More Miracles

Dear Family and Friends!

Buenas dias!!! Estan todos! Aww, I just love hearing from you guys! Seriously, I love hearing from you guys! And all the fun and incredible stuff that has happened in this past week!

But now it's my turn! And to be able to let you know how our last week went! The weeks here are getting faster and faster and I can't believe we have already finished a half of this transfer already! Wow! Only a transfer and a half left! Scary!!!! But even though they are going really fast, they are getting better and better! Really! I love seeing how the Lord is blessing us so much right now!

But to get the details in for all you guys! We visited Shirley a lot this past week and we were preparing her for her baptism for Saturday and we even got her to have her baptism interview Thursday. And she passed! She accepted everything and has a great testimony! But the only down side was that Shirley wanted to talk to her parents in Peru and let them know of her decision. So by Thursday night she said she would talk to them Friday. But Friday some cousins came from outside of Santiago and took her away for the day. So she wasn't able to talk to her parents. Then we were waiting to see what would happen Saturday, but she was having problems with the Internet and couldn't connect with her family. She called us to let us know that she hadn't talked to her parents yet and that she would like one more week that way they would know. 

So even though we didn't have a third back to back baptism this past week, we scheduled her baptism for the 13th. We are praying and hoping that everything will work out fine!

We have been able to find some new investigators that are progressing really well. One of them is Erlipper who was a new investigator that I found almost 3 months ago! But we were able to run into him again. We were able to teach him 3 times this week! He accepted to go to church, but didn't show up. But he is praying to know if he should get baptized the 27th or not. He is a little older in age, but a very humble and powerful man of little words! He is great! He reminds me a lot of Grandpa Cowan.

We also passed by Luis Fuentes who is a recent convert in the ward and we have always shared with him, but never have met his family. We passed by Monday and Friday night and he wanted us to teach his daughter. We met Maria Alejandra who is 18 years old and is deaf. Luis just looked at us and said, "Teach her!" HA ha but she isn't completely deaf. She can hear a little still and reads lips super well. So we were just using the pictures out of the pamphlets that we had and she actually understood. I was so surprised. We even invited her to get baptized and she accepted too! Ha ha it was a miracle! Really, we were able to experience the gift of tongues as we were speaking a foreign language, Spanish, to a deaf girl. But the spirit was there and it was awesome! I am so grateful for the gifts of the Holy Ghost!

And we had another miracle with our investigators German and Maria. We were on divisions again with Elder Hatch who was in this sector over 7 or 8 months ago and he found them. Ever since then they have been receiving the missionaries. They have always wanted to get baptized, even the sister of Maria and the son of German have already gotten baptized. But German and Maria haven't been able to get baptized because they aren't married. They have had a lot of problems with their papers because they are from Peru and it's complicated here in Chile sometimes. Back in November they were able to go to the centro and pull out a date to get married by the government. But in November of 2014, they gave them the date of the 20th of July 2015! Sometimes it's crazy like that! 

But the missionaries have always passed by them and Germana has already read the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Convenios, Pearl of Great Price, and now is half way through reading the New Testament. While we were visiting with them, German's other son, Edwardo, came from Peru, and it seems that Edwardo is going to live with them. 

During that lesson it was great to see Elder Hatch who had found them originally, finally invite them to get baptized for the 27th of this month! They both accepted and it was a really powerful epxerience! These two people have waited so long for this! And now it's coming true! I'm so grateful that the Lord has put me here just in time to see these two get married and get baptized!

And another miracle was that we passed by later on in the week to see how they were doing and when we entered we were soo surprised. German had already shown the Restoration video to his son Edwardo and were watching the Book of Mormon story videos on Youtube! Ha ha We were able to teach Edwardo and he is super interested in the Church. He explained to us that he has always been so confused of why there are so many churches. He accepted to offer the ending prayer and asked 3 times to know if this was the true church. And on top of that he attended church yesterday as well! So we are gonna try to invite him to get baptized the 27th as well with his parents. Ha ha even though he has been in Chile for 4 days now. HA ha whateves! Salvation can come at any place at any time! :)

Truly, the Lord is blessing us so much right now! We have a lot of potencial of investigators that can get baptized this month. As well, the attendance in the sacrament meeting is growing and growing! What used to be at 180-190 we were at 264 now! Woo hoo! It was incredible to see the church filled!! I didn't even have a seat left to sit in so I stood in the back for the whole meeting! But it was incredible! We were able to bring 5 new less actives to church and it was the first time in years for some or months since they have gone to church! 

Our sector is bringing a lot of fruits right now and now the only trouble we are having is trying to motivate our missionaries in our zone to do the same. We had a zone conference last Saturday to pump them up and it was awesome. But when we got los datos yesterday it wasn't too great for our zone. We are going to be doing a lot of splits this week to help our missionaries out. Our goal is that they can feel the love in the work and not just do the things day to day which sometimes we feel they fall into that trap a little. But we want the best for them so much! So we are going to be trying to help our missionaries feel the LOVE for this great work that we are in!

Truly, I LOVE THIS WORK SO MUCH! I Love this country with all my heart. Chile is the place for me! And I love working side by side with my companion and most importantly with the Lord's angels as we bring them into His fold! I LOVE THIS MISSION!!

Love you all!!

Elder Cowan