2 May 2011

Hey Family,


How have you all been? I've been pretty good. But I guess I'll start out with the news of transfers first. I'm... out of here. The Lord has called me to go somewhere else, I'll know on Friday. There's three languages on the island so I really hope I won't have to learn a new one. Elder McClellan, surprisingly, is transferring too, leaving just Elder Ball here to get his 1st senior. So that's the main news about that. Anyway, I realize that Mother's Day is next week :D so I get to call, I'll probably call on Monday morning because our district meetings just switched to Tuesdays. We have a phone right now, all companionships do but I can't tell you my number now because.. I'm transferring, so we'll have to figure it out next week.


I guess my feelings about transferring are okay. I really feel I am leaving the area better than I found it, and even though I won't be here to consume the harvest we've been reaping, I'm fine with that. As long as they become strong active members, that's all that's important to me. I'm definitely going to miss everyone here. I really love this area and all the people I've met here, but at the same time I'll go wherever God wants me to be.


So this week has been way good anyway. We've had some interesting experiences. We've been trying to up our teaching pool again since in about two weeks all our super progressing investigators will be baptized. We decided to get into this richer neighborhood but it was way hard to tract there. Like everyone who came out of the house was like a housemaid and they would just tell us the owners weren't home. It was tough. Anyway, eventually we just went out and found this guy sitting in... a waiting shed. We talked to him for a while and he asked if we had ever seen Jesus before. We hadn't, btw, but we talked to him a little about the spirit and asked if we could share with him. He seemed way interested. It was a way cool lesson. Usually when we teach the first lesson it's way hard for our investigators to really understand apostasy and the true importance of the restoration, but this guy understood dayon. Even before we taught apostasy. We were teaching about Christ's church being built and talked about how it was built upon the foundation of prophets and apostles and he said, "Whoa! There's no prophets and apostoles now! So what happened to Christ's church?" It was pretty cool. I think he has potential. Hopefully he just reads and prays. He has a couple of problems we need to fix which we'll work on, little by little.


Later we taught some other people. One was a referral from some of our ward missionaries, Dave, Nenita, and Geneva Ramos, they are way good. Anyway, the referral is a family and they are cousins of the Ramos. They seem pretty interested. I really liked their attitude as we taught. They are pretty good members of their church but they said they would try this out, to see if it's true. And I think when they find out it is true, and it is right, they will change. It's different than our other investigator we taught earlier that day, who had read and prayed about the Book of Mormon and says he knows it's true. We taught that guy a little and I felt we should commit him to be baptized. We did and first he said that he would, but it would be too hard because he'd have to change his birth certificate or something. Lame! So we talked about that and resolved that concern well "Dios man gihapon!" Which is a phrase that basically means that we all worship God and can do it in our own way. But what we really need to know is how to do things in God's way, because our thoughts are not his thoughts. But we talked to him about it and told him that's what this stuff means. If the Book of Mormon is true then all of this is true. And if it is truth... we should follow it. I wish that clicked better in people's minds. But he said he'd try it out too. Be more serious in his search to know.


The best thing that happened that night was we taught this other girl named Fatima. She used to be not too good of an investigator but one day we just gave her paper and a pen and said, "Hey, if you have questions, write it down here and we'll answer it." After that her reading got real sincere and she understood a lot more and has been asking great questions. We ended up teaching her about infant baptism and she understood, so again we committed her to be baptized. When we did she immediately said, "I have to pray to God first." I just thought that was a way perfect answer. I really liked it. Usually if people say yes straight off I say, well, make sure you pray to God to confirm that this is the right path. But she said she would right off. I'm happy and excited to follow her up.


So do you all remember Gregg Davila? Elder Jenkins and I taught him during like my first week in this area and then he was baptized like the next week. Anyway, he's always busy at work so I've never really got to work with him. He's worked with Elder Adams a couple of times. Anyway, on Thursday, we invited Cornell, our ward mission leader to work with us to meet our investigators who are being baptized on the 14th. We did and then Gregg just showed up. He said he went out and was taking care of some stuff in the area and just randomly texted Cornell, so he ended up coming with us too. It was cool. We talked a little about baptism with the some more and Gregg shared his experience with them. It was way cool. They are way ready and I think Gregg's experience helped and they'll stay active members, I wish I could have been here to watch the baptism.


Later we taught Mike Panelo again. He's a good investigator he is just way hard to catch. He is also a way smart filipino. He has a ton of questions and really wants to understand analytically. So we figure our main focus for him is on the spirit and how to know spiritual truths. So anyway, we got to his house and talked to him and he asked us if we could explain to him what everything in the book of Revelations means. 2 problems there, 1) Yeah, I'm not really sure what it all means myself and 2) That is not what he needed right now. Anyway, we just straight up told him that. We just talked the entire time about the Book of Mormon, about knowing truth, to prepare to meet our Father in Heaven. We stressed just how important it was to find out if the Book of Mormon is true or not and just build off of that. I think he's going to really read it carefully now. I can see him getting baptized in the future.


Friday was way cool. I went on splits with Thor again and guess who we were finally able to recontact? Melchor Molina! You remember him? He's the body builder in the midst of the squatters. He looks like superman or something. He has all these protein pills and stuff inside of his house. He's way cool. He's just been busy lately but we had a really good lesson with him and we made a schedule with him again. He's going to be a good investigator. I'm excited for him.


Saturday was way cool. WE taught some cool investigators, including the Abaya family. They are way cool. They are a whole family we've been teaching. They are baptist and way strong but so nice and have way strong faith. When they become members they are going to be way strong, but we still have to work slowly with them. He says a lot of religions have visited and shared with them but he likes us the best, because the stuff we teach just seems right. (Not to mention we are way gwapo. just kidding) And he just loves us. I love them too. They are a way good family. I hope we can help them progress. Their church and our church is at the same time, that's what is hard right now. They are willing to try our church out, but they won't miss their own church to do it. But we'll keep visiting them, they are way cool. Saturday night we had what was called the Jubilee. It was a cultural show from members of the church in Manila area to celebrate the church being in the Philippines for 50 years. IT was way cool. It was like a folk dance show. They actually did some of the dances they did in Christmas around the World before my mission. IT was kind of cool to see that. So the next day we had a broadcast of people speaking from Manila, including some apostles. It was cool. I didn't get to here to much because I was trying to usher people in and help them get seated and the entire stake center was packed, with all of Iloilo and Guimaras people. Hopefully I can find the talks online though. I got our investigators inside and seated though so that was good.


At night the highlight was we finally got to teach Darleen's family. She always just has listened in with Holy Grace and her family but we've been committing Darleen for weeks to let us teach her family. Her dad is always drunk just like Brother Po so that's hard but we got in and shared with them. It was one of the like best flowing, people focused lessons I've had in my mission. Everything just flowed together and into lesson one. It was way cool. The mom is a "dios man gihapon"er too, but she really understood why we were there, why it's important what we're sharing, and I can see her changing her life for the gospel of Jesus Christ. I hope we can help the Dad too. It's going to be good.


Anyway, that's basically all that happened. Hopefully we figure out the calling situation. I'll let you know where I'm at. Well, I love you all, take care!
Love,
Elder Joshua Burton


P.S. Jared wrote in a letter he asked a woman to prom, but didn't tell me who she was. Also, I sent out some letters for all of you. I hope you get them. And could you tell people if they write me a Dear Elder to write their address on it if they want a letter back.