Families can be forever!

 This weekend was full of joy and rejoicing! We had the opportunity to attend the temple with two of our branches. 3 families were sealed for time and all eternity!!!! Several individual had the opportunity to take out their endowments and tons of new members were able to perform baptisms!!!!!! 

Bantayan branch - Bantayan Island is a short ferry ride off of Cebu Island (were we live). We have an awesome branch there. When we arrived in January they were just getting permission to start having a special sacrament service on the far side of the island. 2 of the families sealed live in the area of the special sacrament! It has been an honor and joy to be associated and work with all of these amazing people whom we love so much.

Bantayan Branch

Mata Family

Alimoncar Family

Balobalonos Family

Kawit Branch - Kawit branch is a brand new branch that was formed in April from dividing 2 of our other branches into 3. When we started to plan the temple trip we thought about 10-15 people would join. Turns out 32 ended up attending! This is incredible considering there are about 35 individuals attending on average for sacrament service!!!! It was so wonderful to see so many newly baptized members there with us. 

Kawit Branch

Delan Family - This incredible family was baptized this April. Last week President/elder Dabel had the privilege of sustaining brother Delan to the Melchizedek priesthood and also set him apart as a counselor in the branch presidency! His sweet wife was also called to serve as the young woman's president. It was so awesome to be in the temple with them for the first time.

Delan Family

Do I believe it?

There are moments in our life that truly challenge and define who we are and what we believe. I had one of those moments. We went with a couple of elders to visit the most precious soul in the world. He is a sweet 84 year old man that drives a bicycle with a side compartment built on it for a taxi service. He has made a humble home out of primarily ropes and rice bags. I fell in love with him immediately and my heart ached a bit for his humble circumstances. 

I learned that the tent pictured above was his primary residence. I remembered that the elders told us we were there to teach him and invite him to live the law of tithing. (Giving 10% of everything we earn back to the Lord). When I realized that I was about to ask this elderly man to give what little he had my heart sank. I have never been homeless. I have never missed a meal without choosing to. For a small moment I questioned if it was the right thing to do. Then almost immediately my mind was flooded with memories of all of the blessings and true miracles David and I have received from living this law. 

In Malachi 3:10 we are invited to, "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse,... and prove me now herewith,... if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. 

I have personally witnessed the Lord pouring out blessings upon my family through obedience to the law of tithing. How in the world could I deny this sweet man the blessings and miracles he so desperately needs? Of course it was right to teach him how to access Gods blessings through the law of tithing.  In that moment I knew without doubt that I believe 100% what I teach. I know the Lord lives. I know He loves us. And I know that he always keeps His promises and loves to bless His children. 

We have had the awesome opportunity to work with our district in teaching and promoting the Linking Arms program, created specifically for the Philippines. The heart of the program is linking missionaries with branch members to who then minister together to part member families. The success has been astronomical and most of our reactivations and baptisms come from this effort! It's been really exciting to see the growth and success. We work with 6 branches but I only have pictures of a couple of our meetings. 

The number of baptisms has grown significantly in the past two months. I'll share just a couple pictures. I especially thought these pictures were breathtaking. Elder Dabel and I aren't in the group photo because we are holding up all the cell phones for lighting and taking the pictures. 

Some of the growth in our area has resulted in the creation of special sacrament services. When there are individuals who want to attend, but live far from a meeting house, occasionally the mission president will allow special sacrament services to be held in the area closer to the home of the individuals desiring to attend. These groups started out with just a few attendees. Within in only a couple of months they have grown substantially. This Sunday there were well over 20 participants in the Polambato group, most of whom are not members, that are receiving the teachings of the elders! 

This is Brother Bobby's family who also host a special sacrament in their home. They live out on one of the islands our district covers. Their group has seen massive growth as well. We have really grown to love this precious family and enjoy the time we have had to visit them. They had us for dinner and made us a delicious meal of deep fried chicken feet and heads, fresh fish, adobo chicken, and rice. 

The final activity I want to share was the invitation to attend the San Remigio's youth activity the past weekend. We were asked to participate in the games and share a spiritual message. We had a blast!!!

These videos are hilarious. We had to come up with a team name, dance, and song!

We are loving our time here in the Philippines. We feel overwhelmingly grateful for the sacred opportunity to serve the Lord in such a choice country, filled with the most wonderful people in the world!!!!

By small and simple things

 I've been thinking a lot about the scripture that says, "by small and simple things are great things brought to pass". 

As many of you know it wasn't too long ago that I was hobbling around on crutches having had my ACL completely replaced and my meniscus repaired. It's been a hard recovery. Prior to my injury and surgery I could run 3-5 miles without a problem. 

When we arrived in the Philippines David and I started walking and I attempted to jog. For the first time ever I wasn't able to job more than 1 minute. We had to slowly build up. I started timing myself and setting goals. We went from 1 minute to 3, then 5, eventually 10 minutes, finally I was able to jog 1 mile straight, and today we went a total of 4.5 miles with jogging 3 of the miles. The improvement has been slow but steady. 

Our first mission to Chile was hard. Possibly one of the hardest things I've ever done. It was hard to be away from family, hard to learn the language, hard to adjust to the culture, and hard to learn how to work together 24/7. But we learned a lot, set goals, worked our butts off, and saw success. We loved the people we met and taught and were able to help 13 precious souls make covenants with their Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ through baptism.

This mission in the Philippines has been different. Our job is to help the district grow into a stake. David serves as a member of the district presidency. We do a lot of training and visits with members, the junior missionaries, and the district leaders. We serve 6 branches (congregations) and get the chance to speak in sacrament meeting almost every Sunday in different buildings. 

We love the people and the work. This mission has not felt nearly as overwhelming. We still work hard but we have been able to apply a lot of what we learned in our first mission, which I think has made it easier to adjust. Most days we are filled with overwhelming gratitude, love and joy. 

Not too long ago we were asked to visit a brother that had made some pretty serious mistakes. I was apprehensive at first and, to be honest, felt a little bit judgmental of his situation. As we walked in and began talking I was overcome with love and compassion. All judgement was gone. I felt how much Heavenly Father loved this man. It was such a sacred experience. 

He wondered if there was hope for his situation. My heart swelled with gratitude for the message we could share of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who made it possible for ALL to repent, change, be forgiven, and become completely washed clean. I had no hesitation testifying of the love his Father in Heaven and Jesus Christ have for him because I could truly feel their unconditional love for him. 

Sometimes the process of changing (repenting) is not immediate or easy. It's kind of like building up my ability to run again. If we don't quit and keep trying then little by little we can grow stronger and be just a little bit better every day. In the words of Jeffrey R. Holland, "It is not possible for you to sink lower than the infinite light of Christ's Atonement shines." 

These are a few pictures of a few of the amazing people we have had the privilege and opportunity to work with and visit. We could not love them more. 

FUN FACTS!

In the Philippines bananas are plentiful. We have banana trees in our yard. They make ketchup with banana's and dye it red. It's actually quite delicious. It's so good in fact that is what they use for their spaghetti sauce. I'm not joking!

These are fried banana's coated with some sort of yummy sugar sauce.

Another cool thing-

They eat with their hands a lot. So much so that we are often given a glove to eat our rice with! I love it!!!

We made it!

After several LONG flights we finally landed in Manilla, Philippines. Although we had been traveling for 40+ hours, the moment we landed we headed to the car rental booth. It was Monday, missionary Pday, and we needed to hustle in order to see our nephew Mahonri who is also serving in a mission in the Philippines. We drove 3 hours and had a wonderful lunch with Mahonri and his companion. It was an awesome treat to get to spend some time with him. He is doing wonderful, is full of the spirit, and an incredible young man. We couldn't love him more! 

Visiting Mahonri we a special treat but we were anxious to get to the island we would be serving on, Cebu. In Cebu we met with our mission President and were assigned to the Northern part of the island, Bogo district. We have been asked to help the district grow into a stake. David is serving as a counselor in the district presidency. We have 6 branches that we serve, on 2 different islands. It will be a lot of work but we are excited to do it! 

It's gorgeous here! The ocean is breathtaking. There is white sand and crystal clear warm water. I'm so grateful senior missionaries can enjoy the water activities!!! There are plants and trees and greenery everywhere. I love the jungle! We went to visit some members who live near our home and got to hike through the jungle on small trails. It was crazy. From the road you can see homes all over. But you have no idea how many homes there are hidden in the massive trees and bushes. We passed home after home. Most were very humble. The people are incredibly loving and kind. Everyone waves at us and says hi everywhere we go. We love them with all our heart! Here are a few videos of our hike - 

The family we visited was so warm and inviting. They said we were the first senior couple missionaries that had ever visited them. There were 4 generations living in there sweet humble home. They kept apologizing they hadn't fixed us anything to eat but we assured them we had just eaten so not to worry. We all shared messages of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ and bore testimony of the blessings we recieve when we obey His commandments even though at times it may not be easy. Our hearts were filled with love and the spirit of Christ. It was a cherished experience. Here is a picture of the family, the young missionaries and some youth that went with us. 

Some fun facts!

Public transportation primarily relies on either jeepnees or trikes. Jeepnees are the old World War II jeeps that were left here that have been redesigned to be used like a bus. They are painted all sorts of fun colors and can be found all over. Trikes are either a motor cycle or a bicycle attached to side compartment that can hold 2-4 people. They are custom made here and are super cool. Here are some pics: