Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Well....its finally happening, Im coming home. Funny, cuz it seems like Im leaving home. (stolen from the other side of heaven) haha. But actually.....my feelings about coming home arent really anything. It hasnt really hit me I guess. Like Im sitting here typing my last email, but it seems like Im just going to wake up tomorrow and do missionary work as normal. So to answer your question...i feel normal.... I did say my goodbyes, but it really didnt feel like i was saying goodbye. Just seemed like a goodbye when i get transfered or something. So maybe it´ll really hit me when im actually LEAVING the country. but I dunno.
This week was a really good and busy week. It kinda sucks but we just got a bunch of new elect investigators....right as Im leaving! Why couldnt they have come a transfer ago!
But we have this one girl that came to church 2 weeks ago named Ema. Shes 14 and was invited by a member to come to church. she loved it and came back the next week and brought her boyfriend and brother. Both of them loved it. and just yesterday we taught the 1st lesson and they enjoyed that. They freely expressed their questions and understood really well
Then we have Marisa. Shes this new investigator that we got last week. I think i mentioned her in my email last week about how her daughter was explaining everything to her in the lesson, cuz the daughter was understanding but she wasnt. Anyway, last sunday Marisa came to church and LOVED it. she made a bunch of friends and then there was a baptism after church at 4:30 and she came to that too and LOVED it. she stayed around after and helped clean up and everything. Then later that day we saw her daughter on the road and talked to her and she said how much her mom loved church and now the daughter next week wants to go. yesterday we taught both of them again and we talked to Marisa about church and she said "i really really like your church, but the members...." and i was like "great...she already has a complaint about the members" she continued "they dont do enough missionary work! if they were out doing the stuff you guys are doing that church would be HUGE. so you need to tell your members to start preaching the gospel!"
it was awesome. Shes really elect, same with her daughter. We left the Restaration DVD with them the saturday before and she watched it 3 more times...the daughter watched it 2 times in portuguese 1 in english and 1 in german (cuz she speaks all 3 languages)
so ya...then we have this one couple that has come to church the last 2 weeks in a row. the wife had quadruplets 2 months ago, but lost 3 of them...and now owes the hospital alot of money. so she went seeking help and talked to our bishop and now they´re coming to church and we're teaching them. its cool.
We also had a streetmeeting where I grafittied the plan of salvation! We got a bunch of paper a sheet of 4x2 meters and I grafitied it! it was really cool, drew lots of attention!
But this week was really good....my last time at church we broke the record for investigators at sacrament. we had 11 there! SO my last week as a missionary ended VERY well.
THe mission was awesome! Definately a good choice! haha. It sucks that Im leaving but it has to happen.
My testimony has grown a ton! I know that God really does live and he works everyday in our lives. I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and that he died for all of us. I know for a fact that Christs church. his true and living church is on the earth at this time and is lead by a prophet that talks and communicated directly with God. I know that on that spring morning, Joseph Smith saw God the Father and the Son and that he was called to restore the church of God on the earth again.
of this I testify with love for the last time as a missionary in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Love,
Elder Rhett Dustin Hildebrandt

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Walkin the green mile

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So...this is my last week. Im walkin the green mile. its kinda like ripping off a bandaid really slowly....like i know it has to come off...and it will feel good once it does...but its painful....
anyway...update
We got some new investigators. Marisa and her 19 yr old daughter. we contacted Marisa on the street and then we went by her house to teach and her daughter understood everything really well, and even had to explain it to her mom who wasnt getting it very well. it was really cool. I could see them progressing alot.
Then we 3 new people come to church that members brought! its way cool that the members are catching onto the fire of missionary work. we´ll meet with those people soon
Then as far as our other investigatores, Afra, she isnt progressing that much so we kinda had to go over and tell her if she doesnt start reading and going to church more often, theres other people who are waiting to hear this message and we cant waste our tiem. Hopefully that will knock some sense into her.
Then we also had an interesting experiece come Armindo. This caboverdian we are teaching thats lonely and sick and away from his family to get medical treatment for diabetes here. But he doesnt pay attention in the lessons much and always has excuses for not doing stuff. But elder Thomas has a greenie puppy dog love for him and its like one of his fav investigators. Anyway, the other elders had a baptism this saturday and we invited him and told him we would meet him close by the church at the bottom of soem stairs 15 minutes before 5 (cuz thats when the baptism was) well we later find out that the baptism isnt untill 7, but it was already almost 5 so we wait at the bottom of the stairs just to tell him that its not at 5, but at 7. So we wait and wait and he doesnt show up. so Elder Thomas wanted to walk ALL the way up to his house to tell him it was at 7 even though he didnt show up at 5 (when he thought it was) so reluctantly i agreed and we walked up this huge hill to his house and told him we would meet him in the same place at 6:45. he agreed and we go back. well 6:45 rolls around and we go wait...and wait and wait. Elder Thomas with his puppy dog eyes looking up the stairs, waiting. It gets to be almost 7 and i was like "lets just go." So elder Thomas starts running up the stairs toward his house. Im like "no, back to the church" then he started complaining and wanted to go to his house to get him. I was like "he didnt come the 1st time...didnt come the second time...hes not gonna come if we go up there". but he insisted so we went ALL the way up there again. We get there and.....hes not even home. I could see Elder Thomas´s heart break. but we went back to the church, the baptism had already started. We walk in and who do we see, none other than Armindo sitting there! it was pretty cool. Elder Thomas was happy. but then we invited him to church the next day...and he didnt show up :( oh well.
And.....thats about it since friday!
well......ttyl!!!!! or soon!
-Rhett

Friday, June 12, 2009

Only 1 more full week!

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Man, its ending sooooooo soon. CWAZY!
Anyway, onto this week.....
it was really good. Pday last week we went to the Zoo and I got kissed by a sealion :) it was really fun. Then this pday we went to Quinta de Reguleira....it was the 5th time that ive been there haha. but its a really cool place.
Elder Thomas had another greenie moment this week. It was raining and we were walking home for lunch and i was walking under the cover of the buildings cuz we didnt have umbrellas. He was in the middle of the road a little bit a head of me. I looked over and he was walking toward soem people at a cafe that were motioning him over, with a big smile on his face. One of the people was teasing him, asking him where he was from...and Elder Thomas stood there with a confused look on his face. didnt know what he was saying. I finally went over there to save him and the guy just was just messing with us. Making fun of us. So we left. I was laughing cuz i thought it was funny and Elder Thomas still didnt know what was going on and what the dude was talking about haha.
Also on sunday we were talking with one of our members named Irma Felix. And she´s a little crazy but she was saying how she gave out 10 book of mormons to her neighbors. So we set up with her so that we could go with her and she could present us to them. Anywho, we go over there and she takes us from door to door. I didnt expect many people to be interested cuz shes crazy and they probably just took the book out of sympathy. We knocked on the doors and the people that answered all said that they were busy and didnt want to hear anything. So we went to the last house, which is the house of her cousin. (and they actually lived in houses, in this neighborhood) We knock at the gate, and her cousins daughter comes out whos about 20 years old. Irma Felix tells her that we´re here to talk about Christ. The daughter pulled her aside and started talking to her quiet but sternly that she was sick of her coming over and talking about Christ and how she didnt want to hear of any of this and stuff like that. Then Irma Felix started yelling and saying that God was gonna curse the house and how everyone that lives inside is going to be cursed, then she X´d the house number. THen the daughter started yelling and SLAPPED Irma Felix across the face. the started attacking her! Pullign her hair, ripped her blouse, tore off her necklace, etc. it was crazy. We broke up the fight and she briskly walked away. We pulled Irma Felix off the ground who was crying now and walked her over to the other side of the road where the neighbors were watching. then the daughter came back and slapped her in the face again. She fell to the floor and cried again and the daughter ran off. One of the neighbors called the police and we waited until the police came. then the police talked to the daughter and Irma Felix. and we waited and waited and waited, thinking that they were gonna ask us for our testimonies or info or something. We finally just went up to them and asked and they were like "nah, we dont need it, if we need it in the future we´ll be in contact" so we said bye and left. It was really crazy. Then just 2 days ago, we saw another fight between 2 portuguese punk teenagers. it was hilarious cuz they couldnt fight at all. their punches were SOO weak and it was really funny just watching them try and fight haha.
In other news, we marked one of our investigators for baptism. Armindo. Hes a really a humble dude. So I hope it all goes well for him. We also got a new investigator that seems really golden. Her name is Teresa. Shes 40 years old, used to be a model or something, but now she has Multiple Sclerosis. When she was diagnosed her husband left her and now shes alone with a 10 yr odl and a 20 yr old. Its a really sad situation, but she has a really positive attitude and was really excited to read and pray about the BOM. we´re going to be passing by again on monday and giving her a blessing.
We still havent talked to the people whos friend died. Stuff keeps on coming up and they have to cancel the appointments.
But everyone else is doing about the same. Im sprinting until the end!

-Rhett

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Three more weeks

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Sooooooooooo.....my week.......
Elder Thomas and I are getting along good. he still has all that greenie fire but hes getting more used to how everything goes here.
We had a really cool experience a couple days ago. We went and passed by this one brasilian lady that we had contacted on the road a couple weeks ago. and we knocked on the door and asked for her. The girl that answered the door went to go get her and inside i could see that there was alot of people. kinda like a party or something so i thought that our contact would just say to come back later cuz she had company over but she came to the door and was like "ya, sure, come in." so we went in and sat on the couch and started talking to her. There were about 4 other peopel in the room around a table talking and the contact (marlinda) told me that she had company over today cuz a good friend of theirs had just died suddenly. I told her that we could share a message that could help and asked if we could start with a prayer. One of the people around the table heard that and was like "hold on a sec, let me go get everyone." so he went and gathered everyone up in the house to hear the message. 8 people. We prayed and shared a message about the plan of salvation. Everyone was crying the whole time and they invited us back again. We´ll go there tomorrow.
But it was a really cool experience.
Also later that night we went by a member´s house thats from Sri Lanka to eat dinner. We actually went to his Indian neighbors house. and they cooked us some AMAZING indian food. it looked weird but it was really good. We ate with our hands and used these scone type things to eat the stew type thing that was made with chicken. also they brought out these full little fish that looked like they were chared, and you had to rip of the head and just eat it, it was actually really good. but the indian guy there kept on putting food on our plates! we were there witht he Zone Leaders and it was getting time to be home and the ZLs still had to catch a train, we were already stuffed, but the guy kept on putting food on our plates. it got to time to be home and we were ready to leave and they were like "but we have dessert!" and the member is like "you have to eat dessert or they´ll be offended" so we gobbled down the dessert and walked briskly home. i was STUFFED oh man....i almost threw up but it was really good. there was also a Bollywood movie playing. it was way funny. i loved it! haha
Our investigators are doing really well. We have a new investigator named armindo that came to church! hes this caboverdian thats here cuz of medical problems. hes a really humble guy.
Afra is about the same but doing good. the brazilian families we were teaching are doing good, except for one, Elizete. Her member freind said that we should back off for a little bit...so we are, but Alba is doing really well!
Then last night something interesting happened. We went over to a recent converts house Familia Agues and we got invited in Eneida (the wife) broght us into the kitchen and told us how her husband (whos a member) has been drinking alot lately and how hes ruining hte family. We had her call the bishop and he dropped everything and came over. Then the husband came in and he was so slobbering drunk he couldnt even function. it was way sad. I hope things get better for them.
and thats about it!
Tchau!
-Rhett