The old man, the teenagers and the midget

Sister Reva Brooks took this picture of Heidi (Sister Hope), companion and two other Sisters at the Sao Paulo, Brazil Temple on Wednesday.

Following is an excerpt from Sister Roper's last email:

Last friday was my last day going street contacting in São Paulo. A few hours before we were to leave I got really tired and wasn't really feeling like spending time in São Paulo. But I got tired of not feeling up to it because I am a missionary, this is what I am going to be doing for the next 16 months so I told myself that I just needed to have fun and enjoy the moment and enjoy São Paulo because I may never be in this crazy city again.

So before I left I told Sister Lundstom that we were going to just have fun while we were tracting. So before we left we decided to contact 3 specific types of people. We decided to look for an older to contact because the are always really mean :). Then we decided to contact a teenage girl because for some reason they are really intimidating to contact.. Probably because they think we look like nuns and talk like 3 year-olds. And Third I told sister Lundstrom that we were going to contact a Midget. So we are driving in the van to our contacting area. We were each given three book of Mormon's to place. We didn't get any pass along cards this time, and Irmã Fillao told us that if our whole district got rid of all out our BOM's she would buy us sorvete (ice cream).

So we got to our area which is the frist area we contacted at where all the J.W.'s were (a few weeks ago) and where Sister. Lundstrom got stoned. Yeah it wasn't my favorite place to go but I just decided to have fun with it and was looking forward to the challenge. So we got to the park plaza place and start working. It was a little less busy then the first time we went, the J.W.'s were there which was awesome...but we actually didn't talk to them. There was a lovely cool breeze so life was good! Right when we started walking down the plaza we saw these two teenage girls sitting on some steps and before I knew what was happening I started talking to them. Once girl had a bunch of piercings but seemed nice enough and the other girl had a really nice friendly countenance. They both listened to us and were really friendly. We asked them if they wanted a book and the friendlier girl took one. It was really interesting because I could tell that she was interested in it even though the other girl wasn't. Anyway....

We were excited after that contact. So the rest of the day went fine. We actually had a lot of laughs and we were passing out our book of Mormon's. We talked to one guy forever trying to understand what he was saying and could pick out little bits and pieces but he was just kind of rambling and we felt prompted to just move on and stop listening to him. So finally after probably 10 or 15 minutes I asked the guy in Portugués if he wanted to learn about the Book of Mormon or not, he said no and so I was said "Taobóm. Obrigada por seu tempo. Boa Tarde!" (okay, thanks for your time see ya) It was crazy because the spirit can really help me identify who to teach and what to do. We contacted one guy and the whole thing was so quick, but I could tell he was truly interested in the book. I am grateful for the gift of the spirit because he definitely directs me and helps me be bold and unafraid. I am so blessed.

So we only had about 20 minutes left of our contacting and we still had one book of Mormon left. Luckily for us Sister Lundstrom spotted out our very last contact....Our Midget! Haha I couldn't believe it. At first I thought she was just pointing to some short man but when I looked again I saw a midget across the park from where we were. He was so accommodating too because he was in a bright orange outfit. Sister Lundstrom slowly walked his way figuring out if we should go over there. Duh..of course we should go over there. We are missionaries. We spare no one :). So we walk over to the Midget and he is actually a city worker and he was with two other coworkers. We started talking and the MIdget wasn't interested but one of the other workers was....especially when he found out the Book was free. haha it was good way to end the day. Even better is that our whole district passed out all of our BOM's in about 2 hours. We passed out 31 BOM's total. I felt so proud of all the elders and Sis. Lundstrom. All of us went out and had fun and relied on the Lord and overcame our fears. That was probably my favorite day here in the CTM. It's so important to remember to have fun while work hard because if you don't life will just be miserable.

...I am so excited to get to Rio (de Janerio) because I know there is a ton of work for me to do. I know that modesty and morality is a huge problem in Rio and Women have a skewed image there. So I am dying to get there and help God's daughters know who they are and who they can be. I want them to feel the purity and strength that I feel daily as a result of my knowledge of the Gospel and usage of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. We are so so blessed to have this gospel. I am learning so much. I love studying so much. I love this gospel and know it is important to remember that we don't have to go on a mission to feel close to God and feel the power of atonement. All we have to do is show God that we want to be closer to him, that we need his help, that we need a friend, that we need some comfort, that we need direction. For anything we need God is waiting to help us with. All we have to do is let him in. I know that as we make a process of daily diligent scripture study and prayer, our lives will literally be filled with peace and love and happiness. That doesn't mean that every day will be perfect and we won't make mistakes and that we won't have struggles, but there is a definite added strength to our lives. I am starting to become grateful for my challenges because I can see how they are slowly molding me into who the Lord knows I can become...I just feel so blessed and am excited to go teach the gospel for real.