August 23, 2017

Hey it was a pretty long week, we had a bunch of stuff to do in the office. But I learned a lot this week so it's all good. Last week for pday we went walking around Viña becuase it's a very pretty city. We took some pictures with the water and I found an anchor. Today for pday we made some pancakes and watched a movie that President recommended for us. It's been a pretty calm day so it was nice to rest up a little bit.

Changes are coming up, this change I'm going to start training the next secretary. I don't know who it is but we've got a great group of guys out here. In like a week and a half I'll know who the new guy is.

This week we started teaching a less active lady, Yael, with her two kids. The oldest Francisco is 10 and he accepted to be baptized. They are a really cool family. They live in a tiny house that is pretty unfinished. We go there with a member and they only have two chairs and they sit on an old matress. It's really humbling to be able to teach them and see how happy they are with so little. We've only taught them a couple times so we're still getting to know them, but they're awesome.

This week I found a scripture I really liked. It's in Psalms 37:4-5:

4 Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.

5 Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass.

If we trust God and ask in faith, according to His will God will bring it to pass. We just have to learn to trust God and leave the things we can't do up to Him. That being said, we have to take care of our part and do everything we can, remembering that without God it'll be impossible.

Love you a lot!

Elder Cheney

August 15, 2017

Yea thanks for keeping the blog up, that's been really cool. The pcitures I attached today are from a car ride that we just started taking a million pictures, so that's kind of what Viña looks like. You guys haven't sent me any pictures! I don't even know what you look like anymore! Just send me some stuff of Cosmo, the house, or whatever you're doing.

You can choose to share what happened yesterday with everyone:

There was a missionary that was going home and he needed to be at the airport at 6am. So me with the other office guys we left to go take him a 4:30 and to leave at 4:30 we had to wake up at 3:30. The night before we got to bed at like 12ish because we did a dinner and stuff with the misionary that was leaving(he was the assistant). So we didn't get a lot of sleep haha. We went and dropped him off and there were some complications with that, but we raced back to get to the zone conference at 9. We got there literally at 8:59 and walked in when they started the first hymn. Then we had that all day and right after instead of getting some stuff done in the office we had some appointments so we headed over there and taught. We went to bed like normal at 11 so we were all pretty wrecked. President gave us permission to sleep in to 9 this morning so I feel like a million bucks. I should sleep in every day, haha just kidding. But it was a pretty hectic day yesterday. It's going to be a busy week too. 

Yesterday we had a family home evening with the Cortes Family and apparently they know David too from a ward they were in in Santiago. They said I'm funnier but they still liked him. They're going to help us find some more people to teach, they are a really cool family. 

This week we found a guy named Luis. Or maybe Igor. We were walking down the street and my companion was like we need to knock the door. We knocked on the door and it was the easiest contact ever. The guy looks at us and he's like "You guys are out this late? Come on in!" It was pretty sweet and we went in and talked to him for a bit and me his wife and son, Benjamin. His wife didn't participate in the lesson, but while we were talking Benjamin(he's 10) brought us juice and cake from his birthday party. He was a super cute kid haha. We talked to Luis a lot about eternal families. It went really well and he invited us to go back. 

Tell Dustin not to plan out the end of his mission before he starts haha. But it would be cool if everyone was out there before he leaves. 

This week I read a story in the Book of Mormon that I always like. It's about Alma the elder when he recently started preaching and teaching people. It's in Mosiah 23-25ish and you should definitely read it. But one of the scriptures in there Mosiah 23:21-22 says "Nevertheless the Lord seeth fit to chasten his people; yea, he trieth their patience and their faith. Nevertheless—whosoever putteth his trust in him the same shall be lifted up at the last day. Yea, and thus it was with this people." This was a group of people that was recently converted and baptized, they were keeping all of the commandments and doing everything right. But with all that there was a reason they had to pass through more trials. Sometimes in our lives we're doing everything right, but for some reason there are a lot of challenges. That's becuase God is preparing us for the future. He gives us chances to grow and increase our faith. At the end (without spoiling the story) the people of Alma were able to bear all the burdens that were put upon them with patience and joy. It all depends on our attitude and if we are willing to put more confidence in God than in ourselves. 

Hey I love you guys a lot!! Have a good week!

Elder Cheney

 

August 8, 2017

So we had a miracle last night, it was a pretty late night in the office and we get back to the pension and change and everything and I'm writing in my journal and the assistants called me. They asked for some help to pack up the car because they have some zone conferences this week and they had to finish up their presentation. So we went back to the office (with Elder Smith) and we tossed a ton of stuff into the mission van. A ton of packages, tables, boxes of books of mormon, and other materials and food. And we finished up finally and it was pretty late at that point (They had promised it would only be like 15 minutes). We headed back to the apartment after to go to bed and we realized that we didn't have keys. We were outside the door just hanging out ringing the bell and calling the other two elders in the apartment, but they had already fallen asleep. I guess they were sleeping like logs because no one came to the door. After about 20 minutes of that we started planning on sleeping on the floor outside the door. So we sat there for a bit calling them and then my companion said "And I haven't even said my prayer yet tonight." And I had a brain blast so we decided to say a prayer. We knelt down and started saying a prayer and I only said "thanks for letting us help the assistants out" and then the door opened! It was pretty awesome and immediate answer to the prayer. Elder Clark had woken up some how and came and helped us out, good news we didn't have to sleep on the floor all night, bad news is that would have been a great story.

This week was pretty busy in the office, we had a lot of stuff to do. And this week will probably be pretty busy too haha. But we've been able to get out and teach a bit. We taught a less active family with a son that isn't baptized and at the end the mom prayed so that there was a big change in the house and that the Spirit could be there. We have a couple appointments this week that should be pretty good so we'll see how that goes. 

Also I haven't had companion exchanges since I've been in the office so me and Elder Smith planned out an interchange for this week with the zone leaders, we're both going up to their sector to work for the day. That's going to be a ton of fun. 

Not that much else happened this week, just a lot of paper work! Thanks for the letter, love you a lot!!

Elder Cheney