19/8/2015

Crazy special change this past week. Well yesterday really. Yesterday I left San Bernardo and I am now in the Sector Los Carolinos, in the Stake El Bosque. We knew for a little bit that it was going to happen. But we were a little sad. It is a little stinky because this is my last change in the mission. And I am going to finish in a ward for one change. But I am really excited! It is going to be cool! I am really excited for this sector! From what I have seen it is really good!

I am with Elder Noriega from Utah. His parents are from Mexico, and he speaks spanish really well. He's a really good guy, and I am excited to work with him. It's going to be a good change! He just finished his training, so he is fresh with energy and super ready to work! I am super excited! Here's a picture of him.

So we'll see how this new sector and last change goes. I am excited. It was a little hard to leave Elder Corbo. He is a really good guy and I'll miss him a lot. The thing that kind of stunk was that I was only in that sector for less than 3 months, so I didn't have enough time to really get to know everyone. But San Bernardo is a really good ward. I'll miss it a lot.

But anyway, some other pictures. Just to show, this is all of the Area Books that we have in this sector. So much work has been done and missionaries have been here for so long, that all of these are just full. It's kind of crazy.

And this is Hermano Sergio. He was our Ward Mission Leader. He is a great guy. I am going to miss him!

12/8/15

This has been a very interesting week. First of all starting with Thursday. Thursday it started to rain really hard. So, to make a long story short. We got home for a few seconds after lunch on Thursday to pick up something, and then we saw a lot of water on the floor. Those were just a few drops, but then we went into our bedroom, where the 4 of us had our bunk beds. And we see that the roof above us had accumulated so much water, that it could burst in any minute.... So we spent almost all Thursday trying to move the bunk beds into our living room so they didn't get soaking wet. It was fun.... Not really. But that's the only problem we had from the rain.

But other than that it was an interesting week. We've been trying to work really hard. We know we don't have too much time left in the sector, so we have been trying to work hard to get the last little bit out of it that we can. We've been contacting a lot and it's been kind of rough. It is definitely the hardest sector I've ever been in. But I have learned a lot because of being here.

One of the biggest things I have learned here is that even though progress or work might be slow, if we keep working, something will happen. It might be really hard and we might go crazy, or better said drive ourselves crazy. But If we keep pushing, something will happen. We can never see what might happen just a little bit further down the road. If we give up right now, we might never be able to see what might have happened had we just kept going a little bit further. Let's keep working! Let's keep going!

Anyway,the first picture is the room we had our beds in, we had to move them.

The second is the disorder we had the living room in while we tried to fix it all.

And today we went Bowling. It was really fun!

5/8/2015

This has been a good week. We had quite a few great, interesting things happen this week! 

Well to start off we were able to give on of the first Spanish lessons taught in Chile (hahaha) to Jimmy and Dalen, the Haitian investigators. They are progressing well and are commited to come to church this week. And they asked us for help in Spanish! Hahaha it was really funny!

The first really cool thing was what we taught to a part member family. Pablo and Estefany. They are from Uruguay, and they are great! They have 2 little girls and they are awesome too! So we decided we were going to try to teach the Restoration in a way that they could really understand.

So we took 3 candles and put them on a plate, and we taught a little bit about prophets and dispensations and stuff, until we got to the Earthly Ministry of Jesus Christ. And when we taught about the establishment of Christ's church, we lit the 3 candles. One for the 12 Apostles, one for the Priesthood, and then one for the Revelation necessary for Christ to guide his church after his death. 

Then we talked about the Apostasy. When Christ died, he still lead his church through the Revelation to his apostles. But when the Apostles died, so did the church, and we blew our the candles. The room we were in went dark.

But as we explained the Restoration, and the First Vision of Joseph Smith, we were able to light the 3 candles again! Because through Joseph Smith 12 Apostles were called, the Priesthood was restored, as was the Revelation. And as we lit the candles again, the room lit up. It was really clear! They understood it really well! It was all around a great experience!

Then on Saturday, we were able to take a lot of investigators on a tour of the Temple in Santiago. It went really well! Of the 5 people that went, 2 are sure to get married in order to get baptized, one had recieved his answer and wants to get baptized and our investigator Julio is keeping his commitments and has shown interest in being baptized! It was incredible! We were able to go into the front doors of the temple into the reception area and be a few minutes in silence! And the Spirit was incredible! It was so cool! The first picture I put there is a foto of all of us who went on the tour!

So overall a great week!

And then the other picture is of me giving my Zone Leader a hair cut! Haha, it actually turned out all right. Another thing I've learned here on the mission.

29/7/15

This was an interesting week. Nothing to special or crazy happened. Other than we had a cute little puppy that followed us around all day the other day and it was really hard to ditch it so that it could find a real home. 

But other than that nothing crazy or out of the ordinary happened. Which was interesting because while I thought about it, I realized that that's okay, because even though I didn't see any great "miracle," I still feel good because I was able to share a little bit with people. I can't even say that everyone I shared my testimony with wanted to listen or wanted to learn more, or that it caused them to change. But I felt really good working and sharing it. I talked to my comp about it too. He felt the same way. We aren't seeing any success that makes the whole world change, but we personally feel great for serving the Lord.

I think I am finally coming to understand when everyone talks about us "sowing seeds." That we might not see a lot of growth or anything like that. But the few words that I say to the guy on the corner, or even to the guy that leaves his house screaming at us to leave him alone, just might be the thing that causes them to change in 10 or even 20 years down the road. So I'm finally starting to get it. That doesn't mean that I remember it every day that's hard, but that's something new I learned this week. So it was a good week.

But anyway, we had a fun P Day today. We had a ping pong tournament and ate tacos. It was good!

22/7/15

Hey guys, hope everthing has been going good. I tried to start the letter home this week a little bit different, because I realized I probably start every letter off the same way. But anyway,

This week was a good week. We had some good work to do, and it was great! We've been working hard and we're trying to get ahead and do well and stuff, but it does feel like sometimes sowing seeds happens a lot more than the harvesting here. But we're used to that. We've got to just keep going ahead and working hard.

But actually Sister Cook, President's wife, talked about that yesterday in a Zone Conference that we had. I think she gave us all a lot of what we needed to hear. She talked a lot about putting good goals, and how to reach them. She talked about having the desire to reach them, and the effort that we put into it. It actually made me think of a Tim Mcgraw song that says,

"How bad do you want it? How bad do you need it? Are you eating, sleeping, dreaming with that one thing on your mind?"

I liked it. It's a question I asked myself. How bad do I want it? It gave me a lot of drive this last little bit and me think a lot!

And then today was really fun! We went to play soccer, but we were able to bring our Haitian investigator. His name is Jimmy. He's a great guy. Really cool. But he was really excited to come and play soccer with us.

15/7/15

This has been quite the week! A few exciting things to write about.

Well as of Monday started a new change. Time has gone by so fast that I didn't even realize to mention that last week. I stayed in San Bernardo with Elder Corbo. But Elder Curtis left the house. So it's me, Corbo, Elder Zazueta and his new comp Elder Torres, from Argentina. He is actually getting here from my 2nd sector, Covarrubias. So it's going to be a good change!

This last week was really good too! We all got together as a mission to watch the Funeral for Elder L. Tom Perry. That was a really good experience. Elder Perry with be greatly missed as an apostle. He was a great teacher and we could all learn a lot from him.

Then later this week, we were contacting a few houses and we found a family from Haiti. It was really cool! We were able to go back another day and share something with them. It was interesting and really hard. They have only been here for a year, so their spanish isn't that good. They speak a little bit of english, and that isn't that much either. Being from Haiti, they speak best French. So, I talked to the mission office and I got 2 copies of the Book of Mormon in french. "Le Livre de Mormon." One for them, and one for me! I decided to start studying my 3rd language. French. I know I'm not going to be fluent, but I'm going to try to at least familiarize myself with the language to help them out!

And the last crazy thing... A lot of Elders and Sisters went home this past week. Like a lot. For example, Elder Purnell, Elder Mcmullin, and 3 of my old District Leaders. That's nuts! It really makes me sad to think about it. But they all went home. It's kind of a bummer because I only got the chance to see Elder Purnell right before he left. But, still. I hope they all got home well and that it's going well for them.

There is the last picture of me and Elder Purnell as missionaries.

There are the 3 languages I'm hoping to be familiar with when I get home.

And then today for P Day we went to a huge hill in the middle of the city to see it. There is a really cool castle to see on the way up.

Copa America!

This week was AWESOME! We got permission to see the Final of the Copa America! It was a good game and everyone is excited because Chile won! Everyone except my companion haha. But it was a good game! A bummer that it went to penalties, but a good game! We had a good time watching it too! It was great because now everyone in the streets and everyone we contact are all super happy! Helps a little bit with contacts!

But the rest of the week has been good too! We are finding a few people and stuff.

But this last week was special for Chile in another way too! The Area Presidency asked everyone in Chile to dedicate the fast this month to ask for rain for the places like Santiago that haven't had rain all year. And so they did it. Everyone was fasting for that purpose. The Testimony meeting Sunday was very spiritual. Really it was special because everyone who went up expressed their faith and feelings about the fast. And then at lunch we were all talking about it, and then we heard the *tick tick tick* of rain. It had worked! It rained a little bit on Sunday, but not very much. But there is rain in the forecast! So we are hoping for it!

So anyway. I've got 2 pictures this week. One is me and my companion after the game hahaha.

             And the other is our house eating pizza. It was reaaally good!