October 25, 2011
Tudo Bem, Familia!
You guys are in for a treat, I just sent another letter to you Yesterday. Oh, and Autumn should expect a letter as well. I'm just going to say what comes to mind in this letter, so if I have some
overlap with what's in my handwritten letters, I’m sorry. I'll try to avoid that.
What's the deal with our family and computers? It seems like we are ever-plagued by viruses and malfunctioning systems. Our family is like Job's family in the Virtual World--perhaps we should just Curse computers and die? Oh well, if we keep persevering, perhaps we'll receive more blessings than we can handle, eventually... virtually, of course.
Visas are such a weird thing. They're like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're going to get. Or like the Ice cream truck. It just kind of shows up randomly, with no warning. Pois e' (whatever).
I'm glad you enjoyed the pictures! I hope you can see a little bit of the caliber of missionaries we have here. I feel really lucky. Yesterday, I got some pictures of my teachers, too. They’re such amazing teachers. The best teachers ever, in fact. I'll probably send the pictures of them sometime next week.
So Elder Olpin got a reassignment, along with his whole district. I don't think he's going to Minneapolis-- I’m pretty sure he's headed to Milwaukee, Wisconsin? Maybe I’m wrong. He left Saturday morning though, and I didn't get a chance to say goodbye to him really. Oh well. But it was cool, I think someone from his district is going to Milwaukee also, and a few of them are going to Alabama together. I feel bad for Elder Olpin's companion, Elder Bowser. He got reassigned to Salt Lake City. He hasn't even filled out his electronic visa, and he put in his papers at the same time as me. It was sad, his whole district was gone by yesterday, so he
just followed our district around, because he wasn't allowed to be alone. Oh well, he's such a good guy, I know that he's going to do great things.
So last week, our district got four more Visas; Elders Hobbs, Reeves, Johnson, and Glenn. The situation in which they got it was really funny, because we all ended up rushing down, expecting our Visas, because the Lady on the intercom told all Curitiba missionaries to come down. We all get down there, and then Only they got their Visas, so Elder Barkdull and I were totally psyched out. It was funny. Anyway, they all left today, it was actually pretty sad. We all sang "God be with
you 'til we meet again", and then prayed together a last time, and took pictures, and saw them off on the Bus. Muito Triste (very sad).
The Real tragedy is the state of our District now. It's just Elder Trevisanut, Barkdull, Sister Patton, and me. Four person district. It gets really weird too, with the companionships, because now Trevisanut is in our companionship, because he can't be alone at all, and Sister Patton is still in our group (We found out that she's not a "companion", we're just her escorts, which honestly, to me, sounds almost as bad.) So, we are going to be a four person group walking together all the time. This doesn't really start until tomorrow, but basically all four of us are going to be together all the time. And I have no idea how they're going to arrange the teaching schedules. I hope all don't teach together. Teaching with four people would be... overkill. But, I really don't expect to be like this that long. I'm definitely going to get my Visa soon. It's going to happen. The amount of Brazilian Missionaries arriving hasn't really decreased. If anything, it's pretty much the same. More of us are getting Visas, though, so I’m thinking our numbers are decreasing. It's cool though, we don't really even notice, in our district. Most of the Portuguese speakers go to another building for classes--there’s only our district and one other in our building. So we're kind of cut off from everyone else. We're the forgotten districts. The only other district we really knew was Olpin's district, but they're gone now. Poise'. I'm getting my Visa this week, so it's not that big of a deal. So it's actually been pretty cool teaching with Sister Patton, because she lived in like Peru or something for 6 months, so she speaks Spanish really well, which transfers somewhat to Portuguese. She definitely can hold her own when we're teaching. The only problem is that sometimes, when she tries to say something really fast, she'll start saying Spanish words, so she's really speaking some sort of cacophonic farago of language. Like, Portuglish, or Spatuguese? see, even the names sound nasty. Spanguese?
On Monday, we had one of our most difficult lessons. We were teaching Rogerio (Irmao Maxwell) about the plan of salvation, and then when we got to the Spirit world, he got all sad. We asked him what it was, and he said that on Sunday, the Bishop said during class that people who are not part of this church are going to "Lugares Ruimes", which means horrible places. Rogerio interpreted this as Hell, and felt like we were teaching that all his friends and family not in the Church were going to Hell, Which is nao Bom. We then tried to console him. We shared with him a few scriptures, saying that everyone will get a chance to hear the gospel, and feel happiness. I think we shared Mosiah 3:11? I can't remember. But he still was sad. Then we testified that we
knew it was true. Still, upset. There was a long silence... Then, we just told him that we were here to help him, and that we cared about him. We said a prayer, and then left. Wow, what happened! None of us--Patton, Barkdull, or me-- had had a lesson like that. Maxwell must have been trying to get us out of our comfort zone by giving us a situation that couldn't really be resolved in one lesson. Whatever it was, us three all sat down and seriously discussed how we could help Rogerio feel comforted. After a lot of spiritual consideration, we decided the next thing to teach would be faith, and that we'd have him read either Ether 12 or Alma 32 with him. He has to understand that through faith in Jesus Christ, he can feel that happiness, and know that God loves all of his children, even the ones that haven't been able to receive the gospel yet. We prayed to know if this plan was the right way to go, and I felt the spirit pretty strong. So, hopefully our next lesson turns out well. I honestly am thankful that our lesson went so bad, because I feel like they've been ideal investigators for us this far. Now, we're a little bit more on our toes, and we have to really PRAY about our investigators.
Our next lesson with Kaka (irmao Simons) went pretty well, he had some difficulties with his family, but we were able to comfort him. That was a really spiritual lesson for me, but I don't feel like I can really describe why in writing. It was just really cool, and I’m thankful for Elder Barkdull and Sister Patton, and their testimonies.
I'm glad you enjoyed the pictures! I hope you can see a little bit of the caliber of missionaries we have here. I feel really lucky. Yesterday, I got some pictures of my teachers, too. They’re such amazing teachers. The best teachers ever, in fact. I'll probably send the pictures of them sometime next week.
So Elder Olpin got a reassignment, along with his whole district. I don't think he's going to Minneapolis-- I’m pretty sure he's headed to Milwaukee, Wisconsin? Maybe I’m wrong. He left Saturday morning though, and I didn't get a chance to say goodbye to him really. Oh well. But it was cool, I think someone from his district is going to Milwaukee also, and a few of them are going to Alabama together. I feel bad for Elder Olpin's companion, Elder Bowser. He got reassigned to Salt Lake City. He hasn't even filled out his electronic visa, and he put in his papers at the same time as me. It was sad, his whole district was gone by yesterday, so he
just followed our district around, because he wasn't allowed to be alone. Oh well, he's such a good guy, I know that he's going to do great things.
So last week, our district got four more Visas; Elders Hobbs, Reeves, Johnson, and Glenn. The situation in which they got it was really funny, because we all ended up rushing down, expecting our Visas, because the Lady on the intercom told all Curitiba missionaries to come down. We all get down there, and then Only they got their Visas, so Elder Barkdull and I were totally psyched out. It was funny. Anyway, they all left today, it was actually pretty sad. We all sang "God be with
you 'til we meet again", and then prayed together a last time, and took pictures, and saw them off on the Bus. Muito Triste (very sad).
The Real tragedy is the state of our District now. It's just Elder Trevisanut, Barkdull, Sister Patton, and me. Four person district. It gets really weird too, with the companionships, because now Trevisanut is in our companionship, because he can't be alone at all, and Sister Patton is still in our group (We found out that she's not a "companion", we're just her escorts, which honestly, to me, sounds almost as bad.) So, we are going to be a four person group walking together all the time. This doesn't really start until tomorrow, but basically all four of us are going to be together all the time. And I have no idea how they're going to arrange the teaching schedules. I hope all don't teach together. Teaching with four people would be... overkill. But, I really don't expect to be like this that long. I'm definitely going to get my Visa soon. It's going to happen. The amount of Brazilian Missionaries arriving hasn't really decreased. If anything, it's pretty much the same. More of us are getting Visas, though, so I’m thinking our numbers are decreasing. It's cool though, we don't really even notice, in our district. Most of the Portuguese speakers go to another building for classes--there’s only our district and one other in our building. So we're kind of cut off from everyone else. We're the forgotten districts. The only other district we really knew was Olpin's district, but they're gone now. Poise'. I'm getting my Visa this week, so it's not that big of a deal. So it's actually been pretty cool teaching with Sister Patton, because she lived in like Peru or something for 6 months, so she speaks Spanish really well, which transfers somewhat to Portuguese. She definitely can hold her own when we're teaching. The only problem is that sometimes, when she tries to say something really fast, she'll start saying Spanish words, so she's really speaking some sort of cacophonic farago of language. Like, Portuglish, or Spatuguese? see, even the names sound nasty. Spanguese?
On Monday, we had one of our most difficult lessons. We were teaching Rogerio (Irmao Maxwell) about the plan of salvation, and then when we got to the Spirit world, he got all sad. We asked him what it was, and he said that on Sunday, the Bishop said during class that people who are not part of this church are going to "Lugares Ruimes", which means horrible places. Rogerio interpreted this as Hell, and felt like we were teaching that all his friends and family not in the Church were going to Hell, Which is nao Bom. We then tried to console him. We shared with him a few scriptures, saying that everyone will get a chance to hear the gospel, and feel happiness. I think we shared Mosiah 3:11? I can't remember. But he still was sad. Then we testified that we
knew it was true. Still, upset. There was a long silence... Then, we just told him that we were here to help him, and that we cared about him. We said a prayer, and then left. Wow, what happened! None of us--Patton, Barkdull, or me-- had had a lesson like that. Maxwell must have been trying to get us out of our comfort zone by giving us a situation that couldn't really be resolved in one lesson. Whatever it was, us three all sat down and seriously discussed how we could help Rogerio feel comforted. After a lot of spiritual consideration, we decided the next thing to teach would be faith, and that we'd have him read either Ether 12 or Alma 32 with him. He has to understand that through faith in Jesus Christ, he can feel that happiness, and know that God loves all of his children, even the ones that haven't been able to receive the gospel yet. We prayed to know if this plan was the right way to go, and I felt the spirit pretty strong. So, hopefully our next lesson turns out well. I honestly am thankful that our lesson went so bad, because I feel like they've been ideal investigators for us this far. Now, we're a little bit more on our toes, and we have to really PRAY about our investigators.
Our next lesson with Kaka (irmao Simons) went pretty well, he had some difficulties with his family, but we were able to comfort him. That was a really spiritual lesson for me, but I don't feel like I can really describe why in writing. It was just really cool, and I’m thankful for Elder Barkdull and Sister Patton, and their testimonies.
Oh, so real quick, Elder Trevisanut is our District leader now (yes, he has a lot of power over this four person district). And Elder Barkdull and I are Sacrament Coordinators here, which means we assign people to pass and bless the sacrament each Sunday. It's not really that big of a deal. If I get some overwhelming spiritual experience from this calling, I’ll be sure to inform you
straight away.
Also, I do indeed get to go to the Temple every Tuesday. I absolutely love it. It's like receiving Much needed direction every week. It's always such a spiritual experience. But, unfortunately, I couldn't go today, because we were seeing half our district off. Dang Visas. That's cool about the dancers! It's always fun to just tour around and such. I'm still not really sure what that whole thing is about, but it sounds like it was a fun time, and you guys enjoyed it! I will say this though: my dancing days are over :P
straight away.
Also, I do indeed get to go to the Temple every Tuesday. I absolutely love it. It's like receiving Much needed direction every week. It's always such a spiritual experience. But, unfortunately, I couldn't go today, because we were seeing half our district off. Dang Visas. That's cool about the dancers! It's always fun to just tour around and such. I'm still not really sure what that whole thing is about, but it sounds like it was a fun time, and you guys enjoyed it! I will say this though: my dancing days are over :P
You know what's even cooler than the Dancers? READING THE BOOK OF MORMON! That
so cool that you have the goal to read the BOM! I encourage you to read it quicker than in a year, but it's up to you. It's really not about speed. It was the weirdest thing, I always thought it was impossible to spend more than an hour on a chapter, but the other day, I spent two hours just figuring out all of the implications of just this one chapter (I think it was Alma 26? I can't remember right now). It’s been bad though, the past couple of days I haven't been reading as much as I want, and I can so tell the difference. I need to work on that, and focus more during study time.
I hope you guys know that you're in all of my prayers! I've been praying about Autumns tooth, and that Amber will do well with all the changes going on right now!
Keep updating my blog! It makes me feel really happy that the experiences I’m feeling here are expanding past just myself. Maybe they can help others during hard times. That's my hope, at least. They're really not at of me though. They're all of the Lord, and I’m glad that there's a chance that they can help others.
Keep looking up, being positive, and remembering the Lord. Happiness comes from a humble and obedient attitude to the Lord, from personal revelation through the Scriptures, and revelation received through Church.
Good luck, you're in my Prayers, May the Lord be With You.
Love,
Elder Avram Tyler Twitchell
so cool that you have the goal to read the BOM! I encourage you to read it quicker than in a year, but it's up to you. It's really not about speed. It was the weirdest thing, I always thought it was impossible to spend more than an hour on a chapter, but the other day, I spent two hours just figuring out all of the implications of just this one chapter (I think it was Alma 26? I can't remember right now). It’s been bad though, the past couple of days I haven't been reading as much as I want, and I can so tell the difference. I need to work on that, and focus more during study time.
I hope you guys know that you're in all of my prayers! I've been praying about Autumns tooth, and that Amber will do well with all the changes going on right now!
Keep updating my blog! It makes me feel really happy that the experiences I’m feeling here are expanding past just myself. Maybe they can help others during hard times. That's my hope, at least. They're really not at of me though. They're all of the Lord, and I’m glad that there's a chance that they can help others.
Keep looking up, being positive, and remembering the Lord. Happiness comes from a humble and obedient attitude to the Lord, from personal revelation through the Scriptures, and revelation received through Church.
Good luck, you're in my Prayers, May the Lord be With You.
Love,
Elder Avram Tyler Twitchell
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