I have a few rather interesting/exciting things to report this week, finally.
First off, we took our Pday today instead of tomorrow because the Belo Horizonte Zone Pday was today and a bunch of the missionaries rented an indoor soccer field/court (Futebol de Salão, if that makes more sense) so we all went to play.
There were enough people for three teams of six, so we made a Staff Team. We spent the majority of the time on the field because Elder Do Nascimento, one of the assistants, is a soccer fiend, so we lost very infrequently.
At one point I was going down the sideline with the ball, and this one Elder (American, obviously) came running at me, slipped on the synthetic grass and crashed into me, took my legs out from under me, and threw me into the concrete wall. It hurt. A lot. But I'm good now.
But I made some sweet goals before being taken out of the game.
Important news and events:
I am now training my replacement, and Elder Rodrigo is training his. That means we are now four secretaries, and six people in our apartment. Elder Montgomery from Mesa, AZ will be taking my place. I will be leaving the office on the 15th of April. Elder Rospirski from Santa Catarina in the south of Brazil will be taking Elder Rodrigo's place.
On Sunday night President Frei went to get them in their areas and dropped them off at the chapel where we were having our baptism.
Yes, OUR baptism. Andreia, however, was not baptized. She got "sick" and said she wants to wait just a little bit longer. She did not go to church on Sunday. I will be so relieved when she finally gets baptized. It's giving me a headache.
Last night we went to her house (Elder Montgomery and I) and we were talking to her seated outside in front of her apartment and this drunk guy came up to the gate and started talking to the three of us. He was talking about how he had seen us (the missionaries) and he just need to come over and congratulate us for the great work that we are doing. Then he started testifying about how the church is the only true church and how if he had followed the council the missionaries gave him in the past he wouldn't be in such a rough situation like he is right now. He smelled horrible and talked forever, but at the same time he was kind of testifying, so we decided to let him keep talking. He said he was baptized about 10 years ago and was a fool and stopped going and now he's paying for that decision. Eventually he started repeating everything he had already said and mixing that with some nonsense, so I told Elder Montgomery to talk to Andreia while I tried to get the guy to leave us alone. After about ten more minutes he finally left.
Elder Montgomery was talking to her about putting on the armor of God, and how after her baptism she would have the help of the Lord to get through the trials and temptations in her life. She's scared about taking that "leap of faith". So I asked her if she had ever seen Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. She had not, but I explained the situation to her: Indiana Jones is standing at the edge of a large cavern/canyon inside a giant cave and he needs to get to the other side. Suddenly he remembers the words of the old knight or whatever he was (I couldn't remember what the words were, if anyone could help me out that'd be great. I think I'll probably use this example in the future, I liked it.) that had something to do with a leap of faith. I stood up on the bench we were sitting on: "And you know what he did? He stepped off of the edge. But he didn't fall. He stepped onto solid earth. And the same thing is going to happen to you when you're baptized. You can't see your life after your baptism from where you are right now; you can only see where you are and where you want to be- but I promise you that the Lord will support you once you demonstrate your faith and take that next step forward." I don't know if I stated the scene from the movie correctly, but it worked to get the point across. And she seemed to understand it quite well.
Anyway, Gilvano was baptized on Sunday. Our first baptism in almost three months! (I'll send pictures after) I think I explained last week but he's the fiancé of a less active woman. Now that he has shown interest in the church she and he go together, and they're even going to get married in the church at the beginning of April (they are keeping the law of chastity, yes). The baptism was awesome, the Spirit was very strong.
There's another guy that we taught who is the husband of a member; he's named Moacir. I say we "taught" him because he made it very clear that he had no intention of keeping the commandments or following the church. He told us two weeks ago that he wanted to be baptized on the 28th of February "para que ela deixe de encher meu saco." In other words: so that my wife will stop pestering me about it (but in much harsher words). We decided baptizing him wouldn't be the best idea.
But on Sunday he came to church with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. He said he wants to be baptized on the 15th, and it's for him, not for her this time. I'm still skeptical, but Rodrigo thinks he's telling the truth. We'll see how it goes.
The daughter of that member is going to be baptized this Sunday hopefully together with Andreia. Elder Rodrigo and Rospirski are responsible for the little girl, Yasmin, and Elder Mongomery and I are accompanying Andreia.
Hopefully everything will go as planned. Keep those prayers coming, please. She hasn't been baptized yet! I think I said this already, but Andreia told us last night that she has watched the copy of the Restoration that we loaned her like, 15 times. She was like "I guess I should probably give it back to you. But let me just watch it one more time and I'll give it to you on Friday." I told her as long as she wanted to keep watching it she could keep it.
Well, that's all the news I have for now. Next week our Pday will return to Thursday as normal. Sorry about the confusion this week. It was a last minute decision that we all made yesterday to go play soccer today.
Transfers are next Wednesday, so this is going to be a very busy week for us. We have to get everything ready... I have to train Elder Montgomery how to do it all at the same time.
'Til next week,
Elder Sisco