Elder Hilton June 7, 2016-2018 : Week 15: Speedy week

This week literally flew by. i feel like it was just pday 2 days ago! i guess that is a good thing :)

MONDAY: was a normal pday. we emailed and visited Gloria and Mateus, then planned for tuesday. we didnt do anything fun or special. hopefully next pday is better.

TUESDAY:We had lunch with Genilds today. It was really good as usual. After we picked up Ananda and Daniel to work with us today. We stopped at Cristina´s but she wasnt home, but that one old guy who is always sitting outside in front of his place was there so we talked to him. His name is Ternolino. We tryed to teach him the Restoration but it didnt go so well. He would always interrupt us and wouldnt stop talking. He still believes that Christ didnt die on the cross. he also said lots of other funny things such as ´´God wrote the scriptures and only the poor people are saved in heaven. He was funny but pretty annoying because he wouldnt let us teach. he just wanted to argue. We eventually gave up and my companion said, ´´maybe some day some other elders will pass by and finish this lesson´´ After that we did street contacting and made some new investigators.

WEDNESDAY: We had an amazing lunch today! it was a longer walk but 100 % worth it. The member wasnt even there, we ate with her brother who is from Salvador. We took lots of pictures inside and outside the house because it was a super nice place! i was shocked and wanted really badly to jump in their pool. haha

THURSDAY: We worked with Emillie and Samuel. Samuel had some friends over when we picked him up so they tagged along with us. There was 6 of us total, and we split up´and made lots of contacts. it was lots of fun and a lot more enjoyable with all of us. After we dropped everyone off we went to the church to teach Carlos.

FRIDAY: Elder J. Sousa recieved an unexpected phonecall that changed our plans for the day. he had to go to a different part of the city for some baptismal interviews and i stayed back and worked with Samuel and Gabriel (two youth from our ward). it was lots of fun. we walked to a bumch of people´s houses to try and find them and set up dates to return and teach but no one was in their homes. At 7:00 my companion returned and we taught Carlos again at the church. he is very close to baptism and has a date for the 8th of next month to be baptized.

SATURDAY: It turned out to be a pretty unproductive day. no body was home and no one was answering our calls. We taught Cristina the Book of Mormon and invited her to church. her response was ´´i will see if i can make it´´ she realy sounded like she would come.

SUNDAY: We have 5 investigators in church! and one of them was Cristina!! that was surprising because the last 2 times we had invited her she said that she would come with certainty but never came. and this week when we invited her yesterday she sounded like she wouldnt come, but she came! and she liked it a lot. she said she loved that she was recieved so warmly and lots of people talked to her. we met with her after church in the evening. She told us she got an answer to her prayers and she was feeling really good. She told us for the first time in a long time she didnt take all her various medicines because she was feeling so good, and she didnt feel as depressed, etc. We taught the word of wisdom and i took her coffee and tobacco and threw it away after we left. She committed to being baptized the 8th of October, the same day as Carlos. We are going to have 2 baptisms in one week!!! Woohoo! miracles happened this week. Also today at church i met an awesome couple who are traveling the world together. they showed me a map on their cellphone of the world and it had points of everywhere they have been. i was blown away with how many countries they have been to. they have their own youtube channel that you can check out. its, youtube.com/jonandeva Jonathan Mahdney and Eva Mahdney. Jonathan is from Canada and did a study abroad type thing through BYU and studyed in Moscow Russia where he met his wife on a train.

we saw them walk out of the house below ours and we were suprised and thought possibly they were americans. that was a few days ago. but then yesterday they were at church so i talked to them and then since they were leaving the next morning i talked to them for about an hour that night. they are really cool! He served his mission in the Ukraine

For a spiritual thought, i would like to share a quote from Robert D. Hales.

´´The fulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ brings great comfort in stressful times of mortality. It brings light where there is darkness and a calming influence where there is turmoil. It gives eternal hope when there is mortal despair. It is more than just beautiful doctrine. It is a reality in our lives that if we can be obedient and obtain the eternal rewards that God grants us, if we will draw nigh unto Him and embrace the eternal doctrine, we will be blessed.´´ and Thomas S. Monson once said, ´´ There is no fog so dense, no night so dark, no gale so strong, no mariner so lost but what the lighthouse of the Lord can rescue. It beckons through the storms of life.´´

And we should always remember to find joy in the journey. We should remember that even with such a solemn mission given to him, the Savior found delight in living; he enjoyed people and told his disciples to ´´be of good cheer´´, He said that we should be as thrilled with the Gospel as one who had found a shiny pearl of great price, right on their own doorstep. I know this gospel is true and it really blesses families.

Have a great week everyone! :)