Tuesday, March 21, 2017

The British are Coming and Bible Bashes

Olá!!

This week... whoo hooo. It was one of those lovely weeks on your mission when absolutely everything goes wrong but you have some of the most amazing miracles! We ended up laughing all of Sunday night looking back at our adventure of a week.

On Monday we had a great relaxing Pday and then our 3 appointments that night fell through and we walked... and walked... and walked... Much like Pioneer children! But that's okay because I got to show Sister Foster the very pretty beaches and contact all the elderly British tourists that are flooding our area. We also found out that we can't speak English very well anymore and that the gift of tongues to teach doesn't work very well in English! 

On Tuesday we found this crazy guy who was one of the revolutionists that changed the Portuguese government. Unfortunately I can't tell you his name because apparently he's been banned from the US and lots of other things. We had a very interesting conversation with him about how Mormon missionaries are not CIA spies! He's a good buddy of ours now! We also taught this Brazilian man named Reginaldo about the plan of salvation. He had a whole bunch of theories about where we came from, why we are here, and where we are going and I just whipped out my little picture things of the plan of salvation and blew his mind. 

On Wednesday we found half off Ben and Jerry's ice cream. 'Nuff said.





Those little tubs are normally like 7 euro. That little tub of peanut butter ice cream was probably my favorite tender mercy this week!

On Thursday it rained. I don't like rain.

On Friday we saved a bunny!! This little girl lost her bunny and it was running around in the road and hiding under the cars. We were walking past and I saw five or six people chasing this little white rabbit trying to catch it for like 10 minutes and I told Sister Foster... Hey service is service right? So we tightened our shoulder bags, put our hair in ponytails and chased that rabbit. I caught it in less than 5 minutes! #bunnywhisperer.

On Saturday we were trying to find some of our investigators and we ended up crashing a Jehovah's Witness party. Our Mission President always tells us not to Bible bash with them... So we listened quietly as they pulled out these useless and poorly used scriptures to try and get us angry. We just smiled and waited until they ran out of steam, thanked them for their time, and we left them with a card that invited all 40 of them to go to church with us. It was definitely a huge test of willpower XD

On Sunday we found this young guy, probably like 25, who said he was atheist but accepted a lesson with us. We had a really amazing moment with him as he said his first prayer. In a timid but yearning voice, he said, "God. Um..." (Long pause) "...Thank you for my family whom I love very much.." (Another long pause) '... and I would like to know if you exist and if you love me..." As soon as he said those words the whole room just filled with the Holy Ghost. It was the ultimate warm and fuzzy!  I peeked at him and I could see that he was concentrating really hard and then he had a twinge of a smile and finished the prayer. We asked him what he felt and he said "I feel good.... Does that mean that God exists?" We smiled and said yes. Oh man... Moments like those make everything worth it! It's like doing a high five of success with the Holy Ghost!

Anyway. Life of a Missionary is an adventure. It's my favorite adventure ever. 

Love all of you!

Sister Ellsworth

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