Love President Kahnlien and I'm eternally grateful for all my leaders...

Hey Mama and dad! A couple of big announcements! We are going to have another baptism this Sunday of a guy that we are teaching named Jhoel!! He is going to have to go through this whole week without smoking to be baptized, so If you and the family could please pray for him to resist this temptation that would be amazing! We had 2 investigators attend yesterday and they are both progressing super well and reading The Book Of Mormon. On Thursday Jhoel has his interview for his baptism.  Wednesday will be the last zone conference with President Kahnlien which is pretty sad because I love him, he is awesome! It should be a very special Day. I was also a part of his last conference of district leaders. He started crying and I was seriously shocked to see that because he is basically a army Sergeant. It touched me a lot to know that he really does love us so much and I thought of all the other leaders I have had through my life so will you please  get in contact with as many as possible and tell them that I love them and that I am eternally grateful for keeping me on the path to salvation.  I love you too mom and dad, there aren´t words in Spanish or English to express my love for you and Dad! Les Quiero.

Elder Christopher Ryan Barlow Valiente

Veronica is baptized....

 This  Week was amazing!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We officially have one more sister who has opened the door to salvation! Veronica is super cool! Her baptism went great. And I am still on a good roll of never having to repeat anyone's baptism, which is awesome! But even more importantly she got baptized!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love the gospel and I can´t really express all my feelings,  so your just going to have to wait until I get home and we can read my journals and go over all my photos. 

P.s. we learned yesterday that she was a model here in Chile for a couple years which is pretty cool not gonna lie. The strangest thing I have eaten here is called whateata! Its cow stomach! It's cooked in a real special way so that its really chewy, like gum! Its actually pretty good!

 I love you Mom and Dad! 

I love my mish!!!!

Veronica is going to be baptized!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We have an investigator that 3 weeks ago didn´t believe in god! And bam, she read what we left her, felt the spirit and will be baptized on the 26 of April! She is so dope! She is reading the Book of Mormon and has started to read it completely this week. She is already in 2nd Nephi! She still struggles a lot with prayer because it blows her mind that we can talk with God directly but she is trying very hard! She also has a 9 year old son named Matias who is super funny and really well behaved, which is really strange here  because the kids here walk all over parents! I love the mish!!!! 

Loved conferernce, Immense joy for bringing many souls...

First off Hannah got taller, what the crap! She is almost the same size as Jessica or is that you in the photo mom, I can´t tell.  Which well isn´t that tall but she was like to my hip when I left!! That is so weird!!! Jessica looks hermosa (beautiful).  I am glad that dad and Britt enjoyed my letters because I love writing them but I have just been trying to cram so much stuff into this hour and a half of writing. 

I loved conference and I will never watch conference again without taking notes because it helps so much. Not just with helping me focus on what the speakers are saying but with writing down the impressions the spirit has given me. I really liked the talk from Elder Anderson and how we live in this wonderful time when the gospel WILL fill the whole earth. It reminded me of a scripture in Doctrine and Covenants section 1 and its the last 2 versus. The Lord says: what i have said I have said, And I excuse myself not, and tho the heavens and the earth shall pass away my words shall be fulfilled. Heavenly father said that the gospel will fill the earth. We just have to make the decision of how many people we want to help in finding the gospel. Everyone will know. Now it just depends on if I will have much joy for bringing 1 soul to our father or immense joy for bringing many!!!!!!!!! I love the Gospel and I know I will be able to see my Savior again. I will be able to thrust my hands in to his side and feel the marks in his hand. I will be able to say to my Father in heaven that I was faithful until the very end and that I truly truly love him. I know Jesus is my savior and my Redeemer and that he loves me, you and each and everyone of us so much. I know I will be able to live with your future daughter -in- law for all eternity and your future grandchildren for all of time. Thank you for giving me the chance to return to live with my father in heaven. I love you so much and I know I will never be able to repay the Debt I owe you or dad but I want you to know I love you guys so much.

How are you on your scripture study? Are you reading the Book of Mormon cover to cover or  just opening it? I know it will help you so much more if you read with a purpose first off and do it cover to cover. 

Here are some goofy photos of your son/ favorite child.    

He thinks he's Samuel the Lamanite

Testimony comes through praying and reading the scriptures...

Hola Pops!! What up!! 

I am all good here in La Ligua, still. And I am still with Elder Almanzor.   so I am pretty sure the lord has a reason for me to still be here.  I've decided that I am just going to love, learn how to be patient and learn how to teach through words that are kind a through my example.  We have worked a lot better this past week which was nice and 2 of our investigators attended this week which was so nice because I was sick and tired of nobody keeping their commitments! Most people that we are teaching are reading and not praying or praying and not reading and none of them are attending, apart from 2.  And well, we have not had a baptism so I'm now sure that no one can gain a testimony of the truth of message, fully if they don´t do all these things. So we are going to be pushing a lot more with attending this week to our envestigadores( Investigators).   With it being conference and all I think it will be really good when they listen to  the prophet speak! I discovered that I love receiving revelation, so that is pretty awesome!! This morning I was studying and I got asked the question why would God call a prophet  if we have the Bible and I knew the answer but the words just weren´t coming out in the way I wanted them to or in the way that I knew they should come out and it bugged me a lot. I couldn´t answer in a convincing and sure way. So I studied why and Heavenly father saw fit to bless me with an answer so now I am ready for the battle. I love the gospel and the simple and easy way it all fits together. Satan has tried for thousands of years to put everything into darkness and change so many things but this just shows me how much power we as children of God have to overthrow the chains of misery that Satan has around us, step into the light and love Christ has prepared for us. 

Elder Christopher Ryan Barlow

Branch is good but struggling...

 

I am good with my area its called La Ligua and it is super big if I haven't told you before. I have the biggest area in the mission.   Some of my areas are 2 hours away on bus and there are members that live there!!! They are inactive but still I might have to visit them someday if our branch president asks us to. My companion and I are well.  We will also have changes soon. 

I am being fed very well don't be worried.  I'm still doing a lot more exercise so I wouldn't worry about the pants not fitting. There are lots of hills and its really hot, dry and I walk a butt load. I am in a pretty good branch with about 765 members. About 200 are on our branch list don´t live here and about 60 are active. Its a struggle.

Lots of traveling, reading BOM a lot...

  Hi mom! How are you? I like the family picture you sent. You all look beautiful. You guys are really skinny! Except Hannah she is fat and needs to start running! Jk I'm really tired!!! And this week we will be traveling a lot because we baptismal interviews for the sisters. We also have zone conferences in Belloto on Friday. We will need to leave at 4 am so we can be on time. We are in search of a good investigator too because all our investigators aren't progressing, which is really bad. We have about 6 investigator's and only 4 are progressing but they aren't married and live together.  The first couple is a young couple with a 6 year old little boy. Camila the mom wants to get married but Ulises has been married before and is afraid. The other couple is great!  They want an eternal family, want to be baptized and want to get married. She was married before but has been separated for 15 years. They have send the papers for a divorce but she needs to wait 9 months to get married again... it's stupid. 

  I have been reading the Book of Mormon a lot, obviously. It is wonderful how easily I can relate everything to what is happening to our day today. I have been blessed with so much revelation and I have been making some very important promises to myself, for my future. Promises about the way I'm going to raise my kids, how I will treat my wife and how nothing will be more important then the church in my life. I've thought a lot about why people have such a hard time attending church here and its because they live to work and they don't work to live! So I've decided if at anytime in my life my work is separating me from going to church, for more then 2 weeks I am going to find another job. I will live to follow the commandments and for the salvation of my family. 

  I don't know if you know about this tv show but all the members said to talk to you about El Chavo? And they say I'm more hungry then El Chavo. Love you.

Big guy was my companion in the MTC and the "Gringa is Brad Anderson's cousin

El Chavo a Mexican television show that they watch in Chile