Hello Everybody!

WEll happy Birthday MOM!!!! i hope it was great you should be getting a letter i sent it today!

    Well we had 5 baptisms in the ward on sunday! This ward had 1 in the past year and we have had 6 in the past month! we are seeing the hasting of the work before our very eyes! the Lord has his hand in all of this and i can not doubt that all of this was his doing! it is a great miracle to see his love for his children! It was the first baptisms of Elder Lopez, Me, and Sister Cabrera!! 3 of our 4 missionaries! 

   now how it all went! we got to the chapel at 4:30 to turn of the water to the font! we got there and there was a foot of water! We freaked out the water was SUPER LOW!!! so we had to improvize! we pulled out the emergency hoses for a fire and filled the font with those! It was super crazy! the baptism was planned at 5:00 but we had to postpone a little! The water came out SUPER DIRTY!! I just said to all of the people "hey better than a cold river right?" that was a little fun we were all running throught the building with fire hoses! just like spanky on Little Rascals! then we had the service and it was Absolutely beautiful!! i could not believe how strong the spirit was there! We had 67 people in sacrament that morning and we had over 80 to the baptism it was incredible!!! also our two baptisms are related to a member of one of the quorums of the 70!!!! that was a surprise to have a 70 there! it was all so wonderful and i was out of my mind excited and happy! These people that i love so much are now on the path to return with their Father in Heaven!!!!!! WOW!!!!!!! 

    as for the rest of the week it was great! we had changes this week and Elder Lopez and i were not changed! President almost never does that 3 changes together is rare, but with two new and normal missionaries is SUPER rare! we are super excited about that! 

    WEll the week was great we had 20 lessons on friday and saturday and sunday were all of the final preparations for the baptism! Oh and Renee one of the baptisms is kind of like me! she shut down and got really quiet before the baptism. she wasn't smiliing or talking much. but after the baptism she was all smiles and was so happy!!! it was so great to see that she knew what she did was the right thing!!! 

What a great week to see the hand of the Lord here in CHile!! Have the best of weeks family GOODBYE I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!!!! 

 Love elder Groen!!! 

A great week!

  I was reading my notes from november when Elder Nelson came and talked to the mission. i want to share a quote from him with all of you!! "All prophets have preached and looked forward to this time, and we get to play on the field! How do we not jump out of bed every morning?" think about it we are living in the most talked about time by the prophets! we are living the revalations of OLD! of Nephi, Abraham, Daniel, and almost all of the prophets of old and new! what a great chance to serve the lord! Let's Go! its up to us to fulfill their prophecy's!!!

       THis week we had a service project with a little old lady named Maria. we did a lot of work in her garden and her yard! it reminded me of the work Dalton and I did with RIchard and Ike! We were almost all done and i was still working cleaning some stuff up and I said "done!" and wiped my brow! then she looked at me and said "poor american, you haven't worked a day in your life. have you? not like the other three missionaries. (their are 2 sisters from mexico and argentina and my comp from colombia) what can i get for you? you are probably exhausted!!!" she said it with all sincerity and looked at me like I had just done the hardest thing in the world! I laughed and said i've done more work like this than all three of them! (they all told me they haven't done any work like this before!!)

       WE had Zone conference this week and we were given a lot of great advice and council! Also we saw Meet the Mormons in spanish!! the first ones in South America!!!! it was a great movie!!! 

we were given councel on two big things! first is swamp water. nobody wants to drink swamp water because it sits still all day long and gets really gross! but a beautiful mountain river everybody wants to drink! because it is always moving! President Cook challenged us to make sure our wards are not swamps that are not moving! he said it is up to us to make the water run!! he gave us a great tip to help us out! CONTACTS!!! this is when you talk to anybody and everybody about the gospel!! He told us we need More of this! this is how the water runs! when we are talking to everybody we are showing faith that Heavenly Father has people ready and waiting for us!!!

      Elder Lopez and I have been trying to live this in our work here! we have seen some really incredible miracles and i know that hard work pays off!! we have our 2 baptisms this sunday! for my moms birthday!!!;) and then on tuesday we have changes and i think Elder lopez is going to leave... it is sad because we were both new together and learned so much together! we grew together and saw miracles happen together! Elder Lopez has taught me SOOO much about being a Messenger for the Lord, And i will always be grateful for his example!!!

Love the very hot Elder Groen!!! that came out very wrong! oh well!

Just another day in the life!

well this week was really great we had 23 lessons this past week! we visiting SOOOO many people it is so great! the hard thing is catering to everyones needs! but that is what we are learning to do! and how to help everyone individually! THe work is working! sorry this was a pretty lame letter this week!!! 

Love Elder Groen! 

Family!!

well this week we had to change our baptismal date to the 25th of January! happy birthday mom!! this is REally exciting for us! we don't get a lot of baptisms in this mission! but we are trying to change that saying and work to make it a lot of baptisms!! we are seeing a lot of people change which is one of the coolest things in the world! 

     

The vision of the missionaries is a little different here. they seem to do everything! the ward members here rely on the missionaries for SOOO many things! our goal is to make them self sufficient! they use us for everything! and for some reason they think we are perfect! that sounded very prideful but it is true they all say that we are perfect! i wish they could see our trials and struggles and realize that we are human and are learning and growing just like they are! 

    

THis week we did a lot of walking! until monday! we had a really normal week with walking and visiting! we are trying to find more people to teach that is something that we are always focused on! finding new people and yes it is hard, but no not impossible! 

WE had our surpise inspection this week and because we are both really organized people we passed with flying colors!!! 

WEll sorry im not good at writing! my time management is kind of bad on the computer i just chat with you guys the whole time! i will do better next week! and write a few letters too! 

With all the love of the world!!! Elder Ethan Groen! 

Growth!

       Early in my mission and even at times now i found myself measuring my growth and my testimony compared to that of the others around me! i thought wow they have great spanish why isn`t mine like that? or sometimes it was almost a competition! like, Well my spanish is better than his I am so great! Look at how good my spanish is!        

   

        Those may be the extremes, but yes i was comparing myself to others and their growth. I looked for comfort in being better than someone or maybe more obedient than someone! Everything i was doing was about an outward display of what kind of Missionary Elder Groen was and is! I still struggle with this every day! i struggle to really understand my motivations for everything i do. But i now realize the Pride that was and is involved with this attitude that i had and still have. I am now where near perfect with this idea. but now i see it living in me! 

      It is this aweful monster called Pride! pride is in each of us, but it doesn`t want to be seen. it tries to hide and make its self something noble and great, when really it is one of the most sorry and weak carracteristics. It is the very thing that caused Satan to fall and bring 1/3 with him. it is the verything that has caused many to forget testimonies, love, and conversion all for things of the world! I realize how much pride i have! everyday i am trying to conquer my pride and find new ways to ask for forgiveness and live for a new purpose. but it is so hard! and in the hard moments i remember the words of my mother! you can do hard things!!! so i hope that together this week we can all notice our pride and do all we can to overcome it!! 

With all the love in the world Elder Groen!!!!!