Letter dated 2 June 2014--sorry, late posting on this one!

Oh my gosh! It is already JUNE! Can you believe that minha família e meus amigos?! The time is passing by so quickly and it is absolutely crazy.

 

So Mom, I have some super great news for you. Yes, the package arrived (This is mom writing... yeah, that small package took 3 months to arrive and $80 to mail. Can I just say, how crazy is that?!!) and I am very happy (okay, maybe its all worth it!). I am just going to enjoy some valentines day chocolates (M&Ms and mint cookies, sweet!) and my BYU shopping bag (which I have already used to do errands today) and my tabs (which look nice in my planner) and of course my pillow case has already been changed so now I got a feeling that all my dreams at night will be "trunky" thoughts about school after the mission. But let's be honest, I love it and thank you so much!

 

So in the missionary world, we really didn't teach a bunch this week. Why? Because we didn't leave the office until like 7pm every day, which after making the 30 minute hike to Bela Vista, we only had an hour before we had to walk back. So because of that, Elder Godfrey and I are reevaluating the work that we are doing and have a new plan to make the members a greater part of our teaching since, in reality, it will be their responsibility to integrate new members into the ward after we have left. So we have been setting goals and everything to get members more involved in the work.

 

On Saturday, the Primary General President, Rosemary M. Wixom, and the 2nd Counselor of the General Relief Society, Linda S. Reeves, came here to Cape Verde and did a series of devotionals for the members here. It was actually kind of fun how I got to see a couple of members from Fogo again. We only had time to go to one of the them, and even that one we only could stay for half of it, but we heard Sister Wixom talk to the members about the importance of learning and teaching in the home. She talked about how what we learn as kids from our parents determine how we make some of our decisions. It is a lot easier for kids to think about breaking commandments, "Must not be that bad, my parents are doing it, I can too and it won't change a thing." But we all know that is a lie. The things we do (whether we feel like it will only affect us or not) always have an effect on someone else. I have seen the damage that has been done with this type of thinking here. It is just another way Satan is attacking the family, a creation of our Heavenly Father. Needless to say, that within our time listening to those talks, while thinking about the needs of my investigators, I thought about my desires for myself and my future family.

  

So last but not least, I want to share an experience I had yesterday. Like I had mentioned, we haven't had much luck in teaching due to our time. Well, the other Elders had given us a reference like a week ago and we still hadn't had time to make a contact with her but last night we had 10 minutes and we were determined to talk to her. Our little referral turned into an 1 hour and 30 minute search all over our area as the way she had explained where she lived was super unclear. We were walking around, asking everyone if they knew her and at some point we were just kind of annoyed that we couldn't find her. We had already asked if she could meet us at a nearby store but she said that her daughter was sleeping and couldn't leave the house. Eventually we were talking to one another trying to figure out if we should continue our search or if we should just go to our marked appointment but for whatever reason, we decided to keep searching until we found her house (we were helped by one of our other investigators). Her name is Mila and the funny thing is that we had been in her house before. We had taught her cousin and his wife in her house while she was at work. The visit was very comfortable and it was obvious that she was interested in what we had to say. At the end of the visit she accepted a baptismal date with joy. It was a blessing for us, especially to finish off the week like this one. We had missed all of our other appointments because of the search and the visit itself but to be honest I feel like that was the visit that the Spirit wanted us to make, because He was there. 

 

Well, another great week has passed and a new one is about to begin. This week 2 more Elders go home and they will definitely be missed. That is the weird thing about being in the office. Everyone passes your door or house before they leave the country. 

 

All you people take care and have a good week too!

Elder Brent Dorff :)

Living the Dream... Life in Technicolor! (Coldplay shout out)

No one can accuse this Elder of not having a sense of humor! We've vacationed in Europe and have been sending him pictures of Gothic and Romanesque cathedrals and the like. In reply, he sent us this picture of some Cape Verdean architecture!