JUST ALWAYS REMEMBER TO TRUST IN THE LORD, WHEN YOU CAN'T DO IT, HE CAN

Hello everybody!!!

Well it sounds like everyone is doing good back home and no Mom, I had no idea that it's Martin Luther King jr. day. I had a hard enough time remembering Thanksgiving jaja. And about the changes in the stake presidency I know that President Chamberlin will do awesome. Speaking of presidency changes, I think that I forgot to mention it last week, but we finally have had a change in the branch presidency!!! The old one was slackin' big time and was partially less active so everyone's happy about the change and he's happy that he´s been released so everybody wins.

Well overall, I cannot lie, this week was very challenging and might have been one of the worst weeks ever if it wasn´t for some events and a finish that actually made it completely turn around and totally humble me. Because every missionary needs a good humbling every once in a while. Heck, everybody, missionary or not, needs a good humbling every once in a while. Yeah, so anyways here it goes.

Remember about that bathroom problem that I told you guys about last week? Well that turned into a total stressful nightmare this week, and I'm not talking about the loss of our bathroom and shower. I'm talking about getting it fixed. First we spent a bunch of time looking for a new house and the only one we could find was too far away from the chapel and centro so we and President just decided to get it fixed. Most of the week was spent sitting around waiting for plumbers to show up and then never coming. Then, finding new plumbers. Then, dealing with drunken workers in our house from the plumber's team. Anyways, it was a big mess and we lost most of the week dealing with it instead of working. Most of the time I just felt like a caged Lion sitting in the house just wanting to go out and work and help our investigators; it was frustrating. But now we have finally set things straight with a plumber and now he gets here to work when he says he will. If everything goes well, he will finish redoing all the piping and stuff either tonight or tomorrow. But I'm at least at ease now that it's actually getting done.

So as far as the work went this week, we didn't have much time to do anything else but just take care of our investigators who are showing the most progression. Alvaro... well he is still good to go but right now they are remodeling the chapel and the font will not be ready until the 29th, which is the last Saturday of the cambio and probably my last Saturday in Loncoche. We would have just baptized him in the river or taken him to Gorbea or Pitrufquén to baptize him but his health is too delicate for the river or to move him to Gorbea or Pitrufquén. But he is still firm in his decision to be baptized so we will be praying very VERY hard that the baptismal font is ready in time to baptize him before I leave. Oh and we also put a baptismal fecha with Neli, Tamara, and Valeria for the 29th so if everything goes according to plan we will be baptizing 4 souls unto Christ on the 29th of January. Neli and her daughters were shaky with accepting the baptismal challenge at first but now they are progressing more and they feel better about the idea so I think that everything will work out there. Now when we are finally having success we are having tons of opposition, but that's ago because good will always triumph over evil. No unhallowed hand will stop the work!!!

So even though we had very little time to work this last week, the Lord still miraculously blessed us and on Sunday we had 10 investigators in church and 4 of them have a baptismal date. It was pretty incredible and you might think that it would make one prideful, but man, was it a humbling experience for me. Even though our work time was very limited, the Lord provided. He always provides. Really we can't do much of anything through our own strength. It's only through faithful and diligent trust in Him that great things will come to pass. I´ve learned that lesson many times on my mission but I need to be reminded often because like the Nephites of the Book of Mormon and the Jews of the Old Testament, at times I can be very slow to remember. This is kind of random but as for Patricio we were not able to get a hold of him once last week and he didn't go to church. But I still am holding out my faith for him and we will continue to work with him this coming week. Well, I'm running out of time today so I'm going to wrap this up. Just always remember to trust in the Lord, when you can't do it, he can. I love you all and as always we will be hearing from eachother next Monday. Ciao Ciao!!!!

Elder Harper =)

p.s. I turned 18 months two days ago.. cant believe it.. 6 months left... yeah enough said about that, it will have to be enough.