Açaí and Merry Christmas!

 Monday, December 23, 2024; Iranduba Branch, Iranduba, Amazonas, Brazil:

Olá como vai pessoal? Minha semana foi boa. Feliz Natal para todos vocês, espero que vocês estão bem!

Hello one and all! This week has been pretty good, but a little frustrating. 

-We helped someone build their house so they can move in before they get kicked out of their rental.

-We had our Branch Christmas party; it went really well. There was a bunch of food, it was great.

-We ate lunch at one of the Branch member's houses. It was nice that he gave us a ride because otherwise that would have literally been a 4-hour walk. 

-We saw another Iguana this week.

-I saw more vultures, and some other small cool black birds, along with another small green bird.

-It rained a bunch this week too, and there are lots of dirt roads, so I have to constantly clean the bottom of my shoes.

My companion, Elder Gale and I had a talk about some of the fruits and veggies that they have here that we are less familiar with. From what I understand, most other parts of Brazil have frozen açaí (kind of like soft-serve ice-cream açaí) but here we also have pure açaí being straight pulp from the fruit itself. My comp had never eaten it, so we bought some for him to try. He has, however, also eaten several fruits that I have never eaten here, and I don't even want to write them down because I'm not sure how to spell them, or what they are in English.

This week I was able to see (for better or worse) that some of the people we are teaching progressed and learned more and are understanding more about Jesus Christ while others are not. It was hard to see some people not understand or value Jesus Christ as much, but it was cool for me to see the difference in our own free agency, that we can choose if we want to accept and follow the Savior or not. So, while it's hard to see others making decisions against God's will, each of us has the choice to do as we will. 

Personally, I learned a ton about faith this week. I am learning to understanding how much harder faith is to have and to continue using our faith.

For Christmas I bought a few small things for myself/my comp, and we just bought a little bit more food, some chocolate and sweet things, etc. Our branch also gave us a few things, and we will celebrate with some of the members.

But today I wanted to give my thought to some of the more important parts of Christmas. Jesus is, as they say, the reason for the season. But what does that actually mean for us? This year for me that included studying more about Christ and some of His names. As I believe I may have mentioned last week, but I love the title for Jesus, "The Savior". Studying him, so that we can emulate him. 

But I also remember Christmas events of my past. Christmas dinners where, as a boy, my brothers and I didn't understand why we had lots of random strange older people to our house. People who over the years, became dear to us. Christmas events to spread joy and music, like the Church Nativity Creche Event, or youth activities to help brighten the season for those in need physically or Spiritually. Acts of service, love and laughter. Time with family as well. 

A dear tradition for my family has always been an event on Christmas eve in our neighborhood. We always gather with others to combine sand, paper bags and candles, [to make luminaries to be] delivered to all the streets in the neighborhood the morning before Christmas, to be lit Christmas eve, and enjoyed by one and all. To me it always meany cold mornings with cookies and hot chocolate and getting to ride in the back of a truck or car, running around all over the neighborhood. 

And then that night to drive around with my family, looking at all the beautiful lights and think of the work we did to prepare them.

But until my mission, I had not connected this activity with the REAL Christmas Spirit. How we were lighting the world one candle at a time, one street after another. How we were sharing light physically as well as Spiritually. How the big dark neighborhood was lit up, little by little, until just looking at the streets made people happy and joyful! 

In this Christmas season, I want to leave my testimony that, no matter what happens, Jesus Christ is the light that always shines. That He was born and lived and died for us. That each day, I try to be more like Him, because He is perfect and so therefore that's my goal. The more light that I and you all bring into the world, the easier it is to see. To choose the right. And to help others along the way. That's my invitation to you all! #LightTheWorld!

To end this, I wanted to share a video with you all. Some of you may have seen it, but it is called The Christ Child. It's around 17 minutes. It's an awesome video to watch with your family too!

The Christ Child

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/video/christmas-messages/2019-09-0050-the-christ-child-a-nativity-story-lighttheworld?lang=eng

That's it, but I love y'all and hope each and every one of you has an awesome Christmas!

Elder David Olson 

Missão Brasil Manaus Sul

Iranduba, Amazonas, Brasil

Pics-

-Building a house 

-The Amazon

-Sunset

-Brazilian Hospitality - You have to eat a lot!