Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Well to start off SHOUT OUT TO CHILE FOR WINNING THE COPA AMERICA AGAIN!!!!!! We had to be in the house early because of the game and as missionaries we aren't allowed to watch the game... but we are allowed to hang our heads out of our second story window and listen to the neighbors all night and have members call us with every goal. 

Also other quick soccer story when USA played Argentina in the semi finals I happened to be on a division with Hermana Fea... who is from Argentina. Its safe to say there was a lot of trash talk going on that all got thrown back in my face. We talked to a member earlier that day and made him promise to call us with every goal and keep us updated- it was a pretty funny situation. My district is just a bunch of gringos so in our district meeting the next day we had a moment of silence to mourn our loss. 

Sorry enough soccer lets talk about my investigators. This week we taught a lot of people and we are finally starting to see some progress. When I got here we had absolutely nothing in my sector and it was super hard on me but lately we have been seeing so many miracles and finding people who God really has prepared for us. The mission is hard but the little things make is so worth it!! 

Also Sunday in church was AMAZING! We had so many people in the church that we had to set up more chairs in the middle of it. And Carmen came to church!!!!! It was my first investigator in the church and it seriously made me so happy. We also had two of the less active families that we are teaching come too and I almost cried to see them in the church.

Anyways love you all and hope you're all enjoying the nice warm summer because its freezing here. Until next week!

Hermana Wittwer 

Wednesday, June 22, 2016

Hey everyone! This week has been a good one. 

President and Hermana Warne (my mission president and his wife) are finishing their mission this month so we had a big reunion in Rancagua with our zone for a final goodbye. Our zone wrote a song to sing them at the conference and it was hilarious. I would send it to you guys but 1. its in Spanish and 2. its full of inside jokes so sorry... And yes mom and Dad I did sing at the top of my voice like preschool all over again. 

This Friday we had divisions and I was with Hermana Cook who is a gringa from my district in the CCM. So basically we are both on the same Spanish level which made our lessons fun! We taught two lessons together and although they were definitely a little iffy I think they went pretty well under the circumstances. 

This week we taught Mario (the old investigator from Colombia) and it was super... interesting. He doesn´t really have a religion but he pulls from all of them so he was pulling facts from about every church that has ever existed. We taught him about the plan of salvacion and he had a really hard time accepting that we are still alive after death. After the lesson he very kindly gave us some books from a few other churches and told us we should read them and pray about them. Haha hey thats our job! So we left him with Alma 40 to read and will visit him again this week. 

This Sunday my nightmare came true. My entire mission I have been dreading the day that our President of our branch would ask me to give a talk in church but this Saturday he did. So I spent Sunday morning frantically trying to prepare a talk. I was super nervous and when we got to the church, who decided to come this week? Presidente Warne... Talk about pressure! I think the talk went alright but I can´t remember a single thing I said.  

Funny story-we found some wet cement and stuck our hands in it (which has been my goal my whole mission), but then the next day our hands had been wiped out. Bummer!

Anyways I love you all and am loving the work here! 

Hermana Wittwer 

Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Hey folks sorry this is going to be a short email this week, I´m just going to share about one experience. 

So this Monday we went to a lesson but it fell through so instead we searched a family that had received missionaries a few years ago called the family Cancino. Ma Ines is actually the daughter of Carmen (the miracle investigator from last week) which is super awesome. We got to their house and they welcomed us in and we started talking and they are AMAZING. They already know absolutely everything. We had a family home evening with them and every one in the family participated and it went great! 

There have been a lot of futbol games and every time Chile plays we have to be in the house early because things can get pretty crazy so thats kind of a bummer, but what can ya do. 

This week I want to mention something that I´ve learned on the mission and its gratitude. I don´t think that I´ve ever had less in my life, but I don´t think that I´ve ever felt more grateful in my life either. Guys we seriously are ridiculously blessed to have the knowledge that we do. The gospel is AMAZING!!! 

Anyways love you all lots! 

Hermana Wittwer 

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

Hey hey everybody! So to start off, my new compañera's name is Hermana De Los Santos (yes, like De Los Ultimos Dias, I know). She is 20 years old and from Uruguay and has 15 months in the mission. She is super awesome and we get along great, we are very similar. 

This week has been a week of miracles. To start off we had divisions one day and my compañera went to Peumo and I stayed here with Hermana Wight. BUT Hermana Wight is new and from Gringolandia, so she speaks absolutely no Spanish. Which meant that it was all up to me that day. Luckily it all went super well. We degrained (more) corn for Hermana Zamorano and I managed to talk to her for 2 hours straight while we did it. I think it's safe to say that while my Spanish still has a long long way to go, I can survive on my own now! 
Also, funny story with that: when we degrained the corn it destroyed our hands (blisters everywhere) so Hermana Zamorano says to us "I have this really awesome cream that will totally heal your hands, its got lots of vitamins." Aaaaaaaaaand then she gave us some sunscreen. Hahaha I love her so much. 

So I don´t remember if I´ve already written about our investigator named Daniela but she was our super promising investigator who accepted a baptismal date and was amazing. However we found out today from her mom (who is a less active) that she already got baptized when she was 8. It's probably something we should be happy about but it was a bit of a bummer... 

Anyways, Saturday we started fasting that we would find people to teach, and guys fasting works! I seriously have such a huge testimony of that because right when we started fasting we started finding a bunch of people. One of them is named Mario and when we knocked on his door he said "Oh hey you guys are the mormons. I met with some missionaries a few years ago did they send you? I´ve been waiting for them to come back!" We have a date to visit him this week, I am very excited for it. 

Later that night we were passing through a pobulacion called Rucatalca but we were heading for Eduardo Barrios, and for some reason I thought I knew a shortcut to get there (all who are familiar with my sense of direction know that this shortcut doesn´t exist). Anyways, we were walking down a road when some crazy dogs tried to eat us, so we ran down a different random road. From here we happened to see a road sign that said Chepica. In my mind I thought "huh, I think there is an old investigator that lives down this road that we were going to visit the other day." So we searched for this house and when we got there Carmen, the lady who lives there, let us in. When we got into her house she said to us "Do you know why I let you in?" (this scared us a little) and then she said, "I let you in because I need you. I´ve been praying for someone like you and I know God sent you to help me and I know that I need your message." BAM! It was such a miracle because we had absolutely no plans to pass by her house. I know that it really was an answer to her prayer and an answer to ours. 

This really is Gods work and I am absolutely loving the mission! I have grown so much here it's incredible and I know that I am only going to keep learning and growing. I love you all have a great week!

Hermana Wittwer 

Wednesday, June 1, 2016

Hey hey every one!

So this week I didn´t get to work in my sector as much as I would have liked to because we had to do a lot of things because my compañera is ending her mission tomorrow. BUT we do have two new investigators with baptismal dates in July and I´m super excited for them! We have only taught them one lesson but they are super great and super receptive. They just need to get married and all will be well. 

On Saturday the missionaries in my Rama did an activity about family history. I will be the first one to admit that I´ve alway hated family history and usually I avoid those types of activities BUT something changed. I´ve suddenly started to love it. Planning this activity really helped my testimony grow and I am definitely going to be working more with family history after the mission (if my Grandma Diane hasn´t already found every person that has ever existed after Adam haha). For the activity Herman Aycho and I made a super cool family tree and put old pictures on it and everyone brought old things and pictures and food. Not a lot of people came to the activity because it was raining and when it rains nobody does  anything but its alright. 

On Sunday it was the last day here for Hermana Aycho and Elder Madsen (a elder in my Rama) so we visited all the members to say goodbye. However it also happened to be Elder Madsen´s birthday. So every family gave us cake. Like every single one. I seriously thought I was going to die I´ve never eaten so much cake in my life! It was kind of hilarious. 

We have changes tomorrow and since Hermana Aycho is leaving for Peru I´m going to be recieving a new compañera named Hermana De Los Santos. I havent met her yet so I´ll let you all know more about her next week. Anyways love you all!

Hermana Wittwer