Tuesday, June 23, 2015

Mission Brasil Belo Horizonte Oeste 1994-1996

I served in the Brazil Belo Horizonte West Mission from Oct 1994 till Oct 1996. I served in the following cities: Divinopolis (6 months-branch), Patos de Minas (2 Months-branch), Vespasiano (5 months-ward), Campo Belo (1 month-group), Betim (3 months-ward), Varginha (4 months-branch) and Barreiro (3 weeks-ward). My Presidents were Expedito Jose Saraiva and Sister Saraiva. The mission boundaries were huge. You could travel from Tres Coracoes (birthplace of Pele') to Janauba which was about 12 hours away within the same state. You could travel 6 hours West to Patos de Minas and transfers were still individual at the time. The Church was mainly in branches. There were quite a few wards in Belo Horizonte/Contagem/Betim as well as in Sete Lagoas, but everything else was done with branches and groups. There were 3 stakes at that time, Contagem, Belo West and Belo Horizonte. The district in Sete Lagoas included branches in Montreal, Curvelo and Pedro Leopoldo. The mission had JUST split from the original mission creating East/West missions. As far as the work was concerned, a great week was 20 discussions and 3 baptisms per month was regular, but they came in waves and not regularly, so we served knowing that if we did our best, the wave would come in. Belo Horizonte was a life changing mission for me. I had a challenging mission, but I finished strong and plan to do it again with Adriana at some point in time, we'll see ;).