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
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