Chile - Pucón - Week 12 - Cambios - Transfers.. New Comp.

Today Hna. Segura received a new companion.  Her name is Hna. Wyatt from Cedar City, Utah.
She is excited to learn new things from her new comp as well as being able to continue teaching their current and new investigators. More details to come.

Chile - Pucón - Week 11 - "....has God ceased to be a God of miracles? Behold I say unto you, Nay..."

Hola Familia y Amigos!

   What a crazy few weeks it has been! Time goes by so fast here on the mission! Lots of miracles these past few days, its incredible! I have lots of stories so I will try to type fast!

First of all, Jesica and Damian still haven`t been able to get married, which has been hard, but we decided that as always God has a reason. Recently Jesica's son Mico has shown interest in the church and wants to start taking the discussions! He is 11 years old and is really prepared to hear the gospel. I think we were so focused on just getting Jessica and Damian baptized that we weren`t really worried about teaching anyone else, but I think we are supposed to wait for Mico so he can be baptized with Jesica and Damian! We are going to start teaching him this week!

 Story number two! Last Sunday Hermana Vance and I were out walking and we had about an hour left before we had to be in our house for the night. We had a few people we could go visit, but we weren´t sure who we wanted to teach. We weren´t really feeling the spirit so we decided to stop and say a prayer in the street. We prayed that we would be able to know who we needed to teach that night. We ended the prayer and Hermana Vance turned to me and said "okay Hermana, where does God want us to go?" I hesitated, but I decided to take a moment and just think about it. The only names that came to my mind were that of Korina and Nestor, a couple that Hermana Vance started teaching even before I came, but Korina was getting ready to have a baby so they were kinda busy and they weren´t keeping any of their commitments. We had left asked them to read a chapter in the Book of Mormon like a month ago and they still hadn´t done it. Korina had the  baby a few weeks  ago so we decided that now would be the perfect time to start teaching them again! I told Hermana Vance that I felt like we needed to go visit them. We went over there and had one of the most powerful lessons I have ever been apart of. Hermana Vance and I testified of the importance of the Book of Moromon and how through this gospel and through Christ we can be forgiven of our sins. We committed them to read in the Book of Mormon and Korina said "yes, I am going to read it this time." We went back to visit them a few days ago and Korina had read even farther than we had asked her to! We asked her how she felt while reading it and she said that she felt like the book was talking to her and that she could read it with clarity and she felt a peace while doing it. We told her that was the Holy  Ghost! She was seriously beeming as she talked about how it made her feel! This was really awesome because she was the one who wasn´t really interested in what we had to say at first, but she has completely changed! Nestor also read and said he felt the same peace. Nestor now has a baptism date! Korina will too, but she had to leave in the middle of the lesson so we couldn´t invited her. We are so excited though!

Number three! A few weeks ago we found this guy in the street named Alex and talked to him for a few minutes and taught him a little bit about the restauraciòn. He was really receptive so we asked if we could come back another day and give him a Book of Mormon. He said yes and said we could go back the next day. We went back the next morning and he wasn´t there. As we were walking down the street to another appointment, he pulled up in his car! We were able to give him the book and we asked him to read some before our next appointment. We taught him again on Friday and had an awesome lesson! He told us his story of how he has been searching for something like this for a while now. He goes to the catholic church, but he never found the peace he was looking for. He told us he wanted to feel "full". We told him that this was it and he said "I know, I read some of the book." He said he felt that peace he has been searching for and that he felt it while talking to us as well. We told him that was the Holy Ghost testifying of the truth. He accepted our invitation to be baptized! The sad thing is he will be moving back to Viña in the next few weeks so we wont be able to baptize him here, but we are expecting a "thank you" card from the missionaries in Viña! He is so prepared.

 Everyday incredible things like this happen. God is so aware of us and knows what we need. I know that God answers our prayers, all we have to do is ask. He loves us. We are His children.

Hermana Segura

Chile - Pucón - Week 10 - Visit from the President of the Santiago Chile Temple.

No blog letter this Week.  Hermana Vance and I had the Opportunity to go out with the Temple president of the Santiago temple, and his wife! They are in Hermana Vance's home ward! They are in town for a fireside this Wednesday so they came a few days early to visit us and take us to lunch and to some waterfalls! super fun! I'll send some pics next week! this week was so good! We are planning for another baptism on Saturday! Pray that Jesica and Damian will be able to get married this week so they can get  baptized Saturday!! I'll let you know how things go next week! So many miracles are happening here in Pucòn! I am so blessed to be here!

Chile - Pucón - Week 9 - How great shall be your joy!

Another hot, wonderful week in Pucòn!

 

  The baptism was amazing!!! Ignacia`s whole family came, and she brought 3 non- member friends! Our investigator, Magali, also came! It was so awesome! Ignacia shared her testimony at the end and it was so powerful. We talked to Magali afterwards and asked her how she liked it and she just started crying. She says she wants it for her family so bad. She said that if her "husband" doesn´t decide to marry her, she at least wants her daughter to be baptized when she turns 8. Magali comes to church every week! She is so good, I want her to get baptized so bad!! Hopefully we can start teaching Ignacia`s friends too!

 

    So, yes everything was perfect!! Except........for the water in the font......Hermana Vance and I got to Villarica (which is about 30 min away from Pucòn) 3 hours early so we could get the font filled up. The Elders warned us that it would need to be cleaned before we filled it up so we got the mops out, got it all nice and clean, ( It was crazy dirty.....Im not sure how long its been since they`ve baptized someone in there...) and we were ready to fill it up! As the font began to fill we started noticing some things floating in the water.....we were later informed that the vent thing that is in the font needed to be rinsed out before we filled it up with water because all the dirt that was in it just floated back up into the water......That would have been nice to know, Elders!!! So she got baptized in some pretty nasty water.....but thats okay cuz now she's baptized!! I am so happy for her! She is going to be such a huge example for the people here in Pucòn! She is also looking forward to serving a mission when she is 19! 

 

I am looking forward to seeing more people baptized here in Pucòn! It is such a cool experience to see people you have taught the gospel make the decision to follow Jesus Christ! Even though the work is so hard sometimes, this experience helped me remember why I chose to be a missionary.

 

Hermana Segura

Hna. Segura, Ignacia, Hna. Vance

Hermanas and Ignacia's family.

Sporting our Soccer Jerseys - Go Chile..

 

Chile - Pucón - Week 8 - Hola from Down South !!

!Hola!

       Another lovely week down here at the bottom of the world! Nothing super exciting, just good! A little disappointing in some ways. We will only be having one baptism on Friday instead of five. Ingacia is still going to be baptized,  but Jesica and Damian, the couple from Argentina won`t be able to get married in time because of Damian`s papers and stuff. All of his papers are done, he just has to wait for his official card thing before they can get married. He said it is probably going to be another month and a half before he gets it, but last fast Sunday we fasted that everything would  be ready by the 31 of this month. We still fault 5 days so hopefully a miracle will happen before then!

      Magali also needs to get married, but I think she's afraid to talk to her husband about it. He is supportive of her decision to get baptized, but he is a little hesitant to get married because apparently marriage here in Chile is kind of difficult as far as like money and housing goes? I don´t really understand it but no one here is married here because its like super complicated....hopefully he will come around soon so that Magali can get baptized! We are shooting for next month!

      Magdalena was the other investigator with a baptism date but her family has been in town for the last two weeks.  We haven`t been able to teach her so she won`t be ready by Saturday. Kind of a bummer but I`m not worried about her at all. We are gonna set her Baptism date for next month as well!

      I`m way excited to plan for Ignacia on Saturday though! She has been waiting so long for this day and is so ready! She also asked Hermana Vance and I if one of us would speak, and as the newbie I got thrown under the bus....so I will be speaking about the Holy Ghost at her baptism.....I think she forgot I don´t really speak Spanish.

      That's about all for this week! It was one of the hottest weeks here in Pucòn! People were saying it was like 35 degrees C on Tuesday. I don´t know what the conversion is in F, but Im pretty sure is like 1000. So hot! I also made the mistake of wearing a gray shirt on Friday.....lets just say couldn´t take my backpack off in fear of offending the general public with my sweat marks.....haha...

       Hope all is grand in the land of the free. Its pretty crazy here in Pucòn, lots of tourists. Centro is packed all the time with people from all over the world! Its crazy but kind of cool! I hear in Feb. its even worse here! Probably going to have to walk to church all of next month! Guess will find out!

 !Chaopo!

 Hermana Segura.

 

Chile - Pucón - Week 7 - Many Visitors

¡Hola Amigos!

Its a hot one down here in Chile! Hermana Vance and I about died this last week, apparently there is like a hole in the ozone layer here, so the sun is muy fuerte! Not a fan of the heat. I`ve got some really nice sister missionary tan lines already!

We are still seeing miracles here in Pucòn! Damián is now leagal here in Chile so he and Yesica can get married now! Hopefully they can do it before the 31st, if not, we are having another group of baptisms on the 22nd of Feb. Magali is also planning to get married before the 31st!  Her husband is really awesome and we are hoping he will want to get baptized sometime soon too! He Works for the tour buses here in Pucòn and its super busy during the summer months so he is never there when we teach. We have taught him twice though and he has a lot of really awesome questions. Everytime we go visit Magali she has another question from him for us to answer! We are like teaching him through her and its really cool! We even gave her a Predicad Mi Evangelio book the other day so that she knows what, and how to teach him. He is gonna get baptized I know it!

Yesterday we also had some small miracles! We had over 70 people attend church! Most of them were visitors, however the room was full and it was awesome! We also had one of our menos activos, Pilar, come to sacrament meeting! Pilar was baptized in Spain a few years back with her son and was really strong in the church. She`s been through the temple and everything. for some reason she fell away and hasn´t been to church in a really long time. Shes started smoking and got into some bad stuff these past few years. Shes about 4 months pregnant now and wants to make a change in her life for herself and for her family. She has such a strong testimony its amazing. I always feel the spirit so strongly when I talk to her. We had a lesson with her last week and she told us she got more time off of work so she is going to be able to come to church now! She knows she has a long ways to go, but she is willing to put in the time and the effort to come back to the church for good! I am so excited for her!

Another great week here in Chile and looking forward to many more! ¡Me encanta ser misionera!

Hermana Segura

Chile - Pucón - Week 6 - Milagros

!Hola, Hola! 

Wow what a week! I don´t even know where to begin. Lets start with miracle number one.

​   Wednesday Hermana Vance and I went on exchanges with the Hermana leaders. Every cambio we go on exchanges with them just to get help and advice on how to improve and stuff like that. I left the house at 3:00 with one of the Hermana leaders and we started walking down the street. We had literally been walking for 10 seconds when we saw a lady walking the next street over. She saw us, stopped, and waited for us to come up to her. I have been here over a month and have never seen this woman before. She introduced herself as Magdalina, and we introduced ourselves as the Missionaries for the Church of Jesus Chirst of Latter-day Saints. She said "I know, would you like to come to my house and talk?"........um Yes!! Before we knew it we were sitting in her living room and she started telling us her story.      

  She Went to Italy a while ago to try to find work. She didn´t have any luck so she moved back to Chile. Months later she got a phone call from a man she had met in Italy and he said he had found her a job and to come back and that he would help her out. She went back and found out he had lied about everything. Long story short, he beat her almost to death and then threw her out on the street. She decided that after living through this experience God must have a purpose for her, and she wanted to find it. She said when she saw us on the street she knew somehow we would be able to help her. She said she saw something radiating from us and wanted to know what it was and wanted to have it too.

   Since Wednesday we have taught her the first three lessons, she came to church on Sunday, and she is going to be baptized January 31. 

Miracles happen.

Miracle number two.

  Yesterday there was an Ironman race here in Pucòn so all the streets where closed from 6:00 in the morning to 4:00 in the afternoon. Church starts at 10:00 which ment we would be leaving early to walk to centro. We had 6 investigators committed to make the hour walk to church with us. 5 out of those 6 investigators walked to church with us yesterday! We were 20 minutes late to Sacrament meeting, but the branch waited for us to get there so our investigators could take the sacrament. These 5 people also have baptism dates for January 31.

Miracles happen.

These are only a few of the miracles that happened this week. Amazing things like this happen everyday as a missionary. Everyday is a testimony to me that God is real and that he has people prepared for us to find and teach. I am so grateful for the opportunity I have to be apart of this work. It is hard, but seeing how much the gospel changes lives is the most incredible experience.

God lives, our Savior lives, and this is the true church.

Hermnana Segura