Thus begins the mid-mission mark!

 Hello!  I would like to apologize in my tardiness in writing this last email.  I did not realize how long it really was before I have been able to do a full update.  As always, we have had a plate full of work and a lot of things to all juggle at the same time.  And so, without further ado, this email will be a compilation of the people and events over the last 3-4 weeks.  VAMOS LÀ!!!  

Firstly, over the last bit of the mission, we have been teaching some amazing people!! Let me explain them.  

The first is Ana Clara, who was a girl who has already had connections to the church for a long time.  She was over on the other side of the Rio bay when she ran into two of our secretarys.  She immediately recognized the missionaries, as she had already been to the temple open house.  And she lives in our area! That very next day we marked a lesson, and we taught her about the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ! We taught her about the prophet Joseph Smith and the importance of prophets and the Book of Mormon.  Only, she already knew about it all.  And she had already read half of the Book of Mormon and already prayed about it and received an answer that it is true!  WOAH!  So, that's a lot of the first steps already done.  And so we invited her to baptism that very same lesson.  She accepted!!  Since then we have taught 2 more lessons, and she has very very good questions that are always amazing.  She came to church for the first time last Sunday, and everyone in the ward was very welcoming to her thank goodness.  And she is 19 years old as well, so it is really easy for me and Elder Oliveria to connect with her!  She won't be able to be baptized in the ward until next transfer unfortunately, because she will be traveling for the next month, but we are going to be doing video calls with her throughout the month to help her prepare for her baptism! 

The next is Delia! She is a woman who we found randomly on the street.  She was looking at us a little strangely, and so we decided to talk with her and gave her a BoM really fast, as her Uber had already arrived.  We thought it would never develop, until she came to church that Sunday. She later told us the Uber revealed he was a member of the church as well, so she took that as a sign and came. She has now come 3 times, and again has amazing questions and we meet with her weekly.  As well, she has read 25% of the Book of Mormon.  We will be inviting her to baptism during our next lesson.  

Then finally and notably are Leninha and Luciano.  Leninha is a woman who is AMAZING, and she cooks SO much food, and she will be baptized later TODAY!  And she has known the church for over 15 years, and her and her recent husband have finally gotten married and now they will be baptized today.  They are a legend here in the ward, because all of the assistants for the last 2-3 years have known them and taught them, and me and Elder Oliveira are the lucky ones to finally help them make the covenant!  We will be doing a broadcast though for the scores of people who want to watch their baptism.  I will post all the pictures next week, I do promise.  

So yes, there are some awesome people in our teaching pool.  When we haven't been teaching these people, we have been doing some finding though our members and also working on the street.  There has been a lot of meh work that we have done on the streets, just because there isn't a whole ton of people on the immediate streets who are interested in the gospel unfortunately.  However, the more we do contacts in hope and faith, the more our members are helping us with really good referrals and we are receiving many good blessings.  

Some other things that happened was my celebration of one year on the mission! I celebrated by getting Açai and finally experimenting Taco Bell here in Brasil.  (Spoiler, it's basically the same and a little more expensive here but it's different so I enjoyed it!)  

Me and Elder Bush from my Florida Mission did an exchange and we found a hungarian man, and we talked in Portugeuse and English to him.  That's basically it.  But it was a very strange and interesting experience.  

One of the P days, I returned back to the Christ Redentor statue with Elder Oliveira before he will go home!  There were plenty of signs about not feeding the animals, and yet we saw a monkey with a bag of manufactured popcorn.  So much for caution signs.  

Zone P day!  Churrasco!!

As I am reading through my journal here to try and do some updates, I realize that there are a lot of interesting, and somewhat weird stories. I will not share them all here, but if you do want to hear some more details, just shoot me an email and we'll talk alright?

I realize as I haven't been able to do updates, I'll just say what we have been doing.  We have been doing a lot of exchanges.  Every single Thursday is our Assistant Day where we call all of the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders.  Our P day has been moving around a lot.  We did 2 service projects, one move and one to help refurbish a house after a fire.  And let me tell you, taking a refrigerator through a narrow favela staircase is an experience I can only say is possible in Rio de Janeiro.  

Also! Two of our ward members got married and I was asked to play piano at the wedding!  It was shore and sweet and a very memorable night I am sure for them.  I played for all of 50 seconds during the procession but I was still nerve wracked, cause it's THEIR special day.  But all went well!  

We are coming up here at the end of the transfer on Tuesday.  It means that my companion, Elder Oliveira is leaving. He has been an amazing help to me in our positions here, and in the area, and so it will be a sad day to see him leave.  But I am grateful for him and excited for him to move onto a new area and work on this new 'transfer'.  I know I'll stay here in the area (President has told me that much) but as for a new companion, it is all up in the air!  

One thing, is I feel like as much as I could try to describe to all of you at home about the spiritual growth and learning that I am experiencing here, I know that it could arrive to the point that I would want it to.  There is so much I am learning and feeling every single day through my studies, prayers, and the conversion of the people we are teaching.  It is the greatest blessing in my life.  In short, I would like to share my personal thoughts over the last couple weeks in terms of a more spiritual aspect.  

First off, I did a brief study this week for one of our district councils.  I looked at Repentance.  One of the key phrases that stood out to me is that repentance can change the way we view God, ourselves, and the world. So often the world is working in the complete opposite direction.  We can see the world as correct, and the gospel as the one as incorrect and outdated.  OR, we can take some time to repent unto the Lord and find his will.  That is when we can find for ourselves that the gospel is the one that is, and always will be true and the correct path in our lives.  So, not only is repentance a remission of sins, but it helps us in our viewpoints.  And it's not always easy.  I mean, we live in the world.  We live in the trudge and sludge where Satan has been given so much power.  But though the atoning power and grace of Jesus Christ, we can change our viewpoint and see what God wants us to see.  Who we can become.  Our divine potential.  The love that God has.  His perspective and understanding.  His love. All of that is possible through Jesus Christ.  

Ephesians 1: 17-18

17 That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of ^awisdom and ^brevelation in the knowledge of him:

18 The eyes of your ^aunderstanding being ^benlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the ^criches of the glory of his ^dinheritance in the saints,

I would like to share my testimony and truth of these things.  With that, I would wish you all a very happy Saturday and week.  For those of you out in the mission field, I love and appreciate the work you are doing. And I am cheering you on! And for those at home, know that I love and appreciate the support that you have sent me.  Until the next week, with a new companion, and a new transfer to grow and learn!  

Elder Moss 

RJ, Brasil