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
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