The heavens are opening!

This week has been absolutely incredible!!! This week was crazy but we worked so hard, and the heavens literally opened!!! We had an amazing zone conference this week! It literally was such a spiritual feast! And it gave us the motivation and determination to keep working, and to become better!!! It was especially remarkable because I saw a new spark in Hermana L that I never saw before! I saw an urgency and determination from the Spirit, and we put some great goals for ourselves and our sector and companionship! But I really love the theme of faith, and the more I learn about it, the more I realize I can always develop a stronger faith! But in my studies this week I read about Nephi, the son of Nephi, in 3 Nephi 7:18, and the kind of faith he had that says, ¨no era posible que descreyeran sus palabras, pues tan grande era su FE en el Señor Jesucristo que angeles le misistraban diariamente.¨ It was amazing to find that verse the day after zone conference! I know there are ministering angels! But more than anything, I want to develop THAT kind of faith! 

So Hermana L just shot right through the roof this week! I CANNOT BELIEVE HOW MUCH SHE HAS PROGRESSED!!! She is taking the initiative in lessons, and she is learning how to focus her studies! And she is smiling during the lessons, and now she gets SO excited when we teach and she gets to explain a principle!!! IT´S INCREDIBLE!!! She especially improved with the mornings! This morning she got up and did her exercises and didn´t fall back asleep in the morning! She has REALLY improved in all aspects of the work! In contacting, in working, in climbing the mountains, in focusing during studies, oh man, she really is going to be the GREATEST missionary ever!!! This week we had intercambios with Hermana E and Hermana L, and might I just say they were SO inspired!!! Hermana Eand Hermana L found four new investigators in one afternoon here in Conti!!! And three of them were a family! A family that the Lord has totally been preparing to receive the gospel! We taught them last night, and it was probably the best lesson of the restoration that I have taught in my whole mission!!! The heavens are opening! But as far as our goals for our sector, every day we want to invite at least one person to baptism! Whether it be in lessons, contacts, with investigators or future investigators, at least one person! And the Lord is totally giving us opportunities to do so! We invited Y to baptism on Friday and she said yes!!! We know God is preparing so many people!!! :)

With that being said, we have had some problems with our fechas. We have done everything to help V progress towards her baptism, but she still hasn´t come to church, so her fecha, along with J´s, fell through. So we are going to have an important discussion with those two about the importance of covenants, and if they really want to make this covenant, what that would mean for them.  Ju. is getting really close to being ready! He is really changing and really has shown he has a broken heart and a contrite spirit! He is excited to have an interview with the bishop to help him a little bit with this repentance process! But he is SO GOOD!!! He is really striving to be ready and clean before his baptism, but that´s all he wants! A remission of his sins! 

Hermana L is doing GREAT in 12 Semanas! This week she filled out the Informe de Progreso for our correlation meeting, and we made goals with our mission leader to work more closely and involve the members in missionary work! It was great!! Hermana L is really incredible! She is learning SO FAST!!! I am so lucky to be her companion! I love her so much! :) 

And from her weekly email to her mission president:

There was just one more thing I wanted to share. It was a story my Dad recently sent me while he was traveling and attending a ward in Thailand, and this is the experience that my Dad shared with me: 

¨It is amazing the power of the missionary work going on in Thailand. It truly is a miracle. There was someone who arrived just on Sunday to move back to Thailand.  In 2001, he and his family have lived in Thailand for nine years while he worked as an investment banker. He said that when he was there back in 2001 the mission  baptized about 20 people a month.  Today they are baptizing around 80 to 100 per month and in some months as many as 300-400! There's also a new temple announced to be opened in Thailand! It is amazing to see the church grow!¨

As I read that, I couldn´t help but think of our Mission Chile Rancagua, and our average for baptisms every month, but I know the Lord has bigger plans for us and our mission, and I know that everything you are doing for us missionaries, the members, and our investigators, is what is laying the foundation for us to elevate this mission, just like what happened in Thailand! So, I just wanted to say thank you President for all your hard hard work, because it is changing people’s lives, and allowing the Lord to accelerate his work! 

 Have a great week! 

Hermana Christensen 

I felt a guidance I have never felt before

WOW!! This week has been so incredible!! Heavenly Father has answered so many prayers! And on Saturday, the Holy Ghost was really working! I felt a guidance that I have never before felt from the Holy Ghost! He literally was there in every decision I made. I don´t quite know how to describe how the Holy Ghost was with us so strongly, but wow, it was incredible! 

 Hermana L is absolutely incredible! I felt like this week was just so much better than the previous two!! She really is starting to pick up on more Spanish, and she is learning how to study more efficiently, and she is just getting so excited to share the gospel with everyone! This week,  we got out of a lesson at night, and we had about 20 minutes before we needed to go home, and she said with a bunch of excitement, ¨Hermana, we could contact, can we contact?¨ :) It was so fun! YES Hermana! Of course we can contact! And so we prayed and started knocking on doors, and found some great people! She is SUCH a great missionary though! She is SO friendly! And not scared of anything! She just starts talking to the people in the colectivos, and she literally waves to EVERY person, and EVERY car that passes by! Every single one! She is such a joy!! Also, she is very wise! And has a deep understanding of the gospel, and I totally know why I had to be her companion in my last cambio, because she literally has all the answers to the questions I´ve had my whole mission, and my whole life! So it has been WONDERFUL learning and studying with her! Oh I love her! We laugh a lot! :) 

So for our sector!! V told us she feels SO happy and excited about her fecha! And that she is 100% going to be baptized on the 25th! She has progressed so much! And she is reading the Book of Mormon everyday!!!!!! WOOOO!!!! We had a family home evening with V and the Bishop and his wife and it was incredible! She is just so excited about her baptism, she is telling everyone about it!! :) J has also progressed so much! We had a great lesson with him this week, and we talked about fasting, and he was so excited he wanted to join in on our fast for the month! He decided he wanted to fast so that he could be prepared to be baptized on his date, and even though we went out of town this weekend to visit his Dad, he made him go with him to the church in Lincanten, and he stayed for the classes! He just wants so badly to be baptized! It´s truly incredible all the miracles we have seen in their progression! :) 

Well we are all up to date with 12 semanas! It is going great!! It really is such an inspired program! And we are practicing, practicing, practicing!!! This week we focused on teaching people, not lessons, and really focused on asking inspired questions, listening, discerning, and teaching the doctrine according to their needs, and that totally helped us in our lessons! Especially with one of our investigators, C, who we invited to baptism, and at first she said no, but because she had already been baptized, we listened, discerned, and Hermana L came in and promised her that if she prays and asks God, the he would tell her it´s all true. It was a powerful moment, because her testimony was just so pure and sincere, and I know C felt the spirit in that moment! I sure did! But then she accepted the invitation to baptism, if God responds to her question. 

Oh I just love being a missionary!! I am SO SO blessed!!! I just wanted to invite you all to pray for missionary opportunities this week! God is more than willing to give us these opportunities when we promise to open our mouths and share the GOOD NEWS of the gospel!!!! I love this great work with all my heart! I just want to serve our Heavenly Father for the rest of my life!!! So let´s open our mouths to share these glad tidings of great joy! I love you all so much! Have the best week! 

Hermana Christensen :) 

Land of miracles

WOW!! What a week it has been! Definitely a week of relying on the Lord! But I am just SO grateful to be a missionary! Especially here! The Lord is blessing us so much!!! :) I love Hermana L!!! I really do! She is such a great missionary! I really love her! She has progressed SO much in just one week! It was incredible!!! 

So our sector is doing great!!! SO MANY MIRACLES!!! Conti is the land of miracles!!  So we were having a hard time finding new investigators, but guess what? This week we found 6 new investigators!! And we made significant progress with our three fechas: J, for the 22 of July, and V and J, for the 25 of July!! V told us, "Hermanas, I am going to be baptized on the 25th, not a day sooner, not a day later!" AHHH IT WAS AMAZING!!! We read through the baptismal requirements in D&C 20:37, and she is ready!! Oh what joy!!! 

Also, O finally found the determination to talk to her family that visits her every Sunday to tell them that she is going to church, and that she wants to be able to go to our meetings on Sundays, instead of having to attend them. OH so much progress here in Conti!! :) I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!! 

This week we practiced as a companionship the points in Preach my Gospel from, "How to begin teaching" (when we first walk in a house) and we practiced a LOT, especially in the bus rides from Talca! But the coolest thing was, Sunday afternoon, during my personal studies, I prayed and asked God for the opportunity to find  a new investigator, so we could use the points we had just practiced in, and of course, God answered my prayer! We found Teresa! And her two sons J and M, and we were able to apply ALL the points of how to begin teaching, because she let us in to hear our message!!! It was INCREDIBLE!!!! OH Heavenly Father really knows what he is doing!!!

This week as a companionship we made a goal. Our goal was to share the last point of how to begin teaching, that talks about covenants and baptism, with all of our first lessons and contacts so that the people can feel the importance of this message, the importance of covenants.  By doing this, we can prepare them sooner for the baptismal invitation! We just want to invite everyone to baptism! After all, that is our calling! :) And I know that God is preparing people, and he has given us all the instruments we need, now we are the ones that just have to do it! Just invite! 

I am SO SO grateful to be a missionary and a full-time representative and disciple of our Lord Jesus Christ. For now and for the rest of my life I want to be an instrument in his hands, to invite others to come unto him. Oh how I love this work!

I love you all so much! Keep sharing your light!!!! 

With all my love, 

Hermana Christensen 

What an adventure it has been

OKAY!!! From traveling for days, staying the night in Rancagua, receiving my new companion Hermana L, inviting everyone to baptism, lots of laughs and lots of stress, braving the crazy tropical storm that knocked out all the electricity here for 2 days, and from all the funny moments of helping a new missionary learn Spanish, you could say this week has been the BEST WEEK EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :) :):) :) :) 

WOW!!! What a week and what an adventure it has been! Training is SO MUCH FUN!!! But it´s also a little difficult at times but I am happy to say that we are getting the groove of things and we are SO happy to be missionaries! This week I was a little stressed out the first few days, but always more excited and happy than stressed out but, Heavenly Father is SO amazing, I have totally felt the Holy Ghost first of all comforting me, but also cleansing me, sanctifying me, and strengthening me! I LOVE the Holy Ghost! I LOVE the scriptures! And I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!! It´s literally the greatest thing ever!!! :)

OH MY GOODNESS HERMANA L IS INCREDIBLE!!! She is 19, and she´s from Gunnison Utah. WOO!!!! She reminds me a LOT of my trainer, Hermana Darley!!! This week has been a great week of learning for the both of us, but I really just REALLY love Hermana L! I just feel SO lucky to be her trainer!!! It is so amazing to see how much she progresses every day!!! OH MY! It´s a miraculous thing! We get along great!!! And we don´t have any problems! I am doing my best to teach her how to be the best missionary she can be! She does have a really hard time getting up in the morning, and the first few days were really rough, well, every morning is really  rough for her, but I am happy to say that after explaining the rules and everything, she has been out of bed, praying at 7:00am every morning!!! WOOOO!!! I cheer her on every morning! But she is amazing! And so so funny! And SO talented! And SO good with people! And she´s not afraid of anything!!! She is an incredible missionary, and wow, I can´t even imagine how powerful she is going to be when she can speak fluent Spanish!!! AH I AM HER NUMBER ONE FAN!!! I love Hermana L! 

Our sector!!! We put another fecha this week!!! WOOO!!! His name is J! He is 13 years old and he´s the nephew of a recent convert, and Hermana L´s new best friend (they totally bonded through video games and anime) haha :) But he is so prepared! He had a fecha before, but it fell through because he stopped going to church to go visit his Dad on the weekends, but he came to church yesterday and we made him a calendar to prepare him for baptism and he was SO excited!! We are working so hard to help these people progress! Our other two fechas didn´t come to church, and we are working with several investigators to get them to come to church, it seems to be the biggest challenge in our sector, but we´ll get them there!!! Also, we just have SO many investigators that we are running around from cita to cita all day, that there isn´t much time to find new investigators!! But we will be better at planning time to contact!! 

Okay Hermana L is amazing!!! It´s incredible because we have only been together for about 6 days, but I have already seen SO much progress in her! In her Spanish first of all, in her confidence, in her focus, in her desires to overcome the natural man, she is really progressing! And thanks to 12 semanas, she has got the baptismal invitation down!!! She invited three investigators to baptism last week, and SHE PUT A FECHA!!!! She is so set!! We are doing LOTS of practices and every practice gets better!!! Oh she is awesome! She doesn´t particularly like studying, and she doesn´t like setting goals, but I am helping her set goals, and helping her in her studies in disguise! Especially with the language and everything!! hehe :) I make her lists and charts and things to help her! :) But it´s amazing being a trainer because what I learned this week is you really have to go where they are, get down on their level, understand where they are coming from, and then you can slowly start to show them the way to get up to where they want to/need to be! OH it´s so incredible!!! 

I just feel so lucky the Lord trusts me enough to train this cambio! It has already been such a great experience for me and we are going to keep learning together! I am SO grateful for Hermana L! SHE BRINGS ALL THE MIRACLES!!!!! :)

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!! Have the best week ever!!! I know we will!!! :)

Con todo mi corazon, 

Hermana Christensen 

Training this cambio

We didn't receive an email from Ashley and so I was a little worried until I finally received a brief email from her today.

 

This is what she sent: 

Hey Mom!!! I'M ALIVE!!!!! so what happened is I am TRAINING this cambio and so I had to travel to Rancagua all day yesterday and I never got to write!!! SO I got permission to send you this quick email telling you that I am okay and HAPPY and alive! So no worries! I haven't read anything but I will catch up next week! I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!! ENJOY YOUR TRIP!!! And I hope your knee is better! I have been praying hard!!! And my companion is Hermana L, from Gunnison, Utah, SHE IS INCREDIBLE. I AM SO EXCITED TO BE HER COMPANION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

It's just all true!

This week has been absolutely incredible!! I feel like I have learned so much!!!  And I feel like I  know how to be an effective missionary! I feel like I finally have a strong testimony to share in a way that the spirit can testify of my words! I finally feel confident in the scriptures, so that in any given moment, I can use the scriptures to help others resolve their doubts. IT´S INCREDIBLE!!!!  This week we found 6 new investigators! It was great!!! We always are finding more people to teach! The hard part is getting them to keep their commitments, and to have good seguimiento with them, but we are getting better!! J.(10 years), the son of a family menos activo, has come to church these past two weeks in a row with his menos activa sister A. But J. keeps asking us when we are going to prepare him to be baptized! He loves the church! Is always asking questions, and just says, ¨Oh, que bakan.¨ Whenever we explain something!! He´s so cool! But he really is such a great kid! Soon, he too will be baptized. We just need to have a good talk with his parents!!! We still have 3 fechas, but we are having a hard time helping them progress, but we are going to really focus on them this week, so that we can find out if they are really willing to keep their commitments they are making! But the work is progressing! Constitucion is incredible!!!  This week we had a lesson with a menos activa, A, who was baptized young, and doesn't remember anything at all about the church, but she is in a tricky situation now, and is really searching for God in her life. Anyways, we taught her the Book of Mormon, and it was one of the most powerful lessons of my whole entire mission!!! We testified of the power of the Book of Mormon with all our hearts, and of the reality of God´s presence and promises, and more than anything the Spirit testified. There was not a dry eye in the room. I just LOVE this gospel! It has changed everything for me! And all the truths of the restored gospel are found in the Book of Mormon. I know it! Because through the Book of Mormon, I have come to know all of this is true. And through the Book of Mormon, I have come to know my Savior.  ITS JUST ALL TRUE!!!! And it makes me so happy when others come to know the truth of the gospel too! Have a fantastic week everybody, and in the lovely words or our beloved prophet, "If you are not reading the Book of Mormon each day, please do so." Do it! I promise, It´ll change your life! :)  I love you all so much!!!  Hermana Christensen

Nothing greater than bringing the gospel to these crazy Chilenos!

This week has been incredible!!! I feel like the time has gone by way too
fast!! We have been running from lesson to lesson and traveling and then
before I know it the week is over! It´s crazy!!! But it´s SO great!!! We
are SO BLESSED in this sector! We have so many people to teach and so many
people who want to be baptized! Now we just have to help them get there! :)

Hermana R, is incredible!! This week we had intercambios with our
Hermana Leaders and they were absolutely incredible! I am so grateful for
Hermana L.! I learned so much from her and we saw so many miracles! I
know intercambios are inspired because it gave me the excitement and JOY
that I needed to keep working with all my heart!!! I am so grateful for our
Hermana Leaders! They`re the BEST!!! But also being away from Hermana
R. made me realize how much I love her!!

 Guess what?? WE PUT THREE FECHAS THIS WEEK!!!!! I am so so excited for
them!!! One is O., and she has such a special spirit! She has born her
testimony to us of how she started praying like we taught her, and she has
seen MIRACLES! It´s incredible!!! We also put a fecha with V., an
antigua investigadora, and her daughter J., they want to get baptized
too!!! But the struggle we are having now is that we are always finding new
investigators, and that`s great because we always have citas! And we are
running around all afternoon, but because of that, it´s hard to have
consisitent contact with everyone to help them progress! We have lots of
potential, but it´s hard for us to give enough attention to every
investigator, but we are trying to come up with plans to help have more
consistent contact with them and to help them come to church! But it´s
incredible to be here!!!

Oh what JOY it is to be a missionary!! There is nothing greater than
bringing the restored gospel to these crazy Chilenos!!! OH I love them! And
I love you all! Have a great week!!! Keep spreading the JOY of the gospel!
:)

Con todo mi corazon,
Hermana Christensen