessings, it's to follow the Lord. Thanks for your prayers everyone, things are great here. Sorry to not have a lot more to report, but HURRAH FOR ISRAEL!!!! -Elder Ballard

BLESSing of an Easter, and celebrating with a BBQ :)

If you look at last year's easter, I had a big old chocolate easter egg, but this year our lack of funds and lack of time, we ended up these little egg-lets (ovinhos de Páscoa), but they were good too :)

Happy Easter this last week! 'Twas the best here in Sion... I couldn't be more grateful :)

    So like 2 hours after I sent my email last pday we already had an incredible miracle. We got a call a few days before about a guy who asked the other 2 missionaries who work on the other side of the city, for a Book of Mormon. He said he'd studied with some sisters that had been here a while before, but had lent his BoM out and never got it back. So we went there last pday night, and this guy, named Odair (Oh-die-ear) told us about a few addictions that he still had, but remembered basically perfectly the story about Joseph Smith and the BoM. When we gave him the book and told him the invite to read and ponder and pray, he accepted and said that that was what he hadn't done the other time when he'd been studying. We marked his baptism for sunday, and he had worries that he wouldn't be ready so fast, cuz of his addictions, but we testified that the Lord would help him and that the Book of Mormon truly had the power to help him. It was amazing how the Spirit testified cuz when we told him that sunday being Easter when we commemorate the resurrection of Christ, we explained how his baptism would be like a resurrection for his new life. The Spirit was super strong and he accepted the date. We came back the next day and he had read like 4 or 5 chapters even though we'd only left 1 chapter for him to read, and he showed us 2 or 3 verses that had called his attention that were super powerful about baptism and repentance. He told us that he had also stopped smoking and didn't even have any more desire to smoke, which was a direct blessing from his reading. Over the next few days he kept reading, kept progressing, stopped drinking, and on Sunday, Odair was baptized!!! There were a bunch of members who remembered him from the time when he had been going to church a while back, and the support that the members gave him was amazing. Odair is a really sarcastic and kinda impatient type of guy, but it was such an amazing thing to see him come up out of the water and just, wait. He stood there for just a few seconds and it was just like you could see the reality of what had just happened sink in, and he realized that he was finally free from the problems he had had before. Man it was an amazing moment. Elder Leite de Sousa was able to baptize him, and since it was the first person that he has baptized, it just made it all the more special. I think this is one of the parts I love the most about my mission is seeing the change that happens to someone from the first day up until the baptism. With him it was just like 5 days, but the Lord can make anything possible. It made it more real to me the why I was called to this area. Man I love the mission :)
  This week is going really well as well, we've been putting our focus on families and we're praying and working as much as we can to find families who are ready for this gospel. Today we decided to do something a little special, and we did a hamburger roast! The house here has an open area out back that's just overgrowth and trees and stuff, so we made a little firepit out of cinderblocks and ceramic tiles, bought some charcoal, and roasted up some american burgers :) We even found bbq sauce today, so it was a good old American Favorite. Really, the smell of smoke and the taste of barbeque sauce sure put me back in time... Not with homesickness or anything, but just like an extreme fondness for the good old days of camping in moody meadows and whatnot. Good times eh? And good times in the future as well! I sure am just loving every minute out here. It's kinda annoying cuz everyone I talk to and tell how much time I have on the mission, always says, "Oh, so you're time is basically out..." And I always retort that NO! There's SO much more that needs to be done!! It scares me cuz every day that passes I feel the reality of my time closing in... I just want to burn myself out to the last minute and do everything that the Lord has for me to do. Keep me in your prayers everyone, cuz I just desperately want to do all that I can. I love you all, things are wonderful here, have a splendid week and I hope to bring more good tidings next week :) Hurrah for Israel!!!!!
      -Elder Ballard



 Today's bbq. Nothing compares with the smoky smell of open-fire cooked patties.

Oh Sion, dear Sion! Wow conference was great.

Crazy how this was my last general conference on the mission... These moments are kinda rough cuz it makes it all hit home that I'm not gunna be able to stay our here forever :/ But, let us all rejoice either way alright?
So, conference was amazing wasn't it? Sadly on saturday we spent the time during the sessions running after people who had accepted and marked to go with us to conference, but to no avail, they ended up not being able to. Kinda a bummer, but I end up learning more in my studies of the Liahona afterwards when it's in english haha. The sunday sessions were incredible though. Like you said Mom, it was so SO focused on families!! I loved that. On the sunday sessions we only were able to take a few investigators, but as the Prophet was ending his talk, I got this super strong feeling of how much people outside of the church are missing out. This city that we're in has roughly 150,000 people that live here, and our side of the city should have at least 70,000 that out area covers. With the 50 or 60 people that went to these sessions I just couldn't get it out of my head just how many families could evade all the problems that families have nowadays. All the children born without parents... All the marriages that don't last, all the abuse and sadness and heartbreak, the answers are ALL right in front of our faces!!! It's so sad that we invited so many people to come and only a handful took the decision to just use 2 hours of their saturday or sunday to hear those priceless words. It was honestly really sad how that was my last conference on the mission... I remember last year as well as last conference thinking, next year I'm gunna take like 30 people to conference so that they can know that there is such thing as a true prophet!!! And now I can't say that "next time" thing :( Man... talk about a killer feeling.
   Even though the missionary aspect of the conferences didn't go quite as I'd planned it, Monday we had a Leadership Council in BH (we left here 1:45 am, got back here 7:45 pm... haha, kill me) and wow... Talk about an eye opening experience. We've received a lot of new missionaries these last few months so President has opened a lot of new areas and even new zones, and there were so many good ideas discussed there. It was amazing how it all happened, cuz we all just discussed our difficulties in the work and what is holding us all back from finding and helping more families and people in our zones, and the Spirit just turned it into an incredible learning experience. At the end and since monday I've just had this like, renewed fire inside of me. Even though it scares the heck outta me that time is going so fast, I feel like I've been able to take hold of my original excitement and fire that I had when I was brand new, and I just feel like the Lord is so ready to make SO many miracles happen, and now it just relies on my effort and focus!! I'm hitting that point where I'm realizing that there's just no time left to lose, and I just need to give it every single bit that I have. I just regret not catching this vision earlier, but either way I'm just stoked and ready to give it all I can. I'm realizing just how much more I truly can give, how much more focused I can be, how much more I can sacrifice, and I'm just... Excited haha. More than ever before I know that this is God's work. I know that missionaries are truly representatives of Jesus Christ, and that I just need to be the type of instrument that will allow the Lord's hand to be manifested just as much as He is wanting it to. Happy anniversary Mom and Dad, happy birthday Brigham and Austin, and happy Easter to all. Hurrah for Israel!!! Thanks and love you all!!    -Elder Ballard

Transfer time! On to Varginha!!

There goes another area and another companion already haha... President sure likes to juggle missionaries :D 
 
  Mom -I have heard gossip as well about elders using ipads in the future instead of the good old fashioned Area Books, and we'll see what happens. Ha, it's obviously years and years away from happening here in Brazil, but maybe it'd actually work out with american elders who have cars and stuff. I did in fact understand what you retold about Satan shoving obedience on all of us. It was his plan in the pre-existence, and continues until today. Everyone always thinks that obedience will tie us down, and if you aren't doing it with the right mind set or open heart, it really does feel like it holds you down. I've really learned that with the rules in this mission. This mission is super strict with rules and I love it haha.

    Well, this last week was a great one. That family that we were working with is progressing really well. The son, Carlos, went to the EFY dance (the youth had EFY like a month ago, so he went to Belo Horizonte with the ward youth) and really liked it. Lamely enough, the dad had an emergency at his work place so he had to take Carlos and Beatrise to work with him, so the baptism didn't happen on sunday. It was a bummer that it didn't happen, but we remarked them to be baptized on the 1st, in between the two sessions. Everything was going as planned, they are all reading the Book of Mormon, stopped drinking coffee, and then out of nowhere on Monday, President calls with yet another transfer call :P Haha, told me that I'd be getting transfered to a city called Varginha (Var-JEAN-yuh) which is about 5 hours by bus away from Belo Horizonte. E. Carneiro was also transfered so we had to pass this family on to the two new elders that would be coming into our area. Even though I would have loved to stick around and watch them be baptized, I'm just happy that they WILL be baptized. When we said goodbye to them they were super firm about saying that they will be getting baptized and they'll send me the picture.
   So that's why I didn't send email yesterday, we got to BH from Sete Lagoas at like 9 in the morning, went to a training session, went back to the bus station (it's the bus version of an air port haha) and sat around until 2:30, grabbed our bus, and arrived here in Varginha at 8 pm. My new comp is named Elder Leite de Sousa (leite means milk btw haha, cool middle name eh?) and he's from São Paulo and is just barely starting his mission. It's kinda funny as we talked on the bus and up until now, cuz it's so crazy to think that since Brazilians only stays in the MTC for 21 days, a month ago he was still a normal person sitting in his house with his family :D At the point where I'm at, that pre-mission life thing is SO distant feeling. Family, home, the US, Austin probably knows what I'm talking about that it all just feels like a dream. I'm really excited to work with him though. He's got a super strong desire to be obediente and work hard, so we're gunna just work our tails off and start his mission off good. This morning was the first time we saw out area in the daylight, and I'm really excited. Tons of people, tons of houses, the Branch President told us there's about 120,000 habitants, so it's gunna be an adventure!! It's also a branch which I absolutely love. With conference being this weekend, the rule here is that saturday you can only watch the sessions if you have investigators, so keep me in your prayers that we can take a LOT of investigators to church this weekend :) Especially with the scandalls and crud going on with other churches, I'm so excited to help these people have the relief of hearing true Prophets and Apostles. Well, I don't have a whole lot else to report, I don't really know much about the area yet, only that this city is always called "The ET City", it appears that years back there were alien sightings here or some garbage like that haha, they even have a big UFO monument in the middle of the city, I'll try to snap a pic. Well, love you all! Hope that you all enjoy conference and have a good rest of March. Hope Shandee had a happy bday! Can't believe she's already 12... Thanks for your prayers and love everyone! Hurrah for Israel!!!
    -Elder Ballard

(picture of the family): Sadly the mom of this family was working so we didn't even get to say a real goodbye to her :( But man I loved this family. If they could speak english they'd be such a perfect match for our family :D The dad, Alysom (Al-ee-son) is 42 and works with furniture restoration (Dad's match), the mom Eliana (Ell-ee-anna) is 40 and is like a spiritual power house (even before baptism haha), Beatrize (Bee-uh-trees) is 17 (Nat's match), Carlos is 15 (Tan and Keat), Alice (Ah-lee-see) is 12 and reminds me a ton of Shandee, and Danilo (Dah-knee-low) is 6 (Brig)... Crazy how that all turns out huh? -

This is Elder Leite de Sousa. He's like the first
 brazilian I've seen with reddish tinted hair

Finding families!!! And a massive religious scandal! Opa!

Another week and another step closer to Conference already!! Good heaven those 6 months passed quick.

The work this week was awesome. We were a little frustrated cuz a few people that were progressing to be baptized on sunday had some problems with addictions stuff, but amazingly saturday night we returned for like the 4th time to this contact that we felt we better teach, who was a 15 year old kid playing soccer in front of his house, but when we entered it was him, 3 siblings, and his mom and dad. We taught the whole family together and they were super SUPER prepared for the gospel! They had recently moved here to 7 Lagoas and the mom and 2 kids accepted to go to church with us. The dad accepted as well but sadly had to travel with one of the kids on sunday. We've been praying non-stop to find families, and the Lord blessed us at like the very last minute of saturday so that they could go to chruch :) They went to church and all 3 of them loved it, at the end the mom said, "This is where my kids need to be raised." We we so grateful to find them, there is literally no better thing on a mission than to find a family of mom dad and kids that are open for the gospel. I dunno when transfers are gunna happen but I sure hope I can stay here haha. I'll have more about them next week.

   On other news, it was interesting how our lesson in church this last week was about supporting our Church Leaders, cuz there's this news flying all over brazil right now about the leaders of this church called "A Igreja Mundial do Poder de Deus", which would be translated The Worldwide Chruch of the Power of God. Anyways, this pastor was filmed during one of there meetings talking to the congregation sobbing saying stuff like, "After some financial difficulties were are faced with the terrible fate that more than half of our church buildings here in Brazil will be closed.... (Remember that he was sobbing uncontrollably during all this) Brothers and sisters... we NEED to help these churches stay open! What I ask of you, what the Lord asks of you, is that 7000 people, need to each donate 1000 reais (brazilian money) so that we can maintain these buildings open and functioning..." The poor faithful people donated, and a couple weeks later the news showed that this pastor ended up using like 7 million reais to buy two massive farms, which in turn he did some business deal to get a whole ton of other money, and after some more investigation they found that this pastor secretly had like 15 cars, 2 yachts, 3 houses, and a whole lot of other junk, and with this huge scandall the police had to get involved, and ended up seizing like 500 million reais worth of stuff that this guy had bought with the basically stolen money of the members. Yeah.... HOLY MOLY right? It's a crazy story and it's calling a TON of attention everywhere here. Even though it's one of those, "got what you paid for" stories, it's SO sad that so many people were and still will be robbed like this. Anyways, all this made me so so SO much more grateful for the leaders we have. I think a lot of times we don't realized just how important and blessed we are to be able to actually have 100% confidence in what the Prophets and Apostles tell us. I love this church so much, now I just hope that the Lord can lead us to these poor people that must have had their faith all but destroyed with this scandall. Well, that's this week haha. Love you all and hope you guys have a good spring break!! (It's spring break right?) Hurrah for Israel!!!

   -Elder Ballard

Incredibly good weekend :) Hurrah!!!

Hope you guys are enjoying the warmth that's hopefull hitting there, on the boring subject of weather, we had some pretty good rain storms here these last few days. I don't know why, but when you just sprint out into a thunder storm with rain falling so hard that you get soaked instantly, the first reaction is randomly burst into uncontrolable laughter. I dunno if it's because you imagine what a passer-by would think - "Why in the world are two young men in church clothes and ties doing running through a torrent like this? And especially without umbrellas?" Hahaha... I love it, I wish so bad that I could get moments like that filmed.

So, this past week sure was a blessing. We've been working with this lady named Sandra since about the 4th or 5th day that we came to 7 Lagoas. We found her knocking doors and she told us how she had talked to missionaries like 19 years ago when her family was receiving the lessons, but no one was baptized and the missionaries stopped coming. So these past few weeks she progressed really fast and it was great, and originally her baptism was supposed to be on the 25th of February (or 26th, don't remember) but she randomly decided she wanted to wait. It was weird cuz she didn't even know exactly why... She had already passed her interview, was feeling great about the church... Just randomly decided she'd wait till the 10th. So finally the 10th arrived and since she had already had a few weeks of getting to know the members, there was a huge turn out at her baptism. There was like 30 people or so, which, for a week day, is really really good. The baptism was wonderful and once again that sight of her smiling and watching her son be baptized was priceless. Everyone afterwards gave her hugs and welcomed her and it's just the best feeling when someone is really truly accepted into the fold like this. These are the type of people that you don't even have to worry about staying firm in the chruch. To make things better, sunday they both were confirmed, as well as Jandira! Jandira had been having problems with trading her work schedule around to get sundays off, so it was just awesome to see all 3 of them confirmed. The Spirit was really strong, and the way he testified of the reality of the ordinances was really special. I sure love watching the progress that happens as these people take their steps in the gospel. I imagine how happy the Lord is when He sees his children and all of us progressing in the gospel. Since the people I baptized 6 or 7 months back aren't really firm, I'm also getting a taste of just how sad the Lord is when we forget about Him and let ourselve slide off the path a little. The part that gives me hope though is firstly the Atonement and repentance, because no matter how long these people are off the trail, they can always ALWAYS come back. The other thing is the fact that all of us staying firm, is totally our decision. It's not an inevitable thing for someone to fall away, it just depends on the little things we do every day. I'm so grateful for the foundation the Lord is helping me build here. I feel like I'm learning so much and muturing a ton and becoming more and more who I want to be. Obviously I have a TON of stuff to get better at, and a TON of weaknesses to overcome, but I know that the Lord wants us to succeed. What other knowledge could be more hopeful than that eh? Thanks for your prayers everyone, the work is great here, I'm loving what I'm doing, and the work of the Lord will go forward. Hurrah for Israel!!!
   -Elder Ballard

Reality's starting to hit home... Hard.

Tis really weird thinking how conference is already just around the corner... Seems like we just barely had the last one in October.

  This past week we had 2 days of zone conference, and boy oh boy... It was kinda a startler. The meeting was pretty normal, super spiritual and very motivating. The thing that really took me off guard though was how first of all, looking around at the other missionaries, the ones that I know really well are becoming extinct. There are SO many new missionaries here that I'm realizing that I'm becoming an oldie on the mission, and I feel like it's a huge "already?" Sheesh. One of my good missionary friends Elder Costa went home on monday to go to college, and especially with these Brazilians that weren't ever my comps or anything, it's kinda sad realizing that I probably won't see them again :( At least for a very very long time... Who knows. But then at the end of our conference yesterday we all sang Called to Serve, and just hearing the voices of a good 70 or 80 elders belting "Somos hoje conclamados a servir" really touched me. I talked to the Elder Randall that Austin's friend knows, and he'll be finishing in 2 weeks... He was like one of the first american elders I saw here in Brazil so shoot... it was a wake up call that this mission isn't gunna last forever :( Thinking about how I've already been out for 18 months, it just kills me thinking how I won't have the time that I really want to just work my heart out. President Parrella gave a super strong talk about how important it is to live in the now. He explained how the past already happened, and yes we need to learn lessons from what already happened. He talked about how the future hasn't even happened yet, we don't even know what it'll be like. Then he explained how the NOW is what will determine how our past continues, and what our future will become. He made an amazing promise with us saying how if we stop thinking about what we'll study, where we'll work, who we'll become, who we'll marry and etc. and just focus on the now and how we can fulfill our purpose right now, that the Lord will provide studies, work, opportunities, the right wife, everything for us. It hit me really really hard just how important that is... And even though the way time passing scares me, I realized that nothings gunna change the way it passes, but for the rest of my future I'll always be able to look back on the past and remember what I did with my now. Haha, kinda confusing, but either way it just made me get a renewed fire to seek out and find God's children who are prepared and waiting for this gospel, because there are SO many out here. Even though i'm getting a little scared about my mission, I'm so determined to just burn it up out here. My desire to work is growing every day, and my little lazinesses that I used to have (ex. liking the 3 hour bus rides to Itabira cuz it was some time to sleep) have turned into a desire to simply work and save the Lord's sheep (ex. I HATE busrides now cuz it wastes time when I could be working haha) I love my mission so much... I couldn't ask for a better time of my life or a more miracle-full life in general. I love the Lord and His gospel. Things are great here and I hope that all is well for you all as well. Hurrah for Israel!!! Hurrah hurrah hurraaah!!!

   -Elder Ballard

bit o' Brazil -

  So I think i've done like 2 of these bits of Brazil... but I had a funny one this week. The peep holes that you put on your front doors, here are called "olho mágico", which being translated means "Magic Eye" Haha, peepholes are nice, but I don't think they're THAT cool. :P