Week 74

Week 74!

Here we are, at yet another Monday! Its great hearing from all of you. I hope that your week went well. 

Finally finding:

Alright to start off, we feel a bit better about the week because we were finally able to find people during the week! Woohoo!

So first off we were able to find Miguel again. I don’t know if I wrote about him some time ago, but he was home again. He is a construction worker, a father of two daughters and has been pretty busy and we haven’t been able to visit him for a long time now. We found him a couple months ago and we finally were able to contact him this week. He was glad to see us and we shared a short message about the atonement. He felt good and invited himself to church. Yes. Invited himself. But turns out we couldn’t find him later in the week and he didn’t go to church. We are going to be passing by a lot this week to find him.

On Sunday we were just wandering and searching for futures and other people and we just decided all of a sudden that we were going to stop by a house we had contacted a lot but they had never actually let us in. Turns out that they were all home and they let us right in. We entered in and began to visit. They have been sharing with missionaries for a very long time. Half of them are already members but haven’t been to church for a very long time. The missionaries haven’t passed by for more than a year. Their family name is the Monsalve Alarcon family. We are looking forward to teaching them and getting to know them. Hopefully we can baptize the mom and the oldest daughter. They are a family of 5. Juan (the dad), Maria (the mom), and three daughters.

 A Special Conference:

On Thursday we had a special conference! We were privileged to have Elder Di Giovanni come and address us. He is an area seventy from Argentina. His talk was great. It really inspired me. He talked about obedience, the atonement, success, unity, blessings and a few other topics.

We had KFC for lunch and it was really good. We all had a great time and it really inspired us all.

The day after the conference, It doesn’t end there….

So we’ve been painting the house right? Well to paint the rooms we had to move some of the stuff out of there and cram it all into the main room. So it isn’t the cleanest we’ve ever had the house. It’s not dirty it’s just a bit unorganized at the moment.

So Friday morning we all got up and almost unusually quiet and calmly we got all ready and got to our studies. We were in our personal study session and all of a sudden ant 9:45 we hear a knock on the door. Elder Flores and I looked at each other just a bit shocked because no one ever shows up during studies let alone goes to our apartment not even letting us know beforehand. So we got up and went to the door. Elder Flores slowly opens the door and to our great and terrible surprise president was standing in the doorway, we open it up a bit more and there is ELDER DI GIOVANNI AS WELL!!!! Oh man we were freaking out. Here is president with A SEVENTY here in our disorganized house. The ONLY DAY where it isn’t all clean and ready!! Oh man…. So we let them in and they looked around and looked all surprised and they asked ‘’so elders, what happened here?’’ We explained that we had been painting and we had everything super disorganized. They asked us if we had been advised that they were coming. We just stood there and said no… They chuckled and told us that we should have known that they were coming. They just told us ‘’well at least you are all ready, dressed as missionaries, and studying!’’ President asked me to tell the other missionaries that they were there. I walked into their room and I told them with a calm panic ‘’Elders… President and Elder Di Giovanni are here in the apartment to visit us.’’ Their eyes opened wide all in disbelief and rushed to tidy things up a bit in their room and then came out. President and Elder Di Giovanni then went into their room and visited the other elders. We went into our room and organized a bit and then waited for them to come in. They eventually came in and asked us how things are going, revised our plans, our area book, and various other things. Thank goodness that we were all prepared. They finished up, and thanked us that we were all ready and studying without being advised that they were coming and then left.

We were shocked. A seventy had just come in our house at the most in opportune moment and spent time with us. A mission classic. It’s something that every missionary dreads will happen but usually never does. We just got lucky to have the experience.

A ward vacation:

The ward had a big ‘’Paseo de Barrio’’ which means like a ward vacation. With permission we went for 3 hours or so and had lunch. We went to a little campsite on the far end of a city called Hualki farther south of Concepcion. It was great spending some time with the members outside of the sector. It was really nice to get out for the first time in a long time and see something different that the sector.

Alright. Those were some highlights for the week! I hope this next week will be even better! Thank you for all of your support and your love! I love all of you! Talk to you next week!

Elder Ethan Haws