Brazil week 5

What up,

This week has been pretty long and packed. Things are going slow with our investigators. Fabio doesn’t want to quit it with the ladies or smoking so he is out. All the others one way or another backed out on us so we started fresh this week. Again. It is all cool though.

Sorry no pictures again this week...sorry

So some interesting things about Brazil- Apparently the fanny pack has come back in to style? Not just in general, but like the ´´gangsters´´... it’s hilarious haha Seeing some Brazilian gangster walk down the street, and then reach into his fanny pack to pull out his cell phone- sometimes I just have to chuckle to myself! And then we have the Christmas season here in Brazil- only a very few people have put up Christmas lights, and some of them have these little ´´gremlin Santa’s´´ as I like to call them. Little Santa’s that they place in random places that are climbing up the walls of their houses or their balconies It’s really funny, I’ll have to get a picture of it here soon haha.

Ok, so I realized something this week about faith. Amidst all of our trying in this life to have faith, I was asking myself one day why I didn’t feel in that moments the feelings of confirmation that I’ve had before about my testimony of the gospel. Then it hit me (about 2 days later haha- Faith isn’t those feelings or confirmations that we get that tell us the church is true or that the Book of Mormon is true. Faith is our ability or willingness to believe when we can’t see the end result and to act on that belief. Those feelings and knowledge that come are confirmations after the trial of our faith! Ether 12:6 As we choose to act and believe when we aren’t quite sure of the result or don’t have that burning feeling of confirmation, only after we have that faith can we receive the confirmation. Those confirmations then help us to strengthen our ability to believe and ability to have faith. It’s so simple, yet in many instances is so hard- I’m still learning to do it, I really feel how weak my faith is! I have a testimony of this gospel, but sometimes when doubts or worries come, I worry ´´Where’d my testimony go?? Where’d my faith go?´´ It didn’t go anywhere, in that moment is when you demonstrate your faith to believe when you don’t know the result! Anyway, just wanted to share that, and man, I really need to work on it!

Anyway, I got to go do groceries for the week, but I know this church is true, and that it truly is guided by revelation through a living prophet today, President Thomas S Monson. God is really our Loving Heavenly Father, and He wants us to have happiness not just in this life but for eternity with our families!

Till next week

Love,

Elder Merrick Reynolds

We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to become

                                   - Elder Richard G. Scott