Monday, December 23, 2013

Christmastime is Here, too


Me and probably the two most adorable brazillian kids you´ll ever find.

Well.... Kindof

Hello my beautiful friends and Family. I´m not even sure what to putin this letter since I´ll be talking to you all in only 2 days. but we´ll see what pops into my head. My Trainer Elder Grow finished up his mission last week and had a chance to call me the day he flew home. It was pretty cool to talk to him and have a chance to say one
last good bye. He was a great trainer and we got along super well.

Words can´t begin to describe how different Christmas is here in Brazil. The Spirit of Christmas is still strong and prevalent, but I never imagined I´d have a Christmas that was SO HOT. It´s kind of weird to get used to, but I´m loving it. Elder Leite and I have been doing lots of street contacts with people and it gives us a wonderful
opportunity to share a  short christmas message with brazillians in the street. Yesterday, the  stake we´re serving in had a Christmas devotional. They arranged a choir from all the members here and sang lots of christmas songs (One was even in English). Every chance I get, I try to play that Jon Schmidt christmas song on the piano. Not many people have pianos here. Actually, like no one, just the church buildings.

Bruno and Ranna are still progressing, but this week was a little tough. Bruno´s grandmother died at the beginning of the week, and although that gives us a wonderful chance to teach the Plan of Salvation and testify that our mortal life is only a small step of God´s devine plan for his children, he became really busy visiting
with family, planning a funeral, and since he still had to work, we didn´t have many chances to pass by there and teach a lesson.

I think I´ve talked about this other couple, Jacqueline and Alexandre, but their starting to do really well and moving a lot closer towards being married and being baptized. (Jacqueline is the girl who I said looked just like Hannah Jensen, only Brazillian. I think I have a photo I can post). Her parents were baptized 4 months ago and she recognized a big difference in their life that gave her and Alexandre and interest to investigate the church. Although they don´t live in our boundaries, they often visit her parents and we get a chance to teach them. They both REALLY want to get baptized, but are in the process of doing the papers necessary to get married. We´ve been giving them goals and steps to follow, and with  the help of JAcqueline´s parents (Aguinalda and Rogerio), we´re praying and hoping that the process can be speedy and fast for them to progress towards baptism.

I can´t think of other big news going on, and I figure if something comes to mind, I´m talking to the fam in only 2 DAYS!!!!!! I´m super crazy excited. Speaking english. Seeing the new car. Seeing snow. Seeing my wonderful family. You can do it, Elder Braun, just two more days. I love you all and can´t wait to see how much you´ve grown these past few months!

Love,
Elder Braun

PS I made a skype account, ElderBraun, which I´ll use to talk to yáll on Wednesday. Get all of your questions ready!! I´m ready to give the inside scoop on all things Brazil! If you could try and add me as a contact before the call, that should make things a bit easier. I also will not guarantee that our call will start at exactly 8. It will probably be a bit later since 4 missionaries will be using the same internet and we´ll be taking turns.


Photo with Rogerio, Elder Leite, Jacqueline, Me, and Aguinalda

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