Baptism of Gabriel!

Dear Family and Friends,

Bueno el tiempo ha llegado. . . .

But before we get on that idea, I want to talk about the milagrous week we had this past week! 

Truly, milagros are still coming down to the very last day! 

Last Monday we were visiting Maria Ignacia who has attended church twice now and likes it a lot. We were visiting her and talking about the Plan of Happiness when we started talking about the gospel of Jesus Christ and how one needs to be baptized to be able to get into the Celestial Kingdom. She was really excited when we started talking about baptism and all, but then Luis, her dad, had just come home. Luis sat down and once he realized that we were talking about baptism with his daughter, he freaked out a little bit and told us how she isn't ready and with her hearing problems she can't be baptized until further on. 

He was being a little stubborn with us even though he is a member and got baptized in February, but sometimes he is like that. . .HA ha! We started to worry a little at how, first off, we realized that the spirit had gone and it was getting into an argument a little bit. We were able to calm things down and then we asked Maria Ignacia what she thought. There were a slit pause of silence, as she looked at her dad with fear and then looked at her mom and said some things in sign language. We found out that she was telling her mom that she wanted to say yes. So after explaining to her mom, her mom yelled out, "then say yes if you want to!" Finally, she looked at her dad one more time and told him, "Me bautizo." Luis was fine with her final decision and all and she looked to us and gave us the sign for faith in sign language. 

It made me a little emotional as she was truly showing complete faith in that moment. I truly have never seen so much faith in one person before! We were all excited for her and put the baptism date for the 8th and she accepted! Woo hoo! So we are gonna try to pull off another baptism before I finish the mission!! Woo hoo!!

Another miracle was with Gabriel after the life changing lessons that we had last Sunday. We passed by Tuesday and ran through the baptismal questions and he knew everything. But the only problem was that he was still smoking a little bit. So we gave him a priesthood blessing then  left.

We left a little worried but at the end of the day Elder Daniel and I prayed and really asked the Lord for His help in letting him stop smoking. It felt as if all Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday I was walking with the prayer in my heart. Finally, it got to the day of his interview and we hadn't had contact with him for the last two days so we were a little worried. He went to the church to have his interview as I stayed outside. And aww, it felt like forever! I was really nervous and I couldn't focus at all even though Gabriel's sons were trying to talk to me. 

I finally couldn't take it anymore, so I went around the corner and offered a small little prayer. As I was praying, I instantly felt a calm peaceful feeling come over me. As I finished the prayer, I felt fine and lifted up my head to see Gabriel leaving the interview with a smile on his face. He had passed his interview.

Two days later we filled the baptismal font and I had the opportunity to baptize him. Later on Elder Daniel confirmed him and gave him the gift of the Holy Ghost. Later on that day, Sunday in the afternoon, he told us that from the day of the interview he was really fighting against the temptation to smoke. But he was able to drop it for a few days out of his own will power, but then he told us that from the night of his baptism and especially after receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, it was as if the desires to smoke had left him--from one day to the next. It was powerful to see how changed this man has become! 

It was an even greater blessing to see all the family united in the church now, happy and all members of this great church. Something that the rest of the family were waiting for for years and years! 

I know that God is a God of Miracles. I am extremely touched at the feeling of knowing that my loving Heavenly Father has given me to be his instrument and to be able to see so many miracles. I know that my faith in centered on my Savior and Redeemer Jesus Christ. I know this is His church and I know I have the power and authority given to me through the holy priesthood to fulfill the covenants with His children. 

I love this mission so much. Yes, it is a very emotional time right now. . . But I know I have given it my all. And I still will till the end of this week. I know that with my faith, the Lord will be my constant companion with me for the rest of my life. there's no doubt in my mind about that. I love serving with Him and look forward to serving even more for the rest of my life. I am His servant and His friend. I am so grateful for His atoning sacrifice that He has offered to me specifically to be able to be cleansed and to be endowed with power. 

I love my Savior so much and this mission! 

I can't wait till you guys get to see this wonderful place! It's a place that will always be in my heart forever!

Love you all,

Elder Cowan

Baptism of Erlipper

Dear Family,

Well this week was ridiculously fast. . . Each week I am having a harder time trying to remember all the things that are happening. Really everything is passing by like a big blur. But as always, it was amazing! :)

Surprisingly, the Lord is blessing us so much with finding new investigators. This whole transfer almost we have been able to find 10 or more investigators each week! Which has been a surprise to me thinking in comparison of how much time I have here. But I'm so grateful to the Lord for helping this sector to continuously progress.

Wednesday we had our go-homer group go to the temple and lunch with Presidente. The temple was really nice and I just love going there so much. I felt a little weird though since I know that won't be the last time I will be there. There were a lot of missionaries crying and all and I imagine it was hard for them. But knowing that I will be here one week more with my family, I didn't really feel like it was my time to rendir mis cuentas al Señor. It was a weird experience but I know it will hit me one day. . .

Right after the mission and lunch, I went on divisiones with a new missionary in Parque O Higgins. I was there from Wednesday afternoon till Friday night. These two missionaries are doing whitewash there and sadly the sector has been dead for some time! It was a little sad to see how negative the other missionary was being during the whole division as he just whined and dragged his feet. But I knew that wasn't going to affect me! Even though he is a greenie, I just went overload on animo and just tried talking to every person in my sight! For every negative comment he made, I would bounce back and make it into a positive situation. He started to check in a little bit later on and right as the two of us started to be positive, we turned the corner, and talked to the first guy in the street that we saw. And he let us in! 

The greenie missionary was so surprised as this nice gentlemen let us into his house and he even stopped washing his car to let us in. We were able to teach him the first lesson and the spirit was really strong. As we left, the missionary that I was with was just stunned, he turned to me and asked, "It's that easy?" As I just smiled and replied, "As long as you're happy, yes!" You could see how it just clicked in his mind and I was able to teach him the importance of our attitude that we show to the Lord. I shared with him the quote that I have kept with me my whole mission which is, "Your attitude determines your altitude." 

I loved seeing the change in this new misisonary as the two of us were able to keep finding news and having lessons. In which for the first 4 weeks of his mission, he has just contacted and walked all day long without having lessons. It was a dramatic change and I can't wait to follow up on him!

I love working side by side by my missioanries! They are so special to me and I know I have this big responsibility to help them make the best of their missions. As I am finishing the misison, all I want is to help my misisonaries to enjoy their misisons to the MAX!

Other than that, I was able to get back into the sector as we had to go straight into divisions with greenies from the CCM again! And it was awesome being with Elder John from Mesa Arizona! That Elder is going to rock it on his mission! He's such a stud!

Then finally came the weekend! We had the baptismal service of Erlipper and wow! It was amazing! Sadly, there weren't a lot of members that came to the service, but all the family of Erlipper came! And wow does he have some prosperity! His famliy is huge and it was awesome to see how this seed that we have now planted and nourished in Erlipper is going to bring more fruits through his family members! His wife has already attended church 3 times now so we are excited to see what more we can do for them!

Then comes the miracle! Gabriel!! We had a lesson with him last night and we read Moroni 8:24-26 We talked about the gospel of Jesus Christ and were really direct with him. We invited him to get baptized just as we have done a lot of different times. But he started to ignore it. That's what Elder Cowan's patience ran out, I think, and I was really bold with him and told him that if he wants the spirit in his life then he better be humble. We talked a lot about humility and how we need to trust in the Lord. We invited him to get baptized again, and he accepted!!!!!! And he accepted to get baptized next weekend!!!

Awww! IT was so powerful! And the family was so emotional at his response! Truly, all the fast and prayers that we have done have really paid off! Thank you so much for all your help guys! We are just hoping that he can stop smoking this week!

I'm so grateful for this moment to keep baptizing in my mission. It really is a special experience that I will never forget!

Love you all! 

Elder Cowan

Updates on Investigators

Dear Family and Friends,

Wow entonces, we had some difficulties in the Internet place today so I have been trying to write this letter for sometime now and now it's finally all working out! So this might be a little shorter of a letter but it's alright! You guys will be able to hear everything personally in only 3 weeks! Wow soo weird!

But to give an update right away of our investigators. We have been able to focus a lot more on Erlipper this past week and we were able to have him accept baptism! Woo hoo! We were pretty frank with him but he understands that through this whole time we have been sharing with him, he has realized how much he really has learned. 

So he attended church yesterday and he liked it a lot and as well his wife came with him too! So we put the date for his baptism for this next weekend the 25th! Wooo hoo! We're gonna start off and finish the month with a baptism! Woo hoo! So we are really excited for Erlipper! 

Another cool thing is that Shirley who just got baptized a couple weeks ago, already has a calling in the young womens and now is attending our missionary meetings with the zone! Ha ha, she loves it! We are hoping that she will be able to like it enough to make the decision to serve a mission! She is amazing and she is progressing so fast! It's amazing to see! 

Another investigator that is progressing really well is Maria Ignacia. I don't know how much I have written about her, but her dad is a recent convert and her mom is inactive in the church. She isn't a member and is deaf. But even though she is deaf, it is AMAZING to see how the spirit really touches the hearts of people. Elder Daniel and I have been learning Spanish sign language and we can do a lot of stuff now so we're pretty impressed at how fast we are learning. And what's even more amazing is how much Maria Ignacia wants to learn! She is reading the Book of Mormon and is communicating with sister missionaries in the States that talk in sign language! 

She has had a lot of things happen in her life that have really helped her to learn that God really does exist and loves her. She even has had a couple near death experiencias (diagnosed with a disease as a kid, and a couple months ago she was in a very serious car accident) but in each experience she has explained to us at how she really has felt the Lord protect her. 

I love teaching her! Because it really is 100% depending on the spirit! Aww its so amazing! And it was awesome to see her come to church yesterday! She has so much faith! She even wants to serve a mision that way she can come back to Chile and teach everyone else the gospel here since there are really no recourses to help deaf people here in Chile. But she wants to be the first! She wants to be the pioneer for the church in helping everyone possible!

And another amazing thing is Gabriel. Aww, this man is sooo close to getting baptized. I was on divisiones with another elder and we went by the family and found out the Gabriel had snapped and gave into the temptation of smoking and smoked a whole box of cigarettes, but since he has been barely smoking his body reacted really bad and made him sick, which really was a tender mercy because now he can see literally how smoking is hurting him. I was able to give him a blessing and it was really powerful. 

He stayed in bed and I felt prompted to share something with the rest of the family. We read Ether 12 and talked about the faith. I invited them to show more faith to stand up against Gabriel to really help him accept baptism. They all got really motivated and in the next lessons that we had on Saturday and Sunday, it was amazing to see how his sons and wife started to double team against Gabriel and really stand up and testify to him of the truth and importance of this gospel. Usually Gabriel has a strong character, but the sons didn't have any fears and had the courage to testify back to him.

Last night we was accepting almost everything and really was leaning more to the idea of getting baptized. He is soo close! Really! I can feel it! Please be praying for Gabriel! We are gonna see if we can challenge him to get baptized this weekend with Erlipper!

So that is a quick update of our investigators! It seems like we will be having a couple baptisms these last couple weeks of my mission, which I'm truly grateful for! I love this mission so much! I'm grateful for each and everyone of you too! Justin and Stacie keep getting better! Trevor and Kiersten! Hope everything is well  with the pregnancy. Blake! Be safe out there in the Philippines. And Mom and Dad thank you for everything that you do! I love you guys so much!

Love

Elder Cowan

Hablar Con Todos (Aun en Lluvia)

Dear Family and Friends!

Wow, well just about all of you mentioned in your letters today, yes I only have 1 month left in my mission. Even though inside I can't get myself to wrap my brain around the concept. I know that everything has to come to an end! 

Now it's the last round and I'm stoked to give it my all! Winter has fully kicked in (sorry mom, it might be pretty cold here for ya) but it's game time!

So this week started off with a lot of fire, I guess you could say coming from President. On Tuesday we had consejo de guerra with him and he sure let us feel the pressure of the importance of this month. Sadly, the week before the mission only baptized 5 people in the whole entire mission. One of them being our baptism. President told us that that has never happened! So he was freaking out a little bit. He even called the district leaders to come to the meeting later on and gave a really clear vision for all of us to achieve. 

So we left the meeting pumped and ran straight to Erlipper's house, who we taught and taught a lot about what is Fe and how he really needs to show it. After our powerful lesson about faith, we invited him to get baptized and he accepted for the 18th! WOO HOO por fin! He finally accepted a baptism date! But the only down side is that he couldn't attend church yesterday and since he still needs one more attendance at church to get baptized, we are gonna pass by tomorrow to put a fecha with him for the 25th! Please pray for him that he will be able to be baptized that day! President is putting a lot of pressure in that everyone baptizes this month. And even though we baptized Liceth in the first week of this month, we know that we can show a bigger example to keep baptizing more and more!

Then the next day we passed by Gabriel who has received most of the lessons now and he is SOO close to getting baptized! Aww, we taught the Word of Wisdom and he has been able to stop drinking now, but he has a pretty strong addiction to smoking. He usually smoked about a pack full of cigarettes at least every day. But we were able to set some goals with him on Tuesday to start dropping one cigarette every day. We weren't able to pass by much during the week, but we passed by Saturday and he couldn't quite meet up with the goals, but he has dropped down to only smoke 4 a day which is still a huge progress! We taught him on Saturday about the importance of the Holy Ghost in our lives and how we need to endure to the end. We challenged him to get baptized but he doesn't feel like he is ready. He wants to get baptized but doesn't feel like he's prepared at all and still needs help with his smoking problem and doesn't want to fail after getting baptized. We explained about the sacrament and more of the confirmation of the Holy Ghost but he was being a little stubborn.

Really his whole family wants him to get baptized and he acts as if he is going to get baptized, but he just puts himself in a stubborn mode sometimes and sometimes it bugs the crap out of me! Aww! Ha ha, we are going to have a FHE with the Cruz family who are really good friends with them and we are hoping that he will get baptized this weekend or the next one with Erlipper!

Other than that the Lord was really merciful with our zone this past week. Our zone hasn't been progressing a whole lot. Month for month the only ones to baptized is us. We have tried so many things to try out for our zone, but it has seems that nothing has happened. Elder Daniel and I both decided that we needed to focus on talking with EVERYONE. We realized that the zone is barely finding any new investigators and obviously if we aren't finding, we aren't teaching, so we aren't baptizing! So we excited the zone this week to "open their mouths" and told them that if they wanted to be obedient we have to! We challenged the zone to talk with everyone possible! And this week there was a big rainstorm that started Friday night and lasted till Sunday afternoon. In which during the storm a lot of the companionships just stayed out in the streets getting wet because a lot of their appointments had fallen through.

But just by all of us opening our mouths the Lord truly did put people in our path. In our sector we were able to find 12 news! Something that we haven't been able to achieve for a long time. And as a zone we were able to find almost 70 news! We we were averaging achieving only like 25 a week. So that boosted a lot of the missionaries excitement and now it's just time to baptized them! The best part! Woo hoo!

Really, it was amazing to see how many tender mercies happened to us as we were walking in the street and so many families let us in. There was one case where we were able to find 4 news just by going into one pasaje in our sector, entered and taught in the first house, when we finished, we asked them for referencias, and they told us to talk to their neighbors, so we did! And we repeated that process for the first 4 houses! Ha ha, it was amazing! Enter, teach, ask for referencias, and we were able to find a lot of news! IT was amazing!

Truly the Lord is preparing a lot for us for the second half of this transfer. Even though it was a little slow this first couple weeks for the rest of the mission and mostly everyone, I know we are setting the building blocks for a lot of future baptisms for the end of this transfer and for the month of Agost! 

We are really focused on baptizing Erlipper and Gabriel since they are the only ones that could get baptized this month. We are pumped to see what miracles we will be able to see for the rest of this month!

I love this work and I know miracles exist!

Love you all!

Elder Cowan

Bautismo Gratis!

Dear Family and Friends,

Wow, I can't believe it's already July! Happy 4th of July to everyone!! Woo hoo! The 4th of July here was crazy! And that's because of the Copa America soccer tournament! And guess who won!!! CHILE!!!!!!! Oh YEA!!! CHI! Woo hoo!! It was crazy! Obviously we had to stay in the pension all day that day but after the game ended there was an endless night of celebration here in Chile! Wow! It sounded as if the whole entire country was celebrating! HA Ha it was insane! But it was an awesome experience! I love CHILE!!!! (p.s. sorry Blake about Argentina ha ha). 

So it was awesome to be here in Chile when Chile made some records with experiencing this country winning the cup for this soccer tournament! 

Bueno, this past week was awesome! I love being a missionary! Really the time seems to be going super sonic speed now since this is my last transfer! But I'm trying to give it my all!! And really, I just can't stop testifying about how many miracles there are! Wow! This week the Lord was really merciful with us again and I'm so eternally grateful to be serving in this great work! 

One of the awesome things that we were able to see this past week is how this ward has changed soo much! Really, when I got here it was a little "frio" you could say, but it was awesome to go to the church Tuesday night to have our weekly meeting with our leader misional as there were a lot of members that came to the church to see if Elder Daniel and I had changes or not! And it was nice to see how much love we have been able to develop for this ward! I think every day this past week, members gave us food to bring home to eat in the night, ha ha. Tuesday we were able to receive a bag full of oranges, a 2 liter of Sprite, bread sticks, and 2 boxes of pizza! Ha ha!! I love the members here so much! It's amazing to see the relationship with the members now as Elder Daniel and I both already have a good amount of time here and how they really establish mucho cariño!

Wednesday was just a miracle day or I guess I should say that is when the miracle started. It was the first week of the transfer, so for the weekly meetings that we usually have we wanted to get the zone pumped for this next transfer and month. So we decided to talk a lot about miracles! And how we show our faith to receive these miracles through our obedience. Really, I love being obedient! Aww! I don't know what I'm gonna do after the mission with not having so many rules to obey! I love feeling the spirit and the confidence that one can have with our Heavenly Father. Jesus Christ truly showed the perfect example as he always taught that everything He does is what He had seen by His Father. I love looking up to our Savior's example to be obedient just as He is.

After the meeting ended, I pulled out our phone and realized that we had a missed call from our ward mission leader. We called him and he yelled out, "Elderes! Tengo una referencia de ORO!" Ha ha, we got so pumped as he went on to explain that there was a family from Ecuador that we knew and who are active in the church, but that they still haven't baptized their daughter! So he, taking the initiative (aww, I love seeing members taking the initiative in the work) set an appointment for us to pass by that same day at 4! 

We were so thrilled! We were able to go their house where the Chiza family lives. We had already met this family a long time ago but surprisingly there was some confusion with the bishop and their daughter Liceth still hadn't gotten baptized. We started talking and they told us that Friday, Liceth was going to turn 9 years old and that they wanted her to get baptized that Friday! My comp and I both started at each other just surprised! Knowing that from 9 and above is when the missionaries come in to play! So we talked to Liceth, who is so adorable! And we were able to set up a baptismal service for Friday!

So starting Wednesday in that lesson and the second lesson we had with her Thursday we were able to teach all the lessons! We taught L1-L5 to Liceth! Ha ha, it was amazing! She has been attending church her whole life so she already understood everything! Then right after that lesson we met up with one of our district leaders, had the baptismal interview, we got baptismal clothes and got everything ready for the baptism Friday! WOOO talk about miracles! 

Friday came along and we were able to help Liceth's dad learn the prayer for the baptism and taught him everything he needed to know to be able to baptize his daughter. There were a lot of members that came and we were able to have another beautiful baptismal service! 

My feelings were overwhelmed of gratitude as I realized that we didn't hardly do anything. That was a miracle in itself and I am so grateful that we were just able to help this family receive all the blessings as being members of the Church. Really, It was all so fast and I think that must be a baptism record or something because we met her, taught her, and baptized her in only 3 days! Wow!! It was a miracle!!!

So we were able to have Consejo with President and then Saturday morning we had a zone conference with our zone and it was amazing to be able to testify to them of the power of miracles! We had no idea that we were gonna have a baptism that day. Actually, when it was Monday of last week we realized that the week before we put the goal for 1 baptism but on Monday we realized that there wasn't really a potential of anyone getting baptized so that same day we changed the goal to zero. But wow! Were we wrong! The Lord had other plans for us! 

I'm just so grateful to have been able to be the Lord's instrument in that miracle. It's been a wonderful feeling helping people receive this covenant in their lives. It was another miracle to have been able to have another back to back weekend with baptizing! Aww, I love this Lord and this work soo much!

There was another miracle too! The Family Rañiman were able to get married on Wednesday! And it was a huge celebration! There were about 60 people in the church and it was a big event! I love this family so much! Ever since the first day, helping the mom and her 2 sons to become active now and now to see the dad, Gabriel, get married and is now attending church with us! He is soo close to getting baptized! But during the marriage ceremony, Ana and Gabriel wanted us to take a minute to say a few words. Ha ha, Elder Daniel and I were a little nervous at first to have to go up in front of all these people with most of them not being members of the church, and to give a few words. But we were able to pump each other up as we realized that we had this moment to testify to EVERYONE! Aww, it was incredible! Elder Daniel and I were able to testify in front of everyone about the power of the gospel and how it blesses the families and how the families can become eternal. I put Gabriel on the spot as we were talking about the importance of temples and told him that when one is a member for more than a year then is it possible to get an eternal family. 

I think he got the message that we were talking about because yesterday they invited us over to eat and he offered to say the first prayer! Now that was a miracle! Because he has only prayed twice in front of us and usually we have to have a really spiritual lesson for him to commit to pray. But he willingly offered the first prayer and basically admitted to us that he knows he is going to get baptized but he just wants to make the decision himself.

Woo! IT was an amazing week! And to end it, Sunday we were able to have a mini MTC program with the members of our ward and we got together in the night and we were able to teach them how to do contacts and teach and everything! There was a lot of excitement and it was contagious to everyone! I'm so excited to follow up with our ward members to see how they can do this in their real lives! Woo hoo! 

But another miracle that we were able to see started 2 Sundays ago. The bishop read off a letter from the First Presidencia inviting all the Chilean members to fast this next Sunday specifically for this country to receive rain. This winter has been a really dry one. Especially in comparison to last year, last year it was already raining from May till August. But this year there hasn't been anything.

So as Saturday came my comp and I were able to start our fast as well with all the members as we were united in fasting for this purpose that the prophet had told us. And it was a miracle! With not seeing rain for a long time, we went to our lunch Sunday afternoon, broke our fast, ate lunch, and as we were leaving the house, it started to rain. And it rained almost all day long! Aww, IT was amazing to see!!

I love this work! I know and testify that God is a God of Miracles! He just wants us to show our faith to Him, and we do that by showing our obedience. I love my Savior so much! I love being able to save people and help them come back into His fold. The mission is the best!

Love Elder Cowan

Baptisms of German, Maria and Shirley!

Buenos Dias Amigos y Familia!!! 

Aww well we just got back from our transfer meetings and aww! I just love President and his wife! They pump me up soo much!! And wow! I really can't believe another transfer has already gone by. Now it's down to the last 6 weeks! And I ain't going without a fight and until the end! I love this mission soo much!!

So this last week a ton of stuff happened so I'm just gonna give a review of the most important things that happened. First off, we got Savka to pull off her first FHE in her house and she invited her neighbor and she actually came! It was awesome to see one of my converts participate in missionary work as she is trying to adapt her life to this new path that she has taken. It truly was a miracle because that doesn't happen a whole lot here in Chile. If you invite someone, there's usually a small chance that that person will actually come. But her neighbor came! And her name is Barbara! It was an awesome family home evening!

To give you guys an update about Erlipper we didn't get to have enough lessons with him as we usually have been having with him, but he is still progressing really well. He couldn't go to church yesterday which we were a little bummed about but he has finished reading the first book of Nephi now and we are getting pretty close to finishing the missionary lessons with him. Mas de nada, he is trying to understand on how to recognize if he is getting an answer to his prayers or not. We have been teaching him a lot recently about the role of the Holy Ghost and how to recognize it's impressions. He told us Friday that he still hasn't noticed anything. We are thinking that he thinks his answer will come in a way of helping get better with his health since he is an elderly man and we have been noticing that that is what he has been asking for in his prayer, that he has better health. Once we can help him to feel the spirit, we believe that he will accept a baptismal date for July!

So that's how the first half of the week was going which was pretty tranquillo, but starting Thursday it started to get pretty stressful. Thursday morning I had to go with a missionary to take him to the hospital which is super far and it took almost half the day to do all the stuff with him in the hospital. But it was nice to be waiting in the hospital for about 3 hours and to see the same stuff that I would like to be doing after the mission.

But we were able to get back in time for lunch and we went up with Elder Daniel who was with Elder Martins and then I was with Elder Martins for a 2 day division as Elder Daniel left to his sector. So the whole transfer of companions with a long slow morning kinda got me a little stressed out. But what stressed me out even more was our sector. I was with Elder Martins for 2 days and I have no idea what happened to our sector, but it was just dead! Ha ha! Nothing happened and they were two really long days of just straight walking. IT was weird because Elder Daniel and I have been taking out the trash these past 3 weeks and then suddenly it seemed as if everything stopped. 

Then Thursday night Elder Martins was going to do the baptismal interview with German and Maria but they couldn't get back from their work in time to get to the church so we had to ask the assistants for permission to be able to do the interview the day before. They told us it was fine and after a whole day walking on Friday we were finally able to have the interviews, but there was a problem with one of the interviews in which it was needed for President to come in and do the interview for German. I'm not gonna go into details, but it was basically a 2 hour long wait as we were talking to the assistants as they would talk to President and then back to us and I just felt back for German and Maria because it kinda just ended up being an awkward situation as they just waited.

And at the same time other missionaries were calling me about some stuff that happened with some other missionaries which resulted in having a missionary going home which were some stressful phone calls and basically that night I just sat against the wall and I could barely sleep as I was trying to wrap my head around everything that was going on. It was probably one of the most stressful days of my mission.

But we were able to get everything worked out Saturday! President came in the morning and interviewed German and everything was fine so finally at about 3 in the afternoon we were sure that we were going to have a baptism that day in only 4 more hours. We are super grateful for President who sacrificed a lot to be able to drive out to us, on the same day of his planned baptism, to come and interview German. So after that we started filling up the font, and las hermanas in our zone had one baptism in the afternoon and we were able to finish the night with our 3 baptisms! 

And ohhh que gozo que fue! The baptismal service was amazing! I am so grateful for the members in this ward! They did soo much! More than we thought they would do. There were 2 special musical numbers and desserts after the baptism service and they really pulled it all off perfectly! It was a huge stress reliever to see the members coming in and pulling the last threads through to pull of the baptism and it was really beautiful! It was so emotional! I had the privilege to baptize German who I know is going to be a future stake president! This guy has so much faith! He has been waiting over a year for this day and it truly was a miracle and a huge blessing to have been able to be the one to baptism him. Elder Daniel baptized Maria and our friend, Jherson, a member that always leaves and does visits with us, baptized Shirley. IT was truly amazing! I loved seeing the 6 of us in white! IT was amazing!

Then to finish it off, we heard transfers and Elder Daniel and I are staying together for one more transfer! Woo hoo! I was a little nervous because on Saturday President told us that he was thinking of changing me to be one of his assistants but today in our transfer meeting he told me that in the end he didn't change me because he saw us our baptisms that we were gonna have that day and decided that it would be better to let us be here and keep baptizing. So it was a little shock I think for the mission because an hour before the transfer meeting, every single missionary that I knew came up to me and told me that I was going to be the next assistant. I think half the mission thought that, but I'm truly grateful that I have these next 6 weeks to keep going strong and to keep baptizing till the end. I love serving here and serving with those missionaries in my zone. This is the place where the Lord wants me and I'm grateful that I have this time to show and give everything I have over to the Lord!! 

I love my mission!

Love Elder Cowan

Casamiento!

Dear Family and Friends!

Wow, I honestly don't know where the time is going! I can't believe that we are in the last week of this transfer. The next time I will be writing you I will already be in my last transfer. Aww, that's so scary!!

But this past week was amazing! Really Elder Daniel is such a stud and I love working with him! In this tiny sector that we have been together in, it has been a blast to be able to take out the trash! We are achieving things that none of us have achieved in our missions before! It's amazing to see miracles after miracles! 

But to give you an update about the sector we have Gabriel and Erlipper who are progressing really well! The both of them came to church, Erlipper for the first time AND he brought his wife with him too! HA ha, it was awesome! Erlipper still hasn't accepted a baptismal date, but we are almost done with all the lessons with him and he is already finishing 1 Nephi almost! He is such a chill grandpa! I love the guy. He doesn't say much, but he says what's necessary! We were able to meet his wife this past week and she didn't know that we were visiting with him so we were a little worried on how she would take it. But the funny thing was that the day that we had a lesson scheduled with Erlipper in which he told us that he would have his wife there, we were actually contacting a new part in our sector and contacted Reina. She was super nice and she loved to talk with us.

Then to our surprise, as we entered the house where Erlipper takes care of his grandsons, (that's where we teach him instead of his house,) we were surprised to see Reina in the house with him! Ha ha!!! We had contacted Erlipper's wife only 2 hours before the appointment we had set to meet her for the first time! Ha ha! And actually we found out that they have a son that got baptized in the Church a long time ago and a lot of their family members from the side of their sisters and aunts and uncles are members too but live in Peru. So Reina already knew a lot about what missionaries do and what Family Home Evening is and everything! They both went to church and liked it a lot! We are soo stoked to see them progressing!

Gabriel Alegria, as well, is progressing really well! He is the dad of the family that we reactivated. Something happened with the wife and she wasn't able to go to church. And usually if she doesn't go her two sons Seba and Gabirel Jr. don't go. But the dad, Gabriel, felt like he needed to go to church to be able to show his gratitude for the blessings that have happened to their family. They are about to have a baby and things have been going really well. So he by himself showed up to church and brought his two sons! It was amazing to see! WE were so excited! Last night we shared the Plan of Salvation with him and tried challenging him to get baptized, but we think he might need a little bit more time. But he's getting there! 

It's amazing to see how this man who has been with the missionaries for over 5 years is really opening and changing so much! He prayed for the second time in front of us last night and it was so powerful! It's amazing to see this change in heart in him.

Then we did another 2 day splits this week and this time I went out of the sector and I was with Elder Kimball for 2 days. And it just so happened to be right when Elder Kimball hit one year in the mission field! HA ha!! We were together exactly one year ago and we were able to have these divisions again! Seriously, I love that kid soo much! It was amazing to see Elder Kimball leading his sector and I got to watch and see how much he has grown in this past year! IT was a really special division!

Then Saturday we had the casamiento or marriage of German and Maria!!! Wooo hoo!!! Two people that have been waiting to get married for over a year now! That part was great and it was amazing to see how the Lord has his timing in everything! 

This Saturday will be their baptism as well with the baptism of Shirley who is soo ready to get baptized! We are stoked to be able to finish the transfer with 3 more baptisms! 

Seriously, this transfer has been MIRACULOUSLY! I have never seen so many miracles and baptisms in one transfer before! I'm so grateful to my Heavenly Father who has given us all these blessings! I love working and showing my love through my obedience and my trust in Him with my faith and diligence! 

There is a God, and I know without a doubt in my mind that he is our LOVING Heavenly Father. I have felt that love so much in my mission and I love sharing with everyone!

Love you all!

Elder Cowan