1st Baptism!

Sector- Villa Primavera, Santiago
Companero- Elder Perdue
Letter #12

Haha wowww why do you put Big tires on the car when I leave!? Wow that's so lowww... haha Oh and I know why the car is so broken probably because I used to take it into the sand dunes in Rexburg and jump it like 20 feet hahah Well that sucks that you guys have to fix all that stuff..have fun!!

Haha Bobby's homecoming looks so cool!! He looks like a skinny twig!! Haha and he looks like hes super happy to be home!! I wish I could be there!! I miss the beach and surfing sooo much its a good thing that I don't have a beach around or I'd probably just go cuz its so stinking hot here! And Dad sounds like you're getting pretty shredded in the cross-fit classes!! Thats sweet!! I hope that I can keep my shape up on my mission its not easy when they give you 9 pounds of food for lunch!! Haha 

Oh yeah and It's changes this next week so I don't know if I'll get changed or stay in my sector!! And If I get changed I won't be able to Email next week! But this week was good! I had my first baptism and she was super happy to be baptized!! She wanted it so bad and I seriously think that it was the easiest baptism we could get because our first lesson she told us she wanted to be baptized!! Haha So I dont really feel like we did anything at all!! But this week was good because Im starting to get used to the mission life..I know it took a while for me but I'm starting to get used to walking and i'm starting to learn the lessons a lot better and this week my companion is the district leader so he did intercambios, I have no idea what they're called in English. But its when he goes to the other sector with another missionary in our district. And one of the days he left me in our sector because he had to do baptismal interviews. He left me to work with a member who had just been baptized like a year ago so I had to teach like 3 lessons just on my own basically because the member did not know very much. And it was really really hard but I did it and I was surprised that I could do it because I had never taught a lesson without my trainer speaking 80% of the time!! But it was good, I taught these two investigators named Exil and Abel from Peru. They are so ready for baptism, they told me that they've been looking for a church for a long time and Exil said that none of the other churches could bring this spirit to her and that she knew this church is different than the others. I taught about families in the lesson that we had with Exil and Abel and my trainer wasn't there and when I bore my testimony that the gospel blesses families so much and that I know through the gospel we can have a much happier family when we focus our home on love and the Gospel, our family can be so blessed from it. She started balling because thats what she is most worried about is her family because she loves her family so much and wants happiness for them. So that was pretty cool and I think were going to invite them to be baptized the next time we teach them. But yeah were teaching a lot of people and should have a lot of baptisms this week.  That was the highlight of my week that story!! I hope that you guys have a good week! 

I love you guys!!!
Love Elder Dirkmaat

P.S in the Christmas package that I think you're going to send me, I don't know if you still love me enough to get me anything for Christmas, but if you send me something you should put in it a book called "7 highly effective habits of a missionary"! Cuz I heard its good, oh and an electric toothbrush, oh and 90 dollars hah kidding...

I love you guys!!
Bye

Spreading the Good Word!

Area- Villa Primavera, Santiago
Companion- Elder Perdue
Letter #11

Hahahah Hi!!!

AH Bobby's home!! Wow it seems like he was gone since I was like 5 years old!!! Hahah I hope you enjoy having Bobby home and I hope he likes the new car that I got in place of the dumb Tracker! He better be stoked because I put a lot of work into that car!!! Haha  And Lets be honest Dad... tell me how much Bobby sucks at surfing now haha just kidding. But if it was my choice I'd skip the dumb homecoming and go surfing in Mexico!! Way better! What are you guys thinking??

Yeah, I read the E-mail from last week thank you!! Emily liked it a lot too she told me!! It sucked knowing that Bobby came home on Wednesday and me not being able to be there!! But this week we worked hard and knocked doors and got 12 new investigators!! Wow! We have a lot of lessons to teach this week and we have a lot of work to do to prepare for those lessons! Haha I'm trying to think of what happened last week and there was just so much stuff that I cant remember a specific thing that happened!! Haha But one thing was kinda horrible this week is that we taught the first lesson to two families that we thought were going to be perfect and for sure get baptized!! We taught them the first lesson and then the next day watched the restoration with them and I thought I could feel the spirit really strong while watching it and the first vision and stuff! And then after the movie, ( this is what happened with both the families) We asked them what they thought and what they liked and stuff and they just started talking about how they liked it and felt good but that they have their religion and that as long as our religion and their religion that they already practicing both believe in God and Jesus Christ then we are fine. And then we started talking about authority and how the church has the authority through the restoration and no other church has the authority, but then they'd just not take that into account or something and just argue that as long as we both believe in god then we're fine and both saved. So that was a bummer!! I wish I could have changed their minds but if we would have kept talking we know that the spirit wasn't going to be there because they just weren't prepared I guess. But We found a really good couple who actually just walked up to us while we were standing outside the church and asked if they could learn about our church. They're from Peru so their Spanish is so much easier to understand, Chilean Spanish is so horrible hahah But we taught the first lesson to them and committed them to read the Book of Mormon and they said they would and they're just golden because they said they've been searching for the truth and they don't see the differences between religions if we all believe in god and Jesus Christ. But we explained it to them and they believed us and loved it!! So we will probably commit them to being baptized.

I'm happy that Bobby's finally home and you guys get to spend time with him! It sounds like he's happy to be home too!!! Have a great week!! I love you guys!!!!

Love,
Elder Dirkmaat

4 New Investigators!!!

Area- Villa Primavera, Santiago
Companion- Elder Perdue
Letter #10

So Bobby is coming home on Wednesday!? Wowww I wish I could see him! Haha that's crazy hes coming home! Finally!! It seems like Bobby has been gone for like 5 years!! Hahah But that's good for him!!

This week was pretty good we had a day where we were just tracting and we got into the houses of Four people and taught four people the first lessons!! Hahah thaat never happens!! And so we got 4 new investigators in one day!! That never happens either! Haha  

I had two cool experiences this week, there was one when we were teaching an old lady who is 78 years old and we had just come across her from a reference from another person we had talked to. She let us in and started telling us about her life and her life is horrible!! It absolutely is horrible!! She lives in the smallest house ever and there's hardly room to sit and there was not enough chairs for all of us! And to work she makes salads and sells them on the side of the road and makes her living from selling salads that she puts into plastic bags. Haha she has a big tub of salad in her backyard. And to set up her stand in the morning she starts making her salads at 2 a.m every morning and gets her stand out there at 7 a.m to start selling and works until 6 and then sleeps and does it over again every day!! but the weird thing was the whole time she was talking about how much the lord blesses her life all the time and how much the lord has provided for her and all this stuff and she was talking about how much faith that she has in the lord and I was like wow how do you say that? It was amazing to me! But then we taught the first lesson to her and afterwards she asked us can I get baptized into your church? And we were like of course!! Hahah that was the easiest thing I've ever done hah But its cool how she can be so happy in her small circumstances. 

 The second experience is we were knocking doors at like 9:30pm and we were about to finish because we had to be back at like 10 to our apt so I was about to go back and then I was like I should knock one more door, then I was like no there's not a enough time and then I just decided to do it because it would take like 3 mins anyways haha but I knocked it and I talked to the guy and we said hello how are you?  My name is Elder Dirkmaat and I'm a missionary and he said here, come in!!! hahah I was like what! That never happens. So then I called my companion over and we went in and found out that he's a member but has been inactive for twenty years so we taught him about the importance of going to church and stuff and now hes coming to church with us! Wow, after twenty years and all he wanted was an invite!! 

The thing that sucks about Chile is that we have like 3 investigators who want to get baptized so bad but they can't because they're not married and their husbands don't want to get married here. It's weird here in Chile, people don't like to get married and almost every house we go into even if they have like 4 kids and are 65 years old they're still not married so I hope that we can teach some of our investigators the importance of marriage!! 

 I hope you guys have a good week and I hope that you enjoy Bobby being home because I wont!! haha But thanks for the Email.-...

I love you guys!! Thanks for the pictures of the beach!! I miss the beach!!!

Love, Elder Dirkmaat

Mission is Opposite of Easy

Area- Villa Primavera, Santiago
Companion- Elder Perdue
Letter #9

District 4 Missionaries!

Hey family,

Thanks for the motivational emails!! They really help!! Thanks mom for sending that package I finally got it on Tuesday!! And now I eat Nutella everyday!!! hahah. Don't worry I've only gained 3 pounds on my mission!!! haha. I hope that its from getting taller and not fat though! 

Thanks for the Email and your experiences in the temple! That was motivating to hear that my relationships will be strengthened because of the mission because that's one of the things that I worry about most hah.  So just for all the people that think that the mission is going to be Easy its the opposite of easy! No day is easy, every day is hard!! That's what makes us grow I guess. This is the hardest thing that I've ever done and its so hard to stay positive sometimes because the way of life that we live here on the mission definitely does not fit my way of life haha. I am all about having fun and all about doing everything to have fun. The mission has made me a lot more serious about life hah, but I still hope that I can keep the fun in the mission. Its hard sometimes but I try haha. 

I hope that you guys have a good week!! Here in Chile Halloween is funny because they do the trick or treat except they say it in Spanish obviously, but if you don't have any candy they actually throw eggs at your house so the next morning there was a bunch of eggs all over the houses where the people weren't home or the people that didn't participate haha and there's a lot of people here that are against Halloween for some reason like evil spirits and stuff, they're dumb hahah. But It was just a normal day for us on Halloween, we were able to do a bunch of contacts because every one was out!! 

Oh yeah, and there was an earthquake!! A 6.6 on the Richter Scale!! But Chileans are used to it and never freak out because there's earthquakes like every month here haha. But like 3 years ago there was a huge one that killed like 2000 people!! hahah, hope that doesn't happen while I'm here!! 

Well, Elder Holland is coming to talk to the Santiago missions next week! That's pretty cool!! I'm excited because Elder Holland is an Amazing speaker! Haha. Oh yeah, and also I had to give my first talk in Spanish this week! It was pretty hard!! But I managed to do it!! Yes mom, my Spanish is improving and I'm starting to understand a lot more!! 

I hope that you guys are excited for Bobby to come home in like 2 weeks! I'm jealous that I wont be there to go surfing with you guys!!! I hope that you guys have a good week this week!!! Thank you for the Emails they're great!!! I wasn't able to see the Halloween pictures though!!!

I love you family!!!
Have a good week!
Love, Elder Dirkmaat

Letter in Spanish

If you speak Spanish you can read most of it, but the last part is written in English!  Mail takes a while to get here!  Nate wrote this letter while in the MTC on October 8th and we got it on November 2nd!