Alma 26:37

Olá Família e Amigos!

To be honest, nothing too exciting happened, haha. 

BUT, we finally moved apartments! As you probably already know, the apartment we used to live in was 35 to 40 minutes from the church, and on the outskirts of our area. It was a very nice apartment, and very new, but the location was bad for us. Where we live now is ten minutes from the chapel. and right in the middle of our area. Now we don´t have to waste 40 minutes every night walking up a huge hill, lol. We´re on the top floor, so we get a pretty nice view, but it´s also freezing! It´s a little bit older of a builiding (not too old), so the insulation is pretty much just cement, lol. My new address to send letters ( :) ) is:

Elder Michael Barker

Rua Miguel Torga, Nº 167, 5º Esq.

Leiria 2410-134

Portugal

This week we had zone conference on Tuesday. There were two zones there (Coimbra and Santarem) and the mission presidente spoke. I´m ashamed to say that I didn´t take any notes, haha. But, I was able to understand everything he was saying, so that´s good. The main points were to avoid judging others (he gave a lot of scriptures) and to use "olhas de luz" which means, eyes of light, which basically means to look for the positive in every situation, even if it seems like a negative at first. 

Our mission presidente also focused a lot on helping less active members to come back to church. This really made me excited to start searching for our less active members here in Leiria, because there are a lot. It´s so important to help those who have fallen away, because each one of them is a son or daughter of God that He cares about just as much as any of His other children. We were able to meet with a 25-year-old women named Anísia this last week who was baptized a year ago, but hasn´t been to church for a long time. We actually found out about her from one of the missionaries who baptized her last year. We saw him at the zone conference, and he asked us about how Anísia was doing, and seemed sad when we said we hadn´t ever seen her. RIght when we got home, we looked in the Livro de Area, and found her phone number and called her, and she said that we could come right over. Apparently she hasn´t been coming to church because she works every Sunday during the time of the meetings. But we are going to continue to pass by every week to continue to help her and teach her and help her to know that she isn´t forgotten.

It is so important to work with our members who have gone inactive, because they are just as important to Heavenly Father as any of His other children. Every person on our "less-active" list is loved by at least one person, and has a story. And I know that God knows each and every one of them. 

We had the primary program in church yesterday, and it was so cute, haha. It reminded me that the church truly is the same in all parts of the world. The members are the same, the doctrine is the same, the primaries are the same. Even thought Leiria is one of the bigger wards, they still only have about 10 primary kids, but it was still the same, haha. THere was that one 5 year old who sang louder than every one else. There were the kids who needed the teacher to whisper every word into their ears. There were the kids who spoke as if they were 30 years old, haha. I always love the primary program, and it always brings such a nice spirit into the room. 

Marcelo came to church yesterday! He seemed to really like it, and even made a comment about faith in sunday school. He is still marked to be baptized on the fourth of december, and I´m just so excited for him. I´m so grateful that I can be a missionary and be able to take part in helping people find the gospel!

My Portuguese is still not too good, but I can understand people a lot better now, and can have simple conversations about the weather and setting appointments, lol. But each week I can see improvement, and I know that the Lord is helping me with this. Each week the zone leaders call to follow up on our investigators who are planning to be baptized, and this week elder Cardentuto had me do it. I was a little scared, because the zone leader is a native speaker who doesn´t speak english. But I was able to talk without having to think too hard about what to say, and I was able to get everything across. So I´ll call that a success.

We didn´t have too many lessons this week, which made me a little bit sad. But I realized that not every week will be fantastic. But each week I can improve  just a little bit more and learn a little bit more how to be a missionary. Every week I can become closer with my Heavenly Father. 

I know that Heavenly Father loves all of His children, and I would like to end with this scripture in Alma 26:37: "Now my brethren, we see that God is mindful of everypeople, 

whatsoever land they may be in; yea, henumbereth his people, and his bowels of mercy are over allthe earth. Now this is my joy, and my 

great 

thanksgiving;yea, and I will give thanks unto my God forever. Amen."

I love you all, and I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving! 

Love,

Elder Barker