Wesley...he's not who you think he is...and It's ELDER LINDSEY"S BIRTHDAY!

Well I will start this letter with Wesley. Who is Wesley? He was our upstairs neighbor, and considering the fact that like all missionaries we live on the top floor, he lived in the attic, and liked to keep us awake at night! Him, his wife and his children were really annoying. Oh, they were also gambas. (or in English skunks). Yes we had a family of skunks in our attic, and we called the bombeiros to come get rid of them. So no more skunks in the ceiling.Also it gets really foggy here in Brasil, and it rains a lot so everything tends to be wet most of the time.

So this week has been pretty good. We have had a lot more lessons with members, and we have started working with two less active members.
One of the youth in the ala has been bringing a friend to church who has started taking the lessons, and has committed to baptism (October 12)
Please pray for these investagators, as they have problems or doubts keeping them from being baptized:
Claudir has stopped drinking, but still has some problems with smoking.
Ricardo has also stopped drinking, but we havent been able to contact him, except seeing through some of his friends.
Pedro e Anezia are doing well, we aren't completely sure why they don't want to be baptized, but we are working hard with them.

On Friday we went and helped a member build a house. As in-- they were building the house we were hauling 20 kg bags of concrete, about two tons of rocks, and nearly a thousand bricks up seventy stairs. (about the first 10 times I ran, but after about 30 we all walked slowly up the stairs) Yeah we were exhausted, sore, and we've slept really well since.

The Lord watches his missionaries. I know that I have seen God taking care of us, and that he takes care of you.
This next week is GENERAL CONFERENCE!!! And my BIRTHDAY!!! (if you want to send something send reeses or candy)
"if any of you lack wisdom let him ask of God"
Elder Lindsey
Moroni 8 3
I love you all.

Here are some pictures!

First, the district in the MTC

Second, his trainier

Third, his area

Crazy Week

So this week Elder Cordiero was sick, and it was really bad, so we spent the day in the hospital. By the way the hospitals here are nothing like hospitals in America! We had to wait for about an hour (and we were in one of the better hospitals, apparently its usually more like four hours).  Elder Cordiero is feeling a lot better right now, so hopefully this week will be a little better.

It rained a lot this last week. The streets turn into rivers and everything gets soaked. It's also been pretty cool (it's about 15 right now.)

We had an emergency transfer, so Elder Silvestre is now in Juiz de Fora, and we are currently waiting for our new Elder. 

We have a few good investigators, but they all need to stop smoking. Yesterday, we went to go pick up Claudir and bring him to church, but on the way to church he backed down.

 Pedro and Anezia don't often come to church, but they have been investigators for a while, and they got married, but Anezia is having problems with the word of wisdom. We haven't seen Ricardo this week, but we think it was because he was with his family (he has been separated from his wife because of his drinking and smoking, so we are hopeful)

Tomorrow we have an appointment with a friend of a member, who has gone to several activities, and has expressed interest in getting baptized.

My Português is improving and I can understand a lot more, and can usually get my point across. My accent is still awful, and I imagine that it will be for quite a while.

The other Elders in our ward had a baptism this week, which was really exciting.

The food here is really good, and the members basically force you to take two plates weather you want to or not. 

When ye are in the service of your fellow men ye are only in the service of your God

I love you all, and pray for you

Elder Lindsey

Missionary Work is Awesome

Seriously, missionary work is awesome! It's hard, and there are a lot of challenges (like sore feet).  But then there is that one moment, when your investigator sees you across the street, and calls your name, then comes and talks to you....it  is totally worth it! Also members love missionaries! Every time we pass the house of Sister Cesar and she sees us she invites us in, gives us a drink and a snack.

We have 12 new pesquisadores (investigators) this week. They are all amazing! Please pray for Claudia, and Ricardo, they both know the church is true, but they just need to stop smoking and drinking. They are by far our investigators with the most potential, and the other day they invited over two of their friends to have us teach them.
The people here are so humble, they have so little, and they love the Lord. We have taught people who live at the end of dirt roads, in houses I cannot stand up in, and some men who live under a bridge. At times when we talk to people on the street they start talking to us about their faith, and how they believe in Christ. The people here are trying to find Christ but don't know where.

The other day I was walking along a clear stream, when i noticed that it had turned brown, i looked back and saw a small trickle of filthy water had joined this much larger clear stream and had been polluted by a small bit of filth.

We walk a lot here. A lot of hills!! One of the pictures that I hope sends shows the terrain we are walking through all day.
Also pray for Vanhia and Eduardo. We set a baptismal date with them, but haven't been able to get in contact with them since.
The work is going great!  I am starting to be able to understand the majority of what people say. The members here love the missionaries, we can barely pass a members house without them stopping us and offering us a drink.
Moroni 7 (I think its verse 21 and 22 but it might not be, but it talks about faith.) Basically read everything Moroni wrote. :)
With all my love
Elder Lindsey
P.s. dont ever drop a meal appointment with the missionaries (you never know when they will be fasting)
PPS i tried to send pictures but they wouldnt load so maybe next time

First Area: Rua Coronel Viega (Petropolis) Lots of hills!!!

Well this is it. The work is hard, but the Atonement wasn’t easy, and the path to salvation isn’t easy.

The last week at the CTM was pretty normal. The last day was 10 hours of orientation that I learned very little from.

We woke up at about 2 to get to the airport and fly to Rio, and we could just barely make out Christo o Redentor from the road. We went to the mission office, had lunch, and learned everything we were supposed to learn in the orientation.

 We stayed with the APs then the next day we got assigned our areas, and got our trainers. My trainers name is Elder Cordeiro, and I am in a suburb of Petropolis (it’s in the south east of the mission and in the state of Rio, so everyone speaks Portuguese here.) My area is 5 wards that are basically a hill or two and also the valley in between them (except for indepencia which is our only somewhat level ward) The hills here are really steep, imagine the Lehi dip, but five plus times the size of that hill. Yeah huge and steep, and we walk up and down them all day.

Yeah my feet hurt.

Our first day was awful!  We are in a new area, so we don’t have investigators and we only had 1 lesson. And it was raining all day. The second day was better, we had several lessons!  In one of them the Spirit was so strong almost everyone was crying (and Brasileiros don’t show emotion that often). We got two baptismal dates, and 3 investigators. (Who live at the top of the biggest hill in our area at the end of a little tiny dirt foot path that we have to cross a stream to get to).

Saturday and Sunday nothing huge happened, except we have another investigator (who lives just a little bit from the top of São Paulo).

God blesses his missionaries. We get to see blessings daily, and there are many miracles. For example on Thursday when it was raining we would just stepped under a roof and the rain would go from a drizzle to pouring! And then as we are leaving it would return to a drizzle. 

There are so many dogs here, and every time I see one I think of Blaze, and I just want to pet it and play with it. 

The other day we were walking through the city and there were some horses just chillin’ outside of some house with some cãos (dogs) barking at it.

My companion and I are starting to be able to understand each other and we teach each other our languages. I am getting to the point where I can say just about anything I want to (even if I sound like a 3 year old). I still find a lot of people hard to understand (some are really easy and I can understand every word, but there are others that I can barely understand anything. 

I am learning a lot about teaching, and am getting pretty good at contacts and the baptismal challenge, I still struggle to speak, but the point gets across. 

The locals can’t pronounce my name, so they all say Elder Lindsh, or Elder Lindish.

I love you all.

Stay firm in the faith that our reunion may be like that of Alma and the sons of Mosiah.

I know that Jesus is the Christ. I know that we have a father in heaven who loves us and blesses us. I know that Christ atoned for our sins, and that if we have faith in him, repent, are baptized, receive the Holy Ghost and endure to the end, we can repent and be saved. I testify that Joseph Smith restored the Church of Jesus Christ, again on the earth. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is Gods church on the earth today. God loves you. He watches over you.

-Love Elder Lindsey

He arrived in his mission!

Elder Lindsey first day in Juiz De Fora mission!

Elder Holland Visits Brazil MTC

Well, I will be here at the CMT for a grand total of 7 more days. I am excited, and feel vastly unprepared (but considerably more prepared then when I got here). The food here is still good. It has been a really hot and dry winter here like the mid-seventies, and it has only rained about ten days while we have been here.
One of my instructors, Irmão de Oliveria got engaged this week so he was really happy the next time we had him. (they were reading Alma 7 and he poppped the question)
Life here in the ctm is just about the same every day--minus last Thursday. We had Elder Holland come speak, and we all got to shake his hand. He talked on obedience and our purpose as a missionary. He talked about our purpose and got to the first two words of our purpose, which are 1. "invite" or,  we ask them to come, and our duty is to bring the Spirit and they have to do the rest. "Others" 2. If we are to invite others, we already have to be there. We must be our first converts here in the mission field. He also said "unless you are a Brasilian missionary you don't rise to the summit"
Well I get to be a Brasilian missionary, and I have decided to reach the top, whatever the top might be (Elder Holland was joking about the Brasilian missionary thing).
I am really excited to get out into the field, for the field is white already to harvest, and here in the ctm I feel like the amount that I am learning each day is not as much as the day before. Thankfully this week we basically learned about being a missionary, instead of studying language (we all love gosple study a LOT more then we like language).
Life here in the CTM gets really boring (as we have at least ten hours each day stuck in a tiny little room). Oh I forgot to say, we got three new elders in our district (one is still in provo) so we now have 11 going to Juiz de Fora, and aparently we are the largest group of American Elders to all get our visas at the same time ( there were 15 who arived with me) which is really cool. Everything I hear about Juiz de Fora is good, the work is progressing, the people are nice, and that you will baptize people. It is going to be really hard, but nothing worth doing was ever easy.
The language is coming and our district is doing English fasts (no English whatsoever). It's hard to say what I want to say, but I learn so much more when I don't speak any English. Well time runs short, so see you in two.
Vocês me faultam, e penso de vocês .
I miss you all, and think of you.
With love.
Elder Lindsey,

P.S. future E-mails will probably be on Mondays (and I might not email next week)

Proselyting for the first time...and sketchy meatballs??

Proselyting was amazing!! We got to place 4 copies of "O Livro de Mormon"! The first was easy, as the guy spoke like five languages and wanted to talk to us in English. Then had two guys come up to us and ask for a copy, and the third three of them were members, and the fourth wanted a Book of Mormon. He is a man who has a strong testimony of Christ, but he has never heard of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and we talked with him about how the Book of Mormon is ment to be junto with the Bible. After that we still had about twenty minutes, so we managed to give out about 7 pass-along cards. It was a great experience, and I learned that very few people talk anywhere near as fast as my instructor Irmão Nasimento. 

Speaking of instructors, one of ours, Irmão Leal, is now going to college, so we just got a new one yesterday (Irmão Ceasar). This last week we also got to go to the federal police station to apply for residencey, and apparently another Elder and I had a problem with ours, so we go back again on Friday. The other day we had a rainstorm that dumped water like  crazy, and the power kept going out (the CTM has  a generator so it only goes out for a few seconds). We had some really sketchey meatballs this week that tasted more like mint than meat... Thanks for all the letters. I have to say I kinda miss home, but they dont give you enough time to miss home for more then a few seconds before you are off to some other activity. We didnt get devotional last night which made me really sad, because devotional is what carries me until p-day, but they changed it to tomorrow, so I'm pretty sure it is for an important speaker (rumor has it that it is Elder Holland). We are beginning to be tired of studing in the same room for 10+ hours a day so sometimes we try to study outside. We have a massive group of 16 american elders arriving in our zone today, and I think there is another district or two in other zones. The bus ride to and from the temple was a lot shorter then last time, so my legs didn't feel like falling off. 

They now occasionally serve panckes for breakfast (the best thing I have eaten here, with the exception of tortugitas (little chocolate turtles). I miss having american food, and random thing, just about every Brasilano that we talk to loves lasagna, it appears to be just about everyones favorite food. I am excited to get out of here, it gets kind of boring doing the same stuff each day. 

Other news, I am the new district leader (which basically means I pick who prays). I am kind of scared to get a haircut at the barber here. Most of the district got one this week, and they either had their head all but shaved, or had random bits of hair that weren't cut (Elder Grigg had racing stripes in his hair, and an alfalfa spike, which we trimmed) Just about all the friends we made in our first week here at the CTM have gone home (as in our district and the other american district that arrived the same day as us are still here) I am excited to get out in the field and only have 13 days left in the CTM. I am just about the only guy in my district who isn't gaining weight. I love going to the temple as missionaries, and we take up just about the whole session, and today i did the whole thing in portuguese, and understood a lot more then I thought. Well we only have like 45 min here to email home so I am running out of time, so I love you all, thank you for all the letters and prayers, signing off Elder Lindsey. I love you all. 
Bye