Fire!

first things first..... happy birthday lisa. hope you have a good day this week. cant wait to see you.

Elder Magnusson and his sister, Lisa

this week was pretty solid. we taught a ton this week which was nice. alot of people started progressing and we found some solid people.

we found some guy this week... he said that we contacted his house about 2 months ago but he was in the shower and by the time he got to the door we were already walking away. he saw the hermanas walking in the street and asked them if they could send us by. we just have had one lesson with him but it was super super solid. he is really prepared. he reminds me of our other investigator  (who went to church yesterday!) we were going to invite hime to get baptized but right when we were going to bring it up he got a call from his boss saying that he had to go work but he committed to go to church. we went by his house to pick him up on sunday but he wasn’t there. at 12:30 we got called by him 6 times but we couldn’t answer because we were in church. we called him back and he apologized and said that he got called in again last second. but we have a lesson set up with him on tuesday. we are way excited.

we had a worldwide missionary training this week. elder Oaks, Anderson and Bednar were part of it. they talked about how we can teach the doctrine of Christ better. it was way good. the craziest part was at the end they announced our new daily schedule. basically there is no set hour to study. we just have to use our judgement and study at the least productive hour. it’s wired and i’m not sure if i like it but we just have to get used to it.

so the biggest news in chile right now are the fires. there are a bunch of arsons setting fires all over the country. it has gotten out of control. many people have died and thousands of houses have burned. chile doesn’t have the man power to stop them so they are asking help from other countries. the states have sent over some planes and stuff. the city where i am at hasn’t gotten effected at all but there are several parts of the mission that have gotten some pretty heavy damage. it has  made contacting a lot easier thought. all you have to do is just bring up the fires and you got the person talking for 10 minutes. its kinda funny.

things are going good. but we get changes this week and i think like i’m getting changed and i’m going to be a normal missionary. it is really rare that an elder finishes as ZL so we will see what happens on saturday.

Thanks for your love and support. I love you all.

You can also see the video by clicking here.  

100 days left in the mission

so this week came and went. the days are passing pretty slow but the weeks are flying. its crazy to think that i hit my 20 month mark this week. it was kinda sad to think about.

so big news our investigator got baptized!!! she is a grandma lady who is super funny. she loves to talk. it was soooo hard to teach her just cause she wouldn’t stop talking sometimes but, she did it. she has been investigating for almost a year and recently she really became interested. she said that some of the last lessons that we had with her really touched her and she felt like she needed to be clean from all of her sins. the baptism was really special. when she came out of the water she started crying and you could tell she was really touched. it was a sweet moment to see. if i have learned one thing here in chile it is that the atonement really does work. i am grateful for my Savior and what he has done for me.

we are trying to find new investigators. we are teaching a lot of people but no one can progress because they aren’t married. AHHHHHHHH. people don’t get married here and it kills me. its because the government gives them a boatload of money to be "single parents".  so the point is we are contacting a lot. and we have had some luck. we have seen the hand of the Lord in our sector.

so it is really hot here.... like really hot. i load up on sunscreen and still burn but whatever there isn’t much you can do. but our house is 3 stories. but really 2 because we live above an office building. anyway our beds are on the top floor and at night we would just roast. before we would take cold showers right before getting into bed and just not dry off and that would work for about an hour and then we would wake up from the heat. but then we figured out that the mattresses fit out on our balcony. so we have been sleeping out under the stars for the past week and it is sooooo much better. but i have figured out the heat is better than the cold. doing missionary work in the winter is way harder.

so today was a pretty good p-day. we found some guy that has a frisbee team here in san fernando. they invited 6 of us to play and they were super good but we held our own. i LOVE ultimate frisbee. i miss it soo much. then we played dodgeball with the zone and then soccer. i can just feel myself getting sore right now. i’m going to regret it tomorrow but it was way fun.

thing are going good right now. i’m just realizing how much time i have left..... (100 days today) i just have to make it count. love you all. thanks for your love and support. the church is true.

elder mag

"I love you all"

 thanks for all of the emails and love. the best part of the week is hearing from you all.

this is going to be a quick email...

so this week was a longer week for us. we struggled to find a lot of people in their houses. its all good because we were still able to get a lot of good contacts in and that was a blessing because we found some good new investigators towards the last part of the week. there isn’t too much to say about them because it was just the first lesson but we have some potential. time will tell i guess.

so we are teaching an old grandma lady and she has a baptismal date for this saturday. she is doing really well. we just have to verify a few things and i hope she gets baptized this week.

this week we had one lesson with our investigator.  he is now in santiago for 2 weeks. but the lesson went really well. he told us that when he prayed he felt super good and wants to learn more.

its getting to get pretty hot. before the weather would get into the 100s every once in a while but now it is getting to that every single day. let me tell you it is hard to work at 3 o’clock with the sun burning down on you. but i guess it is going to only going to be in the peak like this for 2 or 3 more weeks and then it is going to start dropping.

thanks for everything. i love you all. hope you all have a good week. the church is true.

elder magnusson

"Thanks everyone for the letters and love."

Elder Magnusson is with his zone.  He is in the very back middle in the dark green shirt.  

thanks everyone for the letters and love.

so this week was a pretty slow week. nothing too crazy.

the coolest thing was we found a guy that was super prepared this week. like honestly he is one of the most prepared guys i have ever met. we were just contacting and we knocked on a guys house and started talking to him.  he invited us into his house when we tried to present him with a Book of Mormon. he got really excited and he told us that someone gave him a book in 2002 and he reads it everyday. he told us that he believes it is true and he wants to learn more. so we taught him the restoration and he said that he wants to study it out for a week and then he wants to meet with us again. so we have a lesson with him  tomorrow and we are hoping that all goes well. so pray for him tonight.

we also had zone conference. we had to train the zone on a better way to teach lesson one. it was a good training. a lot of people said that they liked it. we also have to prepare for a training that we have to give to the zone tomorrow about how to teach about baptism in a more effective way. i’m kinda excited to give it. it should go well.

other than that this week was really slow. we just had our normal lessons.... nothing too special.

love you all.... talk to you soon.

Elder Magnusson talks about handing out a Book of Mormon.  

Watch the video below to find out what the Book of Mormon is.  

You can also see the video by clicking here.  

Learning new things for this new year.

 honestly this was a pretty chill week. nothing too crazy. it was actually pretty boring.

the craziest this this week was the changes. holy cow this change was a lot worse than last change. the zone leaders from the north and from the south didn’t send the missionaries early so they got to our bus station really late and all at once. it was nuts. but it all worked out in the end. it was just 30 min of CRAZINESS!!!  at least the missionaries seemed to work with us a little bit better. except for one hermana who didn’t want to buy her bus ticket when she needed to. (she almost missed her bus) let me tell you my least favorite part about being Zone Leader is the changes.

Another cool thing this week was we went to consejo. consejo happens once a month and all of the zone leaders and hermana leaders go and have a training with president and the APs. it was a good training but it was way too long (6 hours). we talked about how we can teach and contact in a more simple way. but we learned a lot. the best part was we were leaving the church and president asked us if we wanted a ride to our house cause he was going down to san fernando. so we had a super good 2.5 hour drive with president. he asked a lot about the zone and the vision that he has for the mission. he wants to do some big things. but i’m excited. he is a great mission president. you can tell that he knows a ton about the Gospel and he loves us.

on new years eve president told us that we had to be in the house at 7 but some member called him and asked if us and two other sets of elders could go to his house to have a bbq. president gave us permission to stay out until 9. it was a pretty fun night. just ate and talked. i can tell that i’m really going to miss the members in san fernando when i go. its going to be hard to say good bye.

other than that it was  a pretty chill week. not too much happened because of new years. all of our investigators were out of town so there were a lot of long, hot, hard days of contacting. but there are weeks like that in the mission.

thanks for everything. i know that this church is true. just live the commandments and all will work out.

elder mag

Just before Christmas we met with a couple of elders who returned from the Rancagua, Chile Mission a few months earlier - Elder Porter and Elder Will (I don't know his last name)  They weren't Sam's companions but they worked with him in their zone.  It was fun to talk to them about their lives in the mission, serving with Sam and their plans for the future.