Mission week 28 (04/15/24)

Hey guys! Love yall, it has been another week here in Brazil. One thing I have forgotten to mention is that the water heater in this area does not work so the water is always pretty cold. i can get in there just fine but we are Baptizing all these youth and it is super cold to them haha. My buddy Marcio would have loved it! Our recent convert friend Luan Baptized a girl we had been working with named Thaeme and he almost didn't get in the water to baptize her cuz it was cold hahaha. But ya! one more Baptism! one more soul choosing to follow God! lets goooo! I had a dope division this week with a lot more eventful things than I would have hoped for... but our District leader came here with his comp to spend the night, and I got to work with the comp. His name is Elder Salmon (Rocky Salmon) and he is from Farmington Utah! so basically right next door to my house! He actually knows a lot of the people i knew from high school too which was dope! he loves the gym as well and was wayy bigger than me so I was dwarfed for a little bit. we didn't miss the opportunity to take a pic flexing tho lol. They arrived for the division at 10:30 which if any of you know is our lights out and bedtime. We helped them get situated, ate something and then me and Elder Salmon went to bed cuz we were supposed to already be in bed and we wanted energy for the next day. the others were a little less obedient... the DL and my comp were basically partying way up until after midnight into the morning. When we woke up in the morning, 6:30 me and Elder Salmon got up and got ready for the day, the other two Elders were not getting up and were still sleeping! They were in bed all the way up until 8:00! and did not get changed until 9:00! when 10:00 came around me and Elder Salmon got right to work contacting and knocking doors and even marked two baptism dates! When we arrived back at home for lunch we found the Elders had made a Churrasco (Barbeque) , were hanging out in soccer jerseys, and had only left to buy meat! no work was done! It was some good meat, I will not lie, so we reaped the rewards of our comps disobedience lol, then we got to work again. we contacted a ton more all day finding tons of new people! then returned home at the end. We got to bed at 10:30 and the others stayed up into the night again, and they were slow to get up the next morning. they left to catch a bs to go to their area but ended up that they needed an ID and didnt have it so returned back here. me and Elder Salmon had been planning to send an Email to President about the Disobedience of the comps and division because President has asked us specifically to do that for our comps. but we were unsure. that morning none of us had chips to our phones so they did not work and we had to contact a house to get internet there. we prayed about what we should do for the situation. their actions the day before was only a small part of the problem. the area they were working was falling apart, the connections with the leaders were weak and the leaders said plainly they didn't like the other Elder and wanted to retire his calling of stake president because of him. That's wild. but big problems and the area was failing and breaking down. Me and him prayed what we should do. we only had a 10 minutes to do something or to act. we felt the email was not right and we needed to call. it was a direct feeling and super powerful that we needed to call. So we called President Bikman and told him what had happened. He picked up the phone Immediately as if he had been waiting, the phone didn't even ring, he just accepted immediately. We told him all that had happened and our worries about the area. President was surprised to hear these things had happened, and immediately after coincedently the stake president called the President complaining about him too and another leader. now the missionary will be getting transferred out of that area today. that is crazy!! but it needed to be done. was a long story but the most eventful part of the week. Obedience is super important. It is key on the mission and in life. it is also a covenant between you and God so... Be obedient. i am not perfect at it but i am trying really hard. i'll continue doing my best, and ill do it for God. Had a day that seemed like everything just went wrong, it started on the same day the Elders Bus didn't work out. in the evening we got a call from other Elders about a person to visit immedietly becuase he was suicidal and was gonna kill himself. so that cut our other visits off but was important. We set a time that same night to go when he was available. we quickly tried visiting our friend with the baptism date for the next day but she had dipped and was not at the house! we took an uber to the guys house super far away only to find that he was not there and he was apparently at his mothers house and still upset we were not there to visit him! the house is super far on the other side of our working area! it was already late and we had to pick up our cake for the baptism the next day and only could that night cuz the next day was Sunday! So we had to take an uber to try to grab the cake, and found out they messed up the order and didn't have it, so that was frustrating. and we quickly took an uber to zoom home and made it just barely before 9:30 our house curfew. It was frustrating and we could not understand why it happened but it is ok. For now everything is still ok and alright. I just hope that guy is gonna be ok. not everything is gonna work out in life, in fact a lot of the time everything goes very wrong, and we don't know why, but God knows so we just gotta trust him and move forward. The little random things of the week.... -I got some funny looking socks including Batman, fanta, Patrick, pink with pineapples which was pretty fun. the only two things we can change in our outfits is our socks and our ties so we gotta have those options! -Pimenta. it is strong, stings and burns, turns your face red and makes your nose run but it is sooo good! it is like a hot sauce sort of with just hot peppers. -I ate cow stomach, i don't know what the name of the dish was but i knew what it was made of lol. -My comp challenged me to make a promise only to read scriptures, preach my gospel and the missionary Standards in Portuguese until the end of the transfer to help my Language. I accepted and will do it! it will be harder to understand stuff but you gotta make sacrifices to change. change isn't supposed to be easy. -President called us because he needs our help to help the Elders in a neighboring area. Elder Cutler there had a surgery and can't work much so they need our help to keep their area alive and running. I think it will be fun to work with them. we have permission to do basically tons of minni divisions there and help, but my comp doesn't like the other guy there so he is not happy... but i am hyped i think it will be litt! but pray for the Elder there to heal quickly! Recently we have been focusing on helping our people progress to the point of baptism and all the recent converts to stay firm. so now it feels like we just need to find a bunch of people and our teaching circle is very small cuz we pushed everyone through to baptism that was in the circle so pray for us to open up the circle of progressing people to teach! Love yall! Stay obedient, go to the temple, read your scriptures and never stop growing! God loves you! God is Good! God is Great! Until next week... Tchau! -Elder Martin https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZYjR28Ehi9siAcjK9