A Dream and a Dirt Road Miracle
February 10, 2005
Today was as hot and dusty as the dirt road we traveled. Walking slowly just ahead of us, we saw a woman with her two little girls. The smallest seemed anxious to either be held or be at home to open the sacks that—along with the crying—were weighing on her mother. We caught up with them and offered to help carry her groceries or her child. But of course, the tired mother gave a common mother response, “No, I’m fine; we’re almost home, but obrigada, muito obrigada.” (No, but thanks, much thanks). And so we strode past them on our way to “something important.” But the youngest child kept crying; and as I remembered being a mother of tiny ones, I also remembered the tiny rice cakes we’d just purchased. I quickly turned around and went back to the small group of heavy sacks and hearts, and in my broken, eight-week-old Portuguese that she couldn’t understand, I asked the weary mother if I could give her children a treat. With eyes that did understand, she nodded with a smile. After handing a cake to each child, I unwrapped one for the mother and then took her groceries.
We walked them back to their tiny, everything-in-one-room casa—two small beds, a standing-room-only kitchen, a double sway-back bed, a small couch covered by a colorful blanket and cat hair, a striped cat, two kittens, and a small scratchy TV. While the girls were crunching on their little treat, we told their mother that we were missionaries from the Igreja de Jesus Cristo dos Santos dos Ultimos Dias and asked if she had ever heard about the Church. After some discussion she agreed to have us back, so my husband, Elder Benedict, took our missionary planner out of his white shirt pocket and wrote a reminder to return to the little cement house on February 14.
Being Mormon doesn’t mean we’re required to serve a mission and miss the birth and soft baby breath of five new grandchildren: Jase, Alexa, Mallory, Daniel, and Ethan. In fact, full-time missionary work is voluntary—meaning, you save and save and pay your own way to share the thing that you value most: your testimony that families can be together forever.
Everyone should get to know that.
February 28, 2005
We returned on the 14th and talked to Edilene about how Jesus Christ’s original church has been restored to the earth—that Heavenly Father speaks to His prophets, and that revelation is as alive and well today as in times of old. Then we went back a few days later to teach about Heavenly Father’s plan of salvation for each of us. Each time we leave, little Pamela clings to me and then cries until we are down the road out of sight because she doesn’t want us to go. And each time we return, the girls run to us and squeal: Entre, entre! (Come in, come in!)
Yet there are still other squeals a continent away that I long to hear. Serving a mission doesn’t erase the ache of being too far away to watch Jonathan, Caitlyn, Nathaniel, Hailey “K” (the “K” after me!), Aubrey, Samuel, Laura, Heidi, and McKenzie, blow out candles on their seven, five, five, four, three, two, two, two, and one year old birthday cakes, nor does it take away the incessant itch of mosquito bites or the heavy air that sits on us like a thick quilt of heat. But it does help us learn to love more as we befriend our beautiful Brazilian brothers and sisters, and it blesses us as we witness the daily details of the pure love that our Father in Heaven has for each of His children.
March 9, 2005
Edilene’s husband, Paulo Caesar, joined us tonight! And so we began again, sharing our scriptures and our hearts. We were there for quite some time, as they had many questions, but we eventually needed to leave for another appointment. We were surprised when they asked us to return that night, and we happily agreed. As we started down the road for our next appointment, walking close enough to the street lights to see the ruts in the road, yet far enough from them so the black beetles wouldn’t catch a ride in my hair, I asked Stan if he had felt anything special during the discussion. Trying to self-preserve between the cats, the coloring (on me at times!), and the daughters climbing my frame and twisting my hair, I wasn’t able to concentrate enough to catch the fast Portuguese dialogue or to read the eyes all around me. Often I am preoccupied trying to quiet the eager, hungry-for-our-visit girls, combing the few strands of hair remaining on their stiff plastic doll or placing stickers on each other’s arms so their parents can hear the message. Tonight being no different, I really wanted to know what my husband had felt. He replied that when he was explaining how every child of God will have the opportunity to be baptized into Christ’s church (reading from 1 Corinthians 15), he felt the Spirit very strongly.
Upon our return, Edilene met us at the door with a smile and a small container of fresh shrimp that Paulo Caesar had caught the day before from the lagoon. As excited as we were to receive that gift, her next few words was the greater gift by far. While we stood in the doorway under the dim light, swatting mosquitoes back into the night sky, Edilene confided that she had seen us in a dream five years ago. She told us that when Stan was teaching from 1 Corinthians, it was right then that she realized she’d seen that exact scene before, and her dream came back vividly. She’d told her husband about her dream before he left for his boat that evening.
Just as we were about to leave again, Paulo returned on his bicycle. “The wind is too strong to fish tonight,” he said. Before long he began asking more questions about the things we’d taught them earlier. They sat on the bed and listened to us teach from the frail folding chairs they’d brought out from underneath the bed. The red felt cover on their well-used Bible was worn, revealing years of careful study. He has read it thirteen times at home. She has taken it with her to many different churches in search of the truth, trying to find people who practice the words their Red Book teaches. What other scripture was Ezekiel prophesying about? they asked. Their thoughtful questions were as deep as the searching hunger in their eyes. They asked us to come back tomorrow to explain, to him this time, the answers only the restored gospel can provide: where we came from, why we are here on earth, and where we are going after we die. It is amazing how every heart, regardless of language, or country, or climate, or color of skin, has the same questions about life, about family, about forever.
We came home late again tonight, walking the same streets, turning at the same corners—tired, but ready to begin another day tomorrow. My spirit rejoices in knowing we’ll witness another father and mother learn about eternal families. And that thought tucks in my homesick heart.
***
It’s hard to say which miracle has been greater—the miracle of Edilene’s prophetic dream, the miracle that a prophet and a mission president sent us to the exact spot on earth needed to fulfill our part of the dream, the undeniable miracles that Heavenly Father has blessed our family with in our absence, or the miraculous expansion of my heart as Paulo Caesar wiped away tears during fast and testimony meeting (the week before their baptism) and humbly shared: “I am so thankful (Eu sou grato) that Elder and Sister Benedito love Heavenly Father enough to leave their family for a time, so that I could have mine forever.”
I will look for more children to hand rice cakes to. Because miracles happen on normal, average, quiet, unnoticed days—one grocery trip, one dirt road, one home, one heart, at a time.
Eu sou grato.
Brenda and her husband, Stan, are currently serving a mission in the Brazil Porto Alegre South Mission, and will return in June. They have been blessed with seven children and fourteen grandchildren, (five of whom were born during the mission!). Serving a mission is a lot like being a mom, says Brenda, “It is the best, easiest, hardest, most amazing, joyful, work there is!!! I am so grateful. (Eu sou grato!).”
