Hey Everyone!
Sorry about the lateness. Apparently Calheta has
this tradition where the power goes out Monday morning and NEVER returns. Maybe
not but it’s a bit ridiculous. Last week I was so late because the power didn’t
come back until 5:00. Yesterday the power was gone until around 7:00 so we
couldn’t use Internet until today. Water comes and goes as it pleases as well
so yesterday we didn’t do a whole lot of anything. I did read a lot in
"Jesus the Christ" though. Really good book, although it is very hard
to read. James E. Talmage uses some pretty intense language that is a little
more difficult to understand. But I guess when it comes to writing about the Savior,
nothing else would really do it justice. I really learned a lot though and I
wish I had more time to study it. Time... man we need more time here. EVERYONE
and their goat wants to talk to us but we just don’t have enough hours in
the day. We are going to start a “Principles of the Gospel” class every Tuesday
and Thursday night at the church here and we should have really good attendance
to that. Last week we taught a lesson at the church with 17 PEOPLE!!! Holy
smokes! Seriously though, we’ve never done a door contact and yet we have over
60 people that we have taught at least once. It’s pretty amazing to be a part
of this. We will be having 3 baptisms this weekend, the first three people to
be baptized in Calheta. It’s gonna be a very special week. President Oliveira
and a bunch of the leaders from the stake will be there. We’ve got a lot of
work to do though because our goal is to open up a branch here soon. We’re
still going to Assomada for church because of lack of materials but we’re
hoping to start here, maybe this week.
Saturday we cleaned the beach behind out house.
We had a bunch of members from Praia and Assomada, the missionaries from
Assomada and some of our investigators come out to clean the beach. One of our
investigators, who works at the Government Building, organized everything for
us and it turned out really good. The only thing was we used brooms to clean
it. Like the brooms you would use to sweep the garage or something like that.
Who would have guessed that you could clean a beach with a broom? Certainly not
me but it worked and it looks a lot better. We also cleaned the area that we
will use as the baptismal font... IN THE OCEAN!! It’s gonna be so cool! I’m
pretty excited. Other than that though, not much is new. We’re working really
hard and I am exhausted but things are slowly falling into order. We have to
organize our time better so that we don’t keep moving back and forth between
areas in the city... Calheta is huge! Everyone is getting super excited and I
think I’ve given out more Book of Mormons these past two weeks than I have in
my entire mission combined. It’s kind of cool seeing people walking down the
streets, carrying a Book of Mormon.
Time
really goes by too fast. When I think about it, I can’t believe I’ve been here
for as long as I have. Yet, I’ve already seen so many miracles and so many
amazing things. It’s a good thing I still have over a year to go. It’s a really
good feeling to go back to Assomada on Sundays and see the people that I had
been working with active in the church and going strong. Two of my recent
converts gave talks in church and they both have really strong testimonies.
This really confirms to me even more the power and blessings that come from the
gospel of Christ. Also, Assomada is officially a ward now; they now have a
bishop. Pretty cool stuff. Well, I can’t really think of anything else to
write. I hope the end of school goes well. Love you all!
Elder Dola
