It has been another great week here in Kirkland! The miracles keep on coming! I am still so grateful to be here right now.
Monday
After P day ended, we had two great english classes. The first one was with Adei, Rosi, and Thalles. The class went really well, and they are all super nice. It was our first one with them. None of them identify with a specific denomination, but all believe in God and are more than willing to hear our message.
Later that night, we had a really cool double english class. Ana Paula, who we have been teaching for a while, wanted to speak English with her Bolivian friend. So, we decided to team teach with the hermanas. It went super awesome! Ana Paula’s friend, Sheila, is so cool! She is really nice, and loved the Book of Mormon! We are going to start doing this joint English class every Monday. Even though I don’t really speak Spanish, I can understand almost everything.
Tuesday.
On Tuesday, we had district council and interviews with President. It was great. We have a really good district. Everyone wants to be here and participates really well during the meetings. I brought some Brazilian candy (pasoca) that I bought at the Brasil Market, and everyone loved it. During our interviews, President kept on saying how excited he is for us to be working with the Brasilians up here. He is really all in on starting this branch, so that is great!! It was so good to talk with him and see how much he wants this branch to start.
Later that night, we had an English class with Walber. It was so awesome! The English class went really well. We did some grammar, new words, and then we read the first two parts of the Restoration pamphlet in english. Afterwards, we followed up on the Book of Mormon. Walber had read the intro, and he understood it perfectly! He told us everything that it talked about without even looking at the intro. He then talked about how he has doubts that this all happened, but then he read us the last part of the intro that talks about Moroni 10:3-5. He told us that he really liked that because that is how he will know! He literally understood perfectly. We just talked about the importance of praying, reading, and asking. He is progressing really well!
Wednesday
We did some service for a lady named Tamara that I found on Facebook. It was mostly just weeding, but I did get to use a propane tank/torch/flamethrower type thing to crisp some weeds on the driveway, so that was pretty sweet.
We also started to do this new finding idea that we had. I had the idea of making English class flyers and asking the apartment complex offices to post them or email them around. Some of the apartments won’t do it, but we have had a good amount of positive feedback. There have probably been about 6 that are going to send the flyer out to the community email and post it around the complex.
Unfortunately, yesterday, we realized that we wrote our phone number down wrong, so all of the time we spent doing that is wasted because if people are interested, they won’t be able to get in touch with us.
We also went over to the Fowkes’ house. Brother Fowkes served in Curitiba, Brasil, and Sister Fowkes is from Brasil. They want to be a part of the branch! It was so amazing! They are going to be a huge help to us. It was really fun to be over there and talk to them. They also made some Brazilian food for us, including acai! It was great!
Later that night, we had another English class with Ana Paula. It went well. We didn't get to leave much of a message afterwards because we were helping her resolve some problems that she is having. We did talk with her about the Book of Mormon. She read the intro! And some of the pamflet! And she understood! She talked to us about how interesting it is that Moroni and John the Baptist appeared to Joseph Smith. We told her that we would explain more about Joseph Smith next time!
Thursday
We had a really unique experience Thursday afternoon. Ana Paula had a meeting with an immigration lawyer in Renton. We needed to visit people down there anyway, so we went down and worked in Renton. We then went to the meeting with Ana Paula and translated for her. It ended up being 2 and a half hours of translating. Basically, she wanted to see if there was any way she could become a legal citizen. After the meeting, she decided not to try and to just stay here illegally because she would most likely be deported if she tried. It was really interesting to learn all about that process. I was pretty drained mentally afterwards, though.
After that, we had an English class with Bianca and Patricis, and then we shared Ether 12:4 with Mario, Rita, Luisa, and Liv. It was kind of crazy because the Nascimento family came over, but it was good to meet them. We are going to have a big lunch with all of them on Sunday!!
That was followed by English with Walber. We went over a lot of past tense with Walber during english. He is definitely getting more comfortable speaking. At the end, we followed up on 2 Nephi 31. He read, and understood it really well again. He is so prepared. Next time, I think that we will probably teach the Plan of Salvation.
Friday
On Friday,we had two English classes. One was with Haritta, the other was with Rosangela. Haritta’s class went pretty well. She is speaking pretty well and just needs practice. At the end, we read the Introduction to the Book of Mormon.
We then had an alright English class with Rosangela. She just has such a hard time with english. We probably spent 15 minutes trying to pronounce one word. At the end, she started talking about the trouble that she is having. We shared Mosiah 24:14 and talked with her about how the Lord will support her in her trials. We talked about patience and faith. She really loved the scriptures we read.
Saturday
On Saturday, Elder Buhler came and worked with us for the day. His companion, Elder Colingwood, went with Elder taylor. Elder Buhler was in Brasil for one transfer. He is still learning Portuguese. It was really good for him to be with us and get to speak some Portuguese. We had a really good day. We stopped by a bunch of people in Redmond and Bellevue. It was cool to see different zones. We also swung by another Brasilian Market to drop off some of our flyers, and while we were there we bought some more acail.
That night, we had an English class in Bellevue with a guy named Orlando that I found on Facebook. It turns out that he is a member! We were talking with him during the class, and he just told us that he had been baptized 5 years ago in the Kirkland Spanish branch. He is less active now, but that was pretty crazy! I was surprised because he literally hadn’t said anything when I was texting with him.
At eight o’clock, we had another English class with Rodangela. Again, it went really well. At the end, we taught her about prophets and hinted at the Restoration. She wanted us to finish what we were saying but we told her that we would the next day.
Sunday
We had the biggest, most amazing Brazilian lunch with Bianca's family and their neighbors. We got to know them, and continued to make a super good friendship with them. They are literally the best! Elder Bremer actually used to teach them, so he called to say hi to them part way through. It was pretty fun to see him and say hi.They absolutely love us! At the end, we reminded them of the importance of the Book of Mormon, explained what it is, and gave them a copy. They love us, and have stated multiple times that they will come to church to support us. They are not completely committed to learning the gospel, but are very christian, don't have a church here, and are willing to listen to us. They sent us home with almost 10 pounds of food. I was so full afterwards! It made me so happy to have a traditional Brasilian meal.
Our lesson with Waldesson’s family fell through, so that was a bummer. We were going to try and put his wife and son on date for baptism.
We did have a really great lesson with Lucie. We read 3 Nephi 11, which she loved, and talked about a ton of different things afterwards. She had some pretty random, but inspired questions. We ended up talking about baptism, repentance, the prophet Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, and multiple parts of the Plan of Salvation. We left her with Alma 11 (because while we were deciding on a chapter, she picked that one) and told her that we would teach the Plan of Salvation next time. The lesson was so good!!
We also had a third lesson in a row with Rosangela. We taught English, and then we taught the Restoration like we told her we would. We explained about prophets, and she totally understood the pattern of apostasy and dispensation. After we finished, we asked her how she could know if these things are true, and she said "study, looking for the answer, learning, and asking God". We invited her to be baptized once she knows these things are true and God responds to her prayers. She said yes!!
It has been a crazy, and an incredible week. We are going to try and get even more lessons set up each night. If we need to, Elder Schelin and I will go on exchanges with other elders to teach twice the classes. We are trying to get this all moving as fast as we can.
Scripture of the week: Mosiah 18:20
I loved representing the Savior in Brasil and Washington, I love representing Him in Seattle, I love my companion, I love the Gospel and Atonement of Christ, I love my family, and I love my Redeemer. I am ready and excited to work harder, learn more, and love better this week!
Love,
Elder Warren Matthew Dudley
