Branching Out

Last Saturday we went out to Juazeiro. Our flight got in early and we had a few minutes to spare, so we stopped by to see how the new chapel was coming along. It is the first real chapel in the district. Here is Alan in his suit. He looks a little more dressed up than he used to when he was checking construction jobs in Idaho. He really doesn't have anything to do or say about the construction of the chapel. We were just interested in seeing it.


There is a lot of cement involved and they do a lot of it one wheel barrow at a time.

It's hot in Juazeiro. A lot of the construction workers were wearing big straw hats with a hard hat on top. Sort of reminded me of the children's book, "Caps for Sale."

When we got to Zone Conference the Elders were in a pretty good mood. They might have suspected we were bringing cookies or something.

This is the outside wall around the "chapel" in Barbalha. It is a house that was reformed to serve as a church for the branch that was just started there. There will be a new sign, I think. This one was taken from another city where they just got a new church. The elders cleaned it up and stayed up a little past regular missionary bedtime to get it put on the front of the building before church the next morning. I kind of hope there will be a new color of paint on the outside wall too. All the paint on the inside is much more subdued and church-like. It all looked really nice except the outside wall. I didn't know if I should say anything, but I just couldn't help myself. I thought this was a little too French-looking or Scottish-looking. French as is French's mustard; Scottish as in McDonald's golden arches. I didn't say that though. I just suggested they use one of the colors they had used inside. This picture didn't really capture the intensity of the yellow. It really is pretty bright, but maybe it will draw attention and interest and turn out to be a good thing. I don't know. Any thoughts on the matter ?

This is the outside of the house/chapel itself. Elder Monteiro is one of the missionaries serving there. He goes home next week, so I wanted to get his picture. Every one of the missionaries serving there helped with the work on the building this week.
I don't think the chapel would have been ready without them working their tails off. They even got some cuts and blisters to show for it.

They rented a keyboard to use until we are able to get one. The only thing it was lacking was a stand for the book, but Elder Hirata filled in nicely. Elder Peterson plays very well and I didn't hear him miss a note, even if the book wasn't perfectly steady.

A group shot of the 6 missionaries, the branch president and wife, the district president and wife, Elder's Quorum president and some cute kids. There were 57 people there counting us. Too bad I didn't get a picture of everybody. Not bad for a little group that started out with about 6 people. Hopefully it will mature and grow and be strong. With a lot of faith and work, I'm sure it will come to pass.