May 21, 2012

So this week has been a bit interesting. Reeeaaallly up and down. We ended up having 3 baptisms out of the original 6 that we had planned. One that fell through was the dad of the Barbosa family, and he ended up getting home from work on Saturday and going straight to the bar and drank and smoked for quite some time. We visited him last night and he's dedicated to fixing what he did and to being baptized this week. We took his cigarettes from him, and he's working with a member of the ward right now so that should help a lot. 

Another one was a 13 year old boy who is the president of the student body at his school, and he has a really strong testimony of the things that we have taught, but after his baptismal interview on Thursday he was talking with his dad (who was drunk at the time), and his dad said that he couldn't go to church anymore, couldn't meet with the missionaries, and couldn't have a Book of Mormon in the house for at least one month, maybe more. We went and talked to him, his name is Herisom by the way, and he started crying because his dad won't let him do any of this even though he knows it's true. It was really sad to see this all happening, but Herisom promised that after his dad forgets about all this, he'll search out the missionaries and say that he wants to be baptized. So there's still hope for him!

The last one that fell through didn't actually fall through. His name is Lucas, and he's the brother of a kid that we already baptized. He was going to get baptized this week, but his family couldn't be there for the baptism, so they decided to reschedule it for this week. He should be baptized along with his little sister, Julia. With them three baptized; Rodrigo, Lucas, and Julia; there's only the Mom, older sister, and the older sister's boyfriend left. Only Rodrigo, Lucas, and Julia have gone to church already, but the others said that they will this week. They want to watch the confirmation of Lucas and Julia, so they should be there for sure. 

So we have at least 3 more baptisms planned for this week! We'll see how things go!

So I found a trombone on the internet to buy, and it's only R$800. I can have it sent to the Mission Office, and they'll get it to me from there. I'm really excited to have a trombone again! Hopefully it all works out!

Looks like you all are having fun with Disneyland and all that! How is Annie handling the trip? Is she still holding strong?

I love you all and I hope you have a safe trip back home!

Love,

Elder Hopper #1