reply to momma Steele

thats how it is here too. we just gotta keep a good attitude because it´s way harder than what we expected. i guess we thought it´d be easy...like everyone would want to listen and be baptized. but like elder holland said

"Anyone who does any kind of missionary work will have occasion to ask, Why is this so hard? Why doesn’t it go better? Why can’t our success be more rapid? Why aren’t there more people joining the Church? It is the truth. We believe in angels. We trust in miracles. Why don’t people just flock to the font? Why isn’t the only risk in missionary work that of pneumonia from being soaking wet all day and all night in the baptismal font?

You will have occasion to ask those questions. I have thought about this a great deal. I offer this as my personal feeling. I am convinced that missionary work is not easy because salvation is not a cheap experience.Salvation never was easy. We are The Church of Jesus Christ, this is the truth, and He is our Great Eternal Head. How could we believe it would be easy for us when it was never, ever easy for Him? It seems to me that missionaries and mission leaders have to spend at least a few moments in Gethsemane. Missionaries and mission leaders have to take at least a step or two toward the summit of Calvary.

Now, please don’t misunderstand. I’m not talking about anything anywhere near what Christ experienced. That would be presumptuous and sacrilegious. But I believe that missionaries and investigators, to come to the truth, to come to salvation, to know something of this price that has been paid, will have to pay a token of that same price.

For that reason I don’t believe missionary work has ever been easy, nor that conversion is, nor that retention is, nor that continued faithfulness is. I believe it is supposed to require some effort, something from the depths of our soul.

If He could come forward in the night, kneel down, fall on His face, bleed from every pore, and cry, “Abba, Father (Papa), if this cup can pass, let it pass,” ¹⁶ then little wonder that salvation is not a whimsical or easy thing for us. If you wonder if there isn’t an easier way, you should remember you are not the first one to ask that. Someone a lot greater and a lot grander asked a long time ago if there wasn’t an easier way.

The Atonement will carry the missionaries perhaps even more importantly than it will carry the investigators. When you struggle, when you are rejected, when you are spit upon and cast out and made a hiss and a byword, you are standing with the best life this world has ever known, the only pure and perfect life ever lived. You have reason to stand tall and be grateful that the Living Son of the Living God knows all about your sorrows and afflictions. The only way to salvation is through Gethsemane and on to Calvary. The only way to eternity is through Him—the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

This week was awesome!

HOLA!

i seriously cannot believe how fast time is going! all the stores in the mall have their christmas decorations up...like what the heck!? christmas?!

this week was awesome. tuesday night we slept in puerto montt with the hermanas there. we got to work in their sector for the night...which was one of the sectors of hermana bennett. i got to meet Luisa and Belen...a family that was baptized while she was there in Puerto Montt! they were very special. so that was super cool! 

so then wed morning we woke up at 4 AM and went to osorno to listen to elder nelson. i loved every minute of that conference. his wife gave a pretty bomb talk about how we use our time. she said we don´t wanna go home with regrets. she said one day we will wish we were missionaries again. she talked about a really rich man named schindler from world war 2 who bought jews from the nazis. when he retured to the states he started looking at all of his possesiones. the worth of his car, his house, ect. and starting counting the number of souls he could have bought with that money. she read this quote from him..."This car. Why did I keep the car? Ten people right there. Ten people. Ten more people.This pen. Two people. This is gold. Two more people. He would have given me two for it, at least one. He would have given me one. One more. One more person. I could have gotten one more person…and I didn’t."  i for sure do not want to feel like that when i get home from my mission. i know this is His time, and it´s so so so short and so precious. i was thinking about how it´s kinda like life in general. life so short...it´s so precious. are we doing all we can to live the gospel joyfully and to help others live it as well? do we spend our time wisely? ‘Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father:  Ye shall have eternal life.’

sister nelsons talk was really awesome....basically we just gotta work hard out here. i´ve set some new goals to be better because i love it so much. i always love going to conferences like that because it helps me remember that i´m not the only imperfect one if an apostle of the Lord has to tell it to the whole mission.

we are also trying to use family history more in our work to find new people and reactive less actives. so this week i went on familysearch.org and was looking at my family tree. it was really REALLY interesting. i started looking at my great grandma orullian, and her husband joseph, who immigrated from turkey. there were all the dates she was batized and sealed in the temple and everything...it was so awesome. there were also some pictures of her and her family on there. i was crying looking at some of them. it was the coolest thing learning a little more about her. i would LOVE to know more about her and all my other ancestors. and i definitely want to work on my family history when i get home from the mission. "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers"

anways, have an awesome week! i love you all SO SO MUCH!

love always, hermana steele

ps. president obeso said it´s ok for you guys to come!

Pure Christ Like Love Can Change the World!

hola my wonderful, lovely, amazing family!

guess what?! elder nelson is coming to the mission next week! i´m SO EXCITED. it´s gonna be awesome. the elders called the other day and said my package finally came...that was really exiting as well...so they said they´ll give it to me next week when we go osorno for the conference with elder nelson.

guess what else? the fleas are back. and they are ALL OVER MY BODY. it´s horrible. pray for me? and in my next package could you send me some more anti-ich cream? speaking of packages...the mission has told us to tell our parents to start sending christmas ones so that they get here on time...and obviously not through UPS. hahaha.

so the work is going good. this week we found a less active member...he´s been less active for most of his life. he went inactive at 18.  he told us he used to go out with the missionaries all the time. and he still believes the church is true and he said he will never be able to deny it. his girlfriend isn´t a member. they live together and have a little boy. his girlfriends name is anna and is VERY VERY RECEPTIVE! holy cow. it´s awesome. i´m super excited for them. they are the cutest. pray for anna and luis. i know we´re gonna see miracles.

last week we had a really awesome district meeting. we talked about successful missionaries. our district leader talked a lot about how a successful missionary love who they serve. they have charity, the pure love of christ for everyone. i can have the spirit, i can teach well, i can baptize a lot but if i dont love the people, i am nothing. i can serve 18 months here in chile but if my heart isn´t right i cannot profit by it. i may change the lives of others but the good i do will do me no good unless i have charity. elder holland said "pure, christlike love can change the world." God created us in His own image...that means outer image AND internally. love is a quaility God has, and it´s a gift he gives us...and it never faileth. God wants me to become like Him, but change only happens if my heart is in the right place. i know that charity is "bestowed upon all who are true followers of Christ so that when He comes, we shall appear like Him." i know that we are all children of God, and i know He loves us perfectly. i know that we all have the potential to become like Him. it´s important for us to show love for others not only to change their lives, but to change ours as well.

hermana meacham is doing great. she´s learning a lot and getting better everyday. i love it!

i hope you all have a great week! i love you so much! i still love being a missionary! 

con amor, hermana steele

Guess what else?! I'm training a new missionary!

HOLA FAMILIA!

well yeah i spoke yesterday at church. it went well. everyone understood my spanish so that was good....they laughed at my jokes. haha. i´m sure syd did great too!!

so last week we had transfers. guess what? hermana jenkins left. it was a REALLY sad goodbye. haha we were NOT expecting it. i really love her so much. she went to Valdivia! so that´s cool! guess what else? im training a new missionary! she´s from pleasant grove UT. hermana meacham. she´s the sweetest thing on the face of the earth. so so cute. doesn´t know a lick of spanish. (it´s pretty bad) it´s crazy to see how much spanish i actually know. when i got here to Chile i struggled a lot with the language. i felt like i´d never learn. i was exactly like hermana meacham. i´m really excited to help her learn and grow! we´ve already set lots of goals! she told me i speak really fast...it´s SO weird speaking slow hahaha. and the other day we were in a family night and the mom of the family was like "she doesn´t understand a thing...just tell her what i said in english" so i looked at hermana meacham and started talking to her but it all came out in spanish. and she was still confused. and then the mom was like "no just tell her in english!" and then i realized i was still speaking spanish. im not sure if i´ll ever be able to speak english again! i´m definitely learning to have patience with it all. i don´t know how hermana bennett did it with me. shout out to her!

so we´ve only been together for about 1 week but we are already seeing lots of miracles. the street contacts we´ve been doing actually stop and listen...and we´ve been teaching lots and lots of people in the streets. hermana meacham invited 3 people to be baptized in the street this week. it was awesome. she´s got a really strong testimony...the spirit is very very strong when she testifies. i feel very blessed to have the opportunity to train her. i´m glad the president obeso trusts me to do it...but more importantly that the Lord trusts me to do it. it´s gonna be awesome.

anways, i´m out of time but i love you all so much! thanks for you prayers! you guys are the best!

love, hermana steele

Guess What?! I have to talk in sacrament this Sunday!

so normally i´d be telling you guys the changes happening this transfer but president obeso wants to wait until tonight to tell us the transfers. so that will be interesting. i have no idea what´s gonna happen. i think im staying here in Pto. Varas for sure but i´m not sure if hermana Jenkins and i will have another transfer together! this morning when we left the house she prayed that we´d have another 6 weeks together. SUPER CUTE NO?! it´s crazy to me that the transfer is over and that hermana jenkins finished her training! she´s a big girl now!! 

we were supposed to have exchanges with the sister training leaders this week but we didn´t so that stunk. but we did have interviews with president obeso. it went awesome. i really love president obeso. when i walked in the room he asked me "why are you so happy?" 

so we are still in the procress of finding new people to teach. we actually lost like 3 investigators this week. so that was cool. i´ve been thinking a lot about why we haven´t found more of Gods children who are ready to accept the gospel if we are trying so hard to talk to everyone in the street. finding has never been my strength in the mission. i like to teach but i´m not a huge fan of finding. but i´ve learned (slowly but surely) that finding by the spirit is just as important as teaching by the spirit. and i realized that lately, i´ve just been talking to the people just to talk to them. i have the faith that they´ll stop and listen but i´ve had the attitude of "let´s go out and get it done...let´s talk to everyone that passes us." and i´ve realized that i have not been trusting in the spirit to guide me to the people that the Lord wants me to talk to. there´s a huge difference when we work efficiently and effectivly. in D&C it says that we are called to bring to pass the gathering of the elect because the elect hear the voice of the Lord and harden not their hearts. so this week, i´m going to find the elect. and guess what?! i have to talk in sacrament this sunday! i´m super nervous. i do not like giving talks. but guess what my topic is? it´s how do i recoginize and follow the promptings of the spirit. just what i need to be able to recognize and follow the promptings of the spirit better this week.

anyways, i love you all so much! i hope you have a great week!! pray that we can find the elect here in pto varas!!

con amor, hermana steele