elder barton email & photos 10 // 1-19-15

​figured out they have snickers, twix, and milkyway here.... I should be alright haha... 

​THE PIZZA HAS CHOCOLATE IN THE CRUST HERE!!!

 you would love it mom, i think of ya when i get this!! sooo good

Whats up whats up everybody!!!!

Elder B here in the streets of Osasco! This week was super awesome!!!! I cannot believe that I am already in the last week of my first transfer on the mission! That went by soo fast! I'm hoping I stay with Elder Almeida, he is super awesome and I learn so much from him! Its cool too cause he is the district leader which means I get to go on exchanges with a lot of other elders and learn a bunch on how different people teach and do things! (technically that makes me the senior companion too, NBD) haha but i still have no idea what I'm doing haha... I get to carry the keys and cellphone, but every time it rings I just hand it to Elder Almeida cause talking on the phone is so scary in Portuguese haha! But we have been soo blessed these past couple weeks... The lest active members who we visit alot (Maria and her son Thomas) are now active and coming to church every Sunday!!! It is so cool, they are so excited and really getting back into it! She called us and asked us to come over to help her to pay her tithing! And she has been giving us so many referrals to its awesome! Truly a miracle! She brought three girls to church and they are all sisters... Their names are Irenilde, Irenice and Nice (neecy)... They have such an unbelievable story... Their mom was killed when they were little by their dad... And one of the girls actually watched it happen. So so sad.... Irenilde (the oldest one who's 29) takes care of the other two (16 and 13 years old) and she works everyday to provide for them!! They are so so awesome, it has been such a miracle that we have been able to be teaching them. They are so ready for this gospel and need it in their lives. The first time we taught them they were super super timid and hardly wanted to talk, but they all payed close attention. We invited them to be baptized on the 31st of January and they all said yes. We have taught them three more times since then and they open up to us more and more each time we teach them. It is so coo  cause i feel them starting to put their trust in the Lord more and more as they come to church and have a desire to learn. They are all SO nice and they look out for each other it is so cool, they are such a special family. We taught them the Plan of Salvation last lesson, and they really liked it. This obviously was a huge principle we were excited to share with them because of their situation. At the very end, i shared the Hymn "families can be together forever" with them (singing it of course) and bore my testimony to them that they can all live with each other for eternity after this life. Just kidding i dint sing it by the way haha i just read the lyrics... But that was sucha powerful moment, I felt the spirit so strongly, and the pure love that Heavenly Father has for them. I know that he has been preparing them for this exact moment to hear our message. They have gone through so much, and I feel like they are starting to recognize the love heavenly father has for them and that it will be okay! So cool, Elder ALmeida and I feel so blessed being able to teach them... It has been a huge blessing for sure! 

President Del Guerso and Sister Del Guerso also spoke in our ward yesterday which was sweet! They gave amazing talks!!! Sister Del Guerso said something that i especially liked! She talked about a talk from Dieter F Uchtdorf that talks about receiving blessings is like an umbrella. When we have sins, distractions, pride and other things that drive the spirit away, we have an open umbrella... And the blessings that Heavenly Father wants to shower upon us we cant receive because of these things are in our way (like an open umbrella) But we need to have a closed umbrella and make sure that we are constantly trying to grow and improve so that we can have the spirit more fully with us, and receive more blessings! It is so true, and I want to try to always be improving. I'm so grateful for the atonement of Christ that allows us to do just that. To constantly be improving and being forgiven of the things we messed up on! I love serving the Lord, this has been sucha blessing already and I am so happy. I miss all of you guys like crazy, but this is what I need to be doing right now and I wouldn't change it for the world! Couldn't thanks you guys all enough for the support. I love you all so much and think of you all everyday! 

Elder Barton

Elder Barton / 1-12-15 / photos

Whaaaaats up whaaats up everybody??!! 

Im just gonna give a shout out to my main peeps this week, got some other STUFF i gotta take care of... Buisness meetings, phonecalls, stock managment ETC! haha, good weeek this week!  

                                            Elder Barton received his First letter out 

                                                  in the Field!  (It took almost 3 weeks)

elder barton email 9 // 1-03-15

Whaaaat whaat up everybody happy new year!!! 

  This week was a way good week! New Years here is crazy haha! There are soo many little kids that have these little mini explosives and they just chuck them in the street ALL  day long haha, almost got my leg blown off a couple times NBD... haha but seriously there were soo many people all over the streets on new years eve! So many people drinking and blasting music with fireworks a blazing! Way crazier than the United States on new years that's for sure! 

   In the beginning of the week, Elder Almeida and I got to help one of our investigators with some service in their house! It was soo fun haha they live in the favelas, and they were extending onto their house so we were in this super narrow little dirt alley between two shacks digging a huge hole so they could put a new wall in! It was so fun, and it made me realize how good we have it in the states! Thier house is sooo small and crammed against these other little tiny shacks with pieces of sheet metal and bricks all put together with concrete for their homes! Its unbelievable, and they are so happy! Our other investigators Lincoln and Singrid have been progressing really well! Im so excited, they are actually getting baptized I cant believe it! It doesn't feel real, I feel like I'm in the MTC again with a pretend investigator... But these are REAL people! And i can just tell that they are excited to get baptized, and it feels so cool. I still don't talk too much in lessons its mostly Elder Almeida who's doing the teaching, but I still feel the spirit so strong during the lessons. Its awesome cause even though my Portuguese is very broken, I still feel them connected and I feel like they appreciate my efforts in speaking their language which is awesome. 

  Something funny that happened this week was when we were with a less active member Maria, in her home. Shes so awesome, recently she has really had a desire to start going to church again! She called one day and told us to come over because her son Thomas was there and she wanted us to share a message with them! When we got there, i figured out he speaks PERFECT ENGLISH! I was sooo stoked, i was just talking and talking to him cause it felt so good to be able to speak with someone! In my mind i was thinking "this is my time to shine, heavenly father prepared  this person  for me so i was talking to him a bunch about church and missions and baring my testimony to him. I set up an appointment to go back and teach him more because I was so excited, and felt like he was really interested! We left, and I told Elder Almeida my experience and told him that he was going to get baptized and I could just feel it! haha and then Elder Almeida just started busting up laughing at me and told me that Thomas is a MEMBER! hahahaha it was so funny I felt so dumb.. But he is inactive so hey, might be able to help him come back to church! but still it was so funny! This week was really good, it has been raining like CRAZY here!!! The power keeps going out because of it. It actually justy went our while I was writing this email haha! The rain is soo insane, its like nothing i have ever seen haha it rains so hard! Elder Almeida and I didn't have umbrellas one day, and had to go back to our apartment and change because we were literally SOAKED! Elder Almeida also burned one of his ties this week for his 6 month  anniversary, pretty sweet! Almost caught the apartment on fire though(not really but pretty close), probably wasn't a good idea doing it inside haha! 

Well, I couldn't thank all of you enough for your support. It makes it so much easier being away from home knowing that you guys have my back! Thanks for everything and PEACE OUT!

Elder Barton

elder barton - email 8 - 12/29/14

Hey everybody!!!!

Tudo Bem?! 

Haha, this week was a pretty good week, kinda tough with christmas and being away from the family for the first time... But im so glad I got to skype you guys that was so awesome! Even though there were all the brazlilians gathered around behind me screaming and showing off their desserts that they made haha... But its all good, the work here has been going really well!

I went on splits with some of the members in our ward this week, haha it was so fun! Elder Almeida went with one member and I went with another, the one I went with was named Rodrigo, haha he's such a funny guy. He wants to learn english really bad so I was teaching him a bunch as we walked and we were singing american music together haha it was awesome. We had a pretty cool lesson also with a man I never taught before. It was good practice to be without Elder Almeida cause I had to talk alot more. Haha it was kinda scary but it went pretty well! We got a new investigator out of it and he wants learn more! So that was good... We also have been having some really good lessons this week. We have an investigator named Adriana who really likes our message and wants to be baptized, but she needs to get married first and doesn't want to. She has been engaged for 14 YEARS!!! And she just doesn't want to get married for some reason! We taught her a lesson about eternal marriage and she actually accepted it really well! Her "fiance" was there too, and he's usually never there for the lessons so it was really good for both of them hear it together. We bore testimony of faith and told them that sometimes a descision is hard but when we exercised our faith we are blessed. It was really cool and I felt like they really thought about it. We have been praying alot for them to have a desire to get married and really hope heavenly father helps them to know its the right choice! They have 3 kids also, and the two that are old enough really want to be baptized and came to church! So cool, Im really hoping that Adriana and her fiance will choose to get married. 

 Church was way cool yesterday too, we had three investigators come to church which was awesome! One of them was a street contact from Saturday night and he said yes when we asked him to come! Im really excited to teach him his name is Adilson and seems really intersted! I sat next to him in sacrament and it was cool cause in my broken portuguese i was able to help him better understand the sacrament and answer his questions! Haha it felt pretty cool, Im definatley struggling with this language... But I know it will come as I work hard, the Lord will help me and I know it! I can't thank you all enough for your support and love, it really helps me! Until next week!

Elder Barton

Christmas Eve Dinner with members

My area so crazy!

​More of my area... And this was my lunch today... Hope yopu know how much I love ya mom and miss your cooking! haha thats an elder barton specialty! LOve ya soooo much mom 

FIRST WEEK IN THE FIELD!!

View from my room in the CTM 7th floor suite

Brazillian roomates haha they were so awesome

Elder Shapiro and I (CTM comp) at the Sao Paulo Temple

My district in the CTM at the Sao Paulo Temple

#Artsy  Sao Paulo Temple!!!

my other teacher Irma Taveres (gabriel) 

Last day in the CTM with my teacher Irma Jaques 9also paulo

my pretend investigator ha ha)

where we had the christmas party

saying goodbye to Elder Shapiro and Elder Uchytil hopefully

i'm companions with them in my mission! (from my district in provo and CTM)

IN the streeeeeeets! Notice the fire on the sidewalk in the background...

Elder Almeida... It's POURING here right now!  I'll send more pics later...

Whaaaaats up everybody!!!! This is Elder Barton IN THE STREETS OF BRAZIL FINALLY!! No more MTC training wheels... This is the real deal now... Gosh i dont even know where i should start because sooo much has happened within the last time I emailed!! It has been so crazy haha, I was officially "in the field" last thursday... I got to the mission home on Tuesday morning, met my mission president (hes SUPER awesome) and we did a training thing all day.. They took us out to this resturant and I ran into JAMAS WIEBEL!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hahaha it was soooo sick!!! I walked in, and saw him looking all stylish and mingling with some other missionaries haha I freaked out and ran over to him and we talked for like 20 minutes!!! It was so awesome, hes suha stud! It was way cool to see someone i know in BRAZIL! I was hoping I would see him one day, cause he only has a little bit of time left, and I saw him my FIRST day!!! Then Wednesday we had a huge Christmas party with our whole mission! It was soo awesome we went to this area called Cotia in our mission to this huge private park thing, and this area is like a straight jungle!! It was soo awesome there were soo many trees and wierd plants haha! We were allowed to just hangout prettyuy much the whole dy and we played volleyball, football and I watched all thge brazilians play soccer haha it was so intense I would have gotten destroyed if I tried to play, It was like in this giant cage and there were a bunch of people surrounding the cage climbing on top screaming and stuff it was so gnarley haha, we're not allowed to play sports in our mission, so they were all stoked because president said they could that day... Then we had a few meetings and stuff ate dinner and then i met my TRAINER! Hes a super cool guy, hes a native Brazilian and doesnt speak any english hardly at all haha... His name is Elder Almeida, he is super cool and funny, It was really really tough the first couple days because I couldnt talk with him at all and was getting super bummed... But I realized i need to just ask him what a word meant whenever I didnt know, and that has really been helping cause I just write it down and stuydy it later. I have learned soo much within this little bit. Its been awesome! I am in a super cool area also... The town is called Osasco, and our area is Jardim Conceição. Its sooo sick haha it is literally the Favela Map on call of duty for all you gamers out there... There are soo many crazy shacks stacked on top of eachother and super steep hills with stray dogs ALL OVER THE PLACE! There are seriously soo many is ridiculous, and there all super gross haha. Its way cool though because there are soo many people that just walk around or sit in front of their house so its easy to get new contacts... The people down here are so open, they almost always say yes when we ask to come by there house and share our message. But,  alot of the times they flake out and arent there haha... But we have a pretty good teaching pool going! Elder Almeida is a super hard worker and is super obedient so it really is cool cause we get alot done! I cant really talk much in lessons, Its kind of frustraiting i usually just bare my testimony about certain things, or sometimes explain something. But its all good! I am getting better and better each day, and I know It will come if i just work hard! The best day by far this week was Saturday. One of Elder Almeidas investigators from before i got there got BAPTIZED! It was sucha cool experience... It really got me pumped for this work because the spirit was soo strong seeing Elder Ameida baptize him. And the members down here are so supportive also, they were all so welcoming to him and excited for him! The church is growing so much down here its so cool because theres so many new members! It was a really neat experience seeing that, and the guy Alexandre was sucha cool guy, he had so much faith and was so excited!! Then on Sunday, church was awesome also!!! Alexandre recieved the holy ghost and I was able to be apart of it, it was awesome. I also bore my trstimony in sacrament haha and the microphone wasnt working so I had to like scream out to the congreation haha it was pretty funny. This last week has been tought, but so much more awesome than tough... I have prayed harder than I ever have because I have been so frustrated some days... But I have been so blessed and I know Heavenly Father will help me learn this languague!! I hope you all have an awesome Christmas, and I love you all so much and thanks so much for everyones support! I love my mission!!! 

Elder Barton

weekly update yo yo

Whats up peeps!!!

 

Another sweet week here in Brazil!!! This week wasn't as exciting as the last, with all of the crazy bus stories and a man trying to take my nametag... But still a really good week! It's wierd down here it feels like summer but everyone is putting up Christmas decorations. We have been having some really good devotionals and stuff about Christmas so it still feels like the Christmas season even though its super hot which is awesome!! I have never felt the true meaning of Christmas this much before, It's so cool just being able to focus on what really matters!! Elder Shapiro and my lessons have been going really well because of it, we can both feel the love of Christ so much so it makes it a lot easier to prepeare lessons and teach! We had TRC this week which is teaching members of the church and our lessons went really well! We taught about recieving revelation through the Book of Mormon and Church attendance. Our lessons are all video taped too haha so its pretty cool cause we can watch them after and see ourselves in ACTION haha it makes me feel like my portuguese is pretty bad though too haha cause I sound like such a gringo when I watch them. But Its really cool to see how much progress we have made since the beginning! I was looking through my notebook the other day and found the very fist lesson that I ever prepeared, and it was a littlle script that was like 5 minutes long and not very good haha. Now, we are able to teach lessons without a script for like 30 minutes its so cool! I have learned so much  more portuguese here in  6 weeks than I did spanish for 4 years in highschool! Its crazy how much you can learn when you have to! Also both of our pretend investigators are going really well! I especially love Paulo, he is sucha faithful guy! Everything we challenge him to do, he is always so pumped about it and never has a problem! He is such a stud and its so cool to see his progesssion! The very first lesson he didn't even know how to pray, and now he is quoting scripture from the book of mormon and is so faithful! Its awesome! Missionarywork is so energizing, especially when you feel like your making progress! And this is with a pretend investigator so I cant even imagine what it will feel like to see someone progress in the gospel for real! Im so excited, I cant believe I only have one more week in the CTM, I am freaking out!! I enter the field next tuesday... I dont feel like I am ready at all, but at the same time I know Heavenly Father is always looking out for me! Thank you guys all so much for your support, I couldn't do it with out all your encouraging emails and snacks that you send haha! I love you all so much and Ill talk to ya next week!!

 

Elder Barton

December 3, 2014

WHATS SUP EVERYBODY!!!!!

 

Its Elder Barton coming at ya live from th brazilian depths of south america!!!!

This week was sooooo awesome it was unbelieveable how much cool stuff happened!!

The First thing we got to do in the week was go PROSELYTE!! And talk to REAL people!! It was soo sweet! It was a crazy experience from the moment I stepped on that bus... We went as a district down to downtown Sao Paulo with our teacher Irmao Tavereis. We had to walk a little bit out of the CtM to get to this bus stop and waited for a little bit to get picked up, there are SO many buses that come through at the stop!! Its insane haha and they come in HOT i feel like im going to get ran over just standing on the sidewalk... Once we got on, it was seriously crammed with like 50 people and so we had to stand up and hold on to these tiny little straps on the ceiling. The Driver seriously thought he was some street racer or something cause he was going like 60 miles an hour on these tiny little two lane roads that barely even could fit a prius not even kidding... Haha and he was constantly cutting people off and litereally like drifting around corners haha I think we almost got in a deadly crash at least 5 times and all of us were trying to hold on and kept falling over and stuff it was so funny haha and awesome! Then once we got to this huge park bus stop thing, we started proselyting! There were sooo many people and each missionary had two books of mormon that they had to give out. It was sooo Awesome actually! Elder Shapiro and I had some really good discusssions with people in very broken portuguese. We gave them all out and it was unbelieveable how open the brazilian people are to our message. They are so humble, its so so cool... With our first person, it was going super well and I had just barely handed him my book of mormon and bore my testimony when all the sudden some homeless guy came up behind us and started freaking out saying a bunch of stuff I couldn't understand! He took our other books of mormons out of our hands and he was like super upset about something. He tried stealing both of our nametags and seemed like he did not like missionaries at all. He grabbed mine, and started to hit me in the head with it (not too hard) and saying stuff under his breath. We were getting way freaked out and just started to walk away and then out of no were Irmao Tavereis saved our lives haha he started pushing back the man and telling him to leave us alone, and also the guy that we were talking to did the same.. It was pretty scary, Im not going to lie... But I know Heavenly Father looks out hor his missionaries because Irmao Taveries was there right when he needed to be. We said a prayer after words and then felt so guided and comforted afterwards. Satan was definatley trying to scare us from serving a mission... But I know that Heavenly Father is looking out for me. We gave away all our Books of Mormon and it was such an awesome experience!!! We also got to watch some super good devotionals from the provo MTC (of course right after I leave haha) by David A Bednar and Dallin H Oaks... They were SO good I wish i could have been there to see them live but its all  good we still got to watch on TV it was amazing!!!

 

      I have been feeling the spirit so strongly here, I absoultley LOVE serving a mission! We had an opportunuty to watch a clip that the church has put out for Christmas this year... It is SO good!! If you all havent seen it yet, I really encourage you to watch it!!! Its called "He is the Gift". It really made me realize how much Jesus Christ has done for us, and how Christmas is truly about the savior. I know he loves us all so much, and we can be filled with his love if we make an effort to put him first. Share this video with EVERYONE its sooo good, and just a quick little video thats on You tube! Thank you all so much for your support and love... I love it out here!

 

Elder Barton

#sharethegift

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzjFEMmM0Xs