Thursday, July 10, 2014

With President and Sister Broadbent
June 30, 2014

Are other people having a hard time believing that July will start tomorrow??  Or is it just me?  Wow time is going way too fast!  We had such a great and interesting week . . . full of miracles and changes and all sorts of Brasilian fun.  Here are some highlights:

--President Broadbent arrived!  I still can’t believe I will have three presidents during my mission but wow he is really great!  We had a meeting on Saturday with all of the missionaries in the mission and he talked about his standards for us and his testimony of the gospel.  He served here in Brazil and loved it so much.  We have interviews with him this week and I am super excited to get to know him better.

--Two times that Brasil played in the World Cup this week.  (And two times that they won!)  We had permission to watch the game against Chile on Saturday in a member’s house.  It was really strange to watch as a missionary but holy cow was that an intense game!!  I feel really blessed to be here during such a monumental time, though.

--We are seeing some great progress with our less-actives and investigators.  Celia is still working on her addiction to coffee, but she is definitely coming along!  She made it three days without drinking which was huge, and now she believes she actually can do it! (Before she was doubting herself.)  We decided to read the Book of Mormon with her from the beginning.  She has a hard time understanding, so we read verse by verse and explain every little detail.  The Spirit is always so strong and the Book of Mormon is really the thing that is giving her the spiritual power to continue.  I know the Book of Mormon is so true!  I can’t begin to say how many miracles I have seen come from the Book of Mormon during my mission!!

--We also had a ward activity this week called Festa Junina--it’s a huge party Brasilians have every June. Tons of people came and it was such a miracle! Seriously so many investigators and non-members and referrals.  Ah I was so so so happy.  We picked up a new investigator named Wyctor who is a cousin of a member.  He is seventeen years old and loved the activity and came to church the next day.  We are really excited to work with him!

--And on a more spiritual note, we had a profound spiritual experience yesterday.  Sister Moscoso and I visited the restroom before sacrament meeting.  We found one of the recent converts in the ward in the bathroom crying and started to talk to her.  She had an extreme migraine and was really suffering.  We decided to stay with her and give her a massage and help her to feel better.  By the end of sacrament meeting, she was feeling much better but as a result we ended up missing the sacrament.  Later on in the day, we were teaching lessons with a member of the ward named Paulo.  We told him what happened and he offered to bless the sacrament for us.  We got permission from the bishop and we had a mini sacrament meeting in Paulo’s house.  It was seriously so beautiful.  Paulo is seventeen years old and he is the only member in his family.  He carefully prepared the bread and water and we sang hymns with his non-member mother to prepare and to invite the Spirit.  He knelt on the cement floor and carefully read the scriptures from Moroni to bless the sacrament.  I started to cry because the Spirit was so strong and because it was so touching to have this experience when we thought we would have to wait another week to take the sacrament again.  During this moment I was so so grateful to be where I am as a missionary right now.  It is so beautiful to see the humble devotion to the gospel these people have.  I am grateful for the Book of Mormon, for the sacrament, and for the atonement.  This gospel is so true.

LOVE YOU ALL!!!!

Sister Dixon #1

No comments:

Post a Comment