Week 49 - June 15, 2015

Cool thing: The ward had Festa Junina this week and it was pretty wacky hahaha. Brasil has some pretty weird holidays!

Funny thing: There is a member in our ward who always says he will help us teach people and said we need to call him, but every time we call him, he always has an excuse and this week we called him and his phone was disconnected... Don’t be like this member bahaha.

Interesting Character: Darci (dar-cEE) So we did a contact with this guy on the street and he told us a bunch of stories about the missionaries when he was a little boy. We returned to his house this week and got talking to him and turns out he was a pastor and he knows the Bible really well...Yeah he was just full of interesting questions and turns out he wasn’t looking to learn more about our church... But its good to exercise the testimony a little bit!

Weekly difficulty: The work is super slow right about now and it’s been hard getting into some houses! And the area is huge!

Weekly triumph: I made some freaking awesome cookies today!

Spiritual Experience: I’ve found that I’ve been exercising my patience in ways that I never knew possible and it is helping to reactivate a lot of members and its super cool! It was awesome this week to see a lot of less active members show up to church for the first time in a very long time :)

Scripture: Ether 12:4 

Have a great week y’all! Tchau!

Elder Buck

 We had almost the entire zone in our house - minus 6 elders and 2 sisters! haha

Week 48 - June 8, 2015

#willkeepselfiesalive

Cool Thing: We are officially teaching some Haitians so that’s cool! They are hard to understand but are reading the Book of Mormon we gave them in French! I got super pumped to do street contacts this week and it worked out because we have a bunch of people lined up to teach here soon!

Funny Thing: I started teaching English for the whole district (3 elders and 2 sisters). It’s been a good time and thanks to Franklin South Spalding I’ve been able to explain almost everything…but seriously English is a really weird language! :)

Interesting Character: Old Guy on Bike. So elder and I sat down to look at our map to find a road and this old guy with his bike rolled up and started talking with me. I quickly realized that he had some kind of disability like maybe autism, so I made room for him to sit next to me on the bench we were sitting on. He just started talking about God and how God talks with him and stuff and so I just started talking about his family. He told me that nobody visits him and how he missed his dad and stuff. I didn’t understand a lot of what he said but I just listened. He was super awesome! I talked with him for like 30 minutes because one of our appointments fell through. The mission has changed me so much!

Weekly Triumph: One of the sisters made special planners for all of the elders in our district this week that was cool!

Weekly Difficulty: I did a contact with these two teenage girls who were seated at a bus stop and I stuck out my hand to be polite and introduce myself and they kind of just looked at my hand with disgust and wouldn’t shake it. Wow. That made my blood pressure go up a little bit! Heh.

Spiritual Experience: I did a contact with this guy on the street yesterday and went to shake his hand and he did the same exact thing as the two girls I mentioned, but then he said "speak". So I induced myself and Dos Anjos and he started saying a bunch of stuff about how he follows God and not a church and he said if we had a message (invitation to go to church) we could leave it with him. So instead of giving him an invite to church I took out the Book of Mormon and left a message with him in Alma 38. I talked about a person who was truly good and without guile. Then I was able to bear one of the most powerful testimonies I have ever born in my life and I KNOW that he felt the Spirit cause I felt it! It was awesome!

Scripture: Alma 38

But that’s all for this week! Tchau!

Elder Bailey Buck

Brasil knows how to make pastries

Week 47 - June 1, 2015

The picture after Raul’s Baptism (Tyrone in the backround)

Spiritual Experience: Raul’s baptism went perfectly and I love being able to see how happy a person is after being baptized. The change is always super drastic and super awesome! Raul is a champ!

Weekly Difficulty: We had to clean the baptismal font and the water heater wasn’t working so we baptized Raul in cold water YEESH.

Funny Thing: So one of the Elders in our house (one of the Zone Leaders) did a split with one of the other new Elders in the Zone who got here like 4 weeks ago from his mission in Utah and that night, (Elder Mueller is his name) Elder Mueller got locked in one of the bathrooms in our house and we could not open the door in any way. So we called President that night and he told us to do what we need to do in order to get him out, with the least amount of damage being done to the door. The moment we hung up Elder De Jesus (the Zone leader) broke down the door and the door is just a mess now. But it was funny because we were trying to open it with knives, screwdrivers, everything for like 30 minutes bahaha. So yeah...

 The Door.

Cool Thing: Dos Anjos and I spent a whole day in another area and zone because Dos Anjos had a doctors appointment! We were in Blumenau again.

Weekly Triumph: We had a baptism this week! Raul is official now!

Love you guys!
Elder Buck

Week 46 - May 25, 2015

Cool Thing: Went to chapel in the center of Joinville that is the very first church building ever built in the whole south America! It was awesome!

Awesome Thing: I got to see Elder Keller for the first time this week and he is doing super good!

Weekly Triumph: Baptism marked for Raul this Saturday, we are super stoked for him!!

Weekly Difficulty: the baptismal font is outside the church building and it hasn’t been used for a super long time so we have to clean it this week...also...no one was ever home when we stopped by and all of our appointments fell through big time.

Spiritual Experience: We had conference with President this week and he compared us to the army in Judges 7.

Scripture: Judges 7

Hahaha Sorry that’s all I got - but hope you all have a great week!!

Elder Buck

 Zone Meeting

 Found a cool bridge!    

We made some coxinha and pastries!!

Week 45 - May 18, 2015

Week of Walking…

Cool Thing: We have a baptism marked for the 30th of May, and this kid is so ready to be baptized! 

Funny Thing: There’s a less active member in the ward who’s name is Naor. This guy is truly awesome but in the words of my companion he’s a little, "fora da casa..." We scheduled an appointment with him after church yesterday and when showed up and he was jamming out to California Girls by Katy Perry and using the boat he was painting as a drum set. I had to try so hard to not laugh! 

Interesting Character: Jessé (jess-ay). We went to an teaching appointment that we had marked with a friend of one of the members, but when we showed up she wasn’t home. So when we were trying to mark another day to stop by, Jessé walked up and kind of started listening in on our conversation. My companion just stopped talking and turned to Jessé and said, "Hey, what are you doing tomorrow (Sunday) at about 9 in the morning?" Jessé said, "nothing, just going to be here at home doing nothing." At that moment my companion just said," so you want to go to church tomorrow with us??" And he said YES. Hahaha The best part was that he actually showed up at 9:00 at the church building and stayed for the entire 3 hours. It was awesome!

Weekly Triumph: Our numbers improved this week from the last week and it felt good to know that our hard work actually pays off.

Weekly Difficulty: WE WALKED SO MUCH THIS WEEK AND SO MANY APPOINTMENTS ENDED UP FALLING THROUGH. 

Spiritual Experience: We did a contact knocking on doors and these people let us in after talking for 30 minutes outside their house. It turned out they attend an Assembly of God church or something like that. They decided to offer a prayer for us and it was the most crazy prayer I have ever heard in my entire life. The mom started to pray and during her prayer she started yelling and stuff and then her son got into it and started praying and he started yelling and stuff during his prayer, and then before I knew it there were three other people praying for us. I didn’t understand anything and neither did my companion and it was weird. They ended and my companion didn’t even say amen... he ended up talking a little about prayer and how God is a God of Order and our prayers need to be that way too. Afterward I asked if we could say a prayer the way we say prayers and they accepted. I felt the Spirit so strong in that little room as a said the simplest prayer and it was crazy. And yeah, they were really firm in their faith and weren’t about to listen to what we had to say but I felt good knowing that we left with the spirit from that house! 

That’s all for now. Love you all!

Tchau!

Elder Buck

Borrowed my comp's hat and took some pics...

Week 44 - May 11, 2015

Joinville

Me and Dos Anjos

Meeee

So yeah yesterday was a lot better than the Christmas call, WOW hahaha. I only cried a little bit this time! It was super good to see your faces and hear your voices; it’s been too long. I didn’t even feel super trunky afterward, so that was cool!  It was really good to talk to Skylar. I hope she is doing well and hope she knows how happy and grateful I am to be her brother. 

I can feel myself changing and its not a small change, it’s a big one. I realized at home I had a testimony, but it was so weak. I can honestly say I know exactly was it feels like to have that "burning" testimony. It is so real and so TRUE!  But I love you all and hope you know that when we are doing what the Lord asks of us, those are the things that make the difference!

Love,
Elder Buck

Week 43 - May 4, 2015

DAT TIE DO

I like it here!

Well this week was mostly just updating the area book and visiting people I don’t know very well, but it was a good one! I learned out here that if someone has fallen away from the church or decided to quit going, it is most likely because that person lacks a testimony of the Restoration. Or doesn’t fully understand the Restoration. At home I had a testimony, but it was super weak. Now I know with an absolute certainty that these things are true! It has to be! It just makes so much sense! Look to understand more fully the restoration, it makes a difference. 

Cool Thing: Me and Elder Dos Anjos took a ton of time out of one of our days to organize and update the area book and there were a lot of lost investigators and less active members there. So that was awesome.

Funny Thing: This ward hasn’t had an American missionary for a while and the whole week I’ve been telling people I’m from the Bahia and everyone believes me hahaha. Good times. The members either get a really good laugh out of it or they just get kind of confused.

Interesting Character: My companion: Elder dos Anjos. He reminds me so much of Skylar its ridiculous. For example one time he got super mad for some reason and started mumbling to himself and said, "I just want to punch a wall so bad right now but won’t because it’ll hurt my hand!" And then he just kind of sat on his bed and didn’t talk for a little bit hahaha. He’s a funny kid!

Weekly Difficulty: So I thought my last areas were huge but they were super small compared to this one I am in right now. I guess it’s the largest area of the two zones of Joinville.... It is so massive. We have walked so much!

Weekly Triumph: A member gave me a sick tie yesterday (see pictures)

Spiritual Experience: So my companion has been super frustrated this whole week because of the other pair of missionaries that are living with us. It’s been kind of a mess in this area but he was super frustrated and it was something I could just see. In my last area I also got a little frustrated about something that one of the Elders did and just sat in a chair for a while to think. One of the Elders in the house approached me and said, "You alright?" I said I was fine but just a little angry. He said to me after, "you know what makes me feel better and happier?....serving. Another Elder is not feeling very good and needs a blessing, will you come help?" I said yes and we gave him a blessing and I felt so much better. So with my companion I’ve just had a thought that blessing participated in helped me out A LOT, so maybe something like that would help him. Then I was thinking to myself, well do you even really need a blessing? Then at the moment I said to myself no, but I continued thinking and the last time I had received any blessing or had anyone lay their hands on my head was when I was set apart as a missionary. I have often needed a blessing from one of my companions but always ignored the thought. So I asked Dos Anjos to give me a blessing and it was one of the most inspired blessings I have received . And It just changed our whole workflow and attitudes, and I can feel the Spirit so much more when we teach, plan, pray, study, everything. It was super cool. The Priesthood is real!

Scripture: 1 Nephi 1:1

Eu amo vocês!!

Elder Buck

I know what happened to the am pm next to our house. It's here in Joinville!