Wednesday, February 11, 2015

Dear Everyone, 
This last week was a week for sure.

It started out with going to the airport way to many times.  Elder Chevalier showed up.  He is from Idaho.  
His name is french though.  He is fantastic.  He has been out here one more transfer than I have.  
He will probably end his mission here.  We were in a triple for a while and then Elder Domingues was
 with us because the Zone Leaders were in Praia and he is serving with a mini-missionary who hadn´t 
showed up yet, so he served with Elder Zuniga for a few days until Elder Zuniga went to Praia to pick 
up Elder McMullin who is from Logan.  Elder Zuniga will be training him.  

It was an interesting few first days for Elder McMullin.  He got here on Friday, and on Saturday had a 
baptism.  While he was in the water for the baptism he cut his foot on a sharp rock, and so it was 
bleeding profusely and had to go to the hospital.  Haha.  He is having many great experiences from 
day 1.  He already speaks really well, and is going to be a super good missionary.

We had a great zone meeting this week too.  We say, I know that Jospeh Smith saw the Father and 
the Son many times, but in the meeting someone said that, and it had such a different meaning.  I 
understood it on a completely different level.  Even when we aren´t capeable of being fully focused 
all the time on what is the best, but when we are where we should be consistantly, the Lord can teach 
us new things from old things.  I have heard that and said that many times, but the experience of 
Jospeh Smith had such a new meaning.  We also have a new rule that we can not eat with or 
anything from members or natives.  It is going to be a bit of a struggle, but we need to be obedient!

Church was great!  It was super edifying this week, and we broke our church reacord with 56 people.  
We are trying a ton to find and help progress potential preisthood holders.  We had some preisthood 
holder miracles this week.

1. We have been trying to figure out what will happen after our branch president goes back to Portugal 
in a few weeks, and who will replace him.  There were no obvious answers because of worthyness and
 age.  Then at church on sunday there was a new guy that showed up.  He is a returned missionary of 
3 weeks that just moved here.  He got here and pretty much went straight to church.  He had been on 
this island a matter of hours,, and was called as the 1st counselor in the branch presidency.  What a 
blessing.

2. We have been working with a couple, Artur and Simone for a while, and Artur is strong and has 
known that the Church is true, and has been coming to church etc... for a long time, but because of 
the Law of Chastity, he hasn´t gotten baptised yet.  Then this week we went to him, and then shared 
with him a revelation that we had recieved earlier, and the Spirit led us, and we invited him to be 
baptised on the 7th, and he accepted, ready to make the needed changes to get there.  We then 
asked him to bear his testimony in the lesson and it was super powerful.  In church, the district 
president also shared a fantastic talk on marrage.  

The Lord knows that we need worthy preisthood holders, and has prepared a way.

I know that this church is true, and that the Lord wants us to share our testimonies because he that 
does not share, will start to lose it.  We can share it verbaly and through our actions, but we must share 
it, and we must notice opportunities to do so.  That is my challenge for this week.  Make sure that you
bear your testimony at least once every day.  Kids need to hear the testimony of their parents.  Parents 
need to hear the testimonies of their kids.  Friends need to hear the testimonies of other friends in 
situations other than testimony meetings.  I know that if we share our testimonies, we will change.  
Without change, the Atonement of Christ means nothing.

Love,
Elder Sampson

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