29 January 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

Thanks for the emails and pictures.  Please give my thanks to Aunty Kaye and Uncle Pieter for their cool email.  It's been another great week in Tandang Sora.  Elder Van Dyke and I have followed all your good examples and are jogging in the mornings.  Funny, because after the first day of jogging, our legs were so sore.  Hehe.  We went out again the next morning and we're all good now.  It's hard to cope with the amount of pollution in the air when you're running but we're fine.

The mission is going really well and we had a ton of less actives attend church.  So awesome!  I went on exchanges with the Zone leaders this week in my old area of  Bago Bantay.  It was sweet to visit with some of the members and old faces that I knew.  It also gave Elder Van Dyke a chance to lead out in our area.  He is getting really good at speaking Tagalog and it's been great training him. 

If your wondering why my emails are late this week, it's because we had Temple Day today so our schedule changed a little.  We woke up at 4:00 a.m. to go to the Temple and we arrived at 5:50 a.m. only to learn that the first session wasn't until 7:00 a.m.  Oh man!  No worries, it was special just to be at the Temple.   We had a great session, then had a feed at the Temple canteen after, bought a few things, then headed over to the mall.  I found a nice, blue, paisley tie at the mall so I bought it.  

On Thursday we were invited to a farewell for one of the sisters here who has received her mission call to serve in the Philippines Bacolod Mission - the same mission as Sister McIver. Cool aye.  I asked her to keep an eye out for Sister McIver and to give her my regards.  

This coming week we have Zone interviews and it will be nice to receive more guidance and council from the mission leaders.  As a district leader, I have to give a workshop on Chapter 13 from Preach My Gospel (something I shared with dad).  I'm still finalizing my presentation as it has to be 15 minutes long and then we have to do 45 minutes of role playing.  I still have to correlate with the other District leader as to how we're going to present the workshop and role play. I know everything will be fine.

Thanks for all the notes and encouraging words of advice from your Stake Conference.  It's awesome to read of your enthusiasm to continue to help our Lord in his work.

Keep up your dieting.  75% of weight loss is in your food consumption, so it seems like every time you do something good  you go out and celebrate.  If you have to celebrate, just get something small.  You can do it.  I'm trying to lose some weight too as I've got just over three months left and then I'll be home. Cool aye.  Then the real mission begins, "Mission Impossible" - finding someone who will be my wife!  (Jokes). 

Sa totoo. Tatlong buwan lang ang meron ko para ibigay ang lahat na meron ko sa ating Panginoon.  Short time.  Lots to do.  Mahal ko ung diyos.  Mahal ko ang mission at mahal ko din kayo.  Ingat lage.

Elder Chadderton

21 January 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

What to say?  Firstly, thanks for all the great emails and the encouragement that you continue to give me.  I received all your Christmas letters and postcards today along with Geena's Christmas card from Idaho.  Hehe!  Cool!  Amazing blessings! 

You guys make me laugh with your good intentions to do the biggest loser program and then you send me pictures of you celebrating at Denny's.  Too funny!  Keep up the good work.  I think I need to start exercising a bit more because we get fed so much in this area.  Speaking of dinner appointments, we have an appointment everyday this week. Cool aye.  I put that down to paying an honest fast offering.  The Lord has blessed us this week.  Please continue to take care of the missionaries in our home Ward. 

With the new area goals, the Stake is really focusing on tithing.  On Sunday we had a couple of the High Priests and the Stake president speak to us.  The talks were great but I only wish they had spoken in Filipino and not English.  I felt that the people that needed to hear this important message didn't fully understand English and ended up falling asleep and the people that do understand English are those who are already paying tithing.  Oh well,  there's always room for improvement - even in established Wards and Stakes.   

Anyways, our ability to find people to teach this week is going well.  We continue to focus on finding prospective priesthood brethren.   We did some street contacting and made sure that we focused on males.  It was great and we had a lot of success and were able to set appointments with the men we had contacted.  It will be good to teach them and their families and help them to come unto Christ

As an update, our investigator Cokie had an appointment with us on Wednesday but it fell through so we reset for Friday.  We went over and shared a great lesson about the Plan of Salvation and left her a reading assignment in Alma 40.  We set an appointment to return the following Wednesday.  Before we could leave our current appointment she had assembled all this food, set it up on a table and invited my companion and I to have a munch.  That was so cool.   

After church on Sunday we went to visit this one less active family and they explained why they weren't at church.   Apparently, the daughter had an exam at school and the dad had the flu.  I had in mind to share about what we learnt at church that day - Tithing, Jesus Christ as our Savior, Baptism and the gift of the Holy Ghost.   We decided to focus on paying tithing and it was a really great lesson.  When I committed the dad to pay a full tithe he looked me straight in the eye and said, "Yes!" or "Gagawin ko!" which means, "I will do!"  It was a testimony to me how true doctrine understood can improve attitude and behavior.  He understood the blessings that can come to him if he payed his tithing.  It was a great lesson.

We contacted a man that we met last month and asked if he was still interested in taking the lessons and he said he was.  We organized to visit with him every Sunday night to teach him  the doctrines of Christ. He is very learned and knowledgable in the scriptures and has a lot of questions for us and I can see how it would be good to have him as part of the Ward.  We are looking forward to teaching him. 

The work is going well and with the month of February almost upon us, I know I've got to make the most of the time I have left.  I am certainly giving it my best.

Thanks again family and Whanau for everything.  Thanks for the pictures.  Uncle Rana looks great.  Please tell him that he and I are going to go jogging together when I get home. I'm loving the Philippines and I love the work.  Keep up the exercising and healthy eating and give thanks for the many blessings you have received.  The Lord watches over those that do his work.  May we always be in the service of the Lord.

Love you,

Elder Chadderton 

14 January 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

What great and newsy emails!  I love to hear that everyone is doing well and I want you to know that you're all so awesome.  This past week has been a great week here in the Philippines.  We have had so much fun in the work and this year our mission is focusing on Priesthood brethren.  It is going to be a great year.  Well, a great four months for me.   Tell Uncle TC thanks for his email.  Yes, I knew Sister Schmidt and she was an awesome missionary.  Glad Jenna got to meet up with Sister Leauanae.  Good to know she and Sister Schmidt are home safely.   

Well, we received new zone leaders this transfer and they are great.  We had our zone training with them today and we set some awesome goals as a zone. I realize that I am the longest serving missionary in this zone so I want to help guide the zone to follow the direction of the new zone leaders. 

As mentioned earlier, we have a huge focus on priesthood.  Our goal is to bring 200 newly baptized aaronic priesthood holders into the church by the end of the year.  The other goal is to help those less actives that are of age, to receive the Aaronic Priesthood or advance into the Melchizedek Priesthood.  We have to encourage those who are in the Priest Quorums to step up and prepare themselves for advancement and invite those who are less active priesthood brethren to come back.  It's a great goal and this past week we have committed baptismal dates for two prospective aaronic priesthood holders.  Cool aye!

We visited one of our investigator's last Wednesday but she wasn't home.  We went back on Friday and we were able to share a lesson with her and some of her friends.  She is a college graduate and loves listening to the messages we share.  During our most recent visit we asked if her husband could join us during the discussion and he did. Cool!  With the focus on priesthood and the gospel of Jesus Christ focusing on the family, I felt it fitting that the husband should be invited to attend the discussion.   We shared the first lesson and focused on the prophet Joseph Smith.  We testified of the Book of Mormon and gave them a copy.  The spirit was strong and it was a great lesson.  There is a qoute in PMG that says, "True intelligence is to be able to take true doctrine and simplify and explain it so well that even a small child could understand it."  That's what we tried to do.  After the discussion they fed us and continued talking about the lesson.  It was great because they were able to ask more questions about what we had shared and we were able to answer them.

We had our area broadcast on Saturday night where the Area Presidency presented and explained the new area goals for the Philippines in 2013.  The goals are the same as last year with more emphasis on strengthening the priesthood and also encouraging returned missionaries to marry in the Temple.  Hehe. The goals mentioned are 1. Feasting upon the words of Christ,  2. Establishing the church,  3. Rescuing the one, 4. Saving the rising generation,  5. Strengthening the Family.  With each goal the Area Presidency explained more in depth as to how we are to focus  on helping the priesthood.   When we had Ward Council yesterday we were able to get a list of the priesthood members in the Ward.  We will use this list to help us achieve our goals.  My companion and I have a lot of work to do.

I am excited for our mission goals and it really does make me appreciate how special the priesthood is to me, my family (now, and in the future) and also to Heavenly Father.  I know I only have a few short months left on my mission and I want to give it my all - all my, HEART, MIGHT, MIND and STRENGTH.  It's awesome and I'm so lucky to be here at this time in my life.  I love you all so, so, much.  At alam ko na totoo ung gawain misyonero.  Mahirap siya pero alam ko na biyayaan ako ng Panginoon habang sinisikap kong sundin ung mga utos niya.  Ito ang kanyang simbahan, ito ang kanyang gawain at kaluwalhatian at ako lang ang isang bahagi sa kanyang plano.  Mahal ko ito.  Mamimiss ko ito.  At ibibigay ko ung buong puso, sipag, isip at lakas sa gawaing ito. 

I love you all so much.  Thank you for all your love and support, take care and keep being the awesome example that you are.

Elder Chadderton

7 January 2013

Oh man!!!!! 

Hey Mum and Whanau,

What an awesome experience to open up my email's and see all the fun pictures of Jenna's arrival home.  Not much else spells, "Trunky" than when you see those pictures. Hehe.  It was so awesome and guess what? I'm next! Thanks for all the emails and pictures.  I look forward to more pictures. 

What an awesome feeling Sister J must have felt walking through those doors at the airport.  I look forward to those same feelings.  Oh man… Hehe!  Stop crying mum. Hehe! 

Well, this week has been a great an awesome week of finding new investigators.  We gave a pamphlet to one little lady who we had purchased some pineapple from and after talking with her we set an appointment to return and visit her.   Well, upon our return appointment she said to us,  "Hold on, I've got to call my friends!"  She came back with five of her friends.  We visited with them and explained who we were and then proceeded to teach Lesson.  We felt prompted to focus on, "Families!"  We explained how the gospel can help families and how it's central focus is on families.  They loved the lesson and were very interested and nice so we set a return appointment for Wednesday.  Cool as. 

Another experience was where we visited a less active family whom we had not met before. They started to explain a little as to why they had become less active.  I invited them to come to the Temple for a Temple tour.  The lady said,  "Hold on" and she gaps it out of the house and comes back with like eight children all 10 years of age and over.  She says, "These are my kids and these others are my nieces and nephews!"  She then said to the children, "Um, the Elders have a question for you."  I paused and then extended the invitation to each of them to attend the Temple tour and every one of them were excited and agreed to come. It was so sweet.  We taught the family and relatives and then set a return appointment before leaving.  It was really great and the kids were so nice. 

A family member from another less active family died, which was sad and so we are looking forward to teaching the family when they return from their province in Bicol.  It has been a great week and Elder Van Dyke is doing great.  School is back in this week and everyone goes back to work. This transfer is an eight week transfer and I know it will be great. 

BIG NEWS!!!. ELDER ABLE IS BACK!  I didn't go to transfer day but I got a text from another Elder saying he's back in the Mission.  Cool aye.  He's in Mindoro at the moment and  it will be sad if I don't get to see him before I finish my mission.  He is, "The man!"

I love you all heaps.  Take care and have a good week and be safe. 

Elder Chadderton   

2 January 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

Guess what?  I will be staying another transfer in Tandang Sora and will hit my 8 month mark for serving in the same area for this length of time.  Amazing!  My companion will also be staying with me so we're going to have a great start to the New Year. 

This morning I set some goals for me and my companionship.  Goals that will better help the area, the Bishop and my companion.  It's going to be sweet and I've calculated that I have approximately four months and twenty days left in the field and I have much to do.  I know it's going to pass by so, so quickly but  I kind've don't want it to, but I know that their is life after the mission.

I cannot believe that Jenna, Jared, Charlton and possibly Fletcher will be coming back in the next week.  Please ask them to email me and send some words of advice.  I need some help from the experienced missionaries as I finish off the rest of my mission.  I love the scripture found in Alma 17:2-3 where it talks about Alma reuniting with the sons of Mosiah and how he rejoiced exceedingly to see his bretheren and what added more to his joy was that they were still his bretheren in the LORD.  That is what I am looking forward to in May - to be reunited with my, "brethren and sister in the LORD."  Hehe

Christmas was fun and New Year's was a blast - literally!  We had a curfew on New Year's Eve where we had to be home by 6:00 p.m.  We went out and worked all day then we were home by 6:00 p.m.  We stood out the front of our house to watch all the firework displays.  It was so loud and when 11:30 p.m. came around you could barely hear the person standing next to you due to all the noise.  It was awesome.  I took some good pictures of the fireworks and it was so much fun to watch.  This will be my last New Year in the Philippines.

The work has been a little slow this week due to the holiday season but next week it's game on.   We have  some good plans in place knowing that we are staying put in Tandang Sora and we want to go out and find new investigators and put our heads down and get straight back to work.  I'm also looking forward to the ongoing training of my companion.  It will be good to  help him improve on his Tagalog. 

Well family, there isn't much else to share because not much has really happened this week.  Oi, the old lady I blessed passed away on December 21st but the family is doing great.  They are moving forward and we continue to teach them and hopefully, we will baptize Michael by the end of February.  He is a trike driver so he has a really busy schedule.  The work will go forward this transfer and I can't wait to see the results. 

I love you all so much and I figured that if I miss anything from the Philippines when I get home, I'll just go and visit the Ramirez family.  Hehe.  

Thanks again for everything and please give Geena a big hug from her big, but younger brother.  Give Jared, Charlton and Fletch a hug too.  Take care and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Elder Chadderton