Cooldown

Hey everybody!
Well, things have finally begun to slow down here in Tocornal. But does that mean that we dont have any plans? Heck, no! We are still working with about five people who really want to get baptized, but are not able to for bad circumstances. The real one hope we have right now is Sophie, a painfully shy girl who is part of a less active family. When we got there, the family readily accepted us, and things have only gotten better from there. now Sophie has a fecha, and she is more than ready to get baptized. I only had one question: Why hasnt she gotten baptized before? It was a fairly simple question, and the fact that many other elders have passed by this house, presumably to get sophie baptized made me wonder why it had taken so long. were they on vacation? Was sophie a drug addict (she is 9)? What could be the problem that happened there?
What I found out surprised me. We talked with the mother, and in a nutshell she told us that she had not felt comfortable with any of the other set of elders that had come through. We had something that she liked about us, we were different (in a good way, of course). I think that I am beginning to realize why I am the way I am. I know that I can get into houses that other elders cannot. I also recognize my weaknesses and admit that there are houses that I cannot get into that other elders can. It is all a matter of who is where at what time, an even better incentive to just do your best, and let God work out all the details.
Mom, In Preach My Gospel, chapter 6 is just riddled with things that will help you out. I know it has helped me for sure! Also, if you could get a smaller size of journal, that would be awesome; mine is just way too big.
Also, I would like to give a hats off to Alyssa for turning 18 yesterday. Holy cow, lyssa, you´re legal now!!! I need to buy myself a shotgun before I get home: there have been a lot of elders that have asked about you. Let me know how things go with the ACT and the SAT. They are evil. Just take them and never look back.
Thanks everybody, Hopefully we will have more fun things to talk about next week! Take care!
Con Amor,
Elder Westover

The Testimony of Rosemary Eshneverger Salas

Hey everybody!!!

I'm glad everyone heard about the miners. Everyone was pegged to the TV the whole day! They showed intensive footage about the miners living conditions, what they had to go through, and an in depth look at their personal lives. It was quite amazing. Many called it a miracle, and a lot of people believe that it was a gift from God that they all survived. Some people said that they survived off of luck. That God, if he was a loving God, wouldn't have put them there in the first place.
To pick that argument apart, we have to look and see what it means to be called a miracle. What is a miracle? and what is the difference between a miracle and extreme luck? Is there a distinction there? A miracle, according to an atheist man I talked to, is something that cannot be explained by science, but that it happens anyway. He relied quickly by saying that everything can be explained by science anyway, so miracles therefore do not exist. I believed him. I think that if we look closely enough at anything, it can be explained by science and written off as another triumph of science over religion.
However, the miracles do not exist there. The miracle was not Christ healing the blind, or the sick, or raising the dead. The miracle was the people themselves. In Ether 12: 7-8, it reads: "For it was by faith that Christ showed himself unto our fathers, after he had risen from the dead; and he showed not himself unto them until after they had faith in him; wherefore, it must needs be that some had faith in him, for he showed himself not unto the world. But because of the faith of men he has shown himself unto the world, and glorified the name of the Father, and prepared a way that thereby others might be partakers of the heavenly gift, that they might hope for those things which they have not seen." What Christ did was extraordinary, but what the real miracle was was the faith that he had; the faith of the blind, the deaf, and the dumb. In verse 12 of the same chapter, it says: "For if there be no faith among the children of men God can do no miracle among them; wherefore, he showed not himself until after their faith."
Therefore, a miracle has to be something else. The difference between a miracle and luck is a decision that we all have to make; a decision requiring faith. It is this faith that changes an extremely lucky situation into a miraculous one. Once we make that leap, we begin to see with new eyes. In 2 Corinthians 5:7, it says: "For we walk by faith, not by sight." We begin to see miracles occur in our every day lives. They happen all the time, every day; we just have to be looking for them.
One of these miracles on Sunday. The Salas Family was baptized. I was given the honor to be able to baptize Rosemary, a very special girl of 22 years old. But the miracle wasnt the baptism, it wasnt the circumstances that the family had to overcome to get there, it wasnt Rosemary´s one night in the hospital having cancer, and then leaving the next day after having a priesthood blessing without a trace of cancerous cells. The miracle was the family themselves. Rosemary asked to give her testimony after the service. What she said was the most spiritual experience I have ever had in my life. I have only cried a handful of times because of feeling the spirit (Im just not really one of those people), but while she was up there, telling us how grateful she was that we came into her life, I bawled. She said how she was sick. Really sick. By the time we got to her house, she had not gotten out of her bed for over four months. She didnt want to eat, she didnt want to go outside, she didnt want to live anymore. She told us that she asked for God to answer her; to prove that he loved her. When we came she began to change; subtly at first, but after a month, she had transformed into someone much more. She thanked us for being an answer to her supplications, and told us that now her joy was full. I honestly cant express the profundity of her testimony, but when she finished, everyone was crying. Everyone.
I feel so honored to have been to be part of that miracle. I know it was a miracle, because nothing but the power of God could have wrought that kind of change in a person. I love what I am doing and I know that we are all part of the miracle. Open your eyes. Don't wait for the miracles, be the miracle. Thank you for all your love and concern! Go Chile!
Con Amor,
Elder Westover

Mitchel and Denisse

The rose buds in our patio started to bloom the other day.

Yesterday I was present for one of the most powerful Sundays of my life. It was a fast and testimony meeting and of course, the familia Salas came, looking so eager and willing to learn more about the gospel. Today was a special day for us. We had two baptisms planned for today. Today was also special for a reason that I wish I had known before, which was that it was the day that the hour changed forward. Luckily, we were awake when we received the call asking where the missionaries had run off to.
We got to sacrament meeting about 10 minutes late and immediately went to go fill up the baptismal font. Ive gotten used to these rushed days, but its always hectic and a little nerve wracking when you have a baptism, let alone two. But for some reason I wasn't that nervous. I want sure what it was, but I felt a calm sensation as I came into the chapel. I felt a strong spirit even before anyone said anything. Maybe I was just excited that there were ten investigators that had showed up to church, so I kind of just brushed it off.
As the meeting progressed, the spirit grew stronger. All of the testimonies that were borne (it being fast and testimony meeting) were very powerful, and even one of them; Ernesto, a less active member who turned his life around after being hospitalized a few weeks ago, especially impressed me and made my eyes water. I felt the power of change that comes through the gospel. I felt it not as a concept, not a hope of a better tomorrow, but as a tangible, real presence. I really didn't know what was going on during sacrament, but I knew I was not the only one because when I looked over at Elder Chapman, I could tell he was being affected the same way that I was.
After church we had the baptisms of Mitchel Sepulveda (16) and Denisse Campos (8). They had both come a long way, especially Mitchel. When I saw their baptisms (their relatives did the ordinance), I was able to catch a glimpse of their changes from the beginning of the time when we began teaching them. When Denisse went into the water, I thought of her family. How her mother, although supportive, was not the greatest role model. When Denisse left the water, she left everything with her. The horrible living conditions, her mothers infidelity, the police escort from her daughter, everything. When Mitchel was baptized, the force of the spirit struck me like a Mac truck on a highway. Mitchel was baptized by immersion, and when he came out of the water, he left behind the drugs, his girlfriend, the tattoos, everything. He changed from what was, to what could be. That's what the gospel does. Right there, that moment. That's the power of the Atonement. That's the power that we have.
After the baptisms, I felt so grateful just to be able to be here, to be able to be a part of their lives, I really couldn't say anything to them but "Thank You". As we were waiting for them to get changed, one of the hermanos pulled me aside and asked to talk with us. "Thank you, Elders," he told us. "Thank you for what you have done for this ward." He went on to explain why he had pulled us aside. [Paul recounts a very sacred experience that he prefers to keep somewhat private at this time.]
I knew I had a testimony of the gospel before. But now I can not doubt it. This is the truth, and we have God on our left hand, and on our right. He is always with us, and he always wants us to follow him, even unto the waters of baptism.

I really like that those roses are finally starting to bloom.

Thank you guys for all of your love and support. I feel honored to be here and serve these people.
Con Amor,
Elder Westover

La Familia Salas

Now I know what the mission is like.
After about a year and four months of being in the mission, Ive finally figured out what my purpose is as a missionary. The amazing talks in conference were only a reinforcement for what I have discovered. It is something really amazing and something that I will never forget for the entirety of my life.
To preface this email, I want to take a bit from the book Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. A lot of times nowadays people are looking to learn as much as they can as fast as they can. In the channels of the brain, instead of deepening the channels of the brain, we are turning them into floodplains and causing an overflow of information. What is called for in a situation like this is some channel deepening. Not so much trying to dig as many shallow channels as possible, but fortifying the old ones that we have. That is really what missionary work has been like. Its not that I have learned so many new things that I have never known about the gospel or that I haven't heard the stories of the missionaries in the field, but the things that I have already learned have been fortified and strengthened in many ways that I had not even imagined. I am so grateful for those experiences that have been ingrained in the channels of my mind and my testimony. This is one of those experiences.
Maria Salas is a hard working mother of 40 years who has been working late nights bagging groceries to help out pay the bills. Her husband had fallen into a depression of alcohol and cigarettes to help ease the pain of the child that he had with another woman before his present marriage and had accidentally smothered it during the night and killed it. He usually came back home late in a drunken stupor. He works as a chauffeur in a restaurant very far away from their house (this is a google map of their apartment block)
About six months ago, her daughter, Rosemary, became very sick and depressed. She didn't want to eat. She didn't want to get up from her bed. She thought about suicide for a long long time. What was the point anyway? Her mother felt bad for her, but had to keep working to support them. Then, suddenly, a miracle happened. Maria fell. She broke her hip and was given a medical leave for the amount of time needed for her recuperation. Fall after fall, maria began to think in a different light. They were barely hanging on, and she and her daughter were both very sick and shattered (3 Nephi 9: 13). They didn't know what to do and had no where to go. finally, Maria said a prayer to her God that he would show them what they needed to do. She was desperate and tearfully sought the healing power that she heard was within the infinite mercy of Christ. About two weeks later, two 19 year old boys in white shirts and ties came to her doorstep. I was one of those boys.
The teaching went amazingly. They accepted baptismal dates immediately and knew almost intuitively about the importance of baptism. Eventually, we found out the issues and worked very hard to resolve them. However, I knew that nothing goes perfect in the missionary work. It didn't.
Saturday night we received a call from a neighbor of the family, who incidentally is a member of the church. She told us that Rosemary went in to get some tests done. The doctors told her that she had cancer.
Many times, we don't know why things happen the way that they do, or why we are in the places where we are when they happen. I feel so privileged to have gotten to know that family and to be able to teach the plan of salvation, knowing that death is not the end of everything, but simply a step into a new beginning. I am so grateful for the hope and love the gospel brings into the lives of the people who understand and hold on to it. As far as the condition of rosemary, we don't know much more. Only that the doctors need to do more tests. I hope everything comes out okay. It was in that moment when I found out that she had cancer that I realized that I loved that family with a love that can only be comparable to the love of a mother or father to their children. I love that family and hope that they can grab onto the iron rod and never let go.
I haven't really learned anything new on the mission, but I´ve discovered the true importance of the things I´ve always known.
Thanks for everything guys, les amo!
Con Amor,
Elder Westover