Brazil Week #98

Good morning everyone, its noon here already, but I guess we are 4 hours apart now. Its good to be back and read your letters, this week went by pretty quickly, I guess. We had a good week, we worked alot talked to alot of people and taught alot of lessons. I was pretty burned out yesterday, and slept pretty hard last night, I slept well but I remember well my dreams, I dreamt that I was at home, (which is common) but I was seeing all of my friends and we were doing stuff for institute and stuff like that, it all seemed so real, I remember that I woke up, with my head under my covers and I thought to myself, was it real am I really at home? Then, I noticed the the blaring fan blowing, and I thought nope, I'm still here on the mission. That has happened alot these last couple of years. Mom kinda made me trunky when she said that you guys had already situated the room to be able to fit me and Jordan. Its kinda funny because I was thinking about that this week. I even commented about it to my companion. I told him that I hoped my family didn't expect me to sleep in a room by myself, cause I wanted to be able to sleep with one of my brothers in my room. I don't like the thought of sleeping alone in a room. Well I'm officially in my last month of the mission. I don't know how I feel it seems like there is still alot of time left. Before on the mission, I never really counted my last month, I would think well I go home in 6 months, but November is 5 months away so really I only have 5 months on the mission because the last month, I wont even feel any stress of the mission,  because I will know that its coming to an end and so there is nothing to worry about. Well that thought was kinda dumb cause now that I'm in the last month I don't feel like that at all, I still feel like the mission will continue on and that it will never end, my brain is still not comprehending that this it, I have this last month of November and then, nothing. game over, mission completed. I don't know I still am not feeling and understanding that its almost over. Whatever though endure to the end, a principle that we can apply to all things in the life, especially the mission. This week we worked alot, maybe I should take it easy cause I think I might turn into a pillar of dust by the end of this transfer. Its good though, when your busy time goes by alot faster. We did a division on Tuesday.  I stayed in my area and went with Elder V Alves, I like Elder Alves alot and he is a great friend of mine, we taught some neat people and the day went by quickly, this week we met a ton of new people, some pretty good people I guess, we were working in a new area that has never been worked before, it is located close to the church here. Its an area that is pretty humble, so even if the people don't have a car or motorcycle or even a bike, they can walk to church without any problems. SO this week we ran into alot of people from a church called the Congregação Cristã do Brasil.   I'm pretty sure it has it in the states I'm guessing it would be called the congregation of Christ. Its one of those churches that has their own set doctrine so the members are a little wild sometimes like our members haha, but we taught a family with that had like 10 people listening to us, and there was this lady who was like the grandma of everyone who was from this church, but she was kinda die hard I guess, she is one of those women here that never cuts their hair, doesn't use make up, wears skirts everyday and walks in the street with their nose up, she listened politely, but she said some rather apostasy comments, for example she invited us to visit her church, which for me there is no problems, but she questioned our authority and told us we needed to see people in her church who have authority, that kinda grinded my gears. I just bore my testimony and told them as directly and as frankly as I could, that no church on the earth has a Prophet called of God, 12 apostles, and the authority of God on the earth. Only the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I made that very clear, she kept quite after that. we were knocking on that street that seemed like a good street, but 3 houses in a row I found people from this church, the second house completely rejected us and told us that they already found Jesus, so we went to the house in front and taught an elderly couple there who happened to be the grandparents of the lady that rejected us, the  grandma was actually really nice but the grandpa was, a deaf, grumpy, ignorant old fart. He couldn't hear hardly anything so we yelled can we start with a prayer, he said what?! and we repeated then he asked what church are you from we explained, and he said no I only accept prayers from my religion. Once he said that I was done, instead of leave a message I read a verse that talked about when Christ ordained the apostles and gave them power and authority, then I bore my testimony and told them that no religion on the earth has this authority accept for ours, then I asked the lady if we could visit someone close by she said to visit her granddaughter who lives in front would enjoy a visit from us, I asked what her name was and she said it was kate, the same lady who had just told us that she didnt need a visit from us. I laughed and told her that we had just knocked there 10 minutes earlier and she didn't want to hear us, we had contacted the referral before it was even given. I think I am getting less patient with people who are not will to hear or show signs of flakiness. We met a neat lady soon after though, named Fatima, I had walked in front of her house several times and have felt the need and feeling to stop and make a contact there, I stopped and we made a contact, she invited us right in, she said she was quite confuse with religion and was stopped for a while not knowing where to attend a church, she was very elect, only problem is that she works on alot of sundays, she said that she knows our visit was an answer to our prayers, I was happy being able to help her, she said she has felt very lonely lately and has problems with depression. she wants to go to church but had to work on sunday. We had another lesson with Marcelos sister this week, we taught the Book of Mormon, we invited Marcelo and Aparecida to sit in with us in during the lesson, it was a good spiritual lesson, she said she was curious to read and to visit church.  Saturday there was a special baptism here in Alta Floresta, it was of a young man named Jonathan hes 21 , we had all been working with him for a while, the baptism was technically counted to the other group because he lives in their area, but I cant help but think of him as one of my baptisms, I taught him many times and had many conversations with him, since our district here no longer is part of a zone we now accompany with the assistants instead of the zone leaders, Elder Jackson here is our district leader, but since their was nobody here to interview I was told that I would have to interview him, so we interviewed him on Saturday it was a quick interview, he was well prepared, I asked him who who would be baptizing him, he said he didn't know he said you can baptize me if you want Elder Kennington, I said it would be better to let one of the others baptize him, he accepted but told me that he wanted to confirm him after the baptism, I said that I could do that. And thus it was he was baptized that night, and I confirmed him the next day in church. After the baptism we went to visit some recent converts that we baptized here, Fabiola and Aline and their brother. We had heard that ALine and read something about the church on the Internet and that she didn't want to go to church anymore. So we went there that night to see what the problem was, we were preparing for the worst, but after talking for a while and her finally admitting what she had read we found out, that she read that Obama was a Satan worshipper and the in 2015 he would be sending false missionaries and prophets throughout the world, with chips in the wrists with the number of 666, and of bunch of retarded stuff, and for whatever reason she that it had something to do with the church, we didn't really burn her but we showed that that is one of the most senseless and foolish things anyone could write or say. We took care of her questions and doubts and she went to church yesterday.  Church was good yesterday, i gave the Gospel principles class, which went fine I guess I don't really like giving classes, but hopefully it will be the last time I give it here on the mission. MArcelos family went and his sister as well Cassia, we went there last night and had a very spiritual experience there, we watched the restoration with everyone and then testified of the truthfulness of the things that happened, it has been a long time since i had cried will testifying of the first vision but last night my tears flowed freely, we then watched a quick video called come unto Christ, its a music video for efy made this year. it had Portuguese subtitles so they understood, after words we marked three dates, two of the daughters of Marcelo, Bruna (18) and Eduarda (11) and Marcelos sister Cassia for the 15 of November, we wanted to mark the date of the other daughter steffany but she had left and and wasn't there during the visit. Well the spirit was super strong and everyone felt it. Now I'm just so worried that Satan is going to do everything to ruin these baptisms, please pray for these people so that they can be baptised on the 15th, it would be the best birthday present ever to be able to have these baptisms. Well I don't have much for to say I'm tired of writing haha. I got really ticked Sunday morning when I woke up and saw that my Portuguese Scriptures was soaking wet, it rained Saturday night and water leaked through the roof right onto the chair were i had left my bag, i spent forever drying the stuck together pages with my a hair dryer, I knew that thing would come in handy for something. My scriptures got really swollen up and poofy, so I put them under of box of Books of Mormon. Also wish Jordan a happy birthday on Thursday he will officially be a man haha the big 18, he can be arrested now, I remember when I was 18 it doesn't seem that long ago, when does he plan on starting his mission papers? anyway I hope he enjoyed California, I never did anything cool like that in High School, except for the band trips.  don't have much to say I guess, I sent an email of the hours for my flight, but maybe they will send a more official itinerary before long. Oh also wish Uncle Randy a Happy Birthday, I forgot my calender in my last area so I don't have the dates of anybodies birthday anymore. Well I love you all thanks so much for your prayers, I have been stressed this last while and I have felt the comfort from your prayers I love you all so much take care and have a great week!

-Elder Kenningon