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!