July 9, 2011

Hey Family! Thank you so much for putting money in my account, I’m going to go buy a suit today for the last part of my mission and for after. This week was really good. The days are always so different ha-ha so that makes it so much more diverse. I love being AP. There is a lot of pressure and stress sometimes and a lack of sleep, but seriously it’s so so so cool. Definitely one of the biggest blessings I could have ever received on my mission. There are three of us right now, but Elder Saenz goes home in like three weeks, so it will just be me and elder Tilley my last 8 weeks or so. Elder Saenz is way awesome, I am going to miss him too after he leaves. We get along way good, and he is one of my good friends. This Monday we had a meeting with president and his wife, it was way good. I left that meeting just like so pumped and stuff. President really is so amazing, he told us all these stories and experiences and stuff. We talked a lot about the obedience, so that is what we are going to focus on as a mission right now. On Wednesday we had a meeting with the zone leaders and in that meeting I had to talk about the obedience and stuff for a little bit. I talked about how the zone leaders could do changes with the other missionaries in their zone to give them the perfect example of how to be obedient, and how to pump them up and get them excited. The meeting was really good. We also had to go be with president while he interviewed missionaries of other zones. In their interviews all the missionaries had to teach president lesson 1 in like 3 to 5 minutes, so before we would practice and teach the missionaries before they taught president. We had to teach lesson 1 like 30 times to missionaries ha.

This week we saw two huge miracles. On Thursday we ate lunch with this lady in our ward that is way awesome. She actually lived in Utah for a couple of years. She had met this lady on the phone that was looking for a job, and I guess they starting talking about the church, and she invited her over to listen to us. So we went over there to teach her at this member’s house and seriously she is like the most prepared person to receive the gospel than I have ever met. She is from Argentina, and her husband was way crappy or something so she left her house, her job, and everything to get away and restart her life basically. She is like way rich, (Like everyone in our sector) and way nice. She like told us these dreams that she had about going into like a big white building that looks like a tent, and that there was all these people sitting down and these two fat lady scooted over to make room for her so that she could sit down, and that there was a big wood stand thing in front with a pulpit where you could lay your books down to read them. And she said a man with a black suit and with black hair came to the stand and put the bible on the pulpit and started reading ha-ha we were like tripping out cause that's like exactly how the church is. In Argentina she actually had met with the missionaries before and they gave her a book of Mormon and she had read a little. We invited her to be baptized with out even teaching the rest of the lesson like the Restoration and Joseph smith and stuff and she accepted a baptismal date. It was way awesome, we invited her to church too and she was like o ya, so she is coming to church with us. After lunch we started a fast, because as a mission we are doing like a forty day and forty night fast, everyday one companionship fasts, but anyways we fasted until Friday and at lunch on Friday we made these way good nachos. Like five minutes after we said the prayer and started eating this guy calls and I guess it was this guy that had been inactive for a while, and he has a 14 year old daughter that goes to church every single Sunday but since she was eight he wouldn't give her permission to get baptized. But he told us that he wanted her to get baptized tomorrow! And that he had already called Elder Amado ( a member of the seventy that's in our ward) and that he was going to baptize her. So we get everything worked out, we got her an interview last night, and this morning she got baptized and confirmed, and it was like an amazing baptism. The musical number was incredible too. There is this family in the ward that sings and plays piano like professionally. The song was seriously incredible. So that was a huge blessing. The girl that got baptized is way awesome, and her family is way awesome too.

This ward is so sick because the members actually give us references and stuff. The ward missionary leader is so so cool too. He did like everything. He called everyone and printed out all the programs, and even came to the interview with us last night. A huge example of how to magnify your calling. It was a way awesome baptism. Elder Saenz was telling me a while back ago, that our work as assistants is way different, that instead of serving the people, we serve and help and teach the missionaries, but at the same time, with out almost spending no time in your sector the lord still provides if we sacrifice ourselves and to a good just with the calling we have.

Driving is also a huge blessing ha-ha I love it. I see so much more of Santiago and I just get to experience like a whole new view of the mission. Its just so awesome driving around and stuff. We don’t really have normal P days, we just have a little time to write our families and that’s it. We don’t even really do shopping cause sometimes were so busy preparing and doing stuff. If we need something to eat we just stop and get it in the night. We usually get back to the pension like at 11:30 and to bed at like 12, 12 thirty. Our department has a weight room, but I haven’t been able to go down there yet, because obviously it’s hard to work out when you got to leave early too.

2 days ago I woke up with a bump like below my ear and beneath my jaw line. And I just thought it might be an underground zit or something. But this morning I woke up and it hurts pretty bad and its like swollen. My left cheek is swollen too. I have no idea what it is but its way weird. My face looks lopsided, and I don’t know if it’s just me but it feels like the left side of my face is going a little numb. I’m going to have the doctor check it out. Ya we drive on p-day. We drive a ton every single day. Yesterday for example we had to go move these huge mattresses to another house and I drove this green ford truck that is a stick shift.

I love you family; I hope you have a great week. Thank you so much for everything!

Bye!

Love elder Whitney