hey all you people out there. elder waffles tuning in here (chileans cant ever say my name right, so they just call me waffles). this week for elder rigby and i was kind of just slow....the majority of this week was set apart to find some more people to teach and do a lot of contacting. there was some cool stuff that happened though. i was able to go on divisions with one of the other elders in my zone in his sector! his name is elder villacreses, and he just barely got to the mission. he is from ecuador, and wants to be a pilot when he grows up! during the division, all the citas fell through, but we were able to find some really awesome people! we found this one guy named moises, who i kid you not, was literally prepared to have the missionaries be put into their life. he was just married, and wants to be with his family forever, but doesnt know how to do it. i am literally so excited to see where the lord is going to take him next!! marbella was able to get confirmed this past week as well!!! now she is official! as missionaries, once a investigator gets baptized, they have to go through the lessons again with members. we have been trying to work with the ward and trying to get her some visiting teachers. we even took her on a lesson with us with one of her friends, and she literally had such an awesome testimony. her friend literally didnt want anything to do with us, but like it was awesome to see the spiritual growth that she has been making in these past ocuple of months! the hatian investigator that we have been teaching has been progressing pretty well! adriane used to be a jehova witness, but felt like she needed to change a little something in her life. we were able to teach her about the plan of salvation this past week, and we could really feel the spirit when we talked about eternal families and how we are able to live with god again. she is a little bit worried that she isnt going to receive an answer before her baptismal date, but we are helping her with that slowly! hopefully we will see her and her husband join the church here soon! thats about all we did this week here folks....nothing too cray! haha! i was able to take some awesome pictures this week because another elder that i live with brought a super nice camera to the mission. sick aesthetically pleasing pics to follow! love you all to the moon and back!! EKW for p day we went to a huge field and hit some golf balls around then i took a bunch of pictures edgy golf pic me and the chilean sky outside my casa anyone who ever rode in my car in cali, you'll recognize this guy...he chillen with me here in chile it was a lava-lava kind of day...no dress pants and bare feet
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hey you sick people on the other side of the world! this week was definitely another one to remember! allow me to explain. we were able to have two baptisms here in los castaños!! we were able to baptize marbella, one of the 16 year old investigators that we have been teaching for a while, and another teenager named cristobal. he was in an all member family, and recently took the decision to get baptised! we had the service, and it was literally so awesome! marbella is getting ready to go and do baptisms for the dead here soon, and we could not be any more excited for the progress that she has been doing. there were a couple scary things that happened during the baptisms though. 1)the font was draining as we were filling it, so like we had to fill it up by hand with hot water an hour and a half before the baptism 2)the youth that was going to baptise cristobal forgot his pants, so i had to run home (which is like a mile and a half in the other direction) to get mine for him to use. i made it back like 20 minutes before the baptism. lets say that i ran my fastest mile that day. 3) we had to clean up after the baptism, which was just straight awful ha! but overall it was an amazing experience for us and for the people that got baptized! we were able to go to see christofferson speak one more time (before he left chile)in a multi stake conference. marbella was able to come with us. he talked a lot about how sometimes the things that are bad in our life can make us slip up and distance ourselves from god. he said that sometimes, it is really REALLY hard to try and feel the love that god has for us when we are in the midst of trials. the thing that we have to do though, is "siempre recordar de las bendiciones que el nos ha dado". im literally so sorry i dont remember how to say that in english. hopefully my mom translates it heheh. (momma wattles here...it translates to "always remember the blessings that he has given us") we must turn to christ even if we feel like he is fed up with us turning to him. god is never going to be annoyed with us asking for help, because when we do that, it shows that we give confidence in the power that he has. now i totally know that, sometimes it may not seem like he is helping us in the moment, but that could be because he is just putting the blessings in another period of our lives so that we can be even happier in the future. just a little bit of food for thought :)) love all of you to the moon and back! EKW candid missionary baptismal photo? cristobal (next to rigby) got baptized by his best friend, martin (next to me) remember he's wearing my white pants...yep...they might have been a little long marbella and us! we literally ripped an old roof off of a members house for some service this week! (made me think about the days we tore my house in cali apart to remodel....gooood times!)
hey people of the planet!! do not be mistaken by the subject of this blog entry, it wasn't the most awesome week in the whole world. rigby and i had a rough patch of getting sick, so we had to stay inside for a long time....first it was me, so we stayed inside for a day, but then he got it WAY worse, and so we stayed inside for another three days. it was really "brijido" (sketchy). there was some cool things that did happen during the course of this week! i was able to study a lot about the questions of the soul and where they come from, ad why people even have them. it was interesting to read "is there a god" and "what does god expect of us". if i may put it down in words for you, dear reader, there are literally signs that there is a god all around us. we read from his creation in genesis, read about how he has to intervene in the book of mormon, and how he helped reestablish the church in doctrine and covenants. there was no way that there could not be a loving heavenly father in heaven watching over us. he has established this gospel for us to come back to him, and he has given us the covenants and ordinances necessary to do it! being on the mission has really helped me be put in the perspective of god for just a second. i have had investigators that dont complete the things that they are supposed to read, dont go to church, break commandments because they think its ok. IT. MAKES. US. FRUSTRATED. AS. MISSIONARIES. it has allowed me to feel just a sliver of what god feels when we are down here and we break the small things, or just stop living the gospel in general. if i was to challenge you, dear reader, it would be that you guys should do the things that you are supposed to do! dont ever leave the gospel in the past, and always try to remember how heavenly father is going to feel when you dont do the things that you are supposed to do! elder christofferson came this week to the mission and it was the most amazing thing in the whole world! i got to shake his hand, and i thought i was going to crumble in his glowing presence. i still have so much to lean, and he seems just so wise and loving. he talked about how we as missionaries should always always always be using the book of mormon in our teachings. he told us that investigators are truly converted to the gospel when they take the time to read the book of mormon and apply it to their lives. i have about 9000000 notes on what he said, but sadly i dont have my notebook with me. ugh! well i gotta scram, but i hope that all yall have a good week this week! EKW me and elder scott at the conference (miss this kid now that he's leading the zone in the north) people...keep a journal. thats all. "en that street, where there was representing almost all the bad in the society, the missionaries where like an island of spirituality" (thanks for the pic of cucumberbatch whit) wanabee hipster chile coffee-free coffee shop?
this week out here in los castaños was a little bit of a challenge, but rigby and i were able to see some of the miracles that came out of our hard work. allow me to explain.
like i said this week, we had our sector split down the middle. with the split, we had to give away 90% of our investigators to the elders on the other half. rigby and i have been contacting our BRAINS out to try and find new people to teach. there were some days where we wouldn't find anyone to teach, nor would we get any lessons under our dats...it was pretty rocky to start off. two days go by, and still no body. we were trying to find a street in our sector, but we had no idea how to get there. we knock on this VIBRANT pink house and out comes this 30 year old women. her name is Jeny, and she was SO nice to us. we ended up talking to her for a little bit, and turns out that her friends are mormon and she wants to know a little bit more about our church! plus, she wants her daughters to have a safe friend group, and she wants her daughter to join the young womens group in the capilla! we also found this guy that lived in the bronks for 16 years, and them came back to chile because his wife kicked him out of his house in the states. we started talking to him a little bit too, and he told us that he wants to find god and learn how he can get blessings in his time of sadness....UM HELLO WE ARE RIGHT HERE! we have a return cita with him in this upcoming week. Then...we found a hatian women who let us teach her lesson one in her house, met with a tattoo artist and talked to him about the book of mormon, and a then a single mom who wants to know what the heck this "relief society thing is" its been a really testimony builder to know that god is placing people in our paths when they need it the most! plus, we are starting to look up here!! so so so excited!! ALSO PATO AND FERNANDA GOT BAPTIZED THIS PAST WEEK AND I CRIED KIND OF A LOT. i was so happy for them and for their decision to get baptized. there are some pics of us a little bit before their baptism!! i havce to scram right now though. i need to go grocery shopping because there is like -34 items of food in my house and i dont want to starve for this next week. but i hope all of you have an amazing week this week! elder christofferson is coming to the mission this next wednesday, so my pday is going to get moved to thursday! i am beyond excited to see what he is going to talk to us about! also shoutout to the mission second ward for sending me that Christmas package!! the chilean postal service is literally garbage, but i just got it and absolutely love it!! Also to my main girl..my mum...Thanks for the package of Trader Joe’s grocery’s and cloths that fit. (And thanks for all the other stuff in the box too!) love you all to the moon and back! EKW |
Elder Karson Wattles
Chile Santiago South Mission apartado postal No. 544 San Bernardo, Chile Archives
May 2019
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