X-Dog 🤤

 This week was SO GOOD. 

Our friend Domingos unfortunately was not baptized yesterday. BUT that's okay. His "partner" or ex girlfriend, Maria, is not accepting of his baptism and he wanted to wait but I'm not worried that it won't happen because he's so ready. There was a different baptism this weekend and Domingos was able to come and Maria came too!! Guys that was huge!! Domingos looked at us, winked, and said, "Your prayers worked." He was crying watching the baptism. 

Do you remember the amazing lady who we met with last week that had already read 13 chapters of the Book of Mormon before our first lesson??? WELL SHE'S GETTING BAPTIZED. LISTEN TO THIS STORY. 

Me and Sister Webster love this Brazilian restaurant called X-Dog (Pronounced sheesh-dog lol) where they have the best Brazilian pizza ever. We had it all planned to go there on Thursday to celebrate Sister Webster's 13 months (). Well I woke up on Thursday not super ready for another day and I told Sister Webster "Not gonna lie to you, X-Dog is what got me out of bed this morning, not the obra." Little did I know. Later we get to the chapel for a lesson with Aline!!!! This would be our second lesson with her. This lesson was soo so amazing you guys. Aline went on about when she reads a verse of the Book of Mormon she wants to read it over and over and that she just can't put the book down. We taught about the atonement of Jesus Christ and the Spirit was there you guys. We invited her to be baptized and she so casually said "Yes! I actually wanted to talk to you guys about that!!!" IT WAS SO HAPPY. And then while we were in this lesson, a Ukranian man showed up to the church. He doesn't speak any Portuguese or english, but he just got to Portugal and he wants to learn about the church. Amazingly we have a member who studied in Ukraine and is fluent. So we called him, the member came to the church within 30 minutes, and taught our cute Ukranian friend. Amazingly there was a Book of Mormon in Ukranian at the church. Writing out this story is just blowing my mind. After all of this, we were able to snag a photo of us, Aline and the member who helped in her lesson, and in the background our other member teaching the Ukranian man about the Book of Mormon. It was just so many miracles me and Sister Webster were on cloud 9. We said a prayer of gratitude and then we went to X-Dog. Bless 

I had my first exchange this week as an STL! I went with Sister Page to her area of Olhão. I was very terrified but it went super well. It sounds cheesy, but we were walking down the street and she was talking to me and I just felt this overwhelming love for her. It literally made me emotional. I loved hearing her story and seeing her love for the Savior and this work. 

This week we also went to the temple with my recent-convert from Gaia!! President is just the best to let us go with them for the first time. We left in the morning, traveled 3 hours on the train, went to the temple, got some mcdonald's, and traveled 3 hours back. 

It was a long day but man do I love the temple. Yvens even was able to baptize me  It was so cute. 

At the baptism at our chapel this weekend, 6 of our friends were there to watch!!!! Are we kidding!!!! I was tempted just to throw some of them right on in the water. I'm really excited for Domingos, Aline, and our friend Celia. Pray for them tá bom?

Last Sunday a talk was given at church where he shared an analogy about our Heavenly Father that I had never heard before but loved. And then in Aline's lesson she shared the same analogy and I do not think it was a coincidence. The Irmão who gave a talk said that when he was little, he asked his dad "How big is Heavenly Father?" His dad thought about it for awhile, and then pointed to an airplane in the sky and asked "How big is that airplane?" The little Irmão said "really really small." Then his dad drove him to the airport and pulled up right next to a parked airplane and then asked him the same question. This time the little Irmão said "really really big." His dad compared the airplane to our Heavenly Father. Wherever He is, He is the same size, but when He is closer to us, His grandeur and power and love have a greater influence on us. I love this because our Heavenly Father's love is perfect, even though our ability to feel it is not. When we teach the plan of salvation, we teach that because of the fall of Adam and Eve, we are separated from God physically, but it's because of our sin that separates us cada vez mais from Him spiritually. I've never read this scripture before either, but somehow these past couple of weeks it's been everywhere. 

Romans 8

35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, 

39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

I'm so grateful for our Savior who, because of His sacrifice and divine mission, allows us to repent and close the gap that our sin inevitably creates between us and our Heavenly Father. It's our decision whether or not the grandeur and power and love of God is eeny teeny and impossible to recognize or huge and incredibly present in our lives!!

Amo vcs,

Sister Menden

Pics!

- Aline and Ukrainian man

- pday

- exchange with Sis page!!

- Yvens and the temple!

- Ukranian man teaching Sister Webster how to say book in Ukranian

- us updating area book watching the sunset with snickers in our hands