Memorial Day

Good afternoon!

 

It´s Memorial Day here too, I think, because a lot of people are walking around on the streets. If it´s a holiday or some kind of reason, people like to take the day off here. I miss having a good choir to sing with. Since we only have a branch here in Camocim, we don´t have a piano, and a lot of people can´t really sing. I think my voice will probably be bad at the end of these two years.

 

It´s awesome how John is getting so big. He looked bigger than James on Skype. Are Trey and Ashley working right now or looking for jobs for summer? Ashley´s trip sounds great. I wish I had been a little more active in band and saved up for one of those trips, but band had it´s moments.

 

Here in the mission you have a lot of people here who are friendly and willing to talk, and agree to commitments, but they keep on falling through. We´ve had quite a few people who we wanted to get baptized here these past 2 months (soon to be 3), but they just aren´t ready to make the covenant of baptism when they won´t go to church. It´s just like the parable of the bridegroom. Those who were the original guests or elites were invited but did not come. So those who were in the street and not as good were welcomed in. So we´ve started working a ton on finding new people who are ready to be humble and keep their word.

 

Which reminds me, that recently we had an interview with the mission president and I said one of our goals was to get another set of missionaries here. So that was about 1 week ago and now we have another pair of Brazilian missionaries living in our tiny apartment. We had to go bed and desk shopping. We split our area and have been working with them in our old area and gave them all our old investigators, and basically everything. We have started working on a place that has not had lot of work done, though it was close to the church. We got them familiar with the area and now the numbers in Camocim will be doubling shortly.

 

I hope to leave this place a full ward and with plans to build a new chapel since we are working out of a casapella (a church made from a house). It´s been very challenging, but as a missionary once said, "If things are going rough, it means that Satan is trying his best to stop you. Because you are a danger to him. If things are easy going, then you might not be doing much." I think that all the trouble you´ve gone through for your students, Mom, is helping them be better.

 

It´s crazy how Matt was called to serve in Utah. I don´t know if that would have been the right place for me, but who knows? It could be perfect to him. I wish him the best of luck and success. If you happen to see Brother Chappell, Matt's dad, could you tell him: "Como esta? Espero que tudo é bom com a familia de te. Eu sei que sua familia é um luz para todo mundo e são bençoado. Vai com Deus sempre. Elder Pastor."

 

It´s great to hear that Trey and Ashley are doing so great in the church. It sounded like their talks and the whole meeting was great. I hope that they know that knowing about these things from a young age will bless their lives more then they can imagine. I´ve seen the difference of the youth here who have kept the standards of the church and the ones who have left for the things of the world. I can tell from these people that Trey and Ashley are doing the right things.

 

I love you all and miss you a lot. I love being here and know that the time is already flying by. It´s already been 5 months. Only 2 more calls home and who knows how many more days, but I hope to come home with work the Lord would be proud of.

 

Love,

 

Elder Shepard

Old Letter to Emily 5/26/13

From: Jacob Shepard <jacob.shepard@myldsmail.net>
Date: Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 10:55 AM
Subject: Re: Feliz Aniversário Elder Shepard!!!

Dearest Emily,

                      It's great to hear everything that is going on in your life. I think it's wonderful that John is growing up. It seems crazy to me that I've been in Priest River and Newport for 5 weeks. I have just gotten attached to the wards and getting progress on our investigators.  I have been out in this beautiful area that has mountains, rivers and lakes, trees and it is just breath taking when I was driving around. Thank you for your support and remembering to write or email, even though I've been somewhat lax in that department. As well as writing in my journal. When I come home, I'm usually tired and we are usually so busy on P-day that I have a hard time writing anything, except for emails. But that is just another excuse that I'm using, which reminds me of all the people who use excuses to not do what they need to. So I will do better and write to everyone more often. The last part of this week has been crazy since I got my visa last Wednesday and my flight to Brazil was delayed because of lack of 2 pilots. So right now I'm in Detroit, in a hotel writing. My flight was pushed back a full day so I won't be in Brazil until tomorrow. I've been learning so much in the field and I've learned how to teach simply and for understanding. And being out here has strengthened my mindset of teaching any and everyone. With so many people out here it makes me realize even more that they all are children of God. My love for the scriptures and everything like Article 13 states, in all that is of good worth. My Portugese needs a little polishing and there is so much that I need to learn, but I think I will be going straight to my area. I won't be going to the MTC since I spent all my training in Provo. But I'll still be learning from my first companion to my last. I think that I'll struggle for a little while, but the language will come soon enough. Thank you for the scripture, since it was my favorite in the MTC and memorized it. Added with Matthew's verse about, "unto the least of my brethern" I know that I am in the service of the Lord as the Book of Mosiah saysand that this is the most important work that is going out today other then the building of familys. I also love the Hymn, since it shows how much I need to stay diligent to save some wandering soul. I'll be skyping on Mother's day though I'm not sure what time. I love you and everyone in the States. Soon I'll be working with Brazilians. Love you so much.

Your Brother in the Service,

                                        Elder Shepard

Mosiah 4:6

5-20-13

Hey Hannah, James is huge and I´m here Brazil, and.......it´s a thrill?

Anywho, Thanks for getting on Skype. It´s funny how everyone was on Skype at different times. I´m sending out weekly thingies now so you get to hear more about my week, so if you have questions, ask away. I do have a question for you guys though. I was wondering if you could find the album of the Movie UP and a cd called Night Tracks, which is a piano thing. I was thinkg about music and those were two I knew were mission ....worthy. *shrug* If you could find them online and tell mom and  dad to send them that would be great. Or whoever wants to, If you guys can that woud be awesome. If not, I´m sustained by the work and the Spirit. Missionary Power, Hoooooeeee! As in old english tally ho. I love you guys and being on a mission is the best choice I could have made at this time. I hope your family is doing great.

Love, your Brother,

                          Elder Shepard

Also this the mailing address if any one forgets:

Elder Jacob Allen Shepard

Brasil Teresina Mission

Rua Tersando Paz, N* 2129

Salas 105-108, Centro

64001-380 Teresina- PI

Brasil

Thank you and good night

By the way the N* thing should be writtn like a zero on a degree of temp. And thank you. Your daaaaaaaaa Best! Also if you have the time there is a member called Maria Felix who takes a lot of pictures in Camocim. I can´t send many pictures now because my camera charger broke. If you send here an invite or look at here pictures. you can see some of the pictures of me here in Brazil. All of my love,

 Elder Shepard

First Weekly Report from Brazil

Hello everybody!

It´s me, a distant, as in distance, relative of yours. I´m here in Brazil in a LAN House writing my first email like this that I will be writing weekly to all of you. I might not have all of the contact information of might that might want to hear me, but if you know someone who does, send me a list and I add them to the names of people I´m writing too. (might have been a run on sentence)

 

I´m in a city called Camocim, which is a place known for fishing and it´s beaches. It is as hot as anywhere else in my mission but it´s luckily windy. The down side is that it rains like a monsoon every once in a while. It´s funny because when it rains, all the Brazilians hide in their houses. A saying here is that when it rains ,all the Brazilians melt.

 

The people here are very nice and humble. Many times they do not have a great education, because those that do, usually leave Camocim for a bigger city. They are very serious about the education of kids, though. It´s a different kind of place here. Many people will invite us in and give us juice or cookies or something want us to feel at home.

 

Religion is a big deal down here, and everyone seems to think that they just have to pick on that sound nice. If you see something about Jesus or God on every block, you know your in Brazil. Since we´re missionaries, I think that´s why many of them want to be nice to us, because we are talking about Jesus.

 

It´s been really great here since I can actually see the difference of the peoples lives when we help them. To see a person give up drinking and partying, so that can be with their family, to see a young man get off the streets, away from drugs and gangs, or a women that has gained respect for herself and realize that their is more to life then her body is rewarding and really why I´m here. We talk about what we believe in and try to get them to improve their lives even if they don´t want to do anything with our church.

 

To have them improve their lives in anyway has made my time here worth it and I know I´ll get better at finding and helping anyone from the rich person trying to find purpose to the poor family trying to bring a broken relationship together. And as we talk about these things, I can tell I´m a better person then I was before. At least I know how to clean my own mess, clothes, buy food and live somewhere where I have to take care of things. You´d be surprised at some of the crazy things I´ve seen here, but Life is good.

 

If you have any questions send me a line and I´ll answer as best I can. I´m at the point where I´m mixing my English with Portuguese, so we´ll see how my grammar is. I write emails on Mondays around 10 o´clock to 4. I love all of you and hope that everything is going great in the States.

Your (Something or Other) in the Service,

 

Elder Jacob Shepard

Camocim, 5-3-13

(Elders Morris and Shepard) 

 

 

Camocim, 5-19-13
(Elders J. Santos, Morris, Shepard, and Portela; Sister Felix)

 

Camocim, 5-19-13
(Elders Shepard and Morris

 

5/13/13

Mon, May 13, 2013 at 10:46 AM

The weather here is Hot and humid. We already had the Skype confernce call, and thank you all for he love and support. The lady that picked up is named Matilde and she is married to an American. She was nice enough to let us use her computer for talk with everyone.  Elder Morris is from Utah originally, but lived in Seattle before. I will now be responding to all emails, though some might just tell you that I ran out of time on my hour to read and respond, and that´ll say more next week. Before the Terezina mission was formed, it was part of other missions. So when they split it up, the other missions took all of the good missionaries and sent ones that were less so. Camocim had some lazy missionaries before and was then closed down for about two years. Then some sister missionaries
opened it back up. The Members love the missionaries, but depend on them too much for some things; but won´t listen to us for others. But all in all, it is growing and expanding. The missionaries who have served here recently have worked a tone and Elder Morris and I are working everyday to find elect investigators and help the ward to function better. This last week I had an interview with the Mission President and I told him how Elder Morris and I are working to get another set of missionaries here in Camocim. We just got a call asking how much room we have in our apartment, so some time soon, this area will have more people to work with. I have only 4 weeks more with Elder Morris, but I hope that by the time he leaves, we will have people prepared to be baptized for the next missionaries.
All of my love, Sincerely, Your Son in the Service,
                                                                      Elder Shepard