Elder Dallin Anderson's Mission Blog: Zone Conference, Rain and German Shepherd Lesson

Ola,

Wednesday we went to Setubal for a combined Zone conference for the Setubal and Miratejo Zones. I learned a lot about the power and simplicity of the Plan of Salvation. It really is so simple that a child can understand. It is such a powerful lesson and is one that converts many people to the church, including Sister Tavares. After the conference, our district searched for Sister Isgett's bag that was stolen from a church activity the prior Saturday, I felt like a CIA agent walking through the woods in my suit looking for stolen stuff, haha. We ended up finding a few of her bank cards on the hill behind the church. Then we had to book it across the city to catch the train that we thought was leaving at 5, We ended up getting there on time, but the train actually left at 6, haha. On the train ride back I talked to a few people about the gospel. I have found out that talking to people on public transportation is fun and not as scary as I thought it would have been. I met some pretty cool people.

A lot of people walk their dogs here so to start conversations with people I will often just start talking to them about their dog and pet it. One had a German Shepherd, I began to talk to him then went to pet his dog when it snapped and tried to bite my hand! I pulled it back just it time, its teeth just grazed my hand barely making a scratch. Another inch and I wouldn't have a pinky finger haha- I definitely learned a lesson.

My magnetic tag fell off one night proselyting, I have no idea where it is, We searched almost everywhere that we had gone that night and still haven't found it, hopefully this week. Now I am stuck with just my clip name tag because my new ones still haven't arrived.

Saturday we were filling the baptismal font up for a baptism in the ward, it was about half way full and we were going to stay at the church until it was full, We had an appointment with Catia on the other side of the city, about a 20 minute walk. I had the thought that we needed to go to Catia then rather than waiting for the font to fill, so I showed a boy how to do it, then we left to teach Catia. We got to her apartment building right as they were coming down the stairs, leaving for her son to get a haircut. They said they could wait for the haircut and invited us in to hear a message. We then taught them a powerful Plan of Salvation lesson. Milagre. If we would have waited one more minute we would have missed them.

It rained a ton this week, Sunday morning it was cold and rainy. We left our umbrellas at the church the night before so we had a soaking wet, freezing cold 20-minute walk to the chapel. When we arrived my suit jacket was soaked so i had to take it off and hang it up during church. There was a family from California on vacation that visited our ward. It was fun and a little difficult to speak to them in English- haha.

Ate Proximo.

Elder Anderson