God Keeps His Promises

Wowsa, we are late today. I think I just sat on a jeepney for a total of 5 hours today. A good 3 of which was filled of movies and music analysis with the good and faithful Lynn and a couple other missionaries from the zone. I've still got "what about Bob, "is this corn home chucked?" in my head. Bahahaha, Hilarious. Whoosh, time to get back into missionary mode. But the temple was awesome, as always! I just wish I could sit in the celestial room forever. Can I just do my personal study in there please??

So yeah, the floods are out of control. Only in the city though. We haven't really gotten anything. There's been a few floods down by the dagat, but nothing that's effected our investigators or LAs too bad. Shoot though, in Manila, it's absolutely incredible. We've seen some of the news just walking by houses and when we first get to appointments. Holy hannah, it's incredible. Marikina I think got hit the worst, but they pretty much always do. Salamat po sa package!! So looking forward to the new CDs.  Jessi has a kid! What the?!? I swear, in my head, nothing's changed at home. That's going to be a rude awakening. Ha. I'm so glad though that everything's ok with him. Blessing iyen.

sige, updates sa linggong ito!! Let me pull out my list. Oh yeah, so my clothes are molding. Haha, I'm not even kidding you. Apparently that's "normal" during the rainy season. Normal?? Don't you worry, I worked out a system so as no mold can grow. I seriously am living in a sauna. And this place is so incredible fertile, I swear, if I just stood still for 24 hours, I too would start to grow mold.

So we had a pretty great week. The work is starting to pick up. Honest to goodness, this training has been more training me than it has her. It's been a complete review of everything you need to do just to be a more effective missionary. One of the points in the 8 fundamentals is to invite them to be baptized in the first lesson. Seems kinda crazy right? So I've never really done it. But with training, shoot, you just do whatever they tell you. Ha. So that's what we've been doing and let me tell you the "aha" moment I had about it. I think the Lord is trying to change the way missionary work is done. It's getting time for the big harvest, and he doesn't want us wasting time on the ones that aren't ready. He wants us to find the ones he's prepared and bring in the sheaves. It's been a huge realization to me to see how it's changed how I've run this area. If they're not ready, sige, on to the next. But the area has just flourished because of it. We're finding people that are progressing and not just progressing, but are strong. It's because they've been prepared. Shoot, wish I would have know this 1 year ago. The learning curve on the mission is just so incredibly slow. I read a line though by Elder Holland that said, the Lord cares more about the faith you come with, not so much about the time you get there. Translation for this situation, I'm late in the game, but at least I picked up on it and it's time to go to work!

Sweet miracle this week. So Tatay Padrid, he's a fisher. They're dirt poor. As in, for reals. They make it by because they catch fish everyday and then if they have any extra they'll sell it for money to buy rice. Well last week we promised him that if he would keep the Sabbath day holy and come to church, he would catch more fish. We talked about how the apostles of Christ were fishermen and they had families to feed too. And they left it all to follow Christ and he took care of them and multiple times, their catch was overflowing (what is that word in English, it's masagana here. basta). And we said, he's not asking you to leave everything, he's just asking you for one day. That was last Friday. They came to church on Sunday. Went back on Tuesday, bam....he'd caught 20 kilos of bangus at 100 pesos a kilo. Not kidding you!! And honestly, he usually get 3, maybe 4 if it's a good day. 2000 pesos, that's HUGE in Philippino money. Guys, God keeps his promises. Just gotta trust in him. I love being the one to give the promise and then see it kept by the Lord.

So that's all for the week I do believe! Salamat sa pics, sa updates, etc. P.S. I got a ton of pics from Wendy yesterday. Holy hannah, her mission is BEAUTIFUL. I love that she's loving it. Much love to you all and hope you have a fantastic week! Hanggang sa susunod na linggo!! Give Jess a big congrats for me!

P.S. just a shout out. We get an answer/question session with Elder Bednar. Any questions you want me to ask him? I'm racking my brains over here, but can't come up with anything stellar yet. Let me know if you got a good one!