Packages, Drunks, And Lots And Lots Of Walking (July 6)

Familia,

I spent all of my email time looking at all the pictures from flaming gorge so here are some miracles we saw this week:

*we walked a ton and no one was home...no one.  So God gave us some awesome miracles along the way to help us keep walking.

-I got my packages!!!

- We went to go visit a huge less active family who were baptized and went less active about 15 years ago.  The hermana and her kids arent ready to come back yet but we met 3 of the grandkids who were never baptized and who are super prepared.  We left a book of mormon with the oldest and when we picked her up for church on sunday she explained everthing she had learned in alma 32 and then went on to tell me that she wanted to see what else she could understand so she read the next 5 chapters as well!  I am always so amazed at how God prepares people, especially youth, to recieve the gospel.  I love meeting these kids that just have this natural desire to know more about God.

- We were walking from one appointment to the next when this couple called us over to where they were standing on the street.  The girl goes ¨I´m a member in another area, here's a reference for you¨.  So this week we have an appointment to teach her boyfriend the gospel!

-Remember the huge family of 12?  We have been working so hard on softening up the mom because when we started she was so seemingly unresponsive and cold.  Yesterday we walked into church (we had 13 investigators at church yesterday, whatup!)  and she was there with a few of her kids and we were shocked!  We went to visit them after church and we taught them about the word of wisdom and law of chastity.  We challenged her husband to stop drinking and he basically told us no and blamed her.  She totally opened up to us and told us that all she wants is a happy family and that if she dies tomorrow she wants to know that her family is going to be ok.  She talked about how grateful she is that we are visiting and teaching them and how grateful she is for her son's example (her oldest son is one of our recent converts).  This coming from a woman we thought hated us!  She still has a long way to go before she is ready to be baptized but yesterday was a huge step!  It also means that we can start preparing the rest of the family to get baptized!  

- Ana and Carlos came to church again yesterday and we had some awesome lessons with them this week.  At first Ana told us flat out that she wasnt really that interested but if he went, she would go.  But we had a lesson with just her and it was amazing to hear from her all of the good that has happened in their lives since they started investigating the church and how much she sincerely wants to learn more about the gospel.  She told us that she had lost all faith so we are going to have to start from ground zero but she has the desire which is all that matters! 

Turns out everyone knew it was the 4th of July and decided to party so we found a ton of drunks on Saturday.  I also turns out that every drunk has the gift of tongues and thinks they can speak perfect english.  I had so many conversations without any sentido.

My favorite of all of the unforgettable quotes was this ¨when I want to learn about God, I go straight to the internet¨ 

Love you all!!   Have a great week! Say hi to all the family for me!

Katie

This Week In La Chorrera (June 29)

  I haven't done miracles in a while so here it goes.  The miracles we saw this week in Biancheri-

- One of the members bought a horse.  Literally the most random thing ever because there are no horses around here but they felt like buying a horse so they did.  Most of the time it is just chillin in the backyard but they also tie it up in other places when it runs out of grass to eat in their backyard.  The miracle is that when I am feeling tired or hot or thinking about trunky things...boom there's the horse tied up in the most unexpected places!  I feed it some grass and my companion practices contacting him in english and suddenly we feel a lot better:)

- Yesterday we were walking past a house and I yelled `buenas!`  and three huge dogs come running out of the house and started chasing me and I just closed my eyes and forced myself to walk slowly, praying so hard and just telling myself `dont run dont run dont run maybe they will leave you alone` I opened my eyes and there are all three of them right around me barking and growling and my comp is on the other side of the street just staring at me and I`m yelling `ayudame!` and all the people on the street are just standing there laughing at me.  I seriously thought I was going to die but I kept walking slowly past the house and my comp threw a rock and they went away.  So far my legs are super covered in scars from mosquitos but miraculously I dont have a single dog bite!

- Ok so this week my real miracle is Carlos and Ana.  We contacted Carlos while he was walking to the chino a few weeks ago and he is the greatest.  A little over a year ago he had a pretty serious seizure that left him completely immobile.  He did some rehabilitation and now he can walk mas o menos with a cane and talk but it's hard to understand.  They couldn't afford more therapy, even with Ana working all day, everyday so he hasn't progressed much in the past year.  We have been visiting and teaching them about the plan of salvation and the atonement.  I don't know if I have ever taught someone who needed it as much as this family needs the peace and the healing that the gospel of Jesus Christ provides. 

   Easily one of the coolest lessons I have ever been a part of was talking to Carlos about prayer.  We asked him if he had prayed about the Book of Mormon and he told us no.  He insists on prayers with Ana at night and in the mornings but he had never actually offered the prayer.  He said that he's embarrassed about the way he speaks and that he wasn't sure if God would understand him.  Also that because of past sins that he wasn't sure if God would want to hear him.  We were able to teach him about our loving Heavenly Father who is always anxious to hear our prayers and that our prayers don't have to be formal and out loud.  God knows every thought and every feeling and His arms are always outstretched to receive us.  Always.  

  There is a girl in the ward who is preparing to leave on her mission and we took her with us to a lesson.  That was inspired.  She has taken on Carlos and Ana and now the whole ward is involved!  We have a member who is a physical therapist and he met with Carlos and Ana to evaluate and create an exercise plan.  All of the young single adults signed up for days in the week to help him with the rehab and read in the scriptures!  

   The best miracle is that they live close enough to the church that he can walk there without getting too tired and they were able to come yesterday!  I am so so so grateful for prepared people, amazing members, and this amazing message of hope and healing that I get to share!  

Katie

Katie's Letter (June 24)

quick recap of our week-

The zls bribed us with ice cream to reach some of our hardest goals and surprise- it worked!

  We have been learning and working on inviting to baptism in the first lesson and every lesson afterward with power and authority.  It can be intimidating but it is really important that everyone understands exactly what our purpose is.  We have even been contacting with this line ¨ buenas!  we are representatives of Jesus Christ and we would like to teach you and your family the restored gospel and prepare you to be baptized in the only true church!¨  We get a lot of  ¨ummm.. no¨ but we have had some really awesome experiences of people who have let us in and listened to our message!  

   Our goal to invite helped us to reach our goal of investigators with baptismal dates.  We have been teaching Betsy for a long time and she is reading and praying and she is ready!  Last week we shared the family proclamation with her and challenged her to share what she has been learning with her husband and 2 kids.  So when we came to teach on Friday we were able to teach her 14 year old daughter as well and she is super shy but she has a desire to learn and she accepted the fecha immediately and didn't hesitate at all when we invited her to say the closing prayer!

  This week we taught Kathy about baptism and the priesthood.  She has been evangelica all of her life and feels very attached to her church.  She wants so badly for there to be exceptions- maybe God can give other people the authority outside of the church if they are faithful or maybe any baptism can be valid if you have enough faith.  It can be tough to teach without offending her but it is pretty incredible at the same time!  She knows and LOVES the bible and she reads and studies all of the chapters we leave in the BOM.  She really likes it and I know that her testimony and answer is going to come first from the BOM.  My favorite moment in the whole week was when she told us (after reading 2 Nephi 32)  that the Book of Mormon is really beautiful and clear and teaches her things in a different way than the bible.  What?!  I know she is so torn because she wants her church to be true so badly but she also recognizes that we have something different, something really really good.  We pray constantly that we can help her find the answer that helps her make the change.  The Book of Mormon is so powerful and so  so so true!

So good/awful experience of the week-  We have this inactive that cuts hair in her house.  Everytime we pass by she hides and locks the door but yesterday when we stopped by her son let us in the house and she tried to kick us out by telling us that she had to work and she had people coming for haircuts.  I wanted so bad to talk to her so without thinking I asked if she could cut my hair.  1st mistake.  Then I asked her to just take off the tippy tippy tips and give me a tiny bit of layers.  2nd mistake.  She went nuts and cut off all the hair I have worked so hard to grow out since the mtc and gave me the worst layers ever!  Buuuuuutttt we schmoozed her up and we have a return appointment so it just might be worth it!

Hermana Smith

Records... Broken. Stride... Hit. (June 16)

Hey fam!

So this week was changes and I am staying in Chorrera with Hermana Chamul at least one more transfer!  And to start the transfer off with a bang we decided to break some records...

Yesterday was the ward conference and our bishopric had the crazy goal of getting 500 people into our little chapel (not really that little but it definitely doesn't fit 500).  So they went all out trying to fill up the chapel- hundreds of invitations, a bus, phone calls, food, and activities.  The members each received extra invitations to invite their friends and I was so impressed- everytime we ate or visited with the members they had all passed out all of their invitations!  On saturday all of the missionaries in the zone came to the chapel and we split up on divisions with members and spent about an hour inviting every single less active and contacting every person on the street.  I am so impressed and grateful for members who want to work and want to share the gospel!  Their desire to do missionary work comes from a real understanding of the atonement and I wish all missionaries could have members like mine!  So Sunday came around and we had done everything we could to get our people to this conference!  I was at the piano and I watched as the chapel filled up and kept filling up with members and friends and our investigators and it was just so happy!  The stake president spoke powerfully and the choir wasn't as bad as it could have been and at the end of the count there were 215 people in the conference and 28 of them investigators.  28 investigators!!  When we talked with the 1st councilor at dinner he told us that the last time they had more than 200 people in the chapel was 15 years ago when the wards split and the chapel was dedicated!

The best part for me was that Kathy finally was able to come!  I think she might be my favorite person ever to teach because she really challenges us.  She reads the chapters we leave her and comes prepared with questions and bible verses but not to bible bash she just really knows the bible and wants to understand and learn and is sincerely looking for an answer.  It is really hard for her because she is so involved in the evangelical church and so she is feeling confused and conflicted but the spirit is strong in our lessons and I know she is so close to getting the answer she is looking for!

We also had interviews with president this week which were great.  We talked a little about how I can be a better companion and I asked him about how he does transfers.  He explained the whole process to me and told me that when he changed me to Chorrera the impresion he remembers is that I needed to come to this ward.  It wasn'

t so much about the comp this time but about the area and the ward which has given me a little bit of a new perspective.  We also passed the house inspections even in our sketch house yayyy!!

The family of 12 kids is progressing little by little and we have some great new families starting out! 

I love you all and I love this gospel!  I feel so blessed to be here and as prideful as I can be sometimes I always know that it is all Heavenly Father preparing, inspiring, and directing every part of this work!

Hermana Smith

Biancheri (June 9)

This week was a doozie.  So many good moments and a lot of tough ones too. First we had a zone conference and Elder Alonzo came and spoke with us.  I think he was mostly here to talk with President and not to train missionaries and so his message wasn't so focussed on what we need to improve, he just talked to us about the gospel and the Spirit told us how to apply it better to the work.  I recieved a TON of personal revelation and so did my comp so we were really able to apply it to our goals and the lessons that we were able to teach.  One of the things he said was ¨I am not afraid to share the gospel because it's true.  If people reject it, it's them that have a problem, not me¨ (but he said it in Spanish so it sounded better)  and that reminded me of the quote from President Uchtdorf that says that truth is beyond belief- it's true even if no one believes it.  And the question came to my head so clearly ¨Why are you not anxious and excited to share everything you know with every person you see?¨  And I had to write it down and put it everywhere so I don't forget that I need to be doing every single part of missionary work with way more ANIMO!! 

Two of the little miracles/tender mercies that we had this week-

·  Joseph and Nicole are recent converts and they get the gospel.  They just get it.  Now we are just trying to help their mom and brother get it too.  This week we were doing service in their house that was unplanned and we decided to have a little FHE about the BoM after we were done.  We asked Joseph if he would share a little bit of his testimony of the bom as a part of the lesson.  He didn't even give us a chance to start the lesson, he just stood up and gave an entire lesson about the BoM and bore a super powerful testimony.  Hearing it all from their son/brother had a way bigger impact than anything we could have taught or shared.  He is going to be an amazing missionary in a few years and I love talking with him about the gospel because he has the excitement we should all have about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ!

· We contacted this guy in the park who seemed super positive!  We had a return appointment and when we got there he wasnt home...just our luck right?  So we taught his son and daughter in law instead and they are AWESOME!  We taught with unity like we never have before and we asked all the right inspired questions and the spirit was the strongest that I have ever felt it in a lesson, it rocked!!  

·  My bff from Santiago finally got her mission call she has been waiting for since November!  and she is off to Mexico!

  

· Finally got the English conference ensign- Conference was Freaking Awesome!!  

Some of my funny/ terrible moments this week-

·There were bats in our house and they attacked me while I was in the bathroom...not even kidding.  I also found an absurd number of cockroaches.

·  I have a bacterial fungus on my scalp and underarms and I have instructions that I am not to shave my arms or use deodorant until it stops raining.  #noshavenovember  #noshaverainyseason  #stinkitup

Those weren't funny they are just terrible but I am trying to have a good, excited attitude.  

Love you all,

Katie

Hawanama? (June 1)

Happenings of this week in Biancheri, Chorrera, Panama--

1. Every monday night we eat with our favorite member.  He is this awesome returned missionary who just buys us all of the ingredients and then talks mission with us while we make the dinner.  A few weeks ago the elders made guatemalen food, then we had panamanian food, and this last week it was my turn to make us a traditional american dinner so we ate some really good brownies and ice cream!

2. On Tuesday we got to go to the temple with our zone!  Hanging out with missionaries is the best- especially missionaries who understand their purpose.  We had a ton of fun on the bus and some amazing experiences in the temple!

3.  On Wednesday morning our lunch called us while we were in district meeting so I was rushing to get back and they asked me if we ate something but I didn't understand so I just said yes because lets be real I have lost any kind of picky that I was before the mission and you cant really say no.  So we ate mondongo for lunch.  I kept thinking about mondungus fletcher from hp but its actually just cow stomach.  My comp was super not happy with me but now I can really say that I will eat anything!

4.On Saturday we were part of a stake talent show type thing and all of the hermanas in the zone learned some hawaiian dances.  It was super fun to dress up with all the other sisters and I got to know a lot of the sisters in the zone a little better.

5. Had a crazy contact this week.  This lady started asking us why we weren't wearing veils if we were preaching the gospel and then started preaching to us (without a veil on might I add)  about how the Catholic church is the whore of the earth and that we are just another branch off of the whore tree.  I tried to end by giving her some articles of faith and when she saw it she asked me who was on the front and I smiled super happy and said oh this is Jesus Christ, thinking we could find some common ground. nope.  How do we know thats Jesus if we have never seen him?  And then a whole bunch about worshiping images and bla blah blah.  finally my comp interupts her and goes what kind of tree is that?  ok cool bye.

Super super pumped for the conference with a 70 this week!  And super super sad to hear about elder perry:(  

Love you!,

Hermana Smith

This Week In Chorrera (May 25)

This week was full of good moments-

1. We had a service project in our house and some members and the missionaries showed up to help us deep clean our apartment because there was no way we were going to be able to do it ourselves!  It was nasty but now not so much.  And we have seen a drastic decrease in cockroaches and spider bites.

2. Kathy.  Kathy is one of our investigators and we werent really sure how much she was going to progress because she is SUPER evangelical.  But she is super interested in the book of mormon.  We have taught her the first 3 lessons and every time it surprises her how similar our beliefs are.  She asks really good questions and bears testimony in pretty much every lesson.  And the best part is- SHE READS!  She reads the chapters we leave her and she is sincerely praying to find an answer.  I am so excited to see how and when she gets it. 

3. Familia A- the picture I sent in front of the church?  Familia A.  Eugenio is in the white shirt and tie and he is a recent convert and one of 12 brothers and sisters.  12!  His mom is super catholic and it has been a hard time trying to get her to come to church but she finally came!!  Along with all of the younger kids.  It has been a really awesome experience watching this family progress because it has been maybe 10% us and the other 90% has been the ward members.  They live in a pretty small house thats just aluminum sheets and some of the members have decided to help them build a house.  So all of the members are always at their house talking details and trying to help them so that they can have a real house for the tons of people that live there.  I am once again so grateful for members who honestly love and reach out to our investigators because we couldn't do it without them!

4. A few weeks ago we contacted this guy at the bus stop but we only had time to get his name and he told us we could stop by.  Yesterday we had some extra time so we decided to find him.  Well we found him and guess what- hes a JW.  He invited us in to teach him a lesson FROM THE BIBLE, because he believes everything IN THE BIBLE, and would love to hear ABOUT THE BIBLE.  Ok message received.  So we shared the verse when Christ gives Peter the keys to the kingdom of God.  First and last time we go to that house.  They wouldn't even let us say a prayer...awkward.

Love you all!  we went to the city today and there were tons of stores and I havent been shopping in 9 months so suprise you are all getting some souvenirs in the next few weeks :)  

Keep doing all the good things I know you are doing, I pray for you all day, everyday,

Hermana Smith