Dear Family,
Thanks for the birthday wishes! I kind of understood how mom feels when we always asked what she wanted for her birthday and she would always say "good kids" and I´d think no but what do you really want? Well I felt the same way on my birthday, when ppl would ask what I want for my bday. “I just want you to go to church and read the Book of Mormon! I just want you to be ‘good kids’ :)
One of the highlights of this week, we had Elder Gavarret from the Brazil Area Presidency visit our mission. My favorite part was actually before the meeting with all of Curitiba we had a meeting with just the leaders - the 20-30 Zone Leaders and District Leaders and then the 2 STLs - me and Sister Américo. (We were a little outnumbered.) But I loved what he and President Monteiro talked to us about how we need to have more faith as leaders in the mission. The energy and enthusiasm and faith of the mission starts with us. He shared Moses 6:31-34 which I loved. When Enoch is questioning why he is being called and the Lord didn´t tell him, ‘oh because you´re really qualified and you’re really great’ (because usually we aren´t) instead he said, “Trust in Me. My spirit will be with you so trust that I will take care of you!” And then I love the last thing he says "Therefore, walk with me." That is what we are called to do! Not do be amazing powerful teachers, but to have faith in the Lord and walk with Him! During the meeting with everyone he talked about the importance of retention and seeking for those people that will be strong - finding future priesthood leaders and families - and remembering our recent converts and keeping a responsibility for them. He asked some missionaries if they knew how many of their recent converts were still active and I was grateful I could think in my head that I did, but definitely need to do better at continuing to help and encourage them.
After the meeting he picked one sister and elder to interview and then interviewed me and then the assistants. Such a blessing to be able to talk one on one with a General Authority! Someone so directly inspired from God! He lived in the states for a while so he did my interview in English which felt really weird at first because I had to think about everything I was saying, but it was really cool and I left just feeling so inspired! First thing he did was ask me about my family and I was grateful to get to talk about you :) He talked to me a lot about being a leader and was just really uplifting and made me feel like yes, you have a great responsibility here and you can do it!
Something else I was thinking about this week - I was thinking about how much I love being a missionary and I thought, I think I was a pretty happy, confident person before my mission, but I´ve realized that being a missionary I feel like I have found a whole different kind of happiness. Not that I won´t still love playing sports, going out with friends, going camping, or all the other things I love to do that I don´t do for a year and a half, but I have found another level of happiness. In striving to change my desires to be the Lord´s desires, I find happiness in serving others, in doing hard things. I can feel like even when it is hard I´m at peace because I know I´m doing what the Lord wants so even when It´s hard I’m still happy! And it´s not like I wasn´t before, but when we are changing and becoming better we are happier. And even after the mission I hope that I will still continue to grow and progress and find other things that open up new windows of opportunities to be even happier. It made me realize that sometimes with my investigators, it´s not that they aren´t happy (a lot of the time they aren´t and they know that) but there are a lot of good ppl out there that are happy and we still teach them, not to tell them they aren´t happy and need to change, but that there is so much more that they can have! You think you´re happy because you don´t realize how much more is out there! In learning and growing and becoming like your Savior, you will find so much happiness that you didn´t know existed! So we have to be that example so that they can see our love and happiness from the gospel and want it for themselves!
I love yall and hope you are changing and becoming better each and everyday!
Love, Sister Lewis
Photos -Yesterday after church our ward had this big surprise churrasco for Sister Américo and I because her birthday was Sunday and mine was Saturday. And we had the best cake I have ever had! We really do have the best ward. :)
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