GOOD NEWS!!!! I GOT MY VISA!!!!

I GOT MY VISA!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I leave to Brazil on December 10th!!!! WOOT WOOT!!!!!!! I am so excited!!!! 

So the baptism was great! So many members showed up to support Ryszard and it was awesome. Ryszard was already being a missionary! He brought a bunch of friends to the baptism and we got a bunch of return appointments! It was an exciting week! When Ryszard was baptized, the Spirit filled the room so much and it was amazing. It was cool that the visitors had that opportunity to feel the Spirit. 

I think the Lord was preparing me to get my visa these past couple of weeks. A few weeks ago, I got to go to lunch with a guy who recently returned from a mission in Brazil and we talked for an hour, just having a conversation in Portuguese. And then, this last Friday, I got to teach my first lesson in Portuguese!!! 

So in the area next to ours, there was a referral for a family that spoke Portuguese, so the missionaries in that area told the Spanish missionaries for our zone, which one of the missionaries is from Sao Paulo, Brazil. His name is Elder Moraes. So Elder Moraes and I are pretty good friends, so he called me, and we got permission from the Zone Leaders to visit this family. So on Friday, my companions dropped us off, and we knocked on the door. The wife and husband came and talked to us, and then we ended up talking Portuguese. But since I was the only one not fluent, I was a little quiet. I understood pretty much everything, which was funny when the wife said something along the lines of: "so he doesn't speak Portuguese?" so I responded "Oh, I speak Portuguese". It was really funny. But we had a good conversation for a really long time and then got a return appointment for Wednesday. But the Spanish missionaries will have to go because I just found out about transfers! Just right now! 

I'm going to North Point YSA with Elder Calkins (one of the Elders in my area now) and Elder Thomas. I think thats the area with Kevin Tie! Anyways, I am excited! The Portuguese Speaking Elders are in my district over there, and Elder Moraes just got transferred to the Portuguese Branch! Anyways, a lot of news. A lot of change. I am so excited though! So all day tomorrow I will be packing. 

Anyways, I've gotta go right now, but I'll see if I can email a bit later. Okay, I love you all! This church is true!

Elder Hintze

Good News

RYZSHARD IS GETTING BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Last Sunday, we invited him to be baptized on the 23rd of November, but he declined and said he'd have a date in December...but yesterday he told us he wants to be baptized this Saturday! He thought that he had to pay to get baptized, but once a member cleared that up for him, he was so excited and happy to be baptized. In his Polish accent, he keeps saying "I got to keep the fire burning!" It's AWESOME! So on Saturday is his baptism. He's such a humble and faithful person. I really admire that about him. He's such a good guy. Anywho, that is super exciting! I am so happy for him! If you don't remember, Ryzshard is the big Polish guy who swam 10+ hours in the ocean to escape from communism. Theres a whole lot more to his story, but I'll just tell you when I come home ;). He's such a magnificent and amazing guy. His story is awesome. 

Besides that exciting news, this week has been kind of slow. Not much happened. We got this Egyptian family an Arabic Book of Mormon, but we haven't been able to get it to them yet. 

Oh! funny story. After I was done emailing you guys on Wednesday at the Library, we ran into Dusty Cash, one of our investigators that we had an appointment with on Friday. Well, we said hey and talked for a bit and then left. Then,on Thursday, after tracting, we asked Elder Rodrigues what he felt like we should do. And he said "lets go get ice cream." and then he said "actually, let's go get some drinks". So we went to get some drinks. Well, at the gas station he chose to go to, we ran into Dusty again! It was funny! So then I told Elder Rodrigues "Well, I guess that means we have to get ice cream too" since everything he has us to leads us to something good. Well we decided to go get ice cream. Even though it was freezing cold. Well, at the ice cream place, the girl that worked there said "hey! I saw you guys last week!" but we had no clue what she was talking about. Well, we asked her a bunch of questions to figure it out, and we concluded that she was hanging out with the son of the Egyptian family when we were there on Sunday! And she recognized us! We had a good conversation, got some ice cream, and went off to dinner. But moral of the story is, Elder Rodrigues is an inspired man. 

Another funny story that the other Elders in the ward had...one of there investigators is from Taiwan and he speaks limited english, but he's an awesome guy. He comes and plays basketball with us every P-day, and he's really really good. Anyways, apparently, Kevin just realized that the Book of Mormon is actually a record and a real story! He thought it was a fairy tale! haha. Anyways....I love you all and miss you all a ton! I know that his gospel is true, and that it truly is the Lord's church. God truly loves each and every one of us, and I am so grateful for that. I love you all, and hope you all have an awesome week!

Choose the right! and read Mosiah 2

Love

Elder Hintze

Here are some pictures from the week

Top of Stone Mountain

L to R

Elder Schmidt, Elder MacDonald (shadow on his face), Elder Rodrigues, Elder Blair (in green), Elder Calkins, and at the bottom, my handsome self...We're wearing shirts we made with the Zone Leaders faces on them..haha It was so fun!

We made Zone Leader T-Shirts and here we are showing them off!

Me and my companion on the Top of Stone Mountain!

Nov. 4, 2013 - 3 MONTH MARK

Well, my 3 month mark is coming up this week! It's crazy to think that time's flown by so fast! I am so grateful to be out here on a mission and serving the Lord! So many cool experiences happen. 

This week was pretty average. On Halloween, we did service at the Brady's all day, doing yard work and moving furniture. Then, our mission president said we had to be in our apartment by 6PM, so we showed up at our dinner appointment at 5:30, ate a bowl of chili, and left. 

Since we had absolutely nothing to do in our apartment, I took down all the furniture and built a fort. It was awesome, and it stayed up until last night. 

But the rest of that night, I just stayed up and started teaching myself German. A guy in a bordering ward who speaks German keeps sending me these lessons and they're super awesome/helpful/easy to understand. So that's pretty cool.  Friday, we did more service, and taught a guy named Jonathon. He's from Peru, and he's really cool. We were able to answer his questions, but when we asked him to pray, he just said "well, I don't pray". We tried to find out why, but he said he just stopped and he doesn't pray, and probably won't. So Elder MacDonald did a really good job at explaining the importance of prayer, but he was still being really stubborn. Without being pushy, we got him to agree to try to pray. So hopefully that works out. It was really weird, but it really helped me understand the importance of having that connection with our Father in Heaven. It's also cool that we are able to do that. We get to have a personal relationship with the creator of the universe. That's always amazed me, and I don't think I'll ever fully understand it. So the true purpose of it is, if you ever want truth, turn to the creator of all truth, and "by the power of the Holy Ghost, ye may know the truth of all things." (Moroni 10:5) God will reveal the truth to us if we ask with a sincere heart. I just think that's amazing. 

Anyways, on Saturday...I actually have no clue what happened on Saturday. I forget what happens half the time. Oh! I just remembered. We tracked for, like, 3 hours straight. We realized that the neighborhood that we were tracking was just tracked by the Jehovah's Witnesses. (There are A LOT of them out here). So a lot of people were kind of annoyed, but we also met some really cool people. This one guy came and talked with us out on his porch, and told us that his wife had just suffered a stroke and couldn't walk and his life has been really hard. So he asked if we could say a pray right now for his wife. We offered a prayed, and the Spirit filled that porch step. It was super cool. We didn't get a return appointment, but he was really nice. And just the fact that he has the opportunity to feel the Spirit was enough for us to plant that seed. That's really what we do when we tract is plant those seeds. It's normally a really fun experience to tract. I really enjoy it, and really like talking and meeting new people.  

On Sunday, church was awesome. Ryszard came, but Peter didn't since his mom won't let him. So he stayed at the Christensen's house until we could come over after church and teach them. We showed Ryszard and Peter the Restoration video, and taught about the Restoration. It was cool, and you can tell that they believe. I also found out that Ryszard is fluent in Russian, Ukranian, and kind of German. When he was forced into the communist army, they made him learn all those. He's super awesome. After that, we went tracking in a small neighborhood and wow...let me just tell you. I do not like white people (insert people filled with EGO). This neighborhood was full of every race, but white people. And we got 5 return appointments! If you didn't know, that is pretty good for one day, let alone 2 hours in 1 neighborhood. So that was awesome. White (EGO) people are always rude, but everyone else ROCKS! So I love you all and I am so happy that I am on a mission! I love all you guys, so choose the right and stuff!

See ya

Adios

Tchau

Bye

Elder Hintze