Pinhal da Paz

Pinhal da Paz

My wonderful family and friends,

How are all of you! This week has been pretty great. I just want to comment on a few things before I forget:

To Kim: Congrats on graduation! I hope all is well with you!

To Lynda: I hope that Spring is going absolutely amazing for you, don´t forget your lowly roomie out here on an island and write me!

To Alex: There is a couple in our branch from Russia (they used to live in Ukraine) and they know Russian, Ukrainian, Portuguese, and English. They are great. Their names are Alex and Anastasia. They are way fun. You would really like them. Every time I talk to them they remind me of you. It is just kind of funny to meet the most random people on this island :)

To Poppy: There is a member here named Joao Pinto and he has totally seen one of the lectures you have given at BYU about I think it was Mars exploration. I´m not sure. Anyway, he is totally impressed with you and therefore by association, he is impressed with me. His family is great--very strong members of the church and he always talks about getting a picture with me and the rest of the family because I am your daughter. :) Just so you know that your influence has reached the Açores. ha-ha

To Mom: Thank you thank you for always sending me posts of my friends blogs! I live for hearing all about them (outside of missionary work of course) But thank you for always sending them. It is awesome and always makes my week.

Well, this week we went to the baptism yesterday of a family that is attending the other branch. But, this family is really special. Our recent convert, Manuel, separated from his family 8 years ago and made some bad decisions, but Irma Howard and Brinkerhoff taught him and baptized him. Through coming to know the church, he has started going home more often to his family. He has one daughter and two sons. He is starting to talk to his wife again. He still has not moved back home, but he visits almost everyday and shared the gospel with them. Now, all of them are baptized and he had the opportunity to baptize them! It was so amazing to see! I feel so lucky to see miracles like this on my mission. His family lives in the other branch district, but they have to come down to our building to use the font because the other building is just a house. So, that was really neat to see. Irma Howard and I sang at the baptism: Families Can Be Together Forever. The whole family was in tears by the end of the song. It was really special. I am so happy for them. They have a chance to be a family forever. But, I just can't wait until there is a temple in Portugal. That will be a sweet day for me because then all of these people won't have to go all the way to Spain.

Today for p-day, Irma Howard and I went up to Pinhal de Paz, which is a parque that is absolutely gorgeous! And it has a point that you can climb to where you can see the ocean on both sides. I don't think it really hit me until I was at the point that I was really on an island--surrounded by sea on both sides! It was so gorgeous. When I am done with this camera card, I will send it home so that you can all see it! (Pictures are really expensive to print out here, hence why I haven't sent any pictures home.) But, we'll see...

The work is great--we are going to work with the members more this week with their references. Another recent convert—Aguinaldo—has been giving us lots of references and has been bringing his family and friends to church! So, we have lots of work to do. My favorite pesquisadores, however, is this one family that we are working with: Manual and Gorete with two daughters Nicole (14) and Mariana (10). We just have to get them to church and help them progress to baptism! They are such a beautiful family and I just want to see them in the Celestial Kingdom, so I am going to do all I can to work with them. We have been praying as a zone and as a mission, really, to be able to find complete families to baptize into the church. This will not only strengthen the church, but it will SAVE the families. It has been made apparent to me again and again the real reason why I am here—it is not simply to strengthen the church with more members, although this is good. It is not simply to share a nice message. It is not simply to help people make their lives better, although these are all great things. We, as missionaries, are here to save souls. It is so amazing to be a part of this work. It makes me so happy—the work of saving souls is the greatest work I could ever hope to be a part of.

That Primary activity sounded like so much fun! I bet the kids just loved all of poppy's toys. Chile is pretty much awesome.

That is so great to hear all of the mission calls! We need more good strong missionaries in the field--all over this world! I am so happy to hear that all of those youth (and the Packs) are ready to serve :)

Oh, and thanks for the update on the Christensens. I love that family. Say hi to them for me. I hope all is well with Jenny and the new baby :)

Yes, the work last week was a little delayed because of the Santo Cristo festival, but this week will be better...I am not going to blame everything on the festival, but it did kind of interrupt our work for a little bit, but this week will be awesome, I have no doubt.

Thanks for everything--your love and prayers and support. Until next week,

Love, love, and love again,

Irma Perez