This week I started off with a meeting with my 2 counselors in the mission presidency. Each mission president has counselors that are members of the church who live in the mission boundaries. They know the area and the local members well, and help mission presidents to keep an eye on the safety of the missionaries. My counselors' names are Mallen Miranda and Jaime Sandoval - they are actually brother-in-laws! This week they orientated me to the mission. I look forward to working with them and getting their help and insight.
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| Chile Santiago South Mission Presidency: Jaime Sandoval, Presidente Bartholomew & Mallen Miranda |
Every Tuesday morning we have a mission-wide zoom call with a short devotional with everyone. It’s a chance for us to review our goals and achievement of key-indicators, as well as share pictures and experiences from any baptisms that week. As part of the meeting this week, all the missionaries that are leaving the mission next week had the chance to share some final thoughts and testimonies with everyone.
I then spent the rest of the day beginning our preparations for transfers next week. Every 6 weeks we have transfers - where we will have some missionaries finishing their missions and going home, and then we will receive new missionaries that have just finished their training at the MTC and are beginning their missions. This first transfer we were losing 17 missionaries total, and receiving 15 new ones. Preparing for transfers is like a big jigsaw puzzle. We have to take a look at which areas the missionaries are serving in, and who their companions are. Depending on how long each missionary has been in a particular area, or with a companion, we move them around in addition to pairing up each of the new missionaries with a more experienced missionary to be their trainer. I felt a great deal of responsibility making these changes and helping them to be in the right place with the right people. This took a lot of time throughout the week, and a technology glitch made it a little more complicated than I had hoped. Moving forward it should be a little bit smoother of a process.
Tuesday night we headed to the airport to drop off Brandon for his flight home. It's been great having him here with us for the first week and a half as we got settled in - although we've been so busy since day one, we wish we could have spent a little more time with just him! He actually flew home on the same flight as Elder Averett who we mentioned last week is heading home a week earlier than the rest of the missionaries who are ending this transfer. We were glad they had each other as travel buddies on the way home!
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| Goodbye Brandon ♡ |
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| First airport drop off for a missionary heading home - Elder Averett. |
This week we also got to attend a district council meeting with some missionaries in the furthest south part of our mission, in an area called Buin. Each of our districts (groups of 4-5 companionships, or about 8-10 missionaries) meets together once a week for a district council meeting. Led by the district leader, the missionaries review goals and get the chance to dive deeper into topics from Preach My Gospel. It was great being with them, and they were happy to see us and even happier to get some treats we brought to share!
Our big event of the week was hosting all the outgoing missionaries at our home for a “day of honor” on Friday, celebrating them and all they have accomplished during their missions. I had the chance to interview each missionary one-on-one starting at 10am and ending around 4:30pm. It was a great experience - these missionaries are so mature and experienced and it was amazing to talk to them about how they have grown and changed. One of the Elders asked for Monica to join us for his final interview, and she loved being a part of that. Throughout the rest of the interviews, Monica was on entertainment duty - she loved talking to all of them, and taking pictures and videos as they played some spikeball, ping pong, etc. We had pizza and snacks available throughout the day. We ended the evening with each missionary sharing their testimony about how they’ve grown closer to Jesus Christ throughout their time here in Chile. We are sad we only got to know them for a few short weeks, but we’re grateful for the chance to see them off and give them some advice as they head home. In their final interview, I really tried to emphasize that while their mission has been an incredible experience, they shouldn’t let it be the spiritual high of their life. They need to continue to focus their life of Christ and following His gospel and they’ll be blessed with the help they need to make their next life decisions.
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| Left to right: Elders Bair, Bunker, Barney, Brown, M. Anderson, Christensen, President & Hermana Bartholomew, Allred, West, Shepherd, Chipman, K. Anderson, Shiflett |
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| Left to right: Hermanas De la Cruz, Rivera, President & Hermana Bartholomew, Johnson |
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| Intense game of spikeball. |
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| They played ping pong forever! |
That evening after the missionaries left, we had a meeting with some area-wide leaders of our church, specifically Elder Bravo of the quorum of the seventy. All the stake presidents and their wives from the 6 stakes in our mission were also there. They had a translator for Monica so she was grateful to not have to rely on Google. The meeting lasted from 8-9pm. We then ate a late dinner, referred to as “la once” in Chile. A few members of the church down here have started their own BBQ company, so they catered some delicious food for us. We stayed until 11pm and got home by midnight - we’re still getting used to a typical Chilean schedule.
Saturday is normally our preparation day, but with transfers coming up, I really felt like I needed to review everything one more time. Each week the missionaries write me letters/fill out a form to let me know how they are doing. It includes things like health problems, how well they get along with their current companion, etc. I hadn’t had the chance to read any of these letters yet since arriving, so I had over 200 ready to read. Going through each letter gave me extra insight and helped me make a few changes before submitting the transfers.
That evening we met up for dinner with The Killgores who are also from Draper - they are the new mission leaders over the Santiago West mission, and we live only about 5 mins from each other. We met them before coming to Chile, so it was good to see each other again. It was therapeutic to share our stresses and successes with someone else who knows exactly what we are feeling right now.
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| P-day work from our home office. |
Today (Sunday) we attended the Vicuña Mackenna ward for their meetings from 10-12. At 12:30, there was a baptism service for Claudio and Carolina. Afterwards, we went out to our car and ate some lunches we had pre packed for ourselves in the car. We drove over to the other side of the building to leave, and found the gate locked. We had to call some missionaries who live 10 mins away to come back and open the gate for us, so that was a funny experience!
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| The missionaries that came to save us! |
Then we headed to 2 more baptism services in another town called Paine (one at 3pm and the other at 5:30) for Lia and Thania. Afterwards, we drove down to Buin to attend one more baptism service for Eliana. She has been investigating the church for 16 years. In 2008 and 2018 she actually traveled to Utah and attended General Conference in person. She has been taught by countless sets of missionaries over the years, but has never decided to commit to being baptized. On July 4th (just 9 days ago), Elder Allred, was on exchanges one day with Elder Munk (in Elder Munk’s area) and they had a lesson with Eliana. Elder Allred shared his testimony about the temple and shared some experiences he had when he worked in the temple. She started getting emotional when he was sharing and he testified to her that she was feeling the spirit. She agreed that God was helping her to feel Him in that moment and she decided it was time to be baptized!
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| Carolina's Baptism |
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| Just after Claudio's baptism. |
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| Lia's baptism |
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| Thania's baptism. |
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| Eliana's baptism. |
Today was the highlight of our mission so far! Seeing 5 people choose to follow the Savior’s example of baptism was truly a beautiful experience. We got to share a few remarks at each of their baptisms, and reminded them that this is just the beginning of their journey to follow the Savior every day. What a special day to witness!
Well, that’s it for this week - We are exhausted, but we’re happy!
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| We brought some dehydrated sourdough start to Chile and it's back to life! Let the baking begin :) |
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| Beautiful flowers on our balcony. |
