02/06/23 Why wasnt i called go Venezuela? All I teach are venezolanos😆 (oh yeah its cuz that country is completely closed down to missionaries right now 😳)

 We had a really beautiful week and I'm hoping I'll have enough ganas to write it all  

Monday work hours we had a pretty normal evening, except we had two little miracles. This friend we have named Claudio is really really hard to contact. Which usually means they're not interested. And on the surface, he's not very interested. But God keeps putting us in his path, and every time we see him he tells us he's read the pamphlets we've given him. So Monday night we ran into him and he asked us for a Book of Mormon!! We haven't been able to contact him since 

Then we got home, and there's like a security guy at the gate of our apartment, and he goes, "hey, I have a question..." he was super awkward about it haha "if I were to maybe ask you for a book of mormon, could you give me one?" And of course we were like, YES and we gave him a restoration pamphlet and everything. It was really tender, and we found out that the Pierces had been talking to him and he was very insistent that he's not religious at all.... and we think he asked us cuz he didn't want them to know  

Tuesday was a morning full of meetings, and we had a lesson in the afternoon about temples and family history... and somehow we ended up on the topic of priesthood blessings. And I suddenly felt to invite her to have a priesthood blessing, and to call the elders (conveniently we had seen them knocking doors just up the street... they hadn't seen us), and hermana Sorenson was speechless... because, apparently that morning she had been thinking during her personal study about how we should invite Claudia to get a blessing. It was a super powerful lesson and really beautiful. 

Wednesday the hermana leaders told us they were coming the next day and I got really stressed because I had to try and figure out how to coordinate everything and they gave us no notice  but it all worked out. 

We also had a lesson that night where we invited this member and then as it turned out the amiga and the member already knew each other!! It was really cool because they're gonna be able to strengthen each other in the gospel. They knew each other 15 years ago in college and have since lost touch. But it was really beautiful that the Lord put them in each other's paths. 

Thursday we had intercambios locos. I was with Hermana Cabrera, and it was alright, although there were no fruits of our labors. We knocked a ton of doors and talked to a lot of people and none of them were home or those that were had no interest in talking to us. And the one lesson we had planned fell through, so yeah. 

After the intercambios were over we found a lady sitting on the bench in our apartment complex and we ended up talking to her for quite a while about the gospel. She was from Venezuela. 

Friday I did not feel good  like, physically I was fine, but I felt completely unmotivated and frustrated and just bleh. Ya ever have days like that? In the morning we did weekly planning, and that took forever, and then we had lunch but the member gave us... not very much food. Which was kind because we had food, but yeah we were all 4 of us (the elders were with us too) very much not fed by what they gave us...so we pooled some money together and ate a pizza. And while we were in the pizza place, we saw... the family who had just fed us, also eating pizza. It was really awkward  

In the afternoon I felt bleh, but like super bleh, ya know? So I was like ok hna Sorenson I need like a little bit of time to do something to feel less bleh. So I made banana bread! But i still felt bleh. But then we had a really good lesson! And then an activity for the branch, which turned out really well! And I came home feeling like i hadnt accomplished anything, and just felt bleh. So i went to sleep, and believe it or not, i felt significantly better the next day. So maybe i just didn't sleep well  

Saturday we went to this town thats about an hour out of Vallenar but still part of our sector. It was a really good day of member work! We were able to reactivate a family who hasnt come since before the pandemic, and we were the first missionaries to ever be in their home from what i understood. (We went with the Pierces.) They were very excited to have us there and we invited them to prepare themselves to be sealed in the temple in April when the branch is going to Santiago. They are planning to and it was a really powerful experience. 

Later we visited some active members, and we read the book of mormon with them and it turned out being really nice. What we didnt know is that it was actually their baby's birthday and a series of unfortunate events meant that their plans had fallen through, and our spiritual message was just the pick-me-up that the mom of the baby needed.  

Sunday, church was really good. The testimony meeting was sooo spiritual and we all enjoyed the stories and things, and there wasnt a single moment of awkward silence like i feel like there normally is in Utah. We also had one of our recent converts receive the priesthood!! (He's 11.) And then after church we had lunch and were both feeling unmotivated, but we decided to just push a little harder (drag our feet a little farther) and hope to see what the Lord had in store for us. And boy did He deliver. We started with an amiga whos been really hard to get ahold of... as it turns out, the work schedule of her uncle has changed and now they can BOTH come to church!!! (Shes 10 and cant go on her own.) 

Later we went to a plaza and were doing some phone calls and then we got ready to go talk to some people and hna Sorenson felt really strongly to talk to this guy who I had kind

of dismissed because he was a little rough around the edges. Well, as it turns out he was from Venezuela and has been here about as long as i have, and as we talked to him, he opened his heart a little and shared about his daughter who had passed away through an accident with paint fumes a couple years ago. I was not in control of my mouth when i said this, but i promised him that he will see his daughter again some day and we got to talking about the plan of salvation. It was really special, and when he was talking about it I was kinda maybe crying from the spirit  

Anyways, after that he walked with us a little ways until we parted ways, and i could tell he didnt wanna leave the presence of the spirit we had with us  

But that wasnt all. 

When we were walking home we felt so good and excited about being missionaries and then we met a WHOLE FAMILY from Venezuela, right as we had kinda decided we werent gonna meet our goals but we were proud of ourselves, God put a whole family in our path. We're excited to teach them more!! 

Monday (today) was super low key. We cleaned a bunch and we went and saw a lighthouse in Huasco and i made cinnamon rolls, and we saw some cool fancy beach houses. 

The Lord puts so many miracles in our path and just guides our feet to where we should. I love this work, even though i get unmotivated sometimes, after all im only human  

Love you all! 

xo-hna griffin