Monday, September 25, 2017

Still Going Strong

You know, sometimes it's not very fun having to sweat from every pore while washing the dishes or while sleeping, but you still survive, even though you're always covered in sweat (not even joking) but all is worth it for the people, even though it's still more of a challenge. 

So as for some news this week, District meeting was changed to Tuesday instead of Thursday so that was interesting, Elder Lobaton is a good district leader, especially since these are his last couple weeks in the mission. I'm proud of him. 

Now for the update in our area, it's still going a little slower, but we're still happy! We actually do have a lot of places and appointments we can go to, so we got a lot of people to work on.This past week we went to several people several times. The 2 investigators that we went to were Karen Melchor and Kyle Brent Soriano. Karen is 22 who has 3 members in her family, but none of them live close to her anymore. 

This week we had a couple really good lessons with her and we know she has a testimony. It was impressive too since one of the lessons we had to teach while her 5 year old little sister was screaming her head off throwing a tantrum the whole 30 minutes we taught her. She really does have a desire to be baptized but now the problem is she just got a job and now might have to work on Sundays.... We're working things out. 

Now for our other investigator Kyle, I love that kid too. Kyle is basically now like my wild and crazy little brother. I love going over to his house and talking with his family. I've actually grown pretty fond of him. He listens for the most part during the lessons, he still is pretty young though and struggles sometimes in Tagalog so we're just teaching at a lot slower pace for him. He still has a desire to be baptized so now we are just working on the importance of going to church every week.

The other people we have been working on are less actives. Let me tell you it's awesome to see some people come to church after not coming for a long time. There was an older member who has been sick, we just weren't sure if he would come, so you can imagine our surprise when we saw him at church, along with 3 other brothers from a different family come to church again! 

Our attendance was again at 39 which is doing better for the average attendance. We actually had our senior missionary couple, Elder and Sister Nelson come to church here too! It was awesome to hear them talk! I love those two and I was happy to have them come, and they were happy to come too!

As for another short spiritual note: There is a member in our area who has a very bad skin disease, sometimes she can't even move so it's really hard for her to go to church. This last week, we were given permission to give her the sacrament at her house. I loved seeing how happy she was when we were able to give it to her! Her small thank you was all we needed! Life in Vintar is still slightly slow, but we're still working, staying happy! 

To end I just want to give a cool little insight from my personal study: At the moment I am studying Alma (which has a bunch of great chapters all next to each other) but the one little fact I thought was cool was when they introduced Moroni. How old was he when he took over the army? 25. There are plenty of instances where lots of young people are given a big responsibility. 

Mormon was only 15 when he became a leader, and Joseph Smith was only 14 when he saw Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father! Look at us missionaries too, you have people from age 18-25 out in different countries serving the Lord. It made me think of how much trust he has to his children. 

Age doesn't matter, so no matter what age we are, we can still fulfill our calling to the max! It's Gods will not our will. Always fulfill your calling to the max, age doesn't matter! Personal study is great! Make sure to always read the scriptures every day! It really makes a difference! The mission is great, God is real and knows what we're doing, lets always do our best to make him proud! 

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net


I'm all shiny here


My homies here in Vintar (except only one is actually from here)



Elder Trinidad and I found these while exploring :D

Sunday, September 17, 2017

Small Miracles

Sige, sakbay tayo agrugi, kayat ko nga imbaga kanyayo, nga 13 nga bulan nak itoy mission tatta! 11 nga bulan laeng! Asidegen! 

Alright, for 13 months in the mission you would probably assume that I am fluent in the local language here which is Ilocano. Truth is I still know very little. I had to check if that statement in Ilocano was right with my companion. I really want to start working on improving my Ilocano, which is a lot of work since the mission language is the national language of the Philippines, Tagalog. Narigat ti Ilocano para kanyak, ngem nakasursuro nak! 

Now after the slightly different introduction, here goes my week! This Sunday, we had a small victory during church! Except it started as a slightly depressing moment. When church started, there was barely any in attendance. I mean as in there were about 8 people there. 

It was not a happy moment. I was slightly discouraged. However, by sacrament, we had 39 in attendance, a few less actives from our area and a family. Elder Bottema came to church again! Honestly for the Philippines, Vintar is a really small branch, but we are happy with the small miracles happening when we see people who haven't come in awhile finally return! 

Satan does all he can to discourage us and for a moment he did, but I am happy with the small improvement. We are going to keep working this branch. By the end of this cycle we are hoping to get the branch attendance back up to 50 or 60! 

We have a lot to work on though, such as our investigators (who didn't come, sniffle) and other less actives. Us 4 missionaries here in Vintar have been putting a lot more focus on getting less actives back to church and at the same time working on investigators and finding more people to teach. We have a lot of less actives that we can go teach. A lot of the time they're busy though, so it's a work in progress. 

Right now what we are doing is working on setting Family Home Evenings with them and finding other members to help out. As for the work such as teaching and finding, whether it be slow or not to be honest it hasn't really phased me as much so far this cycle, which is really good. 

The work is going fine, even though we have days where everything falls through, I'm still happy here! Even though there are times that are discouraging, it's okay, I can take them! I love the people here and I love talking to them and learning. Sometimes I mess with them by asking them questions that are pretty hard to answer in English such as what does this mean in English? (for those of you who do speak Tagalog I ask anong basta, o pala o maarte. Mahirap ipaliwanag haha sking them a bunch of works or phrases in Ilocano since I know very little. The people here in the Philippines are just great. 

That was mostly what happened this week, sort of a pretty normal week but good nonetheless. Life's still good, the mission’s still great, and the Book of Mormon is still true with so much information we can apply in our lives. Joseph Smith is a true Prophet of God and this is the true Church. Keep the Faith everyone! Ayayaten kayo amin! 

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net


I found my block of concrete here


Looking forward to the future


This is what happens while we are walking back late at night



We found a really "clean" shack and made spaghetti sauce (just kidding, I think it's really old cooking oil... or... diak ammu. Basta, kadiri siya.) 



Family Home Evening at the Ubaten family, they came to church that Sunday



Sunday, September 10, 2017

I am a Disciple of Jesus Christ

I am a disciple of Jesus Christ and I fear no man! If any of you have not yet heard about the Ricciardi letter, I recommend you read it. A previous missionary left it behind, and I am very glad. 

It is about a new missionary serving in England who gets a 25 year old Italian trainer who is quite connected with the Spirit and very bold. Long story short, I learned a lot from the letter, and one of my favorite things I read was how he always said "I fear no man" and whenever someone rejected him he would put a smile on his face. He wasn't afraid of anyone including his companion, and the reason he smiled when they told him they weren't interested or rude, is so he knew he was able to move on to the people who are "ready to be harvested". It really helped me with our work here in Vintar. 

As all of you know, the work here in Vintar is pretty slow. But to be honest, that fact didn't really bother me anymore (at least this week.) This week we actually had 2 new Elders added to Vintar, one from St. George Utah named Elder Bottema, and one from Pampanga Philippines named Elder Pacapac. That actually relieved us a lot since now we can focus on a couple of areas rather than worrying about all of Vintar. 

This week, we did a lot of finding, and going around finding a lot of less actives. We still had a couple of people that weren't interested, a couple who while we were walking over to their house would just shut the door or just wave us off, but it didn't phase me at all. I know they aren't personally rejecting me, and they just aren't ready, so we can move on to the ones that are ready. We found a lot of investigators with high potential. We also really worked on finding less actives too and getting them back to church.

Sadly the attendance at church last Sunday was only 31 again, which included the people from Laoag 3 and us 4 missionaries. It's discouraging sometimes, but I am not letting that phase me. I know we did our best this week in the work, and it's not our will, but the Lord's will. 

No matter how long it takes I just got to keep being patient. We actually did have an investigator come to church which was Kyle Brent Soriano, the 12 year old who has come before. Surprisingly he actually came earlier before than anyone, and we didn't even pick him up. He came before his sister who is a member. It really made me happy to see him and he's a great kid. Sadly he didn't stay the whole 3 hours but we are still working on him.

"Do your best, and the Lord will do the rest" was on of my favorite quotes that my first zone leader would always say and it's stuck with me up until now. This week I felt like we were really hard working, and even though there aren't any results yet, it doesn't phase me. I know that God has a plan, and people have their agency. I hope next week we can soften their hearts and get more to come, cause I'm not going to lie the attendance is really low. 

But we can do it. It’s also going to be a lot nicer with 4 Elders. I felt we did hard work, but there's always room for improvement. I pray for the best, and I pray for the people here. Let's just hope next week will be even better!

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net


The Laoag zone (plus some extra missionaries that are training)



Just me and the Ilocos Norte Capitol



Don't worry, I was never in any real danger





Don't be fooled, that picture only lasted about a 1/2 second



playing checkers with sticks and styrophoam (the kid without a shirt is our investigator Kyle Brent Soriano


Sunday, September 3, 2017

Another Cycle Down

Here goes to another cycle down in the Philippines Laoag Mission and to another week in Vintar (which I will be staying for at least another 6 weeks) which was filled with rain, nice and busy people and lots of walking (so pretty similar to most of the other weeks).

As for the news for this week, I got to give a district training again, which was pretty fun! Turns out only one of my district is transferring though! The rest of us will be together for another 6 weeks. Another good news: Our apartment will be becoming 4 Elders instead of only 2! I'm pretty glad about that! As for church, we sadly didn't have anyone come to church. We were expecting at least 2 to come for sure, but things happened. One of them had to go to his job on Sunday, and the others Grandma just recently died. We were pretty sad about that, because his grandma was really nice. She was on oxygen for awhile and it was hard for her to move, so I hope she's really happy in the other world and hope she accepts the gospel in her next life! 

The work this week was similar to the other weeks, lots of walking around and looking for people, people being too busy to listen or just not wanting to commit. We don't have too many progressing investigators yet. We do have people that we have been teaching that the lessons have gone really well and I felt the Spirit, but they just haven't come to church. It's a little disappointing to not see any progression, but I just have to keep being patient. 

I have grown to love the people here in Vintar, even though there's not too many that come to church, I am very impressed with the ones who continue to come to church despite the low attendance. They don't go to church for the social benefit. They do it because they know it's the true church. I love teaching and talking to the members here now (also it's great cause they feed us a lot). I love growing close to the members in each area and getting to know all of them. That's one of the blessings I am happy to be able to take part in. 

One of the blessings I got to be a part of though is that this last cycle we did have a baptism which was awesome, and I hope we can find some people that are ready for this next cycle. I know success isn't measured by baptisms so I know that if I am doing my best, then God is happy. 

I do feel times I fall short, but I know I'm not perfect. Though I know it won't be easy, I'm ready for another cycle here in Vintar. We aren't the only missionaries that have had slow progression, most of the past missionaries experienced that too, and I just know it's another opportunity for me to learn. Though I've adjusted to the area’s geography, I still have things I can learn. Vintar is one of the biggest areas in the mission (geographically speaking) so we can't go to everyone but that's okay. 

I know that Heavenly Father put me in this area for a reason, whether it's to strengthen my own self or the people around me (hopefully both) but I can do it. Elder Trinidad and I will just keep continuing to work and find! I know this work that I am doing in Vintar is true and the church is true. I have been reading from the teachings of Joseph Smith, and none of their lives were easy especially when the church was new. 

All the missionaries had a lot of trials which you would say are a lot more tough than mine, so I can deal with the ones here. I'm happy to work in the Lord's vineyard! Just do your best every day, and the Lord will do the rest! 

Elder Espiritu

**you can email Elder Espiritu at joseph.espiritu@myldsmail.net


Sometimes they wear my shoes


Chloe has become one of my favorites



Umbrellas are cool and quite useful




My district


3 districts of the Laoag zone


Got them dragon fruit blooming