1 more week

Well... this week wasn't the most productive week as far "real missionary work" goes. But we got a lot done.

On Tuesday, we went to the sisters area for a while. We had a meeting with our ward mission leader. It was awesome. Hopefully we will have some members that will be able to work with us in the future. 

Wednesday, President came up and interviewed our whole zone. We also started watching the new safety videos that the church put out for all of the missionaries. They are pretty funny. 

Thursday, we worked with a missionary that just returned home from his mission in El Salvador. He is incredible. Then, that night we got onto a bus for the 3 hour bus ride down to the mission home. We spent the night in one house with like 20 other missionaries. It was actually pretty fun, but we didn't sleep for most of the night. 

Friday, we had a followup training for my companion. We were all kind of half asleep for it, but it was super good. President talked about how we can really apply the Book of Mormon to the conversion of all the people that we teach. He also talked about how we can all strengthen our faith by working to eliminate fear and also become more obedient. Then, we sat at the bus stop for like 6 hours. It was rough. It is super hot down in the low-lands. 

Saturday, the sisters in our ward had a baptism. It was awesome. 

Then earlier today, President and all of the office staff made their way up here to Baguio to have a sports day. We played frisbee, soccer, and basketball. It was super fun. Then we had what is called a "Butol fight." We laid these big banana (butol) leaves on the table and then just slapped food on top of it. Then everyone just digs into it with their hands. It was delicious. 

And this coming Saturday is transfer calls. I really hope that I don't get transferred. I hope that I will stay in my area for another transfer and just finish training my companion. But, we will see. I will let you all know what happens next week. 

Sorry it is kind of boring. It was kind of a crazy week. I hope all is well back home. I think about you all and send prayers your way. 

Love Elder Thomas

Panagbenga

The highlight this week was the Panagbenga festival. The whole session road (the main road in Baguio city) was shut off. It was crazy. The whole city was packed. The church put up a family search booth which was awesome. The missionaries were in charge of inviting people to enter the booth. It was awesome. More than 1,000 people came into the booth and created a family search account in the week. It was super fun. 

I have two people that we met this week that were pretty funny. There was one guy who had the sides of his head shaved and he had a bright red mohawk. Naturally, I wanted to stop him to talk to him for a second. I tried to stop him and tell him that we had a way to him to find his ancestors for free. He just looked at me for a second and then in straight English said "No thanks. I'm a Satanist." Pretty sad for him. But, I thought it was hilarious. Then the next day, this old grandma came walking by. She got really mad at us because we were not using our speaker that we had to play music. Then, she basically cussed me out in Ilicano. I knew that she was mad, but I don't speak Ilicano yet, so I actually did not know what she said. The other members told me that she is like famous in Baguio as the "baguio crazy." It was pretty funny. 

The week, I was really focused on seeing everyone's potential. My dad told me in his email last week that he sometimes stands in the cafeteria of the junior high and looks around and thinks "everyone in this room is a candidate for celestial glory. Kind of crazy." This week especially, because we saw thousands of people, it was easy to look at people and then judge them. But, everyone is a son or daughter of God and he wants nothing more than for all of us to return to Him. Missionary work is soo much easier when when we see people as what they can become. Our president told us that the first time we meet someone that we should picture them in white 3 times. Once at baptism, then at their endowment, then at their temple marriage. God has a plan for us and he wants all of us to be as happy as can be. I love you all and wish you all the best!

Love Elder Thomas

Find the Families

Kevin Thomas

Sun, Mar 3, 8:08 PM (4 days ago)

This week was awesome. I loved going out to find people. Usually it is not the most exciting thing. We get rejected a lot and we get lots of doors slammed on us. But, I honestly feel bad for those people. They really don't know what they are missing. This week, we didn't get rejected nearly as much. We started our contacts with people by introducing famiysearch. It was awesome. People naturally have a desire to know those that they are related to and where they come from. At the big festival this week in Baguio, the church is doing 2 booths where people can create a familysearch account. Contacting people this week was awesome and I am excited for the festival this upcoming week. 

One of my favorite lessons this week was with one of our investigators named Honeylitta. She has been taught by the missionaries now for a year. She knows all of the lessons, she reads the Book of Mormon, and she sometimes comes to church. We feel like she is finally ready for baptism, but for one reason or another, she doesn't. We decided that the best thing we could do at this point was have another lesson about the Book of Mormon and the power that it will have in really preparing her. We had an awesome lesson. She was in tears at the end of it and we decided to extend an baptismal date on the spot. She was really hesitant to accept it, but she did and said that she would work to be prepared for it. It was awesome. It is incredible to see what the Spirit and the Book of Mormon can do together to change lives. 

We had another kind of funny lesson with this dude. We were walking down the street to our next appointment and this guy stopped us in the street. He told us that he knew the "cook" from our church. We don't have a cook at our church, so I had not clue what he was talking about. But we went back this week to teach him. He let us in and the whole time that we were teaching, he would like pound his chest, kiss his fist, and then point to the sky and say something to the effect of "The big man upstairs is my best friend." This man is 65. Me and my companion were trying to keep from laughing. He told us at the end of the lesson that he believes that Joseph Smith is a true prophet. It will be interesting to teach him some more in the future. 

That will just about do it. This week, Addie leaves for her mission. And Caitlin has now been in the MTC for a couple of days. Missionary work is by far the most important work that we can be a part of in this mortal life. And I love the blessings that come from it. I love you all and send lots of prayers back your way. 

Love Elder Thomas

Find Them

The highlight this week was our Zone Meeting. We had an awesome discussion with our President about finding. He talked about how it is hard to find motivation a lot of the time. People often really don't know what they are missing and reject the chance to hear the restored gospel.

This week, we had a lot of appointments, but of course, we also had a lot of downtime. One day, we had just finished an appointment and we had 2 hours before our next appointment. Me and my comp asked each other where we should go. We both had no clue and then my comp said "we should pray. Our Father in Heaven knows who is ready to hear the gospel." It was awesome. I had never really prayed out-loud on the go. But, we stopped right then and there in the alley and said a prayer. We told each other after the prayer that we would both point in a direction and decide which way to go. But, we both pointed in different directions. We ended up going in the direction that my companion chose. 

We got down a staircase and ended up finding 2 less active families. It was awesome. Then we talked to a few more people and got 3 more return appointments. We came walking up the road and ended up in the direction that I had pointed to earlier. We both really felt that we would have found those people regardless of which direction we chose. It was awesome!

Sorry, the story was kind of all over. I hope it made some sense. We are a little bit short on time. But, I kind of just want to end with my testimony. This week especially, I learned that God definitely has a plan for all of His children. As missionaries, we don't get to choose who gets to receive the gospel. Our job is to talk to EVERYONE. God will put into our path those that really are prepared to hear the message of this amazing gospel. 

This next week, I am also really excited to talk to lots of people. This week there is a huge festival in Baguio. They shut down the main road in Baguio City for a whole week and there are parties everywhere. The church will be putting up 2 family history booths at the festival. It is a chance for people to come and set up a family search account. This week we will talk to people using family history as our main finding tool. People naturally have a desire to know their ancestors and those that they are related to. I am exciting to get started this week. 

I love you all and send prayers your way. Thank you for the thoughts and prayers. They are definitely felt out here. 

Love Elder Thomas

sorry... no new pictures. I just sent some old ones

 

The moving crew + Valentines Day

Well... this one is going to be kind of short. Our emails were under maintenance this morning, so we did not have the chance to email. We just got a few minutes to come back to the computer shop and respond to the family and send an email.

The highlight this week was the new update from the church about communicating with families. Me and my companion were in the middle of a lesson when we got a handful of texts to our phone. Usually we just kind of ignore them until the lesson, but we got like 3 texts and our investigator told us that we better look at our phone. My companion read the texts and just about jumped out of his chair. We were told that we would have a half hour each week to talk with our family on top of the hour that we are given to email. It was super exciting. This morning, our emails were under maintenance, so we spent the whole hour and a half talking to our families. 

Anyway, this week went by super fast. I had a lot to do. Tuesday, I made my way down to the mission home because I was training again. I had my training on Wednesday and then worked with some Elder's in the area for the rest of the day. We basically just became the moving crew because the Elders and Sisters were trading houses because the were some creepy dudes apparently that lived outside of the sisters apartment. So, we basically just became the moving crew for the day. I attached a picture of one of the trikes that took a load from one house to the other. It was packed full and had stuff hanging off in every direction. It was quite the sight to see as it drove down the highway. 

Then I picked up my trainee on Thursday and had a training and then we made our way back to Baguio. We worked all day Friday and taught like 6 lessons in one day. Which was incredible. Then on Saturday, we worked in the morning and then went to our ward party in the evening. You can see my whole Valentines experience in a nutshell in the picture below. 

That's about it for the week. I love you all and send prayers your way. 

Love Elder Thomas

 

Training Ulit

I just finished my first transfer here in Baguio. That is crazy. It went by really fast and I learned a lot. It was not the easiest transfer for me, but I learned a lot and am definitely grateful for it.

We got transfer calls on Saturday. I got told that I am going to train again. I was definitely not expecting that because I haven't hit six months yet in the field and I have already trained once. But, I am super excited. I will find out on Thursday who my companion is going to be. I still don't know if it is going to be a Filipino or foreigner. Either way would be good for me. I already have 2 Filipino roommates for the transfer. So, If I trained a Filipino, it would be 3 of them and we would definitely speak a lot of Tagalog in our house. But, if I train an American, I really have to be the one to take the lead in contacting and lessons because they will be new with the language. Either way, this transfer will be good for me and I am really excited. 

This last week, the coolest experience that we had was actually another blessing that we gave. It seems like that has kind of been the highlight of like my last 3 weeks. This one was actually to a non-member. Her dad is a member and we have taught her and her husband like twice. But, they really aren't interested. We got the feeling to stop by their house so that we could help the dad (who is a member) learn how to use the Come Follow Me study manual. But, he actually wasn't home. We found his daughter and son in-law who were just about to leave to the hospital. The daughter was super sick. We asked if we could help them with anything. Then we offered to give them a blessing. It was awesome. We told her basically that according to her faith, God would bless her. The coolest part was to look at her husband after the blessing. He never really likes to listen to us, but he was almost in tears after we gave the blessing. The spirit in that little house was awesome. It is soo cool to see how the gospel and the priesthood can bless both members and non members. 

God has a plan for all of us and he wants nothing more than for us to return to him as families. I love the chance that I have to share that out here with the people of the Philippines. I love you all and send lots of prayers back your way. 

-Elder Thomas

 

"I met you Jesus. He is actually pretty nice!"

Well as the title indicates... We met some weirdos this week. We met this lady who told us that she met our Jesus. I am not sure if that is different from her Jesus. But, she said that He is nice. So, I guess that is good to know haha. We drunk people all the time that say things like this. I am pretty sure that this lady was just not quite in her right mind. But she seemed to have faith in something. So, that is good.

We had another awesome experience with a blessing that we gave to an Elderly man that we teach. He is probably 71 and he told us that he has had a headache for like the last 2 weeks. He asked us if there was anything that we could do for him. We told him that there was something that we could do. We told him we would give him a blessing and that according to his faith, God would bless him with what he saw fit. I had the opportunity to give the blessing. I had the feeling to tell him that within the next day, according to his faith, he would begin to see changes in his health. And that God would bless him as he read and studied the scriptures and prayed. 

Anyway, we went back to visit him the next week. He told us that once we left, he read the chapter in the Book of Mormon that we had given to him. It made his headache a little bit worse, so he went to bed. The next morning, he woke up and said a prayer. Then he showered and he said the moment that he got out of the shower, his headache was completely gone. I know that it was because of the power of the Priesthood and the faith of this man. We really do have the power of God here on the earth and the ability to bless our brothers and sisters here. 

We also had a good Word of Wisdom lesson. I am always kind of scared to give these lessons. This is one of the major holdups for people here in the Philippines. But, we taught this man. He had drank coffee his whole life and he smoked 3 times a day. He told us that if this is what God had commanded, that he would follow it. That day, he went out and bought hot chocolate to replace the coffee and bought little candies that he could eat whenever he thought about smoking. His faith was seriously incredible. He knows that God has a plan for him and blesses all of us as we follow His will. 

I love you all and know that God has a plan for each of us. No matter how hard. We don't have the eternal perspective. Our Father in Heaven has a perfect plan for each of us and wants nothing more than for us to return to His presence. 

Love Elder Thomas