Sunday, March 27, 2016

Magandang umaga po so inyong lahat!


This week has been such a great week :) i don't have much time, so i have to make this email somewhat "short." last week, Tuesday, we had zone conference. as usual, president revillo started with his opening remarks. this time, his topic was about being/becoming a consecrated missionary. he referred to a talk given by tad r. callister; one of my favorite "missionary talks." throughout the rest of last week, i thought a lot about what i needed to do to become a better, more consecrated missionary. i was a little confused on what it really means to be "consecrated." this is what i came up with and wrote in my study journal :)

March 25, 2016
Being a consecrated missionary is hard. BECOMING a consecrated missionary is hard! when i think of being a consecrated missionary, i think of perfection; that being consecrated means you're hitting the standard of excellency every week, you're getting baptisms every week, everything goes the way you want it to, and the way it needs too; CONSECRATED. but, then, i sit back and think, not even Christ's ministry was "that" perfect. not everyone believed what he said, not everyone was baptized when he invited them to be. which makes me question again, what does it mean to be a consecrated missionary?

For me, it means becoming more and more of the person heavenly father intended me to be, each and every day. it means letting go of the things i love and miss at home, to fall in love with the things, here, on my mission. giving up time and people, that matter most to me, to take care of and tend to those who heavenly father finds important right now. 

Becoming a consecrated missionary means CHANGING. nothing changes over night. things take time to change. just like conversion and consecration. the lord knows we cant stop "cold-turkey" and just become consecrated. he knows its going to take time. and I'm convinced that's why nothing ever goes the way we want it to in life, especially, here in the mission field. elder holland, a member of the quorm of the 12 apostles, once stated that we need to be willing to pay a taken of the price that christ paid in order to be able to taste of salvation. when investigators don't accept baptism dates, when they don't keep the commitments we place with them, when our bodies are tired from being out in the sun all day...we start to become consecrated missionaries,we start to "pay a token of the price that christ paid." we start to realize that maybe its US that the lord is trying to "save;" maybe its us hes refining.
as we learn to accept the will of god, we become consecrated. as we learn to trust god and know that he is at the head of this work, we become consecrated.

"Nothing in this world is constant except for CHANGE."

I pray that you all have a great week and find something you can do to become a more consecrated missionary :) i love you all sooooo much!


Sis. Leausa

"It was Easter Sunday, right, so of course, I brought home traditions to our house. We had to search for our Easter baskets."

"And we made a big Easter breakfast just like we do at home.
We made cinnamon pancakes, scrambled eggs, bacon and drank chocolate milk."

"Here in the PHI we celebrate Holy Week. And it is a pretty big thing. Everything is closed. During Holy Week people act out the crucifixion of Christ. It's pretty crazy. They literally whip themselves. Like, people will volunteer to be whipped like Christ was AND THEN, people actually crucify themselves. Like literally hang themselves on the cross. There was a parade of floats on Friday night too. 

Sister Mendez and Sister Leausa

Sister Tropia and Sister Leausa at Zone Conference

"We had a district service project this Saturday where we just picked up garbage and stuff. These cute little boys helped."

Elder Souifa, Sister Leausa and Elder Brown

Sunday, March 20, 2016

Another busy week for these Sister Missionaries. These pictures are so beautiful.....

Sister Leausa and Sister Mendez 

"Starbucks tasted sooooo good!"

Sister Leausa and Sister Neilson (also from West Jordan, Utah)

Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Hi Everyone!


Medyo matagal yung huling sulat ko sa inyo. minsan, kasi, walang oras na magemail, hastening the work kami! :) pero, ngayon meron akong oras!!

This transfer is temple transfer! Woohoo! That would explain why I am emailing on Wednesday. We were able to attend  a session at the temple this morning and "rejuvenate" ourselves, spiritually, until the next time we will be able to go back; which will be not next transfer but the one after. I think it depends on when the temple is going to close for renovation.

Anyways, I love the temple. I can truly testify that temples are God's kingdom here on earth. There is no greater feeling than to be able to sit within the walls of Heavenly Father's house and be spiritually fed. I love it!

So this past week for Sis Mendez and I has been a little bit of a roller coaster. NOT within our companionship, we love each other, haha, but within our work. We struggled with trying to find people, specifically families, who have really been prepared by the Lord and who are waiting to hear the message of the restored gospel. We try to focus our hardest on families because we know that the blessings that come to families is so much sweeter than those that come to just one individual. And, we know that if we can help a family, after they are baptized they will be more likely to help one another stay active and stuff.

We struggled at the beginning of the week and by the time it got to Thursday, we didn't think we were going to to find a family in time for church on Sunday. BUT! the Lord had a different plan ....he had us wait one more day, until Friday night, when he lead us to TWO families: Cabilin and Calderon.

One of the hardest things that I am learning on my mission is patience in the Lord's timing. I think if we would have found either one of these families any earlier than we did they would have not been as ready as they were/are. I am not going to lie, being patient in the Lord's timing is hard....and sometimes it really sucks; especially when you want things with investigators to progress so quickly. I can testify that blessings are so much sweeter and so much more appreciated when we wait for them, when we accept and realize that everything will happen in the Lord's time (Ecc. 31)

Only the wife and her kids came to church on Sunday, but that is okay. All we really asked for was a family to teach. Sis. Cabilin coming to church was just an added bonus.  Speaking of families, that probably is my favorite thing about The Church of Latter-Day Saints;everything is centered on families.  I catch myself all the time thinking about my own family, how blessed we are because of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are in no way perfect, and I am convinced that there is NO such thing as a "perfect family" but, I know and I have witnessed the gospel bless and change families lives.

My goal before coming on my mission was to help make families eternal. Not only my family at home, in Utah, but also my families here in the Philippines. And...of course, my future family will be eternal.

Magsasama-sama yung mga pamilya habang buhay. mahal na mahal ko yung pamilya ko. kung wala sila, hindi ko alam kung ano gagawin ko. ibinigay ng diyos yung mga pamilya sa atin dahil sobrang mapagmahal siya. alam niya na hindi natin kaya yung buhay na ito kung walang mga pamilya natin. inordain ang mga pamilya ng diyos :) gustong gusto ng diyos bumalik tayong lahat sa kanyang piling bilang mga pamilya, hindi bilang mga individual lang. pinagpapala ng ebanghelyo ang mga pamilya. sana isang araw magiging "eternal" yung pamilya ko! at syempre, may goal ako na magiging eternal yung future familya ko. uuwi na ba ako?! haha! jokes :) 10 months pa! kung pwede, bumalik ako sa unang araw ko sa field. grabe naman, ang balis yung mission ko :/ sayang! alam ko ang simbahan ni jesucristo ng mga banal sa mga huling araw ay totoo! siya yung tanging totoong simbahan ng diyos dito so mundo. meron tayong katotohanan. sa pamamagitan ng ebangehlyo ni jesucristo kaya natin malaman na yung plano ng kaligtasan ay totoo at talaga, magsasama-sama yung mga pamilya habang buhay. wana nang mas matamis pa kaysa ebanghelyo ni jesucristo. pinangpangako ko sa inyo na magiging mas masaya at mas matatag yung mga pamilya nyo kung iapply mo yung ebanghelyo sa inyong buhay :)


Mahal ko kayong LAHAT! Hanggang sa susunod :) ingat kayong lahat sa linggo na ito!

Sis. Leausa

Sunday, March 6, 2016

Hello!

I received an email from Sister Leausa last night and she and Sister Mendez are doing very well. She did not have time to write her "weekly email" but instead sent these beautiful pictures.

Rice fields.

Sis. Mendez and Sis. Leausa

"These boys came to shower so I decided to help them pump the water."

Metro Manila in the background. 

Rice fields