Bringing the Gospel to Brazil: Buddism e Baptisms

This week was crazy!!! I saw so many miracles and had super fun. Honestly, one of the fastest weeks of my mish. First off I’ll hit on the fun highlight of the week and after the spiritual notes.

So this week, we traded our p-day for Wednesday so we could visit a Buddhist Temple in Tres Coroas, a city nearby. So we got our x-mission leader to drive us there. The temple was sweet. It’s on top of the mountains here so it gave a great view of our area and many other cities. I have never been to a Buddhist temple, so it was pretty fascinating seeing the sculptures, statues, temples, and practices of a different religion. Haha. I thought the 21 taras were pretty cool. After the Buddhist adventure, we had plans to go to another tourist site, a waterfall that our mission leader told us about. So on the way there, his car broke down, but he didn’t want to ruin our p-day and said it was close by. So we decided to walk. So after walking up a giant hill with food, frying pans, and a guitar, we found a sign that said 8 km to the cascata (this was after walking 5 km). But we still pressed on. We got to the sweet waterfall, ate chicken that we fried over a campfire, played guitar and headed back hoping to hitchhike. But no one picked us up, so we ended up hiking another 15 km to the house…but in the end, all worth it. One of the coolest p-days of my mission career. But let’s move on to a more spiritual note.

So, remember how I talked about Junior the other week. Well, this week, he got baptized!!! Super cool. But I think I tell you a little more about him. We first met him about three weeks ago when he called us out in the street. We ended up setting up an appointment, and he loved the message of The Book of Mormon. After two weeks, we became super tight, and he was loving church. He has had a rough life, but is fascinated by God and religion. So last week the Pres of the mish came to interview Junior for his baptism, and in the interview, he asked if Pres could baptize him. And Pres. Campos said yes. So this week, Pres. e Sister Campos returned to the branch for Junior’s baptism. It was awesome. So many people were there, and the spirit was so strong. Fosho a great missionary highlight watching Pres baptizing your investigator. We also started to work in a new neighborhood on the other side of the city. We found 2 couples who are awesome and are progressing a ton. Only problem here in Brazil is that no one gets married. Super frustrating. But I’m excited to work with them. Thanks for all the prayers and support. I know diligence allows and creates opportunities to see miracles. Have an amazing week. à Love Dave

Fun fact: I sang the national anthem in the ward activity to celebrate the 4 of July.