3 Time in a row has got to be a record

 (Elder Putnam)

Dear family and friends,

What a vibe of a week it has been. Thank you to all those who shared their stories from their missions or their friends' missions about inspiration while finding. The training went splendidly.

Monday was very chill in the end of ends. We went to Bible study and learned about hope. We also met with a new friend Antons set up a return appointment. Then we found on our way home and ate pelmeņi for dinner.

Tuesday was the classic district counsel, grab lunch in center, mission devotional, and then go on with lessons or finding if we don’t have teaching appointments. So nothing crazy there. But exchanges did start that night and Elder Roberts and I just chatted it up after 9. It was a good chat.

Wednesday I hit a crazy workout in the morning. For whatever reason I woke up mad. And then we used that motivation to go finding in Jelgava for several hours. Although we didn’t see a ton of success, I felt like we had accomplished a lot and we did well for ourselves.

Thursday we switched back from exchanges, planned our week for our friends, and drove down to Liepāja for zone conference. We planned actually pretty efficiently and I set a goal for myself that to develop more charity and humility I was gonna serve my companions a bit more. That led to 3 humbling graphics on the whiteboard at home. I'll include a picture of them at the bottom.

Once we got to Liepāja we all hiked over to the church where we were able to meet Markuss, Vilārs, President Birkenfelds, and Max. It was super cool to see them and talk with them. Then we went home after eating kebabs for dinner.

Friday morning, due to the fact that Elder Trollenberg and I's training was still not completed, we skipped on Baltic ball and worked on it. We trained on using a map to more effectively find people to teach. The Zone Conference was uplifting, educating and spiritual. Afterwards, as is tradition, we ate dinner with President M.T. which was homemade gyros (literally so delicious).

On Saturday morning I finally got to play Baltic ball on the beach. We lost one of the chairs so we used two trashcans that were already set up. I played well for my last zone conference Baltic ball. I did kinda clock Elder Kane though. He's recovered. Later that day we had a missionary-member finding blitz where we walked all around Liepaja. I got to meet and talk with Raitis which was awesome. Later I went finding with Jāzeps and he was telling me all about the cool stuff that was happening in his life recently. Pretty cool. After the zone blitz it was tough to say goodbye to Liepāja for the last time as a missionary. On the ride back I had a beautiful wonderful conversation with Elder Bastow which honestly changed my perspective on a few things.

Sunday culminated of course with the sacrament. It was hard to concentrate though since our friend who was sitting next to me kept making jokes to me. But I just Kobe Bryant'ed that Chris Rock. Sunday was Cozy's birthday so I got to call her. That was the second highlight of the day (sorry, Cozy, Jesus takes first place)

Thats pretty much all I have for the week. I'll attach some pictures.

Conference Talk of the week: The Doctrine of Belonging by Elder D. Todd Christofferson

Spiritual experience of the week: Taking Elder Philips' advice and writing down who Christ is to me. I discovered that to me, Jesus Christ fills the role as the fulfiller of the laws of Justice and Mercy. That to me is very personal. I know God loves you and I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior. Have a wonderful week!

Telling all the rich folks anything they wanna hear

 (Elder Mackrory)

E aí? Belezinha?

This week was incredible. Full of new and cool experiences. Vamo lá.

We saw exactly 20 fuscas this week, making for a total of 783.

On pday we didn't do a whole lot, since our money was scheduled to drop on our cards that day, we planned to do our purchases. But as some of you know, there was some sort of tech problem in the system of the church, and our money was delayed a day. So since neither me nor my companion had money, we decided to get our stuff on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, we had district council! This was my first time leading it, so I was pretty nervous and worried about it all. But it went well, and we were able to feel the spirit. That's what matters. Next door to the stake center is a Brazil's Costco: Assaí. So we did our shopping there real quick and I saved about 40% shopping there than shopping at our local stores. Since it delays 1 day after the money drops to withdraw from an ATM, we actually had to walk back home after our lessons. The maps told us it would take an hour and twenty minutes, but we made it home in less than an hour.

On Thursday, we had a youth night, and so we played ping pong (pingy pongy) and foosball (tostos or something like that). I sucked at Foosball, so I mostly played ping pong. But that wasn't the cool thing that happened that day. We had a lesson with some millionaires. They live in the wealthy neighborhood already, but I had no idea how rich we were talking. We knocked at the base of their driveway, and their cook answered us and let us in. Upon further entry, we come across their Porsche (an SUV, not pictured), seconds later, their two motorbikes, both BMW and huge. One is a race bike, and the other for comfort riding. The lesson was great, and they had prepared dinner for us. So that was nice. We had to postpone weekly planning, but free dinner was worth it. We talked more about the gospel and how missionary work goes. In the end I don't feel so bad about a 2.5 hour lesson.

On Friday we had zone conference. It was awesome to be able to play the piano and have had time to practice too. We learned lots of great things, especially about repentance, which you all know I love. More on that later. We also received some house materials. Knife, spatula, serving spoons, ladle, and bucket. Not sure why we got a bucket, but we got one. Got to see lots of good friends including my bestie Elder Patterson. After the conference I stayed with some other missionaries to practice for our musical number that we plan to sing for when we get an apostle visit. I also got to rewrite the sheet music to include the Portuguese lyrics and melody. That was fun. Afterwards I had a baptismal interview with one Hamilton, the goat (I am not making a formula one reference). He has one of the strongest testimonies I've seen and it was inspiring to be able to interview him. He was baptized yesterday. In the end, we didn't get back to our area until 9. Exhausting.

Saturday was a good day. We taught a pretty full and productive English class and helped a little with the chapel cleaning. The family that was there to clean it has a little toddler who loves me. She always blows me a kiss and gives me heart hands 🫶. She's not yet used to having hands, so the heart looks more like an H. But it's still cute. Well anyway she randomly ran up and gave me a hug. I know the standards say I'm not supposed to hug children, but I cant do anything about getting hugs. The family thought it was cute too, so we're good. Then after a long day of not much success we come to our lesson with Theo. He's awesome. We shared our message, and he shared some of the things he’s going though and I could see that our message was inspired and truly for him. The spirit was really strong and we all left feeling strengthened. We also got free food which was nice.

On Sunday the family who was giving us lunch said they wouldn't be able to receive us until 1pm. When we found this out, we were already on our way. So we got off of the van early and did some visits in that neighborhood. We ended up finding a less active family and they were happy to receive us and commit to coming to church next week. So there's the tender mercy this week. Would not have happened if we had lunch right away.

SummaRio:

1. 20 fuscas, 783 total

2. Went to Brazilian Costco

3. Taught some millionaires, dominated at ping pong

4. Zone conference was lit

5. I got a hug from a girl 😯

6. Delay in lunch meant we could find some new people (they were actually pretty old)

Spiritual thought:

Repentance cannot be realized if it is incomplete. Our president spoke about this and how we can't just commit to keeping the commandment we broke, but need to recommit to keeping all the commandments. This really struck a chord with me. In pondering the principle, I came across an object lesson. This day, I was wearing my suit. Everything was in order, I was looking my best. Shaved in the morning, did my hair all perfect, brushed my shoes clean, ironed my shirt, pulled hair and scrubbed marks off my suit, made my beautiful tie perfectly knotted and set off. Everything was in order. But the fact that I was carrying a freaking bucket ruined the entire look. Just a big black bucket.  You can clean up your look by doing lots of things, but you won't look good if you got an ugly bucket at your side. We need to clean everything in order for the change of one thing to mean anything.

Fotos:

1. Somehow my garbage phone can take good eye shots

2. Mayara and Marcelo, Thursday's dinner/car show

3. Matando saudades de oreo e leite

4. Lasanha de chocolate?

5. Loja bem colorida

6. Bom meme

7. Ping pong

8. Foosball

9. Membros podem participar online!!

10. Nossa zona + os APs

11. My little fan

12. Big bike

13. Nosso distrito

Week 2, holding up strong

 (Elder Putnam)

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I present to you my 1st two week email streak since the MTC.

This week's main event was MLC, when I got to see Elder Nolan again. The Estonian ZL's stayed with us and brought chocolate and juice down.

On Tuesday we had district counsel which is essentially a district counsel with other districts on a zoom call. We did it with Tallin and Vilnius since they have most similar style of work to us. Afterwards we visited the Šostaki in their garden. We walked by the river on the way and there were a ton of people sunbathing there. We all just had to look down. The šostaki taught us what it meant when in the doctrine and covenants it says "be thou humble and the Lord thy God shall lead thee by the hand..." When we got to the garden we ate some weird berries, Sister šostaka taught us how to properly wash our hands (I got it wrong the first time). We also ate waffles with jam with them. It was great. I'll include some pictures.

Tuesday was also Elder Woods' year mark so he made a video for that. As according to year mark tradition he was in the shower bath with something eatable/drinkable, this time a kebab.

On Wednesday we had a finding activity for MLC. Nothing crazy there. But we did film an awesome video for the Latvian Come Unto Christ Facebook page.

Thursday we had MLC and we decided to get rid of our mission focus in order to more fully focus on our missionary purpose. We also decided that all communications between missionaries within the Baltic mission need to be checked by our companions. That includes transfer notes but excludes notes from departing missionaries for some reason. So that doesn’t apply to me. lol

Friday and Saturday didn't really have much going on.

On Sunday however I had the opportunity to speak in Sacrament meeting. I felt inspired to speak on the sacrament itself and its importance in enduring to the end. I didn't prepare much to share, but I was able to speak as guided by the Spirit which was a really good experience.

On that note, I am preparing a training for  the missionaries at zone conference about receiving revelation, especially in regard to finding. If you have an experience from your own mission about following the guidance of the Spirit while finding on the street please share it. I'd love to tie it into the training.

Conference talk of the week: Christlike Poise from Mark A. Bragg

pictures:

1. a Georgian drink that tastes like cough syrup

2. and 3. pictures from the Šostaki's garden

I rode a horse

 (Sister Cummings)

Hey y'all! Sorry I missed last week! Pday was crazy and we had to cut it short because we had to drive to go have dinner as a district with the new mission president and his family. So I didn't have time to write an email. But, honestly, I'm not complaining because dinner with President was a blast!

These last two weeks have been honestly kind of insane! We got transfer calls last week and my freakin AMAZING companion Sister Woodbury got transferred and is now an STL (Sister Training Leader). Which is awesome because I know she's going to do amazing. I trained her well. But that's not the only thing that changed during transfer calls! The new Mission President is now sending sisters to the Northern Territory! Y'all don't understand but that's amazing because it's been an area for only elders for the past couple years and us sisters have been having mega FOMO (fear of missing out). So we're all so excited!

To tell you about this last week though, I'll explain my email title:

The other day, my new companion, Sister Yochim, and I were out contacting and came across this cutie little playground so we decided to take a 5 minute break and check it out. While doing so, I got on this little metal horsey thing that rocked back and forth. I think I might have been a little too big for it because I absolutely fell off of it but as I fell, my foot got mega stuck and Sister Yochim LITERALLY had to pick me up completely to get me unstuck. And we were in public! It was embarrassing! But yeah, I rode a horse.

One more thing that happened this week is that we have a friend that's on date for baptism! It's such an amazing experience seeing people make the choice to further their conversion and relationship with God. It's top freakin notch!

Okayy now for the spiritual stuff:

I loved the responses I got to my question about where the line is between being humble and being too hard on yourself and I want to share with y'all a basic summary of what I learned from y'all!

Humility is only found through Jesus Christ. It's found through trusting in His grace and understanding your own imperfect nature. It's joyful and sprouts happiness. It involves recognizing the gifts you've been given by the Lord and by continuously attributing them to the right Source. Humility is a product of faith in your Savior and is one of the integral ingredients involved in partaking of the Savior's Atonement. Humility is real and attainable but only through Jesus Christ.

On the other hand, being too hard on yourself is the opposite of humility because it is denying Christ. When you're too hard on yourself and you beat yourself up, you are denying yourself the ability to practice Christ's grace and atonement and try again with patience and love.

So, be nice to yourself and turn to Christ always!!!

Amen? AMEN

I love y'all! I've been learning so much from y'all! And Jesus loves y'all!

- Sister Cummings

Question of the week: What qualities make someone a good teacher?

Pics

I’d be a fearless leader, I’d be an alpha type

 (Elder Mackrory)

Bom dia família e entes queridos!

This week was very different from any other week for sure. From the beginning to the end. Vamos que vamos.

This week I saw 20 fuscas, bringing the total to 763.

On pday, we went as a district to center of Búzios! Now I know why everyone calls my area beautiful. As missionaries we usually stay in the neighborhoods doing our stuff, so I was thinking “well it's not ugly, but there's not a whole lot here worth a vacation”. And then we went here. Wow. I would spend a week here as a tourist. We met up on the beach and went to lunch. I had just gotten a haircut and I had already eaten sufficiently, so I just sat with the district and chatted. That and the extremely high prices killed any hunger I did have. We then took a buggy ride around the city. We got to see all the beaches on this little peninsula, including a beach with red sand! Needless to say, I took some of that home with me. After that, we went home and chilled. Then everything was not chill. My phone rings. It's President! So we chatted for a second and then he says “Would you accept a calling to be a District Leader in Búzios?” “Yes, I would accept that calling” “Thank you Elder Mackrory, the Zone Leaders will call you to give you some orientation”. To my remembrance, I was never officially called as DL. But yet here we are. Oh well. Transfers were announced that night and Elder Flores and I are staying together here in Búzios, only I'm District Trainer. President also announced that this transfer there is an apostle coming to visit us and the Rio South mission this transfer. We are not sure which one he will be, but were excited anyway. That night we taught a lesson in Spanish and went home again. Then I did a little bit of stress cleaning.

On Tuesday we got yelled at by a Chilean dude. Not exactly sure why he was mad, nor did I have the slightest idea of what he was saying, but we were able to calm him down and get back to normal activities. I later asked Elder Flores what he said, and he said he only got like 50% percent of it. So that's the Chilean accent for you guys.

On Wednesday we had the fullest English class I've ever taught. There were only about 15 or so people, but it made it extremely difficult to walk around and help people one on one because of a new hand being raised every 10 seconds. But it was better than 3 people, so I'm happy.

On Friday we spent about 6 hours on the bus. We left our house at 7am for the Zone Leadership meeting. At 9, we arrived. At 10:30 we left, and got to lunch on time at 12:30. At 2, we left for another area in the district to do some baptism interviews. At 3, we arrived, as planned. We then Waited almost two hours for the ZL's to show up and tell us where we were going, not as planned. The interviews went well, and yesterday we had two baptisms. Then we traveled An hour back to our area. After standing on the bus for most of the trip, we decided to do our work online and go to bed early.

Saturday and Sunday were pretty normal, English class, church, amazing member lunches and lessons. On Sunday night my comp came down sick, so we will see how that works out. This week is zone conference, and so I will have the opportunity to practice our musical number as we are preparing for the apostolic visit.

SummaRio:

20 fuscas, 763 total

Had a great pday in my area, and I realized why my area is so envied

Was called as District Trainer! this means I will continue training Elder Flores and be district leader

An apostle will come to visit us this transfer and we will get to do a musical number

The Chilean accent is really hard to understand

English class was really busy

We spent 6 hours on the bus on Friday because of baptism interviews and leadership councils

Comp got sick yesterday, started working on our special musical number

Tender mercy: On Sunday we had a few lessons with a recently returned missionary. Since I've basically been the senior companion since leaving training, I've been looking for new or better ways to teach. Having the perspective of someone who has already fulfilled their two years in the field was really nice for me to see and learn from him. I love training, but I always need my own training.

Spiritual thought: These last few weeks I've really been focusing on repentance, so much so that my predictive text suggested the first word of this paragraph to be “Repentance”. I've not stopped on that process, instead I'd like to focus on one aspect of it. Prayer. My companion's favorite scripture in the Book of Mormon reads, “But behold, I say unto you that ye must pray always, and not faint; that ye must not perform any thing unto the Lord save in the first place ye shall pray unto the Father in the name of Christ, that he will consecrate thy performance unto thee, that thy performance may be for the welfare of thy soul.” (2 Nephi 32:9). Prayer is an essential part of repentance. It is not just a process of realizing mistakes and becoming better, it is also a process of confession to Him, seeking forgiveness and guidance on how to move forward. In some cases, it is necessary to go to the proper priesthood authority to seek this counsel. Prayer will change the night to day because this is how ideas flow. Light bulbs of understanding fill our minds, and the once dark areas of our knowledge are filled with light. It is through the essential step of prayer that forgiveness and true repentance is brought about.

Fotos:

1. Predictive text

2. Random engine

3. Random tundra??? Nunca vi aqui Antes...

4. Nossa! Nossa area

5. Some beach

6. Some garage

7. The Telephone pole decided not to hold the wires anymore

8. Clean house

9. Red sand

10. The island on the left looks like a turtle

11. Buggy ride

12. Red beach

Last transfer, lets see if I can start a streak

 (Elder Putnam)

Friends and Family...

This is my last transfer and so I have a goal to send an email home every Monday. We will have to see how it goes, but at least we are gonna start on a good note. These words that I've just typed out will probably make my mom weep with joy.

This past week has been awesome. Like honestly its just been super fun and I'm super energized for next week.

On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, we didn't have anything big happen. I packed up all my stuff really tight and compactly, which I'm super proud of. Since I'm getting transferred over with Elder Beebe to be with Elder Woods in Brīvības I was able to see that I'm gonna have no problems bringing stuff back home. I'm gonna have space and weight in my suitcases.

On Wednesday we had our actual transfer. Not a ton took place outside of that except for some finding and whatnot.

Thursday was really fun. We went and served at a Ukrainian help center where we made hygiene kits to send to people affected by the war. We formed an assembly line and worked so efficiently. There is something beautiful about efficiency. When something just works without problems its so amazing. At the end we compiled 197 hygiene kits before we ran out of supplies. We went and told the instructor and she was very surprised that we had finished it all in an hour and 30 minutes. The project was expected to take 2 days. no sweat for the Rīga first district.

On Friday we were able to meet with Ralfs and finish teaching him about the plan of salvation. He is so chill so its hard to see if he's ever feeling the spirit. But he's keeping commitments and wants to be baptized, so... I don't know I guess we'll dip him at some point.

On Saturday we had a baptism for Lehijs. Thats a member's son. He was so excited for his baptism that he made his own poster and bore his testimony at the end. I'll send a pic of the poster. At the baptism I got to talk to Gatis Senkāns for like 30 minutes. He's so wise and charismatic and vibey too. he spat in my eye on accident. lol. I also had the chance to teach Arta, who got baptized a couple years ago about endurance to the end. She said it was really moving and really touched her. That was pretty cool. Saturday night we were in charge of basketball night and we had a good turnout. It inspired me to take some pictures and try even harder to get people to come next week. So I texted some old basketball contacts and invited them. I'll report next week on how it went.

Sunday was likely the high point of the week with the Sacrament. I feel like I had been preparing all week and just in general had been a better person and a better missionary this past week. Disregarding eating healthier, drinking more water, and working out harder and more often, I was also doing better spiritually. I've been listening to general conference sessions before 10 and after 9 so I'll include a suggested talk to listen to at the end.

We were finally able to meet with Persijs which was a win. Edžus is still preparing for baptism and has been taught all the lessons. He's just waiting on permission to get baptized now.

Monday (today) we went to get our hair cuts in the morning by Sister Hall. The Hall's are a senior couple and they absolutely adore us. They made nachos for us and then we gave them a spiritual thought to help Elder Hall overcome some concerns regarding the recent assassination attempt of Donald Trump. I never thought that I would teach that kind of a lesson, but there we were, using the story of Enos coupled with a few verses from the Doctrine and Covenants, to address a concern about politics. God is good.

This coming Tuesday we are gonna visit the šostaki family which will be fun. We are gonna go walk with them in their garden. Elder Beebe and I are trying to meet with all the members in Rīga before we go home. So far, they are the first ones but they will not be the last.

Anyways, I think that’s enough for this week. I hope that I will write an email next week too.

Talk for this week: God Knows and Loves You - Elder Allan T. Philips

Lehijs baptismal poster. What a legend

After the storm, something was born on the Fourth of July

 (Elder Mackrory)

Happy Birthday USA! Hope you had fun blowing stuff up!

This week was crazy for me. So crazy, in fact, that I can't for the life of me remember what happened in specifics. But I can never forget this week or the things I learned. The normal things happened, English class, district council, pday, lessons, contacts, and all that good stuff. But this is not what I want to focus on today. So we'll get to the real focus shortly. Here are the highlights:

14 fuscas for a total of 743.

Made cuzcuz (couscous) twice. It's a dish made from corn flakes cooked as if it was oatmeal. Since it's savory by nature, you can add things like eggs, deli meat, cheese, vegetables and all sorts of good stuff. So I did that. each time differently and each time better. The first time I just put green peppers, eggs, deli meat, and cheese. The second time I put green peppers, tomatoes, corn, carrots, savory sausage, onion (grilled of course), and cheese. It was incredible. Highly recommended.

Google maps told me that I have spent 58 hours walking this month. I don't take my phone with me every time we leave though, so it's more than that.

I don't know if you guys remember, but I had a division with Elder Levie on December 30. During that division, we taught the restoration to a family. This Sunday, the daughter and son were baptized, and their parents are next! Missionaries, no effort you put forth goes unnoticed. The people notice it, and your Heavenly Father notices it more. For me these fruits took a good 5 months to come, and some take more time.

I've started including slang in my English classes. The students really like it.

Alright, now for the good stuff. I've been thinking about what the most important thing we teach is. Is it the Book of Mormon? Is it the Plan of Salvation? Is it Baptism? While all these things are important and integral to anyone's true conversion, there is but one principle that goes above all these. It's repentance. Numberless times the scriptures call missionaries to “cry repentance” or “preach repentance”. The Savior himself was often quoted by starting with “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” This is the word for which I have been called. Preach repentance unto those who need it. Who needs it? People who are far from God. People who are close to God. People who are distancing themselves from God. People who are nearing themselves to God. Everyone. No matter the situation or the past, everyone needs repentance desperately. It is the only way we can overcome the world. Christ has already done that, and he has given us the tools to do so as well. The Spirit of the Lord drives away sin. Sin drives away the Spirit. The Spirit of the Lord allows us to leave our worldly desires behind and follow Christ. When we have the Holy Spirit, we will reach a point where sin loses its appeal, and we are left wondering why we would ever want to sin. How do we get to having the Spirit? Repentance. Simple as that. Repentance allows us to realize our faults and shortcomings, but does not leave us in that gall of bitterness, it gives us the righteous desire to do better and to be better. In a lesson this week, we were setting goals for this incredible couple to follow the Word of Wisdom and other commandments. In the Spirit that this repentance brought, the wife said out of nowhere “and I need to be reading more of the Book of Mormon!” We had not mentioned the Book of Mormon in this lesson yet. But the Spirit of Repentance, who is the Spirit of the Lord guided her to make the changes she needed to make. The joy that comes from deciding to follow the Lord leaves us wanting more and more and more. Repentance is not sadness and guilt. It is joy and relief. It is what I now strive to fit into every conversation I have, be it with members of the church, other missionaries, or with our friends. Repentance is the most important thing that my calling holds. As a missionary, it is my duty to share the joy that comes from repentance. In my prayers I always reflect on how I can become better. In doing this, my guilt of not being better before is swept away and joy, greater than was my guilt, fills my soul. I feel inspired and full of righteous desire. A fire fills my spirit as I prepare to preach to the souls of this dispensation. There is no greater joy than that of repentance. Make it a daily goal to reflect on how you can become better, and your day will be filled with inexplicable joy. I promise this. The lesson we had with this wonderful couple was a tender mercy for me and I am forever grateful to have experienced it.

Fotos:

1. Batismo of Bryan and Maria Martha

2. Haircut

3. English class

4. Théo, the goat

5. Cuzcuz part 2 (has the fork)

6. Cuz cuz part 1

7. All you can eat buffet

8. Super sick bike

9. The district