The Spirit is Awesome!‏

Dear Family and Friends,
I have quite a bit to tell you this week, and I’m really excited to tell you about how many times better this week was than the last one. In relation to the Marrone-Diessica situation, we decided to just support them in their date for the 22nd of August. They’re only 20 years old, and this means a lot to them. They continue to be strong and firm in the church, and they love it! I included their wedding announcement in the pictures I sent.

I REALLY hope I can be there for their marriage and baptism. As we decided to leave the Marriage date as it is, we went ahead and marked their baptismal date for the 29th of August. Adriano, who passed us the Referral, is just on cloud 9. With the success that Marrone and Diessica showed, he has opened up and passed us a whole lot more referrals.
At church, Marrone, Diessica, Tainã's mom and sister (his sister finally came!), and Luiz's Mother-in-law (first time - we had been working with her for a few weeks) came.
So now to the part where I talk about how awesome the Spirit is. As a missionary, I was surprised to see how much being in the field was like my training. Most of the real-life situations really are very much like the trainings and practices. Because the gospel is like a math... Read the book of Mormon, Pray, show faith through the completion of commitments, and presto… Testimony. But, as you can expect, at times, as missionaries, life throws you a couple of curveballs. And when those curveballs come, you have to be sensitive to the spirit, or you’ll "strikeout." So on this past Sunday, we took Irmão Jaír to visit a less-active member, Thaís. When we showed up, she was not there, but her house-mate answered the door. As missionaries, we made the contact, and began teaching her instead. Her name is Daiane (not sure if I already told you guys), and she must have about 20 years. So we talked to her about the Restoration, and she showed interest, we challenged her to be baptized when she received an answer, she agreed, and so on, and everything was cool and what not. We marked to return on Wednesday.
Wednesday came, we returned with Adriano to Daiane’s, she gladly let us in, and she started off with a curveball. She said "Hey I have a friend who wanted you guys to bless this crucifix, can yall do that?" I paused. Didn’t exactly know what to do in that situation. I could have just said "no, we don’t do that," but I had this impression, that I know wasn’t a thought of my own. That thought said "Look, this girl trusts you guys as men sent of God (whom you are), use this as a teaching opportunity." So, as is the mentality of a missionary, we asked "Is your friend here?" "As a matter of fact, she is, she’s just a little shy." "Could you grab her for us?" She obliged. She returned with her friend, Andrea. At this point, I still didn’t know 100% what I was to tell her, but I had the impression just to open my mouth and speak what came to mind. And so I did. I asked her "what would be the purpose of this blessing? What do you want us to bless this FOR?" "Uhm, IDK, just so that I can have something holy close to my heart, and a symbol of God to pray to." I commended her for her desire. Then I went on to tell her that Jesus had prepared a way; left us with a way that we can feel close to God, and have this good feeling with us always. I went on to testify about the Spirit, and the Gift of the Holy Ghost. I told her that we can always have this gift with us, and this gift is given to those who are baptized in the Church of Christ. I then testified that we have the privilege to pray directly to God, and that he wants us to do so because He loves us.
It was just awesome. I felt so great, because I always heard of people saying "I felt like it was just the Holy Ghost filling my mouth with things to say", and I hadn’t, until this point, felt like I had an experience 100% like that. But now I had. And it just filled the room with the spirit, and it made for an awesome lesson. We marked for Friday.
Friday came, and we invited two young women in our ward to go visit them with us, to make them feel more welcome and such. But curveball #2 happened. Thais, whom was not present in our lessons until this point, met us at her door. She told us: "Look, I really don’t think you all have much purpose in coming here. I’m not really wanting to come back to church right now, Andrea is already catholic, and I don’t think she’s at all interested in what you have to tell her, and Daiane is travelling outside the city, and I don’t think she’s interested either." She dismissed us. Me, Elder Sena, and especially the two young women with us were a little stunned. It happens, but we had felt so good about those two.
But Sunday came around, and we felt impressed to return to that house. We weren’t going to take no for an answer, especially from a second source. To our surprise, Andrea greeted us warmly, and happily let us in. She said that she had been planning to go to church that morning, but her mom got really sick, and she stayed home to take care of her. She also let us know (without us asking) that she had not read the chapter from the Book of Mormon, because Daiane had been reading, and took the book with her when she went traveling. Rarely is there an excuse that us missionaries like, but that was one of those rare exceptions. So we left one for her, too, and she happily took it and thanked us. She said she had been reading the Restoration pamphlet, however. She then went on to tell us that she had wanted us to bless the crucifix on Wednesday because she had recently had a desire to re-kindle her relationship with God. We told her that that was exactly what we were sent from God to help her with. She started crying. She told us that the way we (the Spirit) explained why we didn’t bless the necklace "just made sense" to her, and that she wanted to learn how to pray and talk to God. So we did. We had a fantastic lesson with Andrea, and she said her very first (un-memorized) prayer to close it off. She told us she was happy that we had been sent there, and that we were welcome at her house.
I’m not sure if Thaís was lying, or just plain wrong, but I am glad that we listened this week to the spirit.
I know my Redeemer lives. I know the church is true. I love you all.
Com amor,
Elder Wassom

Some pictures of our Mission Conference and Scripture Mastery passoffs in Portuguese. :)

Uma Semana Meia Chata

Dear Family and Friends
Translating the title: A pretty lame week. This week was pretty lame. My companion, Elder Sena, started to have a bad ear ache last Sunday. The pain died down on Monday, but came raging back on Tuesday. We had to return to our house a little early to treat him with some pain meds (from the E-Bola survival kit). He did not sleep at all that night. On Wednesday, He finally fell asleep at around 6:50 AM, so I thought, considering the circumstances, I would let him sleep through morning study. We went to lunch, but he threw it all up afterward, he was in so much pain. So we returned to our home and I let him rest until he was able to recover enough to leave home. He didn't recover, and we spent the day inside. In the days following, we tried everything, from Pharmacy meds, to natural meds, to urban legends. I spent much time in prayer and fasting for him. At the times when we were inside, I read the scriptures. That part was good. We were able to leave a few times and teach some lessons, but I had to really carry those lessons, because my comp could barely think.
Marrone and Diessica decided to mark their marriage on the 22nd of AUGUST. When we asked why, they expressed that they needed to save enough money to buy the dress and tux. We considered (exhorted) that they rent those things. But for some reason, they were against that idea. We would have visited them on Wednesday but we had to cancel that lesson due to the earache of my companion. Next thing we knew, they have already made the wedding invitations.
My comp got better today. As some might be suspicious that he magically got better just in time for both P-Days, I will immediately shoot down those suspicions. This was 100% legitimate. Elder Sena is awesome and hard-working, and wouldn’t fake sick.
Another sad thing, I think Helmutt relapsed on his drinking problem. He smelled strongly of beer at church on Sunday. At least he came to church with his whole family, for the first time.
The mandiocada was excellent, but unfortunately, none of our investigators showed up.
Good news - Andrea, Tainã's mom showed up to church again. She and her husband show real potential. Let’s see if they can't get married.
As seen in my pics, we have 2 new elders in Ijuí. Elder Jawaad, companion of Elder Jordan Peterson, is actually American. Rarely do we see two Americans together. He speaks Portuguese fluently, as his parents are Brazilian. He’s kind of goofy , just like Elder Jordan Peterson and me, haha.
Elder Marcelino, companion of Elder Anfuso, is from Rio. He's pretty cool, and I like him a lot.
Uhm, I believe that’s about it. Sorry for the bad news, but hey. Bad weeks just happen. At least I had the chance to read a ton of the scriptures, Ensign, and Jesus The Christ. I am really being edified by the power of these resources that we have.
I love you all. I love my mission, just had a rough week. Let’s hope that my companion stays healthy, so that we get back to working in the vineyard. I am still optimistic.
Com Amor,
Elder Wassom

Our new district, in order left to right: Elders Anfuso, Marcelino (new), Sena, Wassom (shock), Jawaad (new), and Jordan Peterson.


ok, so real quick. I always had the same cover on my planner - the one with Jesus and "seeking the one", but it got old and I made a new one. We got a notice that we received some boxes, and that they were dropped off at a members house. Then that member called us and complained that they have 28 boxes for us. No idea why we need literally 2,000 pamphlets (I use the word literally literally) of the Restoration, and thousands of other pamphlets and forms, but oh well. Our mandiocada was a success. We had the leftovers today. We broke the volleyball.

6 More Weeks in Ijuí Centro!‏

JULY 6th, 2015

So the title is pretty self-explanatory. I survived yet another transfer here in Ijuí. Elder Bispo dos Santos (tall, Bahiano, brown) is headed to Livramento, and Elder Italo Silva (Northeastern, broken tooth) is going to Santa Maria-Tancredo Neves. I'm not sure if that’s important info to you, but why not just throw that in there? Both Elder Jordan Peterson and Elder Anfuso will train, and Elder Jordan Peterson was relieved from his duty as a District Leader, in preparation of his departure to the US in 3 months. Elder Anfuso is our new District Leader.
So on the fourth of July, as some of you asked, we did nothing differently. US Independence Day is irrelevant when you are not in the US. However, Elder Jordan Peterson and I did sing the US National Anthem over the phone in two part harmony to our Zone Leader, Elder Knowles. So that’s something.
On Sunday, it was really really cold. I believe it was below freezing when we woke up. And our house has many perks, but good insulation is not one of those perks. So I had to wake up, put on my gloves, my thermals, my long-sleeve, my sweater, and then my suitcoat. Then I realized- I was still cold. So I threw on my trench coat over that suit. Unfortunately, a lot of our ward and investigators also noticed that it was cold. So our church was a little more empty this week. But that didn’t stop Marrone and Diessica. Marrone bore his testimony. And for the first time, Tainã's Mom showed up to church. That was nice to see her; we had been working with her for some time.
Speaking of other successes with people whom we have been working for some time, Sergio has made a good jump back into activity in the church. He's the man from Rio that lent his computer for us to skype home on Mother's day. He has made a commitment that, because he often works Sunday, that he will try 100% to find a new job, and index 5,000 names this year. He showed us how it all works. It seems easy enough... I will have to do some indexing when I get home. We had lunch at his home on Saturday. That was an experience very close to heaven. We had a beef Fricassé, (Rice, Beans) and a super good mixed salad with different types of bell peppers, cucumbers, and radishes. Ooh and a pasta carbonara. I do like food.
For our final P-day as a district, the three companionships in Ijuí went down and played more volleyball and Ultimate, and then we decided to make a pizza from scratch. It turned out quite fantastic. Elder Anfuso was a little sad because we followed a recipe to make the pizza dough, and it looked like we made too little. So Elder Anfuso went to town and made another batch, just that we ran out of flour and eggs. So he did a little improv using Northeastern Couscous and Baking powder. At this time, he realized that we HAD, in fact, made enough pizza dough, as flattening out the dough increased the surface area far beyond what Elder Anfuso was anticipating. So he threw his couscous mixture in a pan, anyways. Then Elder Bispo dos Santos went ahead and smeared Melada on it (a weird sweet mixture made from sugarcane. We didn’t have very much else to lose, so we just stuck that in the oven, too. To everyone’s surprise, it made a pretty good cake. I’m gonna miss this district. It’s pretty awesome. Our ward is doing a ward Mandiocada on Saturday. A Mandiocada, in short, is pretty much a beef-mandioc stew. If you don't know what mandioc is, neither did I before the mission. I liked it since day 1. One day a Brazilian asked me "What is Mandioca in English?" And I had to say "No idea." So I used my dad’s little green dictionary. It’s a root that is boiled, having more or less the consistency of a potato, but way tastier. So tasty, in fact, I am considering bringing it to the US, and being a mandioc farmer when I grow up. America needs mandioc. And I know it’d make big bucks. So I’m looking forward to Saturday.
We have been working more as a district in respect to activities, too. We are doing more city-wide activities instead of just ward activities. We had a Church Cinema this last Friday. We showed "Other Side of Heaven." So that worked out well.
Hey. Love you all. Pray for you. I'm doing great. Hope all is well with you.
Com Amor,
Elder Wassom

A Good Week :)‏

Dear Family and Friends,
This week has been a good week. Basically, Brasil law states that a wedding has to process 16 days before it happens (at the least). Other thing is that the bride and groom need an actualized (within 60 days) birth certificate to get the process started. Today, Marrone gets his birth certificate, and tomorrow Marrone and Diessica will go with us to the Registry (?) with the documents, and mark their marriage on the 17th of July, (and their baptism on the 18th). :) It will take a little bit, but hey, we're getting things underway.
They are just awesome. To give you an idea, Marrone and Diessica are about 20ish. They’ve been living together for about 4 years. Marrone has a tricked-out low-rider, and Diessica has a cat. Marrone is fairly talkative (but not too much) and Diessica is way quiet. In church last week, we were assigning who was going to go out on visits with us, and Marrone volunteered. We initially thought it was a great idea, so we accepted. But upon further thought, we decided that a person really needs to have the Gift of the Holy Ghost to deal with all the temptations, controversy, and rigor that Missionary Work throws at you. So we decided just to take him to a few less-active families. Give him the Missionary-Lite treatment. It went over alright.
I must tell you about Helmutt and Rosane (yes, it is pronounced just like Helmet - its German apparently) and their family. They are awesome. Helmutt is an ex-alcoholic. His brain is actually a little... cooked... because of his past. And so he has problems with attention, forgetfulness, and stuff like that. Rosane is a saint. She stuck with him through thick and thin, interned him, and nursed him back to health. Other missionaries had visited there 1 or 2 times in January, and gave them a Book of Mormon. But then they stopped going there, because the only way to get to their house is hitching a ride from the members and heading to Coronel Barros, a small town about 20 minutes outside of Ijuí. The missionaries at that time didn’t have the trust of the members, so those visits stopped. Well, now that we have a good ward with huge trust in us, we go out with a member literally every day. So we don’t mind the two-times-a-week 20 minute car ride. We started going there the week before last with the Bishop, whom they accepted warmly, especially Rosane. Rosane has, since February, read the book of Mormon cover-to-cover. She is literally so excited to be baptized, but refuses to be baptized without her husband, because "she's not a widow yet." She’s got spunk. He is also great, and we're pressing him to be baptized. I’m not sure what he's waiting on yet. We're really trying hard to get them to commit to the 11th of July. They’ve gone to church these last two weeks.
Speaking more on the amazing trust our ward has in us, the missionaries in Ijuí have started something called the "Referral Tree". I recommend this to the Ward Mission Leader of the McKinney 1st ward. Basically, it’s a wooden tree, and 3 fruits - Banana, Pear, and Apple, representing the 3 wards - Ijuí, Centro, and Jardim. Basically, it’s somewhat of a contest, whoever has more fruit on the tree (with names, phone numbers, and addresses) wins. I know that missionary work was never a contest, but this gives mare incentive for the members to give referrals. And I think it will work. It was my idea, btw. Vamos time pera (Go team pear)!
We had some surprise visitors to our District meeting on Tuesday. As my companion and I were giving the spiritual thought, we saw, entering from the back, Presidente and Sister Parrella! So it was an extra elaborate and powerful spiritual thought, lol. But we did interviews. And it was really good. Presidente gave me some advice that I should read the Conference Liahona and Jesus the Christ in addition to my daily study of the Book of Mormon, New Testament, and Preach My Gospel. Accepting this advice has caused that I wake up earlier and start my study each morning at 7:15ish instead of 8. It has been so awesome. Members and Non-members alike, (if you’ve got a decent reading level), Jesus the Christ by Elder James E. Talmage is the best biography of Jesus Christ that exists. If you don't believe me, read it.
Speaking of which, Grandma and Grandpa Wassom are the only ones to accept my challenge from last week, apparently. C'mon guys. :)
Yet again, I am short on time. But it suffices me to say that things are great, and we have investigators with potential. Ooh. And we played volleyball and ultimate this morning, and it was super fun. I love volleyball and ultimate.
And I love you guys.
Com Amor, Elder Wassom

I’m not sure if I already sent you a pic of our awesome chapel. The food is all stuff that our High Councilman gives us every Tuesday :) and the paper pear I explained in my letter. The other two are of a fun day of volleyball and ultimate.

It is Cold.

Dear Family and Friends,
It is cold. We're waking up near freezing point everyday now. 6:29 AM has just gotten harder to get out of bed.
So Marrone and Diessica are just awesome. (I learned that it is spelled as with a Di instead of a J. Makes sense because it sounds like how an American would say Jessica) Marrone asked for Diessica's hand in marriage yesterday, and she accepted. We begin the ugly legal process on Wednesday. I really don’t like working with the government. It’s bad here too. But learning that I will not be coming home to Blue Bell classic vanilla ice cream in October 2016 is unacceptably devastating, and I detest that movement. Who cares if some people got sick: they died happy.
But anyways, they are just awesome.
On Thursday, we talked about his earring and her nose ring. I was a little nervous, because I knew they really liked their respective piercings. But as I told them it wasn’t ordained by God, they, without hesitation, removed them without saying a word. We began to commence the process of promising blessings from their faith that they were showing, and he just said "Calm down, it’s just an earring." And then they fed us dinner.
I love that family so much. I can see them being leaders in the church. There’s nothing holding them back. Tithing? No problem. Word of Wisdom? Time to throw out the Coffee. Chastity? Let’s get married. They have not yet failed to complete a single commitment nor assignment. They are there waiting for us at every visit, and show up every Sunday to church.
This is what missionaries call the elect of God.
We had our June-fest on Saturday. That was pretty fun.
Blake - I’m gonna call you out on this one. I had a dream that you were firing up your résumé for a few jobs, and I noticed you were sending some résumés for some Musical Theatre companies. I looked at your résumé, and it had some serious pictures of you looking off in the distance, and said: "Blake Wassom - Meet the very man who starred as "Harvey Johnson" in MNHS' Legendary 2007 production of Bye-Bye Birdie." I woke up laughing.
Gotta Go. Love yall
Com Amor,
Elder Wassom

Challenge‏:
This morning, I finished reading the Book of Mormon Cover-to-cover in Portuguese for the first time. As I finished, I pondered quite a bit over what a fantastic book the Book of Mormon is. Reading it daily has been one of my favorite privileges I have as a missionary. I get to see myself grow closer to the Savior, and also get to use what I learned to teach the people. It’s one of the only books that has a promise that applies to everyone in every circumstance.
Therefore, I, Elder Mitchell Wassom, as a member in God's army, am taking a little bit of the battle on the home front. I make a challenge to everyone - Mormons and Non-Mormons alike, to read the Book of Mormon. Those who accept this challenge, who will be reading it for the first time, email me to let me know that you have accepted the challenge.
As a representative of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (I will really miss using that phrase when I no longer am one) I promise each of you that reading this book will bring you to know your Savior better. It will bring you to understand more of who you are and why you are here. You will come to a knowledge that it is true. It was written by ancient prophets that lived here on the American Continent. As you receive a confirmation of the truthfulness of this book, you will know that the heavens are open again, and God still speaks to his children today.
Please read it. And as you read, pray about it. Find out for yourself. That's all any missionary can ask you to do. Ask any local member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints for a copy, and they’ll get you one within a week.

“No wicked man could write such a book as this; and no good man would write it, unless it were true and he were commanded of God to do so.” Elder Jeffery R. Holland Oct 2009, quoting George Q. Cannon

Pictures: It's really Cold. We had our "festa Juinina" as a ward.

A Really Fast Week

Written: Monday, June 15th, 2015
Dear Family and Friends,
This was a really fast week. It felt like just yesterday that I was writing yall. And we had a couple of special fasts. So it was a really fast week.
We tracted into a completely drunk guy the other day. That’s always funny and scary at the same time. It happened a lot in Uruguaiana. It’s like the whole conversation with them, you are always trying to find a way to leave without being rude. I know that sounds somewhat mean, but people who are wasted are somewhat dangerous and completely useless to a missionary.
So our conversation was like this:
"Hello, Sir!"
"Heyy guyys..."
"I’m Elder Wassom, and this is my companion Elder Sena"
"Hey wait a second... Don’t you wanna... baptize me?"
"We do want to baptize you. But Baptism comes after repentance. And we know that repentance is possible through the sacrifice that Jesus did for us."
"You shouldn’t tell me that right now."
"Why not?"
"Because I’m Judas Iscariot."
"Oh really? So you’re a traitor?"
"Yep. I'm J-u-d-s JUDAS"
"Awh, man. You shouldn’t be doing that, brother. It’s against the commandments. Take care, brother."
So I was all pumped to see how the whole Marrone/Jessica thing would turn out. It also turned out anticlimactically. Seems like they didn’t understand the whole "Pray about getting married" thing. But we made it very clear on Wednesday. And we will follow up today. They’ll get married, I’m sure of it. They went to church again :)
So there’s a few families with Avocado trees. All at once, their fruit ripened, and everyone started giving us sacksful of avocados. We received probably 40 some-odd giant Brazilian avocados in two weeks. Fun Fact about Brasil - They only eat avocados sweet. Like, the idea of Guacamole, and Avocado Burgers, and so on repulses them. It is used only in desserts. So I had to make Guacamole for my companion. He liked it :) Then I made avocados Brazilian style. My favorite way to eat it sweet (until now-I’m still experimenting sweet recipes) is sticking it in the blender with a banana and orange juice. It’s Delicious! I’ve also tried Brown Sugar and cinnamon, Maracuja (it’s like some sort of passion fruit) and Sugar+Lime. It’s surprisingly good. But the avocados here are different... they’re big, green, and less creamy.
I like food.
We've been working really hard. Elder Sena continues to be a beast. We keep finding new people to teach, but they just kind of die off quickly. Not very committed. Our list of Progressing Investigators is getting a little smaller, unfortunately, but we are making plans to counteract that.
So other good news! We entered into contact again with Rose, André, and Bruna! We taught the Restoration, and challenged them all to baptism! They said that they’d read, and pray, and if they received an answer, they’d commit! Yay! We return there on Wednesday.
Today, we helped in the move of Irmão Jaír and Irmã Janaína. It was a good move. Fairly quick, and just one story homes.
I'd like to express my love to my family and friends. This week was a week where I thought a bit about home. Trunky, no. But I miss yall. I think about you and pray for you. I love you. I love the Lord, too, and that’s why I’m here. I love Ijuí, and the people in it. I love being a missionary.
Com Muito Amor,
Elder Wassom

This week’s photos:
There was a banana cobbler I made, a short tie, a lot, but definitely not all the avocados we received, and some men at the move this morning

A really good week

Amados Amigos e Familia,
This week was just awesome. I love watching people’s lives change. I’d like to first comment on Marrone and Jessica. Not sure if I wrote about them briefly, but they are friends of our Ward Mission Leader. They had expressed to him their desire to change their lives for the better, and we had begun to teach them last week. This week, we had two fantastic lessons with them. On Monday, we taught about the Restoration with them. The spirit was so strong, even Marrone was crying. On Friday, they commented that they had read the pamphlet and the passages of the Book of Mormon that we had left them, and felt that it was true. And so we committed them to prepare for baptism, and committed them to pray about getting married. They accepted. I await anxiously for Wednesday for their response. They also showed up to church yesterday, along with 5 other investigators. That’s right! 7 at church yesterday, whoop whoop! But yeah I really do think that they will accept this new challenge in their lives.
Shout out to my not-so-little-anymore sister Rachel, she's turning 15 tomorrow! Hope Louisiana serves you a good birthday. Eat some Cajun food, because it doesn’t exist in Brasil. Saudades... (I miss that...)
Today I was talking to my companion ELder Sena about the concept of stress dreams. So for those who do not know this concept, it is when you’re stressed out and that night you have a fairly realistic dream where unfortunate things happen? When I’m stressed out, I have a dream where I just show up late to things. I hate being late. Well, as the start of a mission can be stressful on a missionary, my companion told me about his stress dream. He said "man, I had a dream where we went to the cybercafé, and my parents didn’t write me anything!" Hehe, looks like he’s already becoming a missionary.
So we had our Zone meeting on Tuesday, so I took another bus over to Cruz Alta. The meeting was awesome, and I learned a lot... got me supercharged-up for the week to come. Like I said, our week was really good. We had a good number of lessons with members. That’s always awesome. Almost without fail, they are just better than lessons without. The only exception to that rule that I’ve seen was in Uruguaiana, when we taught Tiago and Jaqueline at Irmã Delmací's home. I love Irmã Delmací, but she LOVES to talk, and gets distracted way easily.
We went to Alberto's house yesterday. Alberto is the father of Sonny and Gilbeto, two men in our ward. Previously, Alberto hated the church, and especially the missionaries. Well, a few weeks ago, remember how I said we had a service project on a farm with peacocks and stuff? Yeah, that was Alberto’s farm. We decided to gain his trust through service. A couple weeks ago, I forgot to write you about the super spiritual experience that we had. We went there with the purpose of delivering a Book of Mormon. We showed up, and began to talk about families. He said "you know what? I have seen the change that your church has had on my two sons, and I’d like to thank you for it. It’s truly been a miracle." Elder Farias (as he was still there at the time) bore a powerful testimony over the changes that the Gospel has on the lives of God’s children, and how the Book of Mormon is a testimony that the Gospel is restored today. He reluctantly accepted the gift, but his curiosity grew, and shortly thereafter, he promised to read it. At the end of the meeting, Bishop Trage closed the meeting with a prayer. At the end of the prayer, Alberto raised his hands high above his head, and in a loud voice cried out to God, tears streaming down his face, thanking Him for sending the missionaries and the Bishop to his house, and for the Book of Mormon, and for the impact that it had on his children. There was not a dry eye in the group. His wife especially was bawling, as she had been an "Abish" since day one… Always knew that the church was true, but never dared tell anyone but the missionaries and her kids, lest her husband find out. We left that meeting, still in tears. As we drove back home in Bishops car, we stopped along the side of the road, and said another prayer thanking God.
Somewhat anticlimactically, Bishop got a call from Albert, saying that the print was too small to read. So bishop promptly bought an extra-large print copy, and we delivered it to him yesterday. So we're anxiously awaiting his response.
But. That was my awesome week. I am loving my new comp. He’s just too awesome. Way teachable. Makes me realize how terrible of a greenie I must’ve been... lol jk I didn’t think I was that bad. Just. Elder Sena is awesome.
And so are you guys. Love you all. Pray for yall. Happy Birthday sis.
Tchau.
Com Amor,
Elder Wassom

Nothing funner than a chicken plucking excursion with Luiz!