Nov. 2, 2011
Dad,

Wow Elder Oaks! I~m jealous haha. Good luck getting a seat anywhere in the city of bellevue haha.

So this week was great. I have a new companion which means new things that bug me but he is amazing. My first lesson with him he sat down and just taught from his heart. He didn~t use the flip chart thing we have here which I hate and he didn~t just recite his speech he really taught people. ( I came to learn later that his speech is a little less rehearsed but he still has a set plan and that set plan killed a lesson) He likes to work. And more importantly he likes to follow Preach My Gospel. So many missionaries don~t read it. Or don~t use it because its the manual and the manual isn~t in touch with reality. It really bothers me because this tool is amazing. It is half for the lessons and half to convert us to the Gospel. If you really study it you can learn so much.

I am having a hard time with my zone leader and the leadership in general. This is a ladder mission. Which means that everyone is trying to get to the top. With Elder Pereira I had that attitude as well. But my new companion is relaxed and just likes to help people which means that he should be a leader but he isn~t because he is kind of immature and doesn’t]t have that leader attitude. The thing that drives me nuts is numbers. My trainer told me to stop by eternal investigators if you are having a bad week because the numbers will show president that you are working. And my zone leader told me president only cares about numbers. That drives me crazy. I hate that. Because if I am worried about numbers I can~t worry about people and if I am not worried about people I can~t be a successful missionary. I am praying for understanding and sent a letter to My President about this dilemma.

We made 100 contacts this week. haha It was really cool. We were focused on contacts but we had lessons too. People let us in and we tracted into some non members that needed our help. My companion just said lets tract this city so we did. we are about half way through and have some promising new investigators.

Right now I am trying to tell the sisters in the ward that we can~t eat with them alone. They don~t follow that rule here. I have had lunches with a lot of sisters alone because their husbands work during the day and they want to feed the missionaries. I am talking with the relief society president about this and I will address the sisters next Sunday. Pray for me!!

Love you Dad,

Wright

I have been studying humility this week because it is one of my weaknesses and this is my thought about Christ,

Christ died on calvary but he lost his life in Gethsemene. So must we be willling to lose our lives if we want to be truly humble. Also dc 67:10 showed me a lot about

So my truck is runny well? It sounds like a glow plug problem. Be careful with ethenol You can ruin a diesel engine with that spray. Any offers yet?

P-day with elder pereira we hung out with the youth in the ward which I didn~t really like because I wanted to write letters or study ( its odd I don~t really like to sleep on p-day so many other things I could be doing) but anyway I wanted to just relax and cook or draw. My new companion is the opposite he wants to use his p-day to rest so I think now we will just stay in house the rest of day haha. Next week we will to the chapel because I want to practice piano. I want to play here because no one plays ( i know you told me so) so I am learning haha.

We teach about 20 lessons a week. ON a good week. The work here is slow. The church was born here in Brazil. About 80 years here and the entire state only has 5 stakes. The state above and the state below have temples but we don~t. There are a lot of people here who just don~t want to change. They are happy in their religion and think that religion isn~t important just that we are baptized and have faith. They don~t have logic. One woman told us that heaven doesn~t have a plack of a chuch. Just the plack of the church of Jesus Christ. I wanted to say oh you mean like this one on my name tag? haha

Satan has a strong grip on the people. In his half truths they think they are saved, and many of them are becasue they really have faith, but their lives could be so much better. I have been thinking a lot about my purpose as a missionary because I don~t believe that God will damn someone for not listening to two boys in white shirts. It doesn~t fit with my conception of God. So I think the purpose of the Gosple is to bless our lives and we get more blessings through the ordinances of Salvation but everyone will have the opportunity to have these ordinances. I don~t know if that makes sense but thats what is going through my head. That my job is just to help people have more peace through the Gosple of Jesus Christ,

Well enough introspection, Thanks for the spices!!! I used them a lot this week.

Love you Mom,

Elder Noel