July 28

My week was really good.  To start,  we taught a lot.  32 lessons to be exact.  Went up from our last week of 20 lessons.  I feel like the ball is finally starting to roll in the area.  I look forward to the sucess we are going to have here in a bit.  We are starting to plant the fruits.  The lord has truly put a couple of elects in our paths.  I would like to thank you for praying for me and the mission.  I could definately see the results of that this week.  

I had a great spiritual experience this last wednesday that´d I would like to share.  We started teaching this women named Jane and her husband Anderson this week.  Jane is a less active that is 18 and is living with her boyfriend and his mom.  Jane lost her mom 2 years ago and she has a younger brother named Jasinto (14).  Anyways, we marked a day to pass by and we started teaching Jane, Anderson, his mother, and Jasinto.  I was on a split with an Elder from my zone and we taught a pretty good lesson.  At the end of the lesson we asked if we could do anything to help them out.  Jane said she had something for us to do.  She was feeling a bit sick and said that her little brother, Jasinto, started crying the other day.  He told Jane that he didn´t want to lose her and didn´t think he would be able to be by himself.  Jane started to cry as she was telling us the story and she said that she wanted a blessing of  health so she would get better and show Jasinto that everything was going to be alright.  

Me and the Elder from my zone agreed and he did the first part.  I was able to seal the blessing and bless her.  As I put my hands on her head to seal the blessing the spirit entered the room and hit me like a truck.  I had to stop to keep myself from crying because I haven´t felt the spirit fall upon me like that in a long time.  I could feel the pure love god had for Jane and her family.  Tears started to fall down my eyes and I proceeded with the blessing.  I don´t really remember what I said but I know for a fact that my portuguese was flawless and everyone in that room felt the presence of the Spirit.  

Faith is like a seed as described in Alma 32.  When planted and cared for it grows into a tree, consequently you may be able to grab the fruit that the tree of faith bears.  As you bite into the fruit, you realize that is sweeter than all that is sweet and more desireable than all that is desireable.  I tasted the love that god has for his sons and daughters and it was sweeter and more desireable than anything i´ve ever tried.  

I know that as we take care of our faith, and cultivate it with pacience, we are able to partake of its fruit thereof.  I´m so thankful that my faith has brought forth fruit.  It takes awhile to see at partake of the fruit, but when it happens, it´s a real treasure and a delight to the human soul.  

Our love for God and fellow men expand as we comprehend true doctrine.  Our faith becomes true and becomes a fruit-bearing tree.

Have a good week,

Elder Diamond.

July 15

As for me.  Yes I am staying in the area.  And yes i´m going to be Elder Smiths last companion.  I´m going to be his last comp then i´ll get one more companion.  He goes home on the 19th in august.  

 We are doing a lot more contacts on the street next to people who are less active and fallen away from the church.  Our goal is to get about three roads booming with investigators and less active people to teach.  We brought a couple less actives to church this week and we are trying to bring in more.  It´s incredible.  All it takes usually to bring a less active back to church is a visit.  Just one or two visits and they will start going back to church.   All members of the church should take upon themselves this responsibility to bring back fallen away members to full activity.

We have two people that are making good progress in the gospel.  Two women.  Clairta and Nete.  They are neighbors and best friends.  We got a reference from a member and we started to visit them.  They are both looking to streghthen their faith in God and Christ.  They didn´t really know how to do it and that is where we came in.  I love teaching.  It´s so much fun.  We don´t give people fishes but we teach them to fish so that they won´t ever pass hunger again.  We are helping Clairta and Nete create habits that will bring them closer to god and his son.  The simple things have the most profound effect on ones soul.  Prayer, Scribture study, and Church attendance help the faith one SKY ROCKET!  They feel the impact of the simple things in their lives.  I can see it in their eyes when we teach them.  The gospel is perfect and it´s amazing to see how it makes someones life that much better.  I´m not sure why, but we haven´t really gotten around to baptism yet.  I hope that these two will be baptised and choose to follow the savior.  It´s the right thing to do.

I´ve been studying a lot this week about the attonement.  I felt like I was close to having a spiritual break through these last couple of weeks and I finally had it!  The attonement.  I´ve studied it a lot in my mission but it seems like every time I go back I learn something more and my faith in, and love for the savior grow so much.  I´m so grateful for the attonement.  It gives me force to keep going.  It gives me strength.  Studying the attonement is like going to a cabin and looking out one window.  You can go to the cabin and look out the north side of the window and see the beautiful mountains.  But you miss the flowing creak that is at the south window.  Or even the garden that is to the east side.  To appreciate and understand the attonement it must be applied in all aspects and parts of ones life.  

I know that Jesus Christ is the savior and light of the world.  His attonement is perfect.  He went below all things to bring all back to the presence of the father that accept through faith, repentance, baptism, the gift of the holy ghost, and enduring to the end.

Elder Diamond