Transfer #1

Well, we were supposed to get transfer calls last night and it didnt happen. Then they told us that we would get them this morning, and didnt happen. So, we still have no idea what will happen. Actually, that is not true. Elder Thurgood will be transferred. He was told in that special meeting that he went to that he will be a ZL this next transfer. So, he will leave because Elder Rocha, the ZL here, will stay because on Sunday we started a group (smaller than a branch) in Perequê! Also, Monica and Alex have a marriage date for May 10! Our work is finally paying off, even if it will all show next transfer. All in all, my fate is still unknown. I will get a new comp for sure but whether I stay or go somewhere else is yet to be known!  This transfer is over... wow it has passed by fast. Elder Thurgood has been a great comp! 

Not a whole lot happened this week as far as the work goes. We had a couple people ask us for visits, then werent home when we arrived at the agreed time. Joys of the work for sure! The language is coming along much better now. The bishop and WML are finally comfortable with my understanding capacity. I think in this language. It is so weird. I've been having a ton of dreams lately, all in portuguese. Now THAT is an indescribable thing.

But this week I have spent a lot of time thinking and studying about Joseph Smith. I do not have adequate words to describe my feelings and my experiences I have had. In short, I have come to know him. Not know of him, but really know him. I know that he was and is a Prophet of God. I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I may lack faith of a lot of things but I know that book is true. My experiences cannot be put into words. But I have ended my day, almost every night with feelings of joy and a peace I have never felt. Just thinking about it makes me smile.

Other than that, nothing super awesome has happened. There was a soccer championship game last night. Santos lost in penalty kicks but every time a team missed a kick, the whole city seemed to shake, every one was screaming so loud. When the winner was decided, guns where fired, fireworks went off, and empty beer bottles where smashed in the streets. That being said, I cannot wait for the world cup. It will be nuts :D

We had lunch on friday at the American's house in my ward (I also got sick that day but I'm all better now!). He is filthy rich (ex-pro golfer and current senior golf champion of Brazil). He lives in the part of guarujá called Península (google earth it). Gorgeous views and huge house. It was so cool. His name is Ronald Gunn, just in case you wanna look him up.

Austin - Who is such a big boy now? AWWWWWWW ;) Just dont break my truck :) That talk by elder oaks was the motto for my mission in AZ. Sis Cabral has banned us missionaries from buying guaraná haha We only drink it at members houses but it is an every day thing. Water is heavenly though.

Cam - Yea fubeca, tudo bem? :P I hope you had an awesome break and that you did some cool stuff! We were at a members house yesterday and their 3 year old son is obsessed with Ben10 (all boys here are) but he was watching a video that had Skillet in the background and he was singing along to "Monster" and "Hero". I wish I had my camera. It was sooooooo funny.

Lexi - Did you know that my 6 month anniversary of the mission is on your birthday? How cool is that! Next year, that means when you have your birthday, only 6 more months before I come home! Holy cow! or HOLY DOG ;) We'll see what happens on your birthday! It will be super fun!

I hope you all had an awesome break and enjoy school/work ;)

Love you all, 

Elder Johnson

PS.  We just got the call that I am getting transferred!  Elder Thurgood will be transferred too, so the President is "white-washing" the area.  Kinda crazy but I really felt like this was going to happen. New area here I come!!

I have to pay how much to pick up my package?!

Dearest family:

No, I have not forgotten about you. No, I did not forget to write you all. Yes, I am still living. No, I have not been jumped yet. Yes, I feel fine. No, I did not plan on starting this letter like this.

Well, now that i have answered all of Mom's questions, lets get started ;)

This week has been quite the week. The highlight of it was finding a 17 year-old investigator named Bruno. So we went out with the bishop's son who is leaving on his mission on April 10. He wanted to visit Bruno, his friend. We got started with the first lesson (the Restoration) and Elder Thurgood recited the first vision. After waiting for 10 seconds, Thurgood asks Bruno how he feels. Bruno literally shakes, has goosebumps, and then asks "Could you say that story again? I have never felt so happy in all my life. Please?"

Yeah, I died. Right there. After the lesson, he committed to pray and come to church and asked if we could come back the next day. When we came back, he had two other friends there! Needless to say, it was an awesome experience. But unfortunately, he didnt come to church so he wont be able to be baptized before Vitor (Bishops son) leaves :(

That really was one of the most spiritual lessons ever. Everything that day seemed to be going right before that. It was a great day. 

So, this week I have been studying the section in Pregar Meu Evangelho about developing christ-like attributes. Yes, I have a lot of work to do and many ways to improve. Humility (taking the high road), Faith, and patience are among my biggest challenges right now. Studying does nothing however, without application.

A funny thing happened this week too! During a lesson, there was a gunshot literally 3 houses down. Later that day, at night, we were walking past a house in a different part of town. As we pass this house, they set off fireworks. Because of the gunshot earlier, my first thought was "I cant believe my mission ends like this." Thurgood started to run then stopped because I wasnt running. I was just waiting to feel something painful. But then we realized that it was fireworks, and speed walked to the bus stop. Sometimes, I feel like James Bond here. 

So, that is really it for this week. Rodgers and Rocha had a baptism and we are getting close to having 3 soooooo we are working hard here.

For General Conference, we will be watching it at the chapel. The whole ward will be there! Yes, it will be in portuguese. But we might be able to watch it in English in the Clerks office. Maybe. But I am torn whether I even want to watch it in English or not. I am kind of leaning towards the no.... But we will see!

Great news! Your package arrived! Bad News! I have to pay R$157 to pick it up because of size/contents. SO new plan. Only small packages and not very often. Ta bom? I will have to withdraw from my debit card because I dont have that much money to spare with the regular allowance we get. But thank you for sending something :D

Life will be crazy this month! On Lexi´s 10th birthday, it will be my SIX MONTH mark. Already! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I do not feel like it should be that long this soon! 

Andrew called me last p-day and the whole call was in portuguese. Talk about weird. It was like I was calling home but I was talking portuguese... Crazy!Well fam, I have officially been out for 5 months and one day. Crazy huh? It really feels like time flies!

Have a good week everybody!

Elder Johnson

Sempre Fiéis

Beleza? I hope so! I don´t really envy the snow that you guys have had. Although it is pretty hot here and I sweat buckets, I don´t sunburn so it is bearable! Not sunburning must be the gift of the spirit that I was blessed with, not the gift of tongues!

When I was having a particularly difficult day in the MTC, brother Paulich took me into another room and we had a little chat. After our talk, we both came to the conclusion that my lesson that I need to learn from the early part of my mission is to learn to have patience with myself. I did much better after that chat but ever since I got here it feels like there is this pressure to be fluent now. I don´t know. But I have spent hours and hours on my knees and in the scriptures (i have finished the D+C, pearl of GP and started the OT this week). I also read ´´our heritage´´ last night and something stood out. Lorenzo Snow (i think it was him) went on a mission to hawaii at age 16 and was fluent in 3 months. The author said that was the gift of tongues. The way that I have been viewing the gift of tongues has been completely wrong. I thought of it as this immediate transformation but it isn´t. Ignorance of youth huh?

Yesterday, Bishop pulled a fast one on us and asked all the missionaries to speak in church. It´s a good thing sacrament meeting is 3rd hour here! So I gave a short talk on faith and miracles. It was a miracle that I got through it haha. Now half the ward thinks I can understand portuguese and the other half doesn´t. One of the young women in the ward calls me ´´Elder não endendi´´ (Elder I don´t understand). Isn´t that nice? But all is well and I am understanding more and more each day. We clapped outside of a random door on friday (you don´t knock in Brazil, you clap and yell. it is pretty fantastic) and this lady answered the door. She was smoking and had a prosthetic leg but after we taught her the first lesson, she committed to baptism and to come to church that sunday. And she did! Even when we told her that she would have to quit smoking and drinking coffee, she said ´´No problem, I need to stop both anyway.´´ So, she is slated to be baptized the 19th and I am so stoked! We are also teaching a 13 year old and we are trying to get his dad to listen in but he is a bit stubborn. We have a couple more people that we have had for a while but Satan is hard at work. All one family has to do is get legally married and they can be baptized but the mom took the money that they have been saving and used it for a down payment for a new house. ÇALSKDJFAHGAGHUIAEGIERG. We´ll see what happens!

Lunch is the big meal here and they stuff you to the brim. I eat really well. The brazilian diet is very balanced. We hardly buy food because we are given left overs all the time. most of our money goes to the buses. We take the buses a lot and after a while, it gets pricey! I´ve been thinking about buying a cheap guitar here but I don´t know if I will. 

I am loving brazil and can understand more of the jokes and funny stories. Old Brazilian people are my favorite people in the whole world. They are so sarcastic and blunt. One old guy in his 80s had me in tears!

I hope you all are doing well! Enjoy school and work :)

Bom trabalho,

Elder Johnson

Week #5

hey guys!!

Week 5 is officially here! I will be getting my reassignment on Thursday so you'll be getting an email from me in two days telling you where I'll be! GET PUMPED!! 

As you guys can see from the pictures, it is snowing here. 7 inches and still coming down. Blah. 

How is everyone??? Any super exciting FHE's? 

We have had 2 English-fasts where we speak no english all day. Those are hard but they help so much. The gift of tongues is absolutely real! I've been reading the scriptures so much here. They are getting really marked up. Especially Alma 32. Its all about faith! I have a quote from Henry B. Eyring written in the margin. 

"If the foundation of faith is not embedded in our hearts, the power to endure will crumble."

That is from his April 2012 talk "Mountains to Climb". The mormon message with the same title is amazing. I encourage you to watch the talk or the mormon message. Both have helped me so much. 

the shift key is broke on this keyboard so i don't know if much of this will be capitalized correctly. sorry! Thanksgiving was great! we had a devotional where we knew that a senior apostle was coming! Russell M. Nelson came and spoke to us about testimonies. it was great.  he looks just like he does on TV but i think my view of the apostles is a
bit different. They are regular human beings. they look so humble. it's
incredible. He taught how to gain a testimony. Alma 5:44-47 shows how to
gain a "pure testimony" that is mentioned in ch 4. alma 5:44-49 is one of
the greatest testimonies in the BoM. if anyone in seminary is struggling
with their testimony, have them read that.

throughout my personal study, I've been reading a lot about missionary work
and faith. The objective of missionaries is to "astonish" their
investigators. Ammon astonishes the lamanites in ch. 17 and 18 of alma 5
times. Also, the incredible thing is that although ammon was a great
missionary, he had to earn the trust of the Lamanites before he could teach
them. He taught by example rather than words. then Alma 26 shows the
humility of ammon. he is such a pro.

we also took part in the largest humanitarian service project outside of a natural disaster! we put together 350000 (four zeros) meals for the utah food bank! it was a great way to spend the day. after that we watched Ephraim's rescue! 

Turkey day at home sounded super fun! i hope everything turned out great! Not gonna lie, i think the christmas music is starting to grow on me. we sing it in every meeting here! also, it is snowing right now. we have 4 inches of it and it is still coming down. the mtc put up christmas lights up in the main courtyard and it looks awesome. i took a pic of it but only half the lights were on that night haha i'm going to send a bunch of pics today.

I don't really know if i wan't anything for christmas. I'll let you know the closer i get to the day if i need anything. depending on my reassignment, i'll need a winter coat. but that should be it. 3 people got visas this week! one was from my district. one of the new guys got his and his last name is johnson too! We have 3 elders in this zone with the last name johnson and 2 have gotten visas. I'm the only one who hasn't! 

portuguese is getting better. since my last letter, we have had 2 "english fasts' where we aren't allowed to speak any english all day and night. those days are much quieter than usual but awesome nevertheless. 

how is everyone doing? i'm so grateful that you and dad write me every week. a lot of the guys here hardly get anything from their parents and it's sad. i'm truly blessed to have such great parents! have you talked to grandpa and grandma riggs recently? they sent a dear elder but i didn't have their email so i sent them a paper letter with my email inside. I hope they have gotten it!

i miss ya'll like crazy and i'll be able to write you thursday when i get my reassignment. I'll also be able to call you from the airport when i leave so be sure to have a phone close by!

 

Elder Johnson