6.4.12 Last email...probably

Hey guys,

This is probably the last email... crazy.

This week was alright. We got some new investigators that seem really
interested. A couple of our recent converts are surprising me. Juliene
invited 5 of her friends over to her house last monday to meet us. 3
of them went to Seminary with her every day, and 2 have accepted to be
baptized! And yesterday Jacqueline showed up to church with her friend
from school. It is so great to see recent converts helping others come
to know what we know. It shows me that they really have strong
testimonies. I love seeing little miracles like that. I am going to
miss that the most from my mission I think.

Everything is going well. We aren't sure about Jaoa and Pedrina. I
feel like we are losing them. Joao said that he will get baptized...
he just keeps putting it off for the next saturday. It is very
annoying. It is hard to be mad though cause i like him so much. I just
get a little frustrated. I just hope someday he will get baptized.

This coming sunday all congregations in Brazil will watch the
dedication of the Manaus Temple. I am excited for that. It will be an
awesome way to end my mission. I can't wait for the day that a temple
is built here. Someday it will happen.

I know that this is the true church. I know that Jesus Christ lives,
and that through His atonement, and His gospel, we can all be happy.
really happy. I can't think of a better way to have used my last two
years than here in this mission. I love this work and I am going to be
very sad to leave. I am nervous to get back to normal life. I like
being a full time missionary.

Don't worry, I will make this week the best week of my mission. I am
not quite done.

I love you guys so much and THANK YOU for all of the support you gave
me. It means a lot.

Love Isaac

5.28.12 Will the shoes make it??

 my shoe.... i hope it can make it to the end...



me and elder smoot again at our last zone conference!

Hey guys,

The week was good. We are really focusing in on João and Pedrina. They are so dang close to getting baptized. They both know it is what they need to do. They know the church is true... They are just a little hesitent because they aren´t completely sure if they want to make the full change. Like the little things like going to church every sunday and saying no to the ocasional invite for a drink... They rarely drink, but it is just tiny things like that that they are worried about. I think their thoughts are ´do we really want to do this for the rest of our lives?´ They understand they are making a covenent with God and they want to keep it after their baptism and not go back. They are afraid of going back to their old lives after baptism. But they went to church yesterday and they had a great spiritual experience. Elders quorum was perfect for João. we studied Pres. Monson´s talk from the november ensign about dare to stand alone. it was awesome.

Things are going great down here though. I am just trying to keep my mind off home. Elder Davis helps because he just wants to work. He is helping me stay diligent, even though i sometimes really don´t want to be diligent haha. I feel bad for him because I am gettin to the end and all I talk about is going home. Sometimes he will say something like, ´i miss peanut butter.´´ and i just tell him, me too, but in 2 weeks i will eat all i want.´´ I will leave him very trunky I think haha.

But I know that the Gospel is true. I am reading Ether right now. The story of the Brother of Jared is amazing. We need to have more faith!!

I love you all very much!!

love Isaac

5.21.12

Hey guys,

It sounds like you all had some fun up there over the weekend. It is crazy that Leslie is already 2! She looks so big. But Brooke isn´t too far behind haha. She does look a little chubby. That is good though.

This week was good. We are working with a family. i don´t know if i have talked about them before but their names are João and Pedrina. They are awesome. We baptized Jefferson (their son) in December. We have been teaching the parents off and on because they sometimes progress and sometimes not. But this week we went to talk to João and he was very open this time. He really is interested in the Gospel and he knows it can make things better for him. We helped him during the week to get a testemony of the Restoration and so we really pushed him to say prayers every night so he could get an answer. Well, he finally prayed and he got an answer and he accepted baptism!! It should happen this saturday!. I am so excited. He is an awesome guy with a lot of faith. Maybe you guys could remember him in your prayers because he is such a good guy and needs all the help he can get. If you can´t say his name, you can call him John. That is the english name for João.

But this week was pretty good. Things are great here in Timon. I am likin it. Sorry I don´t have too much news this week.

Mom, I think I just want family at the airport. I think that would be the best. I miss you guys the most anyway. I will see my friends some time after i get home I am sure.

I love you guys a lot and I hope your week is great! I hope everything goes well for you mom in wrappin everything up at school. Are you going to miss teaching? I bet you will miss helpin the kids, but probably not all the politics that go with it. I think you are the best teacher though. They will miss you I am sure. It sounds like an exciting time for everyone there though. Can´t wait to join in in the craziness.

Love you guys!!
Love Isaac

5.14.12

It was good to talk to you all yesterday! I love talking to you guys. I did get a little trunky afterwards, but it is passed.. mostly.

 

Thanks for you email, Mom. That was really good. I liked hearing about how the Lord has blessed you through the whole job process. That is amazing! I figured there must be some kind of miracles going on because at least when I left it was very difficult for people to get jobs. It is humbling to think of all the blessings Heavenly Fathers gives us. But all of that experience just goes to show you that He lives and that He loves us. You can´t have doubts about that now.

This week was alright as far as the work goes. The baptism we had was supposed to be on Saturday. We started fillin up the font on saturday and it only got a little water in there, then the water didn´t work anymore. I guess there was a pipe that broke and so none of the water was coming into the church. So we called everyone and cancelled the baptism and set it up for Sunday after church. We went to the church early yesterday and got a small hose and hooked it up to a..... (i forgot the word in english... spiget?) So the font was filling up very very slowly for the whole meeting. It had like 4 hours to do that, but it didn´t even get half way. The good thing is that Julia (who was baptized) is 9 years old and so she didn´t need too much water. It was very good. I love watching people get baptized. The Spirit is always strong.

That is about all the news I have that I didn´t tell you yesterday. I am blessed to have a family like you guys! I love you all so much.

 

Love Isaac

 

 

 

Elder Davis, Julia, Elton, Me. It was a good day!

5.7.12 The Field is White

Family!

This week was pretty awesome. You are all wondering where I am... I stayed in Timon haha. But I got a new companion. His name is Elder Davis. He is from Minnesota. It is lookin like this will be my last companion and my last area. I wouldn´t have ever thought when I got here in November that this would be my last area haha. I have been here a long time. But that is alright. I like Timon.

The biggest news though is that Luís was baptized!!!! He is that 82 year old man i was tellin you about. I was so happy. On Tuesay it finally just clicked for him and he decided right then and there that he would be baptized and that he wouldn´t change his mind. I even asked him what he would do if his preacher dude came and talked to him about it and he said that he wouldn´t even talk to him! haha. He also said that he was going to go to his old church and announce to them that he was leaving and going to be baptized in the Church of Jesus Christ. Luís is one of my favorite investigators that I have taught so far.

Poliana was also baptized, along with Jacqueline. Those two are amazing. They were just prepared thanks to members. We just had to go and basically just invite them to be baptized. They are awesome. I am excited for them.

I am getting excited to talk with you guys on Mother´s day!. It will be the same deal as christmas I guess. I will go to the church and you can call me there. I think your church is in the morning now... so I think you can call me at 4:00 pm my time. I will check my email very quickly on Saturday just to see if there is a problem. The number to the church is this:

086-3212-1051

That is the city code (086) and phone number. And you guys are pro´s at callin brazil now so i am sure you know what to do.

Dad, I do know Elder Wells. He is my friend ha. He was in my district when i was with Elder Melo... my second companion. he is the one that gave me a lot of troubles haha. So elder Wells and I always talked to get all the stress out haha.

Going to Lovell days sounds good to me. That would be awesome to see everyone again!

but I hope you all have a great week! I love you guys!

Love Isaac

 

 

 Daniel (member from a ward in Teresina) Luís, Poliana, Me, Jacqueline, Elder Davis

 Elder Sanders Elder Thomé Prycyelle, Bruna Angeliny (our baptism) elder Cruz and me

And the back yard of Timon.

The great city of Timon

4.30.12

hey guys,

This week got a little better. We ended up having a baptism. A couple
baptisms fell through, but I am so greatful for the one we did have.
Angeliny was baptized. She is 17. We were walking on the street about
a month of so ago and a guy stopped us on the street and said, ´hey,
go teach my daughter some day. She needs a church and some of her
friends go to your church.` so we got his address and went there. It
turns out that she hadn´t ever heard of our church haha. But she liked
everything we taught. I am glad she got baptized. We are working on
her dad now.. he is opening up a little.

Luiz is just full of miracles. We were teaching him and it seems like
this last week we weren´t making any progress. Every time we went to
visit him he said that he wont be baptized, then we would end the
lesson with him saying he is in the middle between two churches and
can´t decide. And then the next time he would always say that he won´t
be baptized. I was gettin down on him and thinkin that maybe he was a
lost hope. My companion was way ahead of me in those thoughts, but
never said anything haha. But then on Friday night, we went to teach
him and explained about the Holy Ghost and the numerous answers God
has givin him about our church. We explained that if it was right when
he prayed about our church, it is still right. We showed him a
scripture in D&C 6:22-24 and that was the turning point. After that,
he said, OK, i just have one problem now... I don´t know how long I
will be able to go to church every week there (because of age... all
those years are catchin up to him.) I explained that if it got to the
point that it was absolutely impossible for him to get to church, then
the priests can give him the sacrament in his house. He said, Ok, I
will get baptized there and nothing can change my mind!

So it was a good week.

I am not sure what I will do for school. I actually don´t care too
much where I go now. Anywhere is good.

My companion is doing better now. He talked more and more. He is just
a goofy kid haha. He just really wants a new companion. Maybe today
his prayers will be answered. Today is transfer day...

I love you all very much and thank you for all that you do for me and
for your emails.

You are the best!

Love Isaac

4.23.12

Good morning family! This week was alright. Things are getting kinda tough here. My companion really wants to be transferred or for me to get transferred. He is pretty sick of me. I am tryin to be good for him. So it was kinda a bad week because we were both not very excited cause he is all depressed and he doesn´t talk and so my mind just starts thinkin about a lot of stuff... mostly home haha. But we will see what happens. I am trying to be a good companion.

Luiz was all set to be baptized on Sunday. We went over the baptismal interview questions with him and he was very excited. We set up the interview to be on Saturday night. He was so excited and was happy. Then we went back on Saturday for the enterview and he said everything changed over the night. I guess he went and talked to his old pastor from his church and talked about how he was going to get baptized. The pastor told him that he shouldn´t because he was already baptized once and that he shouldn´t play with God. So that put a lot of doubts in his mind and he backed out. But our District Leader did an interview any way and helped him get rid of his doubts. He exlpained the whole restoration and everything again helping him understand that if Joseph Smith was a prophet then his other baptism didn´t mean anything. It helped and Luiz said he would pray again all night until he got an answer. I am very happy for him. He has a lot of faith. He is a great guy.

I have a question about dad´s work though... will we get free gas from shell now? And I got an idea from Elder Sanders for a job for me... Do you think it is possilbe for me to work in the oil fields there in texas. Elder Sanders said that you just drive around checkin meters and makin sure everything is goin good. Maybe Dad can get some connections now for somethin like that.

  And another question for Dad. My companion was telling me that he eats pine cones down there in the south of brazil. I guess there is a huge pine cone down there that they take everything off except the core... then eat the core. I laughed at him and thought that was weird haha. But then he said that they eat the same thing in Uruguay. So i wanna know if you ever ate pine cones in Uruguay on your mission?

  Mom, I am not sure about the ´why´ of the release date. I know that i was supposed to leave on June 23rd 2010, but because of visa problems i had to go to the Provo MTC and i think on the 23rd they didn´t have space for me there so it got pushed back to the 7th of july. There are about 10 or so other people that will go home on the 12th with me. So I think it is just easier to send me home with them. I hope that you all have a fantasic week.

 I love you all!! Love Isaac