9 months already!?! Our area doubled in size!; Working with less active members; "I want to come back!"

Hello once again to everyone back there in the US.  :)  Things here in Brazil are as awesome as ever!  As you probably know, the week of transfers is always CRAZY, lots of exciting changes and news.  As I told you last week, Sister Passos and I are both going to be staying in Ibiporã for one more transfer....but this time there's a twist - Sister Marques and Sister Ramirez were both transferred to different cities, and no new sisters were transferred to Ibiporã to take their place.  So yep, Sister Passos and I are taking care of all the investigators and members in TWO areas, which cover the entire city of Ibiporã, as well as Jataizinho, the neighboring city where Igor and his family live.  It is a BIG area.  Last week we had three sisters staying in our house while waiting for the house in their new area to get ready, and they helped us visit our investigators and take care of the area a little bit, so it hasn't been TOO bad so far.  But then their house opened up and they left Ibiporã early Saturday morning... so now it's just me and Sister Passos.  :)  It's definitely different - the first time in my mission that I've been living in a house without another companionship - but there are definitely some positive aspects to it.  More space in the closet.  Less competition for the washing machine.  A shorter line for the bathroom.  Stuff like that.  :)  It will take some getting used to, but I think that Sister Passos and I will have fun together here.

This week we spent a lot of time teaching Iago, the young man that I mentioned last week.  He is a good friend of Lucas', and has been coming to church the last few weeks.  We met his mom and taught the whole family the message of the Restoration, and they both accepted to be baptized!  Iago was baptized yesterday and his mom, Angelica, will be baptized two weeks from now.  It was a really great lesson, and Sister Passos and I are both excited to continue teaching the family.  

Another focus of the week has been working with less-active members.  I don't remember if I've mentioned this already, but there are a LOT of less active members here in Ibiporã.  I think the membership list has something like 400-ish members, and only 70 of them come to church regularly.  The hard part is finding them, as many of them have moved or passed away or lost contact with the church in some other way.  And that's why it was so crazy this week...it seemed like less-active members were popping up all over the place!  We had people stopping us in the street (which does not happen every day), saying "Oh hey!  I'm a member of your church, and I want to come back!"  And it happened not once, not twice, but SEVERAL times this week!  It was a little startling, but exciting, and we have been trying our best to help them make and keep goals that will help them return to full activity in the church.  

 

This week there was a special priesthood meeting in Londrina for our stake, and President Tavares had asked us all to make goals for how many recent converts and less active members we would bring to the meeting.  He promised us that if we got a less-active member to attend, they would be reactivated.  Sister Passos and I definitely didn't want to pass up such a powerful promise, so we got to work visiting and calling all of the people that we had been finding over the last few weeks.  It was amazing how the timing was so perfect, and even though I don't think we had as many attend as we invited, it was really great to see how the Lord is guiding us to the people who need us in the exact moment when we can help them the most.  It was such a special testimony to me that we're here for a reason, and that we're not doing this work alone!  He is with us, and He is leading us every day.  :)

Well, I love you all so much!  Sounds like St. Patrick's Day was great - I actually forgot about it until the day of, and didn't even think to wear green.  Fortunately the people of Brazil don't know about the pinching tradition, so I got off easy.  :P  :)  

OH YEAH, and can you believe that it's already been 9 MONTHS????!  I can't.  :P

OH YEAH, and more good news - President Tavares emailed us this morning to let us know that the email rules have been changed, and we can now email non-family members!!!  Woohoo!!  :)  So if there's anybody out there reading this email who has neglected to write me because of laziness or the cost of postage stamps, I am pleased to announce that you no longer have an excuse.  haha.  Send me an email!  It's faster.  It's easier.  It's cheaper.  And I love it just as much.  :D

I hope everyone is happy and awesome and enjoying the gorgeous spring weather there in Utah.  I hope you are all doing the small things that make a big difference - prayer and studying the scriptures and going to the temple, etc.  And I'm sure that you are, because I have the best family in the whole world.  :)  I am so so so so grateful for you guys and the love and support that you send me every week.  I realized this week that not every missionary in the world has it as good as I do, so I just wanted to send a super big thank you to you guys for all you do for me.  I love you!!!  :)

Com muito amor,

Sister Gee