As Olimpiadas Tem Chegado!

 Animadão para a reuniãozão

 In front of the chapel, clearly

 Opa!

 Off to church

 Elder Didericksen's in town!

 Two of my favorite things!!

 Time to cut my own cabelo

 Making some eggs

 With tomatos and fresh green beans....healthy demais!

Sunrise in Goiânia

For the last two months, the little tv in the elevator of our office building showed a daily countdown to the Olympics (or in Brazil, Olimpiadas). I remember when we had 57 days remaining. That time flew and now…as Olympiadas tem chegado! Every TV in the city has them on and everybody is excited. We don’t watch them, but we get updates from the members haha. It’s really cool to be here with such a big event going on!

The best part of this week was our multi-zone conference with Presidente and Sister Buhrer on Thursday. It was awesome! Presidente presented his vision and goals for the mission. He’s inspired! He wants us to have Preach My Gospel in our bones and veins, focus on the Book of Mormon as the powerful instrument of conversion, and, according to his most-quoted scripture, D&C 82:10 (I, the Lord, am bound when ye do what I say; but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise) obey always. His focus of conversion is not the investigators, but ourselves. "Don't study for the investigators," he said, "Study for you—you are the first convert!" As we convert ourselves—no, I’ll adapt this personally—as I convert myself and grow in my conviction of the restored gospel’s truthfulness, I will have the power to bear firm testimony and the Holy Ghost will confirm my words to the people I teach. No logical explanation, no matter how eloquently crafted and presented, of the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, eternal families, the Priesthood, other restored truths and, above all, the Savior Jesus Christ, could make anyone develop a personal, spiritual testimony of them. However, simple, powerful testimony, from the converted heart can lead souls to feel the Spirit and start building a foundation of faith in Christ and his gospel.

The principle of personal conversion on the mission, as Presidente Bührer explained, relates directly to D&C 18:16: “And now, if your joy will be great with one soul that you have brought unto me into the kingdom of my Father, how great will be your joy if you should bring many souls unto me.”

The “one soul” isn’t one baptism. It’s you! Elder Holland explained this once, that as missionaries, there is one sure convert of your mission, you, and there is no excuse for that not happening!  I feel that I have grown greatly in my conversion to the gospel this past year and I want to grow even more in this last year of my mission. Man, it's been awesome to focus so much on what really matters—o evangelho eterno!

Elder Trent, who was the financial secretary one year ago and who finished his mission in December, came to visit Goiânia! It was cool to see him and his family and was tough trying to speak English with them haha. I didn't have my camera with me or I would have gotten a picture. That's one thing that's pretty chato here: I can't bring my camera everywhere because it might get robbed. I would have like 3 times as many cool pictures to send you guys if it weren't that way here. Anyway, other than that detail, Brasil's pretty great.

One piece of advice that Dad gave me at the beginning of my mission is the following: "If you are becoming who the Lord wants you to become, you will be doing the work the way He wants you to do it." I've been thinking about that a lot lately. Lots of times I don't know if I'm doing exactly what I should be, if I should focus more on this or that or try something new or if I'm just completely missing things I should be learning, etc..., but I know and feel that I'm becoming to converted more fully to the Lord, and that reassures me. Thanks for that, Dad!

Vide é boa, o evangelho é verdadeiro, estou feliz. Amo vocês! Tenham uma boa semana. Abraço!

Elder Anderson