Week 23: Adventures of a pregnant dog chasing a sheep in the back of a truck (say that 3 times fast)

The missionaries humble Christmas tree

Alo everybody!

We got a box from Zach this week. It is chuck full of Chilean chocolate, so too bad for all of you, but we are all over here getting fat off delicious foreign chocolate.

We found out that Zach is transferring to another sector this week, (actually, yesterday to be precise) to a place called Lagunillas, which is closer to Concepcion. One of the Elders who Zach was living with in Victoria said that it is amazing. Elder Van Pelts new companion will be Elder Gibson, who is from Texas y'all! So that will be exciting for Zach to get to know his new companion.

A milagro (miracle) that happened this week with Zach is, he and his companion were out and about after all of their appointments had fallen through for the day. As they stopped on a street corner, a thought came to Zachs mind, "contact everyone". As soon as he had that thought a woman carrying some groceries walked past them, and he knew she was "the one". He caught up to her and asked if they could help carry her groceries , to which she accepted. During conversation on the way to her house, they found out that this woman was actually a member and had two daughters at home who were not members, ages 13 and 15. She invited them to come over and teach them, right that minute, which is awesome! They showed the family the new Christmas video done by the church, (which I have posted below in this blog post for you all to watch) and they ended up setting up another appointment for this Sunday. It amazes me that Zach had the feeling to stop at that corner, receive the message to look around him, and focus in on this woman whose daughters had not been baptized.  A true miracle that they were there at that time and place to help her with her groceries, whereas they may not have been their if any of their appointments hadn't been cancelled.

Zach and Momita, she does their laundry and feeds them :)

The title of the blog post this week is pretty self explainable, and really there is nothing more to the story. I simply put it there to grab your attention. But it did happen, and Zach did not let it go without mention in his letter. In fact, it seemed like he was a little too excited about how funny it was to see a little pregnant dog running so fast to chase this sheep truck. Anyways...

The pillowcase that we all signed with our favorite scriptures and sent to Zach

Zach kind of celebrated Christmas this week with all of the other missionaries. He opened his presents from us and went to a Christmas conference in Temuco. All of the missionaries in South Concepcion were there, so they had a humongous Christmas feast with potatoes, corn, gravy, salad, and they even let him carve the roast beast! (ok there was no roast beast, i'm just obsessed with the grinch, and so is Zach, so I think he would appreciate my reference in his mission blog.) This conference was 6 hours long and made him super excited for Christmas. He is also excited to spend Christmas on his mission remembering the true meaning of Christmas. This Christmas Zachs holiday is centered on Christ and family. He has had a chance to step back (away from commercialized Christmas) and see the things in life that are truly important and worth celebrating. I think that may be something that we could all work on as the holiday fast approaches next week. Let us try and remember who was sent here to Earth to set an example and to suffer and die for all of our sins. What an incredible gift to the world, that Heavenly Father gave his only begotten son. Spend this holiday thanking our Heavenly Father for all of the many blessings we have, do some service, help one another and show your love for your family, because Jesus Christ is the reason we can be with them for all eternity if we just follow him and do our best. I am thankful that Zach was able to share that information with us and that we could be reminded that Jesus Christ and the atonement are the ultimate gift to all of mankind.

Thank you all for reading and I hope you have a great Christmas!!!

Hasta luego!