Email of May 13, 2013

Hello everyone, This week was pretty exciting. We had the baptism of Jackeline on Sunday. Unfortunately we did not have any investigators at church other than her. I was especially dissappointed that the family of D**** did not come. They said they would and even accepted to be baptised next week. We´ll have to find out this week why they did not come. We do have an investigator that could not come this week because she was traveling, but she has been to church once already and so she can be baptised this Sunday. We want to bring lots of members to these two houses so they can get to know some of the members before going to church. That might help them have more desire to go to church as well. We got to play soccer today. We have been playing soccer every p-day. It's a lot of fun. It's good too because it distracts everyone for a little. gives everyone a recharge for the week. Some of the missionaries in our zone are getting discouraged. We will give a training meeting tomorrow and do two 3 divisions this week. 3 is a lot. I hope we can get them more excited and working hard again. I was asked on Mother's Day to give a little more information about the experiences I´m having. I hope that this one was better. I´ll try to make them better for the last 4 months of the mission. Anyway.... Give Hannah and Bryce a big hug for me. I love you all. Stay Firm. The Church is true. See yah all in a couple years. Marc

Email of May 6, 2013

Hello Everyone, This week was a good week. We had a few investigators at church today. That was great! We met a boy yesterday that is extremely interested. He had been investigating about what we do on the internet. We taught him the first lesson and about the Book of Mormon and he felt that it was true. The Spirit was so strong. He accepted to be Baptised. He´s 17 and his parents seem uninterested, but he seems to be an honest and great young man. I hope he will be able to go to church next week so he can be baptised. Anyway that was the big highlight of the week. I´ll have to email you mom during the week, because I´m not sure how its going to work on Mother's Day. It probably will be a normal phone call this time. Does 4:00 your time work? I love you all. See yah in a couple years! Marc

Email of April 29, 2013

Hello Everyone! This week was transfer! Yay! I stayed with Elder Herrera still. We are pretty excited to work together again this transfer. We had quite a few investigators at church yesterday. It was pretty exciting. I hope we will be able to baptise some of them these next weeks. Not much to tell yet. Things have been pretty normal this last week. We did hear Elder Richard G. Scott speak on the satellite for Mission Conference. His Portuguese is pretty good. I liked what he said a lot. Anyway. I love you all. See yah in a couple years! Marc

Email of April 22, 2013

Hey Everyone! This week was pretty great! We had the baptism of Caio. He´s the 15-year-old son of the couple we baptised last week. The Father had the opportunity to baptise his son. This was a really golden family that got baptised. They were truly guided to the gospel. The are progressing very fast. The Stake Council meeting was already talking about preparing him to be a leader when the ward divides at the end of this year. It's incredible because Heavenly Father knows that this area needs leaders and sent one to them. This week was kind of rough with all of our other investigators. No one came [to church] despite many promising that they would, but I guess that´s part of the mission. We will work really hard to have lots of people to work with next transfer. I just found out that two of the investigators that I was working with back in Lucas where baptised. I got really excited about that. The mission is an amazing experience. I love it. Every day my testimony that this church is true is strengthened. I have no doubt. I know it's true. This knowledge brings great responsibility and great joy. I love you all. See yah in a couple years... Marc

Email of April 15, 2013

Hello everyone. This week was great! We had the opportunity to see a family get baptised this week. They got married on Thursday and baptised on Saturday. Its was an amazing experience. Their son will be baptised this Saturday. My companion and I are working really hard and having great success. This ward is a great one. The leaders help us a lot. We have a fantastic ward mission leader. He called Ward Missionaries on Sunday and did a meeting with everyone were they assigned couples and Recent Converts to every couple. It was great. This ward will continue to grow because the members are playing an active role. We got to go an Animal Rehab place today with the Zone. It was cool. There were monkeys, macaw´s, toucans, anta´s, and mountain lions. It was cool. They are all sick or injured animal or some that where taken away from animal traffickers. We got to tour free because a member works there. I´m still happy and working and my big goal is to not get trunky, but to give my all till the end. I love you all. see yah in a couple years! Elder Skiles

Email of April 8, 2013

Hello Everyone! This week was pretty exciting. I didn´t have much time to work in my own proselyting area. We had meetings and divisions all week. The family we are preparing for baptism is going great. This is a family that was clearly sent from Heavenly Father. We don´t have to persuade at all, they just go. His progress is through his own self motivation, so we just have to teach. He is a future leader for sure. He was looking for the true church for him to work in when he found The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He heard of the Church because of Mitt Romney actually. Oh. The rules about email have changed a little bit. I´m not sure if it's here in Brazil or in the whole world, but now we can write email to anyone we want. If anyone (friends, family, ward members) wants to email me I would love to hear from you. We now have 1hr and 30min to do email, so I have lots of time to read emails. Sorry if you are still awaiting a letter reply from me, It's been a little hard to find time to write letters. I´m going to write a bunch today and send them off. Thanks so much for all the letters and emails you have sent. Letters and emails are the best thing ever on the mission. I love you all. See yah in a couple years! Marc

Email of April 1, 2013

Hello Everyone! Happy Easter. My new area is really great, but really strange. There are SO MANY MEMBERS!!!!!! there were 167 people at church on Sunday. I had to bear testimony and I got a little nervous. It's very different to work in such a strong area. We Baptised 3 people on Sunday. A single woman and two kids (cousins of members). All of them were references from members. I like my new companion a lot. Elder Herrera. As for when I go back home. Most of the Americans that come to the mission with me will go in the middle of August, but I want to stay until September. I don't want to have just a week at home and then go out to college again. Also... The mission is two years right? not 1 year and 11 months. Anyway. Things are going great here. A lot of work to be done. We are teaching a great family. The father looks like a member already. They will baptize in 2 weeks. I´m pretty excited about that. I keep praying for Bryce. I´m sure he´ll be fine. I love you all. See yah in a couple years! Marc