Mad's Happy Life: MONDAY - January 21, 2012

following the spirit

Dear querido Irmãos,

You should know that today was the first day i was really honestly cold here in Brasil. I had my longsleeve on and everything..... I was also cleaning out the fridge and chisseling away the ice on the freezer box :) (just so you know, brasil weather is the best). Besides the general pour down of water that comes about 5 every evening, the weather has been quite lovely and we are enjoying ourselves here in Lagoa.

For the past few weeks we have been focusing on following the Spirit. Where are we suppose to be right now? what are we suppose to be doing? We didnt have a baptism this week, but i can honestly say that the week was a successful one, and i felt the Spirit just moving us to where we needed to be constantly. Only two examples-

Our neighbor is named Elson. He is probably in his 50s and he lives with his long time girlfriend, Maria. Elson was at one point a sane, good man. After years and years of drinking and falling over drunk however, he has lost a lot of his mentality and his days are now spent laying on the side of the road with his limbs wiggling helplessly. I am not kidding when i say i have never seen anyone so completely out of control drunk. He has no control of anything that is going on. ever.

Last Monday we were getting home to find Elson laying on the sidewalk with a man digging through his wallet. Elson was laying down with his arms stretching out to grab something but literally, it was like watching the kid from a christmas story with his snowsuit on. There was no way he was getting up by himself. I went over and asked the man for the wallet, it wasnt his and I was taking it back. Come to find out, it had a whopping 600 reais. Lessons to be learned from this? Dont drink okay?

Tuesday morning we had a lesson planned with Jose, one of our investigators. We walked to his house to find he had left...which is not like him at all. We rescheduled and went with our back-up plan. There was a family sitting outside a home on the way to plan B. We had already talked to them, they were all druggies and so we continued on. I felt like we should talk to them, but i past it off as nothing and continued walking. Plan B wasnt home, His neighbors had also been someone we had tried talking to multiple times, a bleached red haired teenage boy named Sandro. Except today his door frame held two teenagers that looked a little....well...druggies. and although i felt the urge to talk to them too, i past it off.

We continued down the street a few doors and sister anderson and i both felt we needed to knock a door. So we hit the closest one, a baptist pastor....umm....he started telling us how ``he already had the word of God and he thinks what we are doing is beautiful but.....blah blah`` I just kind of opened my mouth and the words fell out- we both felt we needed to knock on his door, was there anyone there who needed a blessing or a prayer? Anyone he knew of?

He looked at us for a moment and then said ``dont say I told you, but see that family down the way? (the family we had past up) and see those boys in the door frame? Dona Rita´s son was shot last night in a drug war. They need a prayer``. The minute he said the son had died, both I and sister anderson had the same thought-the red haired kid, sandro.

Holy cow. So we walk back to the boys, and then to the family. We sang nearer my God to thee, and then said a prayer. After the prayer one of the boys came out of the house and announced that they had recognized the body-it was him. In that moment the world just kind of spun and the mother bent over and the sisters started weeping. We had made it to the family before they even had found out for sure the son had died. The Spirit just filled me to the brim as i realized how much Heavenly Father loved that family. How much he wanted them to know he was right there, Feeling their pain with them. And we were his representatives showing his love for them in that moment.

It was very surreal, and if anything heart breaking to realize this kid was the same kid we had ran into many times, Heavenly Father had something for him-and he hadnt given the Lord the time of day.

There is sin and pain and horrible-ness everywhere here. And yet, Heavenly Father is right here with these people just waiting with his arm outstretched hoping they will just take it already. The hardest part about being a missionary is the realization everyone has agency. And i cant really force someone to stop drinking or stop smoking. Or even stop and just think for a few moments how their life COULD be.

Stop and think today how the Lord has changed your life. How he has been there for you. If you dont know, call up your missionaries. They can help you out.

love you all!

sister mad

p.s. carlos update: we had zone conference this weekend and one of the elders, with a smile on his face gave me the message that Larissa, the last of Carlos´ family was baptized two weeks ago. And that Carlos baptized her. And that they have plans to go to the temple this year. Oh my heart is full.

Pictures!!