For the last time

Well it is weird that it has gotten to this point. I say weird because the mission becomes a part of your life, where you think that everything that has ever been, everything that is, and everything that ever will be surrounds you with a companion, a plaque, and spanish speakers...in other words a mission. I feel so many mixed feelings to be honest, because it is so hard when you get to a point that you have to say goodbye to all those that you love here too. As I spoke with my stake president 18 months ago he told me," now it is hard to say goodbye to your family, but just imagine how hard it will be to say goodbye to your family in Ecuador, when you leave and without any surety that you will see them again." I can tell you that it is hard to say goodbye to people that you aren´t sure you will see again they become to have similar qualities like the members of your own family.
 

For example. Bryan. My convert. As I said goodbye to him I felt love and sadness. He became just like my older brother, in one moment my brother seems like a tough guy who will never cry or anything and then in the next moment my brother cries and I felt the same thing with my brother like I did when Bryan cried... He became just like my older brother and as they thanked me for what I did it became hard to realize that it was all going to end. 

Rosalia a member from my ward in ambato. She is like my two sisters and my mom combined. She has a little bit of every single one of them and as she said goodbye to me it was so hard. 

Alfonso...is like my dad. I say that because Alfonso told me one thing, I will talk to you soon and stay true to God. My dad has always been the steady person for me in my life.

I will miss them all, but I am so grateful that I can now see my family. So as I finish this all off I want to share the millioneth testimony as a missonary.

I know without a doubt that my savior lives, and I am so grateful for him. He has taught me so much and helped me to finally understand his gospel. I know that he truly atoned for me. I think I can finally understand that a lot better, but I still have so much to learn. I know that being a missionary is a great opportunity to serve the Lord and sacrifice a part of your life to more than just yourself it is a sacrifice that changes yourself and that helps so many others. I know that God sent me to Ecuador because I was meant to be here because I truly love every aspect of it all. I am so grateful to Him for what he has helped me to do. I promise to continue forward wherever life takes me. I know the church is true and that the gospel has been restored by modern day prophets today. I know that God will always be there for us even when we fall. Jamas olvidaré todo lo que he aprendido y jamás pararé de hacer como él quiere que haga.

I wish you all blessings and happiness in your lives. Dont forget what is the most important, your relationship with God in this life. I wish you all the best and hope to see you all soon.

For the last time 

Con mucho amor de Ecuador,

Hermana Dunkley

I am still seeing miracles‏

Well hi.....I mean buenas tardes ¿como están con todo? Espero que estén bien. 

I have had the most amazing week. It was so hard and we worked our butts off. 

One of the coolest things is that we recieved a call on Friday from a member to come and visit a family with them that night. It was a really awesome experience. I dont know I feel like God is giving me these last couple of moments as a gift.  Literally we found 4 new investigators in that home that night and they truly needed to listen to our message. Their home was so humble and I felt so filled with the spirit to talk to them about how they can have in eternal family. 

I was able to see another miracle. Our Investigator finally recieved his answer, and he told us that he knew it was true, but that he was going to go to the military and that he can´t be baptized right now, but that when he gets out for vacations in three months that he wants to be baptized.  That was like a shock to me. It hit me so hard, because I wanted to baptize him this week so bad, he was my hope for the end of my mission, but i know God has a plan for everyone and I know he will make this step later on in his life. 

I think sometimes we desire things so that wee look good in front of others or other prideful reasons, but honestly all this work is what God does. Everyone of the people I have had the privelege to help be baptized out here aren't because I taught them well or nothing like that, it is only because Christ used me to get to them. Everyone of them are Christ´s converts and I am grateful I had the privelge to be a missionary. I still have one more week and I think I will just testify to you all next week!!!

and tell you about the cuy that I am going to eat this weekend...pray for me people please. I dont know if i can do it alone. I need to leave Ecuador with my intestine still working.

Love you all!!!

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

Ambato, Ecuador

Well I was hoping to throw a lot of quotes in herre from conference, but they arent all loaded up yet, so there went my idea. haha. Conference was so amazing I loved it so much and I was so happy. It turned out to be a conference that really helped me out. I loved when they helped me to see what I need to do. I felt it was really cool that lots of them asked us to ask ourselves questions. It has made me ponder a lot in my heart. I loved the stories that they told and all of the advice they gave us. It was a wonderful experience being able to sustain 3 new apostles. I feel like they all gained our love when they shared those beautiful testimonies. I am so exited to keep trying to apply these things in my life. This next Sunday I have to share with my ward in Ambato how the mission has made a difference in my life....the thing is I dont know how to express there isnt one thing that hasnt changed...well to make sure that that makes sense I wanted to say that everything has changed about me in the mission. The amazing thing is that it has been a change so amazing and I can't wait to keep going. 

As the time goes down to coming home I have been thinking a lot about how I want to keep the changes I have made, and conference made it very obvious to me....the goal is exaltation, discpleship is a journey. We as disciples of Christ need to be on the right journey never stop, never weary.  Keep going. As I look back on all this time, thats what I think it has been a journey that never stops. Just the scenery changes sometimes. So as the scenery changes from here to there we must go and do as the Lord commands. I am grateful for all of you. I hope that you all will be okay and keep going on.

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

Miracles

So one of the many miracles we have been able to see. The baptism of Bryan. It was such a spirtual day and it was so great. He is a super funny kid and he is so awesome. He has had a harder life, but he truly chose to change. It was so amazing when he bore his testimony and said Thank you to everyone for the faith you all have had in me. He said that it was hard to change, but he truly wanted to do it. He thanked us too, and I was astonished, it feels so good to help others to come unto Christ and to see them take these steps. I cant wait to see these upcoming days that we are able to help others to recieve this step of baptism. The miracles just keep on coming. We have to work hard to be able to recieve them. I am so grateful for what Christ has done for me and for the chance I still have to keep on changing. I need these last weeks so that I can still change and become a better person, and so that I can have more amazing experiences as a missionary. There is only one time I can serve a mission this way, and I hope to be able to do it like Christ desires me to do it.

Thank you everyone for everything....We will see you in 3 weeks.

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

El cambio‏

Well first off sorry, this computer wont let me put any pictures on, but its alright, you will all see my face rather soon. 

What do I want to tell you all? I am struggling to write in english. I have thought over how to speak, it is kind of hard. I am not quite sure if that is written correctly. 

Okay. So let me say it gets harder at the end. I thought it would get easier, but that is a lie. haha. 

The great thing is that thanks to this time I have spent here my convert Alfonso, that I always talk so highly of was able to go to the temple. As soon as he finished a year as a member he did it. I think that is so amazing, because I know that it is only thanks to our Savior that I had the opportunity to knock on his door and help him recieve this gospel. I think of how amazing it feels to help people choose the right and become baptized and then I think of how it is even more amazing it is when someone chooses to take that next step and recieve more blessings from God. He made a huge sacrifice in going there, but he choose to do it because he knew it was right. 

I am so grateful that I can serve a mission. This week an elder asked me if I could sum up my mission in one word what would it be. I thought change.  The most important thing that has happened to me in my mission is the change in my conversion that I have been able to have. I have seen so many other changes as well, in the people of Ecuador, in my family at home, in the way I see the world in general...but the greatest change has been the change in my relationship with God and Jesus Christ. I hope you all can meditate in the relationship you all have with them. It is something so important, because without them we are all just here living and then nothing else will matter, but thanks to Our Father, and Savior, there is life in each and every one of us. I testify this to you all, because the one thing that I can do as a missionary is testify and I most do it until the last day I have that authority as a missionary.

Thank you for your prayers, love, and help. I feel your support each day.

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

Get caught in the work

Well not much time again, but I need to tell you all that we are seeing miracles. I am so thankful. This amazing family went to church yesterday and now we are going to help them to keep moving forward. I am so excited to see them baptized this change. I know it will happen. We are doing great here working hard and just pushing forward this last little bit that is left in the change.

Now I just need to share one thing that sister Mori shared with me, Elder Jeffrey Holland. "When the Savior comes I want to be caught living the gospel. I want to be surprised right in the act of spreading the faith and doing something good. I want the Savior to say to me 'Jeffrey' because He knows all of our names ' I recognize you not by your title but by your life, the way you are trying to live and the standards you are trying to defend. I see the integrity of your heart..."

I hope one day I can say the same thing of my own life and that one day each and every one of you can too. I am so thankful that I can say at least for now that I am trying to do these things. I want to be caught sharing the gospel when the Savior comes as well. I love you all and wish you an amazing week.

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

Love

Yay. I am staying in Ambato. I am so happy and excited for this change I can´t wait to keep on going, learning, and growing more. I will be staying these last couple of weeks with Hermana López. My poor companion is going to have to kill another one of her companions, but yeah I am happy. So little things I learned this last week. I love doing divisions with the Hermanas they are so great and it is a learning experience for me when I can be with a newer missionary again helping them out and everything. I really do like it because they always have so many questions for me and I can usually try to help them out a little. We have some really great investigators in our sector too, and some great families that want us to work with them I can't wait to see them be baptized and become families more firm and strong in the church. what else? 

As I have been contemplating these last couple of weeks, I have started to think, What have I done to show Christ that I am willing to serve him and to keep on going? So as I have thought about this, I have seen really how much Satan wants to tempt us at the end of it all. I feel like I have been omnipotent like no one can tempt me or bring me down as a missionary, but then what happened, is that it has become so much harder to fight off the natural man these last few months. Now I need to keep going and work hard, I feel like as we all see the challenges that God puts in our way we have to try so much harder to show to God what we can do better. I know that if we work our hardest to show the Lord what we can do we won't need to worry about our future. I am not worried about anything, I just worry that I can finish saying I have done all that I can, so that means I need to be obedient, and keep being a good examples to others, that means I will work my butt off every day to see blessings and to help others to find there way forward.

As we were going to buy groceries today I ran into these two older women that the one is a less active and her very catholic mother from my old sector in Guaranda. I felt so sad as the very old woman cried to me saying "Come back with us to Guaranda, I need you there, You need to marry my grandson" In those moments I thought of the blessing I have truly seen to be able to love so many people out here and feel the love from them. I know that even though I can't go to Guaranda or marry her grandson, because I really just don't want too haha, that I will see her again one day, and only thanks to the mission I have been able to serve.

I love you all and hope that my mom sends that picture of  me with them because she is just such a sweet old lady! 

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

More and more miracles are coming our way‏

HI EVERYONE!!!

Can I tell you I love you all, and I AM SO EXCITED TO SEE YOU ALL SOON!....

not that I am trunky or anything hahaha. just kidding. 

Well I just have a little bit of time to tell you all that I love you and I am so thankful to serve the Lord. This week was a rollercoaster of emotions. Sometimes I feel like a pregnant woman and I just go crazy. It is called emotional stress disorder I think haha, but it has all been worked out. My companion and I had an amazing week filled with miracles. We were able to work so diligently and then see so many people at church on Sunday. For a hard change opening a sector I felt so extremely thankful to God for giving me this one blessing of closing off this change with so many people at church. We found this one man who we just happened to call and we said hey church is on sunday here and at this time your invited and then he showed up. I was like "this does not happen every day hahahah" then we were able to visit him and he told us that he really wanted to recieve this guide. I think the best part of all of this work, is that we have been able to work with so many members here in Ambato and they are all helping us out with the work of the Lord and our investigators. It is so amazing when members tell us they want to come out with us and when we can see we have investigators to teach!!!

I am so extremly grateful for these blessings that I have seen. Like my mission President told me, you will see so many blessings in your last months of the mission and I feel like I am seeing them. 

Thank you all for your prayers, I am being lifted and helped by angels everyday.

Con mucho amor de Quito....(I am in quito today sorry forgot to tell you)

Hermana Dunkley

Listen the first time‏

I had this amazing experience. While on divisions, I just got stuck and was like what do I do next. Like usual sometimes all of our lessons fall and then you just say to yourself....what next? So as I started to walk in what direction I don't know where I saw a family walking on the street and I like felt in my heart this voice that was my own that said "contact them". So I did it. I went up to them and they were really positive like, "ya come on over anytime were home all the time" they gave me their direction and then we went to see them on Sunday. As I found there house I was like wow, I had passed that house a couple of times and everytime I felt you should contact this house. The problem was that I told myself, well it is a work place and if I contact them they will surely tell me they can't talk because they are working, but how wrong I was to not listen to the voice the first time. I should have listened, but thankfully God put them in my way another time and we could find them. As we walked into the house I showed them a picture of the temple and we talked about how we wanted to help them to be able to go there one day. The first time I have ever done that and they really were interested. I felt a special spirit about the whole lesson, talking about how they could have an eternal family made me anxious to see them baptized and sealed as a family in white one day. Sunday night was only the beggining, but I have faith that this family will become an eternal family one day. I just see them and think, wow I finally had the experience that I so desired. One of my goals before I end my mission is to see a family be baptized and I have faith that I will be able to see them and one other family be baptized between now and October.

I love you all and hope you know that even though we might forget or choose not to listen to the voice of the Spirit the first time, God will always repeat his answer to us, or he will put others in our path so that we don't forget them. I am so grateful that God gave me so many chances to find this family and I know that the same will happen to all of you if you choose to listen to the voice of the spirit not tomorrow, but now.

I am so grateful for my chance to serve, even though it is coming down to only a little more time, I feel that it will all be okay.

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

Wild flowers

Well what to say. I find myself sitting here so often and I just find myself awestruck at the work God has done in my life and in the lives of those around me. I have had the amazing opportunity to serve a mission and see imediate blessings. The grandest blessing has been that I have grown to have a personal relationship with God and understand his gospel and atonement in my personal life. The second most amazing blessing is that my brother and sister in law are going to be sealed for this life and the next.

The family is Gods most important creation. We can be reunited not just for this life, but also for the next. I am so grateful for that promise from God and I am so grateful because of the blessings we can recieve as his children. My companion and I have been thinking a lot about the family lately because we want to help the families here to be strengthened and flourish and I thought of this quote from Elder Quentin L. Cook,

"One of the remarkable characteristics of young wild sunflowers, in addition to growing in soil that is not hospitable, is how the young flower bud follows the sun across the sky. In doing so, it receives life-sustaining energy before bursting forth in its glorious yellow color.

Like the young sunflower, when we follow the Savior of the world, the Son of God, we flourish and become glorious despite the many terrible circumstances that surround us. He truly is our light and life.

In the parable of the wheat and the tares, the Savior declared to His disciples that those who offend and do iniquity shall be gathered out of His kingdom.4 But speaking of the faithful, He said, “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.”5 As individuals, disciples of Christ, living in a hostile world that is literally in commotion, we can thrive and bloom if we are rooted in our love of the Savior and humbly follow His teachings."

so I hope you can all flourish like a wild sunflower. haha. Remember that it is imporant to keep on going even when we are growing in unhospitable soil. 

I love you all and here is my wild flower follwing the light of christ picture, with my daughter hermana Romero. Pure happiness

Con mucho amor de ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

Haz lo Justo

Well I would like to write you all starting with a story my amazing mission president told me.  One time he was traveling with President Eyring to BYU-IDAHO to see participate in some classes. They had gotten to campus early and instead of going to the devotional and having to make a presence and then speak to the audience, they decided to walk in randomly to some high school seminary classes. While entering President Eyring walked into a few rooms and would ask them what they were studying and would participate in the lesson sharing the witness from an apostle that Christ lives. They walked into one classroom and he asked what they were studying and the teacher told him that they were studying the Miracles of Christ. So then he asked the class what was the greatest miracle that Christ did? And I mean just like any class of students that is scared to answer an apostle, everyone was silent for a little bit, and then one girl in the back answered the atonement. Then President Eyring continued to give a personal witness of Christ and his atonement. My president continued to tell me..."The most important miracle of Christs ministry happened at the end of his ministry. If he would have ended his mission at 2 and a half years we would have never been able to witness such an amazing miracle. We would have never been saved from our sins. So just like Him the greatest miracles we can see as a missionary will happen to us as we finish."

I have thought about that a lot in this last week. As we worked really hard we saw a miracle. This sheet of paper with a name on it drew our attention so we called Gonzalo and he told us to come on over. We visited him and we felt the spirit and it was a great lesson, but then the next lesson as we went to see how they were doing Gonzalo told us that he knew he needed to be baptized because he had read in the book of mormon about how we shouldnt baptize little children. It was amazing because God literally gave him his reading assignment when he just randomly opened the book of mormon. Gonzalo and his wife will be baptized muy pronto!!! I am so excited and grateful for that miracle.

Even though we will have temptations and worries sometimes, we can always trust that if we choose the right God will help us. Just like when Adam was tempted, it was like he had the forbidden fruit in his hand and he said no. We can do the same. Even though sometimes the temptation is so strong and it is in our hands just waiting for us to take it, if we choose the right God will help us!

I am so grateful for you help and blessings, keep up the happiness....I always tell my comp hermana lopez where is your smile? and then we start laughing. The best way to choose the right is the happy way.

Con mucho amor de Ambato,

Hermana Dunkley

The hardest decisions He made‏

So I would like you all to just think for a moment and meditate on these things.

As He walked to the garden of getsemani He knew what He was going to have to do. As He asked for support from His friends He knew they were going to forget Him.  As He knelt down to pray He meet each and every one of us. He felt our sadness, our weaknesses, He suffered for our pains, our challenges, he struggled to make tough decisions with us.  Maybe throughout all the time that he suffered he was able to feel just for a couple of seconds what each and every one of us have felt throughout our lifetime.

Today I express to you all that there are two things I am extremely grateful to have been able to have learned throughout my mission.  The first thing is I have grown to understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I now apply it in my life, I am not ignorant to things that I was ignorant of before and this Gospel that belongs to Him will help me throughout my entire life. The second and most important thing is I now have come to understand the Atonement of Jesus Christ even more. I have felt some of the hard things He felt for others. I have seen the tough decisions we sometimes have to make, I have physically, mentally and spirtually suffered and I have felt the pain of other people, which is a pain that can be even greater than the personal pain we sometimes feel. I have changed and am happy to see the change I have made in my life. As I walked around this week looking to find people, trying to get to know a sector and people that I had never meet in my life. I felt these pains as I saw the suffurings of some who had felt like they had been tried and could not overcome there own trials. I meet so many who suffered, and just seeing us two new sister missionaries gave them faith to keep moving forward. To work harder in the work of the Lord. The people have opened up so much to us and I am so grateful for that. They love us and I love them. I cannot be more grateful for anything, but that. I leave you with these words hoping that you all can see the great work that God has done for you as he has done for me.

Con mucho amor de Quito,

Hermana Dunkley