One month after floodwaters covered one of Brazil’s largest cities for weeks amid unprecedented storms, Elder Gerrit W. Gong of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles met with officials of Porto Alegre.
Elder Gong visited on Thursday, June 13, in the same city where several meetinghouses of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were used as emergency shelters for some of the more than 580,000 individuals displaced by the destructive floods.
“It has been very tender to be in this area, which has been so devastated by floods,” he said.
Church members from around Brazil served in many different ways to help those whose lives were turned upside down by the floods. The Church helped organize and provide resources quickly following the disaster.
Elder Gong met with civic leaders who witnessed Church members’ efforts to help those in need.

“We have been greeted by senior government officials who have been very appreciative for the wonderful cooperation as neighbors and friends and community members, as brothers and sisters with our Church members and our Church leaders,” Elder Gong said.
Seeing how members worked to bless the lives of friends, neighbors and individuals they had never met served as a touching reminder of the Savior’s love, Elder Gong said.
“It is just tender and sacred to be reminded that in the hardest of times we are never alone. In the hardest of times, the Lord is with us. And He helps us, and He blesses us, and we do it together. It is part of covenant belonging.”
The Apostle also met with some of those who were displaced and who volunteered to help in the community.
Elder Gong was accompanied in Brazil by his wife, Sister Susan Gong. Sister Gong said she was grateful to see so many people in the world doing good.
“It makes me happy that we are friends with so many of them,” she said. “I am grateful that we were able to share who we are more broadly with them here and to have them understand that this is not just a Salt Lake operation. This is a global church, and it’s strong and vibrant here in Brazil.”
Overcoming fright
Érica Leites, a young woman in Porto Alegre, shared her experience from the floods on the Church’s @StriveToBe Instagram account.

“When I woke up, there was water in the street, and within a few hours, there was water inside my house due to the heavy rains in Rio Grande do Sul,” she said, recalling the sudden way in which the floodwaters quickly rose in the city.
“The first days were frightening, but my parents and I knelt down and gave thanks for each day of life, praying that we could get through that moment with wisdom, constantly reading the scriptures and trusting in the temple covenants,” Leites said.
Members in Leites’ Eldorado do Sul Ward also faced similar challenges that made the roads undriveable in much of their city.
“I felt the immense mercy of God when a team of firefighters and jet ski volunteers came to rescue us with boats,” she said. “We were guided by the Spirit to leave the house at that moment, and along the way, we saved a family whose boat had capsized.”
Her family has since returned home, and the floodwaters have subsided. While cleanup and repairs continue, Leites said she came away from the floods having learned an important lesson.
“It was an experience I never thought I’d live through. But I bear my testimony that if we keep our faith and trust in the Lord, He will never abandon us,” she said.