25 March 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

So glad to hear you're home safely mum.  Thanks once again for the emails and pictures.  It has been another good week and I'm doing fine.  The weather has been a bit of a scorcher but the work has been great and last week we had an awesome baptism.  

As far as the past week of events goes,  we've had a pretty normal week of work - not overly busy.   My companion and I have been playing basketball just about every morning this week.  We wake up around 5:55 a.m. and study from 6:00 a.m. - 7:00 a.m. and then we go to the basketball court and play from 7:30 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. then on our way home, we stop in and buy some pandesal (delicious, small bread rolls) for breakfast and then we get ready for companionship studies at 9:00 a.m.   It has been great to exercise because it shows me how unfit I am due to the lack of exercising.  Elder Carman and I are having a great time. 

On P-Day last week we went bowling with some of the other Elders in our Zone and it was heaps of fun.  Elder Carman and I found this store that sells TimTams and we've been having some TimTam slams.  Only thing is they are a little expensive but so worth it. 

It was a blessing and a miracle for us that everything worked out for our baptism because on Saturday we started the day with a service project helping this one family.  The service project consisted of putting a napkin, a plastic fork and a plastic knife into a plastic bag.  One of the families in our area do this as their job so we helped them out.  Interesting job!  After the service project we went to the computer shop to print out the baptism program and then headed to the chapel where we filled the font, set up the room and made it look pretty.  Once we finished setting up we headed home to shower, change and go out again.  A few of our appointments fell through which was a bit disappointing but we soldiered on and visited with this one member who not only had a lesson but fed us too and by the time we were done, we had to go back to the chapel.  The person we were baptizing arrived around 6:00 p.m. so we took pictures outside and then started the service.  I sang a song called, "I Will Lead You" and it is a really nice song.  The baptism was great. 

Yesterday was a great day of work.  We had church in the morning then headed home, had lunch and went to work again.  We visited four families in this one area that is close to our house then we went to another area and contacted a referral that we've started teaching.  Awesome family.  We then taught a young girl by the name of Joy who is a special child and her family wants us to teach her so that she can be baptized.   After our discussion with Joy we went to our dinner appointment with a family that recently joined the church.  It was another awesome day and at the end of it all we headed home and did our planning before calling it a night. 

Thanks for all the awesome advice that you guys continue to give me.  It's super helpful and I know that I still have a lot of good to do.  One piece of advice that Jenna mentioned in her email - that I've been running through my mind is, "Finish your mission first and the Lord will take care of the rest!"  That's exactly what I'm doing!  

The mission is quickly coming to an end and I want to finish it on a good note.  Thanks again Whanau.  Love you all and take care.

Elder Chadderton

Monday 10th, 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

Thanks for all the emails and pictures. What a strong spirit I feel from you all. I can just imagine sitting in our living room and sharing mission stories with you all. Don’t cry mum - but I am - I miss you all and love you all so much. 

I got my "Trunky letter" today, which informs me that they're organizing my flight plans for coming home. I just need some information. Please send our Bishop's name and our Stake President's name. I was going to request  the mission office if I could get a direct flight home but they said usually they take a different route cause its cheaper. It’s all good. 

It was so sad to hear that Aunty Kun has not been doing well. Take care of her mum!

It was awesome to hear that Jordan is preparing for his mission. It is the best decision that I’ve made in my life and I know that it’ll help him for the rest of his life as well.

There are things that you learn on your mission that seem so indescribable and you just can’t explain them. We had ZLC last week and it seemed that as we were there I was being enlightened as to how the things we do now as leaders in the mission will help and will be very similar to things that we'll do after the mission. It’s been so awesome. 

tulda ng sinabi ko nakaraan linggo hindi ko talagang maipaliwanag ung mga natutunan ko dito sa mission pero nagpapasalamat pa rin ako dahil bahagi ako ng totoong simbahan ng diyos. 

Oh – so we got new mission rules.  We are allowed to email friends, different family members and recent converts in the mission. Cool aye? So now I am allowed to email Jared and Charlton and my other mates. The only thing is I don’t have their email addresses. Ayos lang. Also our email time has now been extended to two hours for everyone. Double cool aye?

So other than that not much has happened this week but the work has been going well and we have another baptism on the 23rd of March. It’s awesome. Take care and have a great week. 

Hey Mum & Dad, I am so jealous you guys get to go and see Sister Nicola in her mission.

Oh and for my birthday I already have a dinner set up (he he) but a small package of little treats would be awesome. Anything would be happy – its up to you guys.

The mission rings I ordered are done but I haven’t got them yet. The lady still has to send them to me. All goods - I’ll send a picture when I get them. 

Love you all heaps.

Elder Chadderton 

4 March 2013

Hey Mum and Whanau,

Thanks for the emails family and the pictures too Danii.  Awesome!  Your question mum regarding the Tatay of the Ustare family and why he wasn't baptized is because he passed away over 20 years ago, so the Nanay is excited to do the temple work for her family when the time is right.  We are trying our best to reach out and teach the older sister.  I think she doesn't like us very much, mainly because when she returned from Abu Dhabi she wasn't too excited to learn that her family had changed religions.  But, she's slowly warming up to us, so hopefully we will have the opportunity to invite her to be baptized before I return home.  That will be sweet to see the whole family complete. 

Cool stories mum about the Ward Movie night and all the popcorn that the Primary made and also the bargains at the Op shops.  Good on you.  It's awesome that Otis and his family are moving into the Temple View house.  And, mum, you've got to  stop reminding me that I only have 10 weeks left.  You are more trunky than I am.  Hehe! Cute! 

So, this week was a good week.  Transfer day went well and we received some really great additions to the Zone.  It's going to be a good transfer and I know the time will pass by quickly because we're all busy in the work.  This morning Elder Carman and I did our planning as Zone leaders where we went through some key indicators and set new goals so that we can better focus on the mission goal of teaching priesthood.   We are focusing on finding this transfer.  We set a goal to do 5, "Open your mouth" (OYM's) every day,  which basically means we have to talk to or contact 5 people - they are counted as contacted if we give them a Book of Mormon or pamphlet and get their name, phone number and address.  We figured that by doing this we will have achieved several of our key indicator's - helping a new investigator, contacting someone, placing a Book of Mormon with someone, increasing the number of lessons we teach and having a member present during our lessons.  It's going to be great and we decided that in order to move the Zone forward we as Zone leaders need to set the example for the rest of the missionaries in our Zone. 

Sister Chadderton asked me to share a miracle that I've experienced this past week.  A few that come to mind are that I consider it a miracle when we make it to all of our scheduled appointments and are on time too.  I also consider it a miracle that on Fast Sunday I fast for 24 hours and haven't died yet!  Hehe.   I consider lots of things to be miracles - even the very small things - such as understanding and applying the things I learn during my personal study to my missionary work, good health and not getting sick for such a long time because since my time in Teresa I haven't really been sick at all which is almost a year now.  Other miracles include having a great transfer this past week and a good Zone, having an awesome companion, having good friends, having active recent converts, having the strength to cope with the demands of missionary work, having the gift of tongues and many more.  That's  just a short list of the things I see as miracles.  I also see miracles through you family. 

Thanks for everything and thanks for being an awesome family and for your continued words of encouragement.  Thanks sa lahat.  Malaki talaga ung mga blessings sa buhay ko.  Di ko talagang maipaliwanag kung gaano ako nagpapasalamat sa diyos. ang daming blessings ang kanyang ibinibigay sa akin at sobra akong grateful sa lahat. 

Alam ko na maiksi lang and oras ko sa mission at talagang mabilis ung mission kapag na engaged ako sa gawaing eto. ito talaga ao ung gawain ng diyos at kanyang kasiyahan para makita tayo bilang masayang mga anak ng diyos. mahal na mahal niya tayo . di ko talagang kayang maipaliwanag kung kalaki ung pasalamat ko sa diyos pero sana naipapakita ko yun sa kanya sa pamamagitan ng aking mga ginagawa. mahal ko siya at alam ko na mahal niya ako. napakabilis po ng sampung linggo at before you know it nandyan na ako sa tabi ninyo. ang saya ng araw nayun. mahal ko kayo. 

Ingat lage at patuloy tayo sa ating paglalakad pabalik sa diyos.

Elder Chadderton