Family Search

     So this week was a good week! first of all we are back on the streets again without sickness working hard! and we are one week away from transfers! stay tuned for next week to find out who will be my next comp!! 

      Now to the work! we have an less active named Oscar and we are trying to help him overcome some problems right now! i have been praying for how to help him for a long time now and i think Heavenly Father is opening a new door for him! this week i got the idea or prompting that i needed to do some family history with him! so we talked about temples with him and in our next visit we are going to teach him how to use the family search website! we are almost positive that we will have a name to take to the temple for him so all we need now is that he gets a temple recommend!!!

We have another less active family the Meza Family and the Dad is really great we talked with him about baptisms for the dead and then we helped him do some work on Family Search and this sunday he has an interview for a temple recommend!! 

     I am literally seeing the hearts of the children being turned to their Fathers! i am seing revelation happen before my eyes! i can't wait to go to the temple with them!!! Family Search is amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

      if you are feeling sad or down hearted. i have a solution! please take the 20 minutes to make an account and do some family search! you can do your own work or you can index! either way it will belss you more than you could know!!

                                                   With all the love from Santiago to Home!

                                                                Elder Groen!

Wow another week in the Lord's vineyard!

     WEll first of all this last week on friday we got a new investigator that moved into the ward! she is absolutely incredible! i think she has been prepared in so many ways for us to teach her! i can't wait to teach her again on this friday! her name is Arielle! super pumped about that one!

      

 Then the plague hit our house! my comp got sick last friday and had to go in the house early and couldn't go out all saturday... so the other three elders and me did divs all those days and tried to get to visit everybody! Then on monday Elder purnell and my comp were both sick again and they stayed home all day so i went on divs with Elder Mellado all day long! then yesterday Elder burt said he needed to come in early because he was sick... Then yesterday he told me he didn't study at all in that whole time he was sick!!! i coulnt believe it!! he was inside for somewhere around 30 hours and didn't study at all!!!!!!!! i was trying to be patient with him and have some sympathy for him but it killed me! i felt sick all of those days too but i knew that if i didn't go visit the people they wouldn't get visited! and i knew that i wasn't that sick so i could go and do it! but then it just about killed me because he had stayed inside and i felt like it was all a big excuse so he didn't have to work hard... i just feel like if we look for excuses to not work we will find them but also if we try to give everything we have we will be blessed with the strength to do anything! sorry everybody that was very pesimistic of me but please do not look for excuses!!!!

                

then on monday we had our Zone conference and it was absolutely incredible!! President told us that our faith is not where it should be and told us that we need have more faith in baptisms and in the power of the spirit! so I am giving everything i can to listen to his words and give more room in my life for faith! After all when we have faith we can move mountains!!!

                          With all the love in the world,Elder Groen

Back to normal

             This week we are back to the normal! After busy General conference and stake conference we are going into a regular sunday! so we finally get to go out and work our week normally! this week we are shooting for 20 lessons and 6 lessons with members! Numbers are kind of a hard thing to fugure out on the mission! we can't let our lives be dominated by the thought of numbers, because then we forget that each number is a person and that person has specific needs and a specific life! but on the other hand numbers show us how important records are in this church! Heavenly Father cares so much about us that he wants to know exactly who is a member and who is doing what! when we realize this love that he has it makes sense that we record the numbers! also numbers help us to measure what more we can be doing! when we see that we didn't reach our goal for the week it motivates us to do more and to try harder to teach more people!!! 

           We are working especially with Francisco and Pato right now! both of them are great people but they are just missing the action part of the gospel! The prophets teach and have always taught that we must act and when we do we recieve! so when we give a scripture or ask them to pray and they don't, but then they say why can't i feel the spirit like you always say i can. we tend to get a little frusterated. but we always try to rmemer that to help them we need patience and love and we look for any possible way that we can help them keep their commitments with us!!!!

           Here in Chile we walk almost all day everyday but i am learning that walking is really fun! if you don't believe me try it! instead of driving somewhere try walking its a great time to talk with someone and learn more about them!!! 

Remember that somewhere else in the world someone is always smiling so why shouldn't you smile!!!

                                         Love the practically chilean Elder Groen!

Miracles Happen TODAY!!!!

      so before i talk about the rest of the week i have to tell you about Monday!!!!! we had district meetings in the morning but then after we had lunch pretty early. so we left early and walked over to our lunch appointment! it was with Nicole and Patricio, Nicole was just reactivated and is awesome! but Pato is out of a job and looking for work. so he had a interview for a job and couldn't be to lunch. so we invited a ward member named oscar to come with us so that we could go in the house! she made lasagna while we all sat around and talked with her (mom i tried to help her she would not let me, i promise!). then Pato got back from his interview about an hour after we got there and he said it went really well! then what happened next was amazing! Pato doesn't talk a lot with us usualy. but all of a sudden him and oscar just started talkin about everything and they were instant friends. I am so glad for that because that is what Pato needed most right now! that was the first miracle of that day! then we all ate lunch and thought nothing of it! then after lunch Nicole told us the story of a woman in the bible who only had enough food to feed one person and fed the prophet Elias with it, but after she fed him their was more food in the pot and so she fed her children and then their was more for her! Nicole told us that usually one pan of lasagna barely feeds thier family of her, pato and little Maxi. they usually only have one square left. but she fed 7 people 4 missionaries, Oscar, her, Pato, and their son Maxi!!!!! she said everytime whe went back for another scoop their was more food!!!!!!! she wasn't even planning on eating that day and got worried when oscar came and when pato got home!!!!! Then Pato Said he didn't know why or how but that everything she said was true and that it shouldn't have happened!!!!!! Miracle number 2!!! then Pato said he would come to FHE this week with Oscar's family!!!!!! Miracle number 3!!!!!!!

              then that night we visited with oscar, because he has a smoking problem and is still techinically not an active member until we can help him overcome that! anyway we visited with him and shared a scripture, then i said the closing prayer and i thanked heavenly father for his good heart and service and asked that he would be blessed for his service. then when the prayer was finished he was crying and thanked us again!!! Miracle number 4 (he doesnt ever cry! EVER!!!! his words!) 

              this week has been such a great week! i promise when you pray for something and then work for it you will recieve that thing, as long as it is Heavenly FAther's will!!

                 we do a lot of walking and working but i love it all so much! i have never been as happy as i am now on my mission! i hope all is well with all of you!!!

                                                Love Elder Groen!

The Book of Mormon is a book of power

Last thursday on the 18th (Chile's independence day! Super fun! Kind of!) we had a big Mission meeting with Elder Zeballos from the quorum of the 70! it was such a great meeting! president, sister Cook, Elder Zeballos, and Sister Zeballos all spoke about the Book of Mormon! 

on monday september 8th we were told that we were going to start reading the Book of Mormon ont he 18th and finish it on December 13th as a mission! so i decided that i should finish it before that! so i spent every moment i had extra and read the book! i went from Alma 34 to the end in a week and a half! it was a lot of reading for story and now i am back to my deep study of it but it was really cool to just read it and see of the goodness of the prophets in it! Now i started and im on track to finish it by the 13th! I know without a doubt that the Book of Mormon is true! And i testify of Moroni's promise that you can know to! if you read and pray you will recieve confirmation that it is a book from Heavenly Father! and you will recieve strength to bear your trials with patience! 

         

then on the 19th we celebrated the 18th with the ward! the best part was we got there adn two of our investigators were there and it was so special to see them just have a good time and smile and be with the ward! the ward did missionary work without even realizing it!!! 

       

 One of the menos activos we have been working with for a while got called to be the ward sunday school president and he is SOOOO motivated to work hard! i am so excited for him and this calling! 

        

this week we spent most of our time walking and knocking! we didn't get very many lessons... but it is motivating for me to think that its not always the number of lessons or baptisms that determines what kind of a missionary we were! it just matters how hard we work and how much we live up to our potential! 

                                   lots of love from Elder Groen!!!!

From Andrea: The next comments are from Ethan when we told him that John, Andrea, Gabe and Sydney (our cousin) are in the LDS Church's Savior of the World production this year.   Jessi has school on Tuesday and Thursday nights when we will be performing, so she couldn't participate this year. 

"oh my Goodness Dad that makes me SOOOOOO happy that you guys made it! my companion has the CD of the soundtrack and we have listned to it here and there, but when we do i only think about how much i loved that time and how much that increased my testimony! memories of wonderful friends we made always come flooding back into my head! I know it will bless the family so much and i know you will love the experience to participate in it!!!!!

ok we worked our way back up to 13 lessons this week. its hard it was still the 18th so everybody was gone on vacations... we did a lot of door knocking again! but we are excited about this week to get our numbers back up! and we can´t give out Book of Mormons on the streets because too many people smoke weed with them... so we have to be in a house teaching someone in order to give one away... oh chile... 

language is great! we get along great! and we obey all of the rules! right now we are trying to help the other two missionaries we live with be more obeidient! but we just got a new missionary in the house! Elder Torres is gone and Elder Mollado from conception Chile is here!"

There is real power in prayer!

so this week was hard because we spent most of our time walking around knocking doors and trying to contact... anyone who has tried this knows that their is a lot of work and not a lot of reward. so i began to get down hearted. then i read in the book of mormon about prayer and the power that fervent prayer has! so i decided that i was going to try this! i did this about two weeks ago! and at first we saw no change at all... but then the past four days have been incredible! first we talked two three peole during contacting that said they were interested and said we could come back!!!!! for those of you who don't know this is a miracle! chileans NEVER have time for the missionaries in thier houses!! then we got two references from a member i haven't ever gotten one before this! and finally we found more opportunites to serve this week than we have before ever! I know that the power of prayer is real and that with it we can change the world! but don't forget that after you get off your knees you have to work! this is a promise from the prophets! and i know that it is true! 

            then one more story! last night we went to visit nicole and Pato nicole is our recent convert and pato is her investigator husband. we went and they live in a big apartment building, and in these buildings you have to go to the front desk and call them before you can go up to their house. yesterday we went and they let us go straight up without calling. then when we got up there we knocked then we heard fighting. After a little bit of time they let us in and we shared a message about christ! i know that because of their willingness to let us in and to hear a message they invited the spirit back into their house and when we left they were holding hands!!!! that was an incredible tender mercy that we didn't have to call them because they probably would have just said not now! 

       

                                                               Love Elder Groen! 

p.s. i finally put some pictures up!!!

Tie anyone? 

90 lbs of ties for $44 dollars - what a deal.
(notice their bunk beds and how close they are to the ceiling).

Elder Burt & Elder Groen

Can you guess which desk is Ethan's?

how important are the members of the church? ESSENTIAL!

so this week was different first off i went on divisions with my zone leader elder Toledo on thursday and turns out he lives in daltons mission! I learned so much from him about how important it is to listen and how important it is to love the people he was an incredible example of those two things! 

        then this week we tried to find more investigators and less active members to teach. so we did a LOT of contacting! we yelled Allo! a million times this week and we didn't get one new investigator. it is hard but it requires a lot of patience! so we have been trying to find new ways to get investigators and we started asking the members in every way possible. we were given 4 new references and two possible investigators. but now in order to keep those people we need the members to keep helping us and go on visits with us so those people have a friend to help them. Without members what we do would literally be impossible! so i want to extend a challenge to everyone that reads this email! please think of every person you know that is not a member and choose one that you can invite over for dinner, family night, movie night, or anything else and then all you need is 10 minutes or more if you can to have the missionaries talk with those people while they are in a comfortable but different setting. Please find a way to get involved with this work the missionaries need you but more important the lord needs you too!!!!

      then we talked with a contact we had and met her dad and he told us all about his time spent in whales and all about some places that i'd heard of! it was so cool how a conversation about his life led us exactly into the plan of salvation and he said he would be willing to listen to our message we are SOOOOO excited to teach him!

     then this week we had a reactivation! Nicole was a member when she was a little girl but her family fell away while she was still young, so she never really was a member. so right before i got to the sector they started teaching her. and she had been truly prepared by the lord. Anything we asked her to do she did with no questions. now she is active and her husband Patricio is listening to our lessons!!!! at first he told us he wanted nothing to do with our message!!!!!!! she is so awesome and her husband has been touched by the spirit it is sooo exciting!

      well just to let you all know right after i am done emailing i am going into my house until friday morning. September 11 is independance day for chile and they blow up cars and shoot guns so tomorrow is my super deep clean of my house!!!! wahoo!!!! gotta love chile!

                                                       Love elder groen

p.s. i sure love all of you!