So this weekend was amazing...in all ways shapes and forms!

1. Edilson, Rose, and Larissa. This week after a lesson we had with
the family, Larissa pulled us aside and told us that she had received
her response on the 12th of February but hadn´t seen the chance to
tell us until that night! She said she was at her Grandma´s house
praying to know and she felt a very pure joy fill her heart and got
very emotional feeling the spirit. When she told us she was so excited
to share her experience. It was adorable! It made me get all teary
eyed and feel the spirit too! We asked her if she wanted to be
baptized on Sunday (what is now yesterday) and she said she would talk
to her parents and get back to us because she hadn't told them about
her answer yet. So she talked to her dad and he thought she should
wait a little bit longer but after talking to him again he said if she
really wanted to, that he´d be there to support her. Rose...she didn't
understand as well. She called her crazy and told her she wouldn´t
follow through with the commitment and so shouldn't do it. We have
learned a little bit more about Rose this weekend. Love her to death,
but she has very set opinions about religious things!

Anyway, so we decided to wait and see how the lesson at the temple
went with their family to see if she would actually get baptized now
or later. It was AMAZING!! We invited a stake leader, Adriano, who is
over missionary work to go with us. He did a fantastic job explaining
temple work and bearing testimony. Loved it. We took them into the
waiting room of the temple and talked about baptism - reading from 3
Ne 11. The spirit was so strong and Edilson had tears in his eyes.
He said he is almost positive he will be baptized even though he wants
to read and pray a little more before setting a date. We asked him and
Rose about how they felt about Larissa wanting to get baptized, and
Edilson said he was very happy with her decision but would like her to
wait a little and even be baptized with him when it happened. I felt
the spirit letting me know that I really should let her wait so they
could be baptized together.

When we invited Rose to be baptized she explained that she feels as if
her baptism (catholic) is valid and was wonderful for her and doesn't
have any intention of being baptized again. Adriano explained
perfectly the fact that her baptism was a wonderful decision she made
should have meant a lot like it did, but that it was a step she took
to follow Christ, and that because of that faith, Christ is now
showing her the place that truly has authority from God to baptize.
It was a great explanation, but she didn't want to hear it. Again, I
love her to death, but I am sad at her lack of spirituality. She isn't
even willing to pray about it. :( But luckily she is very supportive
of her husband learning about the church and going there. He has
always looked for the right church but didn't find it, so he became
someone who likes to say 'I don't need a church, I have God in my
heart"...but now he is seeing that the true church of Jesus Christ
exists and he is very excited!

Long story longer...Edilson LOVED the temple and Larissa too! They
will be baptized soon and stay very very strong in the church. Rose
will come around too...I just know it!!

2. Karoline. We prayed even more with Karol this week and gave her
her baptismal sheet to show to her mom. She really wanted to be
baptized before one of us gets transferred so she took it home and
pleaded with her mom. FINALLY her mom accepted. She signed the sheet
but told Karol that she doesn't want any more members bothering her
about stuff from the church or visiting their house. Not exactly the
way we wanted it to be, but at least she is letting her be baptized
now! She told us on Sunday at church so we spent the first 2 hours
(the schedule is reversed here with RS first and Sacrament last)
organizing everything for her to be baptized that afternoon. The
baptism happened and was awesome! The young women sang and the leaders
bore testimony and people cried and it was wonderful!!

3. Vanessa. Our lunch was at a members house who has a sister that is
inactive form a different city. She just so happened decided to drop
her other plans and come to lunch. Sister Felipe, her, and I hit it
off from the beginning and she ended up giving us a ride to the stake
center and staying for the baptism. Then she helped us with a special
lesson that happened after wards which I will explain now.

4. Amanda. She came to the baptism and we found out that she has
been going to church for about a month in other wards and went that
day in the stake center. The Zone Leaders invited her to our baptism
so she could see it and meet us. She came and we decided to teach her
after the baptism. Vanessa helped us because she had made friends
with her during the service. We taught her about the Restoration and
the spirit was incredibly strong. The lesson was truly guided by the
spirit...its hard to explain...but it was that feeling that the ldeas
and words we used were straight from Him. Not our own. We taught the
lesson to them both and at the end we marked Amanda´s baptism for the
12th of March and the 4 of us were bawling our eyes out....I have
never loved anyone so quickly as Vanessa and Amanda...in less that 4
hours we formed a bond that I will never forget. I cant describe how
powerful it was...but I´m pretty sure we were good friends there in
the preexistence!

Loved this weekend...it was incredible. I know God lives and loves us
so much. He gives us way more than we will ever be able to deserve.
We are very blessed to have this life to prepare to return to his
presence and do our best to show him our love and gratitude.

Love you so much Mom, Dad, Andy, Dev, Ash, Erik, Hailey, Andin,
Cam...your love and prayers make these miracles happen!

Sister Knudsen

Short but sweet.....

Nooooo....my super long email just got eaten...that makes me sad
and angry but I cant be angry as a missionary so just sad....

But okay let me try to remember the highlights...

We are teaching some awesome families and one of them we are taking to
the Temple on Saturday so they can see it and feel the spirit there.
It will be awesome!

The YW in our ward are amazing and are awesome missionaries with the
girls we bring to church with us.

I am anxious about transfers next week! March 2 I will probably be
leaving here and it makes me sad!!

I might be training again because we have 4 new sisters arriving!

I love you guys like crazy!!!

Sister Knudsen

New photos!!!

The chapel that is being built here! We went there and the workers
and security guard gave us a tour and we started teaching them. They
are awesome but I will talk more about them next week!

PACKAGE!!!

The baptism!!! Silvana, Raquel, Henrique, and José Quirino! LOVE THEM!!!

The awesome Brazilian flag that José Quirino made for Sister
Phillips. She came here for splits one day and went there and paid
him to make it for her. It turned out awesome!! I am still deciding
what I want him to do for me.

The spiderman he made!

The cake she showed us how to make and decorate. We celebrated PDAY! hahaha!

Esfihas we made the other day with a member who taught us!!
Delicious!! I know how now! its a very popular party food here!!

Thanks for sending the package!!!

I did NOT get transferred! YAY! I am staying here with Sister Felipe for one
more!! I almost have as much time as Sister Santos had here and everyone
always made fun of her that she would stay her whole mission here! hahaha!
President just forgets about this area! hahaha!

But I am super excited to stay here and see the baptisms of Jose,
Silvana and their kids! They are the humbled amazing coolest family!
Besides ours of course!! haha!

Love you guys!

Erin

Finally a GOOD update!!

Hello my wonderful beautiful and amazing family!

I´m sorry for the past 2 weeks! This week I am writing without being
AS rushed so I will try to include everything that I wanted to say!

To start off...We have transfers on Wednesday so tonight we will find
out if one of us is leaving or if we will stay together again. I
think I will be going this time because I have been here almost 7
months! That is 5 transfers and 3 with Sister Felipe. But there will
be 4 sisters going home in the next transfer (March) so maybe he will
leave us alone until then when he will have to change everything
anyway...who knows!

So I was going to talk about Camila, Geane´s sister. Geane is a less
active woman who we visit and a few months ago her Sister moved there
to help her with the house and he kids. We formed a good friendship
with her and were waiting for the right moment to teach her! Well the
Lord provided last week! She had told us that she would go to church
finally, because we´d been inviting her for awhile. So we took that
as a sign and stopped by there during the week. It was the perfect
chance because Geane had gone to the doctor so it was just Camila and
Geane´s little girl who just happened to take a nap in that moment.
So we sat down and taught Camila about the restoration. She found it
all very interesting and told us that she would read the Book of
Mormon and pray. She told us that she has been feeling lately that
God hasn´t been very present in her life...that she hasn´t felt the
spirit very much. She told us that if He really did respond to her
prayer that she would know that this church is true and would prepare
to be baptized. It was a very special time with her. Since then we
were able to follow up with her and she had read a little but was
feeling that she really needed to take more time to read and pray.
She didn't go to church because she got really sick and then yesterday
didn't go again...we don't know why yet....but we are praying hard for
her because she is ready. We just need to fight again Satan now...oh
how he loves to keep people from the Gospel! UGH! But we are
stronger!!!

An amazing couple that we are teaching, José Quirino and Silvana, went
to church yesterday with 2 of their kids and LOVED it! They are super
humble people and so fun! José Quirino makes mosaic art...I cant
really explain it. (I'll send a photo) Its pretty much amazing
and if I stay here I will have him do one for me. Super talented!
They are preparing to be baptized on the 29th. Please pray for them!!

Marcelo and Marcia went to church yesterday with their 2 kids too.
Marcelo told his boss that he wont be working on Sundays anymore
because he will be going to church! Love it! He chose the 29th to be
baptized as well so it will be a busy and amazing day!!

Last Monday we had a fun day at a member family´s home and she taught
us how to make Esfihas! I´ll make them for you guys when I get home!
They are a party food here! She also taught us a little about how to
decorate cakes. Good times!

THANK YOU ERIN!!

Erin sent the family these AMAZING Brasil soccer jerseys....they are rad. The kids especially were excited to get a gift from Aunt Rinny!!!


From Erin......

I hope that they fit well...it was hard trying to decide the sizes for
the kids but it looks like they fit pretty well. I loved the little
Brazil jersey for Cam too...it doesn't match the rest but I think its
worth it!

LOVE YOU!!

Update THIS week......

Hey Family!!

This week was crazy and amazing! A LOT of work but that's exactly what we are here to do! We have goals in our mission and in our stake here of how many baptisms we wanted this year. We have been praying a lot for direction from the Lord in where to go to find the people that are ready now to enter the Lord´s church and make this important covenant with Him. The Lord has truly blessed us this week with an answer to our prayers.

Two boys, Wenzell and Wesley were both baptized on Saturday and confirmed yesterday. It was very special!!

We had been teaching Wenzell a couple months back because his mom really wanted him to be baptized, but he was unsure about it and said he didn't want to be baptized. We were not about to baptize someone who didn't want to be baptized so we stopped teaching him. Last week as we tried to decide which people we could focus on to help with the goals we felt strongly to teach him again. We went there on Wednesday and had a great lesson with him. We were able to help him understand the importance of baptism and he agreed to be baptized!! So we started planning for Saturday.

We were also trying hard to get Wesley´s dad to let him be baptized but its hard to find him at home. His mom had gone to church with him on Sunday and wanted him to be baptized, but needed permission from her husband. All week we tried to talk to him but it didn't work out. When Saturday arrived we had a meeting with the bishopric and our ward mission leader to plan how we could help his dad accept. We planned to invite them to Wenzell´s baptism and have everyone talk to the dad about all the great programs the church offers, get his permission there, and then interview Wesley to be baptized on Sunday. When we arrived at their house on Saturday afternoon, the dad came to the door and told us he had just gotten home from work and wanted to rest and that they couldn´t let us in right then. We told him we just wanted to talk to him quickly. He came to the gate and we told him that Wenzell would be baptized that night. We were just going to invite him to go, but he thought we were asking him if Wesley could be baptized too. He started saying that Wesley wasn't ready, that he wouldn´t stay strong, that he didnt want him to be forced to do anything. We explained that we weren´t forcing anything and that it was Wesley himself and also his wife that wanted the gospel and wanted to be baptized and that he too would be forcing them to not follow Christ if he forbade the baptism. (We were praying the whole time for inspiration in what to say and the Spirit delivered) His dad looked at us and then called Wesley to come there. Wesley came and his Dad started asking him..."Is this what you want? Do you want to be baptized? etc" Wesley looked his dad straight in the eyes and said "Quero.....Eu Quero!" (I want to...I want to!) His dad looked back at him and started to bawl....He told his son that he could be baptized and that he needed to follow strong. That he needed to follow what his dad says and not what he does (He, the dad, has a lot of problems with alcohol, drugs, smoking, etc) It was a very emotional and spiritual moment. They embraced and we all stayed there crying for a moment. He went back in the house and we continued crying and praying, thanking God for the miracle he had just done for us. We then finished teaching Wesley the lessons he was missing, called President to get his permission to baptize a minor, and called the zone leaders and arranged for them to interview him that night before the baptism. Everything went very well. His mom went too and had a very good experience there. She has a baptismal date for the 8 of January if not sooner. It was truly a miracle how it all happened. I am so grateful to be a member of the True Church of Jesus Christ and to have the Gift of the Holy Ghost.

Its been a very special and emotional/spiritual journey!

I am VERY excited to talk to you all this weekend....AHHHH!! I am worried about how my English will be...its in a very poor state!! But we will just have to rely on the gift of tongues! haha! I will be calling on Friday for 5 minutes to give you the telephone number and hour to call, but let me know right now what time you think is best! Lets try the conference call because our call should be 30-40 minutes according to the mission rules and I think it will be hard to such short time!

LOVE YOU SO VERY MUCH!!! MERRY CHRISTMAS! FELIZ NATAL!!

Sister Erin Knudsen