tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-56828249907270826942024-03-14T11:11:13.800-07:00¡Viva la Viña!Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.comBlogger78125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-45752365988856886942015-07-21T13:46:00.001-07:002015-07-21T13:46:27.987-07:00Oh How Beautiful To My Eyes!!!!!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">July 20, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Wow! Rain in San Diego in July? That's awesome! It's like you guys are in Chile or something... haha!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week just flew right by but it was a great one! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">First we started the week off with a great miracle. All our appointments were on Tuesday night. So, my companion and I were walking around outside, it was freezing and no one was home. No menos activos, investigadores, or future investigadores! We just got to a point where we had an hour left before we had to be back in our apartment, and we had no clue where we should be. We just wanted to teach! So we were like well we could go contact this neighborhood of houses where we don't have anyone. (We tried contacting there before but hadn't had any luck and we didn't want to walk all the way over there to have no luck again and have it be a waste of time), so we decided to pray about it and see where God needed us to be. So we prayed and then we just stood there and thought and I just then had the thought that I should look at my agenda book and see what we had planned for that time of night. We had planned to pass by a future guy who lived in the other direction so we went looking for his street. We couldn't find it so then we looked again at the agenda and decided to go find another future investigor that we had planned for (which took us to another neighborhood) but they weren't home either so we decided to just contact the house next door with a light. A very nice lady answered and we were able to put an appointment with her for another day. So by this point we only had about 15 minutes before it was time to head home so we contacted another house with lights. As we were 'yelling' outside a car pulls up, which is always kinda awkward.... but the guy was really nice. Then his wife came out and we explained to them who we were and what we do and she says, ' oh you talk about God! I love talking about God! It makes me feel so good! Come in!!' So we go in, teach really quick about the Book of Mormon, clear up some untrue thoughts they had about the church, say a closing prayer and the couple became new investigadores! It was crazy! Like literally we had prayed to be able to find someone to teach and God gave us 2! BUT, He sent us on a little goose chase in the other area, which led us to another future lady, so we could arrive just in time to find the couple together! The timing could not have been more perfect! Such a great, great miracle!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then another day of the same, no one being home, so we were just street contacting and I contacted this girl and she was like wait, I´m looking for a church to go to, can I go to your church?? She didn´t end up living in our sector but we gave her the direction of the church and told her she was always welcome. It was just awesome because after a lot of rejection it was just great to see that someone actually cared about God in their life. Also it was nice to be on the other side of the invitation for church and have someone asking US if she could go, instead of the other way around!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week we also had our zone conference with our new mission president and his wife. They are so awesome! It was a lot different from Pres. Kahnlein but not bad different or good different, just different. He´s a convert to the church and was just over all the seminary and institute and he is an awesome teacher. He just gets so excited about it all. He talked about turning principles of the gospel into values in our life, and how to do it. He said first you have to know the principle or be familiar with it, then you have to apply it or live it, so then you can feel it and it becomes a part of who you are. I really liked that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also... funny story. We were walking down the street and there was a dad who was trying to calm his little girl in their yard as we were passing. I happened to have my hair in a braid and he goes, 'look honey, the princess from frozen! I haven´t seen that movie but I´ve seen a picture of the princess with the blonde hair and EVERYONE here tells me I look like her! haha. Also on Sunday a little girl tapped me on the shoulder from behind and gave me a sticker with the frozen girl on it! hahah! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So those are the highlights of the week....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Yes, the rumor is true, turns out this will be my last email home. How weird is that???? I mean unless President Monson receives the revelation that girls can have the option to extend for the full 2 years (He´s still got a week to receive that, so fingers crossed!) </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">One of my favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon has come to be Mosiah 18. I just love how the people after listening to the teaching of Alma clap their hands with joy due to their great joy and desire to follow Jesus Christ and be baptized and how thousands are baptized there in the waters of Mormon. (I wish people reacted the same here).... But the part I love is verse 30 where it says 'how beautiful the waters of Mormon are to those who there came to the knowledge of their Redeemer'. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">It makes me think, what are my waters of Mormon like? Well mine is actually really large. In one part there´s lots of yellow and green countryside with small dirt passages and there happens to grow the most delicious tomatoes and lots of avocados. In the other part, it´s filled with steep hills and the houses are supported up by tall skinny posts. And, as you climb those hills, just as you think you are about to die of exhaustion, you turn around and there is a sparkling view of the sea. There also happens to be lots of fleas and lots of dogs, but... the bread is always delicious!!! And oh, how beautiful it all is to my eyes for HERE I´ve come to the knowledge of my Redeemer. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Mission Viña del Mar is my waters of Mormon!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The mission has not only been the best decision of my life, but for my life. It still hasn´t hit me that it´s winding down. For all I know, I'm just going to stay a missionary in Chile for the rest of my life. (haha I bet you´d love that mom ;) ) I know there will come a time though, very soon, where I´m just going to cry. Really hard. But really, you know, I´m ok with it ending. I just have this sense of peace about it. I feel I´m exactly where I should be at this point in my life. I get that life has to go on and that the purpose of this life is to progress to become more like God and you just can´t reach your full purpose in the mission. I´m so grateful for all I've learned and for the goals and perspective I now have. I´m excited to be able to put it all in practice for the rest of my life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I can never begin to express what it means to me to be a missionary of Jesus Christ. And while I love, love, love being a missionary, I´m even more grateful to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ because that doesn´t have an 18 month time stamp. I´m so grateful for the promises and covenants that I´ve made with God and Jesus Christ in my baptism and in the temple for I know those are eternal and are what bind my heart to my Heavenly Father and my Savior. I know that Christ's church was restored through Joseph Smith and is true. It´s true! It´s so true! I cannot emphasize it enough. I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God. I know that the heavens are not closed, but there are blessings being poured out of them every day, every minute, to those that love God and do His will. I know and put 100 percent of my confidence in the promise at the end of the Book of Mormon. Any person, where ever they are can pray and ask God if that book is true and if they do it sincerely, they WILL receive an answer. To know that book is true is to know that the gospel of Jesus Christ HAS been restored and is here on the Earth today. I have seen so many people receive that answer. I myself have received my own answer. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I have worn my badge with the name of Jesus Christ over my heart for sufficient time that even when they take it off of me, it will be engraved there in my heart forever. I love my Savior. He lives. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you guys so much. I can´t express my love and appreciation for your support and sacrifice for me to be here and have this wonderful experience. Thank you! and.... see you soon, I guess? haha weird! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazón, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">HERMANA EVANS</span></div>
Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-9361277536432134832015-07-17T13:47:00.002-07:002015-07-17T13:49:54.088-07:00Do You Guys Ever Get Sad???<div class="thread-item-list" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1437163758903_1384" tabindex="-1">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">July 13, 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span class="thread-snippet">Hola!! ¿Que tal? ¿Que pasa? ¿Como estai? So somehow the week just flew by and I am sitting here in this cyber again! I dont´ even know how that happens. Somehow 6 days fit into a blink of an eye n</span>ow. I don´t really understand that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We had a great week. Especially because we found people to teach this week that aren´t adolescent boys!!!!!!!!!!! YES!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So at the beginning of the week we found Pricilia, who is just amazing! She lives with her boyfriend, but none the less AMAZING!!! We had a SUPER como comenzar with her! Como comenzar is like the first lesson you have with someone where you explain your purpose, what we teach, and usually give them the Book of Mormon with the challenge to read a little and then pray. But in her 'co-co' we literally taught something from every single lesson! She just had so many questions that moved the conversation along in a way that it all just flowed together and she learned a lot! The best part was when she says, " I just don't like other religions that decide to put their own rules on people and don´t just leave it with God´s rules, like there´s this one religion that I heard that doesn´t let the people drink coffee! Can you believe that?!" hahahaha and then she stopped and looked at us and was like wait that´s not you guys is it? And we were like yes! That´s us! But then we taught the word of wisdom really quickly and simply and she says, ' oh well that totally makes sense.' haha it was great. We invited her to be baptized and she said, ' no I´m just not ready but maybe in the future.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then we went back and visited her the next day and she said she had called her boyfriend after we had left and told him about the visit and he wants us to come by when he´s home (he works 12 days away from the house and then is home for 12 days) and she also said, 'it was really cool, after you guys left, there was this peaceful feeling that stayed in the house. I really like when you guys come.' We told her that peaceful feeling is the spirit!! And that´s what you feel when something is directly from God and how you can know something is true! And she said, ' oh that´s so cool.' Then we taught her the plan of salvation and she just loved it and wants to go to the celestial kingdom. I mean who wouldn´t want to go there right? We tried inviting her to be baptized again but she still wouldn´t accept a date. AH!... It was weird she went off about how she thinks reincarnation is a thing and we were like BUT THE PLAN! Look at the plan! And she says, ' oh right'.... I really don´t know how we managed to walk out of there without her accepting a baptismal date.. but she´s not married for the time being so I guess it´s ok, but I´m really excited about her! She´s just so awesome!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then we were teaching another one of our investigdores that we found a few weeks back named Yorma. And we taught her about the restoration of the gospel and at the end we shared our testimonies of the Book of Mormon and afterward it was so cute she just goes, ¨Do you guys ever feel sad? Like do you feel pains and sorrows?¨And we said, well yeah of course! We´re still human. And she was like oh well it´s just one of those things you have to ask because you guys just radiate this happiness and this confidence that I just thought you guys don´t even feel sad. It was really humbling having someone tells us that. And it´s just proof that the gospel is what will bring any person that truly lives it true happiness. Because obviously we feel lots of sadness. We get rejected every day, people tell us to go take a long walk off a short pier all the time. They give us a wrong address. They aren´t there for the appointments they don´t read the Book of Mormon, the place that sells the best completos is always closed when we decide to eat one..... Like lots of sad things. But the gospel can give us a perspective that reaches WAY beyond the disappointment of the moment. That outweighs the pains and sorrows of living in a very imperfect and unfair world. The gospel not only tells us that it´s all going to be ok in the end but it gives us the tools and experiences we need to let those bad moments and hard times make us become better and stronger people. In the best of times and the worst of times we have an anchor of faith and a surety of hope, that we have a Savior who knows us and loves us. We know why we are here and where we are going. We have scriptures full of faithful people who have a lot of problems and what they did to overcome them. We have prayer which is always available, 24/7. We have the Holy Ghost that gives us a peace that just tells us it´ll be ok. So for that, we can feel sad but sadness is not something that will define us. It something that helps us appreciate all the good that there is. I´m so grateful for the gospel and I´m so grateful for the true happiness that it fills my life everyday.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The other day we also had an interesting experience. We found a menos activo de mucho tiempo and we asked him if he still had his Book of Mormon. He goes off on a rant about how only the Bible is the word of God and how the Book of Mormon is a dead book. I don't know what happened but it felt really good how I was able to control the wrath I felt in my heart when he said libro muerto and use it to calmly but firmly tell him that the Book of Mormon is not a dead book. In fact it is filled with a living and real promise that we can read it and then ask God if it is a true book. And how God always will keep is promises and always respond to his children that truly search for answers and then I quoted the scripture in the Bible that, ask and you will receive, knock and it will be answered. And how I knew that promise is true and it is a living book because I have read it and prayed and asked God. And his face changed and he accepted the Book of Mormon and said that he would read it when seconds before he was totally hating on the book. It´s so cool to see the spirit work his magic and soften people´s hearts. I really hope that he will read it and pray about it like he said he would because I know that he can receive an answer that will change his life and only make sweeter everything he´s read in the Bible and loves about Jesus.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Last Sunday, as a country of Chile we all did a fast for rain because well we need it REALLY bad. The area presidency asked that all members fast specifically for rain here. I´m more in the north now and so here it´s especially harder for it to rain. I was actually way happy that I got to spend the Winter here because I´m not down for rain as a missionary. But last Sunday we fasted for rain. And yesterday it rained! The ayuno worked!!! But this is the best part... It started raining hard when Sacrament meeting started. Then a member drove us to lunch so we didn´t have to walk in the rain and get really wet. Right as lunch ended, it stopped raining so we could walk around and stay dry. Then as we came in for the night, it started raining again really hard. It´s like God not only answered the fervent prayers and fasts of the Chileans but was also mindful of our missionary schedule! SO COOL.!!!!!!!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok one last story before my time runs out... We found a family this week! a couple (AND THEY ARE MARRIED!!!) and they have 3 little girls. We taught them lesson 1 and I´ve never seen someone so excited to receive a Book of Mormon as the husband was! It was awesome and they accepted a baptismal date for the 25th! But then they didn´t come to church because it was cold and rainy-ish so that date fell through.... But then we read with them yesterday in the Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 31 and talked about why baptism is important for the family and they loved it! They accepted another baptismal date for in August. But it´s so cool to be able to teach a couple together! You can just see that they want the very best for their daughters and they are willing to read and pray and look for answers. The husband works all during the week so we can only teach them on weekends but I really hope they read the Book of Mormon this week and pray and can recognize the spirit telling them it´s true so they can be an eternal family!!!!!!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well that´s all that time allows for this week but I know that good things are about to happen here in Sindempart. I know that the spirit is preparing people to receive the gospel and I know that this is the gospel of Jesus Christ. I know that His authority was restored and exists and is here in this church. I know that God listens to our fasts and prayers and is always there to help and comfort.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">HErmana Evans</span></div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-38070248476450171422015-07-10T16:55:00.001-07:002015-07-10T16:55:19.050-07:00Chile Campeon De America<span class="thread-date" role="presentation"><span class="short" role="presentation" title-off="" title="Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 9:34 AM"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">July 6, 2015</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!!!</span><div>
<br /><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope my email finds you guys well. This week just flew by so I can barely remember what happened.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This was our first week with our new mission president, President Diaz. I haven´t met him yet but I´m excited to!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This past weekend was full of weird days for us haha. On Saturday we had a wedding in our church. A couple that the elders are teaching got married on Saturday so the husband could get baptized on Sunday! So I was asked to play piano for the wedding. It made me laugh, the songs that the bride wanted to be played were öh esta todo bien¨ (All is Well (?) The classic pioneer hymn), I Stand All Amazed, and Nearer My God To Thee. The pioneer one just was random but I mean it´s her day right? So that was fun. It´s weird seeing a civil marriage. It makes me a little sad hearing it because I know that there is so much more when we get married in the temple, but that´s their goal so that´s awesome!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">ALSO Saturday was the fourth of July!!! YAY AMERICA!! And I probably celebrated it in the most un-American way ever because Saturday was also the finals of the American Cup and Chile was playing against Argentina in the FINALS! Chile is not the best soccer team so everyone was way pumped that they made it all the way to the finals. AND our new president of the mission, being the true blooded Chilean that he is, gave us permission to watch it in the house of one of the ward leaders so we got to go! And CHILE WON!!!!!! It was crazy! It came back to a goal off in overtime and we won 3-2! The first time in history that Chile has won the Copa America! But then we had to keep working for the last hour of the day and everyone was in the streets making as much noise as possible and celebrating. I wanted to invite someone to be baptized right on the spot because they were all so happy that I was sure that they would say yes to anything but my plan unfortunately didn´t work out....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The work here in Sindempart keeps on going. It´s slow here though.. The sector that we have is HUGE. I think it might be my biggest yet so we lose time walking and there is not always people in the street to contact. Our main investigadors are 10 year old boys whose mom´s aren´t ready to give permission for them to get baptized. We find great people but then they are never home again. I´m trying SO hard to find people to get baptized before I leave but it seems the Lord might have different plans. It´s like everything is perfect on paper but it just isn´t working out in reality. Don´t get me wrong, I´m definitely not discouraged. We work hard and do all we can so I sleep well at night. It´s just sad because I want these people so bad to get baptized because it´s going to help them and I see them know that it´s true and that they have even received answers!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">It was way cute though, ok so cute may not be the right word .... so we have an investigador Diego who´s 23 years old. He has come to church 6 times but is scared of commitment. Anyway we´d left him because he wasn´t progressing but we stopped by this week to see how he was doing. Turns out he´s been reading the Book of Mormon everyday and praying on his own to find answers. His question is not if the Book of Mormon is true or if José Smith is a prophet but it´s that he takes pills everyday to help him control his temper and calm him down and he wants to know if it's against the word of wisdom to take marijuana instead of his pills. hahaha it made me smile because he was like I just want to find where it says that it´s ok. We explained the word of wisdom better to him though (thank goodness he never came across the scripture in Alma that talks about the good quality of herbs that helped heal their illnesses...) BUT Diego was using the Book of Mormon as a source of answers AND he´s quit smoking AND he said that he´s seen a difference in his health. AH! Real life blessings right there for being obedient. But he won´t accept a baptism date. We have an awesomely spiritual lesson planned so I really hope he´ll be able to recognize the spirit and have a change of heart. He´s a good kid, the gospel will help him be even better.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Yesterday in testimony meeting at church, a little boy in our ward got up and bore his testimony. It was the basic cute little kid testimony and then he said something that caught my attention. He said how he loved everyone in the ward and that he was willing to give his life for them. Wow, that hit me. This 10 year old was willing to give his life for the people in his ward. I thought how many people would be that willing? And I thought of One. One who was that willing. One that actually did give His life for every single one of us. Because he loves us that much. Because He knew that giving anything less than His life would have made any thing we tried to do or sacrifice meaningless. What willingness. What sacrifice. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then we had an awesome lesson in our gospel principles class about sacrifice. They were talking about the qualities of the lamb that they would sacrifice in olden times. How they had to wait until it was an adult and fat and it couldn´t have any stains and all that. The teacher made the point that all that took TIME because it had to be PREPARED: That was part of the reason Jesus got so mad at the people selling animals for sacrifices in the temple. Because people would go and buy the lamb and sacrifice it, skipping the whole time and preparation part of the sacrifice, losing that whole part. The Lord requires of us our time and preparation. It´s through the time we take and sacrifice that we become changed and that we can become better. It´s the time that makes it a true sacrifice. It was a good lesson to hear while we were fasting.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well that was basically the highlights of this week. I´m really excited for this coming week to find people (preferably that don´t need their mom´s permission to get baptized..) and miracles. I know that they are there, waiting for us! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hope you all have a great week!! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Love you!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana</span> </div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-8803012454515499792015-07-04T10:40:00.000-07:002015-07-04T10:40:39.950-07:00Convinced or Converted???<div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1436024247575_2811">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">June 29, 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hellloooo my family!!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was awesome. I really do like my new area. It´s super big so we walk a lot but it´s really tranquilo. It´s super quiet and chill. Except when Chile is playing in the Copa America (American Cup?) But I´m pretty sure the whole country is going crazy so it´s fine. Chile plays tonight so keep us in your prayers that we will find SOMEONE who´s not into futbol and will let us into their warm home. I have high faith that we WILL find someone of gold tonight. CHI CHI CHI LE LE LE VIVA CHILE! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week in a lunch we had with a member she said something really interesting that´s been dancing around in my head. As missionaries we are always teaching right now about the Dia de Reposo or Sabbath Day. So the scripture we shared after lunch with this Hermana was about keeping the Sabbath day holy. She´s been a member for like 30 years now and raised her children in the church and she is one of the most faithful members here in Sindempart. And she goes ¨You know what? What I´ve seen in my years in the church is just that most people are just convinced while only a few are really converted. That a lot of people like the church and the teachings and how it´s all about the family but then something happens, I don´t know, they get offended or it´s a cold Sunday morning or who knows what, and suddenly all that seemed so nice and pretty isn´t what is the most important in their life. It´s a side note". She said if we really are converted we´re going to sacrifice and we´re going to do all we can to put Jesus Christ and the truth first. I really liked what she said. It made me think am I really converted or just convinced? Do I get up and go to church every Sunday because I´m a missionary and it´s just part of the schedule or because I really want to go to church and participate in the sacrament and keep the Sabbath day holy? Do I keep the convenient commandments and make exceptions for the others or do I truly obey out of the love I have for God and for my Savior? Do I like being obedient? Or is it an annoyance? Am I like the people of King Benjamin in the Book of Mormon and really don´t have the desire to do bad, but to do good continually? Or is there something that I shouldn´t do but still do? Am I only convinced or am I converted? What´s the difference? I think it all comes down to our testimony. Do we have a surety, a firm conviction that THIS is the church of Jesus Christ? That God speaks to us now in this time and day? Have we read and prayed about the Book of Mormon until we got an answer? Do we hold tight to the spiritual experiences we´ve had? Do our actions reflect our love for God? Being converted to the gospel does not mean having a perfect knowledge or living a perfect life. It does not mean standing up at church and bearing a general conference worthy testimony. It does not mean having perfect family home evenings and understanding all of the scriptures. It does not even mean filling the spirit really strong all the time. Being converted is simply doing the little things constantly. Reading our scriptures, saying our prayers and going to church. It means striving to be obedient and keeping our covenants. It means becoming really good at repenting really fast. It means living gratefully. If we just do the little things we can cross over the border from being a convicted member to being a converted member so that we too can stand alongside the people of King Benjamin with the disposition to do good continually.....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I am also really grateful for the opportunity that I have to play piano in our ward. It´s weird how few people here know how to play piano, but there is always a piano in every church. So now I´m the new pianist and one thing I love about playing the piano is I get to sit in front of everyone so I can see who comes to church and who doesn´t without like awkwardly craning my neck in every direction to see if an investigador or someone came in late. So yesterday I was looking out at everyone during the sacrament and was looking for all our investigadores and street contacts that told us that they were sí o sí going to come. I got over a long time ago the street contacts not coming but I still get a little bummed when the good investigadors say they are going to come and then don´t. So yesterday as I was scanning the congregation I wasn´t seeing anyone. And then I noticed Ali. Ali, is one of our investigadors. He is 10 years old and usually he comes with his friend Nicolas, one of our other investigadores but yesterday he came by himself. I don´t know why but it filled my heart with so much joy to see him there. He was sitting on his little chair (there´s not benches in the church) alone, with his worn tennis shoes dangling a little above the ground. His hair was nicely combed and he had a cute little button up denim shirt and his soft cover Book of Mormon rested on his lap with his Jesus card sticking out the top marking the chapter he was reading. I noticed that there was a little, but good bit, of white between the dark cover and the Jesus card, meaning that he had been reading it. I just thought that was SO COOL. Lately I´ve been kinda stressed because our investigadors are all kids here. We´ve even fasted to find adult investigadors. But seeing Ali there at church alone just warmed my heart and the part in the bible when Christ invites the children to come to Him came to my mind. Is he just convinced or is he becoming converted? Time will tell but until then I´m just really grateful for the humble example of those dangling feet and combed hair.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So something funny that happened this week...... we found this new Mexican food place in our sector!! It´s been a longggg time since I've eaten Mexican food. So I ordered a chicken burrito and my companion ordered a chicken quesadilla. We take it to go and get home and unwrap it and it was exactly the same thing, but folded differently! hahaha we got a good laugh out of that. Chileans... Gotta love them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well that´s about it for this week! I love you all and hope you have a great week!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon,<br />Hermana Evans<div class="yiv7954990991separator" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1436024247575_7793" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Samantha's new Mission President and his wife</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Samantha's Mission President and his wife<br />
saying good bye. They served for 3 years.<br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-11184617595578599252015-06-22T13:49:00.000-07:002015-06-22T13:50:58.688-07:00Up Up And Away To The North!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">June 22, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hello family!!!</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I was so glad to see from the photos you sent that you guys had a great Father´s day! That breakfast looked just amazing! I almost forgot about waffles... and that´s just something that should never be forgotten. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Lots of great stuff happened this week. Starting with.. CAMBIOS (transfers)! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">President called me the morning of cambios and I was released as a hermana lider (sister leader) for my last cambio. I knew it was coming because he´d told me at the last leadership meeting but I was still really sad. Only I got all awkward on the phone and when he told me that I was being released I responded, Que bueno! (ok good) ahhh I felt dumb. Lots of thoughts going through my head and I just wanted to be willing to accept whatever call or position so that was the first thing that came out of my mouth. Sometimes I can´t think really fast in Spanish haha.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">But really I am so so so grateful for the time I had as a hermana lider. Obviously as a leader you´re not better than everyone else. You actually see all the weaknesses in yourself more than ever but I just loved being in a position to help and serve other missionaries. I got to meet so many more people than I would have and I got to form some really great friendships and I learned SO much. I learned how to break out of my comfort zone as there are so many situations where you feel awkward but you just got to be the best example so you make it happen. I´ve seen so many miracles. Days where there were literally no appointments and I´m on an intercambio (spend a day with another companion in another area) and we just find so many great people. I´ve got to see hermanas that are new and shy and how they change and develop so quickly and become powerful missionaries. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The thing that I´m most grateful for is how I changed thanks to that calling. As a leader I found myself becoming more naturally concerned about what I was doing, saying, spending my time, thinking is this how Jesus Christ would do or say it? </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> When I was in a situation that I didn´t know how to handle, what would Christ do? What would He say? What counsel would He give? Does my example reflect His? Do my actions show the love I have for Him? Living with such questions in the front of my mind I have been able to strengthen my own testimony of Him and His character and I feel like I´ve been able to grow and progress not only as a missionary but as a person. I have a clearer vision of how I want to live forever. I want to be the first person to volunteer to take food to a house or to help someone clean. I always just want to be willing to do what the Savior would do. I´ve found so much happiness in the service. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also I´m grateful that I got to experience what it´s like to be released from a calling. I know that´s not going to be the last time in my life and while it´s hard, I´m grateful for the experience. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So with cambios I packed up my bags and went to my last cambios meeting. So weird! It was also the last meeting of President and Hermana Kahnlein as they will leave the mission at the end of this month. We sang Called to Serve as the opening song. Called to Serve is better in Spanish because it has 4 verses not just 2 like in English. I realized halfway through the first verse that this was the last time I was going to get to sing Called to Serve in a large group of missionaries as a missionary. I just stopped singing and I just listened to the middle 2 verses. There is nothing like the sound of a room vibrating of the voices of a hundred missionaries, set apart to preach the true and pure gospel of Jesus Christ, with the power and authority to invite people to be baptized, singing Called to Serve at the top of their lungs with as much conviction as their testimony. If I didn´t already know the church was true, I did in that moment. Then I sang the last verse with as much love and force and energy as I could. I love being a missionary!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">President Kahnlein talked about the last chapter of the Book of Mormon when Moroni was saying goodbye. The last invitation of the book is to come unto Christ. I am so grateful for President Kahnlein and how until the last moment He is always inviting us to come unto Christ and telling us if we just have the faith anything, literally anything is possible in missionary work. That the grace of Christ is sufficient to make up for any weakness or imperfection so we cannot have fear. We have the power and authority and we need to use it every day, every moment possible. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then there were the cambios. So now I´m in a place called Coquimbo, in the NORTH! The best part of it all was Hermana Hansen had cambios too and she got changed to go up north too so we got to ride on the bus together! It was like a 5 or 6 hour ride up north. Looks like the president is sending us up to the boonies to die. But it was a fun ride. We were on it with other friends--one elder that is going home with us and another elder that arrived in the mission with us and also there was a Hermana who just got to the mission. She was really cute, she was asking us about miracles we´ve seen or what we´ve learned the most and what has changed the most and it was just so cool to hear and share stories. Even in the same mission everyone has had such distinct experiences and to hear them just strengthened my testimony and made me want to work even harder. I can honestly say that I´ve had SUCH A GOOD MISSION. SO GOOD. The mission is like a string of a lot of little things. Contacts, smiles, fallen appointments, stopping to offer service, scripture reading, silent prayers, worn out shoes, fasts, conjugated verbs, going to the wrong door, that weave together to form miracles. The spirit has never said to me so clearly in my ear go to that door, walk down that street, share this scripture, but I´ve seen that by just striving to do what is right and by being obedient, the things you naturally do as a consequence are guided by the spirit so everything always just works out. It was so cool to be able to reflect on that kind of stuff with other missionaries in the bus. This is really the Lord´s work. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So like I said I'm now up north and it´s really pretty. I know that Heavenly Father loves me because I´m still next to the beach. I can see a little of it from our house and the church building that we go to for district meetings has one of the prettiest views. My companion is Hermana Carlson from Michigan. I was REALLY hoping to end with a Latina but God had different plans. I absolutely love my companion though. She´s 21 too and has only been on her mission for 3 months but she studied Spanish before so she speaks amazing Spanish. I wish I could have spoken as well as she does when I had 3 months. I´m really grateful to be with her here. I know that we´re going to see a lot of miracles. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Our investigador Nicolas accepted to get baptized on July 4th on Saturday! He´s 10 and his sister got baptized with the Hermanas here a month ago. He´s so cute, he´s just so excited to learn about God and he´s really smart. He makes me laugh with some of his comments haha. But it´s awesome. Also, almost everyone we contacted this past week was strangely receptive so I have high hopes for this coming week! Yay for the North!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> I hope you all have a great week!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazón, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-70948859290059486812015-06-16T15:12:00.000-07:002015-07-17T13:51:46.776-07:00No, It`s Just I Cut My Hair Everyday People<div class="thread-item-list" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1434488634655_3614" tabindex="-1">
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">June 15, 2015</span></div>
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<span class="thread-snippet"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">HOLA! </span></span></div>
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<span class="thread-snippet"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hope you all had a super great week! </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span class="thread-snippet">Winter is coming in quickly here. During the day it still makes sun but then in the night ohhhh man I understand why they call it Chile because</span> the wind is CHILLY. I think it`s because I`m still pretty close to the ocean so that wind just comes and whips through the hills or something. So your package with the gloves arrived just in time! Thank you so much! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The highlight of this week was Friday when we had our last leadership meeting with President and Hermana Kahnlein :( I`m really sad that they are leaving because they are just so so awesome! I`ve learned sooo much from them! Towards the end when he was talking about the new president and when he`s going to arrive and stuff, he was like when he arrives I want you guys to forget about me.... Just forget about me. I got a little defensive in that moment, like NO! I`m not going to forget about you, I can never forget about you and all you've done. I`ve heard a lot of people say that you're not called to your mission, you`re called to your mission president and well whatever the case is, I think I`m one of the most blessed people in the world. I swear though, President Kahnlein is going to be called to a Seventy or Apostle one day. We told that to Hna. Kahnlein and she just laughed at us and said that she didn`t think so, but I have the faith haha! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">As a special treat for the last consejo, for lunch we all went out to eat in a restaurant! And to get there we got to walk right next to the beach. (In the mission we have to stay at least 3 streets from the ocean) We were right there and the day was super sunny and there wasn`t a cloud in the sky! I was soo bummed that I didn`t have my camera! President was so casual when he said that we were going to go to a restaurant that I was not expecting it to be one right on the beach!! I didn`t realize how beautiful Vina and the shore line is! And so then we got to the restaurant and it probably is in like the top 5 nicest restaurants that I`ve eaten in. It reminded me of how it is when you go to eat on a cruise ship or something. Like you eat your fries with a fork kind of fancy. I ordered a Cherimoya juice (cherimoya is a Chilean fruit that is white on the inside) And it was SUPER yummy!! Then everyone eats the same plate so they bring out this plate filled with Chilean asado!! Which is like Chilean bbq! Oh my gosh it might have been some of the yummiest meat I`ve eat in my life!!!! It was SO good! But there was also sausage. One was like a normal German sausage and the other.. BLOOD SAUSAGE!!! I was sitting next to one of my friends and we were like do we dare? yes we do! And we ate a bite at the same time andddddd..... that was as far as I got with it. Her too. To be honest, it wasn`t as bad as I was expecting. It kinda just tasted like dirt with really hard things mixed in it. But the texture was just so weird and the fact that I was eating blood mixed with who knows what more, I just couldn`t do it. But besides from that, everything was really awesome! Especially the drunk group in the back haha. It`s futbol season here in Chile! It was all definitely an experience that I will remember for the rest of my life!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We have cambios (transfers) this Wednesday and usually they don`t tell us until Wednesday in the morning but I wanted to know if I was going to change or not so after consejo when I was saying bye to president I said ¨See you at the cambios meeting? and he says, ' yup because you`re going to change. And I was like en serio?? Because I just have one cambio here in Achupallas, and he says, it`s your last cambio right? And I say, ' yeah', and he says, 'yeah, so you're going to change'. He also had me share my testimony in the meeting and everyone who is going to be released as a leader shares their testimony so I`m not going to be a leader for my last change either. It was sad, all of us hermanas from my group that are leaders shared our testimonies so the next time we`re all together is the cambios meeting and then the last dinner at the mission home before we all fly home... it`s so weird to think that!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also the Copa America has started and it`s in Chile this year! So everyone is going crazy about it! Chile played Thursday and won and you should have heard everyone! I seriously think that every single apartment building and house in the country was celebrating and making noise! I love how everyone gets so excited and pumped about futbol. There`s a lot of Chilean pride here! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Funny story of the week: We were contacting houses and we started talking to a woman and she was like actually I`m busy now and so I ask when can we come back? And she says, I can`t tell you because usually I`m not here. I leave at this time to go cut my hair. And so I said, well I imagine you don`t cut your hair every day though... and she was like sometimes I do and if I don`t go to cut my hair I have to dry it, so no. hahaha She was an older woman too so she doesn't even have that much hair.... It was the most creative excuse I`ve heard in a while. I don`t know why the people just don`t say no! hahaha..</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We`re teaching a bunch of really great couples right now which is really cool! Only 1 of the 4 are married.... But today we went to the registro civil to look at wedding dates so we can invite this one couple that are golden to get married. We taught them the plan of salvation and the wife cried. She wants to get married now!! It was one of the most spiritual lessons of my life! It was awesome! So I hope that at least they will commit to a marriage date before I have to leave. We`ll see what happens....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well I gotta go, I'm out of time!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you all so much!!! Have a great week!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor e</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">n mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-18945729161631906922015-06-09T11:12:00.000-07:002015-07-17T13:53:01.157-07:00Cabello or Caballo!!!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">June 8, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!!!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Como estan??? Espero que esta carta les encuentre super bien!!! Esta semana estuvo super bien para nosotros aqui! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We started teaching some people of GOLD this week that we`d found last week. One, her name is Hashly (like ashley) and she is just golden! We taught her lesson one and she was like wow it is just so easy what you guys tell me! All I have to do is read the book and pray and ask God?? Wow. Ok, I'll do it! hahaha It always makes me smile how people are always so surprised at how easy it is. I also think that`s one reason why so many people don`t do it afterward, because of the 'easiness of the way' as the Book of Mormon puts it. But I just love it so much that it is so easy. Makes our job a breeze. The problem with Hashly is that she lives with her boyfriend. They`ve lived together for 13 years and they have an 11 year old daughter. When you ask what she wants most she tells us to be with her family for forever! haha so we taught her the plan of salvation next. And she loved it. It was a completely different perspective for her but it made sense. Embarrassing....moment. We`re teaching about resurrection so I share the scripture in Alma that teaches 'not even a hair of your head will be lost'. So in español there are two words for hair, cabello and pelo. I always say pelo because that`s what the Chileans say more and cabello is just too close for comfort to the word caballo which means horse and I ALWAYS get them confused. So I`m reading the scripture and guess what I say?? Yupp.. not one horse from your head will be lost. Ooops. But she was really nice, she didn`t even say anything about it.- I actually didn`t even notice that I`d said that until afterward when we were walking home my companion told me hahah oh well...... But so we teach Hashly the plan of salvation and how we can live with our families in the celestial kingdom and she just starts talking about marriage herself, without us having to bring up the subject! She told us she`s scared of marriage ( I don`t get why, they are basically married) BUT she said that if she keeps learning and feels like this is true that then she could get married! Ha! It was great because we wanted to talk about the marriage thing but she brought it up on her own. It`s so cool to see how the spirit works to guide thoughts! We`re going to keep teaching her and I hope that she will be able to recognize her answer!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also we met this guy named Hernan. He told us he was going to come to church but then he overslept... Anyway yesterday we taught him lesson 1 and he accepted a date to be baptized!! For the 28th! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also yesterday I had about the biggest stress moment ever. So Tito who got baptized on my birthday found new work! Awesome right, blessings of the baptism! No! Because it meant he had to work the next Sunday and didn`t come to be confirmed, so yesterday sì o sì he had to come to be confirmed! We talked to him everyday and he would say, yes, yes don't worry I`ll be there Sunday. We call Sunday morning to confirm and he says that he has to work! and that he's actually at work right then!!!! I was like ¡QUE! No. You have to come to church! You have to receive the spirit! I was like this isn`t a game. What are you doing?? SO we talked a little and then he was like no it`s fine I`ll be there. And he came! He just left his work (he`s a security guard) And he came to sacrament meeting. I was really impressed at the faith that he showed to make that sacrifice. And after sacrament he went back to work and as far as I know right now, it`s all fine. I don`t know how many people would just leave work to come to church, but he did! We`re working with another member of the ward to help him find new work so they don`t keep making him work on Sunday. Please keep him in your prayers. But now he`s confirmed and we`re all good!!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">One more miracle of the week. Saturday we were walking out in the street ALL DAY. Like the dogs. Our appointments fell through. Typical. And there`s soccer games all day so no one wants missionaries in their house. I was just praying that we could find new people to teach and give out Books of Mormon but everyone was rejecting us. It was night and we were tired and we were right next to our apartment so the thought of just turning in a little early was tempting with how our day had gone. But NOPE! I have a theory that it`s in the last 10 minutes of the day that the miracles happen. So we kept working and were just passing by a future investigadores and we knocked on one apartment door and they were there and invited us in!! It was a complete miracle because it was 9:20 in the night! They were a little family (living together but not married. But details, details!!) But my prayer of all day was answered in the last 10 minutes!! It was awesome!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well I`m out of time but I hope you guys have a great week!!! I love you all!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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<br />Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-40638222386619173922015-06-03T12:39:00.004-07:002015-06-03T12:39:50.353-07:00Do You Need A Ride???<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">June 1, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Holllaaa familia!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Como estan??? I hope you`re all just great and wonderful! I`m just great and wonderful here! Gosh I love it soooo much. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well I don`t really know where to start since not too much happened this week. It was super chill....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I met one of the investigadores of the other hermana's here from before. She`d been super busy so I hadn`t gotten to meet her yet and oh my gosh she is SOOO amazing! Her name is Carolina and she has 3 kids. She reads the Book of Mormon A LOT and she calls us her gift from God. She has a testimony and doesn`t even realize it. And her little girl who has 4 years calls us the ¨Niñas de Jesus¨ haha that made me smile really big. BUT the big problem is that she can`t come to church because her husband who isn`t even her husband because they aren`t married hates religion and doesn`t let them go to church. It hurts me so much because she has so much love for everyone and is so humble, but she just can`t come to church to keep the peace in the house. BUT she is trying to find work, so she can leave him and still take care of her kids. Basically what she needs is a miracle!! Please keep her in your prayers. She is just golden!!!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We had the coolest miracle ever... So we left her house a little late and were running so we could get home on time, but to be honest it was looking pretty bleak of our chances so I`m running and just praying that a member passes by in their car or something so that we can get home on time. Then as I finish a prayer in my head, a car passes by with two ladies and they ask if we need a ride!!! Get in! And we`re like ok! Thanks! Ok so now as I write that I realize that it sounds kinda sketchy to just get into a random car but I promise that normally I would never do such a thing unless it was a car sent from God as an answer to a very frantic prayer as this one was. DO you know how many woman drive in Chile???? I`ll tell you. Not many. It was seriously such a huge blessing!!!! We arrived home with 2 minutes to spare!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">A few days later we were walking down a dark dirt street and we have to walk up this hill of just loose sand. It`s night, it`s freezing cold and I was just like you know what would be great, if someone just stopped by and offered us a ride just to the top of the hill. Literally 2 seconds later an empty bus passes by and stops and the guy says, I`m going up to the top, can I drive you guys up?? And I was like YES!!! Literally immediately. It was way cool. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">It`s so awesome to be able to see how God really does answer prayers. I think that is the lesson that I`ve learned the most during my time here in the mission. That God really does listen and that most of the time the way He answers is through other people. And through maneras (miracles) really simple.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">As I said, this week was really chill and nothing huge happened. We didn`t find any families or teach any lessons where the people had a super spiritual enlightenment but we were working hard and doing all we could and we received the help when we needed it and asked for it. When we do our part, God will always do His and will help us. I love that so much. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Another thing that I realized this week is just how much I love speaking Spanish. It`s gotten to the point where I can just sit and listen and understand without even thinking about it and then I can respond and it just all feels natural. I can`t even tell you how awesome it is to be able to express thoughts so fluidly in the Spanish language. I love being able to pose questions and the people have to think and they little by little start to recognize the spirit and the plan of God. I also love to see how really we`re not too different. I sit in our lessons and I look around and usually its a Chilean, a Brazilian, and a gringa and we`re all talking about God and families and sharing personal experiences and it is just so cool to see how people can come from places so distinct yet are filled with the same questions and the gospel provides all the same answers that we all need. It is sooo so clear that when it all comes down to it we aren`t Chilean or American or Columbian or Peruvian or what ever, we are just children of God. I don`t have the words right now or time to think and find them to express how amazing it is to realize that. But it is just awesome. I just have soooo much to be grateful for here. I love it sooo much! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok so funny story: We had visited a menos active (less active member) and she gave us a reference to pass by her neighbor that supposedly is super great. So we go right afterward to pass by the neighbor, (she told us to not say anything that she sent us because she hadn`t talked to him before), so we yell, "ALO" and this guy answers the door wearing shorts and a very nicely trimmed beard and a cute little kitten in his hands. We introduce ourselves and he goes oh no we`re homosexuals here.... And it just caught us both really off guard hahaha and I was like what do we say??? So I said, well we talk to everyone! hahah... and he just goes yeah, so no thanks. But he doesn`t even close the door and is just there staring at us! jajajaj I was like uhh what do you want us to say?? So then we just were like, ok have a great day before it got too awkward. hahah well it was probably funnier in the moment then how I`m telling you now but we got a good laugh out of how awkward it got haha. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Anyway, I`ve run out of things interesting to say but know that I`m happy and healthy and I don`t have nearly as many flea bites here as I did in Chorrillos. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you all have a great week!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I LOVE YOU!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-65621464058136286522015-05-27T13:37:00.000-07:002015-07-17T13:54:07.578-07:00Alma 50:16<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hello family!!!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I opened up my email and it was loaded with a thousand emails!! I literally thought someone died or something.. and then I realized that something did. My childhood. I`m officially an adult! AH!! It`s awesome! I can legally say no to alcohol now! Haha, but seriously, thank you so much to everyone who sent me birthday wishes!! I feel super special :)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> My week here was awesome awesome awesome!!! Everyday is full of miracles. It kind of weirds me out sometimes haha not going to lie, but I just think it`s so amazing that Heavenly Father can focus in on every detail in every life as if He has all the time in the world for every single person. He really does have all the time in the world and is willing to do whatever he needs to, no matter how long it takes. I feel like life on Earth is like a very elaborately stitched blanket, with threads weaving in and out of each other in a manner that almost seems to not make sense when looked at up close but as you step back it makes the most beautiful pattern. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So first, we find ourselves with this lady from Cuba. She comes to us and is crying and we`re like what happened?? And she says nothing, I`m fine, I just moved here from Cuba a few months ago and I just miss my family that`s all. Turns out she was studying with the Jehovah Witnesses in Cuba and thought that we were them. Dang it. But it`s fine, we cleared it up and she said that another day she would like to talk to us. So, then we went to our appointment, but the lady wasn`t there! So we walk back up the street and we find ourselves again with the Cuban lady and she comes over and she says, actually I have time now, can we talk. So we talk and we end up teaching her the Restoration on the street! She was super interested and accepted a Book of Mormon and said she is going to pray!! Just like that. Our two citas that we had had fell through and thanks to that we found ourselves with her again, a little later, when she was ready to listen! Timing is everything. Looking back at it I can see how God was working to give this lady, who`s far from home and feeling alone, a chance to learn about Jesus Christ and find comfort in Him and His gospel.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also, we had a lesson with our investigador, Tito on Tuesday. He`d been having doubts about Jose Smith and if he was a prophet or not. So I had left with him my triple so he could read Jose Smith history. We got there and he had read a little and said that he had prayed but still wasn`t sure. We talked about baptism and all that but it always came back to him saying that he wasn`t sure and that he wanted more time because he needed more knowledge and had to do more research. So I was just thinking look, obviously he hasn`t received an answer that these things are true so he hasn`t felt the spirit testify that these things are true. Once you feel the spirit there is just no denying it. I was thinking in the promise at the end of the Book of Mormon, that if you pray with true intention you WILL receive an answer. Not maybe you`ll get one, but you will get one. I know that is a true promise. I trust in that promise. So I was like look, how about we kneel down, right here right now, and you say a prayer and you just ask God if Jose Smith was a prophet and if the Book of Mormon is true? Yeah? And Tito was like ok. So we did it and he said a very simple but sweet prayer. He asked if the Book of Mormon is true and if Jose Smith restored the church. Super simple. Not one pretty word or anything. Boom. And as he closed his prayer, he was crying. He felt the spirit. That promise at the end of the Book of Mormon, that promise that has been tried and tried and fulfilled time and time again has once again felt strong. I can`t even begin to describe how strong the spirit was in the room. He knew that it all was true, even if he didn`t know everything or understand everything perfectly. He just knew in his heart. He stood up and reached out to shake my hand and said thank you. So we sit back at the table and after a little bit more of silence, I asked him, what God was telling him right then. And Tito goes, arrepiéntete y bautìzate. (repent and get baptized). So I asked him how he was with Sunday and he said that Sunday would be great! hahahaha just like that!!!! Literally 10 minutes earlier he was saying that Sunday was too soon and now he was like yes please, Sunday! Literally as a missionary, I feel like I do absolutely nothing. Because I don`t. The spirit is so powerful. The Lord really does His own work. I`m just so grateful for the opportunity that I have to watch it all go down. I feel like I have front row seats to the greatest show in the world. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So Tito passed his interview and was baptized yesterday! On my birthday!! Best birthday yet????? That would be a full hearted ¡¡SÍ!! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I remember learning in my Anthropology class that in other Indian cultures on ones birthday they give gifts to everyone, instead of others giving gifts to them. I always thought that was really interesting and I was thinking this past week, what gift could I give to Heavenly Father for my birthday? Well, I wish I could say that I gave him a baptism, but even that wasn`t me. But I hope that through the baptism and every lesson that we teach and every contact that I do and every scripture that I share, He knows the great deep love that I have for Him and for Jesus Christ. I know that really there is nothing that I can even give them, only my will. And I hope that They know that They already have all of it. I am so grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for the Book of Mormon. I am so grateful for the lessons I am learning and for the miracles that I am seeing. I know that God lives, I know that He loves us, and I know that He works endlessly, night and day so that every one of His children can have the opportunity to have not only happiness in this life but endless joy in the eternities. I hope I can keep progressing and everyday for the rest of my life become a little bit more and more like my Savior. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The baptism was super super beautiful! Tito`s mom who is already a member was crying through out the whole thing! At the end, we asked Tito if he wanted to share his testimony and he said YES! Which was awesome because usually they say no because they`re still kinda shy but he stood up afterward and just expressed pure gratitude. It was so sweet. And then afterward, he told us that we now have to teach his wife and daughter! The fact that they came to the baptism is awesome because Tito has been living with his mom because of problems in the marriage, but he just wants to be with his family and I hope that the gospel will be able to help them! We`ll see, we have a family home evening with the whole family tonight :)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then afterwards for my birthday we ate Papa Johns pizza with a family with a chocolate cake! SOOO GOOD! I felt like I was at home. Then we went over to the Bishop's house in the night who said he wanted to talk to us about some stuff and they surprised me with PANCAKES!!!! Hahaha I`ve never blown out candles from a stack of pancakes, but it was awesome!!! There was even American maple syrup! Did I score or what????? So all in all it was a really great awesome day! Most people on their 21st birthday go out and party all night long, but I wouldn`t trade my experience here in Chile for the world. I know that my party will continue with these people in the celestial kingdom :) Alma 50:16.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well I`ve ran out of time! So until next week... </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you all so much!!!!!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor de mi corazón, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans (21)</span></div>
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</span>Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-65918838962238778832015-05-18T19:22:00.002-07:002015-05-18T19:22:41.457-07:00More Faith Than Sleepyness People<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">May 18, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span class="thread-snippet">Holaaaaaaa familia!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span class="thread-snippet">Oi, como voce esta? tenho saudade de voce. Aonde fica o banheiro? That`s about all I got for my Portuguese this week. Before you get TOO impressed, I just said, hello, how are you?</span> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> I miss you. Where is the bathroom? Haha buena no?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I`m glad you guys had a great week! My week was awesome. I love my new sector a lot! I still miss Chorrillos and the people there but I love everyone I`ve met here!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">First off, question... Do I look like Avril Lavigne???????? I`ve seriously had a thousand and two people tell me since I`ve gotten here that I look exactly like Avril Lavigne. I just don`t see it. The bishop's wife, every time she sees me, she breaks out in some Avril Lavigne song. I don`t know. Chileans are crazy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Speaking of celebrity look alikes, my district leader looks just like Zac Efron hahahaha. It honestly cracks me up. It`s kinda bad but I have a hard time taking him seriously when we do practices haha. I like to drop little references from Zac Efron movies when I`m playing the investigador like, since I started reading the Book of Mormon, I feel like ¨¨It`s the start of something new¨¨ and that I`m kinda scared to change my life but I know that ¨¨we`re all in this together¨¨ and that I just got ¨´to get my head in the game¨¨ hahah it`s fine though because in Spanish it`s not obvious at all but my companion and I get a kick out of it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Our district leader is great though. This past week he made up a game with our number system. Like a lesson with a member is 4 points, a normal lesson is 3, to give out a Book of Mormon is 1 and so forth and whoever has the most points by this Wednesday wins a pizza. Well my competitive side has come out and it is safe to say that the Hermanas will win by a LONG shot! hahah But it`s been awesome though because it makes you so much more focused in using every second to the very best and we`ve seen so many miracles come out of it. Miracles and pizza. I`m totally down. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">One of these miracles. ...Our cita (appointment) fell through so my companion and I were leaving this apartment building and this lady starts screaming at us out of her window, Wait!! Do you speak English?? And I stopped and told her yes. And then she asks if we teach lessons because she wants her kids to learn because the family wants to move to the US next year. I told her that I'd love to, but we were actually missionaries and we teach more than English, we teach about Jesus Christ and how His teachings can strengthen us as families and blah blah blah. She was totally down to learn more and everything. So we taught her about the Book of Mormon right there through her window and she excepted the book and we put a cita to come back another day to teach English AND the first lesson! BOOM! It was awesome. One thing that I`ve learned to love on the mission is fallen appointments. Because I know that means that Heavenly Father needs us in another place with another person and he always uses fallen appointments to put us on a path to find new people, or even a new FAMILY! So you know, when the things don`t work out how we want them to it`s just because there is something better for us and we end up being grateful for it because it always just works out in the end. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Other miracle... We go back for the cita that fell through but Rodrigo, our investigador is SLEEPING! Ah! But his mom is like, well I`ll go back and see if he will come out for a few minutes so you can share something. Ok so I know that if I was sleeping and if I was 14 years old and my mom came over and told me that the missionaries are here, do you want to get up, I`d be like no way, I`m sleeping! So as she went back to his room I just started praying and praying and praying that he would come out so we could teach him. And guess what. HE CAME OUT!!!! Just like that!!!!! Wow, I just felt really strong in that moment that God was really listening to me and that He loves Rodrigo so much that He wants him to listen and wants to help him so that he can get baptized. Usually answers to our prayers don`t come so instantly, but when they do, the Lord`s hand is so clear and it`s just so cool to see the Lord at work. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Funny story... I contact this one guy outside his house and we`re talking and he`s speaking bien Chilean and all and he asks me where I`m from, so as a joke I say, I`m Chilean. (you should see the look on some peoples face when I say that.. they get REALLY confused hahaha) But he just looks me straight and says with a PERFECT gringo accent in English, No you`re not. Where are you from? I was like WOAH! You speak English! He was like yeah, I do. Where are you from? I told him California and he then said, 'I`ve been living in California for the past 30 years. Small world! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Speaking of California... You`ll never guess where the first counselor in the bishopric in my new ward served!! haha... in the Carlsbad, California mission. AND he served in the San Marcos Spanish branch! haha in our chapel!!!!!! How crazy is that! He showed me his mission tag and on the back it`s covered with In n Out stickers haha. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Another cool thing that happened this week is that we got to go do service for a blind lady in our ward, making chocolate!! Well not making chocolate but melting it and then putting it in molds with almonds and peanuts and making chocolate roses and bears and stuff and then she goes and sells them. But I have to be honest, she is the most seeing blind lady I`ve ever met! If a bit of chocolate drips on the stove, SHE KNOWS!!! And you should see her handling a big knife cutting up the chocolate or lighting her gas stove!!! At first I was like there is no way she is actually blind, but she totally is! But it`s way fun to make the chocolate and she always gives us one afterward .) haha the things you get to do as a missionary.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Anyway, I`m running out of time so I will close with one last miracle of the week. We`re teaching this guy, Tito. He works from 11pm to 7 am every day, but since we invited him to come to church, he comes AND shows up early even!! He`s awesome. He has a baptism date for the 24th!!!! And when we taught him last night and were asking him about how he likes the church and everything he was like well I`m tired and all but I like it a lot. Then he said, it`s ok though, because I have more faith than sleep. Listening to that simple but powerful testimony I felt the spirit really strong. I know that he is sacrificing sleep to come to church, but the fact that he loves Christ more than sleep itself is really humbling. Also, he started reading the Book of Mormon 2 weeks ago and he`s already at the end of ETHER! Is he a rock star or what???? Keep him in your prayers this week that he can be baptized next Sunday! The week before the baptism is always the hardest!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Thank you for everything! I love you guys so much!!!! Have a great week!!!!!</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">te vejo depois falo com voce depois</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-36380160623136409972015-05-11T15:44:00.000-07:002015-05-18T19:36:58.037-07:00Achupallas. That`s a Name, Not a Sneeze.. <span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">May 11, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Fue super bueno a verles ayer!!! Se ven super bien! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So, as I told you guys when we were skyping yesterday for Mother's Day, I got changed on Wednesday and now I`m in Achupallas in a sector called Mirador. When it comes down to it, I really didn`t want to leave Chorrillos. I really really love that sector, but I had already been there 6 months so my time was up. But before cambios this week started out pretty crazy!....</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">First this one guy just randomly stops us in the centro and says, hey I want to be a missionary for your church, what do I need to do? And we`re like uhh.. what do you mean? He says, I have a friend on the mission and I really want to be a missionary too, what do I need to do? I ask him, are you a member of the church? And he responds no, I just want to be a missionary. We were like ok cool so we gave him a Book of Mormon and wrote down his address to pass to the elders where he lives and told him where the closet church was to attend on Sunday. He asked if it was a long process to be able to become a missionary. I tell him that from today it will take one year and 3 weeks (investidgadors need to attend church 3 times before they can be baptized) and he was like ok, I can do that. hahaha I really wish that he lives in our sector, I would love to find out what happened with him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then with our investigador Loreto who thought she was already baptized but when we searched her records isn`t, we invited her to be baptized on the 24 (my birthday!) And she was totally down! It`s crazy, she came to church once (hopefully yesterday tambien), and changed her work schedule so she wouldn`t work on Sundays. She`s changing! She`s aligning her life with the gospel and is just happier, I don`t know, that`s just the best way to explain it. I love when you can start to be able to see the changes in people. That`s honestly the best part of it all. So I`m really excited to hear what will end up happening with her. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then on Tuesday we wake up early because we have a zone meeting to get to and we start showering and in our house there is this weird drain in the middle of the bathroom floor and well, it just totally exploded. It just started throwing up water ALL OVER THE FLOOR: It went through the bathroom door and was all over in the front room. Luckily there`s almost nothing in our house so nothing was damaged and we quickly put towels in front of the doors of the bedroom and study room but there was literally 2 centimeters of water all over the floor! But we can`t stick around and clean it up and try to fix it because we have the meeting to get to. And it`s early so the owners are still sleeping so we can`t call them. We call our Zone leader and he tells us to just mop it up and get to the meeting and we say, no elder, there is a lake in our house. You can`t just mop it up....But we were able to soak a lot of it up in towels and we called the guy in charge of our houses and he got everything worked out. I still don`t know what was wrong, but that was a crazy adventure... hahah</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"></span> <span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then it was cambios and well you know what happened there. It was really hard saying good bye to a lot of the people there. I felt like I was leaving home all over again. When I said goodbye to Herminia, this sassy 81 year old recent convert, she gave me hard boiled eggs and bread, to take just in case I wasn`t going to be able to eat traveling to my new area. It really really touched my heart because she doesn't have hardly any money. She told us the other day that she went 12 days with only herbal tea and bread because she didn`t have money for food. The ward brought her over a bunch of food from the bishops store house and she cried. Then she told us that even though the Sunday wasn`t going to be a testimony Sunday that she didn`t care, she was going to stand up to express her gratitude anyway haha (the next Sunday was stake conference.. she didn`t really care. I wonder if she really went through with it or not haha) But then here she is giving me three eggs and bread. It really touched my heart how someone with so little is still so generous with the little that she has. I swear, the people teach me way more about being Christ-like than I can ever teach or show them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So now I`m here in Achupallas (Aw-chew-pie-yas) I know, it almost sounds like someone sneezing... My compañera is Hermana Andrade. She`s from Rio de Jinero! in Brasil! We`ve already made plans for me to come and live with her after the mission! She`s awesome. I`m always worried about getting a crazy companion but I lucked out once again! We`re best friends already. She has almost 9 months in the mission and is pure power. We`re going to be baptizing up a storm over here, I just know it! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The sector isn`t as pretty as Chorrillos. No ocean view :( ... But I love it. Half of it is just pure apartment buildings so even after being here for 3 days I`m still way confused about how to get around and where everyone lives. One of these days I`m going to count how many stairs we climb every day. I feel like half the day we`re just going up and down stairs looking for apartments. And that`s totally fine, because I`m just so happy to be here and to be a missionary. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The ward is awesome. It`s weird going from a branch of 50 people to a ward with 125 people attending. I have A LOT of names to learn! But everyone is really nice so I`m happy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Funny story: My first lunch here, we were talking about ways to clear up your skin or something with the Hermana and she says, ' what I do that works really awesome is I drink my pee. I thought I miss heard her, but nope that`s what she said!!! Then she just goes on about how good it is for you to drink your own pee. Bahahahahahahaha!!! It`s really not that funny but it`s just the way she was telling us, like she was drinking a natural fruit juice or something. But then she says, ' yeah but I don`t do it anymore, I stopped. I was like ok, que bueno, but then she says, but not because it grossed me out. And I honestly can`t tell you why she stopped because I got hung up on the it`s not because I was grossed out part. Oh man. Honestly nothing that comes out of Chileans mouths is surprising anymore haha.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Our investigador here Tito, came to church!!! He works during the night, 11 pm to 7am, but he still came to church at 10! It`s a miracle! He has a baptismal date for the 24th! I really hope that he follows through strong with the fecha. It would be the best birthday gift to have a baptism on my birthday! Keep good ole Tito in your prayers :)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> Those are basically the highlights of my week...... I hope next week at this time I understand the sector a little better and am not totally lost still. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you have a great week! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">les amo</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span> </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Hansen, Herminia and Samantha</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This lady named AnaMaria made Samantha this cake</span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-41445766052787341672015-05-07T14:08:00.002-07:002015-07-17T13:56:24.114-07:00Oh FLEAcidad!!!!!!!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">May 4, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Holllllllaaaaaaaaaaa!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope this letter finds you safe and well and with not too many bee stings. I`m definitely preparing myself for some awesome corn bread and honey this Fall! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week wasn`t all that eventful. Although I did get my haircut! Just the ends though so you can`t really tell but it was fun. We went to a lady in our branch who cuts hair here in the centro. She`s so awesome. Her name is Norfa. And when it was all finished and we tried to pay her she wouldn't accept our money. And we were like no, Hermana, let us pay and she was like Hermanas I went to the temple and I made a promise with God that I would always share my time and talents with others. You guys are here, far from your homes and you`re not paid and are making a big difference in the lives of others. I can`t take your money. I was like wow. It was really humbling to see someone so firm on their temple covenants. Norfa is so awesome. I walked out of that peluquera feeling great in my heart AND about my hair. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> Funny story... So basically I have the most delicious blood in the world or something because the fleas just eat me to death. There is nothing I can do, I`ve tried a bunch of things and I always just itch from all the bites. Fun fact the other week I had 103 bites just around my torso! I literally looked like I had a rash or something. Fun stuff right? So anyway we`re in a lesson and I`m itching the 5 bites on my arm and the Hermana says ' do you have bites? And I tell her the fleas just eat me and she says ' well you need to put rubbing alcohol on them and so I said ok I`ll do that. Next thing I know, we`re talking about the priesthood and she comes out with this huge bottle of rubbing alcohol and says, ' let me see your arm. And I'm like what?? She says, ' give me your arm. So I give her my arm and she just pours all this rubbing alcohol over my arm and just starts rubbing it all over. It`s literally dripping all over her couch and everything. Then she says, ' ok now your other and I say, ' no I'm ok thank you and she says, ' give me your other arm so I give her my other arm and she does the same thing. Then she says, ' I saw you itching your ankles too and just starts putting rubbing alcohol all over my ankles and then she was like do you have bites on your legs too and at that point I was like NO NO NO. I`m good there, thank you so much and she just looks at me and laughs and is like ok. So then I`m sitting there almost dripping with rubbing alcohol and my companion looks at me and is like wow that smells really strong and I'm thinking, yeah, I know. So then I have to go through the rest of the night smelling very strongly of rubbing alcohol. But you know what, I didn`t itch after that so that was good. My gosh though, Chileans are crazy sometimes.... haha, but you gotta love it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">One day this week, all of our citas (appointments) fell through and we were walking around contacting people and trying to find someone to teach. As we were walking we had this guy stop by us in the street in his pick up and he asks, ' do you guys have that one book you talk about and we say, The Book of Mormon??? and he`s like yeah! Can you give it to me, I want to read Enos. And we say, sure, are you a member and he says, ' no, but I have a friend who`s talked to me a lot about it, thank you! and then he just drove off before we could get his information to go visit him or something. But that was a cool little miracle, that he was searching for the Book of Mormon and he just happened to find us walking there.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">A little later we were walking in front of the university that is in our sector and as we were walking by a guy stopped us and says, ' hey are you guys elders? And we were like, well almost. And he said, ' I have a friend that is on the mission and he writes me every Monday. He told me that I should read this book that you guys have, do you have one? And we were like, yeah we do! And we gave him a Book of Mormon! And he says, ' wow thank you so much, I`ve been looking for the missionaries where I live for 2 weeks and have never seen them, I`m so glad that I could find you guys! We asked him if he wanted us to give his direction to the missionaries there so they could visit him and answer his questions about the book and he said that his family is really catholic so he would rather this be a secret, but thanks so much! And then he went away. That day, even though we didn`t teach any lessons, which is something really rare here, I still feel like we were able to be the answer to people`s prayers and were able to help people come closer to Christ by giving them the Book of Mormon. It was just another testament to me that people are really looking for answers and are really looking for what we have. Even if they aren`t ready to commit themselves to baptism, they at least want to know more, they want the security that there is more and God is leading them to where they will find the answers that matter, in His church and in the Book of Mormon. I love missionary work so much!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I contacted this one guy and he asked us where we were from and I told him that I was from California in the US and he asked what part and I told him close to San Diego and he tells us that he has a sister living there and so I asked him what part and he said Escondido! haha I was like really, what`s her name and he said it was Cindy. So if you happen to run into a Chilean Cindy in Escondido, I contacted her brother. He didn`t want anything, He believes in Taoism, but he does make really awesome banana bread which he was selling there on the side walk.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Yesterday, Gabriela FINALLY received a calling!!!! She`s Young Womens Secretary!!! I was so happy! It`s so perfect for her! It`s so cool to be able to look back at where she was when I met her, smoking, not sure about baptism and all that to how she is now.... baptized, coming to church and secretary of the young womens! It makes me want to cry of joy just thinking about all of her progress!!! She`s not perfect, but she`s getting there and she`s trying and she really has changed! Which is totally the point of the gospel, so we can change and become better. She`s definitely doing that and I am just so proud of her!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I also got a letter from one of my converts Ignacio from Limache. He told me that he was able to baptize someone and that he went to the temple and did the work for his grandpa and he felt the spirit so strong doing it!!! It was the coolest thing ever being able to read about his experiences! Really the gospel is just so amazing. I don`t know how to put it into words. You know, it`s like you go on a mission hoping that you can help someone feel a little bit of the love and joy that the gospel has brought into your life and you then get to hear that the people have been able to feel the same love and the same joy and the same spirit as you have, it`s just SO AMAZING. It makes every single flea bite more than worth it! I really wish I could communicate the joy it fills me with. I know the gospel is true because I feel it and I get to hear the testimony of others who I meet on the street one day and then now they feel it too. It is just SO AWESOME!!!!! I love the gospel, I love being a missionary, I love Chile, I`m so happy I could even say that I love fleas. Maybe I`m crazy. But I just love it all so much. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I`m so excited to be able to talk to you guys on Sunday! Have a great week!!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo de mi amor,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">oh and... </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">May the fourth be with you, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Samantha with her companion Hermana Hansen and some Elders from her district</span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Samantha with her companion Hermana Hansen and some other Hermanas</span></td></tr>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-79071212783367196252015-04-30T12:50:00.001-07:002015-04-30T13:08:21.223-07:00Preach My Chicken Wings<div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1430423100203_2998">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">April 27, 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Helllloooooo family</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">How the weeks are just flying. I worry that I won`t have anything to say to you guys because the time just goes by so fast, but I will rack my brain so I can share something practically interesting. (I hope) </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So on Monday we went and taught Barbara. I´m so sorry but I can never remember what I told you guys the weeks before or who I talked about so I`ll just explain again real quick. She is living with a menos activa family that are helping her leave the drugs. She`s like really receptive and just awesome and she`s 15. Anyway we taught about the word of wisdom and she was like well I smoke a pack of cigarettes every day and I can`t try to quit right now because I`m quitting drugs and that `s a lot at once. We totally understood, that would be way hard. So we`re like dang it, she`s going to be a long process but that`s fine. So then we went on Monday and taught her and she was sick so we taught her in her room while she was in bed. She goes, you know I`ve come to a decision. And we`re like oh noo.. and she says, I`m not going to.. and we`re just like no no no don`t leave us! ...smoke anymore. WHAT??? we`re like wait what, seriously??? And she says, being sick I just can`t breath, I have to always sit up straight, sleep sitting up because my lungs can`t breath when I lay down right now and I don`t like not being able to have control over my body so I`m not going to smoke. (Back ground info: She hadn`t gone to church the week before because she was sick.. God works in interesting ways) So that was a total miracle!! But then she didn`t come to church yesterday because she told her cousin she`d go listen to him play some musical instrument in his church. Dang it! I should have told her that I`ll be playing the piano at ours!! Gahhhh! Yeah ok next week next week....</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week we also have the ummmm.. honor? of doing the stand. Ok so to be honest doing the stand kinda sucks because it`s so heavy and you have to transport it down to the plaza with public transportation and then set it up and the stand broke weeks ago so our zone leaders jimmy rigged it using pvc pipes so it`s verging on ghetto and everyone just laughs at the gringas trying to set it up or take it down. BUT once you finally get it up and are there doing it, it`s great. We stand there and contact people walking by. Mostly they want nothing to do with us, they`re all in a hurry to get somewhere or other, so it ends up being a lot of smiling and saying hola, buenas, over and over a thousand times. Over the time of standing there I noticed that no one ever walks by smiling. Everyone is frowning and looks sad. We started doing a smiling count and the first day we got 6 and it was because they were walking and talking with a friend. BUT when we said hi to them, they always at least smirked, but most smiled, and some even said hi back! I realized that the world really just needs a smile sometimes. That really a smile can make so much of a difference. It was awesome to be able to see people looking really sad or grumpy change to smile. Their entire face just changed in an instant! A lot of people even would turn around after they passed us to say hi, because they didn`t realize at first that we were talking to them. And most of the people that came over to talk to us, didn`t want anything to do with learning more about Christ but just wanted to thank us for what we were doing because they recognized that what we were doing was something good. It`s really sad to think that doing good has become such a rare thing in modern day society. But people need good in their lives. They really feel the lack of it in their life. Even though the time we spent doing the stand didn`t leave us with many good contacts to be able to teach, I felt awesome that we could make a difference. I know that they passed by feeling better and really that`s the essence of not only missionary work, but the entire gospel of Jesus Christ. Making ourselves and others just feel good. That`s honestly what made me want to serve a mission, because the gospel makes me feel good. It makes me happy. And that`s the reason most people end up getting baptized. Because they just feel good about it. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Funny story of the week. Doing the stand a lady stopped to talk to us because we`re gringas and we tried to give her a pass a long card and on the bottom of the card are little pictures of random people smiling on the bottom and she looks at it and she says, you guys aren`t on the card and we`re like well no. and she hands the card back and she says, I want one with pictures of you guys and we`re like well we dont`have one and so then she just walks away hahaha. Also I said hi to this random girl walking by and she took off running... Literally people ran away from us! hahahahaha the joys of missionary work. I love it so much!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">But that`s about it for this exciting week! I hope you all can do something small to make someone turn their frown upside down! You`ll feel good, they`ll feel good, everyone wins! Also you`ll look a lot prettier :) </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you all, have a great week! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-50013376662990549102015-04-20T15:53:00.002-07:002015-04-20T18:27:22.645-07:00Moses And His Crazy Dreams!!!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">April 20, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia mia!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Como estan??? Espero que todo este bien allá y que esten disfrutando la primavera.... Ok English transition because I'm pretty sure dad is the only one that understands this right now....... I`m being kind to the rest of you. :)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was wonderful. I don`t think there will ever be any real complaints. I was thinking about it the other day and being on the mission is literally the greatest thing anyone could ever do. It`s seriously this huge break from the world and from temptations and really everything. I don`t know. Even though you spend all day worried about the salvation of other people you just feel good because at least your doing your part. I love that feeling of peace and satisfaction. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week we met this woman named Jeanette. She is basically pure gold. We met her husband the previous week as he drove us in his collectivo. Turns out he`s a menos activo that just moved here from Santiago. We passed by his house and met his wife Jeanette. She is so awesome. She`s a mom with little kids and she believes in God and everything and just wants the best for them. Honestly we didn`t do anything special, we just talked about how the gospel provides a refuge for the family and she just loved everything. When we gave her the Book of Mormon she said, you`re giving me your book!? I don`t have any books here! Wow, you passed yourselves up. Thank you I just feel so good and relaxed now! We were thinking, ' wow you are just pure gold'. Then a few days later we were walking down the hill and we see her standing on the side and we start talking to her and she tells us she locked her keys in the house so she's waiting to see if her husband drives by so she can get his spare. I offer her to use our phone and call him and she was so surprised!!! I was thinking, oh my gosh God loves us too much because what are the chances of us happening to walk down that street to be able to help her. It`s funny how things work out like that. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then ok, funny story..... We`re at Herminia`s house, she`s this 80 year old woman who is REALLY funny because she is so sarcastic and says everything on her mind. We literally just crack up at all the comments she has about everyone..... So we`re there right and she makes us herbal tea to take. So she has me pour the water out of the huge thermos thing and I pour it in my cup and it`s cold. It`s straight cold. I try to keep myself under control and I look at my companion and I`m like do you want some too and then I just couldn`t help myself and I just bust out laughing and Hermana Hansen totally knows what`s going on and she says, yeah, I'd love some and we`re just laughing and Herminia asks what is so funny so I just cover and I tell her, ' I'm so sorry, I just spilt water on my skirt and now I feel embarrassed so it made me laugh and she says, ' oh did it burn you?? And then we just have a laugh attack and I tell her no, I'm just embarrassed and Herminia says, 'these crazy gringas' and just starts laughing at us hahahaha. oh man, it was SO FUNNY! You had to be there!!!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">On Friday I had intercambios and got to go to Agua Santa which is down in Viña and it`s a pretty wealthy neighborhood. It`s really, really pretty! We did service for this family (We literally swept the street in front of their house. The street. Why? No clue. Cars literally will drive on it all the time but it`s fine service is service.) But while we were there the lady`s sister and brother in law arrived and she says, I'm so sorry hermanas but I need to attend them. When we finish we go back to the house and the hermana tells us that her dad just died in the U.S but in the U.S they aren`t listed as his children so they have no way to receive all the stuff he left behind. Then she just breaks down crying and is like I don`t know where my dad is. He never got baptized. And just looks at me and says, ' where is he?? Is he suffering? Tell me how he is?? (She`s a menos activa so she doesn`t really remember the plan of salvation). It was so cool to be able to testify of the atonement of Christ and the plan God has for families and that I could assure her with all my heart that they would be together again. Then her sister, who is an active member, hugs her and starts to comfort her and they both start crying. Then the sister says, hey hey, dad is ok. I know that he is ok. You can go and do his work in the temples. This is why there is that work. He is fine, we`re going to be together as a family again. Just pray. The prayers of the righteous are always listened too, they really make a difference. It was so so special for me to be able to see this family, really applying the gospel in their life and finding peace that surpasses understanding in the simple truths that they feel inside are true. It was so beautiful just to see them there hugging. It was again one of those moments where you`re just like, ' wow, The gospel is so awesome. I`m so grateful for the knowledge we have. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then a little later we found a menos activa who is a return missionary and who has a 9 year old son who`s not a member. We taught the son a simple lesson about how to pray and then we asked him if he wanted to say the closing prayer but he got shy suddenly so the mom said it. I think it was one of the first times they`d prayed in a long time because she got really emotional and started crying. When we opened our eyes we could see that the son was crying too. I asked him how he felt and he said really good. and I explained that feeling is how he can know that God listens to his prayers and the prayers of his mom. He said he was going to pray every day now. It was another super beautiful moment to see how through a simple prayer they could feel the spirit together and it was so strong. They received an answer right in that moment that God does know who they are and that he loves them, even if they hadn`t prayed in a really long time, God was still there, waiting and ready to let them know that He loves them. I really just love being a missionary and just being able to be there to witness such tender moments. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We also met a guy named Pollo this week. That`s really his name. I invited him to be baptized and he looked me straight in the eye and said no!.... You win some and you lose some. Although I think I still win because my name isn`t chicken.! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then we met this guy yesterday. We went in and he started telling us about his experiences and beliefs with God. We thought he was crazy. He started telling us that he knows how to see things and connect with spirits and he was like touch my hand and I can show you what I see. I can show you God. And he tells us if we really wanted to know our spirit, he could help us know our inner spirit. Basically at this point were like yeah we don`t want anything to do with this witchcraft crazy stuff and so we were going to leave but he asked why we`re called Mormons and we tell him that actually we`re the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.... and he says oh wow you guys have that big church in Santiago (referring to the temple) and then he tells us that he had a dream about that place and how he went in. And we`re like wow that`s cool, but then the subject changed somehow and we ended up talking a little about the Book of Mormon and so we gave one to him and then he says, ' wow, my girlfriend and I prayed yesterday that we could receive a book full of truth and now you guys are here and you`re giving us this book. And we`re like wow. Literal answer to his prayer. Ok that`s super cool. And then I asked him about his dream. And he says, ' I went in the temple and I went down to the basement and there was a man with lots of books and he was taking all the best parts of all the books and writing it and putting it all together into one book. Then we were like what. the. heck. And we explained about Mormon and how the Book of Mormon came to be. And he says, ' are you serious?? that`s like my dream. And we all just had a moment of silence. So basically the guy went from this crazy, to maybe a future apostle or something...ha ha.. He told us that he knows really well how to feel if something is good or something is bad... Gift Of Discernment. ...So he`s definitely going to read it and get baptized. I don`t know, we gotta invite him next week, yesterday just wasn`t the moment. Oh yeah, and his name is Moses. Need I say more? I`m really excited to go back next week to see what happens!! Like seriously what the heck.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So yeah it was a great week! I`m happy, I`m warm (Chile thinks it`s Summer still or something), I`m healthy, I`m a missionary. All is good. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-48359738266430206422015-04-16T20:17:00.003-07:002015-04-16T21:02:16.721-07:00Miracles!!!!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">April 13, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hello family!!!! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you all had a great week! The weeks feel like they are just flying! Does it feel the same for you guys too? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was great, here are some of the highlights:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We had interviews with President. This was the first time that I was not totally nervous before. I just really, really, really love President Kahnlein. He is so amazing. The spirit that he has with him is so strong. I love that I can know that he would never do anything against the will of God and that He follows the Savior and the promptings in every way. He has taught me so much by his example. When he talks to you it just love. It also was my last interview with him as they are finishing their mission in July so the next interview I have will be with the new mission president. I`m just so grateful for Pres. Kahnlein and everything he and his wife have done and do. Seriously, they are just the best. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then we found a menos active (less active member). Really it`s not that surprising knocking on a door or stopping to talk with some random person in the street and they`re like oh actually I`m Mormon, I got baptized years ago, I just never go. Literally a third of the Chilean population have been baptized in the church. Does a third of the population come to church?? that`s a completely different story. Anyway so we go into the lesson with this less active member and her son is there and he`s in his 20's and is being all mopey and anti social because I guess he`s sick. So then this girl comes over who`s his friend or something and they set up this IV right there at the dining room table and hook him up to it! I`m like ok what the heck is going on! The mom is like oh just be careful. I guess they`re studying in this 2 year medical course in school or something. And then so we`re just talking and getting to know them and as we go to share a scripture the kid just totally passes out so the mom is freaking out, he`s hooked up to this ghetto IV, seeing the kid pass out makes me feel all queasy inside so I`m praying not to throw up. Then as he comes back to consciousness, he thtows up. Awesome. So obviously the spirit just wasn`t going to be in that lesson. We finish it up and leave and put a cita (appointment) to come back this week. She said she`s going to give us once! So I`m down.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The other day, Friday was just a miracle day. We hadn`t really had a lot of luck the other days of the week and Friday was intercambios. So I stayed in my sector and had another hermana come and work with me there. We didn`t have any citas, Ok lie, we did, but they all fell through... so basically we didn`t. And I was like no, we`re going to make this a day of miracles! We are literally going to talk with every single person we see and we are going to find new investigadors. The first person I see after that is this kinda sketchy looking guy.. but I didn`t care, he`s a child of God too. So I start talking to him and he stops and is interested. Then he realizes that I`m talking about religion and I try to give him a pass a long card. He`s like oh no thanks and then tries to keep walking and I say, wait, why not?? And he just looks at me with his crazzzy hair and says because I`m Jesus Christ. hahaha Ok.... well then I totally understand because in that case you clearly wouldn`t need this then. People are just crazy. So then we start contacting on a street that we hadn`t contacted yet. We found a menos activo after a few rejections. She was open to us coming back another day AND she has two teenagers that aren`t members! SCORE! Then a few doors down we find ourselves with Nicholas. Who`s just great. At first he said that he actually doesn't believe in God, he just believes in himself and that he can do the things with his own strength and that he can help others. I said, that`s great but what happens when we have moments of weakness or when things happen in our lives that we just can`t control. Where do you find hope and strength then? That made him think, so we shared a scripture in The Book of Mormon in Ether about weaknesses being made strong in Christ and he loved it. Then he said, you know, just today I was thinking that I need to find a way to heal myself and just clean myself of my past.... That is seriously music to missionaries ears! So obviously we talked to him about baptism and invited him to be baptized. (That is seriously my absolute favorite thing to do as a missionary, inviting people to be baptized in contacts on the street. I love the power of the calling) And he said he would actually love to do that, but didn't feel ready for it. Anyway turns out that he didn`t live there, he lives in the Elders sector. So we got his address and passed it to those lucky elders. Then a few doors down from him an atheist answered the door. Doesn`t believe in anything. It was so cool, we just straight shared our testimonies that God DOES exist and that he does love us and that through his plan our families CAN be together forever! And you know what, he didn`t close the door. He listened. He commented, we testified, shared a scripture from the Book of Mormon, and he listened. and slowly you could just see a change in his face. Slowly. He really wanted to believe that what we were saying was true. And he let us put a cita to come back. That`s my other favorite thing about being a missionary. I`ve learned that success doesn`t come in how many baptisms you have or how many investigadors you have coming to church, but it`s in the number of hearts that you can touch and about making people be able to feel the spirit of God telling them that what they are hearing is true. People don`t always follow those feelings, but if I can get someone to feel that, I feel like I am completing my duty as a missionary and I just LOVE IT!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Anyway I`ve run out of time now so I have to go, but I hope you have a great week! Think of someone you can share a part of your testimony with, even if they don`t believe in God, you never know who`s heart you will be able to touch. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you all so much!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">A dead tarantula on the road!</span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-26334380685906399382015-04-09T09:02:00.001-07:002015-04-16T20:57:14.440-07:00The Empty Tomb<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">April 6, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hellloooo my wonderful family!! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you guys so much! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was amazing. I just feel so happy to be a missionary ALL THE TIME: It´s literally the very best. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week started out interesting. I had intercambios so this time I went to another area to work with one of the Hermanas there. We go to lunch and it´s with this cooky old lady. We enter the house and it was all almost normal, with just little details off... She had this tree in the corner but with huge pears growing off it and the pillows rested above the couch not on it and there was this huge old horse tapestry hanging on the wall. I felt like I was in an Alice in Wonderland house or something. Then we sit down at this huge table and there was only two places set. She tells us to start eating and then just leaves us. Super weird... But it was fine, the salad tasted good and everything. Then I go to take a drink of what looks like apple juice or something. BLAH! I don´t even know. We were like what the heck is this??? My guess was weed water. It tasted like she´d watered her plants outside and then served us the water that came out the other side of the window box or something. So when she came in to give us the soup course I asked her what kind of drink it was. She´s like oh it´s agua de hierbas, I can´t stand normal water... I WAS RIGHT! WEED WATER! When she left we almost busted out laughing. Then she brings out the lunch... It looked like rice with beef cooked with vegetables. One of my favorite things to eat here so I was totally down. But then as we were eating, my companion was like, what kind of meat is this? I´m like beef? And she´s like I don´t know.. it tastes kind of sweet and the texture is kind of off.. I realized she was right. We´re like what the heck are we eating. My companion got a little freaked out because she thought it was horse meat. But we just kept eating it and I pretended it was beef, even though it didn´t taste like it should. So then when the lady came back, I asked her what kind of meat it was and she looks at me kind of funny and she´s like it´s kidney. I´m like OH! KIDNEY! Wow, and then I told her that it was really good because I felt awkward and didn´t know what else to say. She was like of course it is, that´s why I make it. So yeah. I ate kidney. Honestly it wasn´t as bad as it sounds. But still.... I´m not down to eat it again. But then listen to this! So I was telling another member back in my branch about the kidney lunch and how my companion thought it was horse meat but it was really kidney and I was grateful that it at least wasn't horse. And the lady was like well you know the meat you eat in chorasscos or hamburgers from the little local places? That´s usually horse. So basically I´ve been eating horse meat too and didn´t even know it. The joys of living in Chile right?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">To answer your questions about Teresa. She´s really sick. We saw her only one time and she´s lost a lot more weight, which I didn´t think was possible, she was already SO thin and she has less hair. We´ve passed by a lot more but she just can´t get out of bed to answer the door or isn´t home. I´m super worried about her. Please please please keep her in your prayers. We don´t really know what to do, but we´re going to keep passing by and seeing if we can help.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Olga is just a disaster right now. We taught her again and she seemed like she was getting over what happened and then we invited her to be baptized again and she was like well what good is baptism going to do be if I´m not going to go to church again... Ah! She´s a prideful old woman that just can´t forgive or understand. It´s really sad. Really really sad that she´s letting something so small prevent her from all the glorious blessings of the gospel. We´re going to try to pass by with our mission leader so he can talk to her, but I think that we´re going to have to leave her.. So sad.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This past weekend has just been spiritual overload down here and I´ve loved every second. We had our leader counsel with Presidente on Friday who actually talked about a lot of what they talked about at conference. Chastity and humility. I was so sure, SO SURE, that he was going to be called as a general authority. He´s always so aligned with everything! Next year though, I´m telling you! And then of course GENERAL CONFERENCE!!! Which of course I just loved! Did it seem weird to anyone else though that President Monson didn´t open or close the conference?? I really hope that he´s doing ok. My favorite talks were the guy that talked about dancing and music. Do you know how to dance? Can you teach me to dance? Dancing without music is both awkward and unfulfilling hahaha that part made me laugh. I loved though how he said that learning the dance steps takes discipline but the joy of dance comes when we hear the music and it becomes something natural. It was just a great analogy all around! Also though my number one favorite of them all was the one by Kevin W. Pearson!! I loved it! It reminded me alot of the talk from last conference by Jorg. To hang in there is not a principle of the gospel. We gotta stay by the tree! There was just a lot of good one liners there. And of course my homie Elder Holland delivered as usual. It was just a great Easter weekend.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">It´s funny how Easter really isn´t that big of a thing here like it is in the States. But I will say it was totally weird to see people walking around with big crosses on their back on Friday.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Hansen and I colored eggs! We made eggs for all the missionaries in our zone since we´re all basically gringos. It was so funny how excited everyone got! They all took selfies with their eggs haha! I think if the whole college thing doesn´t seem to go my way I´ll become the Easter bunny because it felt good to make everyone so happy with a simple egg. (But don´t worry, that college thing will totally work out). I loved what Elder Holland said about Easter. That it is the most sacred day of the year for a special remembrance of Brotherly hands that saved us.... And what Uchtdorf said, that on that day our lives changed forever. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">These past days I´ve been reflecting a lot on how grateful I am for Jesus Christ and for His sacrifice for us and how absolutely amazing it is and how little I really understand or can comprehend all of it. I´ll never ever understand all that Christ went through and the love that he has and how the spirit gives me, as Elder Cook put it so perfectly, a peace that surpasses all understanding. It makes me just want to live in such a way that I can return to Him and thank Him!. He lives. He is a perfect resurrected being. Although He is perfect in every way, shape and form, He loves us so that He chooses to wear His scars, so that one day we´ll never have to wear ours. It´s amazing the plan God has for us. It really gives me an eternal perspective. I know what is most important and that is, returning to live with Him as a family. That empty tomb makes it all possible. We always have an opportunity more to try again. Oh it is wonderful! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you all have a great week! I love you all so much! Thank you for everything!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Samantha and her companion, Haley Hansen</span></span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-83108335275284481292015-04-09T07:40:00.000-07:002015-04-09T08:59:01.554-07:00Let The Thunder Roll<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">March 30, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Helllllloooo mi familia!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">HAPPY BIRTHDAY MAMITA!"!!!! So glad you got the letter in time!! I`m glad you had a great day!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Crazy it`s Spring break there for you guys! My sence of time is just gone now haha.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok so first things first, we had cambios this past week and.......... drum roll please!.......... I stayed!!!!!! In Chorrillos! With Hermana Hansen!! So now we`ll be companions until May! Crazy! I totally thought I was going to leave because we already had 2 cambios together and I`ve never had anymore than 3 cambios in an area but hey, not this time! I`m actually really happy about it all! And now we`re no longer in a trio. Hermana Huaccha went to one of the areas that we do intercambios with and is in a trio there now so we`ll still see her and work with her. So it`s all good!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok so crazy. Tuesday night we`re sleeping and we just start hearing all this rumbling. I just assumed it was earthquakes because there`s always earthquakes here and so I just rolled over and kept sleeping. But we kept hearing them. So the Hermana got up (we`re still in a trio at this point) and was like oh my gosh! (ok she didn`t say that exactly, I mean she speaks Spanish) but we got up to see what was going on and there was a huge lightning storm! It was her first time seeing lighting so she was kinda freaked out but I just thought it was cool! The best part was that our view from the window is of the ocean so we got to see the lightning going into the ocean!! Way cool. Totally bummed that my groggy 5 in the morning brain didn`t think to go get my camera.. oh well.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week we were in charge of doing the </span><a href="http://mormon.org/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">mormon.org</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> stand. Ok so first the stand is just the worst. It`s super heavy and transporting it on public locomotion and walking with it.... it`s a nightmare. Also we`re always full with appointments so it`s just an inconvenience sometimes. I should probably have a better attitude... So finally we suck it up and go down and do it and guess what happens. It rains!!!! It just straight starts pouring down rain!!! hahahaha it was one of those moments when you just have to laugh. Like that totally would happen. It never rains here this time of year. Although it was way funny seeing how everyone gets way freaked out when there was thunder, which also doesn`t happen here. But these nice hippie people helped us move everything under a tree so we could take the freakin stand apart. So see, even in the rain and with the stand there`s blessings!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The cutest thing ever happened.... We were contacting a house and this little boy was out front. The mom was busy but was very nice and told us to come back the next week. Then this cute little boy who wears goggle glasses and talks like a little cartoon character tells me I have the prettiest smile he`s ever seen and that I have really white teeth! hahahaha so cute!!! He made me feel like a Disney princess for the rest of the day!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week I was asked to play piano for a funeral. The mom of our lider misional`s wife died. She was really old and was really sick. She couldn`t talk or move or do anything so it was sad, but at least she`s not suffering. I just played hymns and the people gave really pretty testimonies of the plan of salvation. I walked away feeling really really really grateful for the knowledge that we have of God`s plan and the eternal perspective it gives us. The gospel really can bring us hope and joy even in the most darkest times. I`m so so so grateful for that and that this is the message that we get to share everyday.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We put on a branch activity. We did a minute it to win it kind of thing! It was way way super fun! Everyone got really competitive. We just basically had them do a bunch of funny games. Even sweet Nora was participating. Everyone really like it, so that felt really good!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We started talking with Gabriela`s brother this week. He was listening to the missionaries before but he has a terrible drinking problem. He told us that he wants to change and that he wants to be baptized and everything but doesn't think he could give up drinking permanently. We got to talk about the power of the atonement and repentance and how we`re here to progress and not be perfectly perfect. I know that he`s going to get baptized, I just don`t know if it`s his time yet. He didn`t come to church Sunday....But you know who did?? DAVID! He`s that old man that always talks about the time he died but then came back to life.... He came on his own! And then we ended up teaching gospel principles class 2nd hour and we invited him to be baptized right then and he said yes! What a great blessing!!! So I hope everything works out there!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> That`s about it for the highlights of the week! Everything is great here! I think Viña is one of the greatest places ever! I love everything and I feel so grateful for everything I`m able to see and learn and experience. Literally I feel like I personally do nothing, but I get to watch the spirit in action every day, touch the hearts of the people and see them slowly change. It`s just the best!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you guys have an awesome week!!!!!!!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">This is what the mission president wrote to the girls:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The first two he sent to hermana hansen, the bottom two to me! YES! (A 7 in chile is like a A plus!)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hicieron excelentemente bien su trabajo, thanks!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana, gracias por todo el trabajo para ayudarla, lo hicieron de 7!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #e7e6e2; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.89px;"><br /><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span id="yui_3_16_0_1_1428590169489_4892" style="background-color: #e7e6e2; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.89px;">PD: Gracias por ayudarla a cambiar, yo puedo ver el cambio!</span></span></div>
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<span id="yui_3_16_0_1_1428590169489_4901" style="background-color: #e7e6e2; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.89px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">PD: Hermana, ustedes son Celestiales, una bendición para esta Misión, se que cambiaron el corazón de Hna Huaccha.</span></span><span style="background-color: #e7e6e2; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.89px;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: #e7e6e2; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.89px;"><br /><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"></span></span></div>
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<span id="yui_3_16_0_1_1428590169489_4895" style="background-color: #e7e6e2; color: #666666; font-family: Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16.89px;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I don`t have time to translate it, sorry! But google translate it, or ask dad! haha love you!</span></span></div>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-50507786308219790762015-03-25T19:13:00.005-07:002015-04-09T07:35:51.027-07:00All Day In The Street, Just Like The Dogs!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">March 23, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was great! But the work was a little slower. I don`t really know what happened but no one was home.... </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">As for being in a trio, it`s not as bad as I thought it was going to be. I actually don`t mind it that much. More friends! And the Hermana is a good missionary, she just made a lot of dumb decisions but she told us about it and is repentant of it all. I think we were able to help her and I`m grateful for the opportunity because it helped me learn a lot too.... Cambios are on Wednesday so we`ll see what`ll happen.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> Last week we got a reference from a menos activa who just took in 2 kids. She told us she wants them to get baptized, so you know, we`re down to help. We taught them and they`re great. Pretty ¨flite¨ (fly-te) as they say here, which is like ghetto? I don`t know, that sounds kinda bad but that`s about as close as we`ll get... Matias has 13 years and Barbara has 15. They`re into drugs and all that. The Hermana told us that Matias has been in the drugs since he was little. That just made my stomach drop because I`m like he`s 13! That`s little! They want to change though or at least find a way to have a better life than what they have right now. They`re good kids. I just think they grew up in a home where they were never taught how to make good decisions. It`s really sad, but at the same time it makes me more excited to teach them about the gospel of Jesus Christ because I know that is the only thing that can help them overcome these problems for good. It`s also cool because it`s a menos activa that`s initiating all of it. She shared her testimony of the Book of Mormon and it was really pretty. I think it`s awesome how even though she`not the most faithful member, she wants to help these kids in the best way she knows and it`s through the gospel. I think this will be a great experience for all of them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Tuesday was crazy! The assistants call us way late Monday night and tell us that the Hermana in our trio needs to be in Achupallas at 8 in the morning for her zone conference (we already had ours). We have no clue how to get there and we honestly relied straight on prayer and faith because no one really knew how to help us either. We finally got there to drop her off but it was so stressful. Then we had to return to pick her up in the afternoon. And the transportation here is so bad. I think we traveled about 7 hours in total just to go to the area next to Viña. AH! But it`s fine. I think the bus drivers don`t realize that they`re bus drivers and not the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland but it makes it all a little more fun right?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We`ve been visiting Teresa. She has just about all her lessons now! But she`s really sick. The medicine that she`s taking just makes her weaker and she wasn`t able to come to church yesterday because it makes her tired. It`s sad because she loves coming to church but since she missed it the last week it was like the excitement about it died down and then she didn`t come again yesterday. I`m sure it`ll all be fine and I know that she`ll get baptized at some point but it just worries me still because you never know what`ll happen. She said though that tomorrow she has an appointment and she should be getting different medicine so I hope that helps and she`ll be able to come to church.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Olga didn`t come to church either. So weird, so I guess her son drove her by during sacrament and there was a Hermana from church by the door and she gave the Hermana her books and said that she`s not going to be able to come anymore but she still wants us to visit her. I don`t know what happened, but I want to know what whoever said to her to make her not want to come to church. She`s not sick, she`s just old. But so is everyone here so that`s not even a good excuse. Ah! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Sometimes I really just feel like we`re fighting against the adversary here. He always has to get in the way and mess things up. I know, opposition in all things, but it just gets frustrating sometimes when the people are progressing so well. We`ll see what happens this week tho. I hope everything will work out. Well ok,.... I know everything will work out in the end.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Saturday was like the longest day of my life. Literally no one was home, or in the streets. We spent the whole day in the streets, just like the dogs. We passed by investigadores, future investigadores, menos activos, recent converts, everyone. Nothing. We did do the </span><a href="http://mormon.org/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">mormon.org</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> stand in the plaza which was fun. We were able to give 3 Book of Mormons. I also received a wedding proposal from a crazy man, and then a lady came over and literally talked to me non stop for more than a half hour. I know just about every detail of her life down to her favorite perfume, her last grocery store receipt, and how she likes her oatmeal in the morning (she soaks it in milk overnight and then eats it with strawberries in the morning. She highly recommends it.) It`s so funny how the Chileans literally will just start telling you their life story in the street.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then in the night we were out in the street again. We contacted this man in the last 10 minutes before we had to be back at our apartment who is awesome though! He doesn`t live in our sector but is really interested and I just felt really good about him. Just finding him made it totally worth walking through the streets for hours. Honestly, being a missionary is the best.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">That`s about it, this week wasn`t too eventful. Which means this next week is going to be crazy. That always seems to happen so we`ll see.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you all and think of you often. You`re always in my prayers!!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">XOXO</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Gossip Girl</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Just kidding..</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Thiare wearing the girls' nametags</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Samantha with new hair do</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Samantha and Thiare</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Samantha's district</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"> <span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">zone conference</span> </td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Thiare doing hair</span></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Huaccha</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Sister Huaccha, Samantha and Sister Hansen</span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-40576615981905961672015-03-16T22:39:00.000-07:002015-07-17T13:58:55.715-07:00Old People Just Make Everything Great!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">March 16, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hollaaa familliaaa! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was awesome! We had our zone conference with Presidente and we got to watch Meet the Mormons! It was SO GOOD!!!!!! Afterword I was like wow! I want to be Mormon! They`re the greatest!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">It was so cute, they had this huge projector set up on the stage on then chairs lined up in front with juice and popcorn on every seat. It was just like being in the movie theater! I`d forgotten how fun it was to go to the movies. Our president is the best! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then Friday as we were getting ready to leave to have intercambios we got a call from one of the assistants telling us that at 3 we have to go to the office to pick up a hermana that was going to be in a trio with us. He didn`t know any other information. We`re the hermanas that live closest to the office so if there`s a hermana that is going home early she usually spends the night here so we figured that it was just that. So we had to cancel intercambios. Then about an hour later we get a call from Presidente. He told us that there has been problems with some hermanas in an area and that he felt the best way to fix it was to have emergency cambios and to make 2 trios. Hermana Hansen and I about died because we thought he was going to split us up! But no, there`s been a hermana that is super disobedient and doesn`t listen to anything presidente says and is causing a lot of problems and is not working. So he felt the best thing to do would be to put her with us until the end of the cambio. So yeah. Basically the plan is to make her miserable with righteousness. Since she`s arrived we`ve been even more obedient than exactly obedient and she`s followed us in everything. I`m just hoping that it`ll continue like that until cambios and she doesn`t crack or something. Ah! Stressful! But I do feel really humbled at the confidence that Presidente must have in us for sending her to be with us and not another companionship. I`m glad that Presidente knows that we`re the kind of missionaries that he can trust with this kind of thing. We must be doing something right.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The awesome thing about being in a trio is that we can now enter in whatever house! No man home alone in Chorrillos is safe! So we`ve just been teaching up a storm! I love, love love it!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We also had some fires going on here the past few days but it`s all fine where I am. It`s just super hot, like the air feels really heavy and there has been a bunch of ash falling from the air. It reminds me of how it was when we had the fires in San Diego. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">There`s this cute story that is going around about a dog that dug a hole into the ground and put her puppies in it and then covered it with a pot or something and they all were saved! How awesome is that! It`s amazing animal instinct! I love being able to see acts of love and mercy in the middle of natural disasters. I haven`t heard exactly what happened but I don`t think that many homes were affected like they were last year.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Saturday was a morning full of miracles! We start contacting a random guy in the street and what do you know a member comes a long who knows him, stops and stays and talks, and testifies about the Book of Mormon and the guy becomes a new investigator! And we got a lesson with a member! Score! But then they asked where we were headed next and we told them that we were looking for an address that the branch president wanted us to find. Turns out the guy we were talking to lives there! What are the odds! Then we ran into another member in the street that was like hey I just adopted 2 teenagers that I want to get baptized, like sì o sì, come by Monday! And we`re like yeah ok! And then we were looking at our plans to see what we should do with the time we had before lunch and there was a future investigator that we had planned to go see but he lived far from where we ended up being, but 2 seconds later guess who comes walking down the street?? Juan! The futuro! Crazy how stuff works out..... So we talked with him for a little while and put a appointment for another day. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Funny story of the week... We were in a lesson with this old lady and she randomly is like you know why there`s no fish in the ocean here? And we`re like ok, no why? And she says because the Chinese go out in their boats in the middle of the night and steal them all!! That`s why we don`t have fish!! Man, the ab muscles that it took to keep me from busting out laughing..... Old people say the funniest things sometimes! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Speaking of old people.... David and Olga came to church yesterday! They`re two very old investigators that we have. David has lived in the country most of his life and he walks around with this huge walking staff. He`s like a Chilean Moses or something. He always has to tell this story about the time he died but then came back to life like 40 days later. I swear if I have to hear that story one more time... He even shared it in Gospel Principles class at church... haha. And Olga oh my gosh I was just dying at church. She sat between Nora and Herminia, two recent converts, Nora is like 75 with lots of energy, Herminia is like 82 and is a little spit fire of an old woman and Olga, the investigadora is like 89 and well I don`t know how to describe her exactly but she`s great haha. And if you could have just seen and heard them during second hour. I was just laughing. They reminded me of 3 baby chicks or something sitting there talking and listening and responding to the class. It was the cutest thing. And then Herminia just hits Javier in the face with the Gospel Principle book for making some sarcastic joke. So all in all it was a great Sunday! Old people just make everything great. They make me excited to be one one day haha.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Teresa didn't come to church yesterday, we don`t know why. We passed by and she wasn`t home. I hope it`s just because they`d gone on a Sunday drive or something and nothing has happened. But we`re going to talk with her this week and hopefully she`ll get baptized next Sunday after church! Keep her in your prayers, she`s the sweetest!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well that`s it for the week! Full of crazy changes but that`s what makes it interesting! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you all have a great week! </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"> Our zone with Presidente and Hermana Kahnlein</td></tr>
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Viña del Mar</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">The girls with their new companion</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">A cat in the internet cafe</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS",sans-serif;">Smoke from the fires in Valparaíso</span></td></tr>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-91151991769817677682015-03-11T18:53:00.001-07:002015-07-17T14:01:03.248-07:00Jesus The Christ<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">March 9, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you guys are having a great week!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week was great. On Tuesday we had our consejo with President. I love consejo because I get to see all my missionary friends and of course President and Hermana Kahnlein. But honestly of all the blessings that just seem to come from serving, I really am grateful for all the people I`ve been able to meet and friendships I`ve made with the people here in my mission. I just love everyone SO much! And president and hermana Kahnlein are just amazing. I seriously have the best mission president in the WORLD! Here`s my psychic prediction of the week: In General Conference next month he`s going to be called as a General Authority because they finish their mission in beginning of July. 4 weeks before me! So lame. But yeah we`ll see if I`m right, he is just too amazing and powerful and Christlike and spiritual and everything amazing to not be a general authority. I can`t wait to tell you guys about him in real life because I just can`t accurately communicate how amazing they are over email. He`s such a powerful example of obedience and diligence in my life, I am just so grateful to have him as our president here.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also this week I FINALLY finished reading Jesus the Christ by Talmage. I just have to say that everyone should read that book!!! It is SO SO SO amazing. It`s way cool how he chronicles through Christ`s life from the pre existence through the millennium. He takes you step by step through His life as written in the bible and then pieces it with the Book of Mormon and his visit to the Americas and then goes through the apostasy and then when he restored His church through Joseph Smith to today how he still is leading it to the second coming. Oh my gosh it is just so awesome! My testimony of Jesus Christ has been strengthened SO MUCH! I love how he shows Christ as a real person, not just the Savior of the World. It shows that He really did have emotions, and reacted to things. He celebrated holidays, He liked traditions, He even got mad. He did it all but He did it in the right ways, without ever losing control. The thing that impacted me most was to realized that just because He lived a perfect life, He didn`t live an easy life. He experienced temptations just like me. It wasn`t easy for Him to overcome the temptations. He experienced the pain and the strong desire of giving in to the temptation, And yet when we say yeah I can`t take it anymore and give in, He kept persevering through the strong desires and wants. I always just thought it was easy for him to say no or to always make the right choice because I mean, He`s JESUS CHRIST! The Son of God! It should be easy for someone like Him to say no to worldly things. But He was just as human as each one of us. It wasn`t easy for Him in the very same way that it`s not easy for us, yet where we can`t keep going and give in or say well maybe just this once or make the excuse that we were born this way and can`t change, or whatever other justification we make, He kept going and kept enduring, inspite of everything else.. He kept his eye on the prize and never let it go. I really really really admire that. A lot. After reading about His life and His sacrifices, it makes me want to be a better person to show Him just how grateful I am. I want to endure like He did. I don`t want to make excuses, even in situations where it could be totally justified. I`ve heard a lot of excuses from people over the past year and honestly that is just what every single one is. An excuse. And honestly they all just suck because they just block blessings out of people`s lives. It keeps them from becoming more Christlike and taking advantage of all that Christ did for us and does for us. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I want so bad to be like Christ. I want to have His gentle touch. I want to always stand for what is right. I want to keep my emotions under control. I want to be patient. I want so bad to be like Christ. I have a long way to go but, the great thing about the gospel is that I know that I can get there. That book is just so so awesome. I`m probably going to start it again. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So anyway, our investigator Teresa came to church again yesterday!!! WOO HOO!!! She loves it and she is way excited to get baptized! We taught her about baptism yesterday and I shared my testimony of what my baptism means to me and she was so cute, she had to get up and hug me afterward in the middle of the lesson. That actually meant a lot to me that she did that because I know that it means she felt something through my words and she could see that what I was saying was really important to me. She was way cute too, she told us that she loves church and that she`s going to keep going even when we leave haha. I mean that`s kinda the idea. But Teresa is just the most loving and faithful woman. She loves everything and wants us to come everyday. We also had once with her and her husband Julio. He`s great too but whenever we start talking about the church he usually just bolts it up the stairs. But over once we were able to talk with him and he`s such a good guy. He told us that he`s more realistic though because he carries the responsibility of providing for the family so he can`t be as spiritual and trusting like his wife because he has to look at the reality and what really will happen. He`s really worried about their son Christian, because he has special needs and he`s worried what`s going to happen to him when he`s not around anymore. We`ve gained a lot of confidence with him this past week and I know that one day, when it`s his time, he`ll listen to the discussions too and be baptized. But I just love this family. Really they are an answer to so many prayers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Funny story of the week: We met a drunk Spaniard in the street the other day contacting who starting singing us Spanish love songs and he kept thanking the people of Viña del Mar for their support and love and how he`ll be having performances all week. It was entertaining to say the least haha. We gave him a card to visit </span><a href="http://mormon.org/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">mormon.org</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">. Maybe he will. Who knows. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">But yeah that`s about it for now. I love you guys so much!! Have a great week!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">con todo el amor en mi corazón, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MisinViaDelMar/~3/m8doR8l0Hjg/consejo-de-lideres-de-la-mision-marzo.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1426123924054_4579" name="2" rel="nofollow" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, Sans-Serif; font-size: 18px;" target="_blank">Consejo de líderes de la misión - Marzo</a> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><span id="yui_3_16_0_1_1426123924054_4577">Posted:</span> 09 Mar 2015 04:39 AM PDT</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Esta vez sólo hay una foto .. pero el consejo fue tan poderoso como siempre!</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Birthday potato for a zone leader</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chilean cats chillin in the sun</td></tr>
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<span id="yui_3_16_0_1_1426123924054_3347"><span id="yui_3_16_0_1_1426123924054_3346" style="color: #666666;">Cute story by Samantha's companion, Hermana Hansen:<br /><br /><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> <span style="font-family: "Helvetica Neue",Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Fun story, we can´t drink coke in the mission, and we were contacting this guy, and he says ´do you want something to drink?´ And we´ve been walking hills all day and it´s a million degrees so of course we say YES. But then as he goes inside to get us something, we remember that Chileans drink coke like it´s water. So we´re like SHOOT what are we going to do?! So then he comes back out with just one glass of coke, and my companion says coke makes me sick, can you fill my water bottle instead? and I said yeah that would be awesome! so then he took the water bottles inside to fill them and I just dumped out the glass of coke off the cliff. The things we do to obey... but we got water all the same. Good day good day!</span></span></span></span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-22935057759352785482015-03-04T20:09:00.000-08:002015-03-04T20:09:09.517-08:00The Cambio Of The Phoenix<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">March 2, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola Familia!!!!!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We have risen from the ashes. This is not a Harry Potter reference! We have gone from rock bottom with the whole Alonso situation to soaring above the clouds. This week we have been working harder than before and we have seen so many miracles!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">After the whole Alonso thing we were like yeah not letting this get us down, we are good missionaries. So we put the goal that every day we were going to invite someone to be baptized, whether it was a contact on the street or in a lesson, every day we would extend at least one invitation. We are now going 10 days strong and the miracles just keep coming. We have found some amazing people this week. My favorites are first, Olga. She`s 89 years old. It`s crazy, my area is nothing but hills and everyone we find is way old. It`s funny though because she acts and looks like she`s 62 or something. But she`s so awesome. She read a part of the Book of Mormon and when we asked her if she liked it she said yes because she felt like she`d already read the book before. We were like that`s so amazing!!! We invited her to be baptized and she was like well yes! Why wouldn`t I get baptized?? She wasn`t able to come to church yesterday because she had to go do tramites because she just moved here from Argentina but she`ll hopefully come next week. She`s so great though. She told us that she feels like we`re her sisters. So sweet. She`s also a crazy clean freak, she gets up at 6 every day to go out and sweep her dirt, I mean.. yeah. At least her dirt is clean dirt right? Keep her in your prayers though!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then my other favorite we found is Teresa. She`s in her fifties and is recovering from cancer. She`s really sweet and is definitely a woman of faith. We found her while contacting her street. She lives at the bottom of the hill and down where all the rich houses are so they all have intercoms outside their fence. Intercoms are the WORST. No one ever lets you in. But she did. The funny thing was when we went back to teach her, she spent 20 minutes just taking pictures of us, with her, with her husband, with her son, in every room of their house, outside, in front of their truck. We were like what the heck. One picture ok fine, like 30.. haha they just really like gringas I guess. But her family is super important to her and her husband works a lot so she`s super lonely. She`s lost a few people and then with the whole cancer thing she is just worried about the future. We first taught her about the plan of salvation and she was like wow what you think is really pretty. We told her we don`t only think it, we know it, and that she can know too! We invited her to pray about it and to come to church. AND she did! And sweet thing, she walked all the way there. She didn`t think it was as far as it was. BUT she came!!! And she LOVED IT!! She couldn`t stay for the classes but we gave her a tour of the chapel before she left. She stopped in front of a painting of Christ being baptized and was like that`s so pretty. I asked her if she`d like to do something like that and she said yes, very much. We told her that we were planning a baptism day for the 21 of march and she said then that`s the day I`ll be baptized! We didn`t even need to invite her! haha but then it was really sweet because she was like wait, what do I need to do? It was like she committed to it because she wanted it with her heart, before she thought it through in her head. I love that! Keep Teresa in your prayers too! She`s so awesome!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Friday we had a talent show for the ward activity. It was your typical Chilean talent show complete with at least one act dancing to a Grease song and another act of the two young women dancing to weird Asian music haha but it was a hoot. Only when it ended it was 9:22 and we need to be home at 9:30, 10 at the VERY latest. But afterward the branch president wanted to talk to us about this list of people and other things and by the time we got out of the church we had 12 minutes to climb the hill to our house. And locomotion does not pass by the church that late at night and no one in the branch has cars. We`re like oh my gosh we have to run up the hill. Now, note that to climb the hill from the church to our house, going very quickly normally takes 25 minutes. So we just took off praying praying praying because getting home late is the absolute WORST!!!! So we went and I just couldn`t bring myself to look at the time as we were going, I just didn`t want to know how late we were. We get to our house and look at the time. It took us 12 minutes to get there. 12 MINUTES!!! We were like woah.... ok that`s weird. That`s like crazy record time. It was a miracle!! </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I know that God was definitely slowing down time or something because yeah, 12 minutes is just not possible. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">But what I`ve learned most from everything is that when we`re diligent and go to work, the Lord takes whatever actions and efforts that we`re giving Him, no matter how awkward or imperfect and He uses them to work His miracles and to do His work. He knows what needs to be done and He does it. I know that the Lord really is doing His work, He is bringing in more and more of his children to the truth, but He needs us to be His hands and His feet and His mouth. He really does do the rest. I really feel like I have done nothing this past week. I didn`t make Olga feel the familiarity of the Book of Mormon, I didn`t make Teresa feel the importance of baptism, it is all the spirit. I`m just here as a witness of it all. I know God lives, I know that Christ lives, I know that they are active Beings, doing what needs to be done so more of their children can choose to live with more truth and more happiness. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love this wonderful work and the wonderful people here in Chile. It`s the best. </span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I also love you all. Thank you so much for your support. I hope you have just a wonderful week!!!!!!!!!! MUAH!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazón,</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Tan lines from just one day!</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Teresa and me</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Another pic of Teresa and me</span></td></tr>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-48118348954989777842015-02-25T19:11:00.002-08:002015-03-04T20:33:06.252-08:00I Don't Want Another Bite!!!!!!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">February 23, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">HOLA FAMILIA!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok so this week was crazy. Like always. Ok so here`s the update on everything.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So Alonso... Our crazy investigador that lied and freaked out and everything. We met up with him on Monday to talk and see what the heck happened and get everything straightened out and see what he wanted to do. Basically he told us that he didn`t feel bad at all about lying to us or storming out of the branch president`s office and was just really really mad about that lady asking him to move. Also he brought us his Book of Mormon and tried to return it which obviously we weren`t going to accept so he just set it on the bench and went on his way. We haven`t seen him since. We were way way sad about everything that happened. We`d literally done everything we could to help this guy. Maybe we didn`t have the baptism though, but I know that I taught someone the gospel of Jesus Christ. I gave someone the opportunity to accept it and in the process it made him happy. Pride is a mean poison though that can erode away even the most sweet feelings and experiences. It`s really really sad. And it was really really hard for us to accept. But we can`t make decisions for others and we can`t drag them to church. That`s not the Savior`s way. But yeah moving on from that experience we`ve actually had a great week full of miracles. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The next day we went to this pueblito, like an hour away by walking. Good thing there`s public transportation! The missionaries before had never had any luck out there but we didn`t have any appointments that day so we went to see what could happen. And guess what. The Lord blessed us for our efforts. We found a family!!!!!!!!! And not just any family. This family is super special because the mom is deaf. Like legitly deaf. And so is the dad, only he`s deaf from a motorcycle accident so he can hear a little if we talk really loud. So we basically have to communicate with them through the daughter who`s 9 who then talks to them with sign language. And Spanish sign language is different from American sign language..... Fun fact of the day. But they`re awesome and we`re going to go teach them again tomorrow. I`m really excited to see how they`re going to progress. We are going to need A LOT of support from the branch, especially when they come to church. But this is the gospel of Jesus Christ. So I have a lot of faith that everything is going to go great. I`ll let you guys know what happens with them!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then, cutest thing. We have lessons with a recent convert, Javier, who`s basically one of my favorite people. He`s so funny and he just loves being Mormon. But he`s really poor. Like he doesn`t always have money to have enough food. And he finds stuff in the garbage and then sells it for money. So this week he found this cool wooden cigar box. It was so cool that he wasn`t going to sell it and just keep it. But then he didn`t have anything to eat for breakfast so he told us that he was praying and praying and that he knew that God would provide a way that he could eat. So he leaves his house to go somewhere, look for work probably and he has this feeling that he should bring his cigar box with him. He put it in his pocket but then was like no, I need to keep it in my hand. He`s waiting at a bus stop and a guy comes up and sees the box and is like how much is that box, I`ll buy it from you. Javier is like woah, that was a really fast answer to my prayer! And he`s like 4 mil but then he feels like he should change it to 3 mil and does and the guy buys it off of him right there on the spot!! So he went to a store and was able to buy himself bread and a coke. You should have heard him telling us that story! He was so excited! He was like I KNEW God would come through! I knew he`d help me! He outdid Himself! hahaha it was super cute. Also he had the baptism ordinance done for his daughter who died, and he said that he said a prayer afterward and that he just felt like really really amazing and with a lot of peace and that he knows that his daughter is ok now and at peace. How sweet is that?! Aw, he`s just awesome.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok....Funny story time.... </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">We had a lesson with Luis, the little old man who got baptized in December. He doesn`t really have chairs so we always just sit on a little coffee table he has. Ha! welcome to Chile. Anyway, we stand up and it turns out he had this little tanax gun (which is like one of those squeeze tub things of bug spray killer) that had leaked out while we were sitting and our skirts were covered in this very smelly bug spray. Uhhhh. But the thing is that he lives toward the bottom of the hill, we live at the top and we had another appointment right then at even lower down the hill. So we could not go back and change. So we went to the appointment and the smell is just burning our noses. But there was nothing we could do! Luckily the lady didn`t say anything. She was kind of sick though so I don`t think she could smell. Blessings from heaven!!!!!!!!! But then we`re at the bottom of the hill and there`s an investigador there so it was just better time sense to go see if she was home right then because it`s not like we`re down in that area every day. Well she was home and let us in so we taught her and her son. It went fine and great, she gave us juice, but the juice was even bad just because we could smell the bug spray. They didn`t say anything either so I`m hoping that they were sick too. Maybe it was just really strong for us because it was on our clothes. But afterward we booked it up that hill and changed. Nothing like being covered in bug killer spray. Nice.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then yesterday was just crazy! So we were expecting 4 people to come to church. Church starts 15 minutes late mind you. And not one of them is there. Our ward mission leader says no one came and we`re like thanks for pointing that out. But then during the middle of the first talk, this old man walks in and starts talking really loudly to a lady in the back and we turn around and it`s DAVID! He`s this old man that we taught for the first time Saturday and invited him to church and he came! With his very tall wooden walking stick and everything. AND he stayed for all 3 hours! And he liked it a lot! BLESSINGS!!! Then we went to lunch where we ate a really big plate of alfredo noodles and avocado salad and for dessert ICE CREAM! They gave us two bowls full. It was a lot but worth it because it was yummy. Then we leave and find that it`s really hot and we don`t want to climb up the hill. Then I remembered this kid that I gave a Book of Mormon to a few months back that lived near so we went to see if he was home and he was there and we were talking to him out front and his mom says why don`t you invite them in to have a drink and we`re like yes! So we went in and taught the kid, his mom and his brother. The mom gave us leche con frutilla (strawberry blended in milk. Basically like a milkshake) And raspberry merieng cake. We couldn`t say no. We were dying of food and sugar overload. Then we had to book it up the hill because we had a cita with a recent convert who told us she`s going to give us once (it`s like tea time). And it`s hot and we`re like bursting. But then this guy in a collectivo that`s driven us a bunch of times passes by and says hermanas! Get in, I`ll take you up! BLESSING! He didn`t even charge us. So we make it. We`re teaching and the lady brings us once. She brings out two plates filled with mashed potatoes and chicken. We`re just like no. no. no. AND she has pan amasado which is like big pieces of chilean bread AND avocado. Oh. my. gosh. Luckily I asked her for a grocery bag and when she wasn`t looking I put it in my bag and then when she got up from the table we were able to put half in the bag. Literally we were dying. We just hurt. But then we had to go to a family home evening that we had with Nora and Juan and Javier, all recent converts. Meantime, our district leader called us and says have you guys invited anyone to be baptized today because we did. And we`re like ahh how are we going to be able to invite someone to be baptized we have a noche de hogar right now. So we go over to hermana nora`s and guess who`s sitting in there. Maria Cristiana. ONE OF OUR INVESTIAGORES!!!!!! Turns out they`re old friends! We`re like we have to invite her to be baptized. We`re like how do we change the conversation to that.. Bring it to Javier who just starts talking about his baptism and how he wants the baptism for his mom to get done in the temple. It was perfect so we invited her! She said that she wanted to pray about it, which is fine because you should pray about it, but she didn`t say no! Actually it was funny because she was trying to teach Javier about baptism. (She`s very Christian). But then for the family home evening we had made them no bake cookies, which in Spanish they call ``caca de mono``. Don`t ask me, I didn`t start that. But we had a good time laughing about it. hahahahahaha. But yeah. yesterday was just CRAZY CRAZY!!! But it`s awesome how much things can change in a week. AW I love the mission!!!!!!!!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you guys have an awesome week this week! I love you!!!</span><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLGAE4hJ7yMjiGoIa-B9loAgScKobaLPTL2iVkz6_feDWxxdScDO5Srko6oXOykMkfVM0lE_RvErxT_YNmRX72vf1NsI-usIUgq3bgvkLruBxAj95-7IddUXrSEe6yZo2Q30t9k92IMqx3/s1600/IMG_4367+1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLGAE4hJ7yMjiGoIa-B9loAgScKobaLPTL2iVkz6_feDWxxdScDO5Srko6oXOykMkfVM0lE_RvErxT_YNmRX72vf1NsI-usIUgq3bgvkLruBxAj95-7IddUXrSEe6yZo2Q30t9k92IMqx3/s1600/IMG_4367+1.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">chicken and mashed potatoes</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdL3WclgFYlKmIqYgzCyJVoipXhfmjfYqFp8liEPXN-gQOHfUPwpqxBjo3UcwF6KZYtHLtTytjdzH039ZaBP9rd0d2V1sj-FyYpjByXnnJ4t2BMU5bCLSwkiqM4wCvNgLYTuC42O2LLsca/s1600/IMG_4368+1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdL3WclgFYlKmIqYgzCyJVoipXhfmjfYqFp8liEPXN-gQOHfUPwpqxBjo3UcwF6KZYtHLtTytjdzH039ZaBP9rd0d2V1sj-FyYpjByXnnJ4t2BMU5bCLSwkiqM4wCvNgLYTuC42O2LLsca/s1600/IMG_4368+1.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sister (recent convert) who made the delicious dinner<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpFZKpNvoiRX_zRZPx7xoi0Ci2yoPLK_kzpyRP1zu-_PjWcXzNtRQ_kXq9H8mBzNRCD-7I_gq9WGUcVuuNLuIdPLqmDA-HDjMDIUrdvEx9gYorIC8sVmWMC0cPHTC6zmd-_L2Vu6OBgQzb/s1600/IMG_4376.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpFZKpNvoiRX_zRZPx7xoi0Ci2yoPLK_kzpyRP1zu-_PjWcXzNtRQ_kXq9H8mBzNRCD-7I_gq9WGUcVuuNLuIdPLqmDA-HDjMDIUrdvEx9gYorIC8sVmWMC0cPHTC6zmd-_L2Vu6OBgQzb/s1600/IMG_4376.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">having fun at the once</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2PXYWeFXKxp6WKCjEc6vsW0G8u6HfWfKGDPDvwPKNztAM-5WpJGxvwa3fUOfMnbiGNOqto6YAeRh_xmGEw930pmHyAGVvBGDr9Me65yW1Vqncla80VWhCR-PHIYdjz_yc1cYe-S6G6JVR/s1600/IMG_4384.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2PXYWeFXKxp6WKCjEc6vsW0G8u6HfWfKGDPDvwPKNztAM-5WpJGxvwa3fUOfMnbiGNOqto6YAeRh_xmGEw930pmHyAGVvBGDr9Me65yW1Vqncla80VWhCR-PHIYdjz_yc1cYe-S6G6JVR/s1600/IMG_4384.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Nora and no bake cookies</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbVQ1hSfFEFOWcKP-__CnKtKj9Yj6K69GuUUPxJkXTIFKkIfiv6QpiRC-uCs0bRZ3evTU4PrvbXKrz4d-bE1-ohyphenhyphenNcVKC-DNUWYqNMjV6Z5L-VwnRUhLfwuJtbayu-_AKcrbmsYoopDvgb/s1600/IMG_4391.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbVQ1hSfFEFOWcKP-__CnKtKj9Yj6K69GuUUPxJkXTIFKkIfiv6QpiRC-uCs0bRZ3evTU4PrvbXKrz4d-bE1-ohyphenhyphenNcVKC-DNUWYqNMjV6Z5L-VwnRUhLfwuJtbayu-_AKcrbmsYoopDvgb/s1600/IMG_4391.JPG" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bird in the house and in the make-up bag!</td></tr>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-3976705878198450872015-02-17T18:54:00.001-08:002015-02-17T18:56:03.515-08:00La Mano de Dios!!!!<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">February 16, 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hoolllllaaaaaaa faamiliaaaaaa!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Ok so this week was just CRAZY. Ok well actually the week was pretty normal and boring (except for a root canal.. woohoo!) until yesterday.... oh. my. gosh... Yeah so I'll fill you all in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"> The week started off good and normal. We went to this artesian feria (it`s like a flea market thing) and it was super cool! They had stuff from all over South America! I found a really pretty necklace with this stone called lapis lazuli that`s only found in Chile and one other place in the world, like Africa or something. Super cool. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Cambios were last week and we STAYED together! We were way happy! I wasn`t ready to leave yet either, there`s just so much that needs to be done here. So it was a huge relief. But also it`s weird how you usually know what`s going to happen for cambios even before you get the call in the morning. You can usually just feel it. And we both felt that we were going to stay together and we did. YAY!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Then I went for the darn root canal. Root canals suck. They really do. Going into it I didn`t believe it was going to be bad at all. And it`s not like it was bad but it was extremadamente uncomfortable. And they did mine in two parts (no clue why) so it was like right when you start feeling a little better you go right back in for them to torture you again, I mean finish it. I still have another appointment on Thursday for them to close my tooth up. BAH I`m just ready for it all to be done. But I have my pain medicine and I can still work so it could be worse.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So yesterday our investigator Alonso who`s crazy was suppose to get baptized. We show up to church (cool story: We`re walking down to the church which is at the bottom of the mountain, I mean hill, and we live at the top. We`re walking with Nora who`s that sweet old lady that I`ve sent pics of, and this guy on his way up stops and offers to take us down in his car. Turns out he`s the husband who`s not active of a lady in the branch. So that was way nice of him. We were very grateful) and Alonso shows up. Perfect! He`s there way early like always and takes a seat in a pew in the back. We`re talking with the other members and stuff and then we notice that Alonso is gone and so we go look to see where he is and we see him outside talking with our leader missional. We`re like oh man. What happened? We go back in though and then a few minutes later Claudio (the leader misional) comes in and tells us that apparently this crazy menos activa lady came in and told Alonso that he had to move because he was in ¨her pew¨ or something like that. (I`m like ok first you don`t even come every week so you really can`t even call dibs if you wanted to.. whatever) But Alonso got REALLY OFFENEDED by that. And stormed out and said that he`s never coming back into the church because he doesnt`want to see her face. So then we go and try to talk to him and explain everything and he is just like no. I`m not going back. We talk about Christ and everything and he is just not having it. And he storms off up the hill. We keep standing there and wait to see if he`ll come back and he does after a few minutes and is like I`ll go back for you guys. So we go back in but the sacrament is being passed so we have to wait outside for them to finish passing the sacrament. We go in and sit on the other side. Now he`s like can I still be baptized and we`re like yeahhh probably. Afterwords we had him have a little interview with the Branch Pres. to make sure that he`s ok, that everything`s ok, to just talk about what happened and the baptism and I guess in the interview Alonso just totally interrupted the president and said ¨AM I getting baptized or not??!!¨And the branch president said that`s really up to you, but we weren`t able to announce it in sacrament because you left so we just have to tell everyone about it now and then Alonso just freaks and is like no, then just forget it and storms out of the office and comes into the class to say goodbye to us and just leaves. Come to find out, Gabriela tells us that she`s also seen him smoking all last week. And that is honestly what really hurt because we`d be asking him if he`d been smoking, and we told him he can`t be baptized if he smokes within a week of the baptism, and he`d told us everyday that he hadn`t smoked since we taught him about the word of wisdom. Now to know that he`s just been lying straight to our faces was a little bit of like a punch in the face. We did nothing to deserve being lied to, especially over something as dumb as smoking. We just want to help. So obviously, he didn`t get baptized yesterday and I honestly don`t know if he is going to be getting baptized anytime soon either. He called us after church and asked if we could meet up today in the plaza? And we were just like no, we can`t. We needed time and we felt like he needed some time too so we`re going to see him tonight. But it just hurts you know? We were doing everything we could for him to help him, we`d seen changes in him, he`d always been so grateful for learning about the gospel and then he wasn`t even honest in the end. BUT I do have to say that it`s really cool how everything did happen. Maybe we didn`t know at the time that he wasn`t ready to be baptized but God knew. I don`t know why that crazy less active lady asked him to move but good thing she did. I don`t know why we felt like he had to talk with the branch pres but good thing he did because we found out that he wasn`t truly ready and that Gabriela was able to tell us that he`s been smoking. While I want with all my heart for everyone to be baptized so they can enjoy so many more blessings, I don`t want them to do it unworthily, and I definitely don`t want to be responsible for that. So really everything happens for a reason. So it`s really totally fine. He`s just crazy. But it`ll be interesting to see what will happen this week with him. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Besides that whole fiasco everything is great here in Viña. I have an awesome district and an awesome area and I`m really excited to just keep finding more people to teach and help come to know the love that God has for them. I really am so happy here doing this work. It`s just great. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I love you all! Have a great week and look for God`s hand in your life! When you look, you find it and it`s SO COOL!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Con todo el amor en mi corazon,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbFXphML1ukI0RztsrRsReMs35cXGcK1XLAHYEiUECQafLaogDUktHTLZgU7iw7q7Q8mv36HM-opt03IILi9Quvt_wGgQbVas8NkkQXjNd979jJv7LtfoJZWFyzKjifPt4i8jaZRP-Q-8/s1600/DSCN1127%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbFXphML1ukI0RztsrRsReMs35cXGcK1XLAHYEiUECQafLaogDUktHTLZgU7iw7q7Q8mv36HM-opt03IILi9Quvt_wGgQbVas8NkkQXjNd979jJv7LtfoJZWFyzKjifPt4i8jaZRP-Q-8/s1600/DSCN1127%5B1%5D.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">The moon off in the distance</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6ESg80OnqU4WC9oEbOWpA_ZaF29Uyz-YPo2rVjshOmaYZsXxNUhAAtBMpTqMwQ9CWeAq6dptzGjrhvF3P-I19GJuJmetRUQKVtRKlfl-i8y5OurOpcZdfMbpaWYhItZwEY57TkjxVGis/s1600/DSCN1140%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6ESg80OnqU4WC9oEbOWpA_ZaF29Uyz-YPo2rVjshOmaYZsXxNUhAAtBMpTqMwQ9CWeAq6dptzGjrhvF3P-I19GJuJmetRUQKVtRKlfl-i8y5OurOpcZdfMbpaWYhItZwEY57TkjxVGis/s1600/DSCN1140%5B1%5D.JPG" height="240" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Alonso</span></td></tr>
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-11683016636677766782015-02-13T15:12:00.000-08:002015-02-13T15:12:55.085-08:00I Hope Your Children Become Architects!<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">February 9, 2015</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I hope you guys had a great week. This week was pretty great. I`ll catch you up on everything.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So a few weeks ago we were walking up the street and this guy walks by and is like ¨Good night!¨ in English, but no one says good night at 6, it`s good evening. So we corrected him and he stops and looks at us and is like No, Good night. And we`re like no, it`s good evening and then he started speaking very bad English with us. We just figured that he was drunk and crazy so let him just go on with his day. Then a few days later on intercambios the other Hermana that came to our area contacted the same crazy and he was like yeah I`ll meet with you guys. So we went Sunday to meet with him in this little plaza place and we were able to teach him and put a baptism date with him. (I may have already mentioned that to you guys.. We taught him after Gabriela`s baptism) Anyway so we`ve been meeting with him a few times these past weeks and he`s come to church! He gets there at 8:30 in the morning even though we`ve told him that church starts at 10. He just likes to be punctual. Anyway it`s so funny teaching him because he`s crazy! I mean he`s great, but he`s crazy. He actually was hit by a truck years ago and now his knee is messed up and it`s hard for him to walk, especially the hills and he has a little brain damage from the accident. So that`s mostly why he`s a little crazy now. He just shoots off with the most random stuff sometimes in the middle of lessons. This past week he`s been telling us to take bananas blended with milk after we run in the mornings, para las calambres (for the cramps) haha or the other day as we were leavings he`s like I hope that you`re children become architects. I`m not sure what that means but I really do appreciate his well wishes. But honestly, Alonso is awesome. He`s one of the chosen ones. He`ll be the first person that I`ve taught that`ll get baptized in 3 weeks which is the fastest someone can get baptized in our mission (they have to come to church at least 3 times). Everyone in the branch was like aww but he has a really bad smoking problem don`t bother (I`m just like have you met Gabriela?? Smoking can be overcome.) But since the day we taught him word of wisdom he says with a little effort he can stop. And he seriously hasn`t smoked since. And the other day he was telling us some random story about something by the church building and he described it as OUR church. Like it`s his church too!! Ahh that just made me so happy. Also it was so sweet. When we were teaching him about repentance I asked him if he`s felt like he`s changed since he started learning about the gospel of Jesus Christ and he said yes and I asked him how has he changed and he goes Ï`m the happiest that I`ve ever been in my whole life.¨ Ok is that not the most heart warming, joyful thing you`ve ever heard??? It just filled my whole being with gladness!!! Honestly that is seriously the best thing that anyone can ever tell me as a missionary. That with the gospel they feel the happiest they`ve ever felt. Because that tells me that they are not only listening but applying it and that they are feeling the same happiness that I feel. That the happiness of the gospel really is REAL and it`s something that EVERYONE can feel, if they really want to. Alonso had is baptism interview yesterday and he passed! So he`s good to go for Sunday! Only I`m a little worried because we have cambios AGAIN on Wednesday! I seriously can`t believe how fast this change just flew by! And I really really really really really really don`t want to leave. Not now. So I`m really praying that I stay. But I`m grateful for the mission presidente that we have because honestly I know that he would never do anything contrary to the will of God so if I do change it`s because that`s what God wants and so that`s fine with me. But if you asked for my personal input, I really hope I stay.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also are you ready to hear the coolest miracle ever??? So Thiare, Gabriela`s daughter, fell down the metro stairs at the beginning of the week and broke her tailbone! So sad right, because that is just so painful. She`s been in bed on her stomach all week. They told her that she was going to be in recovery for 6 months! Gabriela showed us the xrays and you could see how the bone was just way messed up, facing in the opposite direction. OUCH! So she gets a priesthood blessing and then went back for the next doctors appointment a few days later where they took xrays again. THEY CAN'T FIND ANYTHING: NOTHING. AT ALL: It`s healed. I`m like oh my gosh that`s the kind of story they wrote about in the bible!! I mean what a miracle!! I`m so glad that they were able to have that experience, especially Gabriela being such a new member, because now their testimonies of the priesthood power are so much stronger. They know it`s real. When Gabriela told us at church I freaked out. So great! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">As far as my tooth, they`re doing it in 3 sessions so I went to the first last week and they basically just drilled a huge hole in my tooth and now I have to wait until Thursday for them to keep going on it. I really wish they could just do it all in one, I don't know why they don`t.. But I`m still alive, even if my tooth isn`t. We`ll see what happens. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So well basically those were the highlights of this week! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Wishing you guys the best of the coming days! Until next week!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Love you all!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span></div>
Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5682824990727082694.post-4970651579163471072015-02-03T14:14:00.000-08:002015-02-06T12:45:12.810-08:00Un Ano, What????!!!!!!!!<div dir="ltr" id="yui_3_16_0_1_1422999193861_4230">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">February 2, 2015</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hola familia!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">I had a super great week this week! First off Gabriela got confirmed yesterday and so now she`s good to go! It was such a relief! I wasn`t that worried about her because she`s just progressed SO much but still you never know. She scared us though because we were talking to her and she was just telling us how she almost smoked the other day but didn`t but then she stops and gets all serious and is like Hermanas I have something I have to tell you guys and we`re like oh no. no, don`t tell us, no. And she`s like I ate the cookies we had for you guys. hahaha oh man. Normally I`d probably be pretty bummed about not getting cookies but in the moment I was so happy. I just hope she doesn`t make a habit of that..</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Gabriela also got up and shared her testimony yesterday. It was honestly the sweetest thing. She shared a scripture and talked about what she liked about it. I just felt the spirit so strong. She seriously has come SO far. I really wish I could express to you in words everything I`ve seen and learned from her and her battle to overcome smoking so she could get baptized and do the work in the temple for her mom. But there`s just no words sweet enough that can convey everything--in English or in Spanish. I`m just so grateful for the atonement of Jesus Christ that makes it possible for us to overcome every weakness and temptation and truly makes us new and better people. SO GREAT!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">So I guess you heard about the root canal from the mission nurse.... YAY! haaaa. Actually though Hermana Kahnlein called me a few days ago and it`s been rescheduled for tomorrow so I will let you guys know next week how it all went. It only makes sense though. Last year I broke my front tooth in the MTC, this year I need a root canal. Thank goodness girls only serve 18 months, I don`t want to be around to know what would happen next year..</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">This week Hermana Hansen and I also celebrated our one year as missionaries!!! It was so awesome that we arrived together and we got to celebrate together. We celebrated with homemade quesadillas y donuts. We put a candle in the middle of the donut to blow out and everything. I really can`t believe that it`s been an entire year. The meaning of a year has definitely lost it`s meaning. I feel like I got here 3 weeks ago or something. It`s crazy. Also during our year celebration we found this HUGE spider on our curtain. Don`t worry though, like the mature, one year old missionaries that we are, we drenched it with tanax (bug spray) and tried to set it on fire with a match. It suffices me to say that it is dead. Like my tooth. ahhh sorry... I'm just ready for tomorrow to be over with.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Also I completed my dream of playing futbol (or as I used to say soccer) with real Chileans. We played (messed around really) in the most ghetto court I`ve ever seen overlooking the beautiful view of Viña. It was AWESOME. And if you`re not already enough impressed--I even did it in a skirt. WHAT!!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Now to close for the cutest thing ever that just melted my heart this week. So the Hermana Nora washes our clothes for us. She is literally the cutest most energetic old lady I have and will probably ever meet in my life. (She`s the old lady in those photos). So we went over to visit them (she and her son got baptized like a year ago) and she had all our little socks all over the table and was in the middle of folding them. So I sat down and helped her roll our socks and I was just like Hermana you do so much for us. Thank you for all you do and she was like oh mi hijita! ( I really wish you could hear her little high pitched old lady voice, it`s just the best) you guys work so hard all day long serving the lord and I want to work too! I can`t do much but I can do this and that makes me happy!! Seriously my heart just melted and I just had to hug that sweet woman. She is seriously the best.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Today we went to this super cool museum here in Viña. We saw this mummified body from like 2000 BC or something crazy like that. I was just like that`s probably the brother of Jared from the Book of Mormon. It was way cool though because it was all dated from the Book of Mormon times. And they even had Easter island stuff there too! So basically it`s been a great start to the week. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Well I have to go but I love you all and I hope you have a great spider free week!! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">con todo el amor en mi corazon,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Hermana Evans</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Big yucky spider!</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">Getting ready to celebrate year as a missionary</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">homemade quesadilla to celebrate!</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, "Times New Roman", serif;">First year celebration as a missionary! Her companion is Hermana Hansen.</span><br />
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Samantha Evanshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08079973640964567647noreply@blogger.com0