Who Needs Sleep? Week 55

What is up everyone! Just took a nap and I'm feeling good, so let's get right into this email. 

Okay so speaking of naps, I have had such a lack of sleep recently. It's honestly since I've arrived here in Brazil, but now it's finally catching up to me. It's like a go to sleep, wake up, and I'm still exhausted. After 8pm, I literally look like a zombie walking around on the street. I'm honestly just begging God everyday that my body can last 11 more months. 

This week was a solid week. We worked hard, played (not as hard), and hit a bunch of our goals. Although we had a baptism fall through (again), we didn't let it weigh us down. We've been working a ton through Tatiana (the woman that we baptized three weeks ago), who now received her temple recommend! We are teaching her mom and sister, and her mom is going to get baptized on Saturday! The whole family is super happy!

On the flip-side, I hit leg day for the first time in like 6 months on Wednesday, and I'm still feeling it. Everytime I sat down, I literally couldn't get up. Remind me never to hit leg day again. 

Okay, so we did an exchange on Friday, and I stayed in my area with a newer missionary. Not gonna lie, it really got me in the mood to train a missionary. In this exchange, everything just seemed to go right and we were able to accomplish a couple things that we were really trying to accomplish. We even took some youth out and did visits with them. They learned super quick, and in the second lesson, they were already leading the discussion. And we ended the night in the only justifiable way. Karaoke night! We brought an investigator and I sang probably the most depressing solo of "Peace in Christ". 

I'll just end this email off by sharing something that I learned this week. Our social and physical environment was a huge impact on our social and spiritual development as chrildren of God. This week, we visited a couple teens that we had contacted in the poorer, community part of the town. They were conversating, smoking, and just didn't seem happy. We shared with them a message of hope, light, and growth. I could see the spark and pontential in their eyes, but unfortunately this was hindered by their inability to leave their community, hindered by the fear of their lives if they came to chruch with us. This is a sad reality for some people, and something that these young men couldn't change. They seemed to be stuck in this physical environment, with the impending fear of death always around the corner. I thought a lot about this and how I could apply it into my own life. Fortunately, I think no one that is reading this is stuck in an "impending death" environment like these teens, but we still need to create spiritually uplifting environments in our lives and in our kids lives one day. Through the Holy Spirit, we will be shaped into our divine potential as children of God, and we constantly need to "stand in holy places". 

That's it for this week! I love you all and hope you all have a fantastic week!

Elder Ware