I Probably Had One of The Best Weeks of My Mission Last Week!

How is the new companion, what is his full name, where is he from, how long a member etc?

Silas Pereira Lopes, he´s from a city in Sao Paulo called Presidente Prudente. He was baptized a year and a half ago, he´s 26 years old. His mom was baptized about 10 years ago with his 2 sisters but he never wanted to be a member. He has already graduated from college and specialized as a chemical engineer. He worked in a soda pop factory as a scientist before the mission.   He and I really get along. His parents are from India.

Elder Shepherd and Elder Lopes in Santa Maria

What did you think of the new ward? 

We started an activity with the ward when we spoke in sacrament meeting. We´re doing an activity called Missionary Family of the week.  Everyone loved the idea. I love the new ward!

Do you live in a different place now?  Any change in mailing address?

Yes we live like a 30 minute walk from my last apartment. No the mailing address is the exact same. 

How was your week?

Really good! Probably one of the best weeks of my mission.

How is your new area?

It is HUGE! It´s said to be the biggest area in the mission. and half of it is on the other side of a giant mountain. so lots of walking :)

Do you live with three others still?  If so, how are all the others (tell us about them)?

I live with Elder Matt Lipps from California and Elder Rodrigo Cuadra from Chile; he didn´t know Elder Gula before the mission though. They´re both really cool. Elder Lipps is a really quiet guy, but he works really hard. Elder Cuadra and I have been buddies the whole mission, so it´s a riot living with them.

How is your new apartment?

It´s messy. I went into an OCD cleaning mode today all day while the others slept. It´s big so there´s a lot of un-used space.

Hi family!

So like I said above, I probably had one of the best weeks of my mission this week! We had 11 investigators at church yesterday, and we had a sweet baptism already on Saturday! When I got here they were already teaching this woman, Marjara, who lives behind the mission home. Literally, she lives right behind the mission home and shares a driveway with it. No one had ever thought to teach them until the missionaries knocked there about 3 weeks ago. We went there on my first night and had a super spiritual lesson. We challenged her to baptism for that same Saturday and she accepted!
 

First Baptism with Elder Lopes, Sister Marjara

 We are also teaching her mom and her brother. Her mom drinks tons of coffee so she´ll be a little while. Her brother is so so ready! His only problem is that he only has one friend, and that friend happens to be a pastor in a catholic church. So right after our church he always goes to that church. We´re trying to get him more and more integrated with the members here. He answers all of the questions during the classes at church. His name is Liam and he´s 30 years old. Graduated from college, single, and totally ready for the church and institute.

Then we had just an amazing experience. There is a family that they´d already been teaching, but they didn´t want to get married. Marcio, Diane, Rafael, Tamares, and Adan. They are so perfect!  We taught them on Tuesday and on Wednesday.   They accepted to get married and we got their papers turned in on Friday.

The rest of the investigators that came to church were people that

Elder Lopes and I found during our work during the week. They´re all solid. We´re teaching these two brothers, Carlos and Valdeni, who live together, They were super interested in the message and both came to church, bringing their less-active brother and their nephew with them.

We taught about 40 lessons this week. The ward is all excited, it´s just a great feeling for missionary work right now!  Zone conference was yesterday, so that´s why I’m emailing you today. It was a sweet conference. I´ll miss our mission President a lot though, he´s really helped me change a lot of old habits and attitudes – [we’ll get a new President July 1.]. He´s going to live in Sao Paulo after so we´ll have to go visit him when you come get me. The conference was about the power of the scriptures! Really awesome!

Sorry this week is kinda short, it was really good though! I hope Hailey´s hand is feeling better! Stay away from boys still ‘til i get home. Dad sent me a pic of Tay going to a dance with a soccer girl! She´s a cutie! haha. I think all that I want in packages now is Beef Jerkey and DI ties! Try to get ties that have designs and images on them, the Brazilians love em! Thank you! I hope you´re all doing well and everyone is happy! I love you all very much!

Love,

Elder Shepherd

"Sometimes we need to be like a lightening rod and take the heat"

 

Elder Mason and Elder Shepherd out for some exercise

 How was your week?

Eh, it was a rough week. Lots going on and not enough time to think.

Did you get transferred?  If so, where are you going to?  When do you leave?

I´m being transferred to another ward here in Santa Maria. It´s called Itaimbé. My new companion will be Elder Lopes, I don´t know anything about him. I´ll let you know more about that next week. 

Which conference talk was your favorite?

I really liked President Dieter F. Uchtdorf´s and Apostle Robert D. Hales´ talks during Priesthood session.

Where did you watch conference at?

We watched it in English in our chapel. I sat with Elder Mason.

Are your baptisms still on for Saturday?

One of them is. Verá came to all 4 sessions of conference. She´s ready as can be! The other one, Sr. Godoy, fell through because he was hospitalized because of his cancer. 

Hey Family!

So this past week went really slowly. Conference went really well though and things got feeling a lot better. I think that this was a really great Priesthood Session. It got me feeling just pumped to go out and work! The ward I´m going to be going to is struggling a lot right now.  I´ll still be in the city though, so I´ll be able to come back and watch Verá´s baptism. I found out from the Assistant’s at the start of the week that I was going to be moved, so that just kinda dropped me like a rock.

It was so cool to hear how many missionaries are out in the field and being sent out. By the time I get home we´ll be closing in on 100,000 in the world! There really isn´t a lot of exciting stories to tell today. We did a lot of family nights and said bye to a lot of people this week. My companion is going to stay in the area, but he´ll be a senior now. I felt like the general topic during this conference was Families. Almost every single speaker spoke of the importance of children growing up in a really good family. Elder Hales said something so cool. It´s something I´ll never forget.  He said, ``Sometimes we need to be like the lighting rod and TAKE THE HEAT!``. We encounter so many people who just want to fight with us and tear us down. That´s fine! We can take it, because what do we have that they don´t... THE GOSPEL. It is the most powerful weapon in the world. They all spoke of how important it is for little children to feel safe and loved, and for them to be raised according to gospel standards. There are so many things attacking the youth of the church, and it´s so important to remain in Holy places. Something that I´ve noticed is that there is a difference between obedience and obedience with Exactness. That is something that a lot of the talks indirectly said. 

I´ll include lots more details next week about my new area and my new companion. I hope all of you have a great week! Keep me updated on the basketball stuff and any other sports stuff! haha.

I love you all!

Elder Shepherd

Some People are Baptized because of the Examples They Have Seen

 

Tracting Pic from back in Rosario

How was your week? Really good!

Did you celebrate Easter there?

We had a huge BBQ for lunch yesterday, but nothing really other than that. 

Any baptisms in the works?

Yes we´ve got 2 dates marked for the 13th of April. 

Any guess of where you will go next transfer?

I honestly have no idea. Hopefully somewhere in the city again but I have no clue

Hello family!

What a great week. We had 5 investigators at church with us yesterday. We´ve got a date marked with Vera and a date marked with Darci, he´s the father of a member in the ward.

Vera was just the golden investigator from the moment we found her. She came to church last week and yesterday and is already just pumped to be baptized.   It´s been a great time teaching her, and she´s super smart. She had so many questions, and we answered them all by the Spirit. She´s a widow.

Darci is an ex military sargent. He is a way solid guy. We had a family night at their home this week. We invited the Bishop, Elders quorum president, and one of the High Priests to come with us. They all helped us teach him about the importance of baptism and then we invited him.   He wasn´t able to make it to church yesterday because of Easter (they had some visits come), but he´s already been in the past, and he´ll for sure come to at least one session of conference next week.  

The other 4 we had at church are all young men and one young woman. They´re all really good, we´re just having a difficult time trying to teach them with their parents. We´ve been trying to teach in the apartments again now. We taught the people that live right below us this week! They moved in about a month and a half ago and we´d never really thought about trying to teach there. We went there this week and they are such an awesome family. The father did the last prayer and everyone felt the spirit. They all said they felt something different.  It was a great lesson though and unfortunately they weren´t able to come to church yesterday. We have a lesson planned out with a member family on Wednesday to go teach them, so hopefully they can come to at least one session of conference. We have worked off and on in an apartment complex called Videiras.  So they´re inexpensive apartments. They´re really nice though. We have some less-active members in there and one active family. Yesterday we received 2 references who live in there and we went there again for like the first time in a month. The people were all really receptive because of Easter.   Yesterday was a really good teaching day. We taught like 10 lessons because everyone was a lot more receptive.

It´s a good time to remember what the Easter time is really about. We tend to think a lot about the Resurrection of Christ, but we also need to think a lot about the Atonement. Christ gave his life for us, and we have the opportunities that we do because of him. It would be impossible to return to heaven together with our families without that sacrifice. It´s really an infinite atonement. It makes it all possible. Maybe I haven´t had a lot of outward success here, but my testimony has grown so much. I truly know that Christ died for me, and through him I´m able to become clean and feel the spirit as fully as possible. Sometimes it´s just almost unbearable how strong the spirit is in our messages.   I know for sure that if my companion and I have felt it, so did our investigators.  Some feel it AND invite us to come back. It´s frustrating, but I know that the Lord is preparing people for us to find. It´s just a trial of my faith and my patience for what I´ve been going through this past little while. We did have a giant BBQ for lunch yesterday though, and that helped a ton with the frustrations haha! The lunch lasted forever though because they just kept bringing out more and more food. I felt like we were at Tucano´s again. 

 I got a letter from Kyle today, but i´ll be writing him back to his house! It´s crazy how fast that went by. It´s still going by way too fast out here. I´ll be onto my next area already in a week!  . We´ll have to see. I am so dang excited for conference next week! Actually, all of us missionaries are. It´s like Christmas!!! Elder mason and I already have plans for the foods and goodies we´re gonna be buying. All of the American missionaries will be in a different room watching it in English. I am pretty sure that there´s like 15 americans.

I didn´t take really any pictures this week so sorry for no attachments. I´ll attach some next week.  It´s been a cool time to be out here. We sweat all day sometimes to teach just one lesson, but that one lesson is worth it. If they choose not to accept again, at least we´ve planted the seed. Alma 32 talks about the seed, and there´s another scripture in the bible that refers to it as well. It´s really true though. Sometime the first set of missionaries just goes there to plant the seed, and in a few months/years those people will choose to accept because of the time they´d spoken to the missionaries in the past. That´s why it´s important to always show that we live our faith. Not just for missionaries but for all of us. Some people that we baptize are baptized just because of the examples that they´ve seen others leave. 

Well, I hope you all have a great spring break! Be safe! Have fun watching conference.

I love all of you. 

Elder Shepherd