Healthy Again

I am healthy again. i got some drugs to flush out amoebas and after i took it i got energy and my poo normalized again the next day. so either it was an amoeba or just got healthy again the following day

sister puzey gave [the medication] to me after i complained some more. i asked her if it could be possible if i had an amoeba and she said she don't think so.. i responded (respectfully) you do not think i do but youre not positive if i dont. She then said she was going to give me medicine. and now i am okay!

[while sick and confined to home] i learned a lot of cool verses to teach with from the bible about apostasy and other principles with the bible... i rarely use the bible in teaching so i just do not have my scriptures marked up like my BOM is... so yeah i gained knowledge there.. my sickness made great conversation with people... “what do you think i have?”... anyways i do not know exactly what i learned [from this experience] but i really hate just being in my house not being able to work!

the meetinghouse [in Anao] is actually a house turned into a chapel. [The meetinghouse being built] just got the steeple and its coming together. it will be finished maybe in august. Yes i have gone to the site i have walked around it and looked at all the blueprints. They just asked locals who have experience that live near the site to work [on building it]. Members and non members [work together and we] help share the gospel with them.

[regarding recent tornado activity in California] what is going on over there!!!!! that is not normal! and actually our weather is not normal as well. its more relaxed than normal around here. But we have been having rain a lot at night! OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH I SAW LIGHTENING STRIKE THE GROUND!!!!!! i did not see the bolt but i saw the splash of electricity. i was watching this crazy storm that appeared in minutes through a crack in the wall from inside a house. and BOOOM it was about 10 yards or less from the house. then lightening struck a few more times close to the area!! it was awesome!!!!!! i saw this BIG OLE BAD BOY STRIKE but i was behind trees a good ways away so didnt get to see it actually hit [the ground] but it was awesome!!

nothing really new to talk about but i am loving this area so i am happy!

Doing Better

okay i am doing better but i am not fully okay. i am able to get out and do work but i get fatigued really quick. so yeah i do not have any idea what it is... yesterday i literally hurt all over my body and drank so much water then sweated a whole lot. i do not know if i have a fever because i took Tylenol so that would have reduced my fever if i had one. Sister Puzey has given me all the advice she has for me.. tomorrow maybe i will get permission to go to get a check up and find out. oh and no other missionaries are sick like me."

My comp is great. he is new and just happy all the time.. we are out teaching people so yeah work is going slowly but it is still going.

The Mother's Day Call

Elder Grow was able to make his "Mother's Day" phone call on May 13th (May 14th in the Philippines). Here is what we learned:

Elder Grow has been ill for over a week and is confined to his apartment. Sister Puzey (the mission president's wife) thought he might have a type of stomach flu. He is in good spirits, laughing and joking but is anxious to get out and work. His new companion has only been serving about three months and is enjoying Elder Grow's poor health because he has a keyboard from the church and can practice his piano playing (he was worried he would not have any time during his mission to practice!)

The city of Anao (pronounced An now' ) where Elder Grow serves is in the Tarlac area. He arrived there on May 5. Here is a link to a google map: http://www.maplandia.com/philippines/region-3/tarlac/anao/

You can zoom in and see the houses and the street names! Since Elder Grow has not been able to get around the city, he is not exactly sure where in the city he is located! He thinks he is close to the Cuyapo side of Anao. Anao has a ward but there is no chapel yet, it is being built. If you are interested in learning about this city visit Wikipedia at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anao,_Tarlac

Of course we had Elder Grow on speaker phone, so when Dad asked him to speak in Tagalog we all heard him. I must say, he speaks quickly and confidently. We were impressed. Many words in the Philippines are Spanish words and many Filipinos have Spanish ancestry. Elder Grow also has some Spanish ancestry and the people have noticed how his hair, eye color and skin tone is similar to theirs. But they don't understand why he has such a long nose! You would think his height would be the most noticeable difference, but no, it's his nose.

What new adventures in eating has he had? Dog. He said it tasted VERY good. How was it cooked? Adobo, of course! Actually there is a law against cooking dog, but some people do it anyway.

What made Elder Grow laugh the most during our conversation? Our "American accents" as we tried to pronounce the names of cities or streets or anything else Filipino. He thought Ryan's idea of naming the twins "Luke and Leia" (if they are a girl and boy) was very funny. (Uh, I don't think Chelsea was laughing!) What made us laugh? When I asked if he needed us to send him anything, like razor blades for instance, he replied, "No, I have about 10. That should last me to the end of my mission." Wondering how 10 blades could last 5 months, Ryan asked, "How often do you change blades?" The reply: "About once a month." Ryan's retort: "yeah, I guess you can do that when you only shave your upper lip and chin!" Then, surprise..."hey, I've got hair growing on my cheeks now... kind of blotchy.. but yeah, I shave [more than he used to]." The Grow brothers aren't really good at growing full beards or even sideburns!! So we had to laugh at Elder Grow's new found whiskers.

What does he expect when he returns on October 19th? Well, before he leaves the Philippines, he should arrive in Manilla on the 18th and hopes to go to the temple there. He will leave the Philippines on the morning of the 19th and arrive here on the 19th due to crossing the International Time Line. He is looking forward to: Mountain Mike's Pepperoni pizza for dinner, A big birthday party with bar-b-qued food, and beef that doesn't come from a dairy cow! He has often written that he really misses In and Out burgers. Oh, and he hoped the twins would not be born on his birthday... not his actual birthday... the day of his birthday party!!!

Ps to Jordan-- Thanks for receiving the call and conferencing us through!!

Transferred

i am getting transferred!

i am going to be transferred to the Paniqui area and that will be fun i hear the area has a brand new chapel and the area is really nice, so yeah that is about all the news i have other than may 8 or around may 8 i get to call home and talk to everyone for mothers day my last phone call home!

well monday will be pday again so i will email again and talk about what we are going to do about the phone call! yeah i am one day ahead of you! your sunday is my monday! so i will email you on monday and call later that day or week. We have one week after may 8 to call home on any other day because of the time change... This has been the same thing we have done the last 3 times i have called home... I have one week to call like always

okay love ya

Q&A

Question from Dorothy:

I just found out that this is the 50th anniversary of the Church in the Phillippines.....I wonder if [Elder Grow's] mission is going to do anything special in recognition of that?

Answer from Elder Grow:

“I do not know if they are doing anything special for it.. i do not think so.. I have known about it since my first area”

Question:

Missionaries that return from poor areas tell us about church members who have very little but are still happy. Do you experience that in your area?

Answer:

“Yeah we have families that live in very very SMALL houses but they still have a tv, cell phone and what not. Sometimes they do not eat great food just veggies or canned sardines but i think if they did have money for food they still would eat those things with their rice cause they like to eat that. some houses just have dirt floor or rocks. They are happy for the most part but will always complain about rich people.. so yeah desires of the heart play a big role around here.”

Question:

Anything in your area that you will miss when you leave?

Answer:

“There will be a whole bunch of things that i will miss around here hands down. Most likely the things that we do not have in america but life will go on! There will also be a lot of other things i will not miss. Anyways i still have a good amount of time to enjoy life here thats for sure!”

Question:

Have you had a Halo Halo? Is it the season for that delicious drink?

Answer:

“yeah its that time of year and yes we did have them. We have been eating mango and making shakes “

Question:

What is Easter like in the Philippines?

Answer:

“it is a big day in the Philippines they do weird things... like whip themselves or some will puncture their hands and feet.... they do this in remembrance of Jesus.... yeah i can not see one thing that is good about doing that. it is so sad that they do not understand”

Conference was good

Conference was good... We did have investigators came to church on Sunday morning session.. They struggled with the english [Conference is shown in English to the Philippines wards and branches] but still stated that they did notice or felt a difference in the way their [conference speakers] voices sounded and facial expressions. Most people when they hear that leaders of a Church are going to speak [they think that] it will be a Chastisement Sermon with Shouting and Condemning, also with the need to be scared of God and prepare. That is always one thing i do not like when parents tell their children to fear God and obey. I always share that we should not fear God but Love him by following his Commandments and following his teachings. I normally will ask, if they would like their children to fear them and be forced to say I love you, to them. They all say no They would like them to just do the things which would help them and would want them to do with out having to ask. I then ask, do you not think Heavenly Father would want the same things from his Children? And of course they will agree and probably think of things that they said or commanded their children to do and ended in bad results. I always hope this will make them want to do and keep commitments because it is what Lord would want them to do. I think that one thing i realized in conference was the way Apostles and Prophets teach us is with Love and how much they Care for us because it is how much the Lord loves and cares for us. We have a choice to Show our love by following what they are teaching us (which is coming from the Lord). I shared the story of The Sons of Mosiah to a less active member. I shared the part about how they wanted to do whatever the Lord asked them to do to be forgiven of what they had done. He told them to Go amongst the Lamanites and teach them. They were scared but the Lord Comforted them and told them to go and have patience and bare the afflictions because your work will be worth it later. Then i continued to the Story of Ammon where the Flocks of King Lamoni where being scattered and unable to drink the water. Now i had no idea why i was teaching this.. Why did this part of the Story enter my mind and how can this story help these people. After reading an explanation or expounding of these things enlightened me maybe more than them. In the Story we have Ammon the servant who wants to help. We have the servants of the king who failed and are scared to return to the king because of Death. We have the sheep who are scattered and can not drink the water. We also have the enemies of the king who are scattering the flock. Now we can find ourselves in this story so very simply. Most people will say i am the sheep that is lost because of the robbers or temptations from satan and Need to be found. But i noticed that most of us are the Servants who are scared to return because they will die. Few of us are the Ammons who will go and do things to save our fellow brethren (who he just recently met and calls them his Brothers) and helps them to find the sheep and bring them back to drink the water (or our desires to follow the Lord and partake of his offering repentance) Now who would you want to be, Ammon the one who helps save the people with inspiration from the Lord, The Servants who are to afraid of death, to just go find the sheep that they have lost, so they can be welcomed back, or the Helpless sheep that have no choice but to just run and be lost waiting to be found. There are people that DO [want to be like Ammon] and people that DO NOT, we know that. But there are People who DO things not for themselves but to help their "Brethren". Such a great insight that was given to me by the Holy Ghost. So which one are you and which one do you want to be?? and what are you going to do-- be that one or not be that one? The simple little stories that have great values.. most of the time we will just focus on the Awesomeness of Ammon chopping off the Arms of the enemies which is just awesome! hahaha Well love the work and the simple insights i have gained.

New Investigators

my week has been good. we will watch conference on [next] saturday and sunday sooo that will be nice days

This week we taught and found [investigators] and had a lot of successes. We did not however have investigators come to church. We followed up with our investigators who were positive that they would come to church and ended up having personal things to keep them from attending. We did have some great spiritual lessons earlier this week that really helped our investigators in keeping commitments about reading and praying. They explained their feelings when they had read and prayed and how they felt something different. We helped them understand that what they had felt and they have started to be more direct with wanting to keep commitments, especially like wanting to come to church. We have found a good amount of new investigators that are continually becoming more and more interested. They are interested in the Book of Mormon and have a lot of questions about Church and Baptism. Most of our investigators in certain areas are acquaintances of each other, so hopefully that will help them have someone to come with them to Church. I think some of the hardest parts [of serving a mission] is when you slowly move away from old investigators that have just stopped in progression, because of [their] personal issues or [they are] just too busy, to teach new investigators that are becoming interested. There is always that moment when you walk by the house of an old investigator and you are not going to visit and it’s just hard. But I know that there will come a time when they will be more ready for the Gospel. Elder Tandas is an awesome teacher and is really good with talking to people. At first he was a little hesitant a few times but now he just talks to people more openly. He does a really good job with helping people understand why we are here and what they expect from us. Well hopefully we will see the fruits of our labors in the up coming weeks with lots of investigators who want to come to church. Well still having fun out here loving my area i am in. The members help keep things fun even though we are bummed about our investigators struggling to come to church. Well thats about it for this last week Love ya all thanks for the support as always!

A New Companion

We had rain this morning which was nice. It has been really hot in the afternoons but it gets cold at night and i am waking up every morning blowing my brains out! and then i will sneeze for like 10 minutes.... so i do not know what the deal is... it is only in the morning..

Well my new companion [Elder Tandas] is a very good companion. He is very nice and a very good teacher. He talks to people very nicely which helps with new people letting us teach. We have a lot of new investigators that i like to call TIME EATERS they just eat up our time which is good and bad... because they end up asking way too many questions that just end up distracting the lesson and trying to get them back on track. All of their questions are great, our lessons will give them the direction they are looking for but we continually have to explain to them that we will answer their questions another time because it is part of another lesson we would like to share in a later visit. (Insurance that we have a return appointment). Well we are working in two different sides of our area every other day and then in the mornings we go to another area and work. Sometimes in one of our areas we end up walking for about 40 minutes to our last appointments because there are no more jeepneys. some times we catch a tricycle which is normally when we are about half way to the last area. Well sadly we did not have the success that we should have had with investigators coming to Church because of situations that had occurred. 2 of our investigators who committed to come to church, even if they were going to come by themselves, ended up having something happen with their dad, which didnt allow them to return later that night to come to church the next day. 1 of our other investigators, his fellowshipper (who was going to come the morning of and take him to Church), got Shingles. He is in pain and didnt believe me when i told him he has shingles. 2 other investigators promised to come next week because they plan to have people over for her birthday on [this] sunday so they did not come of course. We did have one investigator who is 11 years old that is a part member family who did not get baptized because she is too shy to answer questions and did not answer any of the baptism questions when she was interviewed. She has started to answer simple questions that i ask now which is good. So hopefully when the time comes she will be ready for her baptism. So that is about what is going on in the work around here. we have a lot of new people and some that we havent been able to revisit because of loss of time at appointments or they just have not been at their house. So we are just going to try and get down to business with these people and teach them.

Pogs!

yeah, we dont talk about any of the disasters cause we are so far inland its not a big concern.

We heard about the big moon but it was going to be at 1 in the morning. although i woke up, i did not want to go out side... But [do] you remember that one night we were at payless and came outside and the MOON was Huge but when we got back home it had become small. If you can find pictures that were taken on the internet i would like to see them.

Anyways... when brother garcia left, the couple missionaries took him back to his home which was far away but i got sent to the area with the zone leaders so just a, "well good bye and good luck" But the night before, we ate well and enjoyed our last night together. he returned this morning to visit the members before he enters the MTC. So i got to see him for a few minutes but because i will not be in kalikid i wont see him later tonight.

Well the zone leader here became the next assistant to the president and so the last AP is working with us. He was my zone leader back in Victoria Tarlac. So it has been fun working with Elder Scott and Elder Landingin but i miss my area and my members and i am excited for my companion to come tomorrow so that i can get back to working with my investigators and what not. My new companion is Elder Tandas he has been out for a [long] time. He replaced me back in Guimba when i left. We did work in my area and we had good success with 3 of my investigators who i hope will come to church! anyways Elder scott is obsessed with Pogs... do you remember pogs? they were those cardboard disc's that i had like 4 tubes of?? well the kids around here play it here all the time. So back when it was cool to have pogs no one new how to play them... WE KNOW NOW! hahaha you can buy pogs anywhere around here and they are 3 for one peso... so we bought like 15 pesos of pogs and play them at night before we would go to sleep. Life in the Philippines is different that is for sure but you always have two choices to make... Hate it and complain all the time or Jump in and just enjoy it all! I will be coming up on 6 months remaining right? I best continue to enjoy life here!!

hey i am getting out of here now! I am done and tired of sitting at the computer and i think Pizza hut is calling me! And people are singing Jim Croce in the Videoke restaurant (videoke is Karaoke) its like the 5th song in a row! hahaha yeah i probably will never play pogs when i get back!! hahaha okay love ya!!

Re: Ryan & Chelsea's twins

twins... really.... that is just "two" much! haahaha well they will probably be born on my birthday! and that will be okay it doesnt really effect me! just means MORE CAKE! hahahahaa well congrats to them!

Well Brother Garcia will be leaving on thursday and i will be heading out to another area for a week until transfers then i will go back and work! so yeah that is the plan i was told... so other than that there is nothing new.. it is just in the next area its not far they said i will go back and work in my area with them a few times so that i do not have to pack a lot.. also they want to use my hot water!! hahahahha

okay i am leaving!

Q&A

Question: What's new?

Answer: nothing really.. just getting work done like always! we have a lot of investigators that.. are not going to church! but they are very nice and actually reading the book of mormon! so yeah that is all.. i went to find a flag of the philippines-- i found one... it was crappy quality and expensive so i did not buy it... that was my adventure earlier! Brother Garcia is doing great i am going to miss him when he leaves!

Question: You sent some pictures from baptisms and have written about them but you never mention if you have performed the ordinance. I know that here the family member holding the priesthood is encouraged to do the ordinance work.. is it the same there?

Answer: Yes we are encouraged to invite members to do the baptism to exercise their priesthood... we were told not to perform the ordinance but they give us the chance now to do so.. But i would much rather have someone in the ward perform it so that they have a connection with the member. so i have not done so.

Question: Of all the areas you have served, which area have you liked best? And why?

Answer: Every area has been different and i have liked them all. They all have their differences. In Jaen it was all the youth that made the area funny and welcoming. (I saw one of the youth at the Mall earlier and just talked real quick.. that was cool). In Guimba it was the relief society that made that area great. all of the nanays and their jokes and good times. In Victoria it was all the single adults that made it feel like home. Here in Kalikid its just the members that are nice and all of the work here that is making this area great. Even tho i hate all the gossip stuff and problems that was caused a year ago that broke the branch into two and things havent been back to normal and all i hear is stuff that i do not care about. But i still love the area, all of my areas! I do not think one was better than the other!

Something Wonderful

I asked Elder Grow to tell me something wonderful about this past week and this was his response:

Something wonderful-- i love my companion and i am going to be horrible sad when he leaves! But we are cleaning up this area and just getting the work done! I do not have much else to tell except we have a lot of new people that we are teaching and meeting so we are just having a good time!! anyways we are leaving now! Love ya!

One Happy Little Dude

i am freaking good! my companion is a short term missionary. He will enter the MTC after this transfer and he will be serving his mission in Baculod. He is BROTHER Garcia, he is not an Elder but i LOVE this kid!! hahaha he literally has ZERO experience in missionary work but he tries even though he fails horribly he doesnt just want to give up. And because this kid makes me laugh like ALL DAY LONG i do not even care that i have to teach whole lessons because he is just awesome! We also had some great lessons that we taught with a strong spirit! The work is awesome and probably because Brother Garcia is just an awesome kid that gets nervous when he speaks and yet tries! Anyways Elder Grow is just one happy little dude here! We almost got to see a cow give birth but it was TAKING my whole life and just got to see the first start to come out! Then we left.. hahaha We had a baptism on saturday and it was awesome, When he was invited to bear his testimony, he gave a very sincere testimony and expressed how this was everything he wanted and knows it’s all true. Like always when I get to see people make a commitment to Heavenly Father, I get to feel how important this work is and love to be a part of it!
Yeah the pictures here are of: people who work with us; the baptism on Saturday; things i get to see... like GIANT spiders! hahahaa also fighting spiders!

yeah you gots to love the philippines just like i do to truly enjoy living around here! Well i love you all and thank you for the support and prayers! They actually help! ;)

Baptism, Saturday February 12, 2011

Brother Garcia, Elder Grow, and the couple missionaries at the baptism
Brother Garcia and Elder Grow, February 13
Brother Garcia and 2 members of the ward that work with the missionaries.
Monkey in a tree
Elder Grow teaches Monkey in a tree!
Things Elder Grow gets to see.....
and touch!
Fighting spiders

Kalikid - Bongabon

Bongabon is nice, no complaints here! seriously we do not use the AC sadly! But the little tiny water heater for the shower works and is amazing!! Shoe goop gets used all the time! my shoe i think will just have a layer of shoe goop protecting the outside because i love that stuff! hahaha... I am in the process of finding shaving cream.. the soap mug is empty... hahaha

transfers are going on and i am going to be training a Short Term Missionary... so, just excited for the new changes! Elder Timbas is transferred it will just be me and Brother Garcia.

Anyways life in Kalikid is going good. Members are awesome and we are always having good laughs. I love the RM's we have here. Talking to them and listening to stories about crazy experiences they have had on their missions is always great! We will also have a baptism on Saturday and that will be nice to have. We will be working on finding some new investigators and helping some of the new ones we are teaching find their answers and prepare to be baptized. Well i will be having a child here in the mission.. but its more of a premortal existence child. I will be taking an intelligence and giving him a spiritual body! hahaha I will be training a Short Term Missionary as he wants to receive his mission call. So it will be me and Brother Garcia. This shall be fun! =D Well I really do not know what else i need to inform you all on! I am like hungry all the time... could this be a sign that i have a stomach dragon?? hahahaha Actually its just normal for me to be hungry all the time! Anyways all is well in the Philippines except it is getting Hot! Maybe i will have to use that A/C after all ;) hahaha Thank you for the love and support!!

Shoes & Dr. Pepper

yeah i totally left my boots and other shoes in my last area... gave the other pair that i never used to a recent convert... they were not COMFORTABLE for walking! but its okay. [Regarding the shoe shine kit and Shoe Goop was sent in Christmas package] the shoe shine.... it was dry... ahahah but the SHOE GOOP is AWESOME! love that stuff. yeah i have one pair of shoes but they will last. they have like a new sole so they are good! [How did he use the Shoe Goop?] i had a hole on the side of the shoe... i used it for that! and i fixed my companions shoes... he had no reaction

I got these pics from the new elder in the mission he is just all full of naivety and excitement! which makes me laugh and yeah so i am just doing the work, getting stuff done! Totally used the air con in our room the other day... it was FREEZING in our room! that was awesome! anyways we might have a baptism in 2 weeks that will be nice so we are excited about that... well i am excited.. my companion i think has zero hope for people and just thinks the worse in all things! he is weird... but hey it is part of the mission life! anyways that is about all the excitement right now. a whole lot of walking is what we do!! Well thanks for all the love and hopefully i will have some nice long letter next week! love ya all!

Ps

i totally drank a dr pepper like 3 weeks ago!! it was a 7.5oz can of DELICIOUSNESS! that is the size of their drinks around here... it was just a normal dr pepper... but it tasted so good! it was the last can in the gas station

Jan 2, 2011
Jan 7, 2011
Jan 21, 2011

Jan 21, 2011

Short message

Anyways so work here is nice we teach a lot... like this is the most teaching i have done my whole mission! We are just out trying to find some new investigators but we seem to be just planting seeds.. which is okay one day they might sprout!

Pics

Sorry for the delay, pictures will be in place soon!

Transferred

I am in the Bongabon zone... in the Kalikid branch (although it should be a ward probably) its interesting... a lot of 'bukid' or farm land... but we work in like little subdivisions... so it feels like i am in places back in sacramento... these people are pretty well off.. there are a lot of car owners here =D hahaha we are just one jeepnee ride from the central city of cabanatuan. we have two malls. this is the area where i first ate at a pizza hut and that will probably happen again! haha

my new companion is Elder Timbas he is extremely nice... he was the companion of Elder Gregorio in the MTC and they are as different as night and day hahahaha elder timbas is a quiet kid who asks a lot of doctrinal questions... so no jokes or pranks probably

Christmas was just another day. New Years we could not leave our house so i really got bored with reading (although i am reading the Great Apostasy by Talmage) I just couldnt take anymore and Elder Timbas is just a unique and curious kid so he had a whole lot of little things to do to keep him entertained..... while i slept.... hahahaha

still new around here and trying to get my bearings straight! next week [the blog] will be more interesting! and [I'll send] pictures because this computer shop is cool and doesnt ask to scan things and bug me about attaching my camera!

its kinda of cold here... oh i have aircon in my new house my new house is WAY TINY but it has air con and a broken water heater for the shower.. i could probably fix it... oh the sad thing is... that because it is cold here.. i have no need for this air con! hahahaha oh the irony!

Restless Week

This week has been rather a restless week! I am not sure if I was just having a hard time getting a good nights rest this week because of maybe a sickness or if just thinking A LOT about concerns and situations of our investigators and our area. Trying to find investigators is just not working for us. We can’t get return appointments or we have conflicting schedules that we can not make it to their houses. There were two very uplifting things: The Domingo family came to Church on Sunday even though they might not be baptized anytime soon because of their situation they are specifically in right now. They have committed to continue to come to Church and wait until they can be baptized. Also Nanay Lydia actually committed to a Specific Date for baptism! So we are very excited about that and as she will continue reading, praying and going to Church, she will for sure be ready to make that special Covenant to Heaven Father through Baptism. I read in Mosiah Chapter 18 which I shared with Nanay about a part of the Covenant we make with Heavenly Father when we are Baptized, which talked a lot about becoming one people (or a Zion people). I used the same question Alma asked to the people to Nanay and she shared how she would love those blessings and Covenant to God. We talked a little more and Extended a Date to her. She was a little hesitant because she was worried about not being Worthy and we talked about how all you need is a desire to want to change then afterwards make that change. We talked about a new life as being part of Christ’s Sheep and how after baptism you will receive that new life to start over. She finally agreed that Jan. 15 will be her date. We told her to pray about this date and if it feels right then that is your answer and that this is your time to Prepare. She was very happy after we ended our lesson with her which was great to see. On Sunday I felt just a huge weight upon my shoulders not really sure why maybe exhaustion or maybe just the weight of the missionary work on my shoulders. Later I was asked to share a lesson in Gospel Essentials. I liked the talk that was given earlier about Talents and based our lesson about Talents, Weaknesses, and Blessings. We talked about how we all have talents, God Given Talents, which we should use in our lives; we also have weaknesses in our lives. We talked about how our Weaknesses can strengthen our Talents or how we can make our Weaknesses turn into a talent and making it a Strength and Grow from them. I asked a question to the Class about Weaknesses, “Weaknesses… If God gives us Weaknesses, are they a Trial or a Blessing?” The Class had a split decision between the two. We came to that decision that after we overcome the trial of our weaknesses we receive blessings from the Lord. We talked about how our Faith will grow and we will increase in eternal progression. We came back to Talents for our close about how we should always share and use our talents because they will be strengthen and become better and help others as well. That is the purpose of why the Lord has given them to us. Every missionary has talents that have appeared here in the mission that they might not have known they had. They should not bury their talents, or hide them and not share them. I know that I have seen talents appear since I have been out here and how I can use them afterwards and I am grateful for that. I do not want to lose them or hide them that is for sure! Anyways I love this work even when it just gets tough and tiring, but nothing like asking the Lord for help and receiving that Comfort! Anyways love it here for the most part! hahahaha oh I ate DOG adobo style... IT WAS DELICIOUS!!!! I have heard that Cat Adobo is apparently way better! soooo Duck (Check), Balot (Check), Frog (Check), Dog (Check), Snake ( ), Rat ( ), Cat ( ), Bat ( ) not sure if i am wanting to eat bat yet... anyways Love ya all

No Complaints

my day is good... no complaints! had an awesome district meeting in the morning lots of laughs and improvement in our teachings. Went to the mall.. ate good food filippino bbq...