Dear family and friends,

This week was very busy and very good! On Saturday, Anderson was baptized!! It has been so cool to work with him the past two weeks. He owns a snack shop right by our house and has a good friend who's a member of the church (Hamilton). 

Anderson is a really cool dude. He is humble and very smart. He has been coming to church for around 2 months and has made some drastic changes in his life. He was an alcoholic and his marriage almost fell apart, but it was all made right through the gospel! He gave up drinking, and he still has his wife and his daughter! 

Hopefully his family will follow his example and decide to be baptized too! They aren't really open to being taught right now, but I think with time they will open up! Especially as they see Anderson grown in the gospel. He is for sure going to be a leader in the church some day.

The work continues to move on and I'm excited to continue serving! We dropped a lot of our investigators this week, but hopefully with a fresh start we will be able to lay the groundwork for a lot of success.

I'm still getting used to the differences in the work here. It's a little difficult to get around in our area because it's pretty far from the chapel. Also, there are no Americans in my district besides me so basically I haven't spoken English for 2 weeks straight and I'm starting to think and dream in Portuguese.

Thank you for the support guys!

Love,

Elder Searle

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Rosi, Tamíres, Anderson, Hamilton, Elder Otávio, Elder Searle

Dear Family and friends,

I made it to Divinópolis! This city is very different from Montes Claros in a lot of ways. We live downtown in a fourth floor apartment which is cool! It's a lot cooler here which is super nice. It rains a lot. We don't use umbrellas, we just get wet. The people here are a lot more diverse. The members have cars. Our ward is huge (we had 148 people in sacrament meeting yesterday!). The members help out a lot. We walk less, cause we are always in cars. We have some good investigators (a teaching pool of around 7 people right now). The only thing that's really the same is the church and the teaching haha! It will be good for me to be here for sure and I'm excited to learn a lot here!

Elder Otávio is my companion! He is from São Paulo, São Paulo. This mission means a lot to him and he always tries to do what is right! The more time we spend together the more I am understanding him and getting to like him!

I got here on Terça and that same night I was surprised to find out that I am now an English teacher haha! Every week I will be giving a basic english class at our chapel. That day had 15 people in the class, and half of them were non-members! It was kind of overwhelming because I was just handed a manual and told to teach for an hour and a half, but I think I managed it alright. The people in the class were pretty excited and it was fun to interact with them!

Speaking of which, Portuguese finally feels normal. Okay so I'm going to brag a little now. I got a lot of compliments this week on my portuguese! Apparently some americans came through this area before me that couldn't speak very well so the members were really surprised when I was talking to them haha! It made me feel good to know the work and prayers are paying off.

We are teaching a guy named Anderson who owns a snack shop right by where we live! He is good friends with a member and hasa desire to be baptized. He has had problems with the word of wisdom in the past, but he is doing really well now! We are also teaching a guy named cleber who wants to be baptized. He plays piano and has 8 dogs. We taught them both a few times this week and will be meeting with them a lot this week so I'll be sure to let you know more about them next week!

Well that's about it. I'm excited to serve the Lord here! It's definitely not easy, but it's more than worth it to be here doing what I'm doing. I love you guys!!

Elder Searle

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Divinopolis

Elder Searle and Elder Otavio

Elder Otavio and Elder Searle

On the way to transfers

An awesome owl

(I missed posting this on January 11th)

I have some exciting news! The assistants called yesterday to tell me I'm being transfered! They have also completely changed how they do transfers so I will fly with Elder Lima (who just finished his mission) to BH tomorrow morning and head straight to my new area! I will be serving in Divinópolis 2nd ward with Elder Otávio! 

I know nothing about my him or my new area other than it's one of the southernmost areas on the mission. So it will be really nice to get away from the heat of Montes Claros. I found it kind of funny that I went from one of the most northern aresas to one of the most southern. I will make sure to let you know all about my new companion and the situation next week!

I will miss Montes Claros and Elder Hatch though. This week was a pretty good week for us. I hope the work we did brings him and his new companion many fruits in his final transfer. Alison and Aline are still moving along, and we found an amazing family this week! Farley Pleiquianne and their 8-year-old son Kerlon were able to come to church and have been reading and praying about the Book of Mormon! They are really nice and I wish I could watch them progress.

I had a lot of growing experiences here and I'm very thankful for all the help that the Lord has given me. He has guided me, strengthened me, and taught me a ton during my time here. I know God loves me and that Christ understands everything I go through. Also, I'm so thankful for the Spirit and the relationship I am building with him.


My perspective has changed a lot here too. Knowing that there are a lot of people living in poor circumstances is one thing, but knowing them and living with them is another. I'm really impressed and humbled by how little some people have, yet how much they will willingly give. Especially some of the members here. I feel so blessed to have been given so much.

It was also nice to get the ward newsletter this week and see that I'm still considered a youth in the birthday section while Brig got promoted to adult. I guess I have some growing up to do ;)

I love you guys!

Elder Searle

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Happy New Years!!

There was some crazy stuff that happened this week! New years was good. I kind of slept through it, but it's cool we are in 2016 now!

The day before New Years we had a man named William approach us on the street. He proceeded to explain to us his life story, in english, which was very interesting. I don't know if he follows a religion or not, but he tried to convince us that he was a prophet haha! He told us many stories, but my favorite one was when he controlled a dragonfly with his mind and was able to ask the drangonfly his name. His name was Edson in case you were wondering. He also apparently made many earthquakes happen. Unfortunately he wasn't very interested in our message, but he was a very interesting guy. I'm thankful to know who the true prophet is haha! We got the General Conference talks recently and it's been really good to study the talks of the prophets and apostles.

Our investigators are doing well! I feel a lot of responsibility on my shoulders because the Lord has given us people who have so much potential. We taught a family on New Years that went super well. They are very humble even though they are pretty well off. The dad cried at the end of the message when he was talking about his family and I really hope we can help them enjoy the blessings of the gospel! Alison and Aline are also coming along one step at a time. It was hard this week with everyone traveling, but we were able to find success and I learned a lot.

I have been studying the New Testament and I'm working through the Book of Mormon again. It's crazy how every time I read a scripture I have a different insight than I did the last time I read it! I love the scriptures.

Elder Hatch is still teaching me a lot and I'm enjoying it here with him! We truly have to trust in the Lord every day because otherwise we would be very lost. He always has the spirit with him and is really good with knowing what to say and when to say it. 

Thanks for all the support and love! Next week is transfers so there's a chance I won't get to email, but only a slight chance!

Love,

Elder Searle
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Elder Searle and Elder Hatch 

Elder Searle and Helberth

MERRY (late) CHRISTMAS!!! and a happy new year to come! I've been hearing it was a Christmas lacking snow in the U.S. but I hope it was good for you guys anyways!​

This week was pretty great for a few reasons. I got to skype with the fam on Christmas, which was super good! It's nice to see that even though things are changing at home, everyone in my family is still the same person haha! It was good to talk to everyone and it made my Christmas.

The work here is going pretty well! We have been teaching a couple who are real truth-seekers and have been putting a lot of our focus on them. Their names are Alison and Aline if you guys would to pray for them! They are very well educated so it's been a lot of long discussions with them so far. But even with them being well-off, they are humble and are willing to try.

I realized this week I haven't updated you guys on Helberth or Karen for a while! Helberth is the bomb. He has been passing sacrament and is reading the Book of Mormon like a boss. Karen is coming along really well too. She has been doing a lot for personal progress and gave the lesson in Young Women's a couple weeks ago!! I love meeting with them and helping them strengthen their testimonies!

I love you guys! I hope New Years is good for everyone this week!!

Elder Searle
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Elder Hatch and Elder Searle with a family who is moving soon

The Branch president gave them a box full of food for Christmas :)

Hello!!

This was quite the week. It started out with the Christmas Conference which was super super fun! It was also the week of Elder Hatch's and my birthday! I took a lot of pictures so I'll try to send some! 

During the conference President talked about Joseph Smith and Jesus Christ. I thought I knew a lot about both of them, but I left the conference feeling blown away! He told us a lot of cool stories from Joseph's life that showed how prophetic his calling was. Essentially, Smith restored the Atonement of Jesus Christ because without the authority to perform saving ordinances, no one was able to enjoy the full blessings of the repentance during the great apostasy. My testimony of Christ grew as he talked about the Atonement as well. It was a really spiritually uplifting conference!

It was also really really good to get mail and finally have peanut butter to eat for the first time in forever haha! I have been very much enjoying eating pb and j's once again.

My birthday was good! Elder Lima made us a cake and we traded ties!! Plus I got super cool gifts. Shout out to the fam for sending a frisbee haha! I was so happy to have your kind words and mail that day.

The work is moving along in Montes Claros! We have been trying to reactivate and find new investigators through the members here. Yesterday we beat our record at church again with 108! It was pretty exciting. A lot of the members here love the missionaries so it's good to have that support. Yesterday we had a family home evening with some recent converts who are working to be sealed in the temple! They have almost been members for a year so they should have their opportunity soon. It was a really special night for me because I could feel the spirit and could see the Lord blessing the work here. That's one thing that President has really been focusing on is getting members to the temple. If only we had a temple close to here.

Also the Lord has been blessing us immensely with better weather. The past two days haven't been super hot and it has helped me to think more clearly and work harder!

Well I'll send some pictures now! I'm super excited to skype and also to be a missionary for another week! This is probably the hardest thing I've ever done, but I'm sure it's blessing me and my family more than I even know. I love you guys!!

Elder Searle

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All the Christmas packages for the Missionaries

Eating a gummy plane while riding on a plane :)

Elder Hatch and Elder Searle

Elder Hatch and Elder Searle

Elder Searle and Elder Fernandes

Elder Searle and Elder Hatch celebrating their birthdays

Elder Searle and Elder Knudson

Elder Searle and Elder Stocks

Elder Searle and his birthday and Christmas packages!

Elder Silfies and Elder Searle

It's Santa!

Bom dia gente!

This week was really good! We did an exchange withe some Elders in our District on Wednesday. I stayed in our area and worked with an Elder who has only been in the field a week! It was intimidating to be the one calling all the shots for the day, but it helped me gain a lot of confidence because it was actually a super successful day!

I was also able to finish the Book of Mormon in Portuguese this week!! I have been reading like a machine these past months and I'm glad I was able to make my goal of finishing before my birthday. I'm able to understand the scriptures and people very clearly now. It's the speaking that still needs work. People understand me just fine, I'm just not able to express myself in the way I would like sometimes. 

But the Lord has helped me so much with this language. He has put just the right people and situations in my path to help me learn and improve.

Tomorrow is our Christmas Conference! We will fly out really early and fly back really late. I'm super excited to get mail and spend the day with a ton of missionaries!! Also, it will be Elder Hatch's birthday! It's cool we will get to celebrate our birthdays together this week.

Speaking of which, thank you for all the birthday wishes!! I love you and really appreciate all the support you guys give!

We taught a lot this week and I felt the spirit a lot! It's surprisingly really hard to get people to come to church during this season though. At least in Montes Claros, many people travel or go out partying over the weekend. 

But Elder Hatch and I are happy and working hard! He is a very good missionary and I'm grateful to have him as a companion. Many times this week people have come up to us and asked if we are brothers. We tell them yes, in the faith!

Shout out to my dad who will turn 32 this week! if you're reading this, then on Friday make sure to congratulate him!

I love you guys! You're in my thoughts and prayers. Study the scriptures, say your prayers, and remember that Heavenly Father has a perfect plan for you. Have a good week!

Elder Searle

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