End Of A Great Chapter

This week was a sad ending and a new beginning. These past seven weeks have easily been the hardest working and most fun weeks of my entire mission. I have learning so much and have drawn so much closer to my Savior. And I gotta do it all with the stud himself, Elder Bradford. This man is a literal unit. Not even his metal legs can stop him from working his absolute tail off every day. This man has changed my mission and I'm so grateful for that. 

But now it's time to start chapter nine of mission. I have received a fairly new companion, Elder Ribas, and have a little bit of weight on my shoulders. I'm stressed, but determined, (and a little bit sad lol) still praying everyday that my body will hold up to the challenge. I nearly buzzed all of the hair off and now I'm locked in. This is the chapter of focus, dedication, and obedience. Let's just see how long that can hold out. 

This week started out sad. We had lunch with President on Tuesday and basically tried talking him into telling us the transfers early for like 2 hours. He's a lawyer and a judge, it didn't quite work. The one thing he did tell us though was that there was a 99.99% chance that we would be split up. Catch us still praying for that 0.01% lol. 

Rosa's Baptism

The highlight of this week was definitley the baptism of Tatiana's mom, Rosa! I had the special priviledge of baptising her and she was so happy! She was basically hopping into the font repeating her full name over and over, so I wouldn't forget. The sprit was so strong in that little classroom and it got me so grateful for the opportunity that I have to be an instrument in changing lives. Tatiana(RC) has literally been praying for five years for her mom's baptism! It was a special day for everyone including Tatiana

sister, who showed a picture of the temple to her boyfriend, and told him that's where they're getting married! Elder Bradford even made a suprise visited a suprised everyone!

Whisperings of the Spirit

Something that I've noticed while being locked-in this week was the greater influence of the spirit in the work. It's crazy how much focusing on promptings actually helps you receive more prompting. To share an experience, we have been teaching this dude, Marcello, for like three weeks now. Almost every lesson and contact, we talk about baptism, but he has been super hesitant to accept. After watching the baptism and going to church for his second time, we felt prompted to stop by his house yesterday, amiss of busy schedule. As soon as we got there, we knew exactly what he needed. We watched a video about temples, and during the video I was praying super hard to know exactly what to say. I don't remember what I said or how I said it, but I know that I was guided by the spirit and he's now super excited to get baptized on the 23rd! Catch him at the temple next month with Tatiana and Rosa!

other cool things

- a dog would not stop jumping on me and humping my leg. I felt so uncomfortable, and Elder Bradford was just laughing lol. 

- bought an 8 dollar 76ers jersey, so catch me repping that and getting ready for the season that I can't watch. 

- we had a ward bbq for independence day on the 7th and it was super fun! We were also able to celebrate Tatiana's birthday that day too!

- I did a mini exchange with Elder Vaclaw and it was super fun!

- I've been eating way too much cake recently and it's not even funny. Time to gain some weight again! It's literally a roller coaster of weight gain. 

But that's all for this week! I'm super grateful to be here in Brasil and I'm super grateful for all of you guys! I love yall and enjoying all of the photos that we took this week!

Elder Ware