Mon 4/27/2015
Forinoy
Dear Everybody, and Hunter, David, and Jared,
Last week was a record-high week for total lessons taught!
President has moved most of the administrative things off our plate and given
us the opportunity to have a model area. We've been able to leave the office
tiles behind and hit the pavement! We had two great exchanges where I went
with an Australian and then a Californian elder. We saw plans fall through--and
miracles come in. The Australian's name was Elder Pickford, and I just love
him. We went into his densely populated area on a rainy Tuesday and had plans
fall through one by one. It was around 8, and we still hadn't taught a lesson
that day. We'd talked to many people, but with little luck. We were using the
ward directory, and found people that'd left. Eventually we made our way to the
Wong family. Brother Wong had come home just for vacation--and for us! He's the
only member in the family, and the whole family is open to be baptized! That
small miracle made up for everything that didn't go right.
We taught Noah at a member's house on Thursday and set up
the baptismal interview for Saturday. He didn't show up at the office like he
said, so we headed directly to his house, where, thankfully, he agreed to be
interviewed! He passed, and now his baptism is happening this Saturday.
Another cool note: there's a popular show in the Philippines
called Forinoy, which is a word coming from "foreign" and
"pinoy" (i.e. Filipino). In this show I think non-filipino people come and they speak
in the languages here in the Philippines and do a little bit of dancing, but I'm
not sure. In one of the pictures I attached, you see a man named Dwayne Bulley,
who served his mission here, and knows Tagalog, Wari-Wari, and Cebuano. He's a
contestant and is up to the next round of the show!
Last thing. We had a service project last Saturday, and
swept a bunch of streets in our area with the ward, and talked to a ton of
people. It took an hour, and then took another hour to eat.
Take care!
Elder Thurber - Philippines Manila Mission
#BecauseHeLives
Mon 4/20/2015
Thorbear, Salve, and Marietta
Hello,
I wouldn't give myself a good rating on comletely describing my missionary experience in my
blog entries. They've been mostly about the most interesting parts of my
mission, but not necessarily about my average day-to-day walk. So my blog entries seem to be about things
that are relatively unrealistic, albeit exciting, at least to me. Maybe I'm
writing this blog entry so you don't get the complete wrong idea about what a
mission here is like. We experience very mundane and repetitive things as
missionaries, like following-up with investigators on reading the scriptures,
attending church, etc. But most of the glamour comes because there's grit—
Like this week: It was hot, and we were out of the office,
preaching the gospel in our area, Palanan. We had a few copes of The Book of
Mormon returned to us from people no longer interested. Some people said there
wasn't any difference between our religion and theirs, so they said we were
wasting their time. A few decided to just simply hide. Yes, Filipinos are very
nice people, but it's something about the gospel that they don't get yet.
So why bother? Those experiences are so common in every
missionary's life. I've found comfort in PMG. It says "when you have done
your very best, you may still experience disappointments, but you will not be
disappointed in yourself." Being out on a mission for a while has brought
me to the point that I treasure any opportunity to share the gospel because it
strengthens my own testimony—and—maybe they'll just accept it.
It's people like these that are on the road to conversion
that make me smile:
- Last Sunday a Danish man in his 20's came to
church named Thorbear. He only came for "moral support" for his Filipina
member girlfriend, but he loved what he saw in church, and will be coming back
every week with her. We had a good conversation about the origin of his name
and my own. I remember him asking, "So you have many people from different
countries?" To which I responded, "Yeah, he's from Brazil and doesn't
speak English. That family's from Japan. I think they're Korean. He's from
Ghana. There are a few families from
Utah, and there is a couple that just moved in from New Zealand."
- Salve is Jerome's mom. She came to church for
the first time last Sunday to support him. Jerome passed his interview on
Saturday, but his mom was a little concerned he wasn't ready. Before church
started, Bishop Espi told us he wouldn't let Jerome get baptized. After
sacrament, he talked to Salve, then brought us in. He said he would allow
Jerome be baptized on the 16th of May if she would come to church every
Sunday.
- Saturday, we looked for members we hadn't met.
We were looking for a family at a particular address when we met a different lady
named Marietta, who's an endowed member who always bears her testimony to
people. We hadn’t seen her at church because she just arrived. She used to live
in Virginia Beach, and now has a new non-member husband, who we will be
teaching.
 |
This is a written commitment we gave to Alexander, who hadn't been attending church.
He came to church this Sunday. |
 |
| Alexander is on the left, along with some of his family, who are members. |
 |
This is another reason I love being a missionary:
Family Home Evening at member's houses. |
That's all I'd like to share today. I am thankful I can be
part of this work, where people really change.
Elder Thurber
Mon 4/13/2015 2:41 AM
Araw-araw, Araw-araw, Araw-araw
Dear Everybody,
I'm currently surrounded by a bunch of missionaries from the
Mandaluyong during interviews. I'm the hall monitor while classes go on! Thus
is my life.
Jerome's baptism is coming up on the 25th! He cracks me up!
This week we've actually had enough time to teach him some of the lessons. He's
going to be turning twelve two days before his actual baptism. The problem is
he loves Primary too much and wants to stay there!
We're striving to teach his mom, Salve, who has been taught
before. The problem is Jerome’s sister Sheila planned to bear hear testimony on
the 5th (which wasn't GC for us) and didn't want her mom to hear her testimony,
so she told her mom not to go, even though we tried our best to commit her to
come to church. She’ll hopefully at least come to Jerome's baptism on the
25th.
The title of this entry is entitled as such because of the
talk by the seventy Elder Pearson, who said to read the scriptures "every
day, every day, every day." Well, Araw-araw, araw-araw, araw-araw is the
Tagalog of daily 3x. As an assistant, my schedule varies, and I have to fit in
personal study whenever possible during the day no matter what, according to
President Ostler. Other missionaries almost always get it in at 8 AM every
morning, but it takes effort on my part. And now I can testify the importance
of what Elder Pearson said. I add to the end of his words: no excuses, no
excuses, no excuses. I've found on my mission, from everybody I've met that WE
ALL HAVE TIME TO READ THE SCRIPTURES! I won't say I've been perfect at it in my
life, and may have rationalized my lack of reading, but I will try my best for
the rest of my life. And I encourage you to do the same. People are happier,
more peaceful, and loving when they read the scriptures.
That's all I have this week!
Mon 4/6/2015 12:43 AM
Budgeting
Dear Everybody,
Due to Sister Hiatt's sickness, the Hiatts have been staying
here in Manila, and will leave on the 15th. President Hiatt is the 2nd
counselor in the mission presidency, and they have been in Palawan for a while
now. We're in interview season yet again (there's 2 this week), and so they're
teaching the classes, not us. We're just the hall monitors.
During the interviews, and also during MLC, we discussed in
depth the importance of budgeting. Many people really struggle with budgeting!
So now we're accounting for how much money each missionary has and their
emergency fund (which should be 3000 pesos). Missionaries now receive 8000
pesos of support each month. At the end of March, many missionaries were eating
out of their 72 hr kits because they used all their support and emergency fund.
Sad, right? Well, some missionaries are already down to 3000 pesos in support
for this month of April. In comparison, other missionaries have budgeted
wisely, and get to enjoy a life free of financial stress! Self-discipline really
pays off.
Here are some other random cool parts of the week:
 |
Some cool views from Makati.
We're looking down on the Buendia office from a neighboring building. |
 |
| Paul Groome and his family. |
We finally got to teach Paul Groome! We went 30
minutes north of Buendia Chapel and taught his family.
Three boys came to church yesterday in the
fourth ward. There was one from Taiwan, but has been here for 10 years and
speaks Tagalog. They were making a report on the differences between Mormonism
and Catholicism. They asked questions about the degrees of glory, purgatory,
the cross, etc. I think they were blown away with how different it was.
 |
Our wonderful district at the Northrup's apartment
where we watched Big Hero 6. |
The Jensens, a Canadian family in the 4th ward,
fed us a Jewish-inspired Easter dinner, which consisted of lamb and unleavened
bread, among other things I haven't eaten in forever.
 |
| Before our Easter dinner, we realized we needed more companionship pictures. |
--
Elder Thurber - Philippines Manila Mission
#BecauseHeLives
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