Osvaldo Cruz-Week Four

This past week was very peaceful. It has been raining a lot, which is good because it keeps the temperature down when it would regularly be really hot. 

I have in particularly learning about being patient this week. We have been really working hard, but things just have not be lining up with our investigators. It is been a real exercise of faith that Heavenly Father has a plan for each of these people we are teaching and that some times that means we have to just keep trying until the Spirit is right. 

We have been visiting a less active member in the ward who owns a bakery. He is less active but he is super kind to the missionaries and always gives us free stuff to eat. This past week he let me have a go at baking donuts. 

We also confirmed everything this week that starting Saturday, Elder J and I are going to start teaching a English Class in our ward. Elder J is from Guatemala, but he speaks really good English. Our goal is to get members from the community to participate, so we can find new people to teach. I am praying that I can teach my native language after 5 months of Portuguese. 

Funny story of this week. We had an unwelcome guest in our house: a cockroach. Luckily, we were able to kill it quite promptly and then, for what ever reason, started teaching it the first lesson while it was lying there squashed on the kitchen floor. 

All and all things are well in Curitiba. There are truly miracles happen in our mission. It is exciting to be a part of the plan Heavenly Father has for us. 

Love and miss you all. 

--

Elder Pinkney

Osvaldo Cruz-Week Three

This past week was a pretty straight-forward week. We did not really stopped. Elder J was pretty sick at some point, but we did not stop. We have big goals for our area and we want to fulfill them. 

Because of the new year, I also spent a lot of time reflecting on how great a year 2017 was and setting my goals for the coming year. It was good fun.

Something cool that they do in the area here is every Thursday the youth play soccer and vollyball at the stake center. We missionaries are not allowed to play soccer, but we invited an investigator and he came.

On Sunday, the members we ate lunch with decided to change things up and they made hambugers. They were really good and I felt really touched by their effort to bring a little bit of home for me. 

This past week, I have really been learning the importance of the testimonies of members. When it is just missionaries teaching, it is harder for the investigators to grow a testimony because they only focus on the fact that we are missionaries and we are saying all these things because we are trained too. The testimony of a member during the lesson makes all the difference. The people in our area are really tough so the members are our weapons to really get into the hearts of the investigator. 

Hope you all have a great second week of the year. Goods things are happening. 

--

Elder Pinkney

Osvaldo Cruz Week Two

Happy New Years to all. What an exciting year 2017 was and what an exciting year 2018 will be.

On the night of New Years Eve, my companion and I spent the night doing our weekly planning session, which I won´t say that I don´t like weekly planning but it was slow. We went to bed early and that got up 15 minutes before midnight to celebrate the new year. We had a toast (with grape juice) to the new year and exchanged hugs. All and all it was a quiet new year of reflection. 

This past week ,we had the blessing of finding a lot of incredible people. One experience, we clapped our hands at a house early in the week and a lady came out. We introduced ourselves, shared our purpose as missionaries and ask if we could share our message. She said that her husband was not home but that we should come back later in the week. So, we returned later that week and the husband answered the door, let us in, and we started the lesson. O  and J are newly-weds of one month and they have a 6 year old son. They shared a lot about their life with us which was really cool. They were very kind and listen intensively to our lesson. At the end of the lesson, the husband shared with us that he had felt something different that he normal did not feel with other pastors or missionaries that knock at his door. For this reason, he let us and he felt the same feeling during our lesson. It was the Holy Ghost. I left that house praying in my heart that they will receive an answer that our message is true. It was truly a testimony to me that after the many times we tried to shared our message and got rejected this week, there are people here waiting for our message. 

It was truly an fantastic week. A week of reflection. A week to set new goals and plans to have an awesome 2018. 

Thank you to all my friends and family. Love you all. Have a Happy New Years. 

--

Elder Pinkney

Photos include 

Elder L , Elder DP and myself at a meeting

Eating a McFlurry at McDonalds

The baptism of T . The first person I invited to be baptized. Elder L finished the job with his new companion. 

Osvaldo Cruz Week One (a day late)

Note from Elder Pinkney's Mom:

We did receive an email from Elder Pinkney. It arrived the day after Christmas.  Here is it...

Christmas in Brazil:

I was transfer to a different part of the city this past week. I am now in area that is a lot more city like and with a lot more people. My new campion Elder Jerezm, is from Gutelmala. He is a super awesome guy and we get a long really well. He has about one year in the mission. I am still living in a house with four Elders, which is really cool.

This past week, I spent a lot of time getting to know my new area, where everything is, and what buses to take to get places. We did a lot of visiting with the members. Elder J  loves to sing so we did a little musical number for each house we passed through. It was bascially Christmas Caroling and was super awesome fun. 

Christmas Eve here in Brazil was really good. A member invited us over and we ate a lot. It was super good. We ate beans, rice, turkey, salad, and the eqivalent to an ice cream cake. 

All night long for Christmas, there were fireworks in the city. Really loud and made it hard for us to sleep. 

Christmas day rained just about the whole day. We had a regular lunch appointment with a member family who had just returned from visiting some friends in Utah, so they gifted me an authentic Brigham Young Root Beer. (See picture) It was super good. They don´t have Root Beer here in Brazil and for those Brazilians that have tried don´t like it. They all say it tastes like medicie. My compaion from Guatelmale also was not really a fan. 

All and all it was definetly a Christmas to remember. I had the opportunity to reflect a lot on my purpose and to remember the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. More than anything that helped me remember Christ during Christmas.  I am doing the things the He would do to help the people around me. There are many here, just like anywhere, that need the Light and Love of Christ. There are many that are going through trails in their lives and need just a little extra to make it through. I hope and pray that we were that little extra help for the people here as we preached and rejoiced in Christ during this Christmas season. I know He live. I know He loves us. What joy this knowledge brings to me. 

Merry Christmas to all and a Happy New Year,

Com amor, His representative  

Elder Pinkney