Dear Family and Friends!
Wow, seems like this week was pretty jammed packed for the Cowan gang! That's awesome that everything went through with the wedding! I'm so happy for you all! What an awesome experience! And while we are talking about awesome experiences, last week we had our zone activity and we went bowling!! Ha ha, it was probably the most run down bowling place I have ever seen but it was awesome! I love our zone! We had a blast playing together! I'll send you some pictures of the adventures!
And I wanna give out a shout out to my Bro Hunter who is gonna be entering the CCM soon!!! Woo hoo!!!! So cool!!! Ha ha, good luck!
But now on a more serious note! This week we had a lot to do. . . whoa it was a packed week! But after the bowling session and after working Monday night we got a call at like 11 at night from the assistants that there was going to be a special capatation tomorrow as a mission with President. We thought that it was pretty weird but then President had all the reason to have that meeting . . .
I don't know if you guys remember the announcement that I gave out a couple weeks about the achievements of our mission last month in November but we did a new record and had 92 baptisms! That is the highest that we have had in years! But just as the title of this email says, just as the Nephites prospered in the land, (or when the mission had 92 baptisms) the Nephites started to forget the Lord and pride entered their hearts. . . . President started showing us that from November we went from 92 baptisms, to December with 42. We had lowered 50 baptisms!! And that's a lot! Yet 42 baptisms is still a lot of people to baptize and reason to rejoice, but the fact that we lowered soo much has never happened in the whole time President has been here in the mission. So lets just say. . . recibimos muchas palos. . . ha ha, or he got on us pretty hard in the meeting.
We had a zone leader meeting right before the meeting with the mission where President just spilled it all to us. And it's true, we could really see in the month of December how the mission got comfortable, or maybe lazy and didn't try as much as we did in November. But the focus on the meeting wasn't to just get down on the missionaries, but to really set the vision for 2015 and January. It was a great meeting! It really helped all of us to re-focus and to start from the beginning which is gaining, maintaining, following, and trusting in the Spirit. Really the Spirit is the one that makes the changes necessary, not us. We learned a lot of the role of the Holy Ghost in our lives and really we are all now dedicated to go for more! A whole lot more!!
And on that note! We left behind December and 2014, we repented, and now we are focused on 2015!!!! Awwww just saying that sends a shiver down my back to think how fast time is going!!! Well for New Year's Eve we didn't do anything exciting, we actually had to enter the house early at 8:00 at night and Elder Goates and I decided to take advantage of it and sleep, so it really didn't even feel like a new year when we woke up. But even though it was nothing for us, the next day we could see the results of the New Year"s Eve "partying" . . . . .
Just how I was telling you, our sector has like three parts. In the middle is the city with all the stores and everything and below that is the new neighborhood where there are 3 story houses. And above the city, crossing the train tracks, is the more humble side of our sector. For the 1st, on New Years Day we had some appointments set up for the sector above the train tracks. So we decided to go up and cross the lines and started to work. But at first none of our appointments were there, that or they were all sleeping. And then it got a little scary. . . in the more humble side of our sector where we already were, there were drunk people everywhere! It seriously looked like a mob of dead zombies all walking in the street. But worse was what they say us, (which we stick out pretty easily) everyone just wanted to come up to us and touch us, or hug us. It was pretty nasty, I'm not gonna lie . . . From that moment I literally felt as if the spirit had departed and we were alone. We tried to get one more appointment in but for an hour I had this huge impression telling me, "GET OUT!"
I fought that impression for about 45 minutes up until we were at the top of our sector and from then my chest was beating and I kept feeling the impression, finally I turned to Elder Goates and told him "I know this isn't gonna make a whole lot of sense since we are at the highest part of our sector, but we have to leave and leave now and go down to the new neighborhood." He agreed and from that point at the highest part of our sector we decided to lower down and basically cross our whole entire sector. And from that moment, the impression kept coming "GET OUT" And as we started lowering down it seemed as if all the drunk people decided to turn on us and tried everything to stop us. We eventually ended up running down since it seems Satan was controlling that sector.
Then we were finally able to get to the new three story neighborhood where we were able to do a lot of contacts and meet more complete families. And we were able to find Nora and her son, Thomas! Who lives like 3 houses from our ward mission leader! They are a great family! And we were able to find Angelica and Diego another great family! As well, we were able to contact a reference we had who is an inactive member that the sisters gave to us. We went by his house too and met Gonzalo. He is about 40 years old, but got baptized when he was 10 and he has been inactive since basically. His brother who lives in Viña is now a bishop and that has sparked up his desires again to look for the church again. We were able to meet with him and he is super nice and the rest of his family aren't members! Woo hoo! So just in that last hour and a half we were able to have a lot of success!
It was such a great feeling to know that we were literally lead by the spirit to these three families! Really, I have now learned to NEVER deny an impression from the Spirit! Really, I know that 2015 has begun and just as some of you have told me, this is all down hill now for me. . . and even though I already know that, I know something else. . . that there is still a lot of work for me to do. I want to be able to feel the Spirit at every moment these last months! I won't give up! I have put a lot of goals for this year and I need to get working! Yes, Talagante is a hard sector, yes, there have been no investigators attending church for over 4-5 months, but I know the Lord has called me here to work, and just as it says in John 5:17, "But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." I know this work is never done! And because of that I too must go to work! I love this work of salvation! As I have submerged myself in this glorious work, I have received those blessing and testimonies of this marvelous gospel! I love the Spirit. I love having, feeling, following, and trusting in that Spirit. This is HIS work and I cherish it soo much!
I love each and everyone of you SOO much! You're all such a huge blessing to me! Don't you ever forget that! Happy New Year to all! May this year be one of many blessings! :)
Love Elder Cowan
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