Last email from Elder Brown

I love the Lord, in Him my soul delights. Upon His word, I ponder day and night. He´s heard my cry, brought visions to my sleep; and kept me high through deserts and the deep. He´s filled my heart with His consuming love, and bourne me high on wings of His great love.

Yet oft I groan, ó wretched man am I! My flesh is weak, and I´m encompassed by a world of sin, which holds me in its thrall, if I give in and to temptations fall. Then strength grows slack, I waste in sorrow´s veil - all peace destroyed, my enemies prevail.

Awake, my soul! No longer stoop in sin! Rejoice, my heart and let me praise again! Ó Lord, my God, who is my rock and stay - to keep me strict, upon His straight, plain way! Oh let me shake at the first sight of sin - and thus escape my foes without and in.

I love the Lord, in Him my soul delights.

 

Jesus é o Cristo vivo. Sei que Ele vive e que me redimiu. Sinto completamente inútil falar Dele, sabendo das minhas iniqüidades e pecados. Sinti o grande amor que traz para nossas vidas e através da Expiação eterna Dele, posso voltar estar com ele - se eu me arrepender de todos os meus erros.

O Livro de Mórmon é o livro mais correto na face da Terra. Sei que ele não apenas completa a Bíblia, mas traz mais direção e entendimento do que qualquer outro livro consgue fazer. Ele foi feito nos céus e é a pedra fundamental da nossa religião.

Joseph Smith foi mesmo um profeta de Deus. Ele os viu e pôde vé-Los porque o Senhor trabalha como bem quer, e quis se apresentar para um homem. Fizeram com que suportasse a presença Deles para que, espiritualmente, soube o que fazer.

Esta é a Igreja de Jesus Cristo. Mesmo que não fosse a Igreja "verdadeira", ainda seria a melhor - nem por perto. Não é uma Igreja de burros nem de fanáticos - é a mesma organização que sempre estava aqui na Terra quando o Senhor julgou certo a colocar junto com a mensagem do Evangelho de Cristo, através de um profeta vivo.

 

Tudo isso tenho aprendido aqui. Sempre serei um missionário.

 

Elder Brown

 

(Google) Translation:

 

Jesus is the living Christ. I know He lives and redeemed me. I feel completely useless to speak of Him, knowing of my iniquities and sins. Feel the great love he brings to our lives and through his eternal Atonement, I can be with him again - if I regret all my mistakes. The Book of Mormon is the most correct book on earth. I know he not only completes the Bible, but provides more direction and understanding than any other book consgue do. It was made in heaven and is the cornerstone of our religion. Joseph Smith was indeed a prophet of God. He saw them and can see them because the Lord wants to work as well, and wanted to present to a man. They made their presence that would support that, spiritually, and knew what to do. This is the Church of Jesus Christ. Even if the Church was not "true", it would still be the best - or anywhere near. There is a church of bigots or stupid - it's the same organization that was always here on earth when the Lord put the thought right along with the message of the Gospel of Christ through a living prophet. All this I have learned here. I will always be a missionary.

Elder Brown

NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.

 

missionary WORK

I somehow missed forwarding this last week!

 

Hey everyone, 

 

 

I´ve never felt the way I feel now. I feel like my body is about to spontaneously combust, because of the heat, the pace at which we´re working, the fact that next week will be my last email home...strange feelings. I´m unsure of the future and nervous that I´ll fall flat on my face as I come back from here, but I know several things, things that I have been able o learn and know here on the mission:

- Jesus is the Christ and the ONLY one who really understands all of our pains, joys and sorrows. 

- the Book of Mormon is the most corrct oef any Book ever written, even the Bible, by a longshot

- The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is God´s church and was restored to the World so that all may have the opportunity to live and partake of the first principles and ordenances of the purifying Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the only church that can even begin to explain this Doctrine in a clear and simple way. 

- I am a child of a loving Father in Heaven, and if I do my best while here on the Earth to keep His commandments, then I´ll receive everything that He has and be all that He is. 

- although I have many faults and stuggle to stay worthy of this calling, I have a firm testimony of these truths. I know that I wasn´t the perfect missionary and I know that there are many things I could´ve done better and in a more effective/meaningful way, but I know that I´m doing what I can to help those around me to come a little closer to Christ, and in so doing, have come closer to Him myself. I now have a true self esteem. I can achieve goals and work like crazy to attain higher goals. I am able to look at myself in the mirror without feeling disappointed or guilty. I am able to control my desires better through planning and pure self control. Though I don´t know all the scriptures by memory I have a firmer understanding of them and am able to explain hem to others. I am more able to love the people here as we study, pray for and think about them constantly. I know how to lead people to baptism and I´ll invite anyone to repent of their sins and be baptized!

 

We had a great week. This week´ll be better. The next will be the best. 

I love you all and hope that you all may deserve all the blessings that God reserves for His obedient children. 

Let´s do this!

 

Elder Brown

NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.

 

Weekly Letter

This has been the best part of my mission, and it will keep improving every day.

Every single day, we have been doing our best to bring others unto Christ and help others achieve their full potential. We have so much to improve, but we will improvve because it´ll be in our Heavenly Father´s hands.

I know that He lives. I testify that miracles happen when we devote ourselves to Him and that He always answers the honest prayer. I know that Jesus is the Living Christ and that only He can fully understand us, and that only He is capable to make us clean, if we liveand persevere in the first principles and ordenances of the Gospel. I know that the Book of Mormon is true. I see its power daily and I walk with it in my hand and give it to all that will accept it. Joseph Smith was a true prophet.

 

This is God´s work and I know that it will never be stopped!

 

Elder Brown

NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.

 

Miracles!

Sorry this is late- from last week!

 

Oi família linda! Tudo ótimo?

 

 

Well, I don´t think I´ve ever worked so hard, and the best thing is that we can do much more still! We were able to baptize again - his name´s Gabriel, and he was almost baptized a while ago with Elder Lott, but his mom didn´t let him get baptized. Now, however, his mom is starting to see that the church really is a good place for her son and, even though she doesn´t agree that the church is true, she let him get baptized.

So many things happened while we were doing contacts this week. Needless to say, I can´t write about all of it, but I´ll write a list:

- we saw a crazy shirtless guy running down the middle of the street screaming like a bird, last week and then today. He´s crazy.

- we talked to some less-active people that, um, use crack. We invited them to stop, and they said they´d try (I hate that one)

- we talked to a guy that kinda looked possessed by unclean spirits. When we started talking to him, he hocked up an enormous loogie and spit it at our feet. So, we got his address. We didn´t go by, because we both felt that he was "trippin´, yo".

- we talked to many people at just the right moment and they were ready to receive us and be baptized! On Sunday, it was raining a lot and a lot of the investigators that we had invited and made plans to come to church didn´t come. We left lunch, and it would´ve been very easy to not work as hard during the day, but we decided to talk to everyone. We were walking without umbrellas and a guy walked over to us and offered his, and we walked and talked. His name´s Alex, and as we talked, we introduced the BOM. He accepted it, and he accepted a baptismal date for the 27th! Then we talked to Ramon, 5 minutes later. He lives in another area, but we got his info and marked a date with him too! Later, in the downtown Paranaguá, we talked to a guy named Sandro. He was in a hurry, but we stopped and he stopped and 5 minutes later he was walking away with a BOM - he said "I´ve always wanted one of these books!" He lives far away, where there aren´t any missionaries, but it´ll be a good read (the best read). Yesterday, we talked to a lady from the Jehovah´s Witnesses, and she said she had a lot of doubts about her church (understandably),and so we invited her to be baptized - she said yes! We´ll baptize a TJ (Testemunho de Jeová)! Then, another guy who has been thinking a lot about his life and what God want him to do, etc. (Héliton) - he´ll be baptized on the 27th as well!

 

We also had a mission tour with an area 70 - Elder Natã Tobias. It was great - we all woke up at 4:00 and went to Curitiba to receive a special training, and it was great! He lead us through a training of the First lesson from PMG - about the Restoration. My comp. and I were chosen to give a demonstration and though we were nervous, we had practiced and the Spirit was there. It was great to know that something we´re doing is going well! Everything we´ve been doing recently has been focused on baptizing more people, and we´re going to do it.

 

I can´t believe that I´m going to be removing my nametag in less than a month. But one thing´s for sure: I will always be a missionary, and I will always do my best to represent Jesus Christ.

I know that He lives and that even with our many problems and shortcomings, we can be made clean through His Atonement. He lives. The Book of Mormon is a masterpiece created by God. The church and the Gospel were restored - we must share this with everyone!

 

Love,

 

Elder Brown

NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.