September 15, 2014

hi family! 

so this week was a little bit of a ROLLERCOASTER..but...all worked out.

we had a lesson planned with miguel and francis. we went to fid francis and he told us that he wasnt feeling well and coulnt meet with us.  good excuse. so then when we were walking down his same road a few hours later, we went to talk to him about putting another cita. he told us that he was in another church and that he couldnt get baptized. i almost bawled right there! i just wanted to throw up.what? another church? he said that he had attend it for tha past week. i asked him if he had prayed about it and he said yes. this is less than 2 weeks from his baptism!

we assigned him some scriptures to read and then to pray and then set another cita for the next evening. then we started fasting.

we showed up and asked him what happened. it was even hard for him to expalin. apparently there had been a lot of people that had been saying lots of bad things about our church. it was confusing him. but he said that he still knew that this church was true and that the book of mormon was true. we had a good lesson and told him that it would not be easy just becasue it was the truth. after all, look at christ´s life and joseph smith´´s- they were killed for the truth. after a good, long talk, he just said, okay, so what is my date for baptism...i want to be baptized! hallelujahj!
ireni and carla have had a rough week this week. her grandma and siister have been pretty sick so shes been helping them a lot. but she hasnt met with us for about 5 days and stopped praying and reading. we stopped by for church and her daughter finally came to the door and said her mom was sick. they didnt come to church so we will ahv to postpone their fecha unitl the 26th of sept with miguel and franics. pray for ireni and carla also. they are struggling.

we are working hard with selia nd emanu also. they are a haitian couple. the father is a member but lives with this woman. she isnt baptized so thay are preparing to get married and baptized. she has to go to haiti to look for some papers and then they have to go get married in haiti becasue they are illegal here. they are seriously the sweetest couple, so humble. they are very poor too so this is a big sacrifice of money for them, but they dont look at it at all like that. the other night we were at the church waiting for an activity to start. emanu was there waiting as well. he had a backpack on, which he never carries around. i was wondering what was in there, then he called me over to him and said,,,,you hermanas can carry avocados right? i said, of course! quickly he unzips his back and unloasd 12 HUGE avocados rfom his bag and starts stuffing them in my purse. i was telling him, n o, no! we cat take all of them! he just said, hermanas, HERMANAS. yes they are ALL for YOU!  they have a huge avocado tree with hundreds of yummy avocados. how sweet! then throught the week we´ve had everyone gift us avocados, so we had about 20. and these avocados are about 4 times the size of the u.s. ones. we eat avocados wtith sandwiches, rice, pasta, mashed potatoes, name it and its there! 

well., i love you all so much! have a great day!

the pic with me and the bag is a snickers, but not JUST a snickers. i opened it up and there were spiders webs and maggots crawling out of it......how disturbing!

> hey mom!,
> its a bummer that you werent on today! BUt, i have to say i have decided to come home my reagular date, thats the 26th of januray.
> i was reading the scriptures and this verse really touched me.
> 3 nephi chapter 13 verse 33
>
> ive prayed a lot and fasted and studied it out in my mind, and honestly, i know that me being a missionry for another month and a half longer is something that the lord needs me to do. so dont worry about classes or anything. i will figure it out all when i ge home! also, tell jessum! i love you all lots!! soo, and dont worry about buying me anything else for christmas!..NOTHING. just save everything for when i go home and we can go to the doctor and dentist and i get everything at home. i want to come home with as little as i can!
> i love you lots mamma! have a great week!
> love hermana rachie hamblin

Sept. 8, 2014

hi fam!

I am finally sending a few pics! 

Here is a pic of my comp that I am training, Hermana Olsen. She is  a great gal! She´s always ready to work hard and participate in the work! We are teaching lots of people and it is honestly quite hard to see everyone. Right now we have people booked till saturday. We´re trying to space it out a bit! We havent been focusing so much this week in the less actives, but in our investiagtos that will be baptized. this week we had a lesson with miguel and francis, the ones that are so great! and francis told us that he was losing his desire to be baptized and that he didnt feel he had much faith. he hadnt prayed for 2 days and said that he felt erally bad. It was geartbreaking to hear! but we had a good leson on the importance on being firm in the gospel and alwasy doing the small things to prepare us and help us in time of trial, because that time will ALWAYS come. then we talked about pray and fasting. we challenged him to bare his testimony at church. the next morning he bore it! he walked up and jsut gripped the podium. he had to take breaks during his testimony and really keep his emotions under control. it was awesome! after he jsut kept saying, hermanas, i have a lot of faith, i do! that was a good experince for him. HE should be good. 

we had to move the baptism dates back for ireni and her daughter becasue they still dont have a testomony of the book of mormon. We´re focusing a lot on heloping them understand the scrpitures and develope a love and appreciation for what it really is. Ireni cant read and so she has to rely on her 12 year old, so we are working with them,  but they really are a great family!

okay, so the 2nd pic i sent to you of the 2 haitians is a pic of one of the most pspecial baptisms that i have heard of. the hermanas have written a story aboout it and are giving me acopy and i will be able to send it to you or eread it when i get back...but a little background is...

he is named angelo and the girl is loveyou...yes LOVEYOU. 

angelo was raised by one of the most famous witches in haiti, his grandfather. Witchcraft and voodooism is very popular and coom on haiti. he was raised by his grandfather and 49 other kids. his grandfather tried to teach him how to take peoples souls and raise people from the dead, but one day we woke up and had the most gut urging feeling to LEAVE THAT MORNING. he had 50 pesos, the equivalence of about 1 dollar and 25 cents and he left. he walked for 18 hours, walked and walked becasue he jsut knew he had to get out of there and never go back. 18 hours later he was stopped by some border patrol. he told them he was taking a long walk and so they didnt ask any moer questions and let him paasss. Little did angelo know he had croseed the border in between haiti and the D.r.. HE caught a guauga to a nearby town and it stopped in vicente noble, and he has been here for 3 years. the missionaries found him, and he was baptized! this is jsut a smmmmmaaaallll part of his life. he is incredible and his faith and story is amazing. Angel was raised by a wicked wicked man, a witch. for 12 years, he was taught to do evil things, only evil things and nothing else. but angelo said there was something in him that always told him, ¨that´s not you.¨  he had no idea who god was or what he was like, but it intrigued him, he followed a prompting one day to ask the sister missioanry for a pamphlet, or anything to read, and from there he was led by god to find a life of god, a life of joy, a change. I love the gospel and cannot begin to describe the security and joy we have promised to us for following god. Do not stray from his path, because nothing good comes doing only what YOU want to do. the holy ghost is real and really helps us make correct decisions that help us gain eternal life. i love each of you and pray that you all try to recognize promptings. although you may not have evr had a life quite like angelos, we can all have the same change, not as quite dramatic, but a change and conversion that saves. have a great week!

love hermana hamblin

Sept. 1, 2014

September 1, 2014

hi fam! 

it sounds like you are all having a blast with lil huds! i have dreams about meeting, so i cant wait to meet him in REAL LIFE! 

this week was realyl good. we have 4 people that we are preparing for baptsim

ireni' the mother of karla

karla

miguel.     miguel is francis´s best friend. he is 21 and just learning so much. they both are so faithful and are at church every sunday and reading everyday.! i swear they have reading parties.

francis. francis has read about 250 page of the book of mormon in about a week and a half. and he can barely read! he absoluety is addicted to it. its so funny becasue he is a 20 yeard old. hes this big muscualr guy, but is absolutely converting through the power of the book of mormon. he just asks every time that we are there, can i get baptized this saturday, please!!  theres a church attendence requirement so the have to wait until the 27th of sept. he was so sad! but we will teach them about the preiasthood next, whcich i am so excited. i found a talk in the ensign that will be perfect! last week we mentioned that theyd be able to receive the priesthood, and miguel stops, and then asks, isnt that the powe of GOD!! their eyes got so bog and they were just beaming with smiles. ahhh they are so great!

well, we had a little rainstorm. we kept seeing purple slash orange blasts of light and we thought they were lighting something on fire..nope, jsut the lightning! it was crackling in the sky and just beaming dark purple and orange! it was the cloolest thing!

well ihave to go, i love you all so much! have a great week!

hermana hamblin

August 25, 2014

hi fam!

tis week was great! we are preparing ireni and her daugheter kaila for baptism the 13th of sept. they are doing so well and faithfully attend church and are always there when we have citas! they said that they hadnt been praying about the church of joespeh smith or the book or mormon, whic is supppperrr impartant so they are wroking on that so they can have a testimony of these things. 

also, miguel that has 21 years and his best friend franics that has 20 years old are going to be beaptized the 27th of sept. they are on fire. they are just so dang cute! they showed up at our church one sundau about 7 weeks ago without an invitaiton, just a feeling to go there. apparently francis had been like joseph smith, visitna nd testing out all of the religions, then found us! they are ready to be baptized and i am so grateful to be teaching them. 

also, a few weeks ago i got a cold and a cough, then i had lots of trouble bereathing so i ahad to go to a clinic and get some steriods injected in me. my comp i guess blacks out sometimes when she sees her own blood and never has problems when it happens to someone el,se, but for some reason, today when she saw them inject me and me blood, she got super sick. i was sitting in a chair with a gas mask on and she looks at me and says i fell sick! she faints and blacks out! all the domincain me in the room came running to her and swooped her up onto a chair, i didnt know what was happening to her and i couldnt leave becaues i was stuck to a mask. it was so crazy and so funny. as soon as she started going down the doctor yelled, grab her! the zone leaders looked at each other and awkwardly tried grabbing her lags and arms and didnt want to touch another missionary. finally some man came running out of the distance and swooped her lifeless body up and ran to a bed....hahhaa oh man, it was a good day today