Kyle with his buddies!

Kyle with his buddies!
I made these cookies for family home evening with this family! They were a big hit

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

June 17, 2013


I have tons to tell you...
     This past week was a great one!  So we had lunch for the first time with this less active family that was baptized about 2 years ago.  The wife stayed firm but the husband fell away so that has taken it's toll.  But we went to lunch and it was great and we left a good message and everyone was happy and progress was made!  After lunch we ran to this government building to be witnesses to  Sindni and Mere's wedding!!!!!  It was so cool!  They bought their wedding rings and on the inside they put their names and engraved CTR.  I had told them about how you used to wear my CTR ring on your wedding finger until dad got you a new ring and they liked it so much they had it put on their wedding rings!  I think I am going to do that with my wedding ring as well!  
     And this past Sunday we baptized a brother and sister we have been teaching!!!  
   Also we had an awesome family night with a bunch of our investigators about unity in marriage and eternal marriages so that was pretty cool and exactly what our investigators needed.  It's funny that I teach people all about marriage and parenting and I'm not even a parent of husband yet!   Mere was telling me that she's been having problems with her daughter getting into trouble at school and she was asking what my opinion was on parenting.  So I told her some of the stuff you used to do with us but I felt a little lost because I've never had a kid! It's kinda crazy the stuff you do on your mission.  
     We played a game after the family home evening lesson where you write down something that you want someone else to do and you put in in a bag.  Then once everyone had written their thing down you tell them how the game goes...the name of the game is "the maker becomes the doer"  So what you wrote for someone else to do you have to actually do, which was good because people had written down that they wanted ELDER KRAUSE to do a lot of things!!! hahaha  But it ended up that both people had to do it so I ended up "demonstrating" how to juggle, hip hop dance, samba, ballet dance, act like a cat and act like a monkey.  But it was funny because I saw my investigators do it was well which was pretty fun and everyone had a great time and wanted to have family home evening more often!!!  
   Well transfers are this next week so it should be interesting.  I really, really want to stay in this area because I LOVE the people here and we have so many people that we have been teaching and preparing for baptism and will be baptized during this next transfer.  But we will see where the Lord needs me.  Where he sends me I will go, I just hope he has plans for me here! :)

 This is the brother and sister we baptized!
 This is the couple we have been teaching forever and that I was the witness for their wedding.  It's crazy trying to help people get married here.  They have to go to their birth city and get new birth certificates.  So I have been having the missionaries in those cities get the papers and send them to me so that we can start the process here.  Then 30 days after they get married they can get baptized!  It's such a long process and soooo much paperwork and it costs quite a bit of money!  But it's all worth it in the end!
Remember a long time ago I told you about when we baptized someone in the Branch President's pool on a Sunday night.  This was her!

June 10, 2013

     So this week we had a baptism!  I did the baptismal interview!!!  It was my first one so that was pretty cool.  We started working in the richest neighborhood in the city and we had a little success.  We were able to make a few return visits so that was really good.  We have some great people we are teaching.  I taught the lesson the other day about gifts of the spirit and I said that receiving personal revelation is a gift of the spirit.  We explained that revelation can be received by anyone but warned that people do not receive revelation for those that they do not preside over.  Mere (a woman we have been teaching for months) asked if missionaries can receive revelation for those they are teaching.  I said, "yes, sometimes".  And she proceeded to tell me and the class how one day when me and Elder DSilva were teaching her the Plan of Salvation she felt touched and understood everything.  She said she has always remembered that moment and that she felt the spirit say to her that the Plan of Salvation is true.  I almost started crying in front of the whole class.  It was an incredible inspiration to know that I had been an instrument in God's hands in bringing the truth and joy of the Plan of Salvation into someone's life!  And that she had felt the truth of it made manifest by the power of the Holy Ghost.  I am very grateful for moments like that.  
    I got Grandma's box the other day and was soooo excited.  I was eating lunch on Saturday and it wasn't very good but then I put the Chipotle Tabasco on it and devoured it!!!  You might have to send me more of that!!!

June 3, 2013

Hello everyone!
     I am doing good!  We had a good week.  We knocked on some good doors and taught some really good lessons.  And we had some new people come to church!  Also, it was fast and testimony meeting on Sunday and the usuals got up there but then Mere (the wife of one of the couples that we are teaching) and she bore her testimony!  She bares her testimony of how a person at work came up and started to talk to her about church.  This lady goes to another church so she started telling Mere that we have to keep Saturday holy and that our church is wrong and of the devil and all this crazy stuff.  Mere said she stopped listening and just let her talk but to her it didn't really matter because she knew the truth inside of her and she is very happy to know about the true church on the earth today!!!  I about wanted to cry it was so powerful for someone who is not even baptized yet to have such a strong testimony!  And Maora (another couple we are teaching) went up and bore her testimony about the Word of Wisdom!  She knew it was a commandment of God and said she never had a craving to drink ceveda until she started keeping the Word of Wisdom!  But she is still going strong.  It was a great meeting and I was very happy!!!
     Last night we had a family night and I taught the lesson.  It was how to juggle!!!  Both with my juggle balls and in your life.  People really liked it and I used the new balls that you had sent me!  I taught about how with perspective, faith and diligence we can juggle our lives successfully.  It was such a great night and it was at this couples house that is going to get married and baptized soon and there was like 15 people there and 7 investigators!  It was so cool!
   And I found a substitute for tortillas so I made some tacos and they were soooooo good!

Sunday, June 2, 2013

May 20, 2013

This is my good buddy Elder Vaterlaus. 
This is my companion in front of a burger place we like to go to.
So this is the family that came to church for the first time last sunday and they loved it!!! They came to say goodbye to us when we were going to Salvador, and they came to church this Sunday again. We had taught them about the law of chastity this week, and about temples and stuff and they totally accepted to get married and baptized so this week we are going to start the paper work with them. There is going to be a caravan for the temple this  September and they were asking all the details like how much was it and how could they go, its soooo exciting. I seriously love this family they are so awesome. They also fed us lunch on saturday, like invited us over!!!! They told us to teach His sister too, which she is super cool and liked our message and ya its just great!!!!!!! 
This is me drinking my favorite drink in Brazil!!!
This is a catholic church in my city. 
See the ring in the picture...that's my attitude towards everything.  I want to spend my life "choosing the right"!

The trip to Salvador was miserable!  18 hours on a freezing cold bus all night.  I didn't really sleep at all but I got my new companion and he is AWESOME!  He is from Vitoria Espirito Santo, Brazil.  He is 19 and very, very happy and excited.  We had a great first week and I am very grateful to have the privilege of teaching him how to be a missionary.  It seems kinda weird at times cause I still feel like I don't know how to do some things but the Lord has blessed us with some great families that we are teaching.  He doesn't really speak any English so I am teaching him some.