Goats and the Gospel

Well, today was transfers, and I'll be staying in Guarabira! Last week Sister Peterson and I found an incredible family!!  We taught them about the importance of the family, and they shared with us some of the desires they had for their family.  Everything they said, sounded like something written in 'The Family: A Proclamation to the World'!  We then asked them if they were married (almost 95% of couples in Brazil are not married legally) and the wife replied that they were married legally, but she's always had the dream to be married in the Church.  We jumped at the opportunity, and taught them about the temple and how they can be sealed for time and all eternity.  When we finished explaining this, the husband and wife immediately responded, 'when can we be married in this place?'  We explained to them that they would need to be baptized and attend Church meetings every Sunday for one year, and then after one year they could be married in the temple in Recife!  They became very excited (including their three young children, who jumped up and down in front of us exclaiming that they wanted to be baptized (even though they are only 5 and 7)).  We committed them to be baptized at the end of August and they both accepted!  This family has been truly prepared by the Lord.  I have never seen a family so eager and excited to learn about the Gospel.  After we taught the husband how to pray, he told us that he would begin to have family prayer with his family every night!  Oh! how I love to see families and people embrace the precious and simple truths of the Gospel!!! 

The people in Guarabira are very receptive in that no one minds letting us in to their house for 30 minutes or so to talk about the Gospel, but not very many are interested in reading the Book of Mormon or coming to Church.  However, this means that we never know what kind of excitement we'll have during our lesson, or who might walk in.  In one home, I was in the middle of teaching about the importance of baptism when I realized that there was a large animal in front of me.  I'm used to dogs and cats constantly walking through our lessons, but this animal was much too large to be a dog...nope, it was a goat!  The goat had walked through the front door, passed through the living room where we were sitting and teaching, and headed for the kitchen.  The woman who we were teaching waved her hand and said, 'oh don't mind him, he always walks through here!' hahaha!