Hey family!                                                                                                         11-2-2011

That’s so cool that Nick was baptized, that punk.  Tell him good work!  And that I hope he goes to Brazil on a mission someday!  It's also cool that Sam and Cassan will be heading to Hawaii, I'll certainly head on over there when I get back, and swim and surf and stuff.  In regards to the statement on the news about gas pumps being the dirtiest item to touch for bacteria and germs,  I think there’s a ton of things I've touched here in brazil that are WAY dirtier than ANY gas pump handle!  (I’m just building up my immunity for the end of the world.)  My new companion keeps talking about home and stuff and it's starting to make me homesick, luckily I think we'll be transferred.  He's starting to be a buddy more than a working buddy, so it'd be better if we were separated so that we both could work unhindered.  The mission's awesome, I’m learning a lot!  It's such a great blessing to see how much the Lord helps us out with our goals and our desires, so that we can become more like the Savior.  I know what you mean about reverence, there was one guy here that says everything on his mind.  I was sitting with him on his second sacrament meeting, and all meeting he was telling me about how irreverent everything's going.  Telling me that it was like we were in a bar or convenience store.  And because of that, he has doubts that this is the church of Christ, and didn’t accept our invitation to be baptized.  Reverence is something SO important.  Anyways you should let me know Keenans email address and not his mailing address. 

Im not too sure what I want for Christmas.  I bought a guitar btw.  It was super cheap.  So now I have something to do other than sleep and play soccer on P-Days.

We had our two baptisms last Sunday and Mateus got way soft and didn’t get wet, But he should be baptized soon, just some more work.

Anyways, I love you guys keep up the prayers and the missionary work on your end and i'll keep it up on this end also.

Elder Williams

Baptism of Karine and Lourdes

Wow! Another Letter from Peter (to Dad)...

Hey Dad,                                                                                              10-26-11

Thanks for the email.  It's steadily getting hotter and hotter and the days are getting longer and longer.  They have day light savings time here as well.  Daylight savings sucks as a missionary, sleeping an hour less!  We're gonna have three baptisms this Sunday.  It’s going to be my first baptisms since becoming senior, I’m pretty stoked.  My new companion arrived sick.  He almost had pneumonia.  So I've decided I’m gonna swim a ton when I get back home.  The desire to go swimming has been growing more since I’m away from the water.  I still get the butterflies in the stomach effect when I think about the swim meets I used to compete in.  So I’m gonna train a ton and swim for BYU or something.  It's cool that you missionaries had a radio station when you were on your mission in Indonesia.  We should probably get that going, but everybody here knows what we do, so they probably wouldn’t really listen a whole lot. Never-the-less, I would be cool to give the first vision and then invite everyone to be baptized over the radio! 

It is so true that everyone in the world could be drawn to into the gospel if the wards and branches would do a more active part in missionary work.  If members of the church were unified with the missionaries, the growth would occur a lot quicker.  That's what we're trying to do here in my area.  We are trying to know what both “hands” are doing.  Anyways, time to write the other family members, love you dad.

Elder Williams

Peter's Guide on How to Win Over Contacts...

Hey family,                                                                                                                                     10-26-11

Thanks for the letter mom and family, this week's gonna be great.  My new companion didn’t go to the temple last week because of transfers, so he complained and we went again today.  We should have three baptisms this week (Pray for them, Lourdes, Karine, and Mateus).  The house is looking way legit.  It's looking like the house of Carlos Martins (the 4th most richest guys in the world), he lives in this zone so I went over there to eat lunch (he’s a member).  It was sweet.  Some security guy let us in.  Anyways, I’m super jealous that you guys were all there Texas together, I've never been there yet.  It's cool the Mal has her own nickname (roller-blading mamma) in the neighborhood.  Good job Mal!  Congratulations to Sam for graduating boot camp!  Here I've been learning that a lot of missionary work is like acting, but acting with the spirit.  It's kind of like what I said to you that one day:  If you’re not happy, act like you are and you'll be happy!  It's the same thing with this missionary work.  If we act like we're doing a “big deal”, the Lord can use the Spirit through us with our confidence and give deeper meaning to our messages.  It’s so true that the mission prepares us for life!  It's teaching me how to persuade people to do what I (and the Lord) thinks they should do.  Under the influence of the spirit, just use your mind, use some teaching, meeting, finding, 'buttering-up' skills and your set  I’m nowhere close to getting them all mastered yet, but I got a good idea of what to do now, in another language too.  Sweet huh?  Well I’m gonna go take a nap now, I love you guys a ton! 

Elder Williams

PS. Go to the temple a ton…it rocks!

More Pictures from Peter!

      Peter and his Companion after the Temple!

  

Campinas Temple

(cool pic!)

Hey family!                                                                                                        10-16-2011

So when we planned our Pday sacrifice, we didn’t know that we were to go the temple today.  Soo next week we should sacrifice our PDay.  The temple was awesome.  I’m pretty blessed to have gone this many times in the months.  I got some sweet pics of it.  Hey so we got a call yesterday, and we found out that my companion will leave on an emergency transfer.  I don’t know what happened in the other area. One of the elders there must have fought with each other.  Anyways, Elder Lima will arrive tomorrow and I'll say goodbye to Elder Madeira.  Elder Madeira was awesome.  Elder Lima is pretty legit as well though.  He was in my zone last area and we had some divisions together.  So we know each other already.  Anyways, something that’s probably pretty cool for you guys to hear is that your guys' prayers helped Edinei a ton.  He returned back to his wife and is trying to stop smoking now and will probably end up being baptised!  But he's not from our area, but its not that big of a deal.  Anyways, can you guys pray for Loudes and Karine (Kareeney)? They will be Baptized this 30th but Karine is having some problems in the lungs and will have to have surgery.  Anyways, I should probably get going, we have to teach someone early today.

Love,

Elder Williams

Peter wrote really quickly tonight!

Hey family!                                                                                                                         10-14-11

Thanks for the email!  It’s probably a good idea to put in the blinds in my room.  It'll be good for when I get back and sleep for three days or so.  Hey so tomorrows my birthday, cool huh?!  We got a cake lined up and everything.  Also we should be marking a ton of baptisms tomorrow.  So last PDay was a holiday so I couldn’t write and yesterday we were doing a service project, which was basically just cleaning trash up.  And remember that I won’t have a PDay next Wednesday.  We're starting and doing a ton of crazy goals and ideas that should help out this area.

Soo, my whole zone found out that I’m sleeping in baptism clothes every night, some started to laugh at us and others are seeing the wisdom behind it and are starting to do it as well.  Pretty soon I reckon that our whole mission will start sleeping in the baptism jump-up suits.  Pretty cool huh? 

So I should get going, we have to work today still.

Oh and they don’t have ukuleles here in Brazil, but I'll gladly accept any kind of money =].

(Hey dad thanks! Now I feel good 'n old. Hey so when are you gonna share some ideas with me? What are some other things that you guys did on the mission? I bet you guys never slept in baptism clothes. Anyways, I think I’m gonna start swimming hardcore when I get back home. You should start practicing right now so that you can be up to me level when I get back. Anyways, love you dad! )

Love you guys!

Elder Williams

 

Peter sacrificed his P-Day today for the Lord. He will write again next week.

OOPS! Here is another letter from Peter to read...

Hey dad thanks for the email!                                                Oct 5, 2011

I liked your garden analogy about growing in the Lord’s garden.  It was pretty sweet.  So it's true I’ll admit, I can feel myself changing, but I'd imagine it’s for the better.  It's crazy what a prayer or two can do if you really poor the heart and soul out.  This last general conference was rockin'.  I really liked the talk by Packer that discussed memorizing scriptures.  It reinforced the necessity of memorizing scriptures.  So I changed what I was doing;  I’m going to memorize them in English I think.  This way it'll help me out after the mission as well.  I am certain that all the apostles and prophets memorized the Book of Mormon and since they gave that perfect example, why shouldn’t we do the same? 
The house looks freakin good!  Mom sent me some pictures and I really like what I've seen.  Maybe if you guys start later than sooner on the outside landscaping I can help when I get back.  But I got some pretty crazy plans to get into a regime when I head back.  One thing that I’m learning here is the importance of making goals.  A lot of members don't recognize the importance of goal setting.  So for this Elder Madeira and I are visiting all the members and setting goals with them, the paper is called “Plan of Action with the Lord”.  We're doing this with the intention of having them make contacts in the street and having a goal of their own baptisms here.  If they find someone and go with us every time to teach  new investigators, I think it'll be really effective.  (Pass it along with the missionaries there if you want).  Anyways, yeah, about goal setting: I’m finding it really important to make goals.  And I’ve got a ton of plans for when I get back to develop talents and be prepared to fulfill my patriarchal blessing.

One book you should check out that I’m reading in my spare time (I can’t read it during personal study) is "Invoking the Powers of Heaven".  It’s pretty sweet.  And the usual standard works and stuff.  How’s the workout regime going?  Did you build up those muscles to the same size of mine when I left?  Good luck.

Well I gotta go.  Love you dad!

Elder Williams