March 18th letter

HELLO!

Wow, I completely forgot about Saint Patrick's Day. That means I am losing myself in the work! Actually this week was kind of a downer. I mean, we had another baptism! YEAH! But we didn't work hard as hard as we could with finding more people to teach. Right now we have no one with a baptismal date. To be successful you have to be always finding and teaching at the same time so that your teaching pool never gets small. We focused a lot in getting Léia ready for the baptism and neglected to find more people to teach. So this week we'll be bater muitas portas [knocking many doors]!

So Léia is Diógenes' sister. Last Sunday when Diógenes was baptised, it was the first time she went to church. Before then, she had received a response, a very clear response, that the Livro de Mórmon [Book of Mormon] is true and that we were true servants of God and that this was the path she was looking for. She was wanting to be baptized, but was still a little uneasy about it and had some doubts still. We talked with her on Tuesday and she was still unsure, she presented us with her doubts. This has happened a few times on my mission already...someone receives a response from God about everything, but they are unsure or unwilling to follow the response. I can be frustrating. Usually as a missionary when this happens I try to use the scriptures and show them that God expects them to follow the response he has given and to be baptized. But this Tuesday, it didn't work out that way. I don't know why. I ended up inviting her to read and pray everyday during the week to get an assurance from God. I usually don't like to do this because I see it as testing God. I don't know if I was inspired by the Spirit to say it, or I just didn't feel like reemphasizing about following the response she'd already received, but I instead decided to convey something else.

Baptismo de Léia

We came back on Wednesday, and when we sat down she said "I made a decision! I'm going to be baptized!" She had reserved the whole day to meditate about the subject, and she received another response from God that she should be baptized! That was a super faith builder for me. Want to know something interesting? The first response she received about the validity of the Church was from the Book of Mormon, but the second about the baptism was from the Bible! I still need to ask her how exactly she got the response. I want to know if she read something that could potentially help touch other people who have the same hesitation. But anyway, she and Diógenes are both super happy and seeing a lot of blessings come in their lives.

I got to thinking a lot about them. They were both really prepared. I think if any pair of missionaries were here in my place, they would still be baptized. I don't think it had anything, or very little, to do with my or Elder Alencar's ability. I just feel so blessed that God let me be here and be a part of their lives. It's a true tender mercy that God gave me.

So, this week is area transfers (this last transfer and the next are only 5 weeks long). Elder Alencar was transferred and will be a trainer already! Makes me think that I should have tried harder to teach him some techniques, but he's already a good missionary. He was freaking out a little yesterday when they announced the transfers. As for me, I will also train a greenie [a newbie to the mission]! Yaaaay! I've been imagining about this for quite some time. I'm excited! And also pretty nervous! A good part of this new missionary's success will depend on me. I'm hoping he'll be an American, but seeing as there are 3 americanos and about 12 brasileiros, I don't think that will happen. But we'll see. Whatever happens will have a reason. I'm going to give an extra effort to keep the rules and be a good example to him. Man I'm excited! Please pray for me that I can know what to do to help my little filhinho.

Obrigado por tudo!!! Continue orando por mim! Eu amo todos vocês! [Thanks for everything!! Keep praying for me! I love you all!]
Elder Bradford

---

Missionaries serving in the Itatiba zone!

March 11th letter

BUN DINHA!!

We had a pretty big miracle here in Vinhedo. David, a member, brought his neighbor Diógenes (gee-AH-gen-ees) to visit church last Sunday. He loved it and we scheduled to visit him at his house the next evening. There we taught him and two of his sisters about the Restauração [gospel restoration], and they accepted to read the Livro de Mórmon [Book of Mormon] and pray. We passed by Wednesday and everyone had already read the part in 3 Nephi 11. Diógenes had read it twice, I think, and received a response. He was super excited and open to everything. I remember when we got to talking about baptism, we explained about it and I looked at him and said "Diógenes, I know you are prepared to be baptized this Sunday" and he gave a big grin while I heard his sisters gasping in astonishment. I invited him to be baptized the coming Sunday and he said 'Com certeza' [For sure]. He explained to us that he had received the impression from God that we were going to invite him to be baptized that night.

Baptism of Diógenes (on the left, he usually has a smile on),
and on the right is David who baptized him.

We passed by the next day and explained the commandments, all of which he already knew. Then the interview on Saturday and baptism on Sunday! I have never seen anyone so prepared for baptism. He was already searching for a church, and wanting to start a new life and be baptized BEFORE we met him. Usually, the people we teach that are ready don't have this desire until after sharing one or two lessons. This is one reason that referrals and member missionary work are so important. The work becomes so much more productive when not just the full-time missionaries but also the members are looking for people who need the gospel, because the finding part is the most difficult. Think of the ratio between missionaries and members in a ward. If every member spent a little time doing this, finding God's elect would be a snap.

So to answer your questions, I've passed and blessed the sacrament a few times on the mission. Two weeks ago I passed the sacrament because we have a group (practically a branch) growing in the Capela area and there aren't very many young men.

Also about your comment Mom, at times it is very humbling to see the Spirit work through us to touch people. When I see this I think "Holy cow, this is the real deal. These are real lives being affected here." Sometimes I take things lightly and forget that our work is of saving souls. We hold a lot more power and authority than we understand. One thing I'm trying to do when I talk with anyone is imagine what Christ would do and imagine what he would do to help this person receive salvation. It would be awesome if I could figure out exactly what every single person we meet needs. But the problem is, it's hard! You have to have the Spirit with you and have to be completely concentrated on the person and not on when and where is our next appointment, and man I'm thirsty, and I wonder what I should do next preparation day, and man I'm hungry, and wow that song I heard yesterday was pretty cool (things that pass through my head if you didn't know). I'm learning a lot here in Brasil and I hope to learn more how to control my thoughts and focus on the needs of the people I'm teaching.

Family Home Evening activity with recently baptized family

Regarding the picture I included, we had a Noite Familiar [Family Night] at the home of a recent convert family. We gave a message about helping others, and as the object lesson we taped a broom behind the shoulders of two volunteers and we asked them to eat ice cream by themselves, which gives no option other than just diving in. But then we allowed them to help each other and they figured out that one of them could grab the spoon and feed the other and it's a lot more efficient. They thought it was cool so it must have been a success!

That's all for today! Com todo o amor do mundo [With all the love in the world],
Elder Bradford

March 4th letter

Bom dia família! [Good morning family!]

So, yesterday I heard that in a national report done recently, Vinhedo won the title of best city in Brasil to live in. Então pode ficar tranquilo, estou vivendo bem! [So you can rest assured, I'm living well!]

So this week was normal. Good day, bad days, lessons that went well, lessons that didn't. Let's see (looking through planner). Bento was confirmed, we talked with a Jehovah Witness pastor, and we committed four people to be baptized.

The first is a girl who lives behind the house of some members (In Brasil it's common to have a house behind a house) with whom we had the lesson. She gets home really late from work, in fact the night we had marked with her she got home almost 9pm. So I was like, we'll just share a brief message about the Book of Mormon. I started talking about prophets and then it just kind of slid into the 1st lesson, and before we knew it we were talking about the Restoration. It was a very spiritual lesson and I think the first time I heard on my mission 'Eu quero' [I want to] in response to the convite batismal [baptismal invitation]. The second was a lady we had met a good time ago but never got around to passing by her house. One night our appointments fell through so we decided to pass by her house. We gave another spiritual lesson and she accepted baptism.

Then yesterday, these two ladies went to church and liked it a lot! We had other appointments fall through so we had nothing to do, and we were walking down this road and I asked Elder Alencar how long it'd been since he had knocked doors on this road. So that you guys understand, Vinhedo is pretty much divided in three - the Nova Vinhedo ward which is to the East, the Vinhedo ward which is in the middle, and then a little ways off to the West is a place (almost another city) called the Capela, which is a little confusing because we also call the church chapel the capela. The members in Capela belong to the Vinhedo ward but they meet together in a rented building in Capela because it would be too far away for everyone to meet at the church building in the center of the city. Every other day we work in the Capela, and the other days we work in the middle of the city. The missionaries before me focused more on the middle of the city, so when I got here almost every single road had been knocked through. These last few weeks we've managed to knock through the rest of the streets, so Elder Alencar has literally tracted on every single road in our area except for the Capela. So now when we work in the center of the city its a matter of, which road have you tracted least recently, Elder Alencar?

So anyways we were on this road that is pretty much a block away from the church and I asked Elder Alencar, hasn't it been a while since you tracted here? He was like, forget it, I've talked with everyone on this road, no one is interested. I said you couldn't have talked to everyone, so I stopped and clapped [Brazilian way of knocking] at a house. No one answered, I went a little further until I heard someone behind a house, I clapped there, a lady came out and we talked with her. She was very friendly and we marked an appointment with her. So I think Elder Alencar got the idea and he clapped at the next house, out came a lady who had never talked with the missionaries. We shared with her and her husband the Restoration and they agreed to be baptized. Her husband told us that he was really needing to hear our message and is searching for a church, as he knows the church he goes to is corrupt. So that was pretty cool to see that God is preparing all sorts of people to hear the good news!

I'm glad to hear that I inspire you mom. That makes me feel important and that I'm doing a good job! Really though, you guys are an inspiration to me. All we have to worry about here on the mission is studying, paperwork and missionary work. There on your side there's less enjoyable work, school, bills, taking care of the house and cars, and church responsibilities on top of that, and you still manage to study the scriptures and have that spiritual power with you through the day even though life demands that you don't focus on spiritual things 24/7. That's tough.

Well, that's it for now.
Elder Bradford

---

Our mission district (yes, those are the Reeses Pieces you sent - they disappeared fast!)

Almoço hoje, bom demais! [Lunch today, too good!]

February 25th letter

Oi Família!

So we heard about the new Brazil Piracicaba mission yesterday as one of the 58 newly-announced church missions. Also, that's pretty awesome they're opening a mission in our little city of Vancouver! Here, they will divide Campinas and Riberão Preto missions to make the new mission.. They've explained which zones will go to the new mission and it looks like all of the areas that I've passed through, except for Vinhedo, are going to the new mission! We haven't heard anything about who's going where yet. I think the change will happen in June or July. I was thinking it's possible to have us three [AJ, Sam McKague, and Tanner Nelson from our ward] in the same mission. Or it could end up being Sam in Riberão Preto, one of us in Piracicaba, and the other in Campinas! But we'll see what happens. It's all in God's hands.

Vinhedo ['Vineyard' in English] supposedly has (or used to have) a lot of vineyards. Every year there's a Festival da Uva, which ended about a week ago. It's like their version of the County Fair, with little rides, those booths with games, and food, performances, that kind of stuff. We didn't go but last week we passed by and saw it.

So living in four has indeed its pros and cons. It's good because you can talk freely with the other missionaries and get their input on difficulties in your area, or how to improve your teaching. We also chat a lot and laugh about things so it helps with the stress. The not so good part can be explained by looking at the kitchen. It seems like sometimes I'm the only one who washes dishes or cleans. But it's not a big deal because most of the time we all do our part to clean the house. Also sometimes we get to talking or goofing around and we lose track of time.

I think when I said that I don't feel like I'm giving 100% it's because I don't follow the schedule PERFECTLY. Like, we're supposed to do 30 minutes of exercises every morning. It's been very few times on the mission that I've been able to do that (not because 30 minutes is too much - it's because I wake up, pray, go to the bathroom, maybe sit there on the bed for a few minutes, and it's already 6:50 and there isn't time to exercise for 30 minutes and still be showered dressed and have eaten breakfast and be ready by 8:00. Well, looking at it now maybe if I got myself ready more in a hurry in the morning it'd work out. :) Also after studies we kind of take a while to get out the door. And lunch is supposed to be only an hour long (achieved this very few times also). And sometimes our lessons take 2 hours. Just things like that. I would feel better if I was baptizing more, but this has nothing to do with giving 100%. Except that we were promised by Presidente Perrotti that if we give our all, we will baptize every week. I really liked what you said mom, that all that God asks from me is that I ask him what I can do better and he will show me, little by little I'll improve. And that is the 100% that I want to reach.

So the package came without problem, I didn't have to pay any fees. Also looks like no one tampered with it. My Brasileiros here like the peanut butter, but they get all grossed out when I start putting it in/on other things like pancakes and apples and bananas and milk shakes.

Regarding the pictures, I included two of our 'cake' that we tried to make for Bento's baptism. The cake baked well, the frosting turned out well also, but Elder Alencar wanted to make a two-layer cake, so I was like sounds good. So, we put one chunk on top of the other and it kind of fell apart, so we ended up putting it back in the original pan and tried to cover up the patches with the frosting that was left which we mixed with milk.

As you can see, It didn't turn out looking very good. I was like, let's just bring it and show the members we tried, and they'll be like, oh just call us next time and we'll make a cake. But the other Elders expressed concern we could begin an apostasy here in Vinhedo by bringing that thing to the baptism. So, we ended up just eating it at home.

Baptism of Bento

The other picture is the baptism of Bento! He was smoking 4-5 cigarros a day, we did a fast so that he could stop smoking in preparation for his baptism on Sunday. We talked to him on Thursday and he hadn't touched a cigarro in the 2 days in which we fasted. So there was really a great change that happened in him this last week.

Ok, é só isso para esta semana. Que essa semana seja cheia de experiências e oportunidades de melhorar e crescer no evangelho! [that's it for this week. Let this coming week be filled with experiences and opportunities to improve and grow in the gospel]

Elder Bradford!

---

I took some pics of the area. The first one has a house on fire or something...

First Week in Vinhedo

Alô!!

Thank you so much for the package! Man, I've missed peanut butter so much! I'm really excited to try the awesome brownies you sent me. Right now I'm boarding with 3 Brasileiros missionaries, and there gonna love the brownies. I'm also gonna try to trade the T-shirts you included.

Vinhedo, São Paulo

So I've been assigned to serve in the town of Vinhedo in the Vinhedo ward [Portuguese for vineyard], which is considered the rich area in the mission. Well, actually it was the rich area until the Novo Vinhedo area was recently opened. Also Elder Mazzagardi from the church Area Presidency lives here. He lives in the Novo Vinhedo ward. The other Elders went to have lunch with his son's family today (his son is the bishop). This last Sunday he came to church and we shook his hand and everything. He doesn't attend the ward here often because of travel.

Me and Elder Alencar

My companion is Elder Alencar, from Petrolina, Pernambuco in Brazil. Meu primeiro companheiro brasileiro! [My first Brazilian companion!] I'm already learning a lot more Portuguese and getting a better accent (or, losing my accent I should say). He's been just 3 months in the mission field.

So our pesquisadores! [the people we're teaching]. There's Bento, who is awesome. He understands the lessons pretty well and asks a lot of questions. He's excited to be baptized but has to stop smoking first. He used to smoke 10 cigarettes per day but this last week he got down to 2-3 per day, but now he's going back up to 4-5 per day. So today after P-day we're going to really give him a lot of encouragement (what will be that encouragement, I don't know because we've been working with him for some time now). We also have two families that are really progressing right now. One is Eurico and Simone, who have already been taught everything, already love the church, already received a testimony but they have to get married. That's the only thing preventing them from getting baptized. But were going to pass by their place tonight as well and see if they've received the documents they asked for so we can go to the cartório [registry or notary] and mark their wedding!! They are a super cool couple and have a daughter who is 12 years old who reminds me of Ellie.

The other family is Rafael and Fabiana. They are a little more hesitant to get married. Unfortunately, Rafael works Sundays so that makes things a little difficult. Please include these children of God in your prayers so that they can feel the Spirit prompting them to make the right choices.

So, I'm still learning my way around being the senior companion. I'm trying really hard to reach 100%...meaning, giving 100% effort for a whole day. I was reading the email from Elder (Addison) Reeves that you sent me, and he said that in that week he gave 100%. Not 99%, but 100%. And even though not everyone went to church, not everything went perfectly, he still felt good, he felt like he did his part. I'm jealous. I want to feel that way. I want to give 100%! It seems like I'm giving a good 85% or 90% and if I try to go further there comes the obstacles: stress, companion telling me to relax, mis-communication, my perfectionism, etc. Even though I don't feel like I'm giving 100%, I can see the development that I'm passing through. I was thinking one day as we were walking to lunch, that really the Atonement can be applied instantly in my life. It can be applied every second. Or it can be applied only every Sunday when I go to take to sacrament. When I apply the atonement I don't have to worry or be preoccupied about my past mistakes or what I was like in the past, I just decide what I need to do and from that moment try my best to do it. If I made a mistake in a lesson, I don't have to be thinking about it the whole rest of the day, instead I can repent, correct the problem, and move forward, seeking to do better next time. I decide whether I want to carry that burden of guilt with me the rest of the day, or whether I want to lay it at the feet of Christ and keep going. I turn myself into a new person every time apply the Atonement. People talk about some great experience that changed their life and we think that it's only those kind of things that can change our life. But in reality we can change our life every day, every second, just by refusing to stay stuck in our previous habits or mistakes. Our life doesn't change until we change it. And it will change as fast as we change it. Those were some of my thoughts that I thought about this last week, and actually this last month. I hope you can make some sense of them :).

Okay, só isso mesmo para esta semana. Eu amo vocês! Tenham uma ótima semana! [that's it for this week. I love you! Have a great week!]

Elder Breu Forte

---

The view from our front door.

Some pics of Jundiaí, while we were passing through there for a zone meeting [note the Burger King near the bottom]

 I think this was from Carnival (last week).