Wednesday, September 28, 2016

September 25, 2016

Helloooo everyone, how are your weeks going?

I have been sick for exactly 1 whole week. I have a really bad cold which is pretty ironic because the Philippines is really hot... But the temperature has been dropping lately because the rainy season is really here and we have had a lot of storms lately so that takes down the temperature. I have not slept with a fan the past couple nights which is a big change since I wrote you guys a while back while I was sleeping with 3 fans hahaha. This week so far has been pretty busy, we had our zone conference last thursday which was great. I always love the conferences and meetings because sometimes the regular missionary schedule and just get to you and wear you out. So its nice to go to the meetings and get some motivation and learn. Elder Abay and I gave a workshop on what we need to do to baptize weekly. That is our mission goal to baptize every week which is really possible here in the Philippines but also very difficult. Elder Abay and I are also working on hitting our zone standards for lessons this week which is 55 lessons. I dont know if that seems like a lot to you for those who served missions but here its a lot haha it is definetly possible to get more but 55 is still a lot. So we have done some careful planning to make sure that we hit this goal this week and right now we are right on track to hit it! We have been really trying to get more member work going here in this area. We have been teaching a lot of member lessons and we share with them a story from the book of Alma about the story of the great missionary Ammon. We talk about how he wanted to serve the Lamanites and bring them unto Christ, we focus on verse 31 where it says basically "Dont worry my fellow servants, we will go and search for the flocks TOGETHER, and bring them back to the right place" We focus on how Ammon used the words TOGETHER. We tell the members that TOGETHER as member and missionaries we can make the work really go in our area. Then we challenge them to give us a referral with in two weeks. So far it has been going well and the members have been loving it. We have a few new pretty good investigators, we didint have the best turn out at church yesterday but thats life for a missionary. There are always trials and stuff that keeps investigators from coming to church. But we found a great family that was referred to us by a ward member last week and we are praying that we will be able to help them come to church and improve their lives. 

Just yesterday I had a cool experience with my own personal testimony. I have always known in my life that the sacrament was important but I guess I didnt really have a true testimony of it. I was reading a talk by David A Bednar about the sacrament and I learned a lot from it. I was reading this just before church. I have been wanting to get a better understanding for the sacrament and better apply it in my life. I really learned the the sacrament is an ordinance that we have to make regularly in order to stay close with God. Elder Bednar really focused on 3 important ordinances and that is baptism, receiving the Holy Ghost, and the sacrament. The sacrament is our way to be sanctified again which is really amazing. We have a way every week to feel cleansed from our sin and feel closer to God. My knowledge and testimony grew from reading, and experience. I love the mission because you learn so many things and it just builds you to be so much better. 

This will probably be my last week in this area. Transfer day is coming up this october 5 and I am due for a transfer. I have been here 5 months. BUT there is still a chance that I could stay and that would be interesting. But next time I email you I will know what is going down. But I hope you will have a great this week and I hope you will all do something this week to be better. I love you all!!