Staying in Chiloe!

It’s weird that I’ve only got 5 months left, that’s such a short time!!! 3 and a half cambios! By the way we have cambios (exchanges) this week and we’re staying another cambio together!! Ha-ha this’ll be my 3rd cambio with Elder Amaya! But that’s actually exactly what we were hoping for ha-ha so I’m cool with it; this sector is awesome so I’m stoked to see some more miracles here. So it’s been frustrating because we have 3 people in the sector that want to be baptized and have a date and everything but they don’t go to church because they sleep in!!! We legitimately go to their house and everything in the morning and they don’t answer and then they always feel really bad when we visit them afterwards and then they do the same thing the next week! They have such strong testimonies, just can’t win the fight with the bed in the morning. It’s frustrating. But we’ve been teaching this one viejita named Rosa and she is awesome! She always gives us food and what not and she finally came to church this Sunday!!!! And she loved it and wants to come more!!! Woo!!! We are super excited for her!

So anyways, due to the fire in the house, we’ve been living with these other missionaries for a little bit, and one of them is leaving in this cambio to go somewhere else, and the other one is going to train. A gringo! From California!! Named Elder Cueva’s. Literally Elder Cave and I am stoked! I’ll have a newbie from California in the house!! It’ll be awesome, so anyways that’s been the week. Not a very exciting week --- just getting stuff ready for the cambios right now, nothing too interesting is going on. Hope you’ve all had a great week!

Love-

Zack

Snow and Penguins!

Alright so I already sent the photos, I hope you guys got them. So to explain...it snowed in Castro! That was pretty sick, so I have pictures of that and we made snow men and what not, all the typical pictures. And we're in Chaiten again right now. We are now their district leader so we have to go every cambio to do intercambios with them. It was GORGEOUS today, like one of the prettiest days I’ve seen in a while. We went and explored some caves, it was pretty sick. And we had to hike along a beach to get there and it was so pretty and we saw sea lions and PENGUINS!!! We got there at the perfect time and all the penguins were migrating right across that beach!!! Sick right?! So I could only get a picture of its head because they swim really fast but hey we saw penguins, I’m super happy. And that crab pinched me on the foot by the way ha-ha...and that bridge picture, yeah Elder Vaughn jumped onto the bridge and it almost broke and he almost fell like 10 feet, it was sketchy. And then you know how the volcano here exploded a little bit back? Well it destroyed the city and there are some of the houses that got glazed with ash ash.  And the one picture is of the river Chaiten that used to go around the mountains but the volcanic eruption changed its course and now it goes through the city. Pretty sick. Anyways, it was a chill day, filled with adventure!

So anyways story from this week, I got super sick on Saturday...I don’t know why, but my stomach was not feeling good at all, but we had citas so we had to go work, Well that night, last cita, we get there and they’re not home, and an Hermana was with us, so we remembered that we promised to chop some wood for this one lady in our ward. So we went and I looked really bad, like I was dying ha-ha so I told her I was sick, and she’s actually a nurse so she went and got this medicine stuff, like these drops and put like 30 into a glass and told me to drink it because it would calm my stomach and I wouldn’t throw up. So I took it, and right after I said "Wow I want to throw up right now" So I ran to the bathroom but she said I couldn’t use it so I ran outside and threw up literally all over her front lawn. So I threw up everything I had in my stomach...whatever she gave me to not throw up, made me throw up. She sent me home with some of it and told me to take it that night but I didn’t take it...I didn’t want to throw up again. At least now I’m all good, I feel fine ha-ha. Very interesting experience.

Anyways we taught some good lessons and everything this week, it’s been a pretty good one, the work is going strong here! Have a great week! Oh also the President called me this week to tell me that my official return date will be the 28th of December! So it’s official...Won’t be home for Christmas but I’ll be home for New Year’s so that’ll be cool!

Love you All-

Zack

Winter Waterfalls

Okay well you’re going to be happy, I’ve got a ton of photos to send you all this week! Woo! We actually went to some waterfalls today which was fun. We went as a district and we all had to hitchhike back ha-ha because we like forgot about the whole return trip...but we took loads of photos! You’re welcome Mom!

Anyways I don’t have too much to write...not much has happened this week. We had zone conference and president had just gotten back from Utah like a couple days before so it was really good with some new spiritual apostolic influences! My companion and I taught a part of it too. It was cool! We taught about the light houses that guide us as missionaries which were: 1. concentrate en la mision, 2. Tenga su objetivo entre ceja y ceja, y 3. Sumerjese en predicad mi evangelio. Sorry I’m tired and don’t feel like translating it ha-ha. But hey mom would have liked it. We made little cards with scriptures and the 3 faros on them for the zone and we even laminated them and everything! Proud, right?

Anyways we also did some exchanges afterwards with the APs which was good! I went with the Italian one from Matt’s mission and it was sick! We taught some good lessons together. It was super cool! This week we were able to put 3 more people with a baptismal date and we will be putting more with dates this week! We are super stoked because this sector is blowing up!!! I really am praying that we stay together another cambio! Anyways that was basically the week for us...oh! Cool story, So we’ve been teaching this lady named Sammy for like 2 weeks and she already has a baptismal date but the other day she told us about her life and she’s had a tough life, like super tough, like tougher than you’re thinking right now, and then a couple months ago she was diagnosed with cancer and she’s just in the last treatments right now. Well she said that a couple weeks ago she prayed for the first time in a while and she said she just kind of told God "Hey I’m still here! I feel like you’ve forgotten about me! Please send me something so I know you’re there listening to me! I have a lot of questions!!" And a couple days later we knock on her door and we have been answering her questions ever since...it’s awesome, she’s super awesome. Just goes to show that God moves this work and makes everything happen. So happy to be an instrument in his hands! 

Have a Great Week!

Love you All-

Zack

Last Two Updates from Zack:)

These are Zack's emails from the last two weeks:) 

6/26/17

Okay so this week was a pretty good one. First time in a couple weeks that something crazy didn’t happen ha-ha. But we’ve been seeing some good miracles here in the sector with finding people. I don’t know why but I’ve never really had a problem in the mission entering houses except in this sector, it has been real difficult! But this week we were able to enter into some houses which was cool! And we found some pretty amazing people that are for sure ready for the gospel. It’s awesome because in this sector right now we have the potential to baptize a lot because all of our investigators have the desire, they just need a little push, and we just got to find out what it is that they are missing! But we counted the other day and we have 9 investigators that are potentials that could soon. be baptized. It’ awesome, we are stoked here ha-ha. Like we don’t have many but the ones we have are golden! Anyways, this week we have also been able to go out with members. We have actually had 6 members go out with us this last week. Which that is the first time that has ever happened on my mission! It  

Hey fun fact, we just got a new ward mission leader this last week and the guy just got back from his mission a week ago. And guess where he was??? He was the AP of the Argentina Posadas mission! So he knows elder Horton! Ha-ha it was fun to talk to him about Elder Horton ha-ha, small world right? Anyways, our President is in Utah this week to get some president training that he never got due to coming to the mission early. It’s cool because he’s doing a zone conference here next week so we will be the first zone to hear his inspiration ha-ha, I’m stoked! Anyways I will also be talking to him this next week about my return date, I prayed about it and I felt that neither option was bad...but I don’t know I felt right about coming home in December...so maybe the 21st will be my return date...if so I’ve got less than 6 months left....that’s weird...but I’ll be talking about it next week with the President. We will see what happens!

Love you All!

Zack

 

7/3/17

What's up Padres? Well this week was an interesting one; we are finally finding some really good people in the sector who are progressing really well! WOOOO! When I got here we were literally teaching like 2 people. But now we’ve finally got a good teaching pool and we are teaching a lot! Anyways, on Monday we went with the papito to go do some citas and randomly he stopped at a house and said "There used to live a big family here that had gone to church and everything and I don’t know what happened to them..." so we knocked and no one was there. Well on Wednesday the Hermanas called us and said they found an old teaching record with some names on it from our sector so they gave us the references and that same day we went to go contact them. Well one of the names they gave us, I realized it was the family that moved to Porvenir and got baptized with us there, so they weren’t there anymore. And as we went to the other one we realized it was the same house that papito had showed us! Well we knock, and the moms home. And it was her! The same lady! But she didn’t seem like very happy to see us, so we talked a little bit outside and ended up setting a date to pass by. So on Friday we pass by with a Hermano from the church and like 100 kids (slight exaggeration) answer the door and they invite us in! It ended up being a whole family of 8!! And they told us that they almost got baptized in the church but the missionaries randomly stopped passing by and they had lost contact with them but she told us how the kids loved going to church and had lately been really missing it. Apparently the kids were too little then to be baptized but now they’re 8 and above! And they’re all stoked to learn about the gospel again. I’m so excited to teach them! It was such a good lesson and everything we had with them. It was awesome ha-ha and the kids were telling us how they want to go to church and be baptized and everything ha-ha it was awesome. Also a couple weeks back we found a lady named Sammy, and she’s had a super tough life...but it was awesome because a couple days ago we went with a Hermano and she totally opened up to us and she had a ton of questions for us about stuff that had been on her conscience for past decisions she had made and everything and we were able to testify about the plan of salvation and the gospel of Jesus Christ...and she started crying and told us how happy she was to hear what we had to tell her. Its moments like that that I love being missionaries and really learn to appreciate the knowledge I have about Gods plan and makes me want to just share with people who don’t have that same knowledge. Anyways...interesting story, Friday night we got home at like 9:30 and we were all ready to go to bed and everything when our investigator calls crying telling us to come urgently so we grabbed some shoes and ran out the door at like 11 at night. We get there and she’s crying, her younger kid is crying and her 16 year old kid is nowhere to be found...so she storms out when we get there so we grab the younger son and start to calm him down and start making jokes and stuff so he laughs, then we go and find the mom who is outside and she starts to tell us that they had gotten into a giant fight and the son had threatened to commit suicide and ran away...and wasn’t answering his phone...and we calm her down and we go out searching...well we find out from another investigator that he had just gone to a party and was there just hanging out...but man it was quite the scare...we didn’t get home until pretty late that night but I’m glad we were able to help and calm down everything. I’m glad nothing bigger happened. Anyway it was a pretty weird and good week! We saw some miracles and everything! Oh and by the way many people were asking me yesterday if I was from Germany, luckily I could tell them I was gringo ha-ha I’m pretty sure they were ready to kill me if I was German...#Chile Lost haha

Hope you all have a wonderful week! Love you all!

Zack

**No new pictures because it is raining a lot there and he doesn't want to ruin his camera so he doesn't carry it around with him. Hopefully he will have some next week:)

Baptism AND Snow:)

This week was pretty crazy...So I’ll start it off by saying that OSCARITO WAS BAPTIZED WOOOOO!!!! I sadly forgot my camera though...but one of the Hermana missionaries should be sending me photos soon so I’ll send you them when I get them! So that was awesome, and the Hermana’s baptized an 11 year old girl and she asked me to baptize her so I had the pleasure to baptize her too! It was awesome!

So this week we had to go to Osorno to the leaders meeting. So it’s a 4 hour bus ride to Puerto Mont and then another 2 hours to Osorno. So we went up a day early, we left at 3:30 in the afternoon so we could get to Osorno at 9:30 at night. Well it ended up SNOWING HERE IN CHILOE!!!!  What the freak!!!!! (It rains a lot on Chiloe but hasn’t snowed there for a long time) That was awesome but there was an accident and then we got snowed in so we got a little slowed up. Actually the 4 hour bus ride to Puerto Mont turned into 13 hours!!! 13 HOURS!!! We got to Puerto Mont and 4:30 AM!!!!!!! And our phone died on the bus!!!!!! The terminal was already closed at 4:30 in the morning so luckily I served in Puerto Mont and I knew where the missionaries lived. So we went and had to knock on their door at 5 in the morning and luckily they answered and we literally slept on a one seater couch, freezing cold for an hour and then we left at 6:30 in the morning to go up to Osorno. We didn’t sleep like at all and we couldn’t even shower because they ran out of gas and they were going to buy more in the morning....oh my goodness....we looked like crap at the leaders meeting. When we told the mission president he laughed so hard ha-ha such bad luck. But hey at least we got to see the snow, that was pretty cool. Anyways, that’s all I’ve got for you guys this week! Hope you all have a great week!!

No Fires, but.....

Well I’m happy to report that there weren’t any fires this week! Ha-ha So there’s a little success but it was also just interesting as a week. Woo I have quite the story to tell you guys...So you know how we were going to baptize this week? Well the Hermana’s in our branch were going to baptize also, and their 2 people chose us to baptize them. So we were all ready for the baptisms on Saturday and people were getting there late so we had to like postpone it just a little. So the Hermana’s decided to go in the car of one of our investigators (Pamela, Oscars mom) to pick up 1 of their investigators. So we were waiting, and they had called us saying they were almost there so we started to get everything ready to start the baptism. Well we get a call a couple seconds later from one of the Hermana’s crying hysterically saying that they had gotten in a car crash! So my companion went and told her other 18 year old son named Nico and we sprinted to where the accident was. The ambulances, firefighters and everyone were already there and we went and found them and the Hermana were just crying like crazy saying that it wasn’t there fault and that it was a big crash, (the car was completely destroyed) but luckily no one was hurt too bad. It turns out that the guy driving the other car was drunk and ran the red light and T boned them head on. It’s honestly a miracle that everyone left out of that car with only minor injuries. The drunk guy and his friend were a little more messed up; everyone in our investigators car was fine. But they had to all go to the hospital and fill out reports and what not so we had to cancel all the baptisms because the Hermana’s couldn’t go or the mom of Oscar. We had to go back to the church and give the bad news to everyone. It was really a horrible accident and now this family does not have a car but the family sees that it could have been much worse. Oscar will get baptized this next Saturday and the family will keep going to church and working with us so it’ll be good. I’m just happy that everyone is alright!!! All the things that have happened to us this cambia (exchange) have been crazy! The adversary is working hard in our little branch. Anyways have a great week everyone! 

 

 

"Your house is on FIRE!!"

Well this year is passing by super-fast. It’s already June ha-ha-- what? Well I’ve got some great news for all of you, We’ve been working with a family, a mom named Pamela and her kids, Oscarito, Emilio, Nico and Nico’s girlfriend.  They are such a great family. So it’s been a work in progress but they all had baptismal dates for this Saturday but they’re all not ready except their 8 year old son Iscariot and he really wants to be baptized this Saturday. The mom is super excited about it too so he will be getting baptized this Saturday and the rest of the family will be baptized on a later date! So we are stoked here! It’s been 2 years since the elders have baptized in this sector and we are seeing miracles!!! And we are so happy! Oscarito is awesome, the other day he told us "I don’t know what I want to do...like I want to be a professional soccer player, but I also want to be a Mormon missionary....hmmm I think I’ll choose missionary because its cooler" ha-ha! And whenever we come in he runs and gives us giant hugs.  I feel so loved in that house!

 

 Anyways, we got permission from the Hermana Isomer (the mission president’s wife) to go to the gym in the morning if it’s possible and if we get up early to go. So there just happens to be a super nice gym right by the house! So we went today and bought a month membership for like 20 bucks, I’m so excited! It’s been almost 2 years since I have lifted weights! Its good because I think we will both feel better through the day too and be more energized in the mission work. WooHoo!

 

Well the word got out in the mission, so I guess I will tell you guys too...so last Sunday, like 8 days ago, we got a call in church saying "YOUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE!!!!" So we ran out of the church and sprinted all the way to the house to find a ton of firefighters there...long story short, our combustion, the fire thing in our house is a really good one and gets like super-hot, so we had a towel hanging there drying, like all missionaries do, and it seems like it must have fallen and it caught on fire and burned a gnarly hole in our roof. There’s really nothing we could do to prevent it, just a freak accident, we've been keeping it on the down low but someone put it in the mission announcements, so now everyone knows. So this last week has been pretty hectic with dealing with that, moving 2 of our companionships in the zone and having 3 intercambios this week and balancing a sector with 5 people preparing for baptism. We’ve been pretty dang busy. So right now we are not living in that house...it does not have electricity and there is a giant hole in the roof and wall....lucky no one was hurt though and the only thing that was lost was the towel! So there’s some major blessings right? So yeah now you guys know...but hey in the house we are in now, we don’t have any way to heat ourselves and the shower only has cold water so it’s been pretty cold lately in the middle of winter here in Chile haha but we’ve toughened it out. Our other house should be remodeled in at least a month so we will tough it out until then! Ha-ha ah you gotta love them mission experiences:) Have a great week!