Do you believe in...MIRACLES?

February 23, 2015

Our neighbors are members and the son, Leonardo, was SUPER inactive and
whatnot and his wife and kids lived there with him, WELL about a month ago
his wife left with the kids and so a lot of the members have been helping
him and he´s been coming to church. We had lunch there the other day and
after we ate he went and grabbed all of his scriptures and got everything
prepared for our message and wow… he bore such a strong testimony and
afterwards Sister Pence and I were in disbelief!! He is making the best of
this trial FOR SURE!!! and also last week he saw us in the street and said
``sisters! I have a family for you guys to teach! They're gonna come to
church with me tomorrow!" But they didn't show up, BUT that same week Sister
Pence and I had nothing to do so we hopped on the bus and started making
contacts and Sister Pence made one with a guy who lives pretty close to us,
so during the week we decided to try and find his house. We walked down
this muddy road for a while and there is NO ONE there, and then all of a
sudden we see this little family sitting outside and the little girl sees
us and yells ``OI!!`` so we went over and started talking to them and.. IT
WAS THE SAME FAMILY LEONARDO WAS TALKING ABOUT!!!

So we taught them and stuff and made an appointment to come back and we
told Leonardo about it and he wanted to come with us so we told him when
and what time, and he called us everyday to make sure he had the right day
and time. haha . Then the day came, and he was waiting out on the street
for us all dressed nice and ready, wow!, it was awesome! But we went to the
families house and the wife was super sick so we couldn't go in so Leonardo
wanted to do what? make contacts! So he made some contacts for us and it
was super sweet!!

AND THEN!! by Saturdays our food gets pretty slim (we basically eat a
banana for breakfast and dinner on Sundays...) and this Saturday for some
reason, we had nothing left to eat. NOTHING! So we went and got some
sandwiches and bread for Sunday and then Sunday night came around and we
ate our piece of bread for dinner and decided we would go to the market for
food early so we could have breakfast and then who calls us?? Leonardo's mom
and says ``come over, I have something for you`` so we walk over to her
house and she said ``I haven't made bread in a long time but I just made
this loaf for you guys...`` and GAVE US A LOAF OF BREAD AND JAM!!!!!!!!!
wow. best neighbors ever. It was seriously a miracle.

Also our goal this week was not to speak ANY English… not even one word! It
was pretty hard and I was quiet most of the week, haha. But now I get my
prize which is a CHARGE BAR! and I'm not going to let ANYONE else eat it :)

During our companionship studies, we practice our lessons and one day we
had one about the Gospel and so what we do is we each read a paragraph in
the pamphlet and then summarize it in 2-3 sentences. So, I read the
paragraph about the gift of the Holy Ghost and I read ``after you are
baptized you will be comfirmed and recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost. This
means you can always have the Holy Ghost with you.`` and when I finished
reading I learned a new word from the paragraph so I was like
``LEGIT!!!!!!`` and Sister Pence just looked at me super weird and was like
``.... you didn't know about the gift of the Holy Ghost before????`` haha
that was probably a very scary 5 seconds to be a trainer. hahaha but then I
explained why I was excited and we laughed for a while and all was well.

Also I was reading my scriptures this morning (which all of you should do
too.) and I read D&C 33:7,8 and read it for Sister Pence and so now we have
new motivation to work with all our heart, might, mind and strength!! haha
:) :)

That's all.

HAVE A FANTASTIC WEEK!!

much love,
Sis Lloyd

``if all men were like unto Nephi, i wouldnt know who to marry.``-Sister Pence

My love for Nephi has only grown and i mightve even influced Sister Pence to have that same love. haha we read the book of mormon together in portuguese and half the time it just us going ``wow! nephi is so amazing!`` the usual for me. and we have this big poster on our wall that has a picture of moroni with the scripture around it that says ``if all men were like unto moroni the very gates of hell would be shaken forever`` and sister pence pointed at it and said ``if all men were like unto NEPHI, i wouldnt know who to marry.`` hahaha and so we made a mini poster of it like the moroni one and we listed all of nephis qualities we could think of and now we have a little nephi shrine. and we are determined to find men like nephi. 

speaking of marriage, we did service this week with a member and we were painting her house and then she asked me to restore the holes in the walls and asked me if ive ever done that and i said ``never!`` and then she just handed me the supplies and said ``preparing you for marriage.`` haha it was really funny. 

and also this week we taught this super cool awesome spiritual lesson and at the end we asked the mom, pauliana, to pray and she didnt know how so we taught her how and then she told us about how the night before she had a dream about the end of the world and everyone was praying and she was super nervous because she didnt know how to! and then we came the next day and taught her how to!!!! wow it was so cool! 

and also, with tatiani and franciele (the people whose house i threw up at) we taught them about the word of wisdom and wow they have so much faith!!! yesterday at church franciele told us she had the biggest headache because she decided she wasnt going to drink anymore coffee and then later yesterday evening we visited them and franciele told us after church she made coffee and had a cup of coffee IN HER HAND and then DUMPED IT DOWN THE DRAIN and went to bed instead! WOW!!!! i was so impressed! and tatiani smokes about 20 cigarettes a day and so we asked her what her goal was this week and she said 10 so we were like ``awesome! 10 a day is so amazing!`` and then she said ``no. only 10 this whole week.`` WHAT! they are so strong!! theyve been reading the book of mormon everyday too! everytime sister pence and i leave their house we basically skip to our next appointment and we always say ``I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!`` they are the best!!!! but. we asked franciele to be baptized this week and she said no.. because she wants to know for sure. Ah!! BUT SHES SO READY!!! so that is our next challenge. :) 

OH ALSO this week the sun was behind a cloud and it made this really cool rainbow looking thing and there was a super bright white part and sister pence goes ``you see that really bright part??`` and then she like flinched away and covered her eyes and said ``AH it makes me wanna go to the celestial kingdom!`` hahahaaha i started laughing so hard because that was totally not what i was expecting her to say and with her reaction it was the funniest thing. hahahaha ill attach a photo of the cloud thing 

also we have some really awesome goals for this coming week so stay tuned :) 

tchau tchau!

sis lloyd

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MORE PICTAS!

​sorry, i can only send 2 at a time.. 

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PICTAS!!!

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a little taste of Brazil... again, and again, and again.

Last week when we were going back to our house, this lady on our street called us over and asked us if we could say a pray with her, so we did, shared a scripture, and the spirit was super strong, so we went back the next couple nights and taught her, her daughter, and her daughters daughter (haha), and they said ``ever since yesterday we´ve been super excited to go to church!`´ so we talked to them about it and about baptism and turns out the one that asked us to pray, tatiani, has A LOT of guilt and she was saying she doesnt feel worthy and all of this stuff so we planned a super awesome lesson about repentence and the atonement and we got the bishops wife to come with us and it was gonna be perfect. THEN honestly 2 minutes before we left our house what happened? i threw up. 

but i knew that this lesson was way to important and its not usual for me only the throw up once (weird fact about me) so i was like ``VAMOS!!!`` and we went and the spirit was super strong and then little sister lloyd leaps up and runs to the investigators bathroom to throw up.... thats definitely one way to get rid of the spirit. haha but they came to church yesterday so im hoping they weren´t too grossed out :) 

then i threw up every. single. hour. during the night. i dont know how because i literally had NOTHING inside of me. but despite that, my body still felt the need to make me throw up 10 times. the good news is, because of this i think i still have a six pack! 

but im all better now. haha all the brazilians in my ward were talking about taking me to the hospital and giving me all these medications and stuff. wow it was crazy but really nice. 

talking about illnesses, i had these weird red dots all over my hands and thought it was bed bugs, but they didnt itch or anything so we asked someone a little smarter than me and turns out it was a rash from petting stray cats... oops. 

okay now for some good stuff >:)

MARCELA. we taught her a super awesome lesson and then asked her how she felt about baptism and such (her original baptism date was in january...) and she said that she just wants to know for sure, without a doubt, that the church is true. and so we explained how the spirit testifies of truth and how that is a for sure answer and asked her to pray specifically. SO we decided to fast for her to know without a doubt and returned later that week and what did she say??............................... shes joining a different church...... uh.... wait.. what?? so we were pretty disappointed and were talking about what the heck just happened and then all of a sudden the talk ``wrong roads`` by Matthew Holland, popped into my head, its about when they were in the Grand Canyon and on the way home they came to a fork in the road and didnt know which road to take so they prayed and BOTH got the impression to go down the road on the left, so they did and soon descovered it was a dead end... and later they were talking about why and he said this, ``Sometimes in response to prayers, the Lord may guide us down what seems to be the wrong road—or at least a road we don't understand—so, in due time, He can get us firmly and without question on the right road.`` and so i told sister pence about it and both of us got chills and so we have GREAT hope!!!!

aaaaaaaannd... thats about all :) 

com amor, 

sis lloyd

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Sugar, spice and everything nice

first the sugar..... RAAAAINNN!!! WAHOO! it rained everyday. and i think i had goosebumps for a minute. and my clothes got washed again just this time, on me! its a win win! :) and one day it out of nowhere just started dumping and about 5 seconds after we got a call from the elders and so i answered and all he said was ``CHOOOOOOOOOOVA!!!!`` hahaha it was funny. then they came to our appointment with us and we read the book of mormon with this super old super awesome recent convert and his non member son and wow i have never felt the spirit more strong in my life. it was amazing. even if i was soaking wet from the rain. 

now the spice, because of the rain, NO ONE was home.  at least thats what it felt like. so after a couple days of going house to house with no success, we just decided to talk to about 10 kids and we invited them to church. and thats about all that happened the first half of the week. OH and a little boy kicked a soccer ball at my face. haha and we have lunch with members everyday and so one day we were going to the members house and we turned the corner and there she was with her daughter walking to the bus stop...... so we didnt know what to do.. keep walking? go talk to her? but she came up to us and was like ``theres food in the kitchen, just go in!`` so we ate lunch in her house... all alone... it was very very very very awkward. also this week everyones been into telling me when i first went to church they thought i was a young women, or asking ``sister lloyd... how old are you??`` and saying i look 15... which i guess isnt a bad thing really..

and now everything nice, one day this week we made a goal to each get 4 contacts; and then we got on the bus and it went like this : sister pence, lady, me, man. so i just sat there silent, scared out of my wits and awkward and sister pence is killin it with this lady and then all of a sudden this man kinda looks over at sister pence then at me and goes ``you guys are missionaries?`` WOW! MIRACLE! and so i talked to him the best i could and then he was like ``i was a missionary for the catholic church`` and then the conversation died and it was awkwardly silent again... and then sister pence handed the lady a card with our number and the address to the church on it and started inviting her to church and such and then probably a good 5 minutes of silence continued and finally the man turns to me again and goes ``do you have one of those cards?? could i have one??`` so i gave him one and asked for his address and then he said something about children (maybe he gave me his address, i dont know.) and then got off. BUT WOW! seriously what a blessing. 

AND THEN! saturday there was a baptism and we decided it was  top priority for marcela to go. BUT we decided that at 4, and the baptism started at 4:30.... so we speedwalked to marcelas and on the way the bus we would have to take was stopped so we told the bus driver ``PLEASE GIVE US 5 MINUTES!!`` and then SPRINTED to marcelas and..... she wasnt there. so we called her and she was on a walk with her dog but said shed come home and go with us so we go back to the bus stop and wait but then the bus driver had to go so we called everyone in the ward with a car and i kid you not, not a single person answered. and its like 4:40 at this point so we called the elders and they said the baptism hadnt started and that they would wait and then right after that, Carol called back and said she would give us a ride! so we went back to marcelas to wait for her and then carol showed up and still no marcela... so we waited and waited and were like ``okay, she has until 5.`` and then 5 rolled around and no marcela... so we called the elders and told them to begin and then we told carol she could go, so carol starts driving away and we look down the road and at that second WHO TURNS THE CORNER?!?! MARCELA!!! wow i felt like i was in a movie! so she puts her dog away, gets in the car and we´re off! unfortunately we missed the baptism but we gave her a tour of the church so it was still good. 

AND THEN! sunday there was a bus that picked everyone up because it was fast sunday, so we walked around to gather up all our investigators and what happened?? they were all asleep.... so we go to the last person we need to get, a recent convert, daniel, and we turn down his street and what do we see?? THOSE 10 KIDS WALKING DOWN THE STREET ALL READY FOR CHURCH!!! hahaha it was so crazy and so cool. 

haha also something funny, you can tell how long someones been on their mission by how bad their tan lines are, SO sister pence showed us her tan lines and elder william like jumped back and covered his eyes and was like ``AH!! VI UM PILAR DE LUZ!!`` which is the first of Jospeh Smiths First Vision ``i saw a pilar of light`` hahahahaha i was dying. 

that is all. TCHAU TCHAU!

sister lloyd

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