Monday, November 3, 2014

Service

so for my dads questions How was Halloween in Brazil? LAME! well the last day in october was pretty dull... nothing happened. but on Sunday we went to a cemetary to proselyte - do some work for the dead (bum dum bum tsh).   everyone goes to the cemetary on, i think, the first sunday of the month of november to give respect to the dead so you could say the grave yard was pretty lively.
What have you done on P-day for fun lately? haha for p day we like to visit a newlywed couple in the sisters ward. we can do this because the church isnt in our area and they live 5 houses down from the church (thats how we justify leaving our area) so we go and visit them eat some DANK pasta she knows how to make while R (the husband) makes stereo-typical remarks about Americans. Its a gay ol time.

 Which superhero would be the best to send to your mission and why?  hmm can Jesus be a superhero? if not, then send hercules cause he's pretty sick and he's also a kinda demigod. haha (I hope investigators dont read this blog)
Do they have daylight savings time there so that you got an extra hour of sleep on Sunday? brah, weve been on that Day light savings time for like 4 weeks now. yeah we lost an hour too so that kinda stinks. had to wake up an hour earlier. 

something interesting about Brazil. So here in Brazil its polite to scoop up a freaking huge plate of food to begin with. I just scoop up what i think i can eat and a little more and pray I can eat it all.  if you eat it all, youre considered a good eater. if you dish up a good size plate and get seconds and thirds (which really no one does here because the first plate was so big) it doesnt matter. youre still considered a bad eater because your first plate wasnt huge so people cant see how much you ate. its weird. Me, im considered a bad eater because I dont want to waste food!! but im becoming better at judging what i can eat and now that my stomach is accustomed to the food I can eat a lot more.

also! This week I realized no one here is praying for rain. Im not sure if you guys remember what happened but a while back it rained a lot in Petropolus and terisoplous and a lot of Houses collapsed and killed a lot of people. I know so far 4 people who had to restart their whole life here in Tres Rios because their house was destroyed and now they all have a huge fear of rain so when it looks stormy they all go to a low point and stay with family. its sad.

but yeah this week was pretty chill. we did a service project on terca fiera that was kinda unexpected. 
so I had been feeling down about my mission and feeling like something was missing. so as I knelt down during my personal study I prayed that I would know what i was missing and be a better missionary. So that day we learned that our allowance had been put in the bank which happens on the first or last day of the month and on the 14-16th day of the month as well. so we left our house at 11 (which is technically my training time but we had already prepared everything for the day so we were set) and on our way to the bank I saw two ladies struggling to carry a couch up the stairs. 

noramally I would have stopped and asked if we could help but today were were short on time and the bank was a 30 minute walk from our house and we had to make it back in time for lunch. so i looked at my comp, and he didnt see them, so i walked on by and and soon as i was 10 feet away I felt so terrible! but we kept on walking to the bank. 

so later that day after lunch we called to see if we could visit our investigator and she said she was busy re-cementing her house and laying down some tile so some other day would be better. I immeaditly told my companion we should go help her. he liked the idea so we got our bag packed and put on our nice clothes ready to go. before we left I asked, ``do you think we shold bring like an extra shirt or something?`` he said nah well be fine`` so off we went

when we got there she covered in dirt and cement and was happy to see us but also surprised. she said no way youre going to help me dressed like that. youve got to be kidding. My comp obviously had second thoughts because when he turned to look at me I was already taking off my tie ready to get get to work. he said, yeah were dead serious, and did the same. 
we measured, cut tile, layed cement and tile all while in our sunday shoes, pants, and shirt. boy was it messy. after 2 hours we had put tile all over one room and half the floor and she re-cemented a room. we drank some Guadana and she thanked us and we left.
As we walked home covered in cement, tile dust, and mud, our ties the only clean part of our clothes, I couldnt have felt more clean. we got home and said a prayer in our hearts as we put our clothes in the laundry bin to soak and hopefully be clean. as I was ironing my shirt I thought that this was exactly what my mission was missing. Service. I realized it had been weeks since we had given someone manual service. 

Tears of laugher and joy filled my eyes as I shined my dirty shoes thinking God gave me two chances today to realize what was missing. the two girls and the couch were the first, and I ignored that prompting of the holy ghost to help. our investigator was the second. I sat there and thought how gracious is God that after I ignored him the first time, he gave me a second chance to follow him. 


I love you guys and miss you!! hope all is well!! 
Elder Jacob Hamm

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