Cabinets that fell off the wall...YIKES!
Monday, October 31, 2016
Letter from 10/31/2016
I love you people!!! And CONGRATS for teaching an investigator in our house! That's so cool!!! And thats the best way for an investigator to stay strong. They just need friendships in the church. The real challenge is to see if you all could do it at least once a week? This can be a challenge for the whole family! Teach an investigator in your house or have someone from your home go with the missionaries to teach someone at least once a week! If all the members in the world at least tried to do this, every ward would see weekly baptisms as well. It's astounding how quickly investigators progress when they see the testimony of a member, because they dont see us missionaries as normal people. Do it! Challenge every one to do it! 30 min-1 hour a week isnt that much time and doing so could save someones eternity.
I dont know what I want! I think honestly I would just like to get money sometime soon to buy material and pay someone to make a couple of skirts and a dress for me. And truly, thats about it! Hahhha! I just want BAPTISMS! THAT is what I want for my birthday and Christmas, so if everyone could make that happen, that would be great! LOVE YOU DADDDDDD AND MOMMMMMM!!! You are truly the BEST
Letter from 10/24/2016
Life is good! So crazy and I never get to sleep enough, but it is truly amazing! As before, Sister Garcia is just the best and our only problem with obedience together is the fact that we just start talking and lbha blah blah and talking and talking and suddenly we're like, hey we're not even talking to people in the street, let's focus! But, it's amazing because our companion study is great and we work great together.
It's been an adventure being a sister training leader because every Sunday night now we have a meeting with the assistants and President to review alll of the numbers of the week and the splits and talk about literally every missionary in the mission, so we don't even end up having any time to do normal work on Sundays. This week we did splits in Guarujá- Santa Rosa and Enseada, so I got to go back to Enseada! hahahah I saw Izabela and Marcela and they both freaked out and I got so excited to! andnnnnndd MARCELA WAS FINALLY BAPTIZED!!!! WOOOHOOO!!!!!!
It's been interesting seeing people do a lot of wrong things in the mission and then know that its my responsibility to correct and teach, because thats just hard for me! I always want to be everyones friend, but I've learned to love and teach the doctrine is the most important thing, because like investigators, the Sisters in the mission CANT BE BLESSED if they're not doing things right.
ALL IS WELL!!!!
It's been an adventure being a sister training leader because every Sunday night now we have a meeting with the assistants and President to review alll of the numbers of the week and the splits and talk about literally every missionary in the mission, so we don't even end up having any time to do normal work on Sundays. This week we did splits in Guarujá- Santa Rosa and Enseada, so I got to go back to Enseada! hahahah I saw Izabela and Marcela and they both freaked out and I got so excited to! andnnnnndd MARCELA WAS FINALLY BAPTIZED!!!! WOOOHOOO!!!!!!
It's been interesting seeing people do a lot of wrong things in the mission and then know that its my responsibility to correct and teach, because thats just hard for me! I always want to be everyones friend, but I've learned to love and teach the doctrine is the most important thing, because like investigators, the Sisters in the mission CANT BE BLESSED if they're not doing things right.
ALL IS WELL!!!!
Letter from 10/17/2016
There are so many hills and small mountains here..my legs are dying! The picture of the doorbells is funny because we passed by this place trying to find a woman SO MANY TIMES and as you can see, many of the doorbells don't even have a house/apartment number to diferentiate. We rang all of the doorbells so many times (for about a week straight) just trying to find someone to open the door....so everyone complained and they wrote our investigators name on her doorbell just because of us:) And the best part? They still complain that we're always ringing the wrong doorbell hahahha! But Michele, the woman that we were trying to find is AMAZING! Long story short: About 8 months ago I was in Areia Branca and I had a dream one night that a recent convert was going to bring a friend to church. It was Sunday morning, so I told my companion that we should ask her when we got to church what friends she had that would be interested in the Gospel, because who knows, maybe I was receiving revelation haha! So around 7:30 am we left our apartment as usual on a Sunday morning going to knock on our investigators doors and accompany them for church. And almost everyone flaked out, ended up sleeping or said they couldnt go to church for some reason or another. We were heading to church when suddenly we heard, "Hey Sister!" It was the recent convert that I'd dreamed about and she was with a friend that was moving to Santos that was staying with her and she wanted to introduce her to the church! I was fairly shocked to say the least and continued to be more and more shocked throughout the day as Michele just embraced EVERYTHING about the church and even decided to pay tithing even though she's not a member. But unfortunately, she was only staying for a week until she could rent her own house and ended up in another stake, where I sent her address to the missionaries there, but who knows if they ever actually passed by. Fast forward to only 4 months ago when I was at a doctors appt in Santos and suddenly I ran into Michele again in the street! Well, actually she saw me and was so excited. Turns out she'd moved to Jabaquara in the Santos stake. I took down her new address and immediately called for the sisters from Jabaquara to tell them all about her. Alright, now fast forward to two weeks ago when I was transferred to Jabaquara. One day we were looking at the potential investigators list in teh area book and I saw "Michele- reference from Sister Neal. We tried to find her, but she was never home." Miracle after miracle and guess who we taught this week? MICHELE! She accepted a baptismal date and has some difficulties, and I don't know why, but God wanted me to find this woman. It's amazing and a testimony to me how He prepares who He wants to be in His true church. I love the mission!!!
Sister Neal
Monday, October 17, 2016
Monday, October 10, 2016
Letter from 10/10/2016
This week has been crazy since I was called to be a Sister Training Leader and that means planning and giving trainings for all the new trainers, leadership meetings, and planning and going on splits with literally ALL of the Sisters in the mission (around 50) so life is busy. Haha, but I am LOVING it!!!
Monday I came to Santos from Guarujá and that took a while to organize everything and then leave Sister Gonçalo with her new companion and met up with Sister Garcia in the mission office at like 5pm. I LOVE SISTER GARCIA! We served in Areia Branca one transfer at the same time (my last transfer when I was with Sister Rodrigues) and I already liked her a lot and now we're just companions and best friends. She has been a SLT for one transfer now (6 weeks) & is HILARIOUS and works hard and is super happy and loves being a missionary, so working together has been just the BEST. Monday P-day ended at 6pm as normal, but we had to stay in the mission office and prepared the training for the new trainers and that lasted until about 8:30, so we just had barely enough time to arrive home from the office with our things and open our apartment because we're opening an area as well. The last missionaries that were here were the old Sister training leaders, so the area book was perfect and organized and the house was clean, so I cannot complain! It's just learning about the area and finding your way around the city that's hard, especially since this area is HUGE and there are like, small mountains that we have to walk up sometimes. My legs are killing! hahaha! But life truly is great and WOW, wasn't conference amazing??? I don't even know what was my favorite part, but last night we watched the womens session and Presidente Uchtdorf killed it. LOVE him and every time I see him it reminds me of Dad!
Love To Everyone!
Sister Neal
Tuesday, October 4, 2016
October 3rd, 2016 - A new Change for growth for Alina
Dear Dad, Mom & Everyone!
Yes! Today we had transfers! I trained Sister Gonçalo for her entire training, so 12 weeks or two transfers. I received the transfer call from the Assistants early like 7am today, which is strange since usually it is our district leader that calls, but honestly the moment I saw the assistants number, I already knew. I was called to be a Sister Training Leader, which means me and my companion (Sister Garcia who I already know and LOVE) are in charge of helping all of the sisters in the mission and we do splits with them and give training meetings sometimes and such. Tonight after pday ends (so here in just a couple hours) we have to go to the mission office and prepare a training for the people that were called to train the new missionaries who arrive tomorrow. We do a lot of splits, but we have an area, so I am now in Jabaquara in Santos, the big city! I'm excited, but extremely nervous as well, but all will be fine! Haha I'm excited to be able to serve all the sisters in the mission more as well.
WOW I was really sad to leave Enseada because that place and all of those people truly turned into my family and saying goodbye to some amazing recent-converts was hard. Marcela and Kellnner (Marcela is his mom and Kellnner is like 16) live close to the apt of the missionaries in Enseada and so I was able to say goodbye to them, and it was hard!! Kellnner cried SO MUCH and just thanked me for everything, for finding them, and all that we taught them and his baptism and everything. It was emotional! Joel and Magda were like parents to me there in the apartments. I wanted so much to just hug Joel and say "Thanks Dad!"
But I know I'm gonna see them again, hopefully sooner than later! But I am good!
Conference was truly amazing! Presidente Uchtdorf pretty much expressed everything I was thinking and feeling as well! Loved it all!!! I thought I saw Josh Hancock while I was watching General Conference but afterward was like, no, theres no way that is him. Is he even old enough to go on a mission? hahahah totally saw him!
LOVE, Sister Alina Neal
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