Circunvalacion 1 - Week #8

¡Hola Familia!

So I just finished off week 8 in the mission office of the best mission in the whole wide world... la Misión Chile Santiago Norte!!! I'm starting to really like it here no matter how hectic it can get sometimes. Unfortunately however we are currently in the preparation phase for a big next change, with 17 missionaries arriving (that means 17 trainers) and 24 missionaries leaving... the funny thing is that both groups are all elders. Also we've heard recently that there are some pretty big changes coming to the mission from Salt Lake, we don't know what they are yet here in the office but I've got the slight inclination that we will pretty soon!

President May is in his last year as mission president and is really working on changing the focus of the mission. The normal schedule of things has really been up in the air this change with all of the changes happening and we are really having to stay on top of things here in the office to be sure to catch any new project that comes up on our already busy schedule. Luckily we still get a little time to have fun here in the office!

Today we have plans to go to the Santiago Metropolitan Zoo!!! Yay!!! One of the advantages of being in the office is that our P-day is Saturday, which means that all of the zoos, parks, and museums are open (busy, but open)... in Chile everything is closed on Mondays (P-day for everyone else) unless it is a national holiday, and then sometimes it is still closed. So we are going to say hello to a few of our not so distant relatives... (aka the monkeys... since we are all office monkeys)... and hang out with a little bit of the wildlife!!! LOL...

This week we've been really striving to meet a goal as a district and zone of completing with a promise given by Elder M. Russell Ballard a while back. He said that if each missionary will speak with 10 people everyday about the Gospel (people that don't already have it) that we will double our baptisms. As a zone we are striving to do so and are currently succeeding with no intentions to stop. We really like how the math works here in the mission, in that 0 baptisms doubled still comes out to at least 1 baptism. We believe that it is because of our efforts in completing with this promise that we were able to find Carlos this week, a new investigator with a baptismal date for the 15th of August. In the past several weeks we had found a few people, but recently all of them have ended with a lack of interest or a blatant disinterest in our message. But now we have high hopes that Carlos can continue to progress in this Gospel and eventually will be able to receive all of the blessings that Our Heavenly Father has available for His children.

I have a great testimony of this great and marvellous work!!! A few months ago I extended the invitation to share the Gospel with someone and I haven't heard from anyone about how it went. If anyone has a success story of when they shared the Gospel I want to know!!! Whether it turned out in success in the sense that the person with whom you shared accepted the invitation or in the sense that you learned something from you efforts I'd love to hear how it went.

Also I have another request for the package... Dad: Could you ask the Spanish missionaries from the Branch for un Libro de Mormón? Afterwards if you could please write your testimony inside, in Spanish and send it to me I'd love to have it to share with an investigator or convert!!! Please, please, please, please, please!!!

I love you all and wish you all the best. Sounds like work has and will continue to be crazy for a while, but I'll be praying that everything comes out alright!!!

Also Mom, Elder Moore really liked the inspiring words for the office! We Texans are really taking over and we are excited about it!!!

I love y'all and miss y'all bunches!!! Hope that everything continues to go well for everyone!

¡Todo mi amor y cariño!

-- Élder Todd