2017!

Another picture from the baptism last week!

 Midnight fireworks from our room window—FELIZ ANO NOVO!

Kodiak Cakes are now the best pancakes in Brasil!

The only full year I might ever spend outside of the United States ended this week.  I clearly remember December 31, 2015 because I thought about how crazy it was to be beginning the first full year of my life in a foreign country, and since that day when I thought that, time has flowwwwwwn. It was the greatest year of my life! I grew and learned so much. This mission is incredible even though I haven’t gone to school in a year and a half, I’ve learned more in this time that will contribute to my mortal life than in 5 years of school. There are so many blessings I could fill pages, but maybe I won’t write all of them this week---it would take all P-Day to write the first third!

This week we had an awesome leadership meeting with President and Sister Buhrer. They’re great. President spoke a lot about obedience—it really is important. He taught us how to lead a good zone meeting and gave us counsel on how to lead our zones. Also, we were told the transfers that will happen this week. E. Gomez is returning to Guatemala after two solid years and my new companion will be Elder Brandoa from Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.

I’m really excited to work with him, and I hope the rest of the changes in the zone will help. E. Brandao, like E. Gomez, is at the end of his mission and so I’ll be the last companion of two missionaries in a row haha. It’ll be great. It’s crazy that now I have only 4 more transfers. Time flies, and I think it flies more like a NASA space shuttle than a Brazilian toucan.

I think cousin McKay in Taiwan explains a six-week transfer very well in the following quote from one of his weekly emails, “We were just talking about how crazy time is out here. It seemed that when we were being trained, a transfer of six weeks was so long. It seemed to have a full other world packed into those six weeks. Now being in the field for a while, you blink your eyes and six weeks go by. It seems that the same amount of miracles, blessings, stories, salvation is still packed in, BUT TIME FLIES. So strange. Anyways, transfers come and go.”

One thing I often think here is this: I wish I could copy my desire to work and paste it into the minds and hearts of other missionaries. Well, it certainly doesn’t work like that. Anyway, a mission is an opportunity to learn how to work with various people.

This week my sister mission ends! The sisters that got here with me will be going home. Doido! If 2 years is fast then 18 months if really, really fast.

As for goals this year, I haven’t had much success in reaching conclusions about my New Year’s resolutions. The only solid goal I’ve made so far is to write in my journal every day until the end of my mission. I was only writing 1-3 days a week, and I want to be able to remember well each day I had during my mission. I’m 100% with this goal so far (easy—only one full day has passed!).

I’m excited for 2017, for the marvelous work of the Lord to be done here in Patos de Minas, and for another great transfer of my mission. I love the gospel of Jesus Christ!

Elder Anderson