June 30, 2014

Dearest familia mia,

Howdy yall! Sometimes i just like to say that because no one here says it haha. How are things in Utah and in Texas? What cool things are yall doing this week?

Here in Santiago, not too much has changed except that Chile lost and are out of the world cup. I am pretty sure many people weeped (many people actually drank a ton Saturday trying to drink away their sorrows). The missionaries are pretty happy though because it is a whole lot easier to visit people without chilean soccer matches haha. We are happy at least even if the rest of chile is not.

We had exchanges this week and i was with Hermana Verón from Argentina. She is 32 and is really cool. It is never too late to serve a mission. All of our plans fell through so we went passed by a less active´s house that was never home, AND SHE WAS HOME! Her name is Marcela Alvarez and a member of the bishopric told us that we should visit her. She let us right in and told us that she just did not know how to balance her time, that before she dedicated everything to the church and left her family in the dust a little. She told us that she knew that she had to come back and she committed to come this sunday. This was a miracle!!! Also, we visited another less active that the ward named Hermana Aranda, who always looks after her 4year old nephew Fernando. We invited her to church and she did not seem too interested, but Fernando said, "I want to go to church! I have never been!!" She then asked him if he would wake up in time to go and he honestly said, "yes, but with laziness (flojera,i do not know how to translate it exactly)". She still did not say that she would go for sure, and in chile that almost always means that they will not go.

When sunday came around, we passed by Marcela´s house so that we could walk to church together, and she was all ready and waiting to go!!! We walked into church and all of the members greeted her like not seeing a sibling for a long time!!! She felt so good and everyone welcomed her back! She is going to keep going to church. At the end of church we happened to pass by the primary room, and there sitting with all of the kids was Hermana Aranda!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My companion told me that she was sitting there, but i did not believe her until i turned around and saw her!!!! She just got to church late, accidently went to the other ward´s sacrament meeting and just hung out in the primary with her grandson the rest of the time BUT SHE CAME!!!!! This truly is a miracle!!! Those grandkids sure do help a lot!

Another cool thing is one of our investigators, Yanet (mom of Tomás from last week´s letter),is progressing. Her son has been sick but we got to teach her this week and she agreed to be baptized if she gets an answer, and asked us lots of questions about the committment that it is to get baptized. She truly is looking for something more and wants to come close to the Lord. We are excited for her too!

Another cool thing, Tuesday we went to visit with Maria and Carolina, a mom and daughter. When we got there Maria was there with her sick grandson but she let us in and we started to teach her a little until her grandson woke up and started screaming histerically. His dad tried to calm him but he couldnt so they were going to take him to the hospital. All i was thinking was, "man if we were elders we could give him a priesthood blessing, but we are sister missionaries and do not have the priesthood. What else can we do?" The only thing that popped into my head was to sing for this poor little 3 year old. We offered to sing and after about 3 songs his crying died down to a whimper and hewas a lot more calm. We just sang for about 45 minutes to help the little guy out until his mom came home and they could prepare to take him  to the doctor´s. It is a miracle how quickly he went from histerical to calm with a few hymns. There are power in the hymns and it helped a poor little sick3 year old out.

This week i am learning a lot about the importance of conversion. Conversion is a processing and the end result is being converted. I think that it is a long process that we are continually experiencing. I am trying to become more and more converted everyday. I love being able to serve the amazing people here in Santiago!!! The mission is the best experience of mylife!!! I love yall!!!

love

hermana taylor