Spiritual Growth, Physical Loss
I'm down to 62 kilos...
So it's been another fantastic week of just straight up finding, following up, and working really hard to get everyone who was committed to come to church to actually... go to church. Which they all did go to church (just the wrong one)
We had zone conference tho this past Wednesday which was super great. We learned a lot about following up and really giving people the time and day and help that they need to come unto Christ and receive such a glorious gospel. A lot with about this ranking system that we were able to come up with here in the mission in determining the desire of people wanting to learn more kind of on a 1 to 4 scale where what we want to find in our work is people who fit under the 3 and 4 category. The categories kinda go like this
1s: Jerusalem 600BC people who laugh and have no care saying "iglesa kame" "aye born again kame" or like this one super gnarly fat american said to us as we were talking to someone else and not even paying attention to him, "I have no time for religion" then continuing to sit down on a chair and drink a beer all alone.
2s: People who say they aren't sure. This is where it arranges around from person to person. We will have people who say "tignan natin" which means "oh we'll see" but then they usually laugh and then don't pay attention but then there are also people who are like "anong oras sya" or "anong dapat kong sulitin" where they ask when it is and what they should wear" and so on. and then kinda finish with "try namin" where they will say they try.
3s: "Opo. Magsisimba ako"* but then sometimes need an extra week to get them to go as they struggle to find how to get there in terms of rides and so on.
4s: "Gusto ko magpabinyag sa simbahan mo" and then go to church that next week and then are direct for 4 weeks and get baptized.
*Sometimes people will say yes to our basic invitation just to get rid of us. this is pretty apparent after the follow up visit that week when they directly try to avoid us or just tell us off again.
We only go to the 3s and 4s and we go to them a lot. However with our area specifically, we have had very very few and we are running out of area to go to in this finding game of people with any sort of interests. We have tried really hard to focus on using the Book of Mormon more often in our teaching as well as keeping things more spiritually oriented to really invite the Holy Ghost. Our area was affected by a long history of not so obedient missionaries (from a long time ago) which has put some not so good impression on the people that live here or the wrong impression of what we do and what our purpose is. So me and Elder Hunsaker as well have been trying really hard to help people (even with no interest in our message or church) at least have a super positive experience with them so we really work hard with our relationship and trust with people so that at least when the time comes for them to meet missionaries again, they will at least have a good aspect of us and be more willing to listen to the next pair to come though their neighborhood.
We are still having a fun time here though in pagudpud. We have a really interesting getup with a 7 week cycle this go round because of the placing of Christmas and New Year making traveling hard (and also a major highway that connects cagayan to Illocos norte being washed out from landslides and flooding) so I get one more week here in Pagudpud to try to really help people out and get them to church. We are going to go ham this week though with our findings. We are so determined to get at least one person to come to church this week. At least one. So any prayers would be appreciated to help us in our work in finding someone who is ready to receive this gospel and their saving.
But also if any of you are willing to update me on your life like I do with all of you, I would love to hear more :) Thanks!
-Elder Powell
Philippines Laoag Mission
#50 Buttong, Airport Ave. Tangid Junction Road
Laoag City, Ilocos Norte 2900
One of the people who we are teaching that wants to go but has a conflict with his work schedule in the electric company. We told him to just go to church in bangui since that's where he works. We are doing everything we can to help this family out too. They're super awesome and our most progressing friends!
Here's all the photos. I'll take more this week just in case it's my last week in pagudpud para maraming memories hehe #TransferWeek
Here's all the photos. I'll take more this week just in case it's my last week in pagudpud para maraming memories hehe #TransferWeek
No comments:
Post a Comment