How many days until Christmas?

Wow it was sure great to talk to the family yesterday, from their responses it seemed as though they understood my broken English. I bet it will be even less possible to communicate when Christmas comes around. I'm at the same point with a few of the other American missionaries where we still don't feel completely fluent in Portuguese and we never quite trade completely into English so it's just a mixed bowl of confusion in our heads.

House we meet in for Church on Sunday

Anyways the rest of the week was pretty great too. (I think I say that every week) My life is currently super stressful but super rewarding. We've been visiting a lot of Former Investigators lately. This week we went to one house and the Sister of the person we were looking for answered and said he would be home the next day. When we went back his mom tried to say that he had left and we explained a little bit more to her our purpose as missionaries. When we said "We'll be back another day" she asked "Where are you going now" and we explained we'd try someone else and she said "just a second" and went into the house. When she came back she explained that her son actually was home but she didn't want to wake him up. He came to the door and was super excited to see us and asked if we could teach him in the Chapel since his Mom wasn't interested and we went there, had a good lesson and after he brought us to his friends house and we taught his friend too. They said they quit going to church because the missionaries they knew left and that they marked a baptismal date but weren't baptized because the missionaries left. It was pretty sweet to see the big change from walking away from a door because of a lame excuse to meeting these guys that seem to have a lot of interest.

We found out yesterday that are ward has to stay above an attendence of 80 people every sunday for the construction of the new chapel to continue. We're working hard to keep building Zion while the workers get the chapel ready for us to fill. 

Love you Guys,

Elder Della-Piana

Só Milagres

Well the work here in São Bento continues with Miracles.

This week we've started teaching pretty regularly the sister of a Recent Convert in our ward. It has been so sweet that we've gotten to teach her. She explained to us that before she met us she was afraid of "the Mormons." She thought the missionaries went around the street and when someone was going to die we would visit them to bring them to heaven. Then she had a rough experience and was praying for someone to come and help her and the next day we showed up at her door. Wow. It's so cool how the Lord works miracles. 

We had a sweet Family Home Evening last night with her family in the house of a member. The spiritual thought was about bringing our families with us to heaven and you could see it working in her eyes that she wants that. Afterwards the game was that everyone wrote on a peice of paper their name on one side and instructions on the other side for someone else in the room to do something (sing a song, do pushups, imitate an animal, etc.) The trick was that when we read the papers the person that wrote the thing to do had to do that thing. I had written for one of the kids of the family that was visiting to eat all the dessert but then they didn't let me eat it all... (I already knew the game)

Anyways there are great times out here. I am learning a ton. This week I studied in Preach My Gospel about how we will be accountable to the Lord for all we do for good or bad. I sure want to be acountable for having done my part in the work of the Lord.

Love you All!!

~Elder DP

São Bento can't get rid of me

Well transfer news is in and (drumroll please) I'M STAYING IN SÃO BENTO! Elder Soares was ticked that he's headed out. This will be his last transfer and he wanted to finish the mission here. Anyways, I'm stoked. We gained the trust of the members the last transfer and now we're seeing miracles start to unfold here. 

First of all my new companion Elder Palhares showed up. He has already served with basically my entire MTC group which is kind of funny. He's from Minais (don't think I spelled that right) and is even taller than me! I always get the midgets or giants as companions, never in between. He's pretty cool. He's obsessed with titantic and I think he cried when he heard I haven't seen it. (Hope I didn't make any enemies back home divulging that information) Case in point, he's excited to work and so am I so I bet it will be a good transfer. 

We had a sweet baptism this week!! Iraci is the mom of a girl we baptized last transfer. Her story of how she chose to be baptized is kind of cool. At first she was very wishy-washy about baptism and said "I'm very instantanious with my choices, I'll let you guys know when I want to be baptized." Then about 2 weeks ago as we were leaving she heard us mention another person that would be baptized and said "I'll be baptized with them" without us even having to invite her. It's funny because the other person wasn't baptized but she was.

Other cool miracles 

 - we had a ton of investigators at church and the ward was super excited about it, even better because it was families that came

 - the new chapel is being built right now and they are working NONSTOP! It's sweet, I'll shoot off a picture.

Anyways, just miracles here, I love this area 

Love you guys, Stay safe

~Elder Della-Piana

(Photos - Baptism with Elder Palhares and the part of Iraci's family that was able to come to the baptism;

Other foto of the beginning of the construction of our new chapel here, should be done by December or so I've heard)

Final da Transferência

Well, yet another transfer is coming to a close here in good old Brazil.

It was a good transfer here with Elder Soares. A challenge we had at the start of the transfer was that we didn't have the trust of the members in our ward and we gained that confidence back this transfer. Sunday we had the chance to give talks during Sacrament Meeting and I really wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to bless the ward. I prepared and prayed and studied all week for this talk and felt pretty good. I had been asked to go 10 minutes and Elder Soares 15 but he put off his talk until the last minute and so when we got to the stand he said "You know, I'm not going to go very long, is there any way you could go 20 minutes" and so I cranked it out to 20 minutes. It was cool to see how my language has changed in just 3 months to be able to pull that off. Elder Soares also had a great talk and after we had a bunch of people thank us for what we had shared which was very different from how it had been one transfer ago. 

Well it's pretty hilarious that right now as I write I am having a ton of trouble remembering how to speak English, I had to change the word I wanted to use several times because I realized it didn't make sense haha. Oh the blessings of having a native companion.

This week I we've been working with the family of one of our recent converts. She is on FIRE for missionary work and is talking with EVERYONE about how much the Gospel has blessed her life. Tomorrow will be a month since her baptism and we've started teaching her aunt, cousin from the other side of the family and the families of two of her friends all because she has been so excited about sharing the gospel. It is so cool to watch someone truly embrace the Gospel of Jesus Christ. 

This week I've been thinking about Easter and Christ's resurrection and how they play into the work of Salvation. For me that's captured in the story of the Sons of Mosiah and their desire to share the gospel - 

"Now they were desirous that salvation should be declared to every creature, for they could not bear that any human soul should perish; yea, even the very thoughts that any soul should endure endless torment did cause them to quake and tremble.

 And thus did the Spirit of the Lord work upon them, for they were the very vilest of sinners. And the Lord saw fit in his infinite mercy to spare them; nevertheless they suffered much anguish of soul because of their iniquities, suffering much and fearing that they should be cast off forever."

I know Christ loves us and wants us to have complete joy in this life and because of this speaks through a living prophet to guide us today

~Elder Della-Piana

8 mezes já!?

Holy smokes, today is my 8 month mark... I can't believe it's already been so much time I can't believe time has flown by so fast already. Hard to believe. 

This week was an interesting one. The week started off slow but we marked a bunch of appointments for the end of the week and it was going to crank up. Then it started. On Wednesday we were in a lesson right after lunch and it was going great, the spirit was strong, the lady we were teaching was involved and really thinking about the message and as we were hitting the climax my companion cut me off mid-sentance, cut the lesson short and pushed us out of the house. We got into the street and I asked him "What was that for!? It was going great in there and we didn't get to capitalize with a good invite!" He explained that it was a matter of urgency that we entered the church immidiately for him to use the bathroom. Shortly thereafter we returned to our house and thus began three days of chilling at home, allowing the king to remain nearby his throne. Our area book is now perfectly updated in all aspects and I think I have Preach My Gospel memorized. Fortunately we have a guitar too so I arranged some hymns on that which was cool. 

We did have a really sweet miracle this week. We visited Andressa who was baptized a few weeks ago and taught her and her mom and as we were leaving her mom heard us talking about a baptism for next week and said without looking up from her sowing "And if I want to be baptized too?" And we said "How's 7 o'clock?" and still not looking up she said "Whatever time works for me." Marked a baptism with somebody without even inviting, how's that for a miracle. We had invited previously but she'd always said it would be spontaneous and it looks like the time came. 

We have a huge page of scriptures to inspire our faith that we read on a daily basis and there's one I've been thinking about a lot lately:

 "Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity...Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee." (1 Timothy 4:12, 16)

By becoming more like the savior, our example can inspire others to become like them and thus by snowball effect save us and all those around us. Save us from misery to joy and from destruction to everlasting salvation.

Love you guys,

Elder DP

Yet another wild wild week in Brazil.

So, between two days of General conference that we spent just about the whole day outside of our area and two days of exchanges that I spent in other areas I only worked for two days in Parque São Bento so that was kind of weird to participate so little in our work here. I think I spoke more english this week than I have for the entire 2 months I've been here in Brazil so that was weird too. On wednesday on exchange I traded with the one Brazilian in a house were the other 3 missionaries are Americans so that was game over on the Portuguese. Then on Sunday we watched the English broadcast of General Conference in a room with all english speakers. It was hilarious to hear how we mixed the portuguese phrases with english words and it didn't make any sense. ("That didn't give" for example in portuguese means that "that didn't work" and another elder couldn't remember if it made sense or not).

www.lds.org  GENERAL CONFERENCE

I loved so many of the talks at conference. It was interesting to watch on saturday in Portuguese and receive revelation even when I wasn't understanding all the words and stories. I love that the prophet and apostles are always inviting us to action and promising blessings. One amazing promise is Elder L. Tom Perry's declaration that if we are seeking to be obedient to the will of the Lord we can always have confidence that we are making the right choice, even as we are bombarded with options.

In comical news this week: We went to give a blessing to a brother in our ward and I was asked to anoint his head with the oil that has been consecrated for the blessing of the sick. The trick was that as I went to do so I stuttered on the word for sick ("enfermo") and nearly said the word "Inferno" meaning "Hell." Fortunately I caught myself and corrected it and did NOT bless him with oil consecrated for the blessing of hell. After my companion said he didn't hear the slip up so it looks like I'm in the clear.

Until Next Week,

~Elder Della-Piana

Nine Weeks in Brazilia

Well this week is week nine for both halves of our companionship: Nine weeks since I arrived in the mission, nine weeks until Elder Soares leaves the mission, but hey, who's counting.

Every week in the mission is so different from another. This week we were running all over the place, I felt like I was hardly in my area. A BIG highlight was a conference we had with President Martins. He taught us all kinds of things throughout the day but the best part was when he used videos of the life of Jesus Christ to teach us about our role as messengers of God. One of the hardest things in the mission is when people reject our message that will bring so much happiness into their lives but he reminded us that Christ was rejected too even though he was perfect. Because of that he suffered much more humiliation than I will ever have to bear talking with people in the street.

MIRACLE! Guilherme, a guy that we're teaching, is going to be baptized this weekend!! He's looking for direction in life and through the Gospel of Jesus Christ he's finding it. I was in another area on an exchange the other day and my companion went to an activity with him and asked "So what to you think about baptism next weekend?" And he said "Sure" (Actually he said "Pode ser" but "Can be" doesn't make sense in english) He's super excited for it and it's such a joy to watch a friend find faith in Christ and choose to center his life around that. 

Other News:

Got asked to play piano in church after 7 months of not playing and the organ wasn't working right... Someone said "Wow, you looked really nervous up there." It was rough

Got kissed by a drunk guy... Again

Tried to put a hot spice on my beans and rice and it accidentally poured rather than dripped on.... The whole table looked at me with shocked eyes and out of emberassment I said "No, it's fine, I like pimenta" (hot seasoning made with peppers) Yeah, I cried.

I LOVE BRAZIL, JUST ADVENTURES AND MIRACLES HERE

~Elder Della-Piana