8 Questions

Well it was another good week here in Dorsal. We’ve been talking with as many people as will listen, and sometimes more. ;)  I’ve realized more and more throughout my mission how important it is to just open my mouth and go for it. At the beginning of my mission I hated contacting people because I was afraid I wasn’t going to do it perfectly, or that people would reject me and this message. 10 months later I still don’t do it perfectly and most people reject me, but I LOVE IT! For many people I’ll be the first person to tell them the marvelous message that Christ’s church has been restored here on the earth. I know this message is true, more than I’ve ever known it before and I’m thankful I’m in a place where we don’t have many investigators so we have time to talk to lots of people.

That said, we’ve found a lot of people recently that will soon be investigators and that’s also exciting. The investigators that we do have are progressing just as hoped and despite one lesson where things didn’t go as planned, everything is moving forward just as we hoped. We are teaching one family that I talked about last week (they live with members) and everything is going well minus the fact that they aren’t married nor do they have plans to be married. We still haven’t explained the entirety of the law of chastity (the “why”), but last night we did a family home evening with them and the other Peruvian family we are teaching (Cristian and Isabel). They are recently married and both bore powerful testimonies of the importance of what they have been doing (her going back to church, him soon being baptized, and them recently getting married). I think it work too, because Hector (the dad of the Peruvian investigator family) is now calling his girlfriend his “wife”.

Another observation from that family home evening; we played a game where 8 cards with questions are lying face down and one person picks a card up then everyone answers the question. My companion and I noticed something. The people who truly understand the gospel (the family of members and Cristian and Isabel) could talk for days on questions like “How can you find peace and happiness”, “How can I become a better person”, and “How can I learn from life’s challenges”. These aren’t necessarily gospel questions, in fact, these are things that we all want to know. The reason for this difference, I believe, is that the gospel has all the answers to every kind of question, especially the questions of the soul.

The 8 questions we asked during FHE

As part of the plan my companion and I made to help more people learn about the gospel and the church, we visited 7 member families on Sunday. We shared a scripture with them and then challenged them to write 5 names of people they know (that aren’t members) by next Sunday. From there we will do family home evenings with them and their friends. Overall, the response from them was really positive. I think many have fears that sharing the gospel with their friends could ruin their relationship, but with the FHE idea their friends can learn more in a relaxed environment and hopefully feel something special.

Last thought. I think fasting is a really undervalued way to come closer to God. It’s mentioned so often in the scriptures, one would think we’d get the idea that it’s something special, but it’s still not thought about enough. I’ve recently been able to get answers from God, feel more strongly the spirit, and see my prayers being answered all through fasting.

We’re as excited as ever, here in Dorsal.

Have a great week!!

Elder Birrell

New Area- Dorsal

Elder Ortiz and Elder Birrell in their Halloween costumes. ;)

*The last few weeks Seth has written his letters on journal paper and then sent a picture of his letter when he emailed us.  We love that he has more time to write and give us more details about his week.

So I think I’ll do my general letter this way while I’m here so I won’t be in such a rush as I write, plus I’ll be able to send pictures every week while I’m here.

I’m with Elder Ortiz who was born in Mexico but has lived most his life in San Diego. He didn’t really know Spanish until the mission. He seems like a really good missionary already and he started the same time as Elder Langston. The sector I’m working in now is Dorsal. It’s a lot nicer and safer than my previous sectors so you can take a big deep breath haha. Also, I gave a talk this Sunday on the spot!

Right now I’m exhausted, but also really happy and grateful. We don’t really have a lot of investigators, neither do we have many people to teach but we’re working hard to change that. This experience reminds me of when I first got to my last sector. We didn’t have investigators and I didn’t know anything about the sector, but we followed the pattern of Ether 12:27, recognizing our weaknesses and humbly looking for strength in Christ. From my experience in Galvarino I learned to trust in this promise and to put my trust in Christ, so that’s exactly what we are and will be doing in Dorsal.

Ether 12:27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

This past week we pretty much talked to everyone in our path and we are already seeing the fruits of that work. This has mostly come from foreigners- Venezuelans, Colombians, Peruvians and Haitians, but every once in a while Chileans too. J This week we hope to see some progress with these people and to continue meeting more.

They did have one really cool investigator before I got here and his name is Cristian. He’s been investigating for about 5 months now and he’s loved everything he’s learned. He got in contact with the missionaries through his girlfriend (now wife as of 2 weeks), who’s been a member for 3 years, but hadn’t been active in the church (she now is very active). Cristian’s a funny dude and he’s usually making a joke about something, but when the time comes to talk about the gospel he talks as if he’d been a member for years. Some people just get it and he’s one of them. His work has prevented him from coming to church very much, but he’ll be getting a new contract on Thursday, so we’re all hoping and praying it includes Sundays off.

His wife is another person that spiritually gets it and she shared a cool story of something that happened to her brother just last week. So in their family, only she, her mom, and her brother are members. Just a week or so ago her brother had a vivid dream in which his aunt came to him and pleaded with him, saying something along the lines of “help me, I cannot progress, you’re the only one who can help me. I can’t do this by myself.” He later realized that just that week she had completed the one year of being passed away and needed to do baptisms for the dead in the temple. He immediately did all the preparations needed to do this saving work for his aunt. Just as described in the last verse of the Old Testament- “he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers.” People (many of whom are our very own ancestors) are waiting for us, who still have bodies, to help them do what they didn’t have the opportunity to do in their mortal experience here on earth. This story helped me to realize how personal the service offered in the temple truly is, these aren’t just names on a piece of paper, these are souls that can’t progress without our help.

A few days ago we ate lunch with a lady from Costa Rica and her Chilean husband. It was easy to see a couple of challenges this lady was facing- 1. Chile was a long way from home and the culture isn’t very similar to the one she grew up in. 2. Her husband now can’t walk and can barely speak due to an accident he had pretty recently. He now only vaguely resembles the man she married 5 years ago. Yet she might be one of the happiest people I’ve ever met. We shared a scripture with her as we tend to do when we eat lunch with people, but what she shared with us was of far greater significance. I don’t remember most of what she said, but as she talked about the gospel her eyes lit up and exuded joy and gratitude. She admitted these past years haven’t been easy, but she said she couldn’t imagine how hard they would’ve been without the gospel.

We’ve also recently started working with a Peruvian family who lives at a member’s house. Last night we had a Family Home Evening with those two families and recently married couple in the ward. We watched the Lamb of God which shows the final week of the Savior’s life including His atoning sacrifice and resurrection. The spirit was so powerful that I think everyone got a little emotional.

I hope you all have a wonderful week!!

Elder Birrell

Goodbye Galvarino

Hermano Mendez our ward mission leader in Galvarino

Hey family and other people!

So, on Thursday night I got the call from the assistants that not only would I be leaving Galvarino, but my companion would be leaving as well. We thought it was a joke at first that both would be leaving, but it turns out that it was true. Elder Langston was so sure that he’d be staying that he bought 30 eggs just an hour and a half before we got the call.  That weekend was the first time in my mission that I’ve had to say goodbye to people and there were a lot of people to say goodbye to.

Luckenson and Elder Birrell

Luckenson, the recently baptized Haitian, was really sad when he heard the news. In fact, he said “Wow” at least 100 times when we delivered him the news and he said that night he couldn’t sleep. On Sunday he received the priesthood, which was a special moment, but something happened just minutes before that I will forever remember. At the end of the Gospel Principles class, he offered to say the final prayer, but before saying the prayer he told us that he wants to share his testimony with everyone in the class since the next fast and testimony meeting wouldn’t be for a couple weeks more. He said that before we started sharing with him, he never liked anything to do with religion and he didn’t believe in Jesus Christ. In fact, his mom would always ask him to come to church but he never wanted to go. He testified that there’s something different here and that through learning more of the work of God, coming to church, and being baptized, he is an entirely new person. He said he’s truly been born again in Christ and that he’s so much happier now. The most incredible part of the testimony was that normally he struggles in expressing himself in Spanish, plus he has a very noticeable speech impediment, but as he bore testimony none of those problems were evident. Truly a powerful moment.

The  Muñoz Family

Another family we said goodbye to was the Muñoz family which is a family that will forever have a large place in my heart. From the first time I passed by their house I’ve always felt something special, but this special feeling has grown as I’ve seen their faith increase and as they shared their own experiences and testimonies. The final scripture I shared with them describes what I’ve learned from them through the 5 months. I was able to play a small part in their lives.

“Now, was not this exceeding joy? Behold, this joy which none receiveth save it be the truly penitent and humble seeker of happiness.” (Alma 27:18)

This family has very little money, 3 kids in jail (some of them for a long time) and every reason to complain in the world, and for a time that’s what they did. As they began to grow their faith and repent little by little their joy has grown immensely. Their humility to follow what invites the spirit and to give them true happiness is something that will forever mark me. Every time we passed by for them they’d have some amazing spiritual experience to share. On Friday night I actually cried when I was talking to Oscar and I thought of this scripture. They recently had an interview with the bishop and he said he sees them as a future bishop and relief society president and I’d agree with that. By law they still need to wait a bit to get married, but it shouldn’t be too long after that before they get sealed in the temple.

Oscar and Viviana Muñoz

This weekend we also said goodbye to another Haitian named Billy, who has come to church for 5 weeks in a row basically and always enjoys his experience, but until Friday never expressed any desire to be baptized. He was baptized in a different church not too long ago and for a while he didn’t accept the fact that the priesthood has been restored in these days and that it is through this authority that he must be baptized. No matter how many different ways we tried to help him understand this concept and ask God if it was true, it never seemed to work. Finally, on Friday night something clicked and it was way cool to see him understand that both the great apostasy and the restoration of Christ’s church are real and how truly blessed we are to live in a time when we can receive all the blessings God wants us to have.

Billy and the Haitian girls

Seeing Jesús from the day I met him to now has also been a blessing. The only things I recognize from May 2016 in Jesús is the fact that he talks really Chilean (bad) and he loves horses. I never would’ve thought that someday he’d go to the temple with his wife to be sealed, but now they’re planning on working towards the 16^th of December 2017 and honestly I believe they can do it. Jesús grew up in rough circumstances family-wise and for a while that mentality of treating people poorly kind of stuck with him. He had a lot of “natural man” tendencies, whereas now he’s a dedicated husband, father, and servant of the Lord.

Jesús, Katalina and little Trinidad

The final goodbye was with Jacob and his family (the Aguilar family). With this family we’ve been able to be there through everything. We were there in the hospital with them as doctors gave baby Alice a few hours of life left maximum and we were also there to see her healed by a priesthood blessing and the prayers of many. The spirit we’ve felt in that home has been undeniable so many times. I know that someday they’ll be faithful member, leaders, and tools in God’s hands to bring this joy to families just like their own. We’re all hoping we get permission to come back for their baptism.

Jacob Aguilar and Elder Birrell

Elder Birrell, Baby Alice and Elder Langston

5 amazing months in Galvarino, some of the greatest of my life. I’m thankful for everyone there that’s impacted me in some way, especially the companions I had there, most recently being Elder Langston. I’d trust my life with the guy and through the service that we gave together in bringing souls to Christ we also formed what will definitely be a lifelong friendship. Also shout out to his best friend Jorge Reyes who was baptized on the 15^th! 

I’ll miss Galvarino.

Elder Birrell

More Aguilar Family

A kid named Diego gave us each a medallion he won in school

Herman Irma. We live right above her. nicest lady in the world, always giving us food

The little Haitian girls

Peruvian family (los peruanitos we called them)

Nicolas. The thing with his fingers is a little dance he loves to do

The Bishop's family