Transfer week again!!! Which means
running around like crazy! (Btw, I almost killed myself today running for the
first time all month! Haha! I’m so out of shape!) Anyway, this meant that
Monday we spent all night picking up elders and sisters going home, then
Tuesday included going to the temple, the War memorial cemetery, and watching a
few slideshows for the 11 pauwi (returning) missionaries and making sure everyone
get home the right way. I learned so many things going to the temple this time.
I had some specific questions I wanted answered and I got specific answers. It
is a good way to pause in life (especially as a missionary) and just embrace
the love of God. It was sad to see so many of my friends go home but their next
chapter begins while I’m still in the middle of mine.
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| War Memorial Cemetery |
The next page
of this chapter included the normal craziness of transfer day. First, picking
up and doing orientation for the local missionaries. Then rushing to Aurora
Chapel and starting up the transfer announcements (btw, Elder Herr is finally
off Mindoro after like 6 transfers).
After
that, I spent a good amount of time at the office trying to get everyone the
things that they needed before they went out to their areas. Next was doing
orientation for the new missionaries that came in. There were 15 of them but
we’re still kulang
(lacking) on sisters… send us some more! I was
able to just introduce the support cards that we have and the budgeting talk
that I give to all of the new missionaries. Then we took a few of them to their
new areas.
Haha!
New missionaries are the funniest to watch
because we sing Called to Serve during transfer meeting and they get so
confused when we switch to Tagalog for the 2
nd verse.
Haha.! Then, when you take them to their area
you try to talk to them and they just look outside the window in total awe.
Elder Vea was totally culture shocked being in
the Philippines.
He had like a million
things running through his mind as he looked out the window trying to soak
everything in.
Then we headed back to
the office to do paperwork for the rest of the night… sigh… I’ve been kulang
(lacking) on
sleep lately cause of having to set things up to make everything happen smoothly.
And then last night, or was it the night
before…anyway, one night this week, we went to take the new Mindoro
missionaries to the airport at 4 o clock in the morning, then do a full day of
office work! Things have been so busy lately we’ve only been able to teach 1
lesson all week!
Though it was one lesson, it was a
great end to the week. I was feeling frustrated with not being able to teach so
much and doing so much in the office before we went to go out and teach, so I
asked my companion where we should go because I was too tired to think. We went
to Brother Jose Vita, a recent convert who usually has a few non-members at his
house. I was trying to think about what to teach and nothing was coming, like
my tiredness and frustration was blocking me from feeling the Spirit. So my
companion suggested that we should pray. So we did pray. Then I decided that the Book of Mormon would
be a good subject to teach about. Now
this wasn’t an “I felt something tell me that this is what we should teach” kind
of thing. It was just a decision that
was made with the intent to go about and do good.
And this was the result…we went into
the house and there were some new faces there.
We introduced ourselves and began to teach. There were a few members
there to help us out and about 5 non-members so it was good amount of people.
We began to teach; we began to testify about the book of Mormon being another
testament of Jesus Christ; we shared experiences on how we came to know it was
true. Then we shared about its sacred origins and that through the power of God,
the Book of Mormon was translated by the hand of a young unlearned servant,
Joseph Smith. We then invited them to pray about our message and ask God, who
knows all, if these are the words of Christ. And if they would, we promised them that they
would know by the power of the Holy Ghost if it true or not. The Spirit filled
the room, our member friends began to testify as well, then, unplanned but
guided, I invited them to be baptized. We
now have 2 potential priesthood holders that have agreed to baptism. ^_^ Now I ask you, was the decision to teach about
the Book of Mormon a spiritual revelation? Yes it was. Did I hear a whisper or feel
impressed that that was the only thing I should teach about that night? No. I
did not receive an impression of the Spirit of this sort. That is because the
Spirit communicates to us in various ways. Elder Bednar says that less commonly
will there be a noticeable “light switch” revelation. More often, there are
sunrise revelations, revelations that take time to realize. Just as the sun
gradually illuminates a field at the break of dawn, such is the more common way
that the Lord communicates with us. I did not realize that the lesson was the
perfect lesson until about 3/4ths of the way through. If you want to learn more about the patterns
of revelation, I would suggest reading about the 50 Mark Note, by Elder Bednar.
Sometimes you are influenced by the
Spirit just by you trying to be a good person or going about with the intent to
do good, like I was. That is my
spiritual thought for the week. ^_^ Please
enjoy it and ponder it in your hearts.
In other news, I heard Sis. Alice
Almocera is back in the Philippines from Australia!!! Sweet! She’ll
be coming to the office to drop a package for an elder in Pasig 2 but that
means I’ll get to see her. She got
married since we had her baptized and was living in Australia. In other news,
do you remember Sister Noemi? My investigator I tried with all my might and
soul to get baptized? Well, she left JR
around November and Elder Coe told me he has a friend in Quezon City North
Mission who knew someone who moved from Mindoro has two kids and knew who Elder
Coe was. Anyway, long story short, Sister Noemi has been baptized since January!
^_^ That makes me so happy! I honestly did all I could for her to get
baptized and now she’s finally taken that step!
^_^ She has now begun her journey
into Eternity.
It has been great sharing with you my
best days ever. I love your comments and
your emails and I appreciate your perfect attendance to our emailing sessions.
^_^ I love you all…have a great night! I'll be heading out now to prepare for the
rest of the week.
Doing you Proude,
Elder Froude ^_^
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| Family Home Evening with the Sardoni family |
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| Our sister missionaries...my district! |
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| Zone Conference...lunch with Elder Alvarez. |
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| Yummy lunch! |
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