Varginha-MG, Sion

Questions:  
Have you had the chance to listen to any General Authority's while there? Yeah acutally we had GA´s here like alot actually. They would come and give trainings to president. 

Do they have mission conferences with the whole mission?  Yeah but only during christmas or when a really big GA or Apostle comes to this area.

Have you driven mission vehicles while there? No. Only the assistantes here really have permission to drive mission vehicles and the president doesnt even think of giving them the keys. 

So we helped President N move right? So they keep trying to plan a bbq for us and keeps falling through so finally he marked sunday at 7. But there were a lot of problems and the other elders asked if we could go and President said only during lunch and only for an hour. So long story short he sees me at church so I just ask like "Hey President Nunes is doing a bbq and asked us to come can we go?" and he starts off like uhh I dont think its a good idea and gets to no. its actually a bad idea. So im like alright thats chill I understand. Later that day we get a call from Elder B and hes like, yeah so the president said you guys have to go to the Bbq and it starts at 8:30, dont get there before or after 8;30. So im like what the heck? Haha super confused so when we get there I can already hear presidents voice and im like "oh dang, we really should have called just to confirm that we could come." So we walk up stairs and president is sitting in a chair with his wife and his son and daughter in law and just gives me a funny look. Thats when my heart just dropped. And im like, "look im just as confused as you are, am I allowed to be here?" And the president just kinda looks at us and shaked his head..... Sister Cascardi saw our faces and was like, "he's kidding loves go get some carne" Hahaha I was like wow so not funny. 

So at the BBQ President called me over and asked if I knew where I was going.... I was like, well you do know I work in the office right? Haha and he tells me about the responsibility I will have serving in the Branch Sion in Varginha. I will be responsible for 28 other missionaries that include, I think 1 ward, 3 branches, and 1 district. I also found out that President N is responsible for that district so i´ll be seeing him a lot more. haha but im excited. I just hate packing ugh. its the worst. Future missionaries, bring suit cases with 4 wheels and that spin in 30 degrees. it will make your life 1,000 times better. 

It will be really sad to leave the office and stuff... but I think Varginha will be the place where I die. only a little more so we´ll see. I love you guys!! miss you all so much!!! 

I also think I have a hole in my boot.... I dont believe this. I´ve already worn these suckers down so much.   

--

Elder Hamm

John 4:35

Questions: Have you mostly served in wards or branches?  Mostly in wards that don´t have more than 40 people in the ward. Here in Juiz de Fora the church is SUPER strong and all the members help so its awesome. The attendance is like 110 so thats a lot, but in my other wards its been like 40 or less. 

Do most the church buildings have more than one ward in them? I think most have 2 because its just 2 small wards but in some area´s its just one because there aren´t a lot of members and its pretty isolated.  

Do they have singles wards? No. Juiz de fora has like 100 single adults and they dont have a singles ward so I dont think anywhere has a singles ward. But they do a lot of activities together. 

So this week was pretty sweet. We had 2 baptisms and 2 confirmations so that was super cool. umm This week also had a sick family night with the elders in our ward where we found 3 swords so we took a bunch of pictures haha more about that on the way. 

Other than that we just taught repentance and baptized the converts who were B and J. J is 40ish and he is the man. Hes trying to help his family be baptized these next few weeks and if they decide to be baptized, HE´s gonna baptize them! Thats so cool how the church works. And B is the grandson of someone me and Elder B reactivated these days and when he found out he could be baptized he wanted us to talk to his mom right away!! Haha So we marked a date with the family and they are gonna be baptised in the next few weeks as well. Sadly I think this will be my last week here in this blessed area ;( 

I had an interview with the president this week and he was like, uhh do you have any questions or doubts or anything? And so I just went ahead and asked, "President, will I stay here one more transfer or will I be transferred?" he just kinda bapped me with the response, "What difference does it make to you?" And I was like yeahhh... haha So today only a part of my readjust went into my account which means I will probably only be in this area, one more week. But im excited for my next area, just not excited for the packing and the leaving. 

Hahahahah so this scripture. So it just so happens that in chuch we were sitting there and the president and his wife came in and sat down next to us and some girl talks about a scripture in John 4 so a few days before Elder Ballard called me and shared this scripture with me ahaha so when I open my scriptures this verse has like 3 stars next to it and is colored and has fev. written in the margin and president looks over and is kinda looking at my scriptures so I point to it and give him the scriptures. He takes out his glasses and I immediately regret doing this. He starts to read a little ahead to get the context and then when he gets to the verse he cracks this smile and shows sister and sister gives me that eye and president gets this YYeahhh! face on hahahaha I died laughing.

But yeah thats about it. I love you guys!! miss you all alot!! TLove

-- 

Elder Hamm

Birthdays

What do most the people wear for shoes there – Nike and Adidas?  Crocs? Flip-flops?  Havaianas is pretty much what everyone uses here. Its like a flip flop made of rubber and not that expensive. its a nice flip flop. I bought some in Cascatinha and I still have them today. So when you get home at night, here in Brasil they dont really use carpet. Its almost all tile. And tile´s really cold, like, all the time. So when you get home you basically take your shoes off and put on your flip flops. Like people never walk around bare foot because you can catch a cold.  

Are there any things there that we don’t think are bad that would offend people there (like Josh said in Mexico you can’t knock “shave and a haircut, two bits”)?  If you call someone an animal. Hahaha they dont like that, thats like swearing at them. 

How do they celebrate Valentine’s day in Brazil? So valentines day is actually in November here soooo yeah. and its call like the day of girlfriends/boyfriends. So its really only for people in relationships... kinda like in the USA

So yeah this week was actually super sick. so last pday was Elder C's Birthday and then the next day wsa Elder B's and then today is Elder Br's so last P day the president invited us over to eat pizza and cake and told us to get there at 21h.....  hahaha but alright he is the president. we had already marked to go out with a member to contact some referrals AND a nother member wanted to have a suprise party for C. So we went to work.  But yeah did all that stuff we had to do then at presidents house we ate pizza and cake and chatted a lot with them. The president is so cool and Sister C is just the best. Seriously they just are awesome haha we talked about everything, the beach, they guessed our first names (cause you dont really use them but they got them all right after about 10 minutes of thinking) and then we had cake and icecream and president got out his binder from the mission and was showing us all of his stuff he got like awards for baptising and stuff. Hahahaha we were laughing so hard cause this dude has like 1,000 and he served only for a year and 6 months. Got home at around 10:40ish. Haha it was cool. 

So after I get out of the shower that night I look at the phone and I see one missed call from president. Hes the only one who would call after 10:30 cause at 10:30 your suppose to be alseep. So I call him back and he said that President N and his family are moving and that they needed my help and if I could help. So I said yeah of course. So on wednsday Sister C picked up in front of the Blue Tower in normal clothes and we drove to the move. It was one of the most trunky experiences of my mission being in a nice car with air conditioning and in normal clothes joking around with sister. Hahah so we get there and they have like a million things its crazy and the truck had to make 3 trips so we being shuttled back and forth and stuff helping out and Sister called the president asking if we could stay a little longer just to help get the treadmil up to the 4th floor. It was tough. But it was cool. And sister took us to Mcdonalds (which here is really expensive) and I asked for a big mac and shes like, why dont you get that one that costs more? hahahaha Sister is so awesome. then she bought us icecream and we went back and finished the move. But yeah it was just kinda a huge trunky week.

But this Saturday we´re gonna baptise J whos 32 (and hopefully the rest of his family next month) and B (the grandkid of a women we reactivated and hopefully her daughers too next month). You see? You can be trunky and still work and still have success. Obviously its eaiser to not be but its not impossible. 

But yeah those were pretty much the two adventures this week. We had a lot of really cool lessons this week with E who was almost being ill because of her confusion amidst the different religions. But she just doesnt wanna leave her church. It is actually really sad. She said someone was gonna be baptised in the church where she goes btu the only thing missing would be..... she paused to think of the word and then said..... Authority. And I almost jumped out of my chair cause I was so glad she understood
. Then we were teaching this lady and her son and she was like crying during the first vision because the spirit was so strong and then her husband gets home and shes like, YOU have to hear what these men have to say, and so he sits there for 30 seconds and then wants to like bible bash. -___-

So yeah thats about my week. It was good. I liked it, I learned a lot. Love you guys!! miss you all so much!! Oh yeah this week is also carnaval so thats pretty crazy too. 

love
Elder Hamm

Just tryin to be EVEN MORE like Christ (only missing 2 more nails)

Don't get that lightning rod too high (from my title), it will probably attract more lightning.  haha

How was your week?  Ours was mostly waiting for stuff to melt.  Like Nate’s brain from lack of school (back home). Hahaha 

My week was good. Its been pretty long especially since I am writing you right now at 1:19 in the morning, from the office, with a hole in my foot. Yeah but more on that later alligator. 

So this week was supppper fun actually. I got to do A LOT of exercise. We helped out a lot with the wheelchairs this week! it was a lot of organizing and moving them around and putting them on trucks and taking them off trucks but it was all worth it Aaturday when we saw all the people there to get their wheel chair. As I sat on the stand looking over the people there I couldnt help but think, "How many of these people will soon know, and embrace, the gospel of Jesus Christ?" Its a great work to be done and im glad that I can do it. 
So yeah why am I here at 1:40 in the morning? Because the secretary is putting the baptisimal forms in the computer which he has to do at the end of every month and this time we had A LOT. So im here with him because his companions were really tired and didnt wanna stay. The presidente already called a few times to see how we were doing. Haha I love that dude. 


  

As for the hole in my foot. Well today, almost right after lunch, we were walking down the street and I stepped on a wooden board and a huge rusty nail went right into my foot. A feeling I know all too well (curse you Cascatinha). So I kinda ripped my foot out of the nail and took off my shoes. Yeah - the nail's luck cause I wasnt wearing my boots because it was sunday and I had to wear my fancy shoes. And a little info about puncture wounds, they are super easy to seal up and stop the bleeding because even though it went in like 3cm it was only about 1cm wide so you just kinda put pressure on it and it stops bleeding super fast - but we were in the middle of nowhere heading.... to a even more nowhere to contact a reference a member gave us so I just put back on my shoe and contacted the reference. Then I called Sister C and she said what I was dreading.... go to the hospital and take a vaccine. ;(  Its not that I'm afraid of needles or anything its just I HATE having to take the time to go to a hospital and wait in that line JUST to have a shot.  So after 5 minutes of begging her to let me just like

fast and pray that it will be okay, me and my comp take off for the hospital where the Doc takes out a part of my shoe that actually went into my foot. That kinda hurt alot. But Doc Sergio was super cool and we joked around alot. It was also cool because I helped a kid who hit his head on a pole stay a little calmer. I told him I had take about 8 staples to my head too so that helped him a lot hahaha he was about 10 years old. 


But then as I was getting my tetanus shot the doctor walks in (which is weird because the waiting room was full) and asks me what church I represent. So we started talking fast and I gave him the watered down version of the Doctrine of Jesus Christ, how it was lost and now is here again and he asks, but what about the gadget? I was like so confused. and he just kept asking so I told him that Joseph Smith used a seer stone to help him translate and about the plates and the Book of Mormon and like everyone his response was "do you have the stone and the plates?" to which I responded "ahhhh Everthing would just be too easy if we had the plates, and would that really prove to you that Joseph saw God the Father and Jesus Christ?" he kinda shrugged and said it all seemed kinda ET to him. I said "yeah I´ve been there. What lead me to know was actually that. I wanted to know if this ET story was real."  So I explained about the Americas and how they had a people there too in the same time as the Bible and he said that makes sense.  So I said "When I read that book. I know Sergio. I know that no man on earth could write a book like that. It was translated in 80 days. 80 DAYS!?! The bible was translated from a KNOWN language to another KNOWN language and it took 52 scholars 15 YEARS TO DO IT."  That sparked his interest. I said I have this book with me right now that could be yours on one condition.  He said "How much you want for it?" I said "nothing but a promise. Promise me you´ll read the introduction and Joseph Smith's testamony and you can have it." He looked at me and kinda extended his arm out to grab it and I kinda did that eyebrow raise. and he smiles and is like "I promise." So all in all it was a good day with an even better expierence. 

But yeah its the afternoon now. We got home at like 2ish and had to still wake up at 6;30. That one hurt.  So I love you guys!! miss you all so much!
-- Elder Hamm

Bible bash só que não

Dad's questions:  

What were some of the strange things about Christmas in the “summertime”? 

All the christmas music about the cold weather and stuff and here we are sweating like pigs.. thats a little weird. Its hard to get into the christmas spirit without the cold weather. 

Haha its been like raining this whole week and kinda cold and im just like "why cant it be snow?"

So yeah this week was Transfers right? Its all just kinda a blur now the weeks are just flying by. 

So as for missionary work this week it was the normal. Visiting the investigators who want to know more and cutting those who dont.

So I have a story I think I didnt tell you last week. So we went over to G and R´s house to teach them a lesson and S was there. He's a kinda cool guy but hes trying to be a pastor and so he thinks he knows everything. He goes to a pentacostal church. So we get there and we left 3rd Nefi chapter 28 for them to read which was cool. So we get there and S was just kinda in a bible bash mood. It might have been because his mom was there this time or because the 2 girls are gonna baptise soon but he was on one. 

So he says, "I have a question."

Here in the book of Mormon, its saying that Nefi was a God. This book isn´t real. 

I was kinda startled im gonna be honest because, well, Ive read this book and I never got that impression so I said "lets open up to where S is and find out whats going on. So we all open to the first chapter in Jacob where in the chapter heading it saids "Nephi dies" then it said in the first 2 verses that Nephi gave a commandment to Jacob to continue writing in the plates. 

S said "So here it saids he dies and in the first verse he gives a commandment, is he God? Did he resurrect? Who is he to give commandments?" 

I looked at the family and they were kinda smiling hiding laughs, so I said, "Who wants to explain to S what those little italic letters are?" and J said that its a summary of what WILL happen. So I said now lets turn the page and look at (quickly scanning the page) verse 12. Read that out loud for us. "And it came to pass that Nephi died." Hahahaha the whole family was laughing pretty hard. 

Then we explain the commandment about writing a history of their people like the bible and he tried to just jump to another thing because this topic was obviously locked. So I get the really strong impression that I shouldn´t even get into it. So I said, "look we are here to teach G and his family, can we continue to teach them?"

And he says "teach me I want to learn!" and we explain that his questions aren´t to learn. He then opens to some random part of the bible and starts reading and is like, "look its like the same thing! 12 apostles!"

"YES" me and my comp almost said in unison. 

"Jesus healing people!"

YES! BECAUSE ITS THE SAME JESUS!

"This is a second testimony of the Bible Why do you need it twice?"

 I said, If I awnser your questions can we continue to teach G in peace?"

"yes"

"2 Cor 13:1"

"BUT where does it say that he will visit other people?"

"John 10:16."

I asked G if we could leave him with a prayer.  I left my testimony and got to my knees to pray. S wanted to keep fighting but everyone was kneeling down to pray so he just kinda stopped. Afterwards G showed us a video about different religions but that all of them believed in love and he thanked us for not fighting with S and apologized a lot. It was really a blessing and the spirit that told me not to fight.

I´ll leave you guys with the same testimony I told them that I know the book of Mormon is true. I know that it is the word of God. I know Nefi wasn't a God and I knew the book of Mormon wouldn't say he because the book was written by prophets called by that all mighty God. I know this church is the only true church on the face of the earth that has the exact teachings of Jesus Christ. I know that he leads this church today through Thomas S. Monson and that through the Book of Mormon we can know the truth of all things. I love you guys and miss you all so much!


Love, 
Elder Hamm

ps. Me and Elder S are going to mark a day to go to S´s house and answer all of his "Questions" haha

Baptisms and Weddings

My comp wanted this foto....I couldn't stop smiling and everyone was like, "no you're fighting, stop smiling!"

#juniorcompprobs

Look I'm Darth Vadar

Do you eat at members for dinner or lunch? We eat lunch with members and we actually have some awesome investigators who like to give us dinner sometimes but everyone always wants to give us Coke or like some cookies or something. 

Are the kids out of school for summer now?  yeah... kinda. Well there was a big long strike in the middle of the year so they are paying for the days off now so some schools might now have summer. haha and this like "summer break" that they are on right now ends in like Feb. 

Where do you shop for groceries? I go shopping in a store called Bahamas. But im not happy about it Bob. Not. Happy. In Rio there is a supermarket called Bramil which is super huge and super cheap. Bahamas is only in Minas and it is not that big and its expensive and the prices are on a crappy electronic thing so you have to like bend down and get eye level to see the price, its just the worst.  

So this week we baptized W. W is 8 years old and super cool and his uncle is a recent convert who is just the best. I didnt think this baptism would do a lot for W but he asked to be baptized like 1,000 times so I wasnt gonna say no. So we taught him everything and interviewed him and baptised him and I gave the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands and in the middle of sacrament meeting he got up and came over to me. I thought he was gonna ask for candy that I have sometimes for the little kids, but instead he came up to me and said my name and said "Obrigado." and gave me a hug. I almost broke down crying thinking that this little kid - this kid who loves getting into trouble and causing chaos, could feel such a difference in before and after receiving the Holy Ghost. it was really cool. 

We also had an awesome lesson with G and his daughters (R was sick so she wasnt there). Where we re-marked their baptismal date for the 30th! we also did a few things the presidente counciled me on doing to really find what they were struggling with. It was funny cause Im always like, Do you guys actually like the church? And everyones always like "Yeah!" So Im like, "and the Book of Mormon? Do you like reading it, do you feel good when you read it?" And they´re like "yeah I know this book is written of God cause I feel the same when I read the bible." So im like so do you guys want to be baptized? and everyone just kinda stays quiet.... hahaha so im like alright i´m lost - like what the heck... hahah I said I feel like this 2 magnets. On one side everyone is saying they love the church and stuff and on the other is baptism... and there seems to be that repeling force between those two things. I want to know what is this force between these 2 magnets.... hahaha so we went and we asked the baptismal questions in detail and I was like alright. So im gonna ask you all a question and you can only respond, "I know this is true," or  "I'm still not sure if this is true." 

Bouquet de Marshmallows.  I'm gonna get
married next.

And boom just like that we found the leaks. They believe in The Book of Mormon, they are just not sure that Joseph was a prophet.  That's gonna be easy to clear up. haha but yeah so im suppper excited about that.

So I was pretty much dying this entire week. I had a really really cut up sore throat and I went for a run monday and almost died. haha I have never had such bad asthma - holy cow. haha I almost blacked out I just had no air. so yeah I had to buy some medicine and stuff.

But yeah this week was good. Today was a sprint since its transfers. We are closing 2 zones which is kinda big. Now we have bigger zones and less Zone leaders. Our district got 4 sisters bigger. so now its staff and 4 sisters and we lost 4 elders. 

So this week M and E are gonna get baptised!! They got married on Saturday and even though they were the investigators of the Assistances, we go over there all the time cause its close to our area and we teach them all the time. Plus me and E have a special relationship cause he works at a Prison so he's super sick  and I just think its cool. So we went to the wedding with special permission from the President. It was awesome. 

But I love you guys!!! miss you all tons!!!

Love

Elder Hamm

Yeah, don't look to closely at it.  Its literally something of Satan.
This is a festival called Filheira dos reis.  

Just some thoughts

This is W, a recent convert's nephew.  We prayed and fasted and he got permission to be baptized.
This is our excited face to be baptized!


How was your holiday cooking?  it was almost all barbeque which is about the best thing in the world. In Brasil Barbeque is like you get some charcol and put some nice cuts of meat on the grill with just rock salt. They have some flavored rock salt which is good but there is a huge debate about using it because if you put flavoring on it, it would be like any other carne just cooked over a grill. But I like the flavored rock salt and some Alcatra or Picanha, a good chicken wing cooked to a dark brown. oh its good enough to eat the bones and everything. but yeah my mouth is water so im gonna stop. haha 

Did you make something good?  Yeah I made cinnamon rolls with a glaze. it was delicious.  

Do they have fireworks at New Years? Yeah there are a bunch of fire works always going off here. and they are sooo cheap! In one area where we work they were trying to sell me 12 of those morter bombs that shoots into the air for like 30 Reais. And when I explained that we are misisonaries he was like alright 25 Reais. Im like DUDE DONT TEMPT ME. haha but I did buy a few little things here and there to have a little fun ;)   haha 

So yeah this week was super cool! We taught a lot of people who really felt the spirit and accepted the invite to be baptised. We are working a lot with the members and they are giving us alot of good references so that reallllly reallly helps the work along. We are also doing alot of family nights with members and investigators which is helping a lot with the members being excited about missionary work and also the members. 

Something really hard to deal with these days is the misunderstanding of the bible. I am getting realllllly tired of trying to explain to someone about how God and jesus and the Holy Ghost are 3 personages and about how Jesus has a body of flesh and bone and stuff like that. THERE ARE LITERALLY 1,000 EXAMPLES IN THE BIBLE OF BOTH THESE THINGS. it comes to the point where im just sad. Sad that so many people dont understand the Bible. Sad that churches preach this. Sad that people dont open the bible to actually read it and just take it for whatever Paster says. If people would actually read the bible, like really READ it to know if it was true and to try and find the Church of Jesus Christ, they would find it. "Seek and ye shall find." that is a promise in the Bible. I dunno. I will spare you the rest of my rant but just know The plain and simple truths are in the Bible. They aren´t hidden or secretly worded. All scripture is interpreted through the holy ghost and if you pray before you read the bible, the Lord will reveal the plain and simple truths to you. It is that easy.

So the rant is pretty much because of one thing that happened this week. We went to AC's house (a recent convert) and her parents go to a different church but I count her mom like my aunt. Shes the best and every time she sees me, she wants to give me a hug and so I have to try and fight the same feelings and not hug her even though shes like 48ish. shes the best. So obviously I love her and want the best for her. But everytime we teach like a 5 minute lesson she has a million questions, which is good it means shes learning, and, well, if you think about it this restoration started with a question too, sooo..... But her questions are doubts her pastor put into her head. She keeps putting into her head, wrong ideas about the basic truths. And when I tell her that that is wrong and show her in the bible where its written she gets this face that is so sad and so confused.  It makes me so sad!  She is so lost and I wanna help her so bad but when you get the wrong information fed to you for the last 40 years of your life its hard to take them out of your head. 

Missionary work is so important. SO SO Important. So important that (insert a not so basic truth here) John the beloved and 3 Nephites wanted to stay here on the earth untill Christ comes again in order to bring more lost souls unto him! It was the most unselfish and loving thing they could ever do. Two years isnt a lot of time but it didnt start in 2014 nor will it end in 2016. We have the basic truths, we have ANOTHER testament of Jesus Christ, and we have to share that. That is our duty, that is our responsibility. When you really understand Jesus Christ and his purpose, you want to share that with others. Its not that we hate other churches and only we get to be saved. But we want to help others have the joy we have and help others know our Savior like we do. That's the love I´ve developed on the mission. 

But yeah. that was kinda my week. Ive been studying alot and its been really good. I love you guys!! I miss you guys so much!! hope you all are doing well!!

Love,

Elder Hamm

Some stuff to mix into açai

AÇAI!!!! WOOOOOO