Just Another Great Week in Campos

Well, as explained in the title, its been another great week in Campos Do Jordao!
A very busy week with lots fo running around everywhere to get everything done.  Good stuff.  Here are the highlights:

*Baptism of Anderson! (woah I don't know if that sounds weird in English lol... ANDERSON GOT BAPTIZED!!) And it was so great.  Saturday morning were were up early to find, clean , and fix and fill up the small pool to use for his baptism at a members house.  Yes haha a swimming pool....we don't have a better option here yet since we don't have a church building close by.  It was hilarious getting it all cleaned and set up.   But it worked out just fine. And the baptism itself was so great.  Super peaceful and filled with the spirit.  Anderson is amazing and was so happy!  All goo things and miracles that the pool worked out, that it didn't rain, and that I wasn't too cold haha.  (yes its actually cold in this part of Brazil!  Hallelujah!!)

Diogo, Matheus, and Gabriel are al studs, and we are seeing such a change in their lives.  We love visiting with them and leave super happy after every lesson.  It's not been super easy for them but they are just the best with their perspectives about life.

We are teaching Rose, who is deaf.  It's been super neat because she has such a sweet spirit, that is obvious to see despite our lack of communication.  But, one member knows a little of sign language and we've also been using an app that when you speak or write it signs for them.

Sister Knudsen and I are learning Brazilian sign language as much as we can to help as well!

WE had a service project cutting grass/weeds, cleaning at an investigators house.  We also cut and gave a bath to his dog haha.  It was awesome and they loved the results.   (especially because the dog had dreads haha).

And at church, we had a lot of members and investigators attend, with a lunch with everyone after.  It was an awesome meeting and turn-out!

I Love Campos!

Boa Semana!
Com amor, Sister Jeppson.

Mosiah 27:14

Anderson's Baptism 

Cleaning out the" baptismal font"

My nice tan lines

Anderson

Gabriel, Diogo, Ricardo, Matheus (left to right) 

Mais que Feliz :)

Ok, seriously this week had some MAJOR miracles and its lucky I didn't burst from happiness! 

Lots of good things but the major points:

Sister Knudsen and I started teaching English! We thought only 5is people would show up but there were more than 20!! It was super awesome! We are using the church program English Connect, and its great! Many people are excited to learn, and I managed well enough with the help of Sister Knudsen.  

Sister Enout and I traveled to Sao Paulo to the mission office for a meeting with the other leaders, and when we returned, we came back with one more sister!  We are back to 4 sisters again and switched it up a bit.  The new sister is Sister Barradas from Brazil.  She is waiting for her visa to go to her mission in the Dominican Republic and is with us until then.  So now I am training Sister Knudsen and Sister Enout is training Sister Barrados.  

-We had an amazing amazing, amazing experience with our investigators, Diogo, Gabriel, and Matheus. We have been teaching them pretty much every day, and they are just amazing people. They are friends of Ricardo. We had some great lessons with them, and they have been reading hte book of mormon every day, and loving it. On saturday night, we challenged them to pray about whether or not they need to be baptized...then the next day was sunday, and we had stake conference. 

(insert: we luckily had a bus rented to take the people here to get there because the stake center is about 2ish hours away. And another miracle was that we had 8 of our investigators come as well! ahhh pure joy. They all loved it and it was super awesome.)

Ok back to D, G, and M. Before we left that morning, G and M told us that the night before, they took us up on our challenge to know for themselves. Matheus told us he prayed, then opened up the book of mormon to a random page. And the verse he opened on was the last verse of Alma 5 (read it peeps haha). And then GAbriel said, ok lets see if this is for me too. He prayed as well, then opened up the book of mormon randomly. ANd guess what he opene too!! THE SAME EXACT PAGE AND VERSE! ahhhhh the church is true. They loved conference, and the talks we so perfect. they were nodding the whole time in agreement. And then to make it more amazing, we taught them that night as well. And it was a super power filled lesson. They were all super excited to say something to us at the end....They said that they all recieved answers and would be baptized!!!! Ahhhh man, so so neat. And not only that, but Gabriel and Matheus are super interested in missions, and Gabriel already said he wants to serve. holy cow. I think I nearlly burst from happiness many times yesterday. 

I know that we all can receive answers to our prayers, and God hears every single one. I am filled with so much joy and happiness seeing the happiness the gospel brings into these peoples lives. The church is true. 

AMO VOCES

-a very happy Sister Jeppson

Sister Enout, Sister Barrada, Sister Jeppson, Sister Knudsen 

Pday pics

p-day fun- riding chair lifts up Elephant Hill

The elephant on elephant hill 

Stake Conference: We have 32 missionaries in our stake...the most missionaries in one stake in all of Brazil, and probably the world. 

Early morning light 

Milagres!!!

This week was another amazing one filled with miracles. Seriously everyday I am amazed at the things that are happening here, and am so grateful!!!

Ok, I have very little time, so here are the highlights. 

-9 months! holy cow I can't believe I am halfway through my mission. Time FLIES and it scares me. crazy. 

-We had an amazing lesson with our investigator A. He has basically read the entire Book of Mormon, and has a testimony of it. But he was unsure of if he wants to be baptized. At the end of the lesson, we all bore our testimonies, and Sis. Knudsen bore the sweetest testimony of her baptism and how it brought so much joy (and still does) into her life. And this is all in her very limited Portuguese (gift of tongues is real people). The spirit was incredibley strong, and A teared up a bit and gave an amazingly genuine prayer after. And then when we met with him again later this week, he told us that he wants to be baptized!! It was so neat, and he is very happy.

-The awesome new member R continues to be an amazing missionary here. He invites all of his friends to meet with us, and on Sat, morning, we walked up to meet with him and an investigator, and were happily surprised to see 4 more other people there to get to know the church! It was so awesome. And three of them came to church and enjoyed it on  Sunday. Ahhh I love it. 

-I got to play with 4 puppies(supper cute haha)

-I saw two giant rats (luckily dead) on the street and one giant spider (unluckily not dead) within one hour

-Everyday I am so happy and grateful for all the miracles that happen. The mission is the BEST!!

Amo voces e boa semana!!

-Sister Jeppson

Sister Enout and Sister Knudsen

Pancakes and buttermilk syrup for P-day 

                                pretty view in Guaratinguetá 

A bit of our area, view from the bus

Rua dos Mórmons hahaha

A Week of sunshine despite the rain :)

Olá Família!!

This week was amazing, and I'm convinced that Campos Do Jordão is the best area in the entire mission!  It rained all week here, but it doesn't' stop our work, and we had lots of amazing moments that were "sunshine in the rain". haha, there ya go, I explained the title.

This area is all hills, and some parts we have to be careful when it rains, because we could get trapped with all the mud - all good things.

Other good things this week:
Fernando: this guy is awesome.  He stopped us last week and asked what church we go to and found out ht is a member from Rio Grade Do Sol (the south of Brazil) and was baptized way back.  He moved to Campos about 6 years ago and was excited to hear that the church is back in Campos!  We didn't have contact with him but on P-day, we ran into him two times in a food place, then when we ate ace later that day! WE got his number to cal him later in the week.  And now, he is super excited and telling a bunch of people he knows (neighbors/friends/people who work in all places he visits) about the church and inviting them to meet us!  It's the coolest thing, and very neat to see his excitement to help spread the word about the church.

We had zone conference this week, which was awesome.  Fun to see some missionaries I haven't seen in a while and fun to meet others I've never met! And to have training/etc. from Presidente e Sister Miller, and our leaders.

We had church with he branch in an area about an hour away (with the actual branch there).  It happens every 1st Sunday of the month there since we aren't a branch yet.  It makes it a bit difficult for a lot of the members here to attend because of the distance and cost of the bus, and not many people have cars.  But, we will become a branch too, so it will be better :)
But a member was able to take one investigator, who liked it a lot and is loving reading the Book of Mormon.  So, it was great.

And basically, I just love it here!! The people are some of the most humble, loving genuine people I've ever met.  Many have almost nothing materially, but know what really matters in life.  Ah, I wish all of you had the experience to meet these people because they are the greatest!! Seriously. Absolutely love them!

Goal this week for you all: Try a little harder to be a little more loving, humble, and serving.

Te Amo

com amor,
Sister Jeppson

Emma was able to find a web cam so we got to do Google hangouts
with the family (Brandon @BYU, Chloe in Spanish class,
 Eric, Hunter and Mckay on their way to the Kings game,
Mom, Stella and Lucy at the school) The BEST!!! 

More touristy part of town 

Green!!! 

On the way to zone conference

Zone Conference