Baptism on Friday! :)

 

 

Hermana Barreiros posted these five photos during the week.  They are of a New Missionary Training Conference for the newest missionaries and their companions.  Braxton can be seen in the first four photos.  He looks happy.  He is not able to send us photos right now with his camera, so we are grateful that Hermana Barreiros posted these. 

  

How come you were later emailing today? (Last week’s question?)

We started later and I started with emailing that I was on and working on Family Search during my time while working with email as well. I sent my Mission President an email about my week shortly after and our time varies.  Usually it will be around 2-4 for you or 4-6 for me.

I had 23 lessons and we only have 4 Baptismal Dates now. Our investigators need 3 weeks where they attend church before baptism. One of them only has 2 weeks before the date and hasn´t gone yet so the date died. Oh well, we have 4 more, but we are doing all we can to teach, strengthen, and prepare them for the date. There is a lot to do in a week and this past Sunday we had 80 people in our Branch and 2 recent converts who received the Aaronic Priesthood. Also, we have an 8 year old who is getting baptized Friday that we worked with the mother who is less active to get him baptized and work to reactivate the family and serve them.  

Things are going really nicely right now, but it is still difficult to say everything that I want to say but it is even harder to understand other people. There are so many challenges in the mission and I am doing everything that I can to serve and enable others to be ready to make covenants and keep them throughout their lives. 

I didn´t feel the earthquake, but I heard about it from everyone. My companion didn´t feel it either. We had just left a house and were walking and people were running in the streets and we were in the more dangerous part of our sector, but I never feel worried here in the field. There is so much to be grateful for and I am doing all that I can to prepare the people. We had another amazing week.  80 people in the church was our goal for the change. Now we are shooting for 90 or 100. We have so many more people that could go to church, but we are doing all that we can. 

Chile is in a state of apostasy. Elder Chuquel shared a scripture from Jacob 5 and the vineyard that describes Chile. The Branches outgrew the roots and now the tree faltered. We are repairing the tree now and grafting in better branches for the posterity and the fruits of the future for other missionaries.

I am doing all that I can and I am loving this work. I love Sundays because I see the fruits of my week and my labors while I rest. There is so much to be grateful for and the time goes by so quickly. It feels like yesterday I was writing home, but it has been a week... Things go so quickly and in 2 weeks it is exchanges again. My trainer Elder Chuquel will probably go.... He is in his 5th exchange here and that is usually the longest people stay. He started his mission here as did the other Elders here. Things will be fine. I have learned the area and who all of the people are. I just don´t know every little detail. There will be a lot of work for me in September. I will probably be directing the sector while learning the language.... A little difficult, but not impossible.

The package I sent you cleared customs in Chile this morning.  Hopefully you will receive it at your district meeting this week or next.  What day do you have district meetings? Are they every week or every other week?

District meetings are normally on Wednesdays. I am in the Zone Ochagavia. If you didn´t know, there are 10 zones and 6 are in the city and 4 are in the country. Ochagavia is in the city. I don´t think we receive pouch every week, but it is every other week for certain. We got pouch last week so it will probably be early September before I get it. Don´t worry I´m doing great!

I know you are doing great!  You are an awesome missionary and you can handle whatever comes your way.  However, I will always worry about you.  What kind of mom would I be if I didn’t worry?


I am sending the attachments separate.  I wonder if that big attachment last week was what kept your email reply from coming back on time.
 

Thanks for the pictures and for the support I am doing all that I can to send photos, but these computers are seriously the quality of 2000 at home.... I don´t know if the USB port is able to read my drive, but I am trying. Don´t worry I will figure it out, but words for me are important in the meantime. 

Are you using the same computer every week?  Has your companion or any of the other elders been able to send photos from their cameras?  There are different levels of USB.  I bet the cable you have is a newer USB cable than what the computer is able to read.  You might try buying a USB cable down there that matches the camera port and then has a USB 1.0 end.  I will try to mail you one and I will send you a USB device that you could pull the card out and put it in and then you plug that into the computer.  I wish you could just use the Wi-Fi, but I understand.  It is important to be obedient.

Don´t stress too much I don´t know if I will be able to use the computers for it and I have used different computers.

You asked about the tomatoes on my salad? I ate them before she took the picture. The food is good, but they like tomatoes here too much. I have eaten a lot of tomatoes here. That´s fine everything is nice, but I feel hungry often. I don´t mind tomatoes too much and we have lunch with members every day except for Preparation Day. Breakfast and Dinner are on our own. Many days I am hungry and I think that I am losing weight. I don´t have any way of validating it, but I am having to tighten my belt, so I´m fairly certain I am losing weight.

Thanks for everything. I am out of time. I will write you next week. Thanks for the support always and for always trying to write when I´m on and for the emails each week. It means a lot. Have a great week!

Well I don’t want you to go the whole mission without sending us any photos.  Sorry they love tomatoes.  Hopefully you will learn to love them, too.  I am sorry you are hungry all the time.  Buy food that is more filling.  If you need to spend money from your account, you can.  Losing is better than gaining.  Eat more of their delicious fried breads.

Thanks for writing.  Will you please try harder to tell me what you are doing.  I hope you wrote more to Clain and Dad this week.  Copy and paste the same email to everyone or just send it to everyone.   It is frustrating to wait for an hour and a half and get very little information.  I love you lots.  Be Goode!

Note from Mom.  We are getting a time delay on the delivery of emails.  Braxton actually wrote me a very nice email last week and another one this week, but I didn’t get either one till after he was done emailing.