Lunch At Habib's

Habib's is a fast food restaurant chain in Brazil

Dear Everyone!

It's good to hear that you guys had a good and busy week with all of your various activites and meetings and exercises.  So you guys are already prepping to pick up Elder Nate over on the west side...so weird. Oh by the way BIRTHDAY SHOUT OUT TO ELDER NATE SCHWARTZ!!!!!!  But seriously, this is so weird for me that Nate is going home and that I already have a year out. It literally feels like it was yesterday that I saw Nate off at the airport.  But I hope that you guys have a fun and safe trip. I don't know when you guys will get there but give Elder Nate a hug for me. 

BUT FAMILY! This last week was such a fantastic week!  We had such a wonderful miracle happen! Through a street contact, we found a man that has been inactive for 13 years that has been dying to come back to church, but just had no idea where it was. While I was talking to a member, Elder Barreto did a street contact with a 12 year old girl named Camilla.  She commented that her step-dad was baptized in the church and we gave her a pass-along card with the mission office number on it and marked a visit for later that week. The day of the visit we got a call from the office elders saying that they got a call from the family that we were going to visit that day just to make sure if we were really coming.  When we showed up for the appointment, we were greeted by Antonio who gave us the biggest hugs and said that he had been waiting for us.  We shared a message with him and his daughter and marked to come a again later that week. We came with Bishop João and we met Antonio's "wife" (not married legally), Ivanilde, and his other two childeren, Henzo and Sofia. We shared a message about The Family:  A Proclamation to the World with them, and set a goal for them to read the Book of Mormon as a family every night and to have a family prayer.  The whole family came to church yesterday and they loved it. We marked with them to get them legally married and if the timing works out, Antonio will baptize Ivanilde and Camilla on May 11th!  Heavenly Father truly knows each and every one of us and he knows our circumstances. He is aware of everything that we go through and in His time and His way, He blesses His children the best way possible. I'm so thankful for the privelege I have to serve a mission.

That was kind of the big highlight of the week. We actually found a good number of less active members that we are working on reactivating now, and we are continuing to work with our investigators and finding new people to teach.  Normal missionary stuff.  This week I also got a sweet letter from cousin Cindy, formerly Stephens but now I guess it's Oswald (and not Singh or Neuman).  Cindy I just want you to know that your letter Spirit smacked me in the face.  It talked a little about not getting caught up in the whole mission culture thing and to  teach people, not lessons, count souls and not numbers sort of deal.  I felt bad because lately that's kind of how my mindset has been, but thankfully I'm repenting and I'm going to do better. 

So this week we also started to implement the FHE in the members houses. Unfortunately, we didn't have one with any investigators because of scheduling conflicts but we had great opportunities to spiritually uplift the members and help them get a vision of how they can do missionary work in their own homes.  I hope that you guys are helping the missionaries back in the MTZ.   Mom I know that you are super hip now and use facebook and have lot's of new Zumba friends (Dad sends me the pictures every week) so take advantage of this wonderful opportunity Heavenly Father has given you guys to share the gospel! Dad you too! I know you guys can do it! I love you all and pray for you guys always!

Until next week!

Elder Schwartz

Elder Baretto seems to like Habib's as well!