Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things; yea, behold, many mighty miracles we have wrought in this land, for which we will praise his name forever. Alma 26:12

Tuesday, April 22, 2014

This house needs much more than a superficial cleaning...

I can't believe my first transfer in Brasil is already coming to an end! This week we received some good news and some not so good news. Good news is that President Fusco approved the house! Bad news is that the area authorities in Sao Paulo didn't.. The house was listed for R$800, which is the cheapest we've been able to find with everything that we're required to have by R$200, but our max allowed is R$700. Our secretary put in an offer for R$700 and the owner turned it down. The Secretary called Sao Paulo to see if they would raise the limit here but, no luck, they said no. So yep. We have to start looking for houses again this week. I never thought that this would have taken anywhere near the amount of time its taken. 

Yesterday, we only had 3 people at church (we have almost 15 members). The Group President and his family (He's the owner of the house) and an awesome member that we just found about a week ago, named Manuel and he lives over 45 minutes away (walking). President Zuza was the President 7 years ago and he just remembered about him. We walk to that area frequently.  It's such a testimony builder to see how strong someone can still be without having the influence of the church in their life for over 7 years (this area was closed 7 years ago). No one knows why it was closed for sure. But from what I've heard, the members basically all hated each other and after the first set of missionaries were here, they started to dislike the missionaries as well. In total, before we were here, Salgueiro was only open for like 2 or 3 transfers. The problem for the members is that our house is at the very edge of our city. Most members live well over 30 minutes away from us and most don't have cars and do have children. One of our members told us that she and her family probably wouldn't be coming to church anymore until we have a new house (which might actually be a blessing because we only have 5 chairs haha). She said that she doesn't think our house is safe for their kids. 


President Zuza just moved back here a couple months ago. He moved to Trinidad a couple of years ago and served as branch president there. The house that we're living in was closed up / abandoned from the time he moved away to the time we entered there on my birthday. We spend over 4 hours every Saturday cleaning and fixing up for church. Unfortunately, in the eyes of the members, this house needs much more than a superficial cleaning. Keep us and our house hunting in your prayers. There are some MASSIVE catholic churches here. We have to have like 70 active members (at least half men) to get a church building. I really feel like this is the week that we'll find a good house.


Not sure about the package. Transfers are next week and I'll recieve any mail thats made it here within a week or 2 after that. It took almost 3 months for Elder Constatinos last companion to recieve a package from Texas. Elder Anderson (Apostle) will be coming to / speaking to our mission at the end of may. Best part? He cant speak Portuguese haha. I can only send 1 pic today :/. I plugged my card into the computer, uploaded a pic, and then the computer started dumping files onto my card.... These computers are full of viruses. 


Love you!!!!


Elder Hamstead