5/25/09

hola minha familia eterna,

How are things? okay i know i promised pics. i lied again. haha. i let a memer borrow my camera because she needed it for school. so sorry again.

well this week was awesome. wednesday we hade zone conference and it rocked!!!! 5 zones together. those who are leaving at the end of this transfer had to give there farwell testimonies. was awesome. then............. the newbies. haha i was suprised, but it was real good. i got to see most of my mtc buddies there and we all conversed and told our stories so far. we had trainings from the president and his wife. awesome and then trainings from the assistants. and then we had to practice the trainings and the APs called me and my companion to demonstrate teaching a lesson with what things we just learned. once again i was shocked, but it was good. then later president called me up to the pulpit to explain 20 passos. (the 20 things we need to do everyday) i guess i was the only newbie that even knew that 20 passos exsisted. thank my companion for that. and then president was giving his final training and he was telling the story of david and goliath. he called a really short missionary to be david and of course i was called to be goliath. it was a crazy day. but way fun.

this week was good. we applied what we learned from the president and we had instant success. it was cool.

well something you should know about brazillians is that they say there going to do something and then they dont. okay thats being way stereotypical, so ill just say the people in this area. but other missionaries say the same thing. We had so many investigators this week and when we say ´´voce vai a igreja este domingo?´´ they all say ´´Eu vou`` means... you going to church this sunday? and im going....... BUT when we clap at there door there excuses range from..... ´´i dont want to leave the house empty´´ to ´´i dont have any clean clothes´´ Its so annoying. my companion said that the greatest gift we gain on the mission is the gift of patience. so we had more baptisms this week and it was beatiful. we still have two families that need to be married and one family that is so intersested in the church and they want to be baptized... and tomorrow we are going to teach them the word of wisdom and sabbath day holy.... they smoke, they drink and work on sundays. its going to be tough. i think that they have no idea that we believe in these things. its going to be interesting. and they have a 21 year old daughter that already commited to baptism but she went to a catholic church this week. our main focus is going to be on them i think.

ok enough of that. so school is out!! max and noah are in heaven right? haha so whats new any crazy stories??

i almost got bit by a crazy dog. it bit my pants and it should have torn right through and got my leg. but it didnt. i honestly believe im being protected now more than ever.

so how is the BOM reading going? good? started? hah

okay well i dont know what else to say. im excited to hear where david is going. hopefully joao pessoa brazil!!

anyway mom thanks for sending the card. it should come soon, i love you all and miss you!

Love Elder Elliott Ainge Fletcher

5/18/09

Hola familia,
Ok i know i promised pictures but this computer doesnt work very well. so sorry. next week.

So this week went pretty well. to start off ... last monday i weighed myself and it turns out i have lost 11 pounds. not good! so i have been eating like crazy, well in the process of eating like crazy i ate something bad. ha and now im sick. but i am getting better. anyway we found out that we have to move out of our house. idk why. so we called President and he said we need to find a house. so we have been looking. pray that we will find one cuz if not soon we will have to close the area which equals Not good! im sure we will find one. im going to miss our house. so today is the 3 month mark of the mission. i am 1/8 of the way done. haha. i was thinking of devins song... ´´ i wont see you this summer or the next´´ haha. anyway yesterday we had stake conference in Natal, so we rounded up the investigators and members and got on a bus. the meeting was good. our president was there and he gave a talk, along with his wife. he is so funny. after the meeting we had our baptisms. it was nice to do them in a real font. haha. all in all this week was good. we have alot of investigators this week so we are going to teach like crazy this week. but we have zone conference on wednesday so its going to be a challenge. im stoked for zone conference. everyone had to write a 10 min talk on the blessings of obedience and President is going to call on 1 missionary to talk. so that should be exciting.

one other thing i would like to say:
anyone who is reading this i would like you to read the book of mormon. As true as the sky is blue, grass is green, the book of mormon is the word of God. It truly is true. Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God and he really did see God and Jesus Christ. i have come to know with assurety, you can too. just read like 10 pages a day and in two months you will know.

because i teach it everyday and testify of it too, its made my testimony grow. and putting aside the spiritual aspect for a moment it just makes senses. learning about how God has always called prophets and how Christs church was established, it makes sense. The same church that Christ established on the earth around 2000 years ago, exists on the earth today. The Church of JESUS CHRIST of Latter day Saints. It does.

okay anyway im doing good and thanks for all the love and support. i appreciate it so much. it truly helps to have family and friends that support. most of the brazilian missionaries are the only ones in there families and the dont recieve support. i am so greatly blessed, i cant even believe it. i love you all so much and keep doing whatcha doing! ha love yall

Elder Fletcher

5/11/09

Hola,

i wanna start off by saying how great it was to talk to you guys yesterday. i didnt realize what was happening till i hung up and i wanted to call back soooo bad. so bad. but it was real good. im so glad to hear that everything at home is going good. so glad. ok so i have alot to say today and i dont want to forget anything so ill start now..

my address:
Elder Elliot Fletcher
Rua Deputado Jose Mariz 515
Tambazinho Joao Pessoa PB
58042 020 Brazil

So mom when you send the card put pictures of jesus or draw crosses on it so the mail workers wont steal it. no joke. and when i recieve the card i will withdraw money to give to the guy that allowed me to call yesterday. so yeah.

Okay so back to the letter:
Im going to send photos of my house and baptisms today in a different letter and ill send photos of the town next week..

ok so everything here is good, we had 2 baptisms yesterday and we were supposed to have 4 but 1 of our investigators was ´´sick´´ and the other is not ready. but all is well. there is always next week to make covenants with the Lord. So yeah its all good here. i dont really know what to say. everyone send questions and ill answer them all for next week. dad they call me..mais grande.. which translates to more big. haha. what else.............. so it rained like crazy last night and my camera was in my backpack and i took it out and took pics but it was all foggy, i was super mad. but i fixed it. its as good as new. what else... i am teaching alot more now. its still a little diffucult and i still get laughed at every once and a while but its so much better. and talking in english yesterday was so hard. i dont know if you could tell............. yesterday i gave a talk in church and i found out like 4 hours before. now in english thats no problem, just open the scriptures read and talk about it. in portuguese however.... a little bit harder haha. i prepared somewhat and it turned out decent. only one person laughed!!! haha. being a missionary is so cool. haha


Ok so david that is soooo awesome that you turned your papers in, and i heard about braden and matt. thats cool. i know nothing about being a missionary yet but from judging by these too weeks, it may have its ups and downs, but its great. it reminds me of the conference talk by.......... dont remember but its something like... ´´when your not living the ways of the Lord nothing can be permantly right. but when you are living the ways of the Lord nothing can be permanantly wrong´´ i dont know if thats how it goes but i know that its true. i gave my talk on charity and i learned alot. we all know the scripture that when you serve your fellow being you serve God but its becoming more apparent here because i can ask the Lord for blessings that i need for other people. and he gives me them. because its for other people, and by helping other people its bringing his work and glory to success and therefore he grants the blessings. okay i dont know if that made sense. but basically just serve other people before yourself and you will be blessed. okay. i love you all and i miss you dearly. devin thanks for the portuguese tips. haha. i can pretty much say anything i need to i just cant understand. thats the problem.they talk so fast. so fast.

okay i gotta go. until next monday

LOVE
elder elliot fletcher

5/4/2009

Hey family,
okay i have Alot to say today. first, i can not send emails to other people besides family. so friends... im sorry. okay second is congrats to mom and patric, parabens!. third, last week was the day that i transfered and i was on a bus or in a bus station for the majority of the day. so sorry. but ya. so ya hear it goes....

tuesday:
we got off the plane in joao pessoa and the president, his wife, and the APs were there waiting for all of us. we went to the mission home and had a couple hours of training, interview with the president, etc. then we had a great dinner with a slide presentation that showed our area, zone and a video of our companion. then bed.

wednesday:
woke up, got ready, and headed out on a bus. after the bus broke down and we were stuck for and hour we got to Natal and i met my companion Elder De Oliveira. He has been out for ten months and he is awesome. he speaks no english. then after 4 or 5 hours in the bus station we went to our area. called Goininha. we are the only missionaries within like 45 minutes. so the town is all ours

Thursday
first real real day. we went out and started teaching. really hard, i thought i knew alot of portuguese. turns out i know none. haha. its 100% normal for missionaries to say that the first week of there mission in the field is the hardest week of there life. it was really hard. but if this is the hardest week of my life, then i will have an amazing life. it is truly difficult to teach and have investigators and members laugh at you. ha but they say it takes 6 to 7 months to get the language down. thats if you hardly study. im not waiting 6 months!! my goal is to be able to communicate with everyone in 2 months from today.

anyway the people here are receptive to the gospel, and i love them already, and they love me. the love americans and they LOVE tall people, so its good.

for friday and saturday basically copy and paste thursday. haha. teaching alot and walking in the heat and rain, and seeing all sorts of animals and beatiful things. and i ate goat. yes goat. and it was sooo good. i didnt know what is was till i was done and then companion told me. ha.

oh before i forget, monday is my pday so u will get letters every monday.

ok so sunday. we have to walk around the entire city and pick up out investigators. its a long walk and even longer when you are soaking wet, but once we got to church it was great. we had more people at the church this weel then ever. its a group of 20 people. no bishop no branch president, a leader. 2 people not including us have the preisthood. so we perform all the ordinances. but this weel we had 43 people at church. doubled the usual. its was awesome. oh and i had my first baptism. a 16 year old boy named romulo. we taught him this week everyday and he chose me to baptize him. so cool. such a nice expericence. we have 2 set up already for next week. so excited. well im going to go. i love it here. its hard. its stressful. and it sucks not being able to be myself cuz i can hardly communicate. but i love it. thanks to all of you for everything. i love u all

Elder Fletcher