Among the Gaúchos: Conference Overload, too good!

We always do a big group shout "BAH-TCHÊ-ZAR"

(Pres. Parrela in the corner there)

10/5/2015

Well this first week of the transfer has been super busy. My new companion Elder Longo arrived 7:30pm on Tuesday and we were already back on a bus 5:00am Wednesday heading to Santa Maria for the Zone Conference. Elder Longo is from Americana, São Paulo, besides being close to the end

meu companheiro now Elder Longo

he is very much "alive" haha here in the field. We work together great and I'm sure that this month we will have good results. It's cool to have an experienced companion because from the beginning the lessons we teach are super good and things flow really well.

Anyway back to the Zone Conference it was funny because there were new American missionaries who had arrived in the field that day and so I served as the translator for one of the elders. It was fun to translate but it also takes up all of the brain power so I didn't really retain much, haha. But one of the things that Presidente Parrela talked about was the "prophetic emphasis" that the leaders of the church are putting on keeping the Sabbath day Holy. And that was strongly reaffirmed in the General Conference.

I was super excited to see the 3 new apostles called, Elders Ronald A Rasband, Gary E Stevenson, and Dale G Renlund. And I loved what they did with the hymn the Spirit of God, way cool, I think that was the first time they did solos at conference. Four things that called my attention during the conference: 1) again the emphasis that they put on keeping the sabbath day holy, wow I think that at least half of the speakers touched on that, I even as a missionary am trying to think of how to be better now, seeing that we practically keep every day as the sabbath. 2) To do our part and trust that the Lord is with us in our work and service. 3) Elder Stevenson and Elder Renlund when they bore their testimonies spoke about how the Lord uses the simple and weak to preach the gospel and how our callings really don't have to do with us and how the Lord qualifies who he calls, cool. 4) And I felt that many speakers also talked about how we can seek answers through the spirit. So much conference, I loved it :) haha

Now I've got to get running back to home because Elder Longo and I will be traveling to do half of our Zone Meeting tomorrow. We leave Santo Ângelo 5:00pm and will spend the night in São Luiz Gonzaga then tomorrow (Tuesday) we go with the elders in São Luiz to Santiago where we will have the meeting and do exchanges with the district leader there. We will finally come back to Santo Ângleo Wednesday morning, what a rush but it'll be good :)

Love you all and have a great week

Elder Pierce

Pizza before Zone Conference Tuesday with the elders from Santa Rosa