{God HaS AnsweREd OuR PraYerS ThiS WeeK}

thanks for the prayers fam!

I know God has answered our prayers this week. I was getting a bit discouraged by the end of the week...i had been sick and then Elder Morris got sick. The Pitty family was looking pretty good for going to church but they weren`t their went we went in the rain on saturday night to visit them. I was a little bummed out but just praying that they would go to church. Also, we have been teaching this kid called Ivan Pinto that said he would go to church last week but he didn`t show. And Chelita was looking a little difficult because she hadn`t been able to go lately. But...Sunday morning comes along. We called Chelita...nothing. Ivan answered...sounding really tired and said he would be there. Ok hopefully he`ll go. And then we left to look for the Pitty family and a less active member named Jorge (who is REALLY struggling and said he would only go to church if we went with him). We saw Rubén Pitty outside and he said he would meet us there...the thing is that everyone says that and then they don`t go haha. But we just trusted that they would go. And then we went to Jorge´s house. He wasn`t ready so we had to wait for him...and wait. And wait. 7 55 came along and church starts at 8. It`s about a 20 minute walk from Jorge`s house. finally he came out...´Elders, i was ironing!´ and we headed to church. I was praying that a taxi would pass by (rare on that street) and God put one their right when we got to the main street. we were only about three minutes late.

I got their to see Rodrigo Castro (Valetina´s husband) saying the opening prayer. I looked up to the sacrament table and saw José Remice sitting there with a shirt and tie ready to bless the sacrament for the first time. The Pitty family was sitting there in the back with their grandaughter!!! Sweet! And we walked in and sat down with Jorge. During the sacrament I read 3 Nephi 18...sitting next to a really sad less active member that needs a council to go through the repentance process. Verse 32 says (translated) ´Not withstanding, you will not cast him out of your synagogs nor from your places of worship, because you don`t know if he might return, and repent, and come unto me with full purpose of heart, and i`ll heal him...and you shall be the means of bringing him salvation´ I really felt love for him and hope that Christ would be able to heal him completely.

After the sacrament (which José blessed perfectly) Ivan Pinto walked in with his mom! And he was carrying his BoM! And almost at the very end of the meeting, Chelita walked in with her great grandson, Hernesto! It was so great! The bishop was excited to meet all of those investigators. And even better, Chelita told us that she wanted to pay her tithing. She had had trouble getting to church because she didn`t have enough money, but she pulled out a plastic container of what she had saved up to pay...and it was almost 12 dollars! (That`s A LOT of money for her)...I felt like God really is working miracles here every day and that we are seeing the fruits of walking in the rain haha

I love you all and want to thank you for your prayers. If it worked one week...why cant it keep working. Pray so that these great people can progress towards baptism and enjoy the blessings that we enjoy. Maybe there`s really not much more you all can do to help them progress...but you can pray so that they use their agency wisely. I hope they take the right decision because i know it will make them happy. I love the Pitty family and i`m glad they went to church. They are great, kind people that really are just searching for the truth and i feel like they are close to finding it.

I love you all! thank you for your examples. this week i`ve been thinking a lot about how j dub would treat people in lessons. Sometimes i want to leave a lesson angry or frustrated but i remember how he always treats people. Thank you all for everything. hoping to see more miracles in barrio 1!

Love,

Elder Henrie

ps the photo is of my old shoes haha they served with honor :)

{PraY fOR iT!}

Hey Fam!!

It`s been a great week! My new companion is Elder Morris...from Arizona. He`s a really great missionary and i was excited when they told me i would be with him. He has only two changes left on his mission so he`ll probably finish here in Chorrera and i`ll have six weeks left here. We have found lots of great people already. The first day he was here we taught a ton of lessons and we`re really excited for this change!

i don`t know why they told me it would be a tough change...all of the missionaries are great here...maybe the assistants just wanted to mess with me haha. We are teaching a family called the Pitti family. They are really cool and reading the BOM already. They said that they had a committment on sunday so they would not go but they promised to go next sunday.

My companion and i want to ask you all for something. Our goal this change is to baptize a family. Please pray for our area so that i family will come to church this sunday. Pray all week for it and we`re going to be working hard in the nights to find and teach families. Pray for it! Alma 6:6

We had a cool experience on saturday. President called to say that one of the sister missionaries had to go home to Honduras so she needed to go the mission home, but they couldnt contact her. My comp remembered them saying something about going to the area of Biancheri so we decided to just take the bus and pray that we would find them in their area to tell them they had to go to president`s house (it was kinda urgent). So we got in the bus to find them and were just praying that we would find them. We turned a corner and saw the Elders of that same area (there are four missionaries there) and we got off to ask them where they were going. They told us that they were headed to meet the sisters because the sisters had to show them where the recent converts lived because they were closing the area. Prayer answered! We found them and let them know what was going on. I think it`s important to look for God`s hand every day in this work.

Also, i contacted i guy on the street like a month ago because i felt the need to talk to him. And we just barely found his house...i had been going to the wrong direction and nobody was home. Now we are teaching him and his wife and they have lots of questions. Chelita isn`t really progressing because she didn`t go to church on sunday. But we`ll see what happens.

Oh and last night we were waiting for a taxi and we saw a CRAZY lady talking to herself and yelling at an invisible enemy. It was kinda nuts.

Love you all! Don`t forget to pray so we can take a family to church! We`re going to work hard for it!!!

Elder Henrie

Mom!

The goal this week has been to get home every night exhausted...I`m tired! haha it`s been a fun week. They sent Elder Valenzuela to Colón...one of the more dangerous zones. And i`m with a really hard working comp.

President wrote me this week telling me that he wants these changes to be the best of my mission. I`m going to do everything possible to make that happen.

Sounds like Libs doin good. That`s great that she actually wants to do homework. Have her develop that habit haha

I`m really enjoying being a zone leader still in chorrera. It`s a good opportunity to love and serve and i feel like i still need to develop a lot of qualities. I`m pretty sure that that`s why president has had me here so long...because he wants me to develop patience and love :)

The book of mormon is true...José Remice received the priesthood on sunday! And i love being a missionary!!!

Elder Henrie

{ReaDy To WorK HaRD}

Hola fam!

This week has been really awesome! We had a stake activity (put on by the missionaries) on Friday night. We had a game night and later a drama put on by the missionaries. It turned out really well! I was worried because it was supposed to start at 6 00 and at 6 NOBODY was there! haha but we knew that everyone was thinking 6 00 panamanian time which is usually half an hour to an hour late. It turned into a great night and there were lots of people there. The stake president and our Bishop really liked it. So that was definitely a good experience. Jose Remice showed up yesterday with a white shirt and tie on! He was lookin guapo! Unfortunately he couldn`t receive the Aaronic Priesthood because we had a combined class the third hour in church. But next week we`re good to go....

I can`t remember if it was this week or last week that we gave their son a blessing and i don`t remember if i already told you about it...but yeah Luisito was sick with a fever and Oderays asked us to give him a blessing. After the blessing she was crying and the next morning Luis was up and ready to go...he was kind of mad because his mom didn`t let him go to school! That was a good experience with the priesthood.

Ok there was a HUGE spider in our house on tuesday night. Spiders honestly don`t bother me but i`m pretty sure this one was on steroids! We took some photos and then killed in and roasted in our back patio! I`ll send a picture :)

I think i`ll be staying here in Barrio 1 for this next change and Elder Valenzuela will leave. I honestly feel great about this change. I feel like i realized that i needed to be a leader here to learn how to really care about the other missionaries. I have learned that the example we give is important and i feel like i can improve in that area. I really do love the missionaries here in this zone. They have taught me a LOT!

I love you all and i hope this week goes great for you! My goal for these last months is to go home every night feeling exhausted...lots of work work and work. Love you!

Elder Henrie

Mom!

I was having a tough time last week but i feel reanimated and ready to work hard this change that`s coming. I feel good about the relationship that we have with the bishop and our leaders...our stake president has given us a few good references to work with.

Sounds like you`re super busy with summer stuff :) i`m glad. It`s always better when there`s something productive to do.

Yes...changes this week. It should be interesting to see what happens to the zone because about half of the missionaries will have changes. I feel ready for more time here in Chorrera. I love the members (and our neighbor cooks the best food that i`ve had in Panama) and the recent converts and investigators are great. Yesterday half of our recent converts came to church. It`s sad to say that that`s the best we`ve ever seen in the ward so far but i felt really happy about it!

Love you mom!

ps here`s the awesome spider

{It WaS GreAT To hEAR YouR VoiCeS}

Hey guys!

Things are good! (since sunday) it was great to hear your voices! Can`t believe marsh man sounds like an old man already. But really the only thing to write about today is the experience we had in the temple today...we had planned to go in a rented bus but he called last night telling us that he couldn`t go. So we had to call everyone really late and then some people didn`t show up this morning but it all worked out. I had a good experience there and it really gave me the desire to go to work. I feel blessed to be here learning so much still. I really am excited about these months that are coming. I hope i get to train again within the next couple changes. I think that would be a good experience.

The members here really are incredible. We are going to visit the familia Remice on thursday night. Unfortunately right now none of our investigators are really progressing. It can be frustrating but more than anything i just want to leave Chorrera knowing that I worked hard. The people all have their agency and we have to respect that.

I love you all thanks for your support. Pray for me this week! I need it.

Mucho love,
Elder Henrie

ps sorry the emails short...i have been trying to load photos but this computer doesn`t want to read my card

Hey mom!

It was really great to hear your voice! A lot has happened this weekend that was really needed to get me going again. Like you said there are some tough moments...but this weekend our bishop gave us a blessing, I talked to my family, and we went to the temple! The temple was awesome today! I felt that i need to finish everything that i`ve started...i felt peaceful and like God wants me to make sacrifices in these coming months. I opened up the Book of Mormon in the temple and it opened to the exact chapter that i`m reading in my studies. Alma 62. I feel like it was what i needed to read. I liked Moroni`s excitement when he found out that Pahoran was still faithful and that he hadn`t been a traitor. I realized that i need to keep being faithful and not change track now.The assistants told me that next change might be tough because of the changes but president told them i would be able to handle it. Whatever comes to Chorrera i feel ready to serve and happy to be here. It`s a huge blessing!

Yesterday was good...we met with an investigator named Ozman...he isn`t really progressing but he wants to get baptized haha but it would probably be good if he went to church first don`t ya think?

Thanks for everything mom i love you!I

Elder Henrie

{A ReaLLy GooD MomENT For TheM}

Well...

Two marriages, three baptisms and confirmations, zone conference, and lots of work! It has been a gnarley week...we`ve had tons to do and really haven`t had a break. So we`re going to a sweet lake today in my old area...Barrio Centro. It should be sweet. The baptism went great! We went early in the morning to fill the font and went back at 6 30 to make sure all was ready, and the font was EMPTY! Oh man what a joke...we had shut it but apparently it has a slow leak, how convenient. So we were trying to fill up the font..during the baptismal service which made lots of noise, and we ended up baptizing them in shallow water. haha luckily Valentina and Oderays are really short, but José was a little more difficult. i baptized Valentina and Oderays´ brother came to baptize her and her husband. It ended up being a really good moment for them. And the confirmation yesterday went really well. the members were really happy for them and received them well.

On Thursday at zone conference i saw the sister missionaries who are in Santiago and they told me that the familia Salinas are going to the temple to be sealed on August 2! Haha happy birthday marsh! I am so excited. Elder Chevez was also their and we`re planning on going to their sealing! I`m really happy for them. I could see the familia Remice getting sealed in a year as well. They seem really interested in the temple! Things are definitely moving in the area. the members are excited and really willing to help us. That´s why all the missionaries want to come to Chorrera. It`s one of the stronger stakes in Panama and everyone helps out with missionary work.

Ok..Mothers Day! First off...happy mother`s day mom! I`m really excited to talk to all of you. It`s scares me that this will be the last phone call home because i feel like there is so much to do still! But i know that i just have to keep giving it everything i`ve got to finish happy and content. I think I will have to call around 6 00 pm Panama time because we have church in the morning and y`all have it in the afternoon. Not sure about Skype because it`s sunday and the internet might be closed. I`ll try to see if we can skype from a member`s house if one of them has a camera. If not i`ll just be calling by phone. But either way i`m excited to hear from you. I really do love you all. i always talk about you to my friends here in Panama. Its funny because whenever i see members from old areas they always ask me how my little sister is doing haha Libby`s a star in panama!

I honestly feel blessed to be a missionary. I`m glad that God has given me the strength to do what i know i need to do as a missionary. He`s given me so many good examples that I am able to use as a missionary to get better. I have so many good experiences every week that it`s hard to share them all but just know that i`m loving it...it`s much different than i had expected :)

Les amo!! hasta el domingo!

Elder Henrie

Mom!

i had to tell you about zone conference this week. we bought a hamster to use as an example in our teaching...to teach a point about fear. We asked the missionaries who was afraid of mice and than called one of them to stick their hand in the box with the ´mouse´ inside haha it was super funny. And then we pulled out the cute little hamster. The pet store was kind of surprised when we brought back the hamster telling them we didn`t want it anymore. Needless to say they didn`t give us our money back haha. it was great.

i love you mom!

enjoy the photos. I hope you like the pants i wore to baptize valentina. Jose was making fun of me in the bathroom because they are so short! Oh and i tried to eat the hamster but he ended up getting away...but the photos take forever to load and i`m out of time..