Week 93

This area is being really difficult! nobody wants to be reactivated and no investigators want to go to church! We had 0 people at church AGAIN this week!

The coldest its been for me has been about 70! the coldest!

Dad, you said you liked my house and thought it would be easy to maintain because we dont have any grass. well you didnt see the backyard to our house! its a huge field that we play soccer on during our p-days!

I´ll send photos today of it!

Elder J. Silva and I are friends, we´re having a rough time here in Osvaldo Cruz but we´re trying hard. He´s a pretty picky eater. He wont eat any vegetable except lettuce. Sometimes. even lettuce he won't eat some times. He doesn't like feijoada (a super famous food here) and won't eat it at all EVER. He also can't eat pork (this one is cause of a health issue and so is okay to not eat). And then after all this he sometimes complains about lunch. Not a lot but just occasionally. I don't really feel bad for him going hungry though because he doesn't eat half the stuff cause he doesn't like it... He buys a lot of crackers to always have somehting to eat at home after a lunch that he doesn't like!

Anyways, this week I´ve got a lot of different ideas that we´re going to try and help this branch strengthen and grow!

Until next week!

Elder Haws

Week 91 & 92

Week 91:

HELLLOOO!

Mom, No. there's no shade in the whole city!

Dad, the weather here was really hot when we first got here cause it hadn't rained in a long time! but now its been rainy almost every day for a week! and in the mornings its freezing!! One day it even got down to 15 degrees Celsius... which i know isn't that cold,but I'm used to Brazil heat now so I´m using my sweater in the mornings, and sometimes for the whole day, and I´m sleeping with 2 blankets!

Elder J. Silva is from Maceio Alagoas. In the Northwest of Brasil. He´s 20. He´s brown haha He has 2 sisters, one who will go on a mission soon and the other has 11 years only so won't be able to go for a while.... His dad works with sugar cane and he did for a little before the mission as well. He wants to be an engineer.

(wow i just realized that as i asked Elder j. silva info about him, i wrote in Portuglish..... i´ll just leave it like that though and i think you´ll still understand)

The branch president is a really cool guy. He´s funny and likes to talk about deep doctrine with us sometimes. His wife is cool too. 

We´ve had a little bit of trouble getting people go to church here in Osvaldo Cruz. We had 6 people for this Sunday and nobody went! Just one lady who said she wasn't a member but turns out that she is so... we at least are helping reactivate her!

We´re working a lot here and just waiting for the results to start showing up. The branch president leaves with us a lot and is always encouraging others to do the same! Its a great bracch here.

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

Week 92:

Alright so this week we had district conference. When all of the branches went to the city called Tupã! President Genaro was there and spoke. He´s great at giving talks!

We aren't the first elders to come to Osvaldo Cruz. There were elders a few months ago and then they got taken out and sisters got put here. After about 3 months, they were taken out as well and now me and my comp are here. The branch has about 40 people that go each week and maybe 100 people in the city are baptized.

We haven't had too much success in getting people to church :( the transfer is already half over too! but the members are great and we´re working with them. I just wish we were seeing results for our work as well!

Im sorry that my email is really short this week! 

I love you and will talk to you all next week! Time is flying by too fast just like mom said!

Elder Haws

Week 90

Hello!!

The trip here to my new area wasn't too long. I left Maringá at 7:15 and got to a city called Presidente Prudente at 12. At 1:45, I left from there and came to Osvaldo Cruz, I got here at 3.

Me and my companion are opening the area. in other words, we got here at the same time and didn't know anybody or where anything is. The members helped us out a bit and since its a small town (with only 30,000 people) we already know how to get pretty much where ever we want.

Our branch here has 5 cities in total. We´ve only been to one other city outside of Osvaldo Cruz so far. It's called Parapuã. 

The branch here has a really great branch president and we´re really excited to work here. Elder J. Silva has about a year on the mission, just a little bit more than a year. He´s from the northwest of Brazil and has a bit of an accent but its not too strong anymore, he´s lost a lot of it on the mission.

It's a lot hotter here than it was in Maringá.. hopefully it cools down a bit. The members however tell us that this is as cold as it gets around here!

I´ve told everybody here that I only have 1 year and a little on the mission, like 3 months... i don't know if its a sin cause it's dishonest or if it´s okay so that people don't just try and make me trunky all the time and talk about home and marriage and end of mission stuff... but I already did it so i guess it doesn't matter. If I stay here until the end I´ll tell them about 2 weeks before I go home that I´m ending my mission!

I´m out of time but I´m having a good time here and I´ll talk to ya'll next week!

Elder Haws

Week 89

Heeellllooo family and friends!

This week i will be transferred!! Elder jackson as well! I´ll leave tomrrow morning at 7:15 and I´ll go to a city called Presidente Prudente. From there I will go to a city called Osvaldo Cruz. That will be my area. I think we´ll be the only missionaries in the city but it seems like a really small city as well! My comp will be Elder J. Silva. I dont know who he is or anything about him yet, but next week you´ll be informed. I do know he is Brazilian, but that's it! Elder Jackson will be going to Marília to finish training another Elder! I told president that Elder Jackson was great and looks like the Lord confirmed it for him, he´ll do great!

This area that I wll be gong to is is the state of São Paulo again. I´ll only have 5 transfers in Parana in the whole mission

Unfortunately, Cleiza wasnt baptized this week. She still has her problems that she wants to work through including a bofriend, ex-husband and her daughter... so hopefully the next elders that arrive will be able to help her more than we did. We are also leaving behind Marcílio. He´s a great guy and one day he too will be baptized, I'm sure of it.

Woah.. DAD HAS A MOTORCYCLE!!??! First off, congratulations, second i´m jealous and third; i also want to upgrade my scooter for a motocycle! How much was it?  i like the pictures a lot! i still cant really believe that you have a motorcycle.........

Well I don't have  alto to say about this area.. it was good but has come to an end. Goodbye shady streets and a few good investigators and friends. I´ve got two more transfers and I´m fairly sure I´ll stay in this new city for both of them! Time is going super quick but i´m trying really hard to stay focused and work hard every day!

Until next week!

Elder Haws

Week 88 (July 7)

Zone conference went great! We didn't get to watch Ephraim's Rescue though :( oh well because president said not to tell! Though im sure everyboudy else already told!

 

This week our investigator Cleiza had an interview! She passed! But she decided not to be baptized. I'm really sad..but I´m really hoping this next week is the week! She has a few concerns about being able to perserverar até o fim.... the 5th step in the gospel of Christ... I cant think of the phrase in english to save my life!

This next week is the last week of the transfer and we´ve got a lot of possible baptisms. I'm afraid I'm going to be transferred and not be here to be able to help them be baptized!

This week we´ve been knocking doors and the same streets as the whole transfer and we´ve knocked just about every single house in the whole neighborhood! We´re going to try a new area this week and see how it goes!

I'm not sure what else i have to say this week...  

 

We´re trying hard to find more elites in our path and this transfer is almost over! I´m pretty sure I´ll get transferred for my last two transfers but we´ll just have to see next week!

Love you,

Elder Haws

Week 87 (June 30)

Once again, a really fast week! But this time it was a week that ended in success!

We baptized a woman named Magda this Saturday night!

Our mission broke our previous record and baptized 192 people this month!

This week we´re going to have zone conference and we´ll probably get to watch the movie ´´Ephraim's Rescue´´. We also got 1 other bonus that can't tell you guys about! But it was really cool!

Elder Jacson and I are just talking to lots of people on the streets and we´ve got a teaching pool of like 7 GREAT people and then like 5-6 others that accept or visits but aren't nearly as interested.

We need to rry and talk to more people each week. It's kind of hard in this area that we are working in. There is nobody on the streets ever. But when we do get find people they are usually pretty good investigators.

I love you all and thank you for our support and love and prayers.

Elder Haws

Week 86 (June 23)

This week went by suuuuper fast. Every week is passing faster than the last! It's getting quite scary!  This week we met quite a  few new people. We spoke to TONS of people had a lot of rejection once again, people that don't even want o hear about our message or even pay a visit at church (here its really common for people who dont want anything to do with you or anything to still do a visit just to appease the Lord and then never want to hear form you again).

But with all this unusually tough rejection we´ve had some successes. The woman who went ot church with her daughter last week are preparing themselves to be baptized this next Saturday!
She is a woman of a lot of faith! She stopped drinking coffee without even knowing why! We didn't have enough time to explain the commandment cause we had to get home by 9:30 (which we did by the way, I havent completely lost my ability to sprint!!). She went 2 days without drinking it while waiting to find out why! That's so awesome!!

Elder Jackson is a great companion! We always have a lot of fun. He talks a lot more than Elder Helms and so I feel like I've gotten to know him a lot better already.

Our mission is really close to beating our record for baptism this month! The old record was set before the new rules for baptism were made (meaning it was easier back then) but even with the new rules we only need 40-ish baptism this next week and we´ll break it! The mission took over 300 people to church this past week, which was also record breaking and so our baptism outlook for next week is looking pretty good! We´re trying to beat 186 (the most in 1 month ever) but really going for 231(our goal as a mission).

I'm really excited to try and do better contact this week and have more success and we knock doors and talk to everybody we see on the streets.

Hope you all have a good week.

Miss you all and hope you all have a good experiece this week to strengthen your testimony of the restored gospel!

Elder Haws