Some Bonds Aren't Made by Coincidence

The Last Week of Cambio Number 4:

And so here we are again, going on to another cambio and Hermana Castro and I, vamos a quedar juntas! Voy a terminar su entrenamiento in Renacimiento...and we ended this great transfer with three baptisms and the last one last night :) Elder Pitola se va a Arica and so we are getting another District Leader who is going to be a gringo, Elder Scottman who I actually met my first day in Chile because he worked in the the office, and so we spent the past weekend celebrating with la Familia Memano who is the house of our mamita and the elders to spend some last couple of moments with Pitola. 

Hermana Castro and I sent a pouch package for President Bruce and Hermana Bruce so they have something to read on their long flight back to the states in ten days. I had some nice surprise phone calls from some other sisters in the mission such as Hermana DeLerma, Hermana Solaman, Hermana Carito and Hermana Fuentes who all wanted to talk about where I was going or if I was staying. Most of the sisters I know, are in Copiapo now, I feel like so many missionaries are either down there or in Arica; it’s like a party house in those places! LOL 

Helping prepare Augusto for his baptism was a little hectic but what are baptisms for right?! He is such a great kid really and when he smiles he looks like Chris Brown! He has been asking a lot of questions about how one becomes a missionary and just knowing that he’s asking those questions already makes me choke up. Our recent convert Antonio came to the baptism as well and was a witness. He blessed the sacrament this past weekend after a week of receiving the priesthood...when we told him on Friday that we had cambios coming up, he got so scared and doubtful when he told us, "You´re not leaving yet?! “I just know you’re not, I’m not ready for either of you to leave." Its moments like that, that make me realize that we truly are their missionaries forever, they are moments and relationships that have a special connection, they are bonds that weren’t made through coincidence. 

From this cambio, I just want to say that I am so eternally grateful for what I have learned from my fellow missionaries and converts and how I have grown in my teaching skills and spiritual needs, I owe a lot for what I was given here and I am determined to work even harder and be even better to see a change in me and to find more of those who are truly waiting to receive this gospel. A gospel whose fundamental truth is change, that it is real and men can change and receive a heart from God but only through our Savior, Jesus Christ. 

Until next week with the news on our new zone, much love from Chile,

Hermana Kennedy

Adios President and Sister Bruce...it was a pleasure

In other news, we had our last zone conference with President Bruce and his wife, I cried because we feel like such a great reign is coming to an end. I feel bummed that I didn't get more of an opportunity to get to know President Bruce but Hermana Bruce did tell me while hugging me goodbye, "I know that we will see each other again because you're friends with Kelly and so you just have another excuse to come to Orange County."

 

For P-day, our leaders thought it would be a good idea to hike up this hill called Cerro Dragon at five in the morning. HILL? are you kidding me!? Its more like a fechin mountain and its completely sand! So for an hour and a half hiking at a 75 degree angle was incredibly hard! We took a ton a pictures mainly because I think we all agreed that, that was the first and last time we were going to do that as a zone. The main idea was to sand board down which is basically like snow boarding but in sand, but the boards didn't work very well at all because they kept sinking too much and so we sort of just rolled/ran down the hill.

 

We look forward to meeting our new president and his wife. We know they'll do a tremendous job  because the Lord only calls his best to take care of his missionaries.

 

 

The Power of the Book of Mormon and 1 Precious Investigator

The final week before another cambio...geez time really does fly by and I sitting here trying to recap what happened this past week! It definitely was a week a little bit more bitter than sweet. Once we hit hump day, the work was pretty slow and got worse until Friday. Friday night we met a man who was better than gold, he was platinum. We were going down a road that we don’t usually go down to get to a less active’s home and a man cleaning a car called out to us in English. I ignored it at first because usually that happens a lot; men say the only English phrases they know to try to flirt with us. Well this man kept talking and so I stopped and turned around and figured that we might as well invite him to church because we had no success the whole day. When we came up to him, the first thing he said was I know about Moroni. My campanion and I were surprised, as he continued to tell us that he had read the entire book of Mormon and while clasping to his chest he said, "I love that book, it touched my heart." Unbelievable! We continued to ask him questions one after another in excited high pitched voices like little girls talking to Santa Claus. He told us how no one had given him the book but that he had found it a year ago in the street. He said that one night in particular, he was leaving work to go home but felt impressed to go a different way home than how he usually goes home. As he turned on a street, a car came down the hill with its lights on and the car shined on the book. As he picked it up, he said he felt a profound feeling in his chest. I wrote down all the information of this man, Refugio, but unfortunately he didn’t have a phone number and so I told him about meeting up in the capilla at four in the afternoon and we invited him to church so that we can start teaching him ASAP. Excited, he accepted both offers, but as the next day came he wasn’t there even though we had waited at the capilla for an hour.

Along with our disappointment, our hearts dropped a little when we found out suddenly the familia Galleagos were moving to Alto Hospicio which is a city behind Iquique and up the mountain, its about a 40 minute commute. We helped them pack up as much as we could, but in the end the two zone leaders from Alto Hospicio ended up loaded the truck and making two runs to and from AH because we were loaded with investigators to find to bring for a baptism and get to church with us the following day. We were hit with another misfortunate event when Augusto wasn’t at home, the next morning he was there as well but finally after church we waited two hours outside of his house and sure enough he came home from the beach. We walked with him to the church building and he asked us what we were doing outside his pension. We told him we waited for two hours outside and he smiled so wide he couldnt believe it...Pitola was right about him, he really looks like Chris Brown when he smiles. We ended up teaching Augusto the law of Chastity and reading from the Book of Mormon, both of which went really well. We asked him about his baptism still for this Saturday and he told us he really feels ready, Augusto has really surprised me considering he is 21 and a body boarder, his views and opinions on life were already very aligned to several laws of the church, he has shown me that there is hope amongst the youth in this country who still uphold values and wisdom. We introduced him to the young single adult group that meet up every Sunday night for family home evening, he really enjoyed it and Castro and I felt relieved that we had actually secured one of our precious investigators :)

Baptism by Sauna and P-Day on the Beach

We were blessed to be a part of the baptism of Antonio Saucedo this weekend, it was Hermana Castro´s first cumplemes on Saturday and even though I was so busy and stressed out putting the baptism altogether, I didn’t have time to make her anything but I ended up telling her that her gift from me to her was a baptism for her first month :)

Everything worked out well too thank goodness because we had some difficulty printing out the programs about an hour before the baptism too! I told Pitola to run the errand for me, since I had to stay to finish setting up, I was trying to work on my pronunciation for my talk that I was giving at Antonio´s baptism, when Pitola freaked out and told us that the water in the font was way too hot. We told him that we filled it up that way because we didnt want it to be cold by the time he got in, the water really wasn’t hot, it was more like warm, but while it was filling up we had closed the doors and when we opened it up to check up on it there was so much moisture in the air that it did feel like a sauna. I told Hermana Castro that we literally are going to baptize him by fire! We quickly ran the cold water for a couple of minutes and the water felt better. After we gave our talks and headed for the font, we were waiting in the sala to watch when Hermana Castro laughed and told me she heard someone say, "I think the waters a little hot." But when the doors opened Antonio was there with his collegue Hermano Marco about to be baptized, it really was remarkable to see this man who I had only known for two weeks and now he was making the real change that he had been working on for years before.

Antonio really was prepared for the gospel, sometimes I don’t really think I did anything except give him an invitation to church. He had been an example to me really, after he was confirmed on Sunday he went to priesthood with the Elders and the President asked if there would be any volunteers to go out on splits with the Missionaries this week and he quickly shot up his hand and asked, "Can I go?" When I heard this I leaned over to Castro and said, “That’s our convert.” ;) Really, he’s such a rad guy. I am just so happy to believe that he will be one of those golden members as well, just after we leave and years go by...that is what conversion should be.

On this loving Pday, our zone celebrated by making a Columbian breakfast and playing out on the beach because we completed our goal of baptizing 12 people this month of May, which is historic because Esther is new and so is Elder Romero. My zone leader is telling us we have to keep this going for as long as we can. It was pretty awesome to find that we were one of the top zones in the mission for this week and month. Speaking of which, the past week, Castro and I made it first in the top ten companionships but I do owe a lot of that to the help of our zone that took a Monday night to help us find news and help teach lessons.

This week looks a little crazy too because we are planning two more baptisms for this Saturday, a man named Gustavo and his daughter Selma will be getting baptized together. Gustavo has been investigating the church for 32 years ever since he married his wife who is a member and then suddenly he finally got his answer. While going over information for his program, we met the daughter who ended up telling us yesterday that she too had received an answer and would like to baptized with her dad. Shocked and amazed, Castro and I got started taking down info, it does feel a little weird only because I feel like their not my converts because I honestly only taught them a lesson during the second hour of church, the principles of the gospel with my kid Fidel, but for some reason after that the wife wanted us to continue teaching and preparing her husband´s baptism.

Hope you enjoy the pictures from these past two weeks, I will have more next week too! Love you all, besitos!

Love your daughter, Hermana Kennedy