Today, June 16, & June 9

June 23

This week went by really slow and I feel like we got a lot of work done. We've been working really hard to work with the members and we were able to find ten new investigators. We found a family of three that is really interested. There names are   Adolfo, Carolina, and Rodrigo. The first time we talked to the Adolfo (the dad) was in the street and he told us that nothing in the entire world can change him of his beliefs in the Catholic church. Surprisingly he let us into his house but thinking that it would go nowhere. We started teaching him and he was a little closed but within ten minutes he opened up and really listened to our message. The spirit was definitely there and the family is committed to church next week. 

This week we'll be starting up English class again. We stopped for a while because nobody came but we found some investigators that have to learn English for work. They said they have a lot of Friends to invite so I think we are going to have a big class this Friday. I realized that English class is a lot harder than I thought. Last night I was teaching English and I felt so dumb because I couldn't answer half of the questions but eventually I figured it out and I'm learning a lot about English grammar.

Sounds like you guys are having a great time at the lake and enjoying the nice weather. Winter just started yesterday and it gets colder every day but I'm enjoying every second of it. Love everyone!

Elder Roberts

June 16

Hola! This week went really good. My companion is improving a lot and he is starting to talk a little more in the lessons. He's a little shy and still getting used to the missionary life but he's picking up on things really good.

We had a really cool experience with an investigator this week. Her name is Elizabeth and she was a reference from a member in our ward. We invited her to pray to see if she needs to be baptized. We found her in the street a few days later and she told us she had had a dream and received an answer! In her dream there was a lady that invited her to come to a church. She went and entered and it was our church and she new she had received an answer. It was awesome to hear that but sadly she wasn't able to come to church this week. We'll be working with her this week and we also have a few more referrals from the same member to work with.

The big Chile soccer game was last Thursday. Its huge and that's all they talk about here. We had to be in the house from 6 till the rest of the night and were going to have to do that every time they play. I don't think its that dangerous here but I guess we need to be extra safe.

Happy fathers day Dad!!! I liked that fishing poll case you got from Tyler. Hope you had an awesome day! Love you!

Elder Roberts

June 9

Tuesday morning I went to Concepcion to pick up my new companion. I was hoping to get a Latino to keep speaking Spanish 24/7 but turns out I will be training another Gringo! I'm actually really excited. The first few weeks are just hilarious because they look ridiculous trying to speak Spanish and they just make no sense. It is funny because that was me not that long ago but we are having an awesome time together. His name is Elder Stallings and he's from Idaho.

We found some awesome new investigators this week. We have a sister in our ward Hermana Carolina that really has the vision for missionary work. She sells bread to everyone in her neighborhood so she basically knows everybody and the other day she took us around door to door visiting her friends. We found two new families to work with one of them named Elizabeth accepted a Baptismal date. Her date fell through when there was a huge rain storm and she couldn't come to church but we are going to keep working with her and get her to church this coming week. 

It is absolutely freezing here. We got dumped on by rain this whole week and it is ice cold. If it wasn't for my water suit it would be impossible to work. If you haven't sent my package yet some rubber shoe covers would be awesome. I hear they're really cheap. 

Dad I love that picture that's hilarious! Tell them i say hi! have fun taking out the boat. be sure to send me some pictures. Love you guys!  

Sam

This week was a little bit tough. We weren't able to work very much with our progressing investigators. We are still working with Betcey Roberts but we found out she's a little weird. She started telling us about how she believes in reincarnation and how she was a white horse before this life. She still has some doubts about baptism also, so the baptism date was pushed back a little bit. She does still want to come to church and everything so we'll keep working with her. 

Our ward is starting to improve a lot. Were really starting to work with the Bishop and we also finally got a ward mission leader! I haven't had a ward mission leader my whole mission so its been really great.

My dream came true this morning. There is a big river about 20 minutes away from our house so we decided to get some fishing stuff from some members and go fishing this morning. All the members told us before we left that the water is contaminated and if we want to catch poop to go there but we went anyways. They were definitely right! We fished for about an hour and didn't see any sign of life but it was still a good time.

I died when I saw you guys boating! That's crazy everyone is out of school. By the way I figured out that I can watch the videos so keep sending me videos! Love you guys!

Elder Requena got a nice dog bite on his leg

This week things are starting to get a lot better. We've been able to find a lot more people and we have one investigator with a baptismal date. Her name is Betcey Roberts! We found her working in her front yard so we asked if we could help. She wasn't interested at all at first and did not want to talk to us. I then asked her what her name was and she said Roberts! I showed her my name tag and she couldn't believe it. She was the happiest lady alive and said that all of her grand kids look exactly like me and she then went off talking for about 30 minutes. She accepted to go to church right there on the street and she went. She even has some friends in the ward and she had an awesome experience. We put a baptismal date for the 31st but she still has a few doubts about baptism so we are going to clear that up this week. 

This morning we went to the professional soccer stadium in chillan! We went to take a tour but they would only let us walk around on the outside and in the bleacher area. As we were walking out the janitor stopped us and told us that we need to bring home some better memories so he gave us a tour and history lesson of the whole stadium inside and out.

Sorry the computer didn't work very good yesterday but it was awesome talking to everyone. Happy Mothers day again mom!! Love you and hope you had an awesome day yesterday. I tried to send some videos, let me know if they work!

Love everyone!

May 5

We got destroyed by rain again this week. I definitely was not prepared and got soaked for about two days. Today I went and bought an awesome water proof suit and some giant rubber rain boots so I think I'm ready for the next storm. Other than that this week went really good and we are starting find more people. Right now the mission is really focusing on contacting people in the street so we've been contacting like crazy. We are really starting to see the blessings from it. A few days ago we found a  family that we had contacted in their front yard a few weeks ago. We taught baptism and they accepted within ten minutes! When we got there they told us about how the other day they were talking about how they need to join a church and be baptized. We arrived just in time and we had an amazing lesson. Everything was perfect until they told us they might be moving to Panama in about two week! It was horrible news but were going to keep working with them anyways and see what happens. 

I'm really exited to skype on Sunday! I think the only time my companion can do it is at 8. I don't know what time Parker has planned but let me know so we can maybe try and change something. I also don't really know what the time difference is there so I'll let you guys figure that out. Love you guys!!!

April 14

This week was a little bit boring. Its starting to get so cold! We're like penguinos in the morning. We have little electric heaters to heat up our rooms but ours doesn't work very good at all. I heard it gets a lot colder and a lot wetter so I'm excited for that. I actually really like working in the cold. The food is also a lot better. We eat a ton of soup and a ton of sopipias or scones. The only bad thing is that they put catchup and mustard on the scones instead of honey butter. Its pretty gross but I'm getting used to it. I think I'm gaining some weight back. I weighed myself and I've gained 8 lbs back so I'm not the skinniest man alive any more.

This week we really focused on preparing Oscar for his baptism! I've never seen anyone so excited for their baptism. He was baptized on Saturday night by one of his good friends in the Ward. I've never seen so many people at a baptism before. We had about 50 people there and a lot of non members. I've never felt the spirit so strong in my like. We gave Oscar a surprise and had him share his testimony at the end. He gave a strong testimony and also his experience in the last few months. I'll tell you guys a little bit of what he said. He used to lie to his parents every week so that he could come to church. His mom eventually found out and wouldn't let him get baptized. He felt horrible about lying to his parents but but he loved going to church. I'm pretty sure his family is all against it but his mom finally let him make his own decision. He's now planning on serving a mission! It was an awesome experience. Also what I loved about it was the ward did everything! Just like President Hinckley said - the members find and the missionaries teach. I hope you guys are taking the challenge and inviting someone to church every three months! Love you guys!

April 21

Another cambio already flew by! They go by faster every time - it's crazy. I'll be staying here in Chillan again with my companion Elder Requena for another six weeks. I'm really excited to be staying here. Our ward is awesome and there is so much potential and I think we are going to see some awesome things this cambio.

Oscar, who we baptized two weeks ago just received the Priesthood and he's doing awesome! Also I think they're going to be giving him a calling soon. He's determined to serve a mission and he's doing everything he can to prepare. We also have a young investigator named Belen that has a lot of friends in the church. She's willing to listen and everything but the only problem is that she doesn't believe in God. We invited her to pray so we'll see how that goes this week. That was the good news of this week but there is also some bad news. The other Elders in my district have some really awesome investigators named Tita and joleni that were planning on getting baptized soon. They were a little hesitant on their decision to get baptized so as a District Leader I got to do an interview of support just to help them with any doubts they have. We had an awesome interview and I could tell she has a testimony of the gospel and the Book of Mormon. She was really excited to come to church the next day and also wanted to go to all the classes. She came to Sacrament meeting and loved it and then we went to the class. Usually there is a lot of people but not one person showed up. The teacher then showed up and said her husband is sick and she left. Tita thought that was really disrespectful and really unorganized so she got super angry, almost starting to yell at us and marched out the door. It all happened so fast and we had no idea what to do. We are going to try and save them this week so we'll see what happens. It would also be great if you could keep them in your prayers.

Dad I'm glad to hear that about my hamstring because I've been playing on it for a while now. Its definitely healed a lot and I don't really feel it anymore so I think it will be fine. We actually played soccer this morning and it felt great. We also ate scones with honey butter this morning for our zone activity and it was amazing.

Sounds like everything is pretty normal at home. I'm glad to hear that Ryan's knee is better. Max and Ryan you need to email me to tell me how baseball is going. Enjoy the warm weather its getting freezing here. Love everyone!!!

Conference!

This week went by really fast! Conference basically took up Friday and Saturday so it felt so short. I loved Conference!! My mind was just blown by all the amazing talks.I got to watch it in English so that was really nice. We had a room in the back with all the gringo missionaries and a ton of candy. That's awesome that Roberts grandpa talked, I didn't even put that together. 

Our Investigator Oscar is still doing awesome! He came with us to 3 sessions of Conference and he loved it! He's really excited for his baptism on Saturday. We still have to teach him the commandments but he is definitely ready. Last week we set a goal in our District to have six investigators in Conference and we were able to bring six! My district is doing awesome and we are seeing awesome progress in our sector. To answer your question Dad we do a lot of contacts! Elder Ballard made us a promise that if each missionary does 10 contacts in the street every day there will be a huge growth in baptisms in our mission. 10 doesn't sound like very much but they also made it a rule that knocking door contacts don't count anymore. I think they're trying to eliminate knocking doors from missionary work. We now talk to literally almost every single person that we walk past in the street.

I guess you guys heard about the earthquake. It was super far away but we heard a lot about it. We actually got a call on Friday night that we had to be in our house because the earthquake was going to hit us at 11! My companion is from Santiago and experienced the huge earthquake about 5 years ago. He is now terrified to death of earthquakes and it was hilarious to see his face. We waited until 11 and all the sudden, our power went out and everyone went crazy. Our power than came back on and it had nothing to do with the earthquake and nothing ever happened. 

Sorry I haven't sent pictures for a while. I don't have much time but I'll send a bunch next time. Love everyone!

March 31

Como estan!

This week went a little slow but it was really good. It started out nice and warm and then all the sudden we got destroyed with rain. It poured the entire day on Saturday. My big Mr. mac jacket was water proof for about an hour and then its a sponge. We got soaked but I actually love the rain. It's so much better than baking in the sun. Ever since the rain it has just been freezing cold and our house is just an ice box.

This week we found some awesome investigators! As we were sitting in church on Sunday, a lady from the other ward pulled me and my companion out of class and introduced us to a kid named Oscar. She told us he's ready to be baptized but he just needs to be taught. We set up a baptism date right there and then taught him later that afternoon. He's in our ward but he's been participating in the other ward for the last two months. It was so awesome because the members did all the work! They invited him to church, helped him make friends, and now he's more than ready to be baptized. He's 17 and wants to go on a mission so I'm super exited to teach him. I did a baptism interview with a little nine year old kid in our ward named Benjamin. He's just like Jaxson but ten times worse. You cant even imagine how horrible the interview was. He was jumping all over the place and literally screaming as loud as he could the whole time. It was horrible but I was really surprised how he understood everything and answered the questions while screaming so he passed. At his baptism he jumped in the font and started swimming before they opened the curtains. It was hilarious.

I finally got my package with my pants! It probably wasn't the best idea to put packets of peanut butter in there. They kind of broke and got all over my pants but it all came out so its alright. 

I hope you guys are preparing for conference! I'm seriously so excited. I'm glad I'll be able to understand it this time because I didn't get a word out of it last time. Love you guys!