meowowowowow

welp, that elder with whom I was working a ton got emergency transfered because of some reorganization in the mish. I've got to stop saying that I enjoy working with people.

We also got DVD players from church headquarters. It is preeeeetty sweet. We are only allowed to watch missionary training videos that they also sent us, but sometimes that is a whole lot more interesting than just doing a ton of practices all day. So I am happy. We are allowed to watch "the district 1" and "the district 2" which is like 2 documentaries that the church did about a district of missionaries for a transfer that highlights the different techniques that they use to transmit our messages and how we can help be people be happier and blah blah blah. It is oddly interesting to me. Like I am pretty addicted to be honest to these DVD's already. Sometimes our lunches fall through and we literally run home to make lunch and be able to watch the DVD's while we eat and then have like 15 minutes to talk about how we can apply some principle that we learned or something. Pretty nerdy I know. And by that I meant: PRETTY. AWESOME.

In other news, we had 8 people's baptisms fall through this month. And all of the reasons were rediculous and so that was pretty tough. We explain to everyone from the very beginning that we are there to help them realize their desires and be happy in a way that lasts by following our fearless leader (Jesus Christ), but somewhere along the way it seems like people decide that they know a better way or that it is too hard. We had this dude just be like "I am giving up" because he said that he doesn't care if he is happy or not. Also lots of people have been telling us that they know that what we teach is 100% true because when they prayed/pray about it God confirms it's truth to them, but that they were raised in another environment where they became used to not having to follow anything, and so they would rather not make any decision to act or follow Christ in any real way. They would rather make themselves believe that they "have him in their hearts" and that is what matters as if God is some kind of psycologist that just wants to make everyone feel happy and isn't looking for progress of any kind on our part.

If anybody reads the bible they will see that that mindset probably won't lead them to any significant source of lasting happiness. In fact, the book of James says that that idea of "I have faith but I don't do anything about it" isn't even real. It is that whole "faith without works is dead" thing. Christ commanded us to follow commandments for a reason, and in the book of revelation he says that we are like a glass of water, and if we are lukewarm then he spits us out. Obviously he doesn't want perfection right away, and there is such thing as repentance, but he wants us to decide to follow what we feel. To know in your heart what church Christ organized and which he is guiding and then to just be like "well, that is cool, but i don't care enough to do anything because I am afraid of family members or I've been taught something else and I trust that more than these new feeling that are coming from God" is pretty lukewarm. Luckily everyone can always change. All they need to do is decide and change. Hopefully one day they will.

One ballin' example of someone who did that was Saul from the bible. That dude had been taught to do a bunch of bad stuff, but when he got something more from heaven the guy took it and ran with it. So yeah, I wish people could be a little more courageous and follow God.

It is tough though. Following something spiritual, be it real or not, is not easy. It is a pretty lonesome life sometimes, as it keeps you from following the common trend of constantly making the same mistakes over and over again and not caring because you think you were born that way. It makes you stretch and reach for divine potential and sadly you end up being super weird and having no friends because that is just not normal. So I can see why a normal person wouldn't want to accept the invitation to be happier through following Christ. It is happy, but uncomfortable sometimes. Luckily we have the promise that our captian of old will be on our right and our left with angles round about us to bear us up and the spirit of comfort in our hearts.

But on a funny note... my hair is getting pretty long. I am gonna just cut it all off today. I was just doing this crazy hard core nerd part to make it less noticeable and slicking it back to make it look shorter. It is straight up James E. Faust style, but red. So just look him up to see what I look like.

Did you guys ever get that DVD of pictures I sent in the mail? I sent it like 5 or 6 months ago...

someone on our street turned 18 and had a crazy party untill 5 in the morning and it was so loud that we couldn't sleep. Well actually, I slept no problem. But my comp didn't sleep and he is pretty tired, so same thing. One thing he said was at one point he heard the DJ they had say, "ALL THE WEMON GET IN A CIRCLE... ARE YOU READY FOR THE GO-GO BOYS?!?!?" and then a bunch of techno started and they were all screaming and stuff. I was asleep so it may be true or not, but the way he explained it was hilarious because it was all in portuguese except the name Go-Go Boys. "Faça um círculo com a mulherada... VOCÊS ESTÃO PRONTAS PARA VER OS GO-GO BOYS!??!" Maybe it was a you had to be there thing....

Welp, times up. I am going to go buy some more oatmeal for my breakfasts this week.

ICH LIEBE DICH.

alls yalls.

until next week my