Hello Fam,
Ether 12:6 stood out to me last night as I was reflecting on this past week. I mentioned last week that no one came to church that we visited last sunday and it was quite disappointing to say the least. But, this week I learned a lot about what it means to "receive the witness after the trial of your faith." We didn't give up and we worked so stinking hard this week! On Monday we went to the Maunes family for family scripture study and prayer...Brother Maones just started talking and we just listened for a long time. (He was a past counselor in the branch presidency, but got offended by the branch president...long story/ really bad situation...) It was a direct answer to our pleading prayers. He said Sunday night he prayed all night long until morning. He said Heavenly Father told him to let go and forget what happened because he needs to focus on his family. His family is more important than the wrong that happened to him personally. He finally understood that his role as father and husband was crucial for the salvation of his family and he was not fulfilling his responsibilities and his family was suffering. I know that Heavenly Father had Sister Ghouri and me focus on the family and family scripture study with this family in particular because that is the only thing that would bring this man back. He had a truly life changing experience as he poured out his soul to God and God answered him exactly how he needed. It was so incredible! And later that week another man, Brother Maones friend, was at their home for family scripture study. This man is also a member and was offended and has stopped coming to church. Brother Maones was able to share his experience and said, 'lets just go back. together, this sunday." WAS I SERIOUSLY HEARING THIS!?!? WOW. Miracle! Brother Maones was completely different than the first time I met him 3-4 weeks ago. I love the gospel and I love family scripture study and prayer! We have gone to his house every night and they have 5 boys. They are 4 months to 9 years old and they read with us and kneel in prayer. ITs adorable. There entire family came to church yesterday. And so did his friend.
In fact, it was a great sunday. The sunday I got here the attendance was 67. Yesterday it was 110! :) We were so happy to see many of the less actives we have visited and a whole group of members from a very far away barangay came. As they entered the church it was just like seeing one miracle after another, one by one. So awesome.
On Saturday we went party hopping (not planned!). It seemed that most of the people we visited that day were celebrating something so we got to benefit from that. Delicious Filipino food. and free! We had to attend a wedding at the church as well. Weird feelings about that, but still good.
So yesterday was a wonderful Sunday and everyone at church was smiling and happy. The talks were about charity, the atonement, and a high councilor gave an excellent talk about the importance of member ship in the church. The chapel was full and everyone was happy to be there...There really is strength in numbers, I think.
WEll, This week will go by very fast I'm sure. We got to Tacloban for 2 days and we have our last interviews with President Malit.
Here's to a new great week. Love you all and thank you so much for your emails, love, and support.
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Monday, June 13, 2011
6.13.11
hey fam!
So, my subject of the email is my new phrase of this "final phase" of the mission. Daily this is me, " HELLO WORLD! HELLO COMPANION. HELLO APARTMENT MATES. I KNOW, I KNOW, "I LOOK LIKE I JUST FELL OUT OF A TRAIN!" Come talk to me. I'm a representative of Jesus Christ! Yeah! "
Don't get me wrong. I love life! I love Hilongos. I love my companion and i love the other sisters I am living with. I am stressed and worried all the time and thats FINE WITH ME. It is not however, fine with my physical body, i guess. I seriously look like I fell out of a train. ALL. THE. TIME. I didn't, don't worry. I just look like I did. I emailed mom earlier and said sorry if your daughter comes home a fat, zit faced, ugly, swollen eyed, crippled, hunchback RM! You are my family so you still have to love me, right??????? I don't know whats wrong with me, but despite it all, we just keep pluggin along. Needless to say my testimony of ENDURING TO THE END has grown. :)
We worked hard this week. We pleaded in prayer. We fasted. We sacrificed. We taught great lessons guided by the Spirit. We gave it our all. It was a great week of doing the Lord's work. My companion and I are learning a lot about love and charity. I can honestly say that I know my Savior better because I have loved my brother's and sisters here as He does. It's awesome and exhausting.
None of the less actives we visited, and read the scriptures, and felt the spirit with came to church yesterday.
It was a lonely Sunday, though our attendance was better than normal. My heart hurt. You give and you give and you give.....You have faith in these people...You love them soo much...You serve them... You sacrifice for them....You support them and listen to them...... and their fear still overwhelms their faith.
But, we keep going strong. We have another great week ahead of us and there is no way we are giving up on them. This is not the time for spiritual weaklings. This is the time to be strong! And that is only possible through the restored gospel of our savior jesus christ. It does not matter what others have done to you....what does matter is what Christ has done for you. So, that is our purpose and focus. Helping others REMEMBER HIM.
We focused a lot on family scripture study and prayer this week. And we will continue for the rest of my time here. I have such a testimony of this. Thank you noel and urs for doing this in our home. I promise you all that that is the best thing mom and dad ever did for me. I testify of that every single day here in Hilongos as well.
There are two families: Maunes and Cinco family that we literally go to every single night for family scripture study and prayer. Please keep them in your prayers.
Well, i love you all! I love being the Lord's missionary! (even if my physical body doesn't seem to be in agreement with all this stress...)
love, sister b! :)
So, my subject of the email is my new phrase of this "final phase" of the mission. Daily this is me, " HELLO WORLD! HELLO COMPANION. HELLO APARTMENT MATES. I KNOW, I KNOW, "I LOOK LIKE I JUST FELL OUT OF A TRAIN!" Come talk to me. I'm a representative of Jesus Christ! Yeah! "
Don't get me wrong. I love life! I love Hilongos. I love my companion and i love the other sisters I am living with. I am stressed and worried all the time and thats FINE WITH ME. It is not however, fine with my physical body, i guess. I seriously look like I fell out of a train. ALL. THE. TIME. I didn't, don't worry. I just look like I did. I emailed mom earlier and said sorry if your daughter comes home a fat, zit faced, ugly, swollen eyed, crippled, hunchback RM! You are my family so you still have to love me, right??????? I don't know whats wrong with me, but despite it all, we just keep pluggin along. Needless to say my testimony of ENDURING TO THE END has grown. :)
We worked hard this week. We pleaded in prayer. We fasted. We sacrificed. We taught great lessons guided by the Spirit. We gave it our all. It was a great week of doing the Lord's work. My companion and I are learning a lot about love and charity. I can honestly say that I know my Savior better because I have loved my brother's and sisters here as He does. It's awesome and exhausting.
None of the less actives we visited, and read the scriptures, and felt the spirit with came to church yesterday.
It was a lonely Sunday, though our attendance was better than normal. My heart hurt. You give and you give and you give.....You have faith in these people...You love them soo much...You serve them... You sacrifice for them....You support them and listen to them...... and their fear still overwhelms their faith.
But, we keep going strong. We have another great week ahead of us and there is no way we are giving up on them. This is not the time for spiritual weaklings. This is the time to be strong! And that is only possible through the restored gospel of our savior jesus christ. It does not matter what others have done to you....what does matter is what Christ has done for you. So, that is our purpose and focus. Helping others REMEMBER HIM.
We focused a lot on family scripture study and prayer this week. And we will continue for the rest of my time here. I have such a testimony of this. Thank you noel and urs for doing this in our home. I promise you all that that is the best thing mom and dad ever did for me. I testify of that every single day here in Hilongos as well.
There are two families: Maunes and Cinco family that we literally go to every single night for family scripture study and prayer. Please keep them in your prayers.
Well, i love you all! I love being the Lord's missionary! (even if my physical body doesn't seem to be in agreement with all this stress...)
love, sister b! :)
Monday, June 6, 2011
6.6.11
Hello Family!
What a wonderful week it has been! It was hard to leave Sogod, but I know that there is purpose for me here in Hilongos and I started to see that a lot this week. My companion is really doing the best she can and I love her for that so much. We have had some pretty hilarious moments together. Like just now actually, walking through the market in the rain we had to cross a little canal/trench thing across this bridge made from wooden slabs and guess who broke the bridge and fell in the trench?! Yours truly. I smell really good right now and i'm all scraped up and a bit bloody. Sureeeeeee. No problem! After much laughter I started singing without realizing it... "Oh it is wonderful, wonderful to me!" My comp just stared at me and laughed so hard. This is my life. And i love it. She has a fever too since yesterday. But we just continue on. :)
This week we had some wonderful lessons with our progressing investigators. I was so excited and texted President about our new investigators as well (he's requested us to update him when we get new investigators and what day they have committed to baptism). And then tuesday morning we received a text from him requesting me and Sister Ghouri to only focus on REACTIVATION AND RETENTION. what? ... I thought we are supposed to find , teach , baptize.... WEll, He has assigned 8 sisters to this assignment this transfer. Interesting, eh? Sister Jones has this assignment up in Samar somewhere and then in Carigara and us two here. He is inspired for sure b/c the more I am here the more I am realizing how bad the situation is with the less actives. I realized that the branch here is wonderful and so supportive of missionary work, but they are not as supportive of the less actives. The member ship here is around 300, but the attendance is 67.....yeahhhh. Its a big area we cover though and a lot of different reasons for the less actives...a lot of it being, offended sila. So, we had some epic lessons this week guided by the spirit. The people we visited in a far away baragay all came to church! And our investigators did. (well, they are now the other sisters investigators, but we taught them this week.) Sister Alma and CArlito will be married and baptized july 2. They are wonderful and have such a strong testimony. Sister Alma bore her testimony on sunday about the power of the book of mormon and all the miracles she has seen since they started listening to the missionaries and started reading the book of mormon... Her husband has stopped smoking and drinking, took out his earring, and they are kind to eachother and not fighting. her testimony was so sweet and awesome.
We had another investigator, norberto that i was really excited about. We taught him and his family and they were progressing as well. But then on friday he told us he had to go to manila for work..school was starting and he had no money for his children. Sister Ghouri and I were sad, but there was also a weird, dark feeling about his decision to go to Manila. We could not shake it. So we told him this. He has heard from the missionaries before and then had to go to manila and that stopped his progression towards baptism... Sister ghouri told him not to go to manila b/c it was not gods plan and that there were no coincidences. god is giving him another opportunity to learn truth and he can't ignore it. I can't describe the weirdness of that lesson other than that...it was sooo weird. It felt so wrong for him to go to manila. His wife was ticked too. We urged him to pray about his decision and read his assignment from 3 nephi 13...We followed up the next day... but he was gone. :(
So, we focus on the less actives. Please pray for the Maones family and for Nanay Cinco. There is some serious issues here and it is quite the struggle, but we had some great spiritual experiences praying and fasting and studying for these families.
I love you all and I am doing well. Love, your missionary,
Sister B .
ps. crispin ( in sogod) had a hard week last week and broke down and smoked... but he seems to be doing better and watched the joseph smith movie and really enjoyed that and gave the best prayer ever according to sister schneider. please continue to keep him in your prayers. Salamat!
What a wonderful week it has been! It was hard to leave Sogod, but I know that there is purpose for me here in Hilongos and I started to see that a lot this week. My companion is really doing the best she can and I love her for that so much. We have had some pretty hilarious moments together. Like just now actually, walking through the market in the rain we had to cross a little canal/trench thing across this bridge made from wooden slabs and guess who broke the bridge and fell in the trench?! Yours truly. I smell really good right now and i'm all scraped up and a bit bloody. Sureeeeeee. No problem! After much laughter I started singing without realizing it... "Oh it is wonderful, wonderful to me!" My comp just stared at me and laughed so hard. This is my life. And i love it. She has a fever too since yesterday. But we just continue on. :)
This week we had some wonderful lessons with our progressing investigators. I was so excited and texted President about our new investigators as well (he's requested us to update him when we get new investigators and what day they have committed to baptism). And then tuesday morning we received a text from him requesting me and Sister Ghouri to only focus on REACTIVATION AND RETENTION. what? ... I thought we are supposed to find , teach , baptize.... WEll, He has assigned 8 sisters to this assignment this transfer. Interesting, eh? Sister Jones has this assignment up in Samar somewhere and then in Carigara and us two here. He is inspired for sure b/c the more I am here the more I am realizing how bad the situation is with the less actives. I realized that the branch here is wonderful and so supportive of missionary work, but they are not as supportive of the less actives. The member ship here is around 300, but the attendance is 67.....yeahhhh. Its a big area we cover though and a lot of different reasons for the less actives...a lot of it being, offended sila. So, we had some epic lessons this week guided by the spirit. The people we visited in a far away baragay all came to church! And our investigators did. (well, they are now the other sisters investigators, but we taught them this week.) Sister Alma and CArlito will be married and baptized july 2. They are wonderful and have such a strong testimony. Sister Alma bore her testimony on sunday about the power of the book of mormon and all the miracles she has seen since they started listening to the missionaries and started reading the book of mormon... Her husband has stopped smoking and drinking, took out his earring, and they are kind to eachother and not fighting. her testimony was so sweet and awesome.
We had another investigator, norberto that i was really excited about. We taught him and his family and they were progressing as well. But then on friday he told us he had to go to manila for work..school was starting and he had no money for his children. Sister Ghouri and I were sad, but there was also a weird, dark feeling about his decision to go to Manila. We could not shake it. So we told him this. He has heard from the missionaries before and then had to go to manila and that stopped his progression towards baptism... Sister ghouri told him not to go to manila b/c it was not gods plan and that there were no coincidences. god is giving him another opportunity to learn truth and he can't ignore it. I can't describe the weirdness of that lesson other than that...it was sooo weird. It felt so wrong for him to go to manila. His wife was ticked too. We urged him to pray about his decision and read his assignment from 3 nephi 13...We followed up the next day... but he was gone. :(
So, we focus on the less actives. Please pray for the Maones family and for Nanay Cinco. There is some serious issues here and it is quite the struggle, but we had some great spiritual experiences praying and fasting and studying for these families.
I love you all and I am doing well. Love, your missionary,
Sister B .
ps. crispin ( in sogod) had a hard week last week and broke down and smoked... but he seems to be doing better and watched the joseph smith movie and really enjoyed that and gave the best prayer ever according to sister schneider. please continue to keep him in your prayers. Salamat!
Monday, May 30, 2011
TRANSFERRED!
Hello Family!
Well, I have been transferred.
Shocked??
I was.
I am now in Hilongos, Maasin zone. It is in Southern Leyte as well and the zone next to my last zone in Sogod. This was the hardest transfer I've had (and my last)...
I wasn't ready to leave. I just went straight to this new area. I didn't get to go to transfer meeting in Tacloban this time b/c I came straight here kay it's close- ish. It was sad to leave Sogod. Sister Schneider and I were a team and we were best friends. We dealt with so much in Sogod. It was the hardest transfer of my mission for sure. I felt like we had to break down the area and now this is the phase to build it back up the way the Lord wants it...and I got transferred out. We both struggled a bit with this decision. We found out wednesday night and then walked up the mountain in the pouring rain to tell Crispin. We had told him not to worry about transfers earlier that day especially b/c i had one transfer left and we definitely didn't think that either of us would be transferred. He started crying and it was awful.
Anyways, my new companion is Sister Ghouri...she is from pakistan. She is the one that President talked to me about back in December. I think he always felt like i should be her companion and after I visited Hilongos I always thought I would come back here...after I got transferred to sogod, i thought I wouldn't anymore, but here i am! Sister Lemmon was assigned here and she loved it.
I've met a lot of great people and the branch is really supportive of missionary work. I know that God sends us where we are supposed to be so I am happy to be here. There is a lot to do and I am starting to see my purpose here in Hilongos. Its going to be a great transfer. We now have 4 sisters in Hilongos and its a lot of fun. We are the international apartment...One FIlipina, One sister from Hong Kong, One from Pakistan, One American. Its a lot of fun.
Well, lots and lots to do! Life is good. Please continue to pray for Crispin Basan. I'm so worried about him.
we have great investigators in Hilongos and their goal date for marriage and baptism is June 25.
We have a youngish member couple here, Nikki and Fanzo Beslig that I love. They remind me a lot of my siblings and I feel like I am hanging out with all of you again. They worked with us all afternoon yesterday with their little boy, Tristan (he's 1.5years old). Fanzo was Sister Lemmons investigator.. She sang at Nikki and Fanzo's wedding. Fanzo reminds me of eric chock actually. . He is tall for a filipino (6 feet) and is a basketball star here. I seriously love them. Its a cool connection b/c Sister lemmon was the missionary that taught him and then they got married and he got baptized... The are so strong and going to the temple this month to get sealed.
Well, life is good! Every day is a new adventure! Hilongos is awesome and so I'm just moving forward with Faith and remembering that God is aware of me and His children here. There's purpose in all things so i'm excited to see how the Lord will use me here.
Love you all!
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, May 23, 2011
5.23.11
hello family.
I don't have much time to write b/c i need to write a lot to
president. I love my companion, i love our investigators, i love being
the lords missionary, even when it's hard. :)
madarana og smile.
That's our favorite phrase to say...all the time... with our
investigator Crispin. It means " Bring the Smile.." or "Just smile"
even when everything seems wrong and hard. So thats what we do!
I prayed before last transfers and asked heavenly father to transfer
me. I told him I wanted challenges i've never dealt with and I wanted
to push my self like never before and i wanted to learn and grow and
do everything I can to fulfill my purpose as His missionary. God
answers our prayers.
Please pray for Crispin Basan. For his safety and so he can be
baptized soon. Also, I was hoping that everyone could call his name
into the temples where you all live. Thanks,.
Please pray for the branch that they will be kind and loving and
accepting and humble. Please pray for us to be safe and healthy and be
able to figure out what exactly we must do in our area for these
people we love so much!
We were in tacloban last week and it was wonderful. I love that place
and we loved doing our training about following the Spirit.
Love you family and I am SO grateful for you.
Love, your missionary,
Sister b.
Monday, May 16, 2011
Pictures
*I just want to apologize for the pictures. I tried to go in and edit them, but it didn't work. I'll try again later! You can click on the picture to make it bigger...
5.16.11
Hello Family,
The internet is having some problems, so I couldn't read all you wrote, but life is good! Currently I am in Tacloban. We are having a Leadership Training Meeting tomorrow and we are doing a training along with the other assistants. We are focusing on needing the Spirit in Conversion. Our testimonies have grown so much with this as we have been in Sogod. We know that the Spirit has protected us and guided us and warned us over and over these last 5 weeks.
Oh how time is flying by! We had our last zone conference last thursday in Ormoc. I got to see my favorite elders and we also had a special training from Elder and Sister Aguillar-the Philippines Mental Health Doctors. They talked a lot about stress. She had us all take a special stress test and mine, my companions, Elder hawkes, elder cox, elder henry, elder bennet (our little clan of american missionaries at zone conference) all had 22+ on the stress level= high stress! She said that in tacloban the missionaries had moderate stress ranging mostly from 1-10 and that the only person that had 22+ was President Malit! Well, we replied with some comments, "What are they doing up there!? Do they go outside!? " Just kidding. Anyways, zone conference was one of the best.
President Malit's training was remarkable. I just sat there in awe and listened to what the Spirit was trying to teach me. He is such a man of power. When he talks everyone listens and there is this silence that over comes the room. The spirit is so strong andits like revelation is just being poured down upon us. I had a great interview with him and I realized how much the Lord trusts himj. That is why he is able to speak as he does and lead this great mission. He's incredible. I want the Lord to use me as he has used him, to help God's children....I know that there are many ways I can be better to earn His trust.
This week was wonderful. This morning we woke up at 3am and went hiking at 4am. Then we got back and we traveled to Tacloban. I am so Cebuano, its crazy to come back to waraywaray and try to talk to the people...but fun, of course. :)
Crispin is doing well. He will be baptized this Saturday. ! He is amazing. He shares his testimony and is teaching part of the lessons as we teach his family. His mom started crying during the lesson as she told us how much her son has changed. She cme to church on Sunday with Crispins siblings. He also attended the youth/young single adult conference and had a blast. The branch is starting to step up, but we have a long ways to go.
We had a meeting with our branch mission leader to discuss our vision for missionary work and especially for mcm. Our MCM yesterday was awesome! We had 30 people come from all different auxillaries and we trained them on the new trainings. It was really fun and productive and they are excited to work with us this week. FINALLY. :)
The 50 year jubilee celebration was great on Saturday. It was really special to be here for that and realize how the Lord's work has moved forward.
We had a very intense lesson this week with Sister Babin and her husband. We followed the spirit and did what we knew was right, but it did not turn out as well as we hoped. We were blessed to have Crispin there and another fellowshipper, a worthy priesthood holder.
Please pray for Babin to receive an answer from God. And please pray for Brother Catubuoran that he will soften his heart and realize what he did was wrong...and come back to church.
here are some names/things to pray for:
Crispin Basan. (getting baptized this week....a lot of challenges)
Patrick.
Daughter of michelle.
Basan family.
Sogod Branch.
Okay, I love you all. Time is going by way to fast and I am loving every minute. My companion is awesome and the language is fun and we are loving our lives.
Love, your missionary,
Sister Blonquist
ps--happy birthday birthday aaron!
and happy wedding anniversary aaron and kerry yesterday!
The internet is having some problems, so I couldn't read all you wrote, but life is good! Currently I am in Tacloban. We are having a Leadership Training Meeting tomorrow and we are doing a training along with the other assistants. We are focusing on needing the Spirit in Conversion. Our testimonies have grown so much with this as we have been in Sogod. We know that the Spirit has protected us and guided us and warned us over and over these last 5 weeks.
Oh how time is flying by! We had our last zone conference last thursday in Ormoc. I got to see my favorite elders and we also had a special training from Elder and Sister Aguillar-the Philippines Mental Health Doctors. They talked a lot about stress. She had us all take a special stress test and mine, my companions, Elder hawkes, elder cox, elder henry, elder bennet (our little clan of american missionaries at zone conference) all had 22+ on the stress level= high stress! She said that in tacloban the missionaries had moderate stress ranging mostly from 1-10 and that the only person that had 22+ was President Malit! Well, we replied with some comments, "What are they doing up there!? Do they go outside!? " Just kidding. Anyways, zone conference was one of the best.
President Malit's training was remarkable. I just sat there in awe and listened to what the Spirit was trying to teach me. He is such a man of power. When he talks everyone listens and there is this silence that over comes the room. The spirit is so strong andits like revelation is just being poured down upon us. I had a great interview with him and I realized how much the Lord trusts himj. That is why he is able to speak as he does and lead this great mission. He's incredible. I want the Lord to use me as he has used him, to help God's children....I know that there are many ways I can be better to earn His trust.
This week was wonderful. This morning we woke up at 3am and went hiking at 4am. Then we got back and we traveled to Tacloban. I am so Cebuano, its crazy to come back to waraywaray and try to talk to the people...but fun, of course. :)
Crispin is doing well. He will be baptized this Saturday. ! He is amazing. He shares his testimony and is teaching part of the lessons as we teach his family. His mom started crying during the lesson as she told us how much her son has changed. She cme to church on Sunday with Crispins siblings. He also attended the youth/young single adult conference and had a blast. The branch is starting to step up, but we have a long ways to go.
We had a meeting with our branch mission leader to discuss our vision for missionary work and especially for mcm. Our MCM yesterday was awesome! We had 30 people come from all different auxillaries and we trained them on the new trainings. It was really fun and productive and they are excited to work with us this week. FINALLY. :)
The 50 year jubilee celebration was great on Saturday. It was really special to be here for that and realize how the Lord's work has moved forward.
We had a very intense lesson this week with Sister Babin and her husband. We followed the spirit and did what we knew was right, but it did not turn out as well as we hoped. We were blessed to have Crispin there and another fellowshipper, a worthy priesthood holder.
Please pray for Babin to receive an answer from God. And please pray for Brother Catubuoran that he will soften his heart and realize what he did was wrong...and come back to church.
here are some names/things to pray for:
Crispin Basan. (getting baptized this week....a lot of challenges)
Patrick.
Daughter of michelle.
Basan family.
Sogod Branch.
Okay, I love you all. Time is going by way to fast and I am loving every minute. My companion is awesome and the language is fun and we are loving our lives.
Love, your missionary,
Sister Blonquist
ps--happy birthday birthday aaron!
and happy wedding anniversary aaron and kerry yesterday!
Monday, May 9, 2011
May 9th
Hello Family!
Happy Mothers Day again!
It was so fun to talk to all of you and to hear all my favorite nieces and nephews! I pray for each and every one of you every single day and want you to know how blessed I feel to be a part of this family. Thank you so much for your love and supporting me in all my decisions and dreams.
I cannot believe how fast this time has flown by! When Spencer told me he was 5 now I realized how much has happened since I have been gone! So much has changed with all my nieces and nephews and a lot has happened to their Aunt Tori, so I am excited for our reunion this summer! It's going to be quite the party! (with a lot of much missed food, and maybe some filipino food gihapon.) :)
This past week has been wonderful but difficult. I am so very grateful for this sacred calling from a very aware and loving Father in Heaven. The tender mercies from Him every day help us so much. I could not do it without them. I know that Sister Schneider and I were sent to Sogod for very very specific reasons and people. God sends his missionaries to save His children--spiritually, mentally, and physically and I felt that a lot this week. We have our own personal trials and struggles, but we must go on, we are these people's only chance. We literally were in the right place and the right time, to save God's precious children. I have so much to do. This week I got a little scared b/c my time is soon ending, but that is gone now. My purpose is clear and my focus is set. Please pray for this area. There are so many crying out for help.
Specifically: The children of the Amparo family.
Patrick Acampado
Babin Catuburan
Crispin Basan
This time the Lord has given me to serve Him had been remarkable. Words can't express it. The mission is a time that you understand the atonement better. You get a glimpse of why our Savior Jesus Christ suffered and endured alll of our pains and weaknesses and trials. Love, charity, the pure love of Christ. We invite others to come unto Christ, to be healed through His love. And when we are rejected, as His missionaries, our Savior is rejected...and we feel a bit of the pain He felt. I have seen the evils in this world as men are tricked by satan and bound by him. But, we must go on in this great cause. God Lives! Jesus is the Christ! We can be healed. All of our losses will be made up, but only through The One that ginubos para sa atoa tanan. . . the one that went below all for all of us.
Only through the atonement can we overcome the natural man-our sins and weaknesses, and we can be totally and completely happy and live with God, with our families, forever. Heaven wouldn't be Heaven without those we love. God's plan is simple and perfect. There is a plan, and all of us accepted His plan in the Pre existence. We all chose Christ before this life. We are all His children. Let us help our brothers and sisters return to God, because our joy won't be complete without them. In Cebuano: Tinabangay Kita. (We all will help eachother.)
I love you all and I am so grateful for eternal families.
Happy Mothers Day.
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Happy Mothers Day again!
It was so fun to talk to all of you and to hear all my favorite nieces and nephews! I pray for each and every one of you every single day and want you to know how blessed I feel to be a part of this family. Thank you so much for your love and supporting me in all my decisions and dreams.
I cannot believe how fast this time has flown by! When Spencer told me he was 5 now I realized how much has happened since I have been gone! So much has changed with all my nieces and nephews and a lot has happened to their Aunt Tori, so I am excited for our reunion this summer! It's going to be quite the party! (with a lot of much missed food, and maybe some filipino food gihapon.) :)
This past week has been wonderful but difficult. I am so very grateful for this sacred calling from a very aware and loving Father in Heaven. The tender mercies from Him every day help us so much. I could not do it without them. I know that Sister Schneider and I were sent to Sogod for very very specific reasons and people. God sends his missionaries to save His children--spiritually, mentally, and physically and I felt that a lot this week. We have our own personal trials and struggles, but we must go on, we are these people's only chance. We literally were in the right place and the right time, to save God's precious children. I have so much to do. This week I got a little scared b/c my time is soon ending, but that is gone now. My purpose is clear and my focus is set. Please pray for this area. There are so many crying out for help.
Specifically: The children of the Amparo family.
Patrick Acampado
Babin Catuburan
Crispin Basan
This time the Lord has given me to serve Him had been remarkable. Words can't express it. The mission is a time that you understand the atonement better. You get a glimpse of why our Savior Jesus Christ suffered and endured alll of our pains and weaknesses and trials. Love, charity, the pure love of Christ. We invite others to come unto Christ, to be healed through His love. And when we are rejected, as His missionaries, our Savior is rejected...and we feel a bit of the pain He felt. I have seen the evils in this world as men are tricked by satan and bound by him. But, we must go on in this great cause. God Lives! Jesus is the Christ! We can be healed. All of our losses will be made up, but only through The One that ginubos para sa atoa tanan. . . the one that went below all for all of us.
Only through the atonement can we overcome the natural man-our sins and weaknesses, and we can be totally and completely happy and live with God, with our families, forever. Heaven wouldn't be Heaven without those we love. God's plan is simple and perfect. There is a plan, and all of us accepted His plan in the Pre existence. We all chose Christ before this life. We are all His children. Let us help our brothers and sisters return to God, because our joy won't be complete without them. In Cebuano: Tinabangay Kita. (We all will help eachother.)
I love you all and I am so grateful for eternal families.
Happy Mothers Day.
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, May 2, 2011
May 2, 2011
Hello Family!
Happy May!
Sorry to Katie and Kerry--I definitely remembered your bdays on the 28, 21st , but forgot to mention it on the big email. But I thought of both of you all day! And Happy Birthday to Spencer! Love you all.
This past week was great. We had two baptisms this week, Shania and Jasmine. They are really smart girls and I love them so much. They are really fun to teach. Cebuano J is usually pretty fun to speak and Sister Schneider are amazed at our ability to communicate, anything, ever. I have a feeling i'll really miss these languages. I've definitely seen the gift of tongues lately and I am so grateful.
We don't have a branch president which has been a little tricky and not good b/c we have been anxious to get things going with this branch, but hopefully we will have one by next sunday. Yesterday we had the District Conference via Satellite. It was really cool and I liked it a lot. We had some technical difficulties trying to get the cebuano translation, so it only worked for one talk, but it was good. We got to watch some concert of Music and the Spoken word and it was gorgeous. Our investigator, Crispin was amazed by the Mormon Tablenacle Choir as was I. We were both just entranced by it. I was leaning forward in my seat and the spirit was so strong. Then I look over and our investigator is doing the exact same thing. He is 23 year old , and his member friend made fun of him for it, but he couldn't stop being in amazement. Me either. The Spirit was so strong.
Then the program started and Elder Teh, the area president talked...love that man! And then the choir sang and I saw Sister Jones (the person that ran the Missionary REcovery Center with her husband up in manila) singing in the choir so that was fun. Then Sister Beck, Elder Cook, and President Packer spoke via satellite. IT was really good! They really spoke to the needs of the people here and I appreciated their remarks so much. President Packer shared a special experience he had in TACLOBAN :) after the war ended. He found one other member of the church when was docked in TAcloban and they had a special sacrament in the middle of all the blasted palm trees. It was a really cool story about my Tacloban.
The Philippines is celebrating its 50th anniversary of missionary work here in the Philippines! ITs called the Jubilee Celebration so they talked a lot about that. In 50 years there is 600,000 members in the Philippines, and 2 temples and 1 more being built.
This week was great. We have a little investigator/ part member family that we are concerned about. He is 9 years old and his name is patrick. He is really really really malnourished and their family is devastatingly poor. Please keep him in your prayers.
We had another really intense lesson with Sister Babin. When we talk and she listens, the Spirit is so strong and she knows it. When she prayers, its sincere and awesome and the Spirit is very strong. But when she talks about what ever else she has heard from her friends, etc the Spirit leaves. Its such a drastic difference and she keeps saying she can't feel it, but that cannot be true.
We have sisters coming to work with us this week (tomorrow), and then interviews with President. Next week more sisters will travel here and then we have zone conference and more sisters working with us. The next week more sisters, and then Leadership training conference and then the transfer is over. Time is going by way to fast and we have so much work to do!!
I focused my studies lately on figuring out our potential as God's children. Alma 18:34-35 was awesome. I related it to Luke 17 as well and being a profitable servant.
When we remember who we are, we realize what we can become.
God's attributes are a part of all of us because we are His children. The natural man sometimes makes those strengths/attributes dormant, but its time to Remember who we are and what our potential is.
The gospel is true. Life is good! I love my comp and I love this area. Thanks for all your prayers and support.
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Happy May!
Sorry to Katie and Kerry--I definitely remembered your bdays on the 28, 21st , but forgot to mention it on the big email. But I thought of both of you all day! And Happy Birthday to Spencer! Love you all.
This past week was great. We had two baptisms this week, Shania and Jasmine. They are really smart girls and I love them so much. They are really fun to teach. Cebuano J is usually pretty fun to speak and Sister Schneider are amazed at our ability to communicate, anything, ever. I have a feeling i'll really miss these languages. I've definitely seen the gift of tongues lately and I am so grateful.
We don't have a branch president which has been a little tricky and not good b/c we have been anxious to get things going with this branch, but hopefully we will have one by next sunday. Yesterday we had the District Conference via Satellite. It was really cool and I liked it a lot. We had some technical difficulties trying to get the cebuano translation, so it only worked for one talk, but it was good. We got to watch some concert of Music and the Spoken word and it was gorgeous. Our investigator, Crispin was amazed by the Mormon Tablenacle Choir as was I. We were both just entranced by it. I was leaning forward in my seat and the spirit was so strong. Then I look over and our investigator is doing the exact same thing. He is 23 year old , and his member friend made fun of him for it, but he couldn't stop being in amazement. Me either. The Spirit was so strong.
Then the program started and Elder Teh, the area president talked...love that man! And then the choir sang and I saw Sister Jones (the person that ran the Missionary REcovery Center with her husband up in manila) singing in the choir so that was fun. Then Sister Beck, Elder Cook, and President Packer spoke via satellite. IT was really good! They really spoke to the needs of the people here and I appreciated their remarks so much. President Packer shared a special experience he had in TACLOBAN :) after the war ended. He found one other member of the church when was docked in TAcloban and they had a special sacrament in the middle of all the blasted palm trees. It was a really cool story about my Tacloban.
The Philippines is celebrating its 50th anniversary of missionary work here in the Philippines! ITs called the Jubilee Celebration so they talked a lot about that. In 50 years there is 600,000 members in the Philippines, and 2 temples and 1 more being built.
This week was great. We have a little investigator/ part member family that we are concerned about. He is 9 years old and his name is patrick. He is really really really malnourished and their family is devastatingly poor. Please keep him in your prayers.
We had another really intense lesson with Sister Babin. When we talk and she listens, the Spirit is so strong and she knows it. When she prayers, its sincere and awesome and the Spirit is very strong. But when she talks about what ever else she has heard from her friends, etc the Spirit leaves. Its such a drastic difference and she keeps saying she can't feel it, but that cannot be true.
We have sisters coming to work with us this week (tomorrow), and then interviews with President. Next week more sisters will travel here and then we have zone conference and more sisters working with us. The next week more sisters, and then Leadership training conference and then the transfer is over. Time is going by way to fast and we have so much work to do!!
I focused my studies lately on figuring out our potential as God's children. Alma 18:34-35 was awesome. I related it to Luke 17 as well and being a profitable servant.
When we remember who we are, we realize what we can become.
God's attributes are a part of all of us because we are His children. The natural man sometimes makes those strengths/attributes dormant, but its time to Remember who we are and what our potential is.
The gospel is true. Life is good! I love my comp and I love this area. Thanks for all your prayers and support.
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
4.25.11
Hello Family!
What a wonderful week it has been. I love my companion. She is incredible. I love her sooo much! We are similar and understand each other incredibly. She is an awesome person and missionary. I love this area too. It needs a lot of help, but it is great. We worked and worked this week and some very spiritual experiences as we taught the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I remember a specific lesson being amazed at our ability to speak Cebuano and remember words. I flow went really well and we knew who was helping us. We make a really good team and have had a blast together doing the Lords work. We had a lot of opportunities to teach this week and got to teach a lot of new investigators which is what our mission president is really pushing for right now.
One lesson was with Sister Babin. Her husband and daughter are a member and she has listened over and over again to the missionaries. We got to her house around 7pm and they fed us some delicious Filipino food that i've really missed. Didn't get tons of that in Tacloban. All the Filipinos there tend to feed you more americanized food...trying to impress you or something...Basta, it was delicious. We weren't sure what we were going to teach her, but we knew it had to be different than what had be tried before. We had prayed and thought a lot about what we could do to help her realize how hungry she was for the truth. I was excited to see where the Spirit took the lesson. And. It was incredible. I started and said that we wanted to talk about Joseph Smith and as I said it I knew that was wrong and we needed to change to Jesus Christ. So that is what we did. The lesson was one of the best I've ever participated in. We let her talk and listened . And we were both praying really hard. She explained she was content with her life and the good blessings she had received from God. She saw no need to change. God loved her and blesses her often. She explained she had listened to the missionaries and felt no need to change. We focused on how the Spirit testified to her and helped her understand that was God inviting her to learn more, to know more about Him and His plan for her. My companion did a great job and talked for a bit and the Spirit told me it was time to get out the scriptures. I knew we had to read from the Book of Mormon, but I had nothing. I took it out and started praying. And then, very clearly the Spirit told me exactly what she needed. I love it when that happens! We read from 2 Nephi 28:29 and 30. The Spirit was so strong as she realized what the scripture meant for her as I asked her questions and explained it. Those verses are about ' wo be unto him taht shall say , we have received the word of God, and we need no more of the word of God, for we have enough." and it talks about how we learn line upon line and we can learn wisdom from God, but if you say you have enough or you are content with what you have, God will take a way that which he has given. . .
I knew she understood. My comp knew. And she knew. Her daughter was really excited too. It was the exact verses that woke her up. My companion then talked about prophets preparing the people for the coming of Christ and related it until now, the book of mormon and bible, living prophet prepare us for the 2nd coming of Christ. We must follow them . We must be prepared. Our purpose is to continue to grow and learn and allow God to guide us. We promised her there is so much more to God's plan.
She is an awesome lady. One that is kinda hard to read and doesn't show much emotion ever. She was trying to hide the fact that she knew what we were saying was true...but she couldn't. She let out this big smile that I will never forget. She was trying to hold back the tears. And she was excited about our message. It was awesome. I can't even explain to you how strong the Spirit was . Her heart was completely softened, maybe for the first time ever. We left that lesson excited and so pumped for anything! We loved being the Lords missionaries. That was one of the times when we knew that we had said everything our Savior would have said if He had been the one teaching. Such a special, sacred lesson. She is awesome and we are excited to go back. She's been out of time this past week so we only saw her one time.
We had another great few lessons with our new investigator Crispin. He came to church this week and we also taught his neighbors. Heavenly Father is really helping us with this language...of course He would, these are His children and we are His messengers. But still, its nice to feel and recognize that.
Tony Capon. Saddest lesson this past week. We taught him the Restoration and he liked it, accepted it. But when we taught about prayer and invited him to say the closing prayer he refused. I'd gotten that several times a day even on the mission but he was different. He was not shy to pray...he refused to pray b/c he felt unworthy. He said that he drinks and smokes and hasn't gone to church in a long while...he said he wasn't god's son and wasn't worthy to pray to Him. He had no hope. He was truly devastated and disappointed in himself and he just kept saying i can't talk to god, i won't talk to god, i'm not worthy to talk to god. I'm a sinner, i'm not his son. It was terrible. We talked to him about it for 20 minutes and nothing we said or tried worked. He was completely convinced he was nothing. It was realllly hard to deal with. I felt God's love for him and I had just met him. We tried to help him understand it was Satan lying to him and telling him he wasn't allowed or worthy to pray. . . but nothing we said or testified helped. It was a very empty sad feeling that was coming from him. We pray for him daily and have searched for him since that lesson, but haven't been able to find him. :( i'm really worried about him.
Easter was okay.
They are HUGE here about Good Friday. We actually didn't go out of our apartment b/c it gets insane...the reenact the crucifixtion, etc so President told us if we felt it was wise to stay inside, do it. I think most of the missionaries did. Especially in southern leyte where it is extremely intense Catholic. We were productive though , so it was good.
It is init season...or HOTTTTT SEASON Now.
I know its hot season when:
my face has heat rash and wounds and will not and CAN NOT HEAL. i am officially allergic to my sweat. its terrible and i look like i have leprosy. :(
my whole body has heat rash/sweat rash.
lots of random bites that get infected.
you sweat as you take a freezing cold shower.
you take numerous freezing cold showers a day and you still can NEVER cool down.
you stand in your towel after your freezing cold shower in front of the fan hoping it will cool you down. it doesn't.
you go through more than one sweat rag a day.
you go no where with out your hand held fan.
you get really cranky cause you can NOT breathe in your own apartment. but then you laugh a lot with your companion...so you don't cry. :)
Life is good. Just sweaty!
love you all.
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
What a wonderful week it has been. I love my companion. She is incredible. I love her sooo much! We are similar and understand each other incredibly. She is an awesome person and missionary. I love this area too. It needs a lot of help, but it is great. We worked and worked this week and some very spiritual experiences as we taught the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. I remember a specific lesson being amazed at our ability to speak Cebuano and remember words. I flow went really well and we knew who was helping us. We make a really good team and have had a blast together doing the Lords work. We had a lot of opportunities to teach this week and got to teach a lot of new investigators which is what our mission president is really pushing for right now.
One lesson was with Sister Babin. Her husband and daughter are a member and she has listened over and over again to the missionaries. We got to her house around 7pm and they fed us some delicious Filipino food that i've really missed. Didn't get tons of that in Tacloban. All the Filipinos there tend to feed you more americanized food...trying to impress you or something...Basta, it was delicious. We weren't sure what we were going to teach her, but we knew it had to be different than what had be tried before. We had prayed and thought a lot about what we could do to help her realize how hungry she was for the truth. I was excited to see where the Spirit took the lesson. And. It was incredible. I started and said that we wanted to talk about Joseph Smith and as I said it I knew that was wrong and we needed to change to Jesus Christ. So that is what we did. The lesson was one of the best I've ever participated in. We let her talk and listened . And we were both praying really hard. She explained she was content with her life and the good blessings she had received from God. She saw no need to change. God loved her and blesses her often. She explained she had listened to the missionaries and felt no need to change. We focused on how the Spirit testified to her and helped her understand that was God inviting her to learn more, to know more about Him and His plan for her. My companion did a great job and talked for a bit and the Spirit told me it was time to get out the scriptures. I knew we had to read from the Book of Mormon, but I had nothing. I took it out and started praying. And then, very clearly the Spirit told me exactly what she needed. I love it when that happens! We read from 2 Nephi 28:29 and 30. The Spirit was so strong as she realized what the scripture meant for her as I asked her questions and explained it. Those verses are about ' wo be unto him taht shall say , we have received the word of God, and we need no more of the word of God, for we have enough." and it talks about how we learn line upon line and we can learn wisdom from God, but if you say you have enough or you are content with what you have, God will take a way that which he has given. . .
I knew she understood. My comp knew. And she knew. Her daughter was really excited too. It was the exact verses that woke her up. My companion then talked about prophets preparing the people for the coming of Christ and related it until now, the book of mormon and bible, living prophet prepare us for the 2nd coming of Christ. We must follow them . We must be prepared. Our purpose is to continue to grow and learn and allow God to guide us. We promised her there is so much more to God's plan.
She is an awesome lady. One that is kinda hard to read and doesn't show much emotion ever. She was trying to hide the fact that she knew what we were saying was true...but she couldn't. She let out this big smile that I will never forget. She was trying to hold back the tears. And she was excited about our message. It was awesome. I can't even explain to you how strong the Spirit was . Her heart was completely softened, maybe for the first time ever. We left that lesson excited and so pumped for anything! We loved being the Lords missionaries. That was one of the times when we knew that we had said everything our Savior would have said if He had been the one teaching. Such a special, sacred lesson. She is awesome and we are excited to go back. She's been out of time this past week so we only saw her one time.
We had another great few lessons with our new investigator Crispin. He came to church this week and we also taught his neighbors. Heavenly Father is really helping us with this language...of course He would, these are His children and we are His messengers. But still, its nice to feel and recognize that.
Tony Capon. Saddest lesson this past week. We taught him the Restoration and he liked it, accepted it. But when we taught about prayer and invited him to say the closing prayer he refused. I'd gotten that several times a day even on the mission but he was different. He was not shy to pray...he refused to pray b/c he felt unworthy. He said that he drinks and smokes and hasn't gone to church in a long while...he said he wasn't god's son and wasn't worthy to pray to Him. He had no hope. He was truly devastated and disappointed in himself and he just kept saying i can't talk to god, i won't talk to god, i'm not worthy to talk to god. I'm a sinner, i'm not his son. It was terrible. We talked to him about it for 20 minutes and nothing we said or tried worked. He was completely convinced he was nothing. It was realllly hard to deal with. I felt God's love for him and I had just met him. We tried to help him understand it was Satan lying to him and telling him he wasn't allowed or worthy to pray. . . but nothing we said or testified helped. It was a very empty sad feeling that was coming from him. We pray for him daily and have searched for him since that lesson, but haven't been able to find him. :( i'm really worried about him.
Easter was okay.
They are HUGE here about Good Friday. We actually didn't go out of our apartment b/c it gets insane...the reenact the crucifixtion, etc so President told us if we felt it was wise to stay inside, do it. I think most of the missionaries did. Especially in southern leyte where it is extremely intense Catholic. We were productive though , so it was good.
It is init season...or HOTTTTT SEASON Now.
I know its hot season when:
my face has heat rash and wounds and will not and CAN NOT HEAL. i am officially allergic to my sweat. its terrible and i look like i have leprosy. :(
my whole body has heat rash/sweat rash.
lots of random bites that get infected.
you sweat as you take a freezing cold shower.
you take numerous freezing cold showers a day and you still can NEVER cool down.
you stand in your towel after your freezing cold shower in front of the fan hoping it will cool you down. it doesn't.
you go through more than one sweat rag a day.
you go no where with out your hand held fan.
you get really cranky cause you can NOT breathe in your own apartment. but then you laugh a lot with your companion...so you don't cry. :)
Life is good. Just sweaty!
love you all.
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
4.18.11
Hello Family!
Well, last week flew itself by. On Tuesday President asked to meet with me and Sister Jones. He told me that I've accomplished what I needed to in V&G and that I was needed somewhere else. However, he said that what we have been doing was presented to the Lord again and that He wants us to keep moving forward working with all the sisters. But, now President wants to double our efforts. SO, even though I am transferred, he wants me to continue training the sisters and doing what I've been doing in Tacloban, just in a separate unit.
So Wednesday I found out that I would be transferring to SOGOD Zone, Southern Leyte speaking Cebuano J. My new companion is Sister Schneider! She is the batch behind me and I lived in Tanuauan with her two times. She is the best and we get a long so well. She was the one that I went to with all my back issues. She is an incredible missionary and gets the job done. She and Sister Farnworth saved Tanauan when they got transferred there in sept and she has been there ever since and I lived with her when i was assigned in Dagami for the first month and then again when i was assigned in tacloban for the first month. I basically can't say enough good things about her. We whitewashed this area and have a lot of work to do here. I have actually been here before b/c sister jones and I worked with the sisters here in February. honestly, it was just an okay day and I remember that it was a lot different than my very spiritual day in Hilongos. The spirit of the work was different here. I discussed this all with Sister Jones and Sister Schneider and we came to the conclusion that this is why we are here--to change the way the work is done and the Spirit of it. Get the new trainings applied and get this area progressing! So we are excited. Sister Jones is in TAcloban with Sister Quimson. She is awesome, I worked with her in CArigara. When we found out that there would be 4 of us assigned to this special assignment we knew it would be sister schneider and sister quimson;so its been pretty fun.
We spent a lot of time meeting all the members and finding all of our investigators. Our awesome branch president here was released on sunday :(. We really liked him and were excited to work with him...another one wasn't called yet. We also both talked in church on sunday. CEBUANO IS REALLY DIFFERENT THAN WARAY WARAY. And Cebuano J is different than Cebuano! It sounds a lot different to me and been a bit tricky to pick up things. But such is my life on the mission, right?! :) We are having a lot of fun struggling trying to speak to people. We keep telling them we promise we know waray waray and we are not as incompetent as we sound! We both really liked waray waray and are kind of sad to give it up and go back to Cebuano , but we are trying to have a good attitude about it and focus really hard on the work here.
We had 4 investigators come to church and we have two baptisms on April 29th. It is also fun kay my batch, Elder Fisher is my Zone leader!
So life is good in the south.
We call our selves the "Assisters of the South."
Life is good. I'm sad to not be in Tacloban anymore and I won't be able to go to Michelle's baptism on the 30th, but this is where I am supposed to be. When I prayed and explained to Heavenly Father all that I wanted for this last part in my mission and what I wanted to focus on and goals I wanted to accomplish I told him I think I need to be far away and out in the bukid again. So he sent me here. :) Its going to be awesome and I am so excited for this area. Its south though so its going to be hot hot hot.
I've been reading Jesus the Christ and plan on finishing it before end the mission. That means I would complete the missionary library, which was one of my goals. I'm learning a lot and really enjoying it.
Lately, i've focused a lot on the Priesthood and the church organization that Christ created while he was on the earth. I'm so grateful for that and that I know that His priesthood power is back on the earth. I think I would be really scared all the time if His power was not on the earth. I'm glad I live at this time when it has been restored. My testimony and understanding about the priesthood has grown immensely while I've been serving here.
Well, I am out of time now. I'm excited for these next two transfers here in Sogod. There is a joke in the mission about this place...how was sogod?... it was sooooooo good. And it is.
The end!
love you all.
love , your missionary,
Sister B.
Well, last week flew itself by. On Tuesday President asked to meet with me and Sister Jones. He told me that I've accomplished what I needed to in V&G and that I was needed somewhere else. However, he said that what we have been doing was presented to the Lord again and that He wants us to keep moving forward working with all the sisters. But, now President wants to double our efforts. SO, even though I am transferred, he wants me to continue training the sisters and doing what I've been doing in Tacloban, just in a separate unit.
So Wednesday I found out that I would be transferring to SOGOD Zone, Southern Leyte speaking Cebuano J. My new companion is Sister Schneider! She is the batch behind me and I lived in Tanuauan with her two times. She is the best and we get a long so well. She was the one that I went to with all my back issues. She is an incredible missionary and gets the job done. She and Sister Farnworth saved Tanauan when they got transferred there in sept and she has been there ever since and I lived with her when i was assigned in Dagami for the first month and then again when i was assigned in tacloban for the first month. I basically can't say enough good things about her. We whitewashed this area and have a lot of work to do here. I have actually been here before b/c sister jones and I worked with the sisters here in February. honestly, it was just an okay day and I remember that it was a lot different than my very spiritual day in Hilongos. The spirit of the work was different here. I discussed this all with Sister Jones and Sister Schneider and we came to the conclusion that this is why we are here--to change the way the work is done and the Spirit of it. Get the new trainings applied and get this area progressing! So we are excited. Sister Jones is in TAcloban with Sister Quimson. She is awesome, I worked with her in CArigara. When we found out that there would be 4 of us assigned to this special assignment we knew it would be sister schneider and sister quimson;so its been pretty fun.
We spent a lot of time meeting all the members and finding all of our investigators. Our awesome branch president here was released on sunday :(. We really liked him and were excited to work with him...another one wasn't called yet. We also both talked in church on sunday. CEBUANO IS REALLY DIFFERENT THAN WARAY WARAY. And Cebuano J is different than Cebuano! It sounds a lot different to me and been a bit tricky to pick up things. But such is my life on the mission, right?! :) We are having a lot of fun struggling trying to speak to people. We keep telling them we promise we know waray waray and we are not as incompetent as we sound! We both really liked waray waray and are kind of sad to give it up and go back to Cebuano , but we are trying to have a good attitude about it and focus really hard on the work here.
We had 4 investigators come to church and we have two baptisms on April 29th. It is also fun kay my batch, Elder Fisher is my Zone leader!
So life is good in the south.
We call our selves the "Assisters of the South."
Life is good. I'm sad to not be in Tacloban anymore and I won't be able to go to Michelle's baptism on the 30th, but this is where I am supposed to be. When I prayed and explained to Heavenly Father all that I wanted for this last part in my mission and what I wanted to focus on and goals I wanted to accomplish I told him I think I need to be far away and out in the bukid again. So he sent me here. :) Its going to be awesome and I am so excited for this area. Its south though so its going to be hot hot hot.
I've been reading Jesus the Christ and plan on finishing it before end the mission. That means I would complete the missionary library, which was one of my goals. I'm learning a lot and really enjoying it.
Lately, i've focused a lot on the Priesthood and the church organization that Christ created while he was on the earth. I'm so grateful for that and that I know that His priesthood power is back on the earth. I think I would be really scared all the time if His power was not on the earth. I'm glad I live at this time when it has been restored. My testimony and understanding about the priesthood has grown immensely while I've been serving here.
Well, I am out of time now. I'm excited for these next two transfers here in Sogod. There is a joke in the mission about this place...how was sogod?... it was sooooooo good. And it is.
The end!
love you all.
love , your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Ready for the last phase 4.11.11
Hello Family!
My mind is a bit blurred and I can't really remember all that happened this week because I just found out I will be transferred. It makes sense. It feels right. I was sad, but I've been praying a lot about this last phase in the mission and this feels right. I am excited to see where I go. I'll find out on Wednesday.
President Malit has this new thing where he calls the Assistants to the Presidents for about two transfers then transfers them on a different assignment. Makes sense, right? Thats what we do in the church. You are a bishop for a while and then the next calling you are the sunbeam teacher...RS president to scouts. etc. I like his style. He keeps us all on our toes and humble and working hard. He is the best. Sister Jones is staying. I'm excited to see who will come here. I had a thought that I would be sent up to the Bukid up in Catarman, so we will see. I'll miss Tacloban a lot. I love this city so much and have had a blast here and some hilarious memories and a lot of spiritual growth.
Okay, this week. We taught Michelle a great lesson and she will be baptized April 30th. We have some great new investigators that I am excited for sister jones to teach. :( Sayang, i won't be around. The high light of my week, of course, was watching conference. I loved it so much! It was like Christmas; i woke up in the middle of the night just wishing it was time, then got up early, pondered a bit, wrote some questions down to receive inspiration, prayed and then we were off. The theme of welfare touched my heart sooo much. That is all I want to do with my life. Serve people and help them become self reliant. That is what I did in Africa and Fiji and what I am doing know in a different aspect. I want to be involved with helping the poor and in need, and especially with Disaster Relief. Things really started coming together as the talked about the Welfare Program of the Church and I am excited to look more into that when i get home. I know that if I work for the church all my hopes and desires to serve would happen, but it would also be appropriate and to the people's needs to help them grow--which is also something I feel really strongly about, and sometime with that there is a fine balance.
I really enjoyed the talks on revelation and understand pain/affliction/trials. Trials come and are often focused on our weaknesses. There is purpose in that. There is purpose in all things. Never forget that! I remind myself of that daily...so much to work on! There were several talks on marriage and family. I feel like for a time in the past few years they haven't focused a lot on telling us singles to get married, but they sure made up for it! It was good and was a helpful reminder to make sure with all my dreams and goals I am planning on, to set my priorities according to the Lord's will.
The spirit was strong and it was very uplifting and helpful hours and hours of words from 'mortal angels' as Elder Holland described it. I am so grateful for the truth and the restored gospel on this earth. It's hard not to smiled when you think of all god has done for you and all that he has in store.
I love my Savior and I have loved serving Him. I am not perfect, but I understand His plan a little better each day, and I strive to be more like Him. I know in that there is total and complete joy.
If you have forgotten the joy the gospel brings into your life I invite you to come back. Realize how hungry you are for the truth and knowledge from a very loving Heavenly Father. Read the Book of Mormon each and every day. Don't give up on the Savior, He will never give up on you.
I love you all so much. This time as the Lord's missionary has been very sacred and tender year and a half of my life that will be with me for the eternities. Thank you for being there every step of the way and cheering me on.
Love, your missionary,
Sister Blonquist
My mind is a bit blurred and I can't really remember all that happened this week because I just found out I will be transferred. It makes sense. It feels right. I was sad, but I've been praying a lot about this last phase in the mission and this feels right. I am excited to see where I go. I'll find out on Wednesday.
President Malit has this new thing where he calls the Assistants to the Presidents for about two transfers then transfers them on a different assignment. Makes sense, right? Thats what we do in the church. You are a bishop for a while and then the next calling you are the sunbeam teacher...RS president to scouts. etc. I like his style. He keeps us all on our toes and humble and working hard. He is the best. Sister Jones is staying. I'm excited to see who will come here. I had a thought that I would be sent up to the Bukid up in Catarman, so we will see. I'll miss Tacloban a lot. I love this city so much and have had a blast here and some hilarious memories and a lot of spiritual growth.
Okay, this week. We taught Michelle a great lesson and she will be baptized April 30th. We have some great new investigators that I am excited for sister jones to teach. :( Sayang, i won't be around. The high light of my week, of course, was watching conference. I loved it so much! It was like Christmas; i woke up in the middle of the night just wishing it was time, then got up early, pondered a bit, wrote some questions down to receive inspiration, prayed and then we were off. The theme of welfare touched my heart sooo much. That is all I want to do with my life. Serve people and help them become self reliant. That is what I did in Africa and Fiji and what I am doing know in a different aspect. I want to be involved with helping the poor and in need, and especially with Disaster Relief. Things really started coming together as the talked about the Welfare Program of the Church and I am excited to look more into that when i get home. I know that if I work for the church all my hopes and desires to serve would happen, but it would also be appropriate and to the people's needs to help them grow--which is also something I feel really strongly about, and sometime with that there is a fine balance.
I really enjoyed the talks on revelation and understand pain/affliction/trials. Trials come and are often focused on our weaknesses. There is purpose in that. There is purpose in all things. Never forget that! I remind myself of that daily...so much to work on! There were several talks on marriage and family. I feel like for a time in the past few years they haven't focused a lot on telling us singles to get married, but they sure made up for it! It was good and was a helpful reminder to make sure with all my dreams and goals I am planning on, to set my priorities according to the Lord's will.
The spirit was strong and it was very uplifting and helpful hours and hours of words from 'mortal angels' as Elder Holland described it. I am so grateful for the truth and the restored gospel on this earth. It's hard not to smiled when you think of all god has done for you and all that he has in store.
I love my Savior and I have loved serving Him. I am not perfect, but I understand His plan a little better each day, and I strive to be more like Him. I know in that there is total and complete joy.
If you have forgotten the joy the gospel brings into your life I invite you to come back. Realize how hungry you are for the truth and knowledge from a very loving Heavenly Father. Read the Book of Mormon each and every day. Don't give up on the Savior, He will never give up on you.
I love you all so much. This time as the Lord's missionary has been very sacred and tender year and a half of my life that will be with me for the eternities. Thank you for being there every step of the way and cheering me on.
Love, your missionary,
Sister Blonquist
Monday, April 4, 2011
4.4.11
Hello Family!
I am so sorry I didn't get to email last week. The day just passed us right by! We didn't get to email president malit either and he texted us and said, "i missed your email." SO sorry everyone! Anyways, I can't remember too much from last week, but I did want to tell you all that Mildred and her boys surprised me and came to Tacloban for church. After the sacrament prayer, I heard, "Sister Blonquist!" And It was little JV with a big grin on his face. Mildred and her two boys are taking care of her cousins house in tacloban for a month or so while they are in Vietnam or something... Which was perfect timing for Mildred b/c things were getting really really difficult. She is trying to make a living making food and selling it (which is extremely difficult over w here she is) and scalding hot water fell on her early in the morning one day and practically put her into shock and she couldn't do anything. It was really bad. All down her leg and foot. The Branch President ended up giving her the branch budget to help her get medicine. They ran out of food and things were really bad and she couldn't do much.....but then her cousin said he wanted her and her boys to come to Tacloban and stay with them and then watch their house while they are gone. The boys are sooooo excited and love it and they get to eat all the rice they want! I was so happy to be with Mildred that Sunday. She is doing so well and just kept telling me alll the blessings since she became a member. I thought while I was in Dagami that I wanted to give her my CTR ring, but things got crazy with my neck and I forgot. So right there in RS I gave it to her. It was perfect gift for her and perfect rememberence from me. I love that ring! Its the one mom and dad gave me the august before I left for college. Loved it soooo much. So it meant a lot to give it to Mildred and I am so so happy I did and it fit her and everything. So that was the high light I would have shared last week...
Now. This incredible week! A week of miracles and fun times! It rained a lot , but the flooding seems to be subsided now. I only had to wear my rain boots one time. Oh, and they rubbed my legs so bad I have this ring around both legs and they were bleeding and scabbing and everyone asks about it and freaks out about it. Embarrasing. But funny also. Anyways, I love fasting! Fasting always always equals MIRACLES for me and I am so grateful for this small opportunity to sacrifice and allow my spiritual side to guide me in all ways.
On Wednesday Sister Jones and I woke up at 3am to do our studies b/c we wanted to start cooking at 8am. We had a 3 elder birthday celebration we were cooking lunch for. It turned out awesome! We made enchiladas and apple crisp and had chips and salsa and ice cream and the elders creation of "tim tam slams." ( a cookie type cracker that you suck hot cocoa through...) Basta, it was a really fun time and a good bday lunch. We then both felt impressed that we had to visit our Ward Mission Leaders wife (they have been separated for 11 years) and her family. He told us about her at the beginning when we got here and there were days we tried to visit but it never worked out for some reason and it was all flooded recently. But Wednesday we were determined and knew the Spirit was telling us to go there. So, we went. We got there, not knowing what to expect. We met the mother in law-sister Maglana, and loved her immediately. Then her husband came home, and he was sooo incredible! We thought they would be hard hearted and not willing to go back to church, but they have strong testimonies and desires, but they are ashamed b/c they cannot pay their tithing. They showed us their salary and he is supposed to get 36,000 pesos per month in gross, but after everything is deducted, insurance, retirement, etc, he only receives 700 pesos!!! I literally don't know how they are can pay tithing! We had a great lessons with them that was totally guided by the spirit. Then during the lesson, their daughter, the wife of our Ward Mission Leader comes home from work and she sat down and listened and she included her in the lesson and switched our focus to her. I am so grateful for the Spirit. Everything came together perfectly and we committed them all to come back to church on Sunday. They were all ashamed and afraid and said they were not worthy to partake of the sacrament. Sister Myralee (the wife of our WML) has not been to church for 11 yrs and opening admitted some personal things to us and we all became fast friends and could feel the love and trust in the room. We talked about the sacrament and we talked about them going to the Bishop and discussing with him their situations. It was so good and they all promised to come to church. They also had a friend there who is now our new investigator! We had woken up Myralee's daughter, Jezlee, to come join the lesson and at the end she said, :that was worth being woken up. thank you so much." Sunday roles around and told them we would be at their house at 8:30am so we could all go together so they would not be afraid or ashamed. We got there at 8am. We read our scriptures as we waited for everyone to get ready. They have a multicab that we were going to take so at 8:40 we all get in and we are soooo excited to go and Myralee was there with her parents and our new investigator , Michelle, was there and we were ready to have a great day at church! THEN, the multicab would. not. start. Try after try....I was praying hard as was my comp. 8:45 now.... WE CANNOT BE LATE!!!! I look at the little daughter and said , okay you have to pray for us to get to church on time. So she did. The multicab did not start, so the driver left to go find another multicab. 8:55 he shows up with another multicab and we pile in quickly. they are getting scared b/c we are late for church and they are already nervous to go. (its been over a year for the maglana family, and 11 years for myralee...) But we get there by 9:08 ish and the bishop is confirming our recent converts. I led the way as the family entered into the chapel and we sat behind President Malit and his family! OH it was such a great Sunday! Everyone in the ward was SHOCKED AND SO happy to see this family! They couldn't believe it!
Ohhh, i'm out of time! Also, Brother Depaz is a member that we have been teaching and trying to get back to church, but he is paralyzed on one side due to a stroke. We taught him the week before and he explained how difficult it is for him to go to church--it seriously is. He didn't come last week. But on Tuesday we visited him with some other sisters that we were on splits with and we read from Alma 33 and also applied some of the new trainings from Presidnet Malit about inviting people to church. I asked him then if he wanted a priesthood blessing to help him have the strength and energy and endurance to get to church and he said yes. So we scheduled one for Saturday. The elders came with us on Saturday and gave him a great blessing and then we taught him a lesson. he told me he remembered the lesson i had taught him on Tuesday. That made me happy. :) He went to church on Sunday! :)
Junie. Junie is awesome and hilarious and I love him but he is oh so frustrating!!! He is 56 and has a lot of questions and opinions and some strange ideas, but we laugh a lot in our lessons and have a blast. He brings snacks too. We actually had a realllllly intense lesson on Friday. I started crying. Embarressing. But it was during the prayer, so maybe he didn't notice. He did not come to church..:( that one hurt lots. But we are not giving up on him!!!
okay, I am out of time but it was a great week and there were many other high lights and miracles, so hopefully someday I'll be able to explain them all!
Life is SO good and we are so happy!
Joey got baptized on Saturday!! He was supposed to drive to S. Leyte for work , but the seminar was cancelled!! AND, its because sister jones and I prayed and prayed that it would be cancelled so he could get baptized and it was! I love miracles!!
Transfers are next week. We are hoping to stay here until our time is done on the mission. So lets all pray for that! We are now working in our area and having sisters come work with us so we get to focus on our investigators again, and it feels so good!
We had a goal of 25 new investigators this past week and we got 17! So that is good, but this week we will do better. We are so excited to watch general conference this weekend! When is easter??? this week??
Love you all so much! I pray for you all every day!!
Aaron, Andru, Jarrett, Dad, Luke, Josh, Marilee, Kerry--what EXACT mission did you serve in???
cONGRATS TO SISTER LEMMON AKA CAMI !! She was proposed to last week and she had a great birthday!
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
I am so sorry I didn't get to email last week. The day just passed us right by! We didn't get to email president malit either and he texted us and said, "i missed your email." SO sorry everyone! Anyways, I can't remember too much from last week, but I did want to tell you all that Mildred and her boys surprised me and came to Tacloban for church. After the sacrament prayer, I heard, "Sister Blonquist!" And It was little JV with a big grin on his face. Mildred and her two boys are taking care of her cousins house in tacloban for a month or so while they are in Vietnam or something... Which was perfect timing for Mildred b/c things were getting really really difficult. She is trying to make a living making food and selling it (which is extremely difficult over w here she is) and scalding hot water fell on her early in the morning one day and practically put her into shock and she couldn't do anything. It was really bad. All down her leg and foot. The Branch President ended up giving her the branch budget to help her get medicine. They ran out of food and things were really bad and she couldn't do much.....but then her cousin said he wanted her and her boys to come to Tacloban and stay with them and then watch their house while they are gone. The boys are sooooo excited and love it and they get to eat all the rice they want! I was so happy to be with Mildred that Sunday. She is doing so well and just kept telling me alll the blessings since she became a member. I thought while I was in Dagami that I wanted to give her my CTR ring, but things got crazy with my neck and I forgot. So right there in RS I gave it to her. It was perfect gift for her and perfect rememberence from me. I love that ring! Its the one mom and dad gave me the august before I left for college. Loved it soooo much. So it meant a lot to give it to Mildred and I am so so happy I did and it fit her and everything. So that was the high light I would have shared last week...
Now. This incredible week! A week of miracles and fun times! It rained a lot , but the flooding seems to be subsided now. I only had to wear my rain boots one time. Oh, and they rubbed my legs so bad I have this ring around both legs and they were bleeding and scabbing and everyone asks about it and freaks out about it. Embarrasing. But funny also. Anyways, I love fasting! Fasting always always equals MIRACLES for me and I am so grateful for this small opportunity to sacrifice and allow my spiritual side to guide me in all ways.
On Wednesday Sister Jones and I woke up at 3am to do our studies b/c we wanted to start cooking at 8am. We had a 3 elder birthday celebration we were cooking lunch for. It turned out awesome! We made enchiladas and apple crisp and had chips and salsa and ice cream and the elders creation of "tim tam slams." ( a cookie type cracker that you suck hot cocoa through...) Basta, it was a really fun time and a good bday lunch. We then both felt impressed that we had to visit our Ward Mission Leaders wife (they have been separated for 11 years) and her family. He told us about her at the beginning when we got here and there were days we tried to visit but it never worked out for some reason and it was all flooded recently. But Wednesday we were determined and knew the Spirit was telling us to go there. So, we went. We got there, not knowing what to expect. We met the mother in law-sister Maglana, and loved her immediately. Then her husband came home, and he was sooo incredible! We thought they would be hard hearted and not willing to go back to church, but they have strong testimonies and desires, but they are ashamed b/c they cannot pay their tithing. They showed us their salary and he is supposed to get 36,000 pesos per month in gross, but after everything is deducted, insurance, retirement, etc, he only receives 700 pesos!!! I literally don't know how they are can pay tithing! We had a great lessons with them that was totally guided by the spirit. Then during the lesson, their daughter, the wife of our Ward Mission Leader comes home from work and she sat down and listened and she included her in the lesson and switched our focus to her. I am so grateful for the Spirit. Everything came together perfectly and we committed them all to come back to church on Sunday. They were all ashamed and afraid and said they were not worthy to partake of the sacrament. Sister Myralee (the wife of our WML) has not been to church for 11 yrs and opening admitted some personal things to us and we all became fast friends and could feel the love and trust in the room. We talked about the sacrament and we talked about them going to the Bishop and discussing with him their situations. It was so good and they all promised to come to church. They also had a friend there who is now our new investigator! We had woken up Myralee's daughter, Jezlee, to come join the lesson and at the end she said, :that was worth being woken up. thank you so much." Sunday roles around and told them we would be at their house at 8:30am so we could all go together so they would not be afraid or ashamed. We got there at 8am. We read our scriptures as we waited for everyone to get ready. They have a multicab that we were going to take so at 8:40 we all get in and we are soooo excited to go and Myralee was there with her parents and our new investigator , Michelle, was there and we were ready to have a great day at church! THEN, the multicab would. not. start. Try after try....I was praying hard as was my comp. 8:45 now.... WE CANNOT BE LATE!!!! I look at the little daughter and said , okay you have to pray for us to get to church on time. So she did. The multicab did not start, so the driver left to go find another multicab. 8:55 he shows up with another multicab and we pile in quickly. they are getting scared b/c we are late for church and they are already nervous to go. (its been over a year for the maglana family, and 11 years for myralee...) But we get there by 9:08 ish and the bishop is confirming our recent converts. I led the way as the family entered into the chapel and we sat behind President Malit and his family! OH it was such a great Sunday! Everyone in the ward was SHOCKED AND SO happy to see this family! They couldn't believe it!
Ohhh, i'm out of time! Also, Brother Depaz is a member that we have been teaching and trying to get back to church, but he is paralyzed on one side due to a stroke. We taught him the week before and he explained how difficult it is for him to go to church--it seriously is. He didn't come last week. But on Tuesday we visited him with some other sisters that we were on splits with and we read from Alma 33 and also applied some of the new trainings from Presidnet Malit about inviting people to church. I asked him then if he wanted a priesthood blessing to help him have the strength and energy and endurance to get to church and he said yes. So we scheduled one for Saturday. The elders came with us on Saturday and gave him a great blessing and then we taught him a lesson. he told me he remembered the lesson i had taught him on Tuesday. That made me happy. :) He went to church on Sunday! :)
Junie. Junie is awesome and hilarious and I love him but he is oh so frustrating!!! He is 56 and has a lot of questions and opinions and some strange ideas, but we laugh a lot in our lessons and have a blast. He brings snacks too. We actually had a realllllly intense lesson on Friday. I started crying. Embarressing. But it was during the prayer, so maybe he didn't notice. He did not come to church..:( that one hurt lots. But we are not giving up on him!!!
okay, I am out of time but it was a great week and there were many other high lights and miracles, so hopefully someday I'll be able to explain them all!
Life is SO good and we are so happy!
Joey got baptized on Saturday!! He was supposed to drive to S. Leyte for work , but the seminar was cancelled!! AND, its because sister jones and I prayed and prayed that it would be cancelled so he could get baptized and it was! I love miracles!!
Transfers are next week. We are hoping to stay here until our time is done on the mission. So lets all pray for that! We are now working in our area and having sisters come work with us so we get to focus on our investigators again, and it feels so good!
We had a goal of 25 new investigators this past week and we got 17! So that is good, but this week we will do better. We are so excited to watch general conference this weekend! When is easter??? this week??
Love you all so much! I pray for you all every day!!
Aaron, Andru, Jarrett, Dad, Luke, Josh, Marilee, Kerry--what EXACT mission did you serve in???
cONGRATS TO SISTER LEMMON AKA CAMI !! She was proposed to last week and she had a great birthday!
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, March 21, 2011
3.21.11 FLOODING
Maupay nga Kulop mga sangkay ngan pamilya nakon!
HI.
This week has been insane. I have never. ever. seen. this. much. rain. It literally rained every single day, all day long. It wasn't just pouring for a little bit, then drizzle, then pour...It was intense, extreme rain. I thought last Saturday was bad with the flooding in our area, but it was nothing like this week. Our apartment was fine, no worries, but outside of our apartment is an internet cafe area and tindahan and then the road, and that was all flooded. Not just our area which floods often, but pretty much our whole mission was flooded. In and near Tacloban there were reports of landslides and flash flooding. In our area it was got higher than a meter in a couple subdivisions. People were evacuated, including our Relief Society President. We were walking everywhere in water past our knees. I bought rain boots, but then the water was above that, so it only was helpful the days when the water went down a bit. Not only was it flooded but it also would not stop raining so while we were trudging through the flood we were getting soaked. All week long. It was awesome. We seriously almost bought a raft. People did actually make make-shift boats and were paddling around or getting there kids from place to place. The elders had to go bring relief goods to a member in the middle of the jungle and road on someones boat. They said that the water was at least 5 feet deep. On Saturday we got to help the relief society organize and deliver relief goods to members. So, needless to say we didn't do a lot of teaching in all the crazy rain and flooding, but we helped a little bit. Oh also the night it was really bad we were on our way to contact an old investigator and both felt like we needed to go to the Bishops house. We got there and the water was just barely starting to creep into their house. We helped them move things upstairs of the vacant apartment that we almost moved into... By the time we were done 20-30 minutes, there was 2 inches of water already.
A lot of people were effected and everyone is talking about the calamity...and members of the church keep talking about the last days.
Our investigator Joey will be baptized April 1. He is awesome and doing well, except he fell from fixing something in the ceiling and we think he broke his heal! Keep him in your prayers please. He is in a lot of pain, but still came to church and has a great attitude.
We have another investigator, Junie who cracks me up. I really like him a lot. We taught him one time last week and discussed the restoration and focused on authority and living prophets. Yesterday we were able to teach him again. He said that when he read the Book of Mormon it confused him so he shut the book. He said he searched the Bible and found scriptures that said don't add anything to the Bible. We discussed that and some of his other concerns and then read 2Nephi 32. It was a perfect chapter for him; all about praying and reading the scriptures. We discovered his real concern--he wouldn't pray to know if Joseph Smith was a true prophet. We had a great lesson and he is really funny and makes us laugh. At the beginning of the lesson he said he couldn't promise to read or pray or anything and wasn't open to it. But in 2 Nephi 32 it talks about the people who are closed to the truth. He talked about his family and his neighbors that are "closed" b/c they are Catholic and they don't give anything else a chance. I then looked at him and said, Didn't you just tell us you closed the Book of Mormon and wouldn't read it? He understood and started laughing. By the end of the lesson he said he would read and he would pray. The Spirit was strong and he did ask Heavenly Father in the closing prayer if the book was true and if Joseph Smith was a true prophet. I felt the Spirit very strongly. I think he did too. He said he still had doubts , but he would read. I keep praying that he will start reading the Book of Mormon and not be able to put it down. If people would only give this book a chance!
HEY HAPPY BIRTHDAY YESTERDAY MOSSY MAGS!
We got an oven! Us and another set of sisters in the mission are the only ones with ovens! SO, we made enchiladas for our office lunch on Sunday. AMAZING. Mexican food is sorely missed here. IT WAS SO GOOD. And expensive to make, but worth it.
My back pain is off and on, but still there. It was pretty bad this past week and even now. I wonder if the rain has anything to do with that??
Basta, life is wonderful. Oh, my scripture of the week was Doctrine and covenants 66:3. All about being better and better through repentance and the atonement of Jesus Christ.
OH! And one of the new office elders--filipino--learning how to drive, drove the mission van into the grass/jungle on the side of the office. Really bad. They couldn't get it out and even had rescue team come. It was hilarious and had to sit there overnight until they brought in a crane. Poor elder. He was so scared/ embarrassed. Then when President showed up he looked at him and President giggled and gave him a thumbs up! Haha. :) He is taking a little break from learning how to drive for a while.
Well, we are moved in and loving our new apartment.
Thanks for all you support and prayers!
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
HI.
This week has been insane. I have never. ever. seen. this. much. rain. It literally rained every single day, all day long. It wasn't just pouring for a little bit, then drizzle, then pour...It was intense, extreme rain. I thought last Saturday was bad with the flooding in our area, but it was nothing like this week. Our apartment was fine, no worries, but outside of our apartment is an internet cafe area and tindahan and then the road, and that was all flooded. Not just our area which floods often, but pretty much our whole mission was flooded. In and near Tacloban there were reports of landslides and flash flooding. In our area it was got higher than a meter in a couple subdivisions. People were evacuated, including our Relief Society President. We were walking everywhere in water past our knees. I bought rain boots, but then the water was above that, so it only was helpful the days when the water went down a bit. Not only was it flooded but it also would not stop raining so while we were trudging through the flood we were getting soaked. All week long. It was awesome. We seriously almost bought a raft. People did actually make make-shift boats and were paddling around or getting there kids from place to place. The elders had to go bring relief goods to a member in the middle of the jungle and road on someones boat. They said that the water was at least 5 feet deep. On Saturday we got to help the relief society organize and deliver relief goods to members. So, needless to say we didn't do a lot of teaching in all the crazy rain and flooding, but we helped a little bit. Oh also the night it was really bad we were on our way to contact an old investigator and both felt like we needed to go to the Bishops house. We got there and the water was just barely starting to creep into their house. We helped them move things upstairs of the vacant apartment that we almost moved into... By the time we were done 20-30 minutes, there was 2 inches of water already.
A lot of people were effected and everyone is talking about the calamity...and members of the church keep talking about the last days.
Our investigator Joey will be baptized April 1. He is awesome and doing well, except he fell from fixing something in the ceiling and we think he broke his heal! Keep him in your prayers please. He is in a lot of pain, but still came to church and has a great attitude.
We have another investigator, Junie who cracks me up. I really like him a lot. We taught him one time last week and discussed the restoration and focused on authority and living prophets. Yesterday we were able to teach him again. He said that when he read the Book of Mormon it confused him so he shut the book. He said he searched the Bible and found scriptures that said don't add anything to the Bible. We discussed that and some of his other concerns and then read 2Nephi 32. It was a perfect chapter for him; all about praying and reading the scriptures. We discovered his real concern--he wouldn't pray to know if Joseph Smith was a true prophet. We had a great lesson and he is really funny and makes us laugh. At the beginning of the lesson he said he couldn't promise to read or pray or anything and wasn't open to it. But in 2 Nephi 32 it talks about the people who are closed to the truth. He talked about his family and his neighbors that are "closed" b/c they are Catholic and they don't give anything else a chance. I then looked at him and said, Didn't you just tell us you closed the Book of Mormon and wouldn't read it? He understood and started laughing. By the end of the lesson he said he would read and he would pray. The Spirit was strong and he did ask Heavenly Father in the closing prayer if the book was true and if Joseph Smith was a true prophet. I felt the Spirit very strongly. I think he did too. He said he still had doubts , but he would read. I keep praying that he will start reading the Book of Mormon and not be able to put it down. If people would only give this book a chance!
HEY HAPPY BIRTHDAY YESTERDAY MOSSY MAGS!
We got an oven! Us and another set of sisters in the mission are the only ones with ovens! SO, we made enchiladas for our office lunch on Sunday. AMAZING. Mexican food is sorely missed here. IT WAS SO GOOD. And expensive to make, but worth it.
My back pain is off and on, but still there. It was pretty bad this past week and even now. I wonder if the rain has anything to do with that??
Basta, life is wonderful. Oh, my scripture of the week was Doctrine and covenants 66:3. All about being better and better through repentance and the atonement of Jesus Christ.
OH! And one of the new office elders--filipino--learning how to drive, drove the mission van into the grass/jungle on the side of the office. Really bad. They couldn't get it out and even had rescue team come. It was hilarious and had to sit there overnight until they brought in a crane. Poor elder. He was so scared/ embarrassed. Then when President showed up he looked at him and President giggled and gave him a thumbs up! Haha. :) He is taking a little break from learning how to drive for a while.
Well, we are moved in and loving our new apartment.
Thanks for all you support and prayers!
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, March 14, 2011
3.14.11
Hey Fam!
A few fun highlights of my past week:
the word Tori in waraywaray means ----circumcise. awesome. thanks for that urs and noel. Glad no one here knows my first name! :)
I got the LARGE package that went to the netherlands and back! Everything was awesome and I was so happy! thank you thank you thank you! It was like christmas all over again!
One night this week as we were walking back from our appointments sister jones shared with me her thoughts about "Munchies." If you don't know what those are, they are a delicious assortment of chips--doritoes, cheetos, sunchips, pretzels. She proceeded to tell me her theory as to why it is the best chip bag of all existence. I agreed. One main reason is that this bag of chips brings you on a journey of your life time. It takes you through all phases of life....for example: the cheeto-childhood. what kid has not had cheeto fingers??? the dorito--middle school age. you know you are a cool kid when you have doritos. youre too old for the cheetos now... then sunchips--a little more health conscience...high school/college. pretzel--older phase/ any phase. Everyone loves pretzels. You cannot go wrong! Well, basta, we talked for almost 30 min about our love for munchies. And then we went home to tanauan and told the sisters about it. They were convinced it is the best bag ever.
THE NEXT MORNING...we walk into the office and there is a large manila like envelope with our names on it on our desks. We realized it was presidents handwriting and opened it immediately...and guess what we found..............MUNCHIES.
I AM NOT EVEN KIDDING HE IS THE MOST INSPIRED MAN ON EARTH. !!!! Well, then there was a note inside that said, " in this pack you will find the pretzels you have been looking for. (i think)." I had told President over a month ago on our trip back from Catarman how much I loved pretzels and there were none in the Philippines. I couldn't believe it. We were so happy. Food makes me soooo happy!! Some things never change...
THEN! Last week some of the elders kept saying to us, "Something good is coming your way. Be excited." We didn't get it...Then today we come back from lunch and on our desk is a whole pan of peach cobbler that they had made for us!! As sister dustin would say, " You're like a man. They way to your heart is through your stomach. " True. :) They elders are so nice! They said it was their thanks for all we do and all the snacks/treats we always make them. Love those random acts of kindness!
So this week was hilarious. We got punted and punted and punted again. We loved working in our area, but it is hard work starting from scratch. But, thats what we did in Dagami, so its fine. :) We've met some pretty interesting people and we weren't sure if we should move forward with them or not...
Oh! Sorry this is jumbled. Two days ago I was struggling a bit and having a nice conversation with Heavenly Father. My struggling had to do with the language....its epically difficult. (Our Ward mission leader served here years ago and he said it took him 3 years to learn warywaray!! and 3 months to learn cebuano...he is a filipino from manila...so that made me feel a bit better...) Basta, I had a rough night and I had the thought that I should wake up at a certain time (real early) and study the language every day for the rest of my mission... I was praying and told Heavenly Father that if He too agreed with my plan please wake me up at that said time the next morning. ( I didn't have my alarm set that early.) I went to sleep.
Then randomly in practically the middle of the night I woke up at that time and I knew Heavenly Father was okay with my plan and was ready to bless me for the extra effort and sacrifice I was willing to put forth. SO, heres to the last phase of the mission really working hard with this language and everythingggggg else! :) Pretty cool story though, right? I know this is what i'm supposed to do.
So. We didn't have a tsunami, but we were on a level 2 alert for one meter high wave. Instead of that we got rain and tons of flooding. Our area is known for how flooded it gets. Our area has 6 phases and extensions and phase two is often referred to as phase "Tubig" (tubig=water in waray). Basta we had appointments in the morning so we ventured out. DRenched. Completely drenched to the bone. We were walking in water up to our knees. AFter our appointments we had to change and hang out clothes in the office in front of the fans/aircon.
We had some really great lessons and we have an awesome investigator--Joey! He is getting baptized april 1. He is totally and completely prepared. Everything makes sense to him. He is 52 years old and a referral from a great member. We just love him and he knows that this is his time to change and find purpose in his life. He told us he wanted a peace of mind and we were reading from the word of wisdom pamphlet the other day with him and that is a specific blessing from keeping the word of wisdom. It was really neat when he read that.
We also talked to a teacher last night who teaches bible as literature. He and his students have lots of questions about mormons and lds so we got to sit and talk with him. It was really fun to answer his questions. He is very respectful of our beliefs and interested in learning the truth about the mormons. I liked him a lot and i'm hoping to teach him again.
We go to balaquid this week for leadership training meetings and then we stay in balaquid and work! I'm going back to my first area! I'm excited but a bit nervous! haha.
well, i hope all is well!
love you all!
love , your missionary,
sister b.
ps--we are moving into our new apartment! its brand new and awesome and it all fell into place! what a perfect answer to our prayers! we are so excited to work work work and live in our area! no more traveling for 3 hours a day with creepy old men on the jeepny! (oh i didn't explain about that story, but it was ridiculous! ) :)
A few fun highlights of my past week:
the word Tori in waraywaray means ----circumcise. awesome. thanks for that urs and noel. Glad no one here knows my first name! :)
I got the LARGE package that went to the netherlands and back! Everything was awesome and I was so happy! thank you thank you thank you! It was like christmas all over again!
One night this week as we were walking back from our appointments sister jones shared with me her thoughts about "Munchies." If you don't know what those are, they are a delicious assortment of chips--doritoes, cheetos, sunchips, pretzels. She proceeded to tell me her theory as to why it is the best chip bag of all existence. I agreed. One main reason is that this bag of chips brings you on a journey of your life time. It takes you through all phases of life....for example: the cheeto-childhood. what kid has not had cheeto fingers??? the dorito--middle school age. you know you are a cool kid when you have doritos. youre too old for the cheetos now... then sunchips--a little more health conscience...high school/college. pretzel--older phase/ any phase. Everyone loves pretzels. You cannot go wrong! Well, basta, we talked for almost 30 min about our love for munchies. And then we went home to tanauan and told the sisters about it. They were convinced it is the best bag ever.
THE NEXT MORNING...we walk into the office and there is a large manila like envelope with our names on it on our desks. We realized it was presidents handwriting and opened it immediately...and guess what we found..............MUNCHIES.
I AM NOT EVEN KIDDING HE IS THE MOST INSPIRED MAN ON EARTH. !!!! Well, then there was a note inside that said, " in this pack you will find the pretzels you have been looking for. (i think)." I had told President over a month ago on our trip back from Catarman how much I loved pretzels and there were none in the Philippines. I couldn't believe it. We were so happy. Food makes me soooo happy!! Some things never change...
THEN! Last week some of the elders kept saying to us, "Something good is coming your way. Be excited." We didn't get it...Then today we come back from lunch and on our desk is a whole pan of peach cobbler that they had made for us!! As sister dustin would say, " You're like a man. They way to your heart is through your stomach. " True. :) They elders are so nice! They said it was their thanks for all we do and all the snacks/treats we always make them. Love those random acts of kindness!
So this week was hilarious. We got punted and punted and punted again. We loved working in our area, but it is hard work starting from scratch. But, thats what we did in Dagami, so its fine. :) We've met some pretty interesting people and we weren't sure if we should move forward with them or not...
Oh! Sorry this is jumbled. Two days ago I was struggling a bit and having a nice conversation with Heavenly Father. My struggling had to do with the language....its epically difficult. (Our Ward mission leader served here years ago and he said it took him 3 years to learn warywaray!! and 3 months to learn cebuano...he is a filipino from manila...so that made me feel a bit better...) Basta, I had a rough night and I had the thought that I should wake up at a certain time (real early) and study the language every day for the rest of my mission... I was praying and told Heavenly Father that if He too agreed with my plan please wake me up at that said time the next morning. ( I didn't have my alarm set that early.) I went to sleep.
Then randomly in practically the middle of the night I woke up at that time and I knew Heavenly Father was okay with my plan and was ready to bless me for the extra effort and sacrifice I was willing to put forth. SO, heres to the last phase of the mission really working hard with this language and everythingggggg else! :) Pretty cool story though, right? I know this is what i'm supposed to do.
So. We didn't have a tsunami, but we were on a level 2 alert for one meter high wave. Instead of that we got rain and tons of flooding. Our area is known for how flooded it gets. Our area has 6 phases and extensions and phase two is often referred to as phase "Tubig" (tubig=water in waray). Basta we had appointments in the morning so we ventured out. DRenched. Completely drenched to the bone. We were walking in water up to our knees. AFter our appointments we had to change and hang out clothes in the office in front of the fans/aircon.
We had some really great lessons and we have an awesome investigator--Joey! He is getting baptized april 1. He is totally and completely prepared. Everything makes sense to him. He is 52 years old and a referral from a great member. We just love him and he knows that this is his time to change and find purpose in his life. He told us he wanted a peace of mind and we were reading from the word of wisdom pamphlet the other day with him and that is a specific blessing from keeping the word of wisdom. It was really neat when he read that.
We also talked to a teacher last night who teaches bible as literature. He and his students have lots of questions about mormons and lds so we got to sit and talk with him. It was really fun to answer his questions. He is very respectful of our beliefs and interested in learning the truth about the mormons. I liked him a lot and i'm hoping to teach him again.
We go to balaquid this week for leadership training meetings and then we stay in balaquid and work! I'm going back to my first area! I'm excited but a bit nervous! haha.
well, i hope all is well!
love you all!
love , your missionary,
sister b.
ps--we are moving into our new apartment! its brand new and awesome and it all fell into place! what a perfect answer to our prayers! we are so excited to work work work and live in our area! no more traveling for 3 hours a day with creepy old men on the jeepny! (oh i didn't explain about that story, but it was ridiculous! ) :)
Monday, March 7, 2011
3.7.11
Hello Family!
This week was transfer week! This week was also our first week focused
in our area! It was a great week and we didn't get transferred so now
that most of all the traveling is done throughout the mission we can
bring sisters here to work with us!
This week Sister Brinton worked with us. It was great to have my anak
back for a little bit. I am so proud of her! Sister Jones, Sister
Brinton, and I all worked together and we liked our threesome. We were
able to teach some great people and the Spirit was strong. We had one
really good lesson with some new investigators that I am excited
about. Aiza, Teresa, Marene.
On Wednesday we spent the whole day finding and contacting. Sister
BRinton was with Sister Jones and I was with a 13 year old ward
missionary. It was awesome. We met a lot of people and set some
appointments. At the end of the day I noticed the 13 year old
(thadda), saying Hi Po, good afternoon Po, Kamusta Po, to everyone and
I finally noticed and looked at her and asked if she knew them...cause
the way she said it made it sound like she did...She said nope! I'm
just being like you! I'm going to serve a mission too and I'm just
being friendly, like you! She also said Sister Brinton was Taylor
Swift, I was Britney Spears, and Sister Jones was Lady Gagga. . .
yeah. Haha. Basta, while contacting with her we found a lady and her
daughter, Ana Liza and Ana Shienobo. Ana Shienobo's nickname is
Shitchan. Yes, seriously. I can never say it without dying of laughter
and feeling like i'm swearing so i always have to say her full name.
Basta, we taught them and her mom said that when she saw me on the
street it reminded her of a dream she had about heaven and angels and
that there was a big gate and a key to get in and all she wants is to
go there and the angels looked like me and there was lots of gold. It
was kinda creepy and kinda cool. Thadda thinks she's crazy, but I kind
of liked her despite some other weird things she mentioned. Sister
Jones and I went back to them on Friday, but only Ana Shienobo was
there. We talked with her and then after the lesson she asked us for
money...awkward. Then we left after telling her we couldn't give her
any, and the neighborhood kids asked us why we were friends with her
b/c she is s stealer....hmmmm. The next day we taught her and her mom
and I felt like we needed to focus on repentance and used a stealing
analogy... I like them, but at the same time there is a weird type of
feeling there sometimes. We are not sure about their intentions and we
are trying to figure that out. At the end of the lesson ana shienobo
seemed to be trying to get her mom to ask us something, but her mom
told her to be quiet.... Again, not sure how we feel kay we want to
give them the benefit of the doubt, but we sometimes think the spirit
might be telling us something else.
Basta, on Saturday we went to a mans house that Sister Brinton and
Sister Jones had contacted. He is a die hard Roman Catholic and I
loved him! He barely let us get a word in , but he fascinated me. Then
when we were able to talk he finally said that he was impressed with
what we had to say and it made more sense than he thought it would. So
that was good. He said he never will talk to missionaries about
religion b/c it always turns into fighting but with us he decided to.
He wouldn't pray to ask God if through Joseph Smith the priesthood was
restored, so I closed with a prayer in stead. It got pretty intense.
We asked when we could follow up with him and he said why would you do
that?! I said, b/c you are important and we love you! He said the
complaint about the mormon missionaries is we are too insistent. I
said we don't give up b/c this is the truth. Sister Jones and i left
and couldn't talk for about a block. It was a very intense lesson. He
was prepared, but he refused to partake of the truth.
Yesterday was even more ridiculous. I am out of time but we had plans
to teach another lady Sister Jones and Sister Brinton had contacted.
We walked in and she was good, but her husband was a little insane. He
started yelling at us b/c there is an age limit for men to serve
missions 19-26 and said that was wrong b/c joseph smith was a prophet
when he was 30. We explained to him calmly why it was this way, but he
wouldn't listen. He then went off about how he wanted three families
to multiply and replenish the earth (his wife got ticked, and we felt
thoroughly uncomfortable...). He was loud and would never listen.
sister Jones was not okay with that. She asked him to sit down so we
could talk. He did not like her. I acted as the mediator. IT got
REALLY intense. I have no time to write about it!
But, it was fun! Life is good. I am happy and healthy! Sorry I am
early to the internet, it costs more after 3pm so now we go just right
after lunch.
I love my Savior, and I love being HIs missionary. I love recommitting
myself everyday when I remember the phrase, " I Belong To God!"
Hope all is well back home!
Katie and Luke, how's the basement?!?!? You all are in my prayers.
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
This week was transfer week! This week was also our first week focused
in our area! It was a great week and we didn't get transferred so now
that most of all the traveling is done throughout the mission we can
bring sisters here to work with us!
This week Sister Brinton worked with us. It was great to have my anak
back for a little bit. I am so proud of her! Sister Jones, Sister
Brinton, and I all worked together and we liked our threesome. We were
able to teach some great people and the Spirit was strong. We had one
really good lesson with some new investigators that I am excited
about. Aiza, Teresa, Marene.
On Wednesday we spent the whole day finding and contacting. Sister
BRinton was with Sister Jones and I was with a 13 year old ward
missionary. It was awesome. We met a lot of people and set some
appointments. At the end of the day I noticed the 13 year old
(thadda), saying Hi Po, good afternoon Po, Kamusta Po, to everyone and
I finally noticed and looked at her and asked if she knew them...cause
the way she said it made it sound like she did...She said nope! I'm
just being like you! I'm going to serve a mission too and I'm just
being friendly, like you! She also said Sister Brinton was Taylor
Swift, I was Britney Spears, and Sister Jones was Lady Gagga. . .
yeah. Haha. Basta, while contacting with her we found a lady and her
daughter, Ana Liza and Ana Shienobo. Ana Shienobo's nickname is
Shitchan. Yes, seriously. I can never say it without dying of laughter
and feeling like i'm swearing so i always have to say her full name.
Basta, we taught them and her mom said that when she saw me on the
street it reminded her of a dream she had about heaven and angels and
that there was a big gate and a key to get in and all she wants is to
go there and the angels looked like me and there was lots of gold. It
was kinda creepy and kinda cool. Thadda thinks she's crazy, but I kind
of liked her despite some other weird things she mentioned. Sister
Jones and I went back to them on Friday, but only Ana Shienobo was
there. We talked with her and then after the lesson she asked us for
money...awkward. Then we left after telling her we couldn't give her
any, and the neighborhood kids asked us why we were friends with her
b/c she is s stealer....hmmmm. The next day we taught her and her mom
and I felt like we needed to focus on repentance and used a stealing
analogy... I like them, but at the same time there is a weird type of
feeling there sometimes. We are not sure about their intentions and we
are trying to figure that out. At the end of the lesson ana shienobo
seemed to be trying to get her mom to ask us something, but her mom
told her to be quiet.... Again, not sure how we feel kay we want to
give them the benefit of the doubt, but we sometimes think the spirit
might be telling us something else.
Basta, on Saturday we went to a mans house that Sister Brinton and
Sister Jones had contacted. He is a die hard Roman Catholic and I
loved him! He barely let us get a word in , but he fascinated me. Then
when we were able to talk he finally said that he was impressed with
what we had to say and it made more sense than he thought it would. So
that was good. He said he never will talk to missionaries about
religion b/c it always turns into fighting but with us he decided to.
He wouldn't pray to ask God if through Joseph Smith the priesthood was
restored, so I closed with a prayer in stead. It got pretty intense.
We asked when we could follow up with him and he said why would you do
that?! I said, b/c you are important and we love you! He said the
complaint about the mormon missionaries is we are too insistent. I
said we don't give up b/c this is the truth. Sister Jones and i left
and couldn't talk for about a block. It was a very intense lesson. He
was prepared, but he refused to partake of the truth.
Yesterday was even more ridiculous. I am out of time but we had plans
to teach another lady Sister Jones and Sister Brinton had contacted.
We walked in and she was good, but her husband was a little insane. He
started yelling at us b/c there is an age limit for men to serve
missions 19-26 and said that was wrong b/c joseph smith was a prophet
when he was 30. We explained to him calmly why it was this way, but he
wouldn't listen. He then went off about how he wanted three families
to multiply and replenish the earth (his wife got ticked, and we felt
thoroughly uncomfortable...). He was loud and would never listen.
sister Jones was not okay with that. She asked him to sit down so we
could talk. He did not like her. I acted as the mediator. IT got
REALLY intense. I have no time to write about it!
But, it was fun! Life is good. I am happy and healthy! Sorry I am
early to the internet, it costs more after 3pm so now we go just right
after lunch.
I love my Savior, and I love being HIs missionary. I love recommitting
myself everyday when I remember the phrase, " I Belong To God!"
Hope all is well back home!
Katie and Luke, how's the basement?!?!? You all are in my prayers.
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, February 14, 2011
2.14.11
Hello Fam,
Looks like I must have come early to the internet cause I only got an email from Katie today. That's cool, no worries. I tried to email jarrett, and kerry and both have come back so maybe something is wrong with myldsmail?? Or you're blocking my emails....:)
well, this week was great and busy! We worked in Tanauan and had a blast with the sisters there. Its beautiful and right on the ocean. We then traveled to Southern Leyte to Sogod zone and worked with Sister Jone's follow up trainer, Sister Borroca and her new trainee. We got to see our batch, Elder Nelson there as well. It is Cebuano J down there so instead of Maayo--its Maajo. Threw me for a loop. I can't understand Cebuano very well anymore either. But it was a fun time. I love going to new areas. It's kind of refreshing. It has its up and downs b/c you work with the people and love them but then you have to leave after a day or so. We then traveled to Maasin zone and worked with Sister Ghouri (she is from Pakistan, got here in December) and Sister Jayson. We were in Hilongos (Sister Lemmon's second area i believe) and I fell in love with that place and the people there. Seriously. I love being a missionary and I had an incredible day. After lunch we went to this bed ridden sister. She can't talk anymore and her left eye has some sort of disease and she was clearly in a lot of pain. We started our lesson by singing, Israel, Israel, God is Calling...(a new favorite by the way) and tears just began streaming down her face. I felt a deep sense of love for her. I found myself turning to Alma 38 and sharing with her that I know she has endured a lot of pain, but God is pleased with her. She will be lifted up at the last day and God is aware of all she is enduring. It was a very tender lesson. The Spirit was very strong and I loved her as I knew my Savior did. I truly felt like his representative. All the lessons that day were unique and powerful and special. I will not forget Hilongos. After all our lessons were done we walked home and Sister Ghouri wanted me to meet her Pakistani friend who lived by them. I was tired but said okay. His name is Tony and he's lived by the missionaries for years and they've tried to teach him for years as well. He is probably in his 30s or 40s. We became fast friends. I seriously felt like I was talking to my best friend. We talked for almost an hour and a half about everything . He is Hindu and I was fascinated by his beliefs and his understanding about faith and God. We talked about Gods nature, His plan, the restoration, Jesus Christ, Joseph Smith, temples, word of wisdom, organized religion etc. And more than anything else, I know he felt that I was his friend and I cared about him. ITs amazing how Charity works and how Heavenly Father truly allows you to see and serve His children how He would. Being a missionary is such a sacred, special calling. I hope I get to see Tony again some day. He made a big impact on me.
We got to attend the world wide leadership training and I really enjoyed that as well. We had a 3 hour drive home (luckily with the other assistants) and made it back in time for a baptism for the other elders in our ward. This past week flew by as I'm sure this week will too. We have Zone conference and then we travel to Ormoc for three days.
Life is wonderful and time is flying by.
Please pray that we will find an apartment in Tacloban this week! We really need one if we want to build up the area around the chapel. Please, please pray for that! Thanks. :)
Well, hope all is well at home and HAPPY VALENTINES DAY.
And happy birthday to Becca Ann Hall on the 17th!
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Looks like I must have come early to the internet cause I only got an email from Katie today. That's cool, no worries. I tried to email jarrett, and kerry and both have come back so maybe something is wrong with myldsmail?? Or you're blocking my emails....:)
well, this week was great and busy! We worked in Tanauan and had a blast with the sisters there. Its beautiful and right on the ocean. We then traveled to Southern Leyte to Sogod zone and worked with Sister Jone's follow up trainer, Sister Borroca and her new trainee. We got to see our batch, Elder Nelson there as well. It is Cebuano J down there so instead of Maayo--its Maajo. Threw me for a loop. I can't understand Cebuano very well anymore either. But it was a fun time. I love going to new areas. It's kind of refreshing. It has its up and downs b/c you work with the people and love them but then you have to leave after a day or so. We then traveled to Maasin zone and worked with Sister Ghouri (she is from Pakistan, got here in December) and Sister Jayson. We were in Hilongos (Sister Lemmon's second area i believe) and I fell in love with that place and the people there. Seriously. I love being a missionary and I had an incredible day. After lunch we went to this bed ridden sister. She can't talk anymore and her left eye has some sort of disease and she was clearly in a lot of pain. We started our lesson by singing, Israel, Israel, God is Calling...(a new favorite by the way) and tears just began streaming down her face. I felt a deep sense of love for her. I found myself turning to Alma 38 and sharing with her that I know she has endured a lot of pain, but God is pleased with her. She will be lifted up at the last day and God is aware of all she is enduring. It was a very tender lesson. The Spirit was very strong and I loved her as I knew my Savior did. I truly felt like his representative. All the lessons that day were unique and powerful and special. I will not forget Hilongos. After all our lessons were done we walked home and Sister Ghouri wanted me to meet her Pakistani friend who lived by them. I was tired but said okay. His name is Tony and he's lived by the missionaries for years and they've tried to teach him for years as well. He is probably in his 30s or 40s. We became fast friends. I seriously felt like I was talking to my best friend. We talked for almost an hour and a half about everything . He is Hindu and I was fascinated by his beliefs and his understanding about faith and God. We talked about Gods nature, His plan, the restoration, Jesus Christ, Joseph Smith, temples, word of wisdom, organized religion etc. And more than anything else, I know he felt that I was his friend and I cared about him. ITs amazing how Charity works and how Heavenly Father truly allows you to see and serve His children how He would. Being a missionary is such a sacred, special calling. I hope I get to see Tony again some day. He made a big impact on me.
We got to attend the world wide leadership training and I really enjoyed that as well. We had a 3 hour drive home (luckily with the other assistants) and made it back in time for a baptism for the other elders in our ward. This past week flew by as I'm sure this week will too. We have Zone conference and then we travel to Ormoc for three days.
Life is wonderful and time is flying by.
Please pray that we will find an apartment in Tacloban this week! We really need one if we want to build up the area around the chapel. Please, please pray for that! Thanks. :)
Well, hope all is well at home and HAPPY VALENTINES DAY.
And happy birthday to Becca Ann Hall on the 17th!
Love, your missionary,
Sister B.
Monday, February 7, 2011
2.7.11 Stay to the truth
Hello Family,
This past week has been amazing and busy kaayo. I learned a lot and I'm grateful for Heavenly Father and how he teaches me new things every day. This week we had a great district meeting, or as we like to call them now, revelatory experience, and I learned about faith. I always liked the story from the bible about the father that brings in his son and asks the Savior to heal him. The Savior asks him if he believes. He says yes. . . and then he says, "Help thou my unbelief." My whole mission I have really tried to figure out faith. Especially how faith affects us and other people when everyone has their agency. Basta, I received some personal insight about faith. The father clearly took action and went to the Savior for his son to be healed. . .that is showing faith, right? But (in the movie finding faith in christ) it seems like Christ must have looked at him like he didn't really believe, and then the father said, Help Thou My Unbelief. Perhaps it is not just taking the action with faith, like the father did bringing his son, but I think we also must know in whom we have faith. The father must have realized who it was who was going to heal his son--our Savior and Redeemer. Once he realized that he was humble and meek and he understood more clearly that everything is according to His will. So faith is not just taking action, faith is knowing Christ and knowing He can do anything.
So, the question of the week slash my life--Do you know Christ?? How do you show your faith in Him, but also what do you do to know him?
Sister Jones and I worked in Dagami this week and had a blast! I just love those sisters. They are the best of the best. We then drove up to Catarman (samar) with the other assistants and spent a couple days with the sisters there. It was wonderful and I love them. They are great missionaries! Their area is right on the ocean up there and all the people just live on the sand. It rains constantly and daily and they had a brown out most of the time. Because it was raining (hard) the sand roads/paths were just rivers. It was a lot of fun! There was a leadership training there for the ZLs and DL so we were able to meet up with President and he took us home to Tacloban...thats about a 5-6 hour car drive with our mission president! :) He said you have your mission president for at least 4 hours, you can ask him anything! Haha, and we did. My first question was about his favorite surat..or topping for rice. And we talked about food to languages to his life and mission and about our missions and gospel questions. He's the best.
He texted us earlier this week about enduring to the end and how he sees it now as Stay to the Truth. I like this best and it translates better into waraywaray/cebuano/tagalog. I was reading 2 Nephi 9:18 and really was able to apply it to that. Our lives are full of 'enduring the crosses of the world', but if we stay to the truth, we will "inherit the kingdom of god" and our "joy will be full forever." He has prepared a glorious heavenly home for all of His children. He wants us to be happy now, and in the life to come. This is possible but we must stay to the truth. :)
Today I was also thinking about the Atonement a lot and realized how our Savior can heal our pains and emotional strife now on earth, but also only through the atonement all of our losses here on earth will be made up.
His plan is perfect! Learn of Him, learn of His Plan for you, and be happy. :) Life is so good!
Well, I love you all, I love being the Lord's missionary, and I love this gospel. The true church of Christ has been restored and there is no need to fear. Have faith in Him and all your dreams will come true! I am living proof of that.
Love you all!
Oh have you read the first presidency message this month? It's about missionary work! And the best quote ever DEFINITELY applies to my life.....
Quote of this phase of the mission by President Thomas S. Monson, " The Lord will shape the back to bear the burden placed upon it."
SO! Maybe the Lord is just reshaping me kay I have lots of things he needs me to do! :)
My back is good by the way. I am taking care of it. Could you send me thermacare for the neck, though?
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
ps. this week we needed president to unlock the mission office and we asked him if he could... he texted us back "Just call my name. and i'll be there." yes. just text me. "---we laughed lots and then made him krispy treats for his bday which was Feb. 6. :) he's awesome.
This past week has been amazing and busy kaayo. I learned a lot and I'm grateful for Heavenly Father and how he teaches me new things every day. This week we had a great district meeting, or as we like to call them now, revelatory experience, and I learned about faith. I always liked the story from the bible about the father that brings in his son and asks the Savior to heal him. The Savior asks him if he believes. He says yes. . . and then he says, "Help thou my unbelief." My whole mission I have really tried to figure out faith. Especially how faith affects us and other people when everyone has their agency. Basta, I received some personal insight about faith. The father clearly took action and went to the Savior for his son to be healed. . .that is showing faith, right? But (in the movie finding faith in christ) it seems like Christ must have looked at him like he didn't really believe, and then the father said, Help Thou My Unbelief. Perhaps it is not just taking the action with faith, like the father did bringing his son, but I think we also must know in whom we have faith. The father must have realized who it was who was going to heal his son--our Savior and Redeemer. Once he realized that he was humble and meek and he understood more clearly that everything is according to His will. So faith is not just taking action, faith is knowing Christ and knowing He can do anything.
So, the question of the week slash my life--Do you know Christ?? How do you show your faith in Him, but also what do you do to know him?
Sister Jones and I worked in Dagami this week and had a blast! I just love those sisters. They are the best of the best. We then drove up to Catarman (samar) with the other assistants and spent a couple days with the sisters there. It was wonderful and I love them. They are great missionaries! Their area is right on the ocean up there and all the people just live on the sand. It rains constantly and daily and they had a brown out most of the time. Because it was raining (hard) the sand roads/paths were just rivers. It was a lot of fun! There was a leadership training there for the ZLs and DL so we were able to meet up with President and he took us home to Tacloban...thats about a 5-6 hour car drive with our mission president! :) He said you have your mission president for at least 4 hours, you can ask him anything! Haha, and we did. My first question was about his favorite surat..or topping for rice. And we talked about food to languages to his life and mission and about our missions and gospel questions. He's the best.
He texted us earlier this week about enduring to the end and how he sees it now as Stay to the Truth. I like this best and it translates better into waraywaray/cebuano/tagalog. I was reading 2 Nephi 9:18 and really was able to apply it to that. Our lives are full of 'enduring the crosses of the world', but if we stay to the truth, we will "inherit the kingdom of god" and our "joy will be full forever." He has prepared a glorious heavenly home for all of His children. He wants us to be happy now, and in the life to come. This is possible but we must stay to the truth. :)
Today I was also thinking about the Atonement a lot and realized how our Savior can heal our pains and emotional strife now on earth, but also only through the atonement all of our losses here on earth will be made up.
His plan is perfect! Learn of Him, learn of His Plan for you, and be happy. :) Life is so good!
Well, I love you all, I love being the Lord's missionary, and I love this gospel. The true church of Christ has been restored and there is no need to fear. Have faith in Him and all your dreams will come true! I am living proof of that.
Love you all!
Oh have you read the first presidency message this month? It's about missionary work! And the best quote ever DEFINITELY applies to my life.....
Quote of this phase of the mission by President Thomas S. Monson, " The Lord will shape the back to bear the burden placed upon it."
SO! Maybe the Lord is just reshaping me kay I have lots of things he needs me to do! :)
My back is good by the way. I am taking care of it. Could you send me thermacare for the neck, though?
love, your missionary,
Sister B.
ps. this week we needed president to unlock the mission office and we asked him if he could... he texted us back "Just call my name. and i'll be there." yes. just text me. "---we laughed lots and then made him krispy treats for his bday which was Feb. 6. :) he's awesome.
Monday, January 31, 2011
1.31.11
Hello Family,
It's great to hear from all of you! I usually only get to skim and then print your emails so sorry if I don't answer any of your questions. But i DO read them. I love love love hearing from any and all of you email or dear elder or regular mail. So thank you so much for your support and love and care.
This week has been amazing. I love being companions with my batch! Sister Jones and I still wake up every day and can't believe how awesome our lives are. I miss my anak--Sister Brinton, but I know she is in good hands with Sister Dustin! We are actually going on splits with them tomorrow to Wednesday so I get to go back to Dagami and check up on things. :) Sister Jones and I got right to work this past week and we actually had to do some trainings for the Leadership Meeting. It turned out really well and we enjoyed it a lot. President Malit is amazing and we've been able to spend a lot of time with him this past week. . .he actually has driven us home practically every night! And provided us with hot cocoa and snacks. Awesome. In one of his trainings he really focused on the law of consecration. I love the different themes and revelation he receives, especially as of late:
1. Desire. Believe . Ponder.
2. Touch of the Masters Hand--its a song, have you ever heard it??
3. John R. Moyle Story
4. Law of Consecration. . . which is what he focused on in the Leadership training this past week.
We watched the movie called Treasure in Heaven and it is about a very very wealthy man named John Tanner that was going to die from a disease in his leg and so he wanted to go about doing good. He thought the mormon missionaries were wrong (he was a baptist preacher i think) and decided to go to one of their meetings. (this is back in the 1800s). Well, long story short, they taught him, he knew the book of mormon was true, and the missionaries asked him to be baptized , but he said he couldn't b/c his leg couldn't endure the baptism. The missionaries right there in the lesson asked him if he had enough faith to be healed and he said he did, and they commanded him with the authority of the holy priesthood to walk and he did! His leg was healed. And as he was walking he exclaimed, " I can walk! I can walk! I belong to God!"
Never has a phrase stood out to me like that did.
What does it mean--I belong to god???
And that was us the beginning of a lifetime of sacred, dedicated service to our Father in Heaven. This man was incredibly wealthy and gave up everything for the gospel. He understood the law of consecration and never looked back. His journey started with a foundation of faith and with that he could do anything, and he did.
The Lord will never require us to give up something we don't have. Everything is from God and he knows our needs. There were several instances where John Tanner realized what was needed to help the Lord's church and he was willing and happy to do it. If you have the video available you should watch it.
So this week I pondered a lot about what it meant to belong to god. completely and fully and if i could honestly say that I belong to God! That's my new motto for life.
We didn't get the apartment so we are still in the process of looking for one. I think the one we want wont be ready for March. So we switched our focus this month on travelling to every sister in the mission and will have to focus on buildling LDSville more so in march. But we do have two baptisms on Saturday! And the elders had a recent convert that was baptized but not confirmed for over a month. We visited him twice this past week and he came to church on Sunday, so he finally got confirmed. :) It was a great day.
The work is great! I am taking care of my neck and health and doing well. It was good this week and only hurt a couple days. Thank you for your prayers and concerns.
oh, i'm trying to learn tagalog now. so Maraming salamat po!
love you all,
Sister B.
p.s. thanks everyone for the letters and thank you to the Blotter family for the great package!!!! Appreciated it so much and it was alll my favorite things! You are the best!!!
It's great to hear from all of you! I usually only get to skim and then print your emails so sorry if I don't answer any of your questions. But i DO read them. I love love love hearing from any and all of you email or dear elder or regular mail. So thank you so much for your support and love and care.
This week has been amazing. I love being companions with my batch! Sister Jones and I still wake up every day and can't believe how awesome our lives are. I miss my anak--Sister Brinton, but I know she is in good hands with Sister Dustin! We are actually going on splits with them tomorrow to Wednesday so I get to go back to Dagami and check up on things. :) Sister Jones and I got right to work this past week and we actually had to do some trainings for the Leadership Meeting. It turned out really well and we enjoyed it a lot. President Malit is amazing and we've been able to spend a lot of time with him this past week. . .he actually has driven us home practically every night! And provided us with hot cocoa and snacks. Awesome. In one of his trainings he really focused on the law of consecration. I love the different themes and revelation he receives, especially as of late:
1. Desire. Believe . Ponder.
2. Touch of the Masters Hand--its a song, have you ever heard it??
3. John R. Moyle Story
4. Law of Consecration. . . which is what he focused on in the Leadership training this past week.
We watched the movie called Treasure in Heaven and it is about a very very wealthy man named John Tanner that was going to die from a disease in his leg and so he wanted to go about doing good. He thought the mormon missionaries were wrong (he was a baptist preacher i think) and decided to go to one of their meetings. (this is back in the 1800s). Well, long story short, they taught him, he knew the book of mormon was true, and the missionaries asked him to be baptized , but he said he couldn't b/c his leg couldn't endure the baptism. The missionaries right there in the lesson asked him if he had enough faith to be healed and he said he did, and they commanded him with the authority of the holy priesthood to walk and he did! His leg was healed. And as he was walking he exclaimed, " I can walk! I can walk! I belong to God!"
Never has a phrase stood out to me like that did.
What does it mean--I belong to god???
And that was us the beginning of a lifetime of sacred, dedicated service to our Father in Heaven. This man was incredibly wealthy and gave up everything for the gospel. He understood the law of consecration and never looked back. His journey started with a foundation of faith and with that he could do anything, and he did.
The Lord will never require us to give up something we don't have. Everything is from God and he knows our needs. There were several instances where John Tanner realized what was needed to help the Lord's church and he was willing and happy to do it. If you have the video available you should watch it.
So this week I pondered a lot about what it meant to belong to god. completely and fully and if i could honestly say that I belong to God! That's my new motto for life.
We didn't get the apartment so we are still in the process of looking for one. I think the one we want wont be ready for March. So we switched our focus this month on travelling to every sister in the mission and will have to focus on buildling LDSville more so in march. But we do have two baptisms on Saturday! And the elders had a recent convert that was baptized but not confirmed for over a month. We visited him twice this past week and he came to church on Sunday, so he finally got confirmed. :) It was a great day.
The work is great! I am taking care of my neck and health and doing well. It was good this week and only hurt a couple days. Thank you for your prayers and concerns.
oh, i'm trying to learn tagalog now. so Maraming salamat po!
love you all,
Sister B.
p.s. thanks everyone for the letters and thank you to the Blotter family for the great package!!!! Appreciated it so much and it was alll my favorite things! You are the best!!!
Monday, January 24, 2011
Boom 1.24.11
Boom.
That was a saying we would always say in the MTC when something funny/ awesome happened. This is now appropriate again to implement into my life and emails.....
1. I got transfered and my NEW (kinda) companion is my companion from the MTC, SISTER JONES!!!!! BOOM. does that happen,ever?? AMAZING.
2. We read our transfer letter and it said that we are assigned in Tacloban under a "Special Assignment." Boom.
We love tacloban and we love special assignments! :)
Well, we had heard through the grapevine that President Malit wanted to make the area around the Stake Center and Mission office the "LDSville" of Tacloban and that if he wanted it done, and done fast, he would put sisters there....We didn't say that, the elders said that..There haven't been sisters in Tacloban for a lonng time. 2 years maybe? Well, when i heard that I thought that Sister Jones would be perfect for that! (so did heavenly father and president malit!) haha. I was sitting next to her in the transfer meeting and i knew we would be companions--and we are! So we are opening/focusing on a new area. Then president malit asked us to have an interview with him. Before the interview we were talking to a past AP, elder shelley, and he said that our special assignment was that we were the new APs. I laughed and thought he was kidding. . .
President Malit is asking us to be in charge of the sisters and to be his assistants for that. So of course technically we are not the APs, but he told us we have the same responsibility with the sisters and we have to do specialized trainings and go on splits and arrange all the companion exchanges and bring the sisters to our area and work with them and then follow up in their area and work with them and we will be doing lots of traveling and trainings and we also have to build up our area and make it this LDSville he has envisioned. And the trainings start tomorrow.... We have a LTM (leadership training meeting) tomorrow with three zones and we will be give a training as well. We have spent the last few days organizing and brainstorming and meeting people and working in the office...haha its fun, we have our own little spot in the office and everything. We have a lot of work to do but this is going to be a really fun growing experience. I love President Malit and we hopefully will be able to move in just about right next door to them this week if we can get the apartment. Right now we live in Tanauan, again.
My health/neck is okay. I still take some medicine and have to wear the neck foam brace when i am not out working. There is still some pain, but its okay and i am just praying my muscles will relax enough that someday my spine will go back to normal. I am right now mainly just trying to maintain it and not make it worse. But i am happy and am not concerned about it. But i am being smart with it, so don't worry. And little Sister Jones has to carry all our bags b/c i'm not allowed to. Poor thing. Pray that her back won't go out.
This week i've had some really special experiences and received some great inspiration and revelation for my life. I finished the Book of Mormon in Manila and have been wondering how i should go about reading it this time. Since i've had a lot of questions lately with our new assignment and my health and life in general here i've decided to pray before i read ask the questions and have Heavenly Father help me know where to read that day. Every time i've done that it's been amazing and i've received answers to my prayers and questions. I learned a lot about covenants in Mosiah 5. i've realized in the past two weeks that making personal covenants with our Heavenly Father is very crucial to our progression. While I was in the temple reflecting on the covenants we make there I had a thought to make other covenants with him about some personal things i've been wondering about.
More than ever before i understand how loving our heavenly father is. He wants us to know him and he wants us to understand his plan better. He wants us to return to him and it is possible for all of us to be better so we can do this. It is a step by step process, but it's possible if we take the time to ponder what our righteous desires are and take the time to make the covenants with him. As i was reading Mosiah 5 i got the confirmation that the promises i had made to him was exactly what i needed to do and he would keep his promise to me. I love that i can talk to my Father in Heaven and he answers me through the Spirit and scriptures study. The covenants we make in the temple are obviously crucial for our exaltation, but I also encourage all of us to think of our own personal convenants/promises/commitments that we can make with our Heavenly Father to recommit our lives and selves to him so that we can be happier, and healthier, and live with our loved ones, once again, for all eternity. Heaven wouldn't be heaven without those we love, right?
I love this gospel. I am so excited for this new phase of growing and learning. I am excited to be working more closely with the sisters in this great mission and also to be working more with President Malit.
Salamat hinduro para ha iyon support ha akon mission. I love you all! Keep praying and going to the temple. That is what this is all about.
Love , your missionary, sister b.
p.s. i got home from manila wednesday night. found out i was transferring. thursday packed and said goodbye to mildred and blanca. friday transferred.
That was a saying we would always say in the MTC when something funny/ awesome happened. This is now appropriate again to implement into my life and emails.....
1. I got transfered and my NEW (kinda) companion is my companion from the MTC, SISTER JONES!!!!! BOOM. does that happen,ever?? AMAZING.
2. We read our transfer letter and it said that we are assigned in Tacloban under a "Special Assignment." Boom.
We love tacloban and we love special assignments! :)
Well, we had heard through the grapevine that President Malit wanted to make the area around the Stake Center and Mission office the "LDSville" of Tacloban and that if he wanted it done, and done fast, he would put sisters there....We didn't say that, the elders said that..There haven't been sisters in Tacloban for a lonng time. 2 years maybe? Well, when i heard that I thought that Sister Jones would be perfect for that! (so did heavenly father and president malit!) haha. I was sitting next to her in the transfer meeting and i knew we would be companions--and we are! So we are opening/focusing on a new area. Then president malit asked us to have an interview with him. Before the interview we were talking to a past AP, elder shelley, and he said that our special assignment was that we were the new APs. I laughed and thought he was kidding. . .
President Malit is asking us to be in charge of the sisters and to be his assistants for that. So of course technically we are not the APs, but he told us we have the same responsibility with the sisters and we have to do specialized trainings and go on splits and arrange all the companion exchanges and bring the sisters to our area and work with them and then follow up in their area and work with them and we will be doing lots of traveling and trainings and we also have to build up our area and make it this LDSville he has envisioned. And the trainings start tomorrow.... We have a LTM (leadership training meeting) tomorrow with three zones and we will be give a training as well. We have spent the last few days organizing and brainstorming and meeting people and working in the office...haha its fun, we have our own little spot in the office and everything. We have a lot of work to do but this is going to be a really fun growing experience. I love President Malit and we hopefully will be able to move in just about right next door to them this week if we can get the apartment. Right now we live in Tanauan, again.
My health/neck is okay. I still take some medicine and have to wear the neck foam brace when i am not out working. There is still some pain, but its okay and i am just praying my muscles will relax enough that someday my spine will go back to normal. I am right now mainly just trying to maintain it and not make it worse. But i am happy and am not concerned about it. But i am being smart with it, so don't worry. And little Sister Jones has to carry all our bags b/c i'm not allowed to. Poor thing. Pray that her back won't go out.
This week i've had some really special experiences and received some great inspiration and revelation for my life. I finished the Book of Mormon in Manila and have been wondering how i should go about reading it this time. Since i've had a lot of questions lately with our new assignment and my health and life in general here i've decided to pray before i read ask the questions and have Heavenly Father help me know where to read that day. Every time i've done that it's been amazing and i've received answers to my prayers and questions. I learned a lot about covenants in Mosiah 5. i've realized in the past two weeks that making personal covenants with our Heavenly Father is very crucial to our progression. While I was in the temple reflecting on the covenants we make there I had a thought to make other covenants with him about some personal things i've been wondering about.
More than ever before i understand how loving our heavenly father is. He wants us to know him and he wants us to understand his plan better. He wants us to return to him and it is possible for all of us to be better so we can do this. It is a step by step process, but it's possible if we take the time to ponder what our righteous desires are and take the time to make the covenants with him. As i was reading Mosiah 5 i got the confirmation that the promises i had made to him was exactly what i needed to do and he would keep his promise to me. I love that i can talk to my Father in Heaven and he answers me through the Spirit and scriptures study. The covenants we make in the temple are obviously crucial for our exaltation, but I also encourage all of us to think of our own personal convenants/promises/commitments that we can make with our Heavenly Father to recommit our lives and selves to him so that we can be happier, and healthier, and live with our loved ones, once again, for all eternity. Heaven wouldn't be heaven without those we love, right?
I love this gospel. I am so excited for this new phase of growing and learning. I am excited to be working more closely with the sisters in this great mission and also to be working more with President Malit.
Salamat hinduro para ha iyon support ha akon mission. I love you all! Keep praying and going to the temple. That is what this is all about.
Love , your missionary, sister b.
p.s. i got home from manila wednesday night. found out i was transferring. thursday packed and said goodbye to mildred and blanca. friday transferred.
1.17.11
Hi Fam,
I am still in Manila and still at the MRC. I am doing fine. I got an MRI, blood work, and xray last week. THe result was my cervical spine is still verry straight where it should be curved, and that the disks in between the vertebrea are dessicated---they've leaked, dried up, shrivelled?? SO not good. But, we just do the best we can. I get to wear a huge, foam, neck brace to help keep my head up and not strain my neck. Awesome. I am in physical therapy until Wednesday. I've taken pictures so you all can make fun of me, no worries. IT's been an insteresting week here. Studying lots--good, SLeeping and recovering--also good, Going to Temple Sessions-AMAZING! :) YEs, i did get to go to the temple and i will tomorrow too. Oh , how i've missed the temple!
I'm not quite sure why I have gotten this very Unique, special experience to come here to Manila, but I do know there is purpose in all things. I have a couple ideas of why Heavenly Father has sent me here and a few things I've already learned. I sure am grateful for this experience. I know that in all things we gain experience and our faith is able to grow. How grateful I am for a Father in Heaven who really knows me and is aware of my needs, concerns, and what brings me joy. I am grateful for HIs Love and Patience and for this time in my life to really get to know Him and my Savior. How sacred this time is on the mission--and here on earth. I am so grateful for this gospel and I know it is true.
I've also got to watch some good church movies here. AND here are some great quotes from them :
There comes a time for all of us tha we must be more than we are...We must follow the course that God has laid out.
Sometimes fear shouts so loud in our ears that it almost drowns out our faith...But God knows who we are. WE cannot go anywhere that he cannot find us.
God has a plan so that all of His children can come back and live with Him, if, we listen. Heaven wouldn't be heaven without those we love.
Sometimes when trials overwhelm us, we forget that God is our Friend.
STrength isn't something you have...its something you find..and often god helps us find it, one day at a time.
What do we hear in the Gospel which we have received?? A voice of gladness, a voice of mercy from heaven. Glad tidings for the living and the dead! Shall we not go on in so great a cause? --joseph smith
WHatever you can do, or dream you can do...begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.--goethe
When you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, sleep in peace. God is awake.-- VIctor Hugo
Remember who you are trying to become like...
I longed to accompish great and notble tasks, but my duty is to accomplish bum ble tasks, as if they were noble and great. --helen keller
Always do what your afraid to do--ralphy w. emerson
I took the road less traveld by and that has made all the difference--robert frost
The time has come for us to stand a little taller, to lift our eyes and stretch our minds to a greater comprehension. This is a season to be strong. --president gordan b. hinckley
I love you all! Thanks for the prayers. I pray for you all too. I'm happy and trying to be more healthy every day:).
love, your missionary,
Sister B
I am still in Manila and still at the MRC. I am doing fine. I got an MRI, blood work, and xray last week. THe result was my cervical spine is still verry straight where it should be curved, and that the disks in between the vertebrea are dessicated---they've leaked, dried up, shrivelled?? SO not good. But, we just do the best we can. I get to wear a huge, foam, neck brace to help keep my head up and not strain my neck. Awesome. I am in physical therapy until Wednesday. I've taken pictures so you all can make fun of me, no worries. IT's been an insteresting week here. Studying lots--good, SLeeping and recovering--also good, Going to Temple Sessions-AMAZING! :) YEs, i did get to go to the temple and i will tomorrow too. Oh , how i've missed the temple!
I'm not quite sure why I have gotten this very Unique, special experience to come here to Manila, but I do know there is purpose in all things. I have a couple ideas of why Heavenly Father has sent me here and a few things I've already learned. I sure am grateful for this experience. I know that in all things we gain experience and our faith is able to grow. How grateful I am for a Father in Heaven who really knows me and is aware of my needs, concerns, and what brings me joy. I am grateful for HIs Love and Patience and for this time in my life to really get to know Him and my Savior. How sacred this time is on the mission--and here on earth. I am so grateful for this gospel and I know it is true.
I've also got to watch some good church movies here. AND here are some great quotes from them :
There comes a time for all of us tha we must be more than we are...We must follow the course that God has laid out.
Sometimes fear shouts so loud in our ears that it almost drowns out our faith...But God knows who we are. WE cannot go anywhere that he cannot find us.
God has a plan so that all of His children can come back and live with Him, if, we listen. Heaven wouldn't be heaven without those we love.
Sometimes when trials overwhelm us, we forget that God is our Friend.
STrength isn't something you have...its something you find..and often god helps us find it, one day at a time.
What do we hear in the Gospel which we have received?? A voice of gladness, a voice of mercy from heaven. Glad tidings for the living and the dead! Shall we not go on in so great a cause? --joseph smith
WHatever you can do, or dream you can do...begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.--goethe
When you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, sleep in peace. God is awake.-- VIctor Hugo
Remember who you are trying to become like...
I longed to accompish great and notble tasks, but my duty is to accomplish bum ble tasks, as if they were noble and great. --helen keller
Always do what your afraid to do--ralphy w. emerson
I took the road less traveld by and that has made all the difference--robert frost
The time has come for us to stand a little taller, to lift our eyes and stretch our minds to a greater comprehension. This is a season to be strong. --president gordan b. hinckley
I love you all! Thanks for the prayers. I pray for you all too. I'm happy and trying to be more healthy every day:).
love, your missionary,
Sister B
Monday, January 10, 2011
1.10.11
HEy family!
Isn't fun that you have to wait a week before you get a reply from me?!?
Haha. well, i think its fun!
So! Thank you so much for your prayers and for putting my name in the temple. I don't remember all i told you last week, but i'm sure it wasn't much.
I am doing well! This week we got to work and it felt so good! It's funny how i talked to all of you and life was good and healthy and then the NEXT DAY i got this strange injury. Oh life. Well, I was on a ton of muscle relaxants and couldn't do much with that. I did not like that at all, and poor sister brinton had to just sit and study and pray and ponder...and then get realllly excited when i'd wake up so she had someone to talk to. But thats all over now. Last week we went back to the doctor on wednesday to see how i was doing. I had no pain and my little hump on my back seemed to be nearly gone--oh, yeah, sister brinton named it, Ezzie. . like esmerelda from the hunch back of notre dame..thanks, sister b. :) Well, we go to the doctor and he said that he would like to continue taking calcium and this other genecol pill to strengthen my muscles. My shoulders were still noticeably uneven so he said he wanted to do a physical exam to make sure my spine was okay....but i would have to be bare....(not okay) and so he said i could get another Xray of my whole spine. He then said he wanted me to do some physical therapy--4 sessions there at the hospital.
I said okay and texted Sister Malit to make sure that was fine. While we waited we paid for the xray and the physical therapy session (you have to pay before doing anything) and waited for their reply. Well, she texted me back that they couldn't give me the okay for that.... (great, i had already paid..) And then she texted me again and said that they would like to request that i be seen in Manila.
Ummmmm, what?!?!?
Honestly, i felt great! And after the blessing from President Malit, i felt no need to go. But I said okay and proceeded the long process of trying to get refunded...
Basta, I felt okay, but i knew they had sent my xray to manila earlier in the week and wondered if the doctor there had requested to see me and something was wrong...I talked to president about it and told him i had felt good after the blessing and felt a little silly going all the way to manila. But he said that he did not feel comfortable with the doctor here and that he had been the one that requested i be seen there. He knows the doctors there and trusts them (obviously, b/c they are from the church) and would just feel better if i had to get physical therapy to do it there. I said okay, sounds good. And I felt better about it too.
SO, tonight i stay in Tanauan apt and tomorrow at 4:55am the office elders will pick me up (poor elders...) and take me to the airport. I will be flying with Sister Malit and their little 6 year old, Spencer! (he's hilarious.) I don[t know why she is going, but thats good for me! Then I will stay at the MRC (Missionary RECOVERY CENTER..not missionary RECREATION center...too bad..) but we don't know how long i will be. It just depends on what is wrong or if anything is wrong at all! I'm just hoping to be able to go do a temple session there!!!! THat would be AMAZING! And maybe go to Krispy Kreme b/c all the APs and elders that have had to assist me these past few weeks love krispy kreme and i want to get them some...there's only one in the philippines. haha , we'll see.
So thats the update. I'm good. I'm excited to hear what the doctor has to say and what type of exercising i can start doing again. I've really missed working out.
This week was great! We had 8 investigators come to church!
We gave the Agujar family referral to the elders serving in Samar and i felt good about that. I realized that its not about me teaching them the gospel, just as long as they receive the truth. Even though I loved teaching them so much and really felt a sense of loss with them, Heavenly Father has really helped me this week to feel at peace and that he will take care of them even if i can't.
Monday, Sister Brinton and I were sooo excited to work again. We were giddy and out with all the kids playing and we got to teach a few lessons. We were so happy!
It rained a lot so there were a lot of floods. Monsoon season is the best. I actually got COLD. It was raining lots--cold rain and windy and we had to take a motor from a very far away investigators home. My arm hair was standing up. STRANGE.
Blanca's mom and little brother are getting baptized January 22!
Blanca is in a lot of pain and we are not sure what is causing it. I think the doctors said cancer maybe. :(
The sister in law to our branch president's wife FINALLY CAME TO CHURCH on sunday! They have been taught by the missionaries for over a year now! Her baptism date is feb 5.
Our investigators are doing well. We taught a great roman catholic lady name Vilma. I was struggling to understand her...cause she spoke tagalog to us. So i asked her to speak in waray, but she didn't. I don't know why people here think we know tagalog. Thank good ness for the gift of tongues! I actually understood her and have picked up on lots of tagalog words. Though, no i can't speak it. !
Haha. Life is wonderful.
We had interviews today with president malit. What a blessing he is in my life. He also gave a great training from 1 nephi 11. I always wondered why it went from explaining Lehi's dream to the birth of JEsus Christ. I felt like it was so random. But he explained a lot about the Tree--the love of God--and that that tree symbolizes the ATonement of Jesus christ. It was such a powerful training. And , per usual, a lot of my questions and prayers were answered while he was teaching from the Book of Mormon. I love my mission president.
**OH! Exciting news: Sister Lemmon--we are now with all the new trainings president has switched the rule to count a lesson. We have to teach 2 principles and read from the book of mormon at least with our investigators to count as a lesson. Let me just tell you that this is the best thing ever. Some day i'll explain more about all the new trainings, but this is really awesome.
My interview was incredible with him. I think i might get transferred next week. ( he didn't mention anything to me at all, but he did to sister brinton... I think he might send me with the new pakistani sister.. i dunno! that would be in a cebuano j area...different dialect of cebuano! oh mannnnnnn) Well, I don't know anything, but i felt at peace with all that has happened in dagami (even though the last few weeks were really hard! with the branch and with my health issues...there is no unity in the branch and the lack of priesthood holders is terrible! ) but president talked about how satan works extra hard on us when we are progressing and when the Lord's work is progressing he works even harder to try and stop it. But satan can never stop the Lords work...He might slow it down, but he can't stop it. Our first transfer here, everythin was on fire and i know i was sent to dagami for many reasons, and then this second transfer i think satan noticed how wonderful dagami was doing and really tried to cause problems. Sister Brinton is doing great and I have complete faith and trust in her to keep dagami going strong. i love her so much! She is a great missionary!
I am out of time! But our interview was awesome.
The church is true, so what else matters!?
This week i am excited to really study the atonement more. I want to access the atonement and teach it better to my brothers and sisters here. I love these people and I really feel like the Lord has helped me understand charity at a deeper level than i have ever yet experienced in my life. I love the mission and i love the different phases were I can learn and grow and become more like my Savior.
Thank you for the prayers. Miracles happen. I have witnessed them and continue to see them daily.
Love you all,
Love, your missionary,
Sister B
**More explanation: to count for a lesson: we have to read w/ investigators for 15 min in every lesson and teach two principles.... just wanted to clarify.
my writing is terrrible now!
love yo uall,
sister b.
Isn't fun that you have to wait a week before you get a reply from me?!?
Haha. well, i think its fun!
So! Thank you so much for your prayers and for putting my name in the temple. I don't remember all i told you last week, but i'm sure it wasn't much.
I am doing well! This week we got to work and it felt so good! It's funny how i talked to all of you and life was good and healthy and then the NEXT DAY i got this strange injury. Oh life. Well, I was on a ton of muscle relaxants and couldn't do much with that. I did not like that at all, and poor sister brinton had to just sit and study and pray and ponder...and then get realllly excited when i'd wake up so she had someone to talk to. But thats all over now. Last week we went back to the doctor on wednesday to see how i was doing. I had no pain and my little hump on my back seemed to be nearly gone--oh, yeah, sister brinton named it, Ezzie. . like esmerelda from the hunch back of notre dame..thanks, sister b. :) Well, we go to the doctor and he said that he would like to continue taking calcium and this other genecol pill to strengthen my muscles. My shoulders were still noticeably uneven so he said he wanted to do a physical exam to make sure my spine was okay....but i would have to be bare....(not okay) and so he said i could get another Xray of my whole spine. He then said he wanted me to do some physical therapy--4 sessions there at the hospital.
I said okay and texted Sister Malit to make sure that was fine. While we waited we paid for the xray and the physical therapy session (you have to pay before doing anything) and waited for their reply. Well, she texted me back that they couldn't give me the okay for that.... (great, i had already paid..) And then she texted me again and said that they would like to request that i be seen in Manila.
Ummmmm, what?!?!?
Honestly, i felt great! And after the blessing from President Malit, i felt no need to go. But I said okay and proceeded the long process of trying to get refunded...
Basta, I felt okay, but i knew they had sent my xray to manila earlier in the week and wondered if the doctor there had requested to see me and something was wrong...I talked to president about it and told him i had felt good after the blessing and felt a little silly going all the way to manila. But he said that he did not feel comfortable with the doctor here and that he had been the one that requested i be seen there. He knows the doctors there and trusts them (obviously, b/c they are from the church) and would just feel better if i had to get physical therapy to do it there. I said okay, sounds good. And I felt better about it too.
SO, tonight i stay in Tanauan apt and tomorrow at 4:55am the office elders will pick me up (poor elders...) and take me to the airport. I will be flying with Sister Malit and their little 6 year old, Spencer! (he's hilarious.) I don[t know why she is going, but thats good for me! Then I will stay at the MRC (Missionary RECOVERY CENTER..not missionary RECREATION center...too bad..) but we don't know how long i will be. It just depends on what is wrong or if anything is wrong at all! I'm just hoping to be able to go do a temple session there!!!! THat would be AMAZING! And maybe go to Krispy Kreme b/c all the APs and elders that have had to assist me these past few weeks love krispy kreme and i want to get them some...there's only one in the philippines. haha , we'll see.
So thats the update. I'm good. I'm excited to hear what the doctor has to say and what type of exercising i can start doing again. I've really missed working out.
This week was great! We had 8 investigators come to church!
We gave the Agujar family referral to the elders serving in Samar and i felt good about that. I realized that its not about me teaching them the gospel, just as long as they receive the truth. Even though I loved teaching them so much and really felt a sense of loss with them, Heavenly Father has really helped me this week to feel at peace and that he will take care of them even if i can't.
Monday, Sister Brinton and I were sooo excited to work again. We were giddy and out with all the kids playing and we got to teach a few lessons. We were so happy!
It rained a lot so there were a lot of floods. Monsoon season is the best. I actually got COLD. It was raining lots--cold rain and windy and we had to take a motor from a very far away investigators home. My arm hair was standing up. STRANGE.
Blanca's mom and little brother are getting baptized January 22!
Blanca is in a lot of pain and we are not sure what is causing it. I think the doctors said cancer maybe. :(
The sister in law to our branch president's wife FINALLY CAME TO CHURCH on sunday! They have been taught by the missionaries for over a year now! Her baptism date is feb 5.
Our investigators are doing well. We taught a great roman catholic lady name Vilma. I was struggling to understand her...cause she spoke tagalog to us. So i asked her to speak in waray, but she didn't. I don't know why people here think we know tagalog. Thank good ness for the gift of tongues! I actually understood her and have picked up on lots of tagalog words. Though, no i can't speak it. !
Haha. Life is wonderful.
We had interviews today with president malit. What a blessing he is in my life. He also gave a great training from 1 nephi 11. I always wondered why it went from explaining Lehi's dream to the birth of JEsus Christ. I felt like it was so random. But he explained a lot about the Tree--the love of God--and that that tree symbolizes the ATonement of Jesus christ. It was such a powerful training. And , per usual, a lot of my questions and prayers were answered while he was teaching from the Book of Mormon. I love my mission president.
**OH! Exciting news: Sister Lemmon--we are now with all the new trainings president has switched the rule to count a lesson. We have to teach 2 principles and read from the book of mormon at least with our investigators to count as a lesson. Let me just tell you that this is the best thing ever. Some day i'll explain more about all the new trainings, but this is really awesome.
My interview was incredible with him. I think i might get transferred next week. ( he didn't mention anything to me at all, but he did to sister brinton... I think he might send me with the new pakistani sister.. i dunno! that would be in a cebuano j area...different dialect of cebuano! oh mannnnnnn) Well, I don't know anything, but i felt at peace with all that has happened in dagami (even though the last few weeks were really hard! with the branch and with my health issues...there is no unity in the branch and the lack of priesthood holders is terrible! ) but president talked about how satan works extra hard on us when we are progressing and when the Lord's work is progressing he works even harder to try and stop it. But satan can never stop the Lords work...He might slow it down, but he can't stop it. Our first transfer here, everythin was on fire and i know i was sent to dagami for many reasons, and then this second transfer i think satan noticed how wonderful dagami was doing and really tried to cause problems. Sister Brinton is doing great and I have complete faith and trust in her to keep dagami going strong. i love her so much! She is a great missionary!
I am out of time! But our interview was awesome.
The church is true, so what else matters!?
This week i am excited to really study the atonement more. I want to access the atonement and teach it better to my brothers and sisters here. I love these people and I really feel like the Lord has helped me understand charity at a deeper level than i have ever yet experienced in my life. I love the mission and i love the different phases were I can learn and grow and become more like my Savior.
Thank you for the prayers. Miracles happen. I have witnessed them and continue to see them daily.
Love you all,
Love, your missionary,
Sister B
**More explanation: to count for a lesson: we have to read w/ investigators for 15 min in every lesson and teach two principles.... just wanted to clarify.
my writing is terrrible now!
love yo uall,
sister b.