90. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

30 March 2015

So this week was good, but also really disappointing... we had tons of great appointments set up that managed to fall through. We did have some great lessons but we don't really have anyone that is truly progressing towards baptism... The good news is the english class is thriving!!!! We had to expand our classroom and we had incredible fruits, they all live in the other area which is a shame, but I'm happy either way, we're all on the same team right?

the "Team"

There was a mother and daughter from the english class that went to church.  There was X, his wife and her mother, whom talked to me at the post office who went to church. There was Y and her three kids who we met at McDonalds whom went to church again and are on date to be baptized April 11th!!!!   That's 8 people, whom we found but belong to the other area :DDDD  So happy though! 

In total the other companionship had 13 investigators at church (incredible!!! ) and we had two.  But we'll count our blessings :D This ward is outstanding, we are going through an epic age of growth. Bishop is focused on expanding our smaller chapel and the stake encouraged him to have an attendance of 170 to do so. I've been here for 3 months and in this time to attendance has raised constantly each week, 120, 130, 140, 150, 160 last week and we hit a new record, 168 this week. massive ward!!! The members are working, we're reactivating and bringing new people each week,... it cant get any better that this!!! 

Just working :D

I love you guys so much!!!!

Elder Siebers

89. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

23 March 2015

Hey everyone, sorry if it seemed like I had been transferred seeing as I didn't enter this morning. [Cooper usually emails in the morning, except on the Mondays when he gets transferred, then we don't hear from him until late Monday or even Tuesday.  So I was starting to wonder.] We went to the LAN House and the system was entirely shut down and the man told us to return after lunch. So here´s the news. It seems President is serious about this whole 6 month in each area thing, and all four of us are staying here in Rio das Ostras! In the entire zone, only 2 of 14 elders were transferred. Times are changing!

I'm excited to be staying, seeing as we have some incredible potential for this transfer! 

So this week was pretty interesting. I just wanted to recap one of the most incredible days I have ever had. Tuesday was a pretty normal day, the sun was shining, we left home with some plans for the day as well as some errands to run. It seemed just like any other day, but for some reason everyone wanted to talk to us for some reason. We probably had about 10 different moments where someone stopped us on the street to know who we were, what we do, or if we could give money :/ I caved in two Phillipiane girls who wanted a church donation, whom didn't even speak portuguese and spoke in broken english to us. But those weren't even the highlights. We had to run to the post office, and we were a bit unsure about it because there's always a huge line and it takes about an hour to get in and out of there, we decided to go. In that hour, a man talked to my comp while in line and marked a day to teach him, a young woman and her uncle asked me about the Book of Mormon while I stood by the exit and she asked how much it costs. We went straight to her home after the post office and shared the restoration and wow it was a lesson. Smart people, with good questions, we´ll see where it goes. Also in the post office and older gentleman asked me about the English class and went this week!!! 

That doesn't even top the day off. So get this, (you guys are gonna loved this story, its almost too good to be true) That night we were kinda hungry and McDonalds has a new promotion for a triple bacon burger for 6, 50 reias, roughy 2.50. So yeah we went and we were joking on the way there that it would be funny if someone stopped to talk to us in McDonalds. We ordered, sat down and ate, and on our way out while throwing out the trash and employee started talking to us. She moved from Bahia a few weeks ago, has a relative in the church, and is looking for a church for her three young children to grow up in...... yep. So, unfortunely she lives in the other elders area, but they are teaching her and she went to church this Sunday!!!! YEEEEESS! We may or may not pass by McDonalds this week just to followup with her and give her some extra support! :D Miracles do happen :D

So that's all for now really

Love you all, 

Elder Siebers

88. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

16 March 2015

Well everyone, things just cant get any better right now! This week was almost completly focused on the getting X and her grandson prepared for their baptism saturday. We spent the week visiting members and planning the baptismal meeting. Saturday came around faster than usual and overall the baptism was a great success! We had in attendance about 35 people including members, nonmember family and friends of X, whom we will be looking to teach this week, and some other investigators from Rio das Ostras 2. We also had someone from the English Class show up which was awesome!!!! She was so prepared and needed the gospel in her life at this time, she has more hope for the future, her soul has been calmed. 

So early this week, I finally received what we call "Ligação da Morte" (death phone call), Elder G. Morales asked me which airport I would like to arrive at. Bradley International Airport was the response. Elder G.Morales also just left from Madureira and informed me on some interesting news. Apparently the are reforming the Stake,  the ward mission leader is currently serving as bishop of three combined wards for the time being. 

And Even better news!!!! My good friend is now Elders Quorum President and he and his wife are booked for the next carpool to the temple to be sealed.

I'm as happy as a clam.

I love you all so much! Hope ya´ll have a great week!

Elder Siebers

87. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

9 March 2015

Well, I´ll call that a week! 

This week was INCREDIBLE. I´ll start by briefly mentioning an incredible multi zone conference we had in Macaé this week with President Cabral. I wont have time to go into detail about all that was said, but President Cabral is one of the most incredible, driven, and largest visionaries I have ever met. He doesn't have a limit, he just wants us to do more and more, and its quite inspiring. He´s pushing the entire mission to new limits and to new potentials and we are having more results than ever! We immediately put into application some of the techniques that were taught there and we had incredible results this week. We began to invite EVERYONE we possibly could to church this week and followup constantly until they fulfilled with their commitments. This Sunday, X, her grandson (whom are going to be baptized this Saturday), X2 (my first student from our english class), X3, Y and X4 (whom we met for this first time this week) X5, Y2 and X6 all came to church. We had ever more people confirmed to be there, but some didn't make it! The chapel was exploding with new faces, especially since the other companionship had 6 more as well! 

Update on our english class. When I arrived here during the holiday season, we had one student. She came the first 2 or 3 weeks alone, and we had a good time learning! Then the class started to grow each and every week until this week we hit 20! We made plans with a member here who lived in the states and teaches english and she's gonna run to course now so that the switch in missionaries doesn't hault the course like in the past. Also that we could better get the members involved! 

Miracle from the week. We were searching for a referral we received this week. A partially drunken man on the road asks if we are 'the mormons'. Yes we are. And he promptly invited us into his home where we proceeded to teach two families from Bahia. They both moved here recently and have always wanted to know more about the church. We dropped a summary of the Restoration and invited them to church this Sunday. They said they would go, but didn't come. I felt sincere desire though, so i know they'll be there this week around! 

So yeah, that's about it for this week. One more in the books. Its gonna be another great week here! Hope it is for ya´ll as well.

Elder Siebers

P.S President has received instruction from Thomas S. Monson that missionaries should stay in there areas for at least 5-6 months. Finally that has been in place after hearing it almost two years ago from E. Anderson in Gilbert. I may finish my time in Rio das Ostras, that would be a dream come true!

86. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

2 March 2015

Good morning everyone. I am doing well. Today we woke up to a clouded sky, which always makes me grateful that today I won't be as sun scorched as usual. 

We had a busy week. We are working a ton in an area called Aquarius, which is about 30 minutes by bus away from the chapel. We are teaching several progressing investigators, we received a good amount of referrals there as well, so weve been heading there almost every day these days. We are so excited about several investigators that are on date and keeping commintments. We were so excited for this week because X and Y were on board for this Saturday, but neither of them were able to come to church this week, so well have to remark them for the next week and see where they are at this week. 

We had a great lesson with Y2 this week. We had planned a specific lesson to help her with a question she has about being rebaptized for the third time, but as we began the lesson she opened up for the first time and began talling us about several spiritual experiences she has had recently. She is dating an returned missionary, they went to visit his uncle, a patriarch, in January and she received a blessing from him. She explained how she is seeing the promises of that blessing being fulfilled and add in some recent prayers being answered. She accpeted a baptismal date for the end of March and it was a great lesson. 

This week ahead, it appears we will have another Zone Conference in Macaé and Elder Aidukaitus will be present. Im pumped

I love you all so much ,and hope you all have a great week! 

Elder Siebers

85. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

23 February 2015

Good morning everyone! 

Another solid week has come and gone here in Rio das Ostras. We spent Monday- Wednesday in quarantine, which isn't so bad when we have Settlers of Catan. We went back to work full time on Thursday, the carnaval festivities had quieted down but those who came to celebrate often stay until the end of the week, so it was still crowded with beach goers. 

Alas, we continued to work and we had some great success this week! 

Here are some updates on the people we are teaching. 

We have been working with Y for a while now. She stopped us on the street and asked if we could say a prayer for her and her family. Weve been visiting several times a week now and she was all excited to make her first visit at church and she was planning on going to X's baptism to see how it goes. She backed out of them both because a friend of hers started telling her lies about the church and the baptismal ordinance. She became scared and didnt go. This week we returned and cleared up those rumors and she came to church this Sunday. She loved it and we´re heading back this week to follow up. 

Y2  is another  woman whom we found through a referral from a member from Espirito Santo who passed by here to visit. Weve also been teaching her for a while now but she finally was able to come to church this week and also had a great experience. She's going to attend the baptism of her nephew in Espirito Santo in two weekends from now so we´re trying to see if we can hold her baptism beforehand. She really believes this is the true church and is excited to become part! 

We are also teaching Y3, it's been several weeks since we've been able to teach her and we just got back on board with things after the festival season and she also recently moved. She made homemade pizzas afterwards!! mmmmmm

So thats really about it for now. We have some awesome investigators right now and lots of good work to be had. Also the mission beat its all time record of monthly baptisms in February. President Cabral is working hard and inspiring us all to do more! 

  

I love you all so much!

Elder Siebers

84. Rio das Ostras, Rio de Janeiro

16 February 2015

Well this week was loaded with good work and exciting events! Here are just some of the updates from this week.

Our new housemates are Elder Hamilton, a missionary I've known since Madureira. He's from Sacramento and is also finshing up his mission and goes home in May. He's a great guy. Dad, send some of your Sacramento areas and we'll see if he recognizes some people! [Scott served in Sacramento Spanish many, many moons ago.]

He is training a brand new missionary, Elder L from Bahia. He's 25 years old, was baptized as a kid and and is now serving his mission. Great kid as well!

This week we had lunch with an awesome  couple from the ward- W and E. They like making healthy foods and refrain from eating meat. Soy meat isn't a favorite of mine. You can ask mom- who tried to make soy meat tacos and I immediately noticed the difference!  She made Kibe, which is practically one of the only Brazilian dishes I'm not a fan of. It consists of whole grain wheat, onion, salt, eggplant and mint leaves. Really weird taste, but we have to eat, so down it went. I doubled up on salad, goes to show I'm not a fan

We ran into Guto, one of the bishopric from Alacantara! He reported back to us about X, who received the priesthood and passed the Sacrament this week! 

Carnaval is brutal. President established a schedule for the entire mission. Missionaries work in the morning, and have to return at 6 pm. But after releasing this information, our leaders got a phone call from him saying that our zone and one other zone (that is in the center of Rio) have to all be home by 1 pm. We only get to work a few hours in the morning, go to lunch with the members and return home. We've been laying a lot of Settlers which is a great time! It will remain like this until Thursday...

The good news is that we worked to get X's baptism all set. We taught him several times this week, he passed the interview and the baptism was a success. He brought several non-members from his family and we had a turn out of about 25! He bore a powerful testimony afterwards and several, especially his mother were brought to tears! 

So that's the run down from this week!

I love you all so much and I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Siebers