Snow like sisters...

Family,

So I really looked in the mirror for the first time since coming here and was shocked! I think when people see angels, those angels have just come from three cambios in Punta Arenas because their skin is really white..".yea and the whiteness thereof doth exceed the whiteness of the driven snow. " Holy Shrapnel, I´m translucent. 

But, as with everything else, we can draw a spiritual parallel.  This pureness of the epidermus didn´t come from one day cloistered away in my one room apartment with the comp (the apartment contains two beds a bathroom and a kitchen..all in one room...figure that one out).  This blancura came from hours and days and weeks of applying spf 75 and weeks of the sun setting at 4pm.  Just as our own spiritual purity or talents or great and marvelous things that we want to accomplish don´t come from one big burst of effort or one week of taking the sacrament...this snow-sister-like state has comes from weeks of effort.  I think Alma 37:6-7 are some of my favorite verses of scripture.

Anywho, great week family.  Shoutouts to BUNDIAL! (I really want that wedding invitation), Katie, mom, dad, and grandma cynthia! Oh yeah, and a shout out to Brooke Bagley (brookie, my comps hands look exactly like yours...it´s really creepy).

 

Creepy slash funny anecdote...we were walking down Ovejero looking for a house when, all of a sudden, Burnmeister says ``my skirt fell off``. There it was...around her ankles.  Luckily, in about .8 seconds she had gotten it back up to the proper position...unluckily, Ovejero is the main street in our sector.  But, luckily again, the only witness was a man who had apparently just drunken a tank alcohol.  He almost fell over laughing. Luckily again, we are in Punta Arenas and we usually wear two or three pairs of tights, thermals and then pants on most days...Also, really luckily again, we are sister missionaries and have absolutely no shame.

Dad, we got into a house and started to teach when I realized that the movie  A Few Good Men (I think thats what its called) was on the TV.  We told the investigators they couldn´t handle the truth and left.

(Joke! We taught a really sweet lesson and she´s progressing.) Thought you´d like that dad!

Well, everything is just dandy down here at the bottom of the world. Great to hear liz and jess are doing well! (someone tell Liz to wait at LEAST till February for me!) Grandma, send Gpa my love and congrats on the fundraiser again! I love those things!

It´s almost 100% likely that I´m leaving Punta Arenas on June 16 which is the lamest thing I´ve ever typed. I can´t even begin to express my LOVE for this sector.  I love so many people here and have had an exceedingly high number of incredible experiences.  I don´t want to think about leaving the sector, so for now I´ll just keep working and helping people develop faith in Christ (the happiest work on earth!)

The picture is me kissing an Indian foot (there is some monument to Magellan here with some big iron Indian), 

I LOVE YOU ALL! Go help the missionaries wherever you are!

This blog entry probably doesn´t make it sound like I´m a missionary at all. But I really am! We´re obedient, working, and exceedingly joyfull (and don´t forget white) When the Punta Arenas missionaries emerged back up into Osorno we all thought they were creepy and white...Creepy whiteness, here I come!

Hermana Bourne

 

Dear ones,

 

Wow, really full, good week.  Davidcito (Melisa´s son) got baptized and that is the best news ever! To watch people take a step towards exaltation is an extremely wonderful, gratifying process and I´m grateful to be part of it.  Two from that family down, two to go! Me and the Burnmeister are having a really wonderful time here in Ovejero...we are absolutely exhausted at the end of every day and we are striving to follow what the Spirit says to us at every turn.  It´s lead us to yet two more incredible families. Other than that...the work continues. Saturday was zone conference and the baptism...exceedingly wonderful day.

 

Shoutouts go to TEEF! and Hal and various members of the family! But the biggest shoutout of all time goes to MOM...the single best mother in the entire world.  I received two large packages full of love and clothes. THANK YOU SO MUCH! We had cutey outfits for the baptism. Thank you thank you thank you! Mom, in the package you sent me a whole load of pictures and in the midst is some picture of some guy skiing and I have no idea who it is...it´s not MIkey, James or Dad or Hal...who is it? Why would you send me a picture of such a luscious bowl to be skied?! (ha!  a mission is better :) )

 

A large holy shrapnel to Tiffany Andrews...way to follow the Spirit...don´t you just LOVE the people from Uruguay? Our next baptism is a couple from Uruguay and they are 100% phenominal.  He was a professional futbol player and she is Hermana Aponte´s TWIN.  We were at the end of a really horrible day and it was raining and dark again and we felt impressed to knock this specific door and Alvaro opened up, let us in, let us teach him, accepted fecha and brought his wife to church the next day! This last week, they quit smoking, fasted, and came to church again. They read the BOM every day and pray and just love it all. I´m just beyond impressed with the disposition of these people to make such huge changes in such a short amount of time...the gospel works miracles.  Thanks for your example of DOING Tiff.  I think sometimes we say a lot of things that we should do without actually DOING them.  keep doing and you will receive more and more impressions! I was actually thinking about you this morning and was SO happy to receive an email from you....thank you. I love you!

 

Well people, Chile is awesome as ever.  It´s so cold outside and the houses are so warm that my pens have started exploding in the inside of my jacket spontaneously.  The temperature change isn´t really good for the ink apparently (or for my clothes!)

 

I had a great experience during personal study that I want to tell you about.  I´ve been praying a lot to know how to improve and help the other hermanas in Punta Arenas and I got such a tender mercy from Heavenly Father this morning. I prayed, studied the BOM for about a half hour (Bourne family challenge!) and cracked open that book that Halsy sent me with talks from GA´s.  I opened to ¨Swallowed up in the Will of the Father¨ by Maxwell and received a whole load of personal revelation.  Consecration (of time, talents, basically our whole lives) is the end all of everything we do.  We are here to submit our wills to God´s will. We do that by ceasing to worry about our own spiritual temperatures and look to see the fevers raging all around us.  Even when we don´t understand why something is happening to us or a loved one...when we REALLY do not understand, we fall back on our faith and knowledge of the heart and mind of God and trust that He understands.  

Oh, man, the best part is when he says that to leave the Telestial Level we need to stop committing sins of commission (actually doing bad things or making mistakes), but to leave the Terrestrial Level and reach the Celestial- we must leave completely the sins of Omission (the misuse or underuse of our time, talents, energy, and lives).  That part just killed me.  How many times have I NOT prayed, studied, helped, lifted, served, shared, been kind or loving? How many times have I not done something because I was sure someone else would?  How many times did I seek for the will of God in the daily things? How many times did I not?

 

I´m more committed to not only seek for the will of God in the daily mission things (we´re already very focused on that), but I want this concept to become part of me. I don´t want to return from here only to leave what I´ve learned and do finally what I want to do and build up myself, my resume, or my ego.  I really want to desire to do God´s will in 5 years and in 50 years. He describes consecration as a process.. given drop by drop throughout our entire lives and that was the part that absolutely terrified me.  When we really leave that which we want or desire, it´s scary and hard because it´s what we wanted! But I´ve found as I´ve given maybe one or two drops out here that our capacity to experience joy is expanded with every drop we give. That there is no happiness apart from God because it doesn´t exist outside of Him.  I think a lot of our dissapointments or discouragements come from looking to something other than God for happiness and I hope I can always remember that. I´m more committed to developing these habits of consecration that will be carried with me throughout my life so I can desire God´s will.

 

I don´t know, people...keep doing what your doing.  Thanks for your examples of faith, testimony, and consecration of your time and talents to God...because in the end, that´s what matter´s, right? Love you all!

Hermana Bourne

HIKING!