¡Sacándonos la mugre!

In chile when someone says that their "sacándose la mugre" it means their working super hard, and that´s exactly what me and Hna. Cottle have been doing this week! This week still had it´s challenges, we were able to return to our apartment and leave injured Hna. Casique at the house of a member so me and Hna.Cottle could go out and work, but about an hour later she called us to come back cause she felt horrible, she took the wrong medication and was shivering and throwing up, and as I helped her out of the bathroom she fainted on top of me, it was totally crazy, I thought we we´re going to have to call an ambulance or something, but we layed her down in the bed and she knocked out the rest of the day. The next day Hna. Jhonson from another area called San Felipe who was sick with the flu came to stay with her and then Hna. Cottle got the stomach flu and was throwing up, but she really wanted to work so we went out and while making some copies of our progress reports for our meeting with the branch mission leader she felt super light headed and couldn´t even ride her bike. So I insisted we go home and she slept from 5pm until the next morning at 7:30 am. So instead of being Hermana Ibarra missionary extrordinaire saving souls one house at a time, I was nurse Gladys stuck at home with 3 sick sister missionaries, oi vay! It was totally crazy, but it did give me a lot of time to write letters :D The next couple days Hna. Jhonson & Casique left for San Felipe to be closer to the doctors and me and Hna. Cottle have been able to work the hardest we ever have this whole transfer now that Hna. Casique isn´t holding us back. We love her to death don´t get us wrong, the Lord has helped us develop patience and compassion with her, but she still has a lot to learn about missionary life and it´s been hard but we´ve been trying to teach her by example. Even though we had all these crazy challenges the Lord blessed us this sunday with 3 invetsigators at church and this week we invited 3 more people to be baptized who all accepted to do so this month!!! We also found a wonderful family who is already married (FINALLY!) and the husband has drug problems and he saw how a close friend of his completely turned his life around with the gospel and is curious to learn more about how it can be possible for him. His wife seems less interested but I know that this is their shinning moment, he accepted to be baptized and keep meeting with us and he said that he didn´t know why he let us in his house, that he always rejects the people out on the street evangelizing, but that there´s something different about us and he is curious about the Book of Mormon. That was the greatest blessing this week! Something I learned a lot this week is that sometimes as a missionary I feel like I can conquer the world, I wake up with so much motivation and energy to teach the gospel and change peoples lives, I see all the wonderful talents the Lord has blessed me with and how so many events in my life have prepared me for this moment, but other days I go out and feel overwhelmed by our investigators who don´t progress, who don´t understand what we´re teaching them, who have so many personal problems I´ve never experienced, and I see how small the branch is and how much help they need to continue going strong so that they can have their chapel built, and at those times I feel like the dust of the earth, to lowly and piuny to help anyone and make a difference. But this week while I was studying my scriptures in the morning I came across Jacob 4:6-7 (I started reading the BOM again from the beginning and am learning so much!) and these verses just pricked my heart and the Lord explained to me why I have to go through these up´s and downs. He´s given me power and authority to command people in the name of Jesus Christ to act,show their faith, and be baptized, but at the same time he gives me experiences that humble me, that I may know that it is only through Him that I can make these miracles happen and not by my talents or knowledge of the gospel. What a beautiful thing it is to be a humble servant of the Lord at this time. I´ve learned more these 2 months than any EFY, girls camp, or sunday at church combined. The Lord is molding me to be a Gladys I didn´t even know I could be. Before the mission I knew with all my heart that I not only wanted this experince, but that I needed it, and I didn´t know why, but now I understand the why. My patriarchal blessing tells me that I have the potential to become an elect lady, and I never understood that, I thought I already was elect that I was living the gospel and doing everything I possibly could to be a righteous person, but I never could have imagined how much potential was still left in me until now. The Lord has big plans for me, he´s promised me that I´ll be an instrument in his hands and I am allowing Him to mold me and change me into that elect lady he knows I can be, so that I can be an amazing wife, mother, and magnify my callings in church and help serve all those around me. In summation, the mission is challenging, but oh so rewarding, and I love it :)

Prayers your way,

Hna. Gladys Ibarra

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Stumbling stones

This week has been literally insane, full of ups and downs. The ups- we are focusing on a sector and the lord has blessed us with some future investigators that seem promising, we did a lot of service this week helping a sister who´s inactive daughter moved in and we´re teaching her kids Camila and Javier who will be baptized in May, Javier is progressing but Camila has had every excuse not to come to church...ugh. We also got a lot of things organized as faras maps of our area go, we drafted a branch mission plan and trained our branch mission leader in his calling so he can better help us. We also had a zone conference thursday and it was THE BOMB! So much fun to hear the new updates for the mission from President Essig who recently went to a big mission president counsel in Buenos Aires, they are making a lot of changes to the mission with the increase in missionaries and particlarly sisters. We had 169 missionaries in the mission when President Essig started and now we have 240, almost 100 more! They´re also gonna have sister District leaders that are going to be in charge of all the sisters which will be cool. The zone conference was also awesome case we played a ton of fun games, got to socialize with all the other missionaries (cause we barely see eachother) and they had a really nice lunch for us, it was like dinning at a 5 star restaurant, sooo nice of them, they really take care of us! We also had a lot of less active members we´ve been visiting come to church this sunday and we were so happy about that! And the biggest blessing of all was that an investigator came to church who we´ve never even met or seen, he simply walked in and said he was led by the spirit of God, how incredible! He doesn´t live in the sector we´re focusing on, but we are definitely going to go teach him and baptize his whole family! We also got to speakin sacrament meeting yesterday, I was an emotional mess. If the mission has done one thing for me so far I´d have to say that it´s softened my heart. People who know me know I don´t like crying and try to hold it in, but in the mission I seriously can´t control it, the spirit pricks my heart and the tears start flowing, but I think it´s a good thing and something I needed to learn and be humble about. My message touched the hearts of the congregation and high councilman that was present, I shared my experience about the branch I was in back home and how I was only a mere spectator to the missionry work there and not a participant and that with time my branch as closed.Now they seem more eager to help us in missionary wor so they can have their chapel built, they need 15 more priesthood holders! So now the downs- most of our appointments fell through, no one came to our english class, our numbers we´re low this week and even though we´ve been working hard at the same time I´ve felt unproductive and like we haven´t been teaching a lot and it was frustrating. Me and Hermana Cottle have a lot of energy and are eager to teach and I´ve felt like Hermana Casique hold us back sometimes because she works at a slower pace, but I´ve been learning to teach by example and be patient. This week we have had several stumbling stones as you can see and some have been quite literal. Hermana Cottle ran over a loose rock and jumped off her bike thankfully nothing bad happened. I fell off my bike, flew off I guess is a better description because it was dark and I didn´t see a speed bumb and was trying to grab my planner and drive with one hand. I landed on my shoulder and had pretty bad whip lash, my shoulder kills sometimes and I´ve just been stretching it and puting some icy hot on it, I scratched up my knee a bit and have a hue bruise but I´m mostly fine, luckily I had my helmet on cause I stratched it up, that could´ve been my head! But Hermana Casique takes the cake, yesterday biking to ward council we were bookin it through a dirt road and her bike slid and she flew off and landed on her knees, she totally biffed it and was bleeding everywhere! Next thing we knew the whole ward council was outside trying to help her and we took her to the stake president house who is a surgeon. So we´re chillin in his mansion for a couple days while he treats her wound, she might need stitches on a knee the other one is scratched up and bruised. She cried a lot and we all felt her pain, so please pray for her so she can recover quickly. I was frustrated at first because I knew this meant we wouldn´t be able to work not that we´ve got one man down, we´re hoping arrangments can be made so that me and hermana cottle can get back to santa maria, but for now we´re here living the good life, his house is huge and super nice and they have been so hospitable towards us. But part of me feels guilty because I want to be out working and sweating and bringing more souls to the Lord! Pray for the three of us and I´m sure the Lord has a plan and purpose for all of this.

Luke 4:11

Peace & Blessings

Hna. Ibarra

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Santa Maria-Holy Mary

I´ve been in Santa Maria 3 weeks now, and 2 months on the mission I don´t know where the time goes, it´s crazy! But everything is going great, we got our bikes as you´ll probably see in the pics on libro-cara aka facebook and it is definitely a work-out, but we are getting so much more done in our day because we´re not wasting time walking and can get straight away to where we need to go. I´m gonna be sooo buff when I get back from the mission, hopefully my chicken legs will beef up a bit ha ha. The other day we rode our bikes to get to know our sector better and wow, what a beaut! (neature walk reference, look it up on youtube friends) LOL but seriously, there are vinyards as far as the eye can see and we can just go and pick the grapes and eat them, all natural and organic the way God intended it to be. We drove through big "alamos chilenos" and can see all the mountains and sunset in the distance, I´ll try to get pics of it next time, we´re planning on going again for our morning work-out this week. Some funny occurences of the week is that 3 old people fell infront of us all on different days, but it was like a crazy coincidence.One was an old lady who just started bawling cause she got scared she broke something and when we helped her up she was like "oh you´re the girls from that church, you´re so nice and beautiful thank you!" and 2 were old men on their bikes that crashed into parked vehicles LOL, one was a drunk and I chastised him and told him to sit on the curb and not ride his bike home and he said "¡si señorita!" it was pretty funny, but I don´t believe in coincidences anymore on the mish and know everything has a purpose and reason. Only 2 old creepos tried to kiss me this week which wasn´t too bad hahaha, those moments are always uncomfortable but funny, luckily I´m in a trio and ma girls got ma back always. Some guy offered to buy us french fries yesterday cause he said he always sees us around town and is looking to see who´s around us cause if someone puts their hands on us he said he´ll turn into an ogre and beat the crap out of them...awesome to know the french fry guy´s got ma back also HAHA. As for the work, things are slowing down, basically people don´t keep the comittments we leave them to read the BOM and attend church so none of our investigators are really progressing and it´s a bummer. But we were so happy to see Pamela come to church sunday! It was fast and testimony meeting and it was awesome because a sister bore her testimony about how she´d read the BOM and never understand, but that as she´s continued to read now she does and that really touched Pamela because she´sbeen having the same difficulty. She left after sacrament, but said next time she´ll stay longer and bring her 4 year old son to go to primary with the other kids. So we´re crossing our fingers! We´re also teaching an awesome couple Anibal y Mariela who have 2 daughters (also not married...ugh) but he is reading the BOM and understands it and said he is coming to know that it´s true, we gave an audio version to Mariela and are hoping she´ll listen to it while she works (cracking open walnuts) and that her heart will be pricked also. Camila y Javier are brother and sister, the kids of a less-active member and we´re teaching them as well and hoping they can get baptized May 5th! Jose Carrasco who has a date for the 28th didn´t come to church sadly, he gave the excuse that he was out of town, but we saw him in a store while we were on the phone with him, the little liar, haha. But oh well, I can´t stress too much and I always remember the wise words of my brother, I am here to invite people to come unto Christ, I can´t force them to do anything and just need to let the spirit do the work. I miss and love you all dearly! Best of luck to all my BYU peeps this finals week, kill it!!! And Send me pics and updates on your life. It helps me to know what you´re all upto cause then I don´t get distracted wondering what´s up with everyone. To all within the reach of this blog, just know the mission is awesome and that it´s life changing and I know one day I´ll be looking back on this time full of gratitude to my heavenly father for giving me the priviledge to serve and be an instrument in his hands in Chile.

Love,

Hermana Ibarra

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Re: Holy Maria!

Hermana Ibarra, me siento tan orgullosa de ti, y creeme que las oraciones se elevan.
Me alegro que estes disfrutando tu mision, y que estes viviendo algo que no te imaginabas jamas... Nosotras tambien tenemos esos problemas aca en Vina del Mar, pues la cantidad de parejas viviendo juntos sin casarse es enorme, 37 y 40 anos y sin divociarse de su primera esposa, otra cosa que es impresionante la cantidad de ninas de 14 15 anos ya con bebes, dejan escuela y todo porque tienen quee cuidar su bebe. Me alegro saber de ti, y lamento que no supe que venias al Templo  para yo haber ido ese mismo dia.. me dejas saber la proxima vez, aunque se me acerca el tiempo o sea el 2 de Julio regreso a USA.
Te quiero mucho y se feliz y obediente
Hna Rodriguez

On Apr 10, 2013 5:42 PM, "Gladys Ibarra" <gladys.ibarra@myldsmail.net> wrote:

My beloved family and friends, I´ve missed you! Sorry I didn´t write ya´ll monday but they changed our p-day to wednesday because it was our yearly temple trip!!! Talk about a spiritual high this week with conference on top of that. We went to the temple as a zone and rented a mini bus and took the 2 hour trip to Santiago. We got lost and got there a bit late but they were able to squeeze all 23 of us in a session, it was my first time in spanish which spiced things up and made it a new and interesting experience for me. The temple looks small and simple on the outside, but once you enter the wooden double doors it is absolutely spectacular inside! Quality craftmanship all around as do all our temples. I went fasting for guidance for my investigators and anything else the Lord wanted to teach me in his house of instruction and I felt such a special spirit. It´s so beautiful to see how it doesn´t matter where in the world you are, the temple is always full of that peacful and sweet spirit of the Lord. As I walked to the session all dressed in white we passed by the sealing rooms with their gorgeous chandeliers and sacred alters, I couldn´t help but shed a few tears, one day I´ll be in a room similar to those with someone special, but that day is far far away and I´m not allowed to think about it right now hahaha In fact there was a bride and all of us hermanas were like "We can´t look! Hurry run! Lets get out of here!" hahaha. But seriously, it was so special to go to the temple, to think I won´t go back for a year! :( We also ate McDonalds on our way back and they had some delish Maracuya Chili wraps, McDonalds is definitely waaaay better foreign. Conference was also AMAZING, I looooved Elder Holland´s talk. To think it´s already been 6 months since I was sitting there in person with my dear friend Chase Bryan, CJ & Chelsea (how are their wedding plans btw?) time flies when you´re having fun! This saturday I will reach my 2 month mark, doesn`t sound like a lot, but it went by super fast and I know the rest will be a blurr next thing I know it so I´m trying to enjoy and make the most of every cold shower, bug in my food, power outage, appointments falling through, and creepy old men whistling at us haha. But seriously, the time on my mission is precious and I want to make the most of every second of this sacred time the Lord has entrusted me with to serve his children in Chile. Our investigators weren´t progressing which is frustrating, Mario and Pamela haven´t kept any commitment we´ve given them and we were about to have to let them go and move on to people who were actually willing to exercise their faith and want to change when we ran into them in the street and they told us they read 2 verses...AAAAHHHHH!!!!! We were jumping for joy!!!! 2 verses doesn´t seem like a lot, but it´s better than nothing and we´re still trying to work with them. Javiera is still terrified of her mom and won´t talk to her about her baptism or that we´re teaching her so we told her we can´t teach her until she does, we talked to her brother who is a member and are hoping he can help us out and praying her mom will soften her heart. Our other investigators seem hopeful but we can´t give them a baptismal date cause none of them are married...Laaaaaaame! But we are going to continue working with them to show them the blessings of marriage and get them to the font. Besides that all is well in Santa Maria, I´m eating a ton, it´s kinda crazy I don´t think I´ve ever eaten so much in my life and my companions are literally freaked out, but we walk all day and I burn a ton of energy, but I´ve gained 5lb´s which anyone that knows me knows what a miracle and joy that is to me! haha It´s starting to get chilly, fall is officially here and the leaves are changing colors which is super weird because we´re in April, the seasons have me totally twisted in South America. Also I want to give a birthday shout out to my beloved niece Bella! Girl you are 12 years old, officially a beehive in young womens, woohooooo!!!! I am so excited for you, you are going to have some of the funnest times of your life these next couple of years, go to girls camp EVERY year and make new friends and do your personal progress so you can get your YW´s medallion and get into BYU ;)! I miss and love you and wish you the best this b-day! I sent mommy (Sherlyn) a letter, there is some $ for you to buy something you like from your tia :) Welp that´s all this week! Thanks to everyone who reads my blogs and e-mails and for all your love and support! I need it because the mission is challenging, but your words of encouragment give me hope and strength :) 

peace & blessings,

Hermana Ibarra

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Holy Maria!

My beloved family and friends, I´ve missed you! Sorry I didn´t write ya´ll monday but they changed our p-day to wednesday because it was our yearly temple trip!!! Talk about a spiritual high this week with conference on top of that. We went to the temple as a zone and rented a mini bus and took the 2 hour trip to Santiago. We got lost and got there a bit late but they were able to squeeze all 23 of us in a session, it was my first time in spanish which spiced things up and made it a new and interesting experience for me. The temple looks small and simple on the outside, but once you enter the wooden double doors it is absolutely spectacular inside! Quality craftmanship all around as do all our temples. I went fasting for guidance for my investigators and anything else the Lord wanted to teach me in his house of instruction and I felt such a special spirit. It´s so beautiful to see how it doesn´t matter where in the world you are, the temple is always full of that peacful and sweet spirit of the Lord. As I walked to the session all dressed in white we passed by the sealing rooms with their gorgeous chandeliers and sacred alters, I couldn´t help but shed a few tears, one day I´ll be in a room similar to those with someone special, but that day is far far away and I´m not allowed to think about it right now hahaha In fact there was a bride and all of us hermanas were like "We can´t look! Hurry run! Lets get out of here!" hahaha. But seriously, it was so special to go to the temple, to think I won´t go back for a year! :( We also ate McDonalds on our way back and they had some delish Maracuya Chili wraps, McDonalds is definitely waaaay better foreign. Conference was also AMAZING, I looooved Elder Holland´s talk. To think it´s already been 6 months since I was sitting there in person with my dear friend Chase Bryan, CJ & Chelsea (how are their wedding plans btw?) time flies when you´re having fun! This saturday I will reach my 2 month mark, doesn`t sound like a lot, but it went by super fast and I know the rest will be a blurr next thing I know it so I´m trying to enjoy and make the most of every cold shower, bug in my food, power outage, appointments falling through, and creepy old men whistling at us haha. But seriously, the time on my mission is precious and I want to make the most of every second of this sacred time the Lord has entrusted me with to serve his children in Chile. Our investigators weren´t progressing which is frustrating, Mario and Pamela haven´t kept any commitment we´ve given them and we were about to have to let them go and move on to people who were actually willing to exercise their faith and want to change when we ran into them in the street and they told us they read 2 verses...AAAAHHHHH!!!!! We were jumping for joy!!!! 2 verses doesn´t seem like a lot, but it´s better than nothing and we´re still trying to work with them. Javiera is still terrified of her mom and won´t talk to her about her baptism or that we´re teaching her so we told her we can´t teach her until she does, we talked to her brother who is a member and are hoping he can help us out and praying her mom will soften her heart. Our other investigators seem hopeful but we can´t give them a baptismal date cause none of them are married...Laaaaaaame! But we are going to continue working with them to show them the blessings of marriage and get them to the font. Besides that all is well in Santa Maria, I´m eating a ton, it´s kinda crazy I don´t think I´ve ever eaten so much in my life and my companions are literally freaked out, but we walk all day and I burn a ton of energy, but I´ve gained 5lb´s which anyone that knows me knows what a miracle and joy that is to me! haha It´s starting to get chilly, fall is officially here and the leaves are changing colors which is super weird because we´re in April, the seasons have me totally twisted in South America. Also I want to give a birthday shout out to my beloved niece Bella! Girl you are 12 years old, officially a beehive in young womens, woohooooo!!!! I am so excited for you, you are going to have some of the funnest times of your life these next couple of years, go to girls camp EVERY year and make new friends and do your personal progress so you can get your YW´s medallion and get into BYU ;)! I miss and love you and wish you the best this b-day! I sent mommy (Sherlyn) a letter, there is some $ for you to buy something you like from your tia :) Welp that´s all this week! Thanks to everyone who reads my blogs and e-mails and for all your love and support! I need it because the mission is challenging, but your words of encouragment give me hope and strength :) 

peace & blessings,

Hermana Ibarra

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more pics

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Santa Maria- week one

Another week in the mish flew by! Things in my new area couldn't be better, Santa Maria is a gold mine! Our 1st day here the 2nd counselor (hermano Victor) of the branch took us around to contact less active members, recent converts, and investigators the previous missionaris we're visiting. The last sisters here got injured and couldn't work so I am once again opening an area for sisters and there hasn't been missionaries in a couple months here. Opening a new area has a lot of challenges because you don't know anything, and you're starting from square one with all the investigators and everything, but thanks to the help of Hermano Victor we are flooded wih work and people to visit. As soon as people heard there we're new sisters in the area they we're calling us begging us to come over and visit them and we are so excited for all the work there is to do here! (nothing like Til-Til). Some special investigators we have are Mario and Pamela. They have a 4 year old boy named Esteban who is crazy hyper and they are havig a lot of problems in their relationship, but we're workig with them with the faith that the gospel will strengthen their relastionship. Pamela wants to get baptized and we invited her to beb baptized the end of this month and she agreed and says she feels the need to be baptized. It's a bit complicated with Mario because he commited a serious crime and he doesn't think he can be forgiven. We can't invite him to be baptized unless he feels the true desire to do it and would need a special interview with the mission president. But before any of that can happen they need to get married! A big issue here is that people cohabitate and have kids so we have a lot of work to do with them but I love them both and see the potential happiness this message can bring them and their son. Another investigator that we have is Javiera who´s 16. She also accepted to be baptized the end of this month but she's 16 and we don't know if her mom is gonna give her permission cause she was very hard on her older brother when he wanted to get baptized, but she gave in with him and we're hoping she softens her heart with Javiera a well. We have a lot more families to work with and invite to be baptized but I'm happy with  done in just 1 week and our names appeared in the Mission News because of our numbers, woohoo! Being in a trio is a lot of fun, but also challenging. Me and Hermana Casique we're trained differently and she's learning a lot from me and what I learned from Hermana Rodriguez and we get along great and laugh so much, we crack eachother up mainly because I speak spanglish ad make up words in spanish ha ha. And Hermana Cottle is just a sweetheart, I'm trying to seve her in any way I can because she's only been here 3 months and even though she's training us her spanish needs work and she feels self-conscious all the time of her spanish and unqualified to train us, but I am constantly supporting her and telling her what a great trainer she is and helping her improve her spanish any way I can. I'm used to be a tour guide and presenting information with a lot of energy and excitement, but Hermana Cottle is teaching me to teach with the spirit and to be more tender and loving during the lessons in order to invite the spirit and she is a great example to me. The house we live in is HUGE, the only bummer is that it's crawlig with spiders and we we're having problems with the water heater so we had to take a coupole cold showers. We have 2 bathrooms and 6 rooms including the kitchen, dining room, and bedroom so it's possible that some more sisters might move-in with us and that they divide the sector, but as of now we don't know. Also Fall is here! The weather is getting chillier and the leaves are falling and I'm sweating less which is always awesome! Anyways, love you all! Send me Dear Elders and tell me what's up in the states!

 

xoxo,

Hermana Ibarra

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