TOO WEAK TO WRITE THIS WEEK!

December 27, 2017

*Elder Sierra was very ill this morning and began vomiting from 4:30am to noon. Needless to say, he wasn't up for writing a letter but did 'chat' with us online for a few minutes. Here are the highlights of that conversation (minus all the gory details of his wretched state 😖)

We had an appointment with a family on Christmas Day and it actually went great. They accepted a baptismal date and they asked if they could be in a co-living arrangement and we were like, "Nah." When we told them they had the option of living separately or marrying, Camila got kind of serious and said, "Well, I guess you'll have to just find a place to live then!" I was like Ammon over there: "Nunca he visto tanta fe! Sí, aun entre los [Chilenos]!" (translation: Never have I seen such great faith even among all the Nephites (or, in this case, Chileans) They are neat people; they just have a hard condition because Camila especially wants to quit smoking cigarettes and marijuana but everyone in their house does it, so it's hard. They have a 2-year old child together, so I doubt they do it in the house, but Camilla really wants to get married or split up.

They've accepted a baptism date for Feb. 24th. If they don't make it, they'll be way closer than they've ever been to baptism anyway.

But guys, I love you all a TON, but it's not good for me to keep writing. I need some rest 

Take Care!

Elder Sierra

CRAZY WEEK! SENT MY COMPANION HOME AND BEGAN TRAINING MY GREENIE

December 20, 2017

Wow, where do I begin!?!

Things were crazy this week as my companion was going home and doing lots of farewells all over the place! He was to be picked up on Monday at 5:00 in the morning. We get home Sunday night and he hadn't packed and the house was kinda dirty so my comp packs all his stuff up while I clean the house and get things ready for my new missionary's arrival. After all, it's not like I was gonna be able to sleep with my comp packing.  I finally got to bed at around 3:30 in the morning. I don't think my comp even slept. We went to bed, but I think he went downstairs and drank máte. The poor boy was anxious. 

He left at 5:15 am and I went to bed to get up at 7:30 am to go to my training for becoming a new trainer. At 11:00 am, I got my new comp, Elder Contreras!  He's from Houston, Texas, and both his parents are from Honduras so he speaks Spanish pretty much perfectly! He's also pretty good on the bikes so things are just awesome! I was pretty dead Monday, though, from the lack of sleep and just going hard all day. When we got home, I went to bed pretty quick and still felt like I was pretty tired the next day. It was a TOUGH day. We looked for tons of references and contacted a lot of people and no one would let us in, but we did get some return visits. 

It's out third day together and we've worked a TON! I hadn't been able to work so much because of the craziness with my previous comp so it's really awesome! We're getting back in contact with our investigators and we've got the week pretty full with appointments in just a couple of days! 

Marjorie is doing really well. We taught her about temples and she said that she thought that going through the Temple was a great goal! We hadn't even said anything yet! 

I'm really, really sorry that I don't have any photos yet; my camera died right before I got my new companion and it was my last pair of batteries. I'll buy some more, though, and we'l get some dank pics of us, our tree, the Christmas conference, cookies, hot cocoa and Christmas. 😀

Ok, I'm pretty sure I'm forgetting something, but I'll figure it out and then include it in next week's letter! I'll probably even do a recording! Love you all, Chao!

-Elder Sierra

SOUPY COOKIES AND A BAG OF SWORDFISH!
December, 13, 2017

Dear Family,

So this week was kinda cool, I guess. Actually, I guess it was pretty dang good; Marjorie got confirmed! 

And then we made those salted caramel cookies at her house with another member as an FHE. Unfortunately, when we made them, we threw in too much margarine and it was a bit melted so the dough was a bit liquidy and we had to put it in a cupcake pan! Then they turned out kinda weird... still tasty but like a cookie with a 'cakey' part on the bottom. It was pretty funny and we had a good laugh. We also taught Marjorie about temples and she thought it was awesome and cool because she said while she was in the baptismal font, she felt the presence of her grandmother who had always been a big spiritual influence for her while she was growing up. So, she wants to do her proxy baptism!

My companion has been a bit.... anxious; the poor fella's going home in, like, 5 days. If you ever get the chance to be with a missionary ending their mission I wouldn't quite recommend it. Homeboy's been a bit crazy. I am training this next transfer though! That's gonna be rad! There's a 80% chance he'll be a latino, which is chill, but I kinda feel like I can help an American more because their experience will be closer to my own. It's gonna be tough for the poor guy because transfers are a WEEK before Christmas! What a struggle. Actually, on top of that, my two other house mates are kinda lame and don't "feel like" decorating the house or doing any Christmasy! And my current comp is going home! So, when my kid arrives we'll get right down to planning some Christmas stuff to do Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. I'm thinking of a Christmas Eve dinner and then some peppermint popcorn with Elf or something in the morning, if I can get permission from President!

A funny story: the other day while we were doing a contact, talking to this one woman, another woman exits her apartment with a bag of swordfish and gives it to the woman we were talking to. Then we start talking to the other woman and she says, "You boys want some swordfish?!" and we're like, "Uh, yeah!" so she gives us a whole kilo of swordfish and we baked it that night with cheese and spices on top! Pretty bomb! 

There's not too much to tell this week because it was kinda slow with a bunch of meetings for my companion and a zone conference, but this next week we have a lot of stuff we're doing so I'm pumped! Love you all and have a great week.  Enjoy the Christmas Season and #Lighttheworld!!!

-Elder Sierra

MARJORIE'S BAPTISM....HOMBRES TRABAJANDO
December 6, 2017

Dear Family and Friends,

This week was pretty great, mostly because Marjorie got baptized!!!  Everything went according to plan except there were a few hiccups on the actual day of the baptism. The mission had no baptismal clothing so we had to ask a sister in the ward for her temple clothing and then, when she got to church on Sunday, we realized that there was nothing for her to wear underneath. So there we were with the font filled while some members went running to grab clothing for her. We just put on a 10-minute Mormon Message and by the time it was over, we had everything figured out. 

The baptismal service was fantastic! We involved some members and I gave the talk on the Holy Ghost. The baptism itself went well, too; there was no mistake or anything. After the welcome to the ward, Marjorie decided to bear her testimony and it was awesome! She talked about her conversion story and how she felt that the Lord had prepared her even before the missionaries met her and that she felt like, before fully accepting the Gospel, she was partially blind and didn't know why she didn't accept the Gospel sooner! It was really beautiful. Her mom was there, too, (she's not a member) and she cried. It was sweet. 

Marjorie will be getting confirmed this next Sunday. We visited her yesterday and she said her friend had given her some random book about prophets and how there was a woman prophet today, and what-not, and she was like, "Nah, this book contradicts the Book of Mormon so it's stupid" We were pretty proud of her! 

Today, I was with Elder Tanner, an elder I've known since the MTC, because my companion is doing farewells in another ward with an old comp of his. It turns out, we've been in the same ward on two different occasions so we're going to take advantage and visit a couple of families. We already had lunch with one family. 

In the morning we had nothing to do so we went on a bike ride to explore the very edges of the mission, which really wasn't that hard. Then we ended up almost getting lost, but in the end we just got a bit sunburned. (Actually, I got tan and Elder Tanner got sunburned.)

That's about the week. We're going to keep going at it with our investigators, however, a LOT of them are just super busy right now  because many have end of year exams, so it's hard. I think Imma get some stuff to make sugar cookies and go deliver it to all our investigators to keep in contact with them. We'll see how things go!

Love you all. Have a great week!

-Elder Sierra

HOMBRES TRABAJANDO (MEN WORKING)

NEW MOTTO: "JUST ROLL WITH IT!" PLUS, VALENTINA GETS BAPTIZED

November 29, 2017

Dear Family,

It was a pretty good week! 

I guess I forgot to mention that Valentina, the 9-year-old daughter of Alejandro and Maria Paz, was getting baptized. Elder Leles and I reactivated the family and then we left and the next Elders taught Valentina. It was cool, though. I gave the message on the Holy Ghost and it was awesome to see them again. It's kinda funny because Capitan Avalos (the ward I was in) borders my current ward (Nocedal) which borders my last ward (Lo Blanco). It's been a good gig staying in this stake so long! 

This week we had Thanksgiving and every district got an apple pie on Thursday! Except MY district, so I called them up and asked what the deal was?! It turned out, they just missed us, so we got hooked up and we got some ice cream, too and it was lit! ​

I had some left over candles from my B-day so I used them to spell "Eat Pie". 

Things in the area have been good. We've been finding new people and Marjorie had her baptismal interview and passed with flying colors! She's been spiritually ready for a while now, but just had some little doubts here and there. She'll be getting baptized this Sunday after the meetings! 

It's been a bit tough recently because my house is composed of 4 missionaries and I'm the only who's disciplined enough to follow the missionary schedule well, or even do simple things like clean the dishes right now. The ZLs and Assistants are aware of that now and have told me I just need to admonish them. Imma just start reading Alma 5 out loud or something, but things gotta change, partially because President told me I'll be training this next transfer 

So, I want the house culture to be a lot better before then.

There's not too much else to talk about. My comp's losing his mind about finishing his mission in 3 weeks. I recently had interviews with President and his advice was "just roll with it." So we'll see where things go! 

It's been a good week, though. Have a good one everyone!

-Elder Sierra

Elder Leles and me at Valentina's baptism.

CHALLENGES AND DELAYS BUT THE WORK'S MOVING FORWARD

November 22, 2017

Dear Family,

This week in Nocedal showed a few more challenges that I'll be facing during this transfer. I mentioned last week that we have a Haitian woman and her daughter who are fantastic. (They really are!) The problem is that we coordinated about 5 appointments with the member they live with to teach them but every single one fell through... *SIGH* They even went to church last week. That's 6 times IN A ROW!  And Brenda was going to be baptized on the 25th (the date the previous Elders had set) however, after our first visit we found out she still smokes socially. *DOH*

Josefa, the little 10 year-old girl that we're teaching, had her second lesson on Monday. She's on fire too! She understood the Plan of Salvation REALLY well and after the lesson, they invited us for "once" and when her baby cousin was misbehaving she was like, "Nah, it's all good; she doesn't know right from wrong!" My comp and I about cried!

We also have our investigator with a baptismal date for the 3rd of December! Marjorie! We were able to find her finally and talk to her. She's been receiving the missionaries since May and has read through ALMA in the Book of Mormon! She has a firm testimony about it but has had some doubts in terms of baptism. In our first lesson with her we just ended up talking lots about baptism and she was like, "Yeah, I'll get baptized" and we were like... "Is the 2nd cool?" and she said yes. We then had an FHE because she thought the idea was super interesting. We got a guy and a girl that are also 20ish to come with us to have an FHE with her and it was awesome! We saw the video "the Mediator" and when we read Alma 34:15-16 she said "I think I'm the most sure I've been about baptism!" YAS!!! 

We'll be seeing her tomorrow and I'M PUMPED.

Apart from that, the ward's been good, however, they did throw us under the bus our very first Sunday! The ward secretary told us right as the meeting was starting that we had talks...

Luckily, I had pre-prepared talk; I just didn't have the notes with me. It went pretty well and it was a good first impression! 

It was a good week and hopefully we'll keep gettin' things rolling!

-Elder Sierra

MAKING SURE MY COMP DOESN'T DIE BEFORE HE DIES WITH A BAPTISMAL DATE AND TONS TO DO IN THE NEW AREA

Dear Family,

So, after one week in our new ward, Nocedal, we've found almost all the investigators that the previous elders left us (which is quite a few). We even got to see one of them today and he passed us a form listing a bunch of receptive contacts they had done. It had about 30 names in total so we just have TONS to do! 

We have 2 investigators with a baptismal date right now, both for the 25th of November, but one of them will probably need a later date. The that is on track is Brenda, a 26 year-old woman and she is a machine! We're were going to teach her yesterday but she got home late from work so we could only get to know her, but it was easy to tell she's very prepared! She even wears a CTR ring! We have an appointment with her tomorrow and if all goes well then she'll be ready for a baptismal interview this Saturday! 

We then have a Haitian woman and her daughter that live with a member and have gone to church, each, about 4 times, even to our recent stake conference! Their Spanish is a bit of a barrier but we have a fantastic recent convert who's also Haitian and helps translate. The mother, Andrizi, has a baptismal date, but has received very few lessons so she may not make it on the 25th. However, if it falls through, it's okay because we'll work on a date for both of them! 

There's also another person who we are going to start teaching! A ten-year-old girl named Josefa. Her mom is a recently reactivated member. When we visited the bishop he gave us the referral so we passed by and the mom answered and was just like, "Hey, I need you guys' help! You need to teach my daughter so she can be baptized. She wants to learn more about the church!" We're going to go by today with Bishop. 

There's even a man who's the husband of the first councilor's mom. He has Alzheimer's and repeats the same things every 10 minutes or so. He's told us the same stories about him living in Argentina and how the best soccer team in the world is Boca Junior (the rival of my comp's team ) However, after a few times he remembers certain things and recogonizes stuff. When the wife mentioned that the missionaries about a year ago said he couldn't get baptized because of his condition I was curious (my face: ). I called up my pal, President Gwilliam, and asked him about it, and he gave me a resounding YES in favor of the man being able to get baptized. We haven't passed by yet, but I think they'll like the good news! 

So that's where we're at! We actually have about 6 other families in our teaching pool (our sector is very populated). They aren't progressing quite as well but still are doing pretty well. It's been a stark change from my old neighboring ward. 

It's really hot though! We're already getting into the 90s and summer's just getting started! We're going to teach more in the mornings and less in the afternoon hours (4-6) and swap that time out for some studies because those hours are just killers! 

My comp's a funny Argentine. I'm just trying to make sure he doesn't die before he dies! It helps a lot, though, that we have so much to do!

That's about it! Everyone have a good week!

-Elder Sierra