Goodness, I can't believe it's pday already! I don't have much time to write this week, but here's a recap of some of our tender mercies this week!:
Monday we had an AWESOME family home evening at the Wenceslao family (Elsie, Cheyene, Miguel, and Daniel). A ton of ward members came, and they are so awesome at fellowshipping. As a result, the father, Daniel, has become a lot more open and has joined us in every lesson since then. He committed to be baptized on August 31st and is trying to figure out a way to get Sundays off work so he can come to church. Wahoo! This family is golden. :)
Tuesday we had an interesting "cool" type of tender mercy. It was one of those days where it was raining super hard. Every lesson we went into, the rain would just pour and pour, but by the time we'd go out, the rain would stop. Then just continue pouring so hard once we stepped foot into our next appointment. haha I know that's a random tender mercy, but I thought it was neat! Even in the little things like keeping us dry, Heavenly Father's looking out for us. :)
Wednesday we had a neat tender mercy where one of our part member families gave us this hard bread type of pastry that they eat as a snack here. We decided to give it to our investigators, Ria, Cristy, and Crystal (her nickname is Bo-ding). :) Bo-ding is about 2 years old and is SO cute when we pray. She closes her eyes super tight and folds her arms, and then occasionally peaks out of her tight squinted eyes. Her mom, Ria, says that when she prays she asks for "bread and a peso." When we arrived, they were just starting to eat their meager dinner of rice and a tiny piece of fried chicken. We told them to close their eyes, and then we displayed the bread for them! Prayer answered for sweet little Bo-ding. :)
Thursday I was on exchanges with Sister Ve'ehala. Sister Arcinas was with Sister Lara. Every once in a while, if there's four sisters in the ward we can do exchanges. Sister Ve'ehala is the newest sister here. She's from Tonga and so excited about missionary work! We had a great day working with each other, and even though she can't speak Ilonggo yet very well, her testimony is so strong! She uses a lot of pictures to express her teaching which I loved. :) We had a pretty powerful lesson with Reneliza. We read Mosiah 2:41 about how keeping the commandments would bless her temporally and spiritually. She's been having a rough time with her dialysis, so as we testified of how the Atonement could help her, she got pretty emotional. She realizes that her sickness can't be taken away, but that through the Atonement, she can be strengthened in her trial.
Friday Cheyene told us about a dream she had where she saw the Book of Mormon and a lot of light. We were excited because she's been waiting a long time for an answer to know if it's true, and this was it! It's always amazing to me how many answers come in the form of a dream for the Filipinos. Their faith is so strong, that all they need is a dream to confirm it! So simple and strong. Elsie says she still hasn't received an answer, even though we're trying to help her see the evidence of all the blessings that have come to them, and how she can recognize the spirit, but she continues to pray and study the Book of Mormon every day, and so very willingly keeps all her commitments, even keeping the Sabbath day holy! (that's a bit of a rough one here) and she tells us different ways the Gospel is blessing her family all the time, so we know she's getting there. We're just praying that she'll recognize the answer to her prayers.
Saturday we had a full day with a one day mission and Cristy's baptism. This girl is so awesome! She went up to bear her testimony after her baptism, but thought she was supposed to pray. Whoops! She gave a really great prayer though, and her testimony shown right through! She came extra early to church on Sunday because she was so excited to receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost. Right now, she's the only one in her family we could baptize because her mom still needs to figure out some marriage things before she can be baptized, so we're hoping her mom will soon follow. Cristy's faith is so strong though, and she's the sweetest big sister to Bo-ding. I know her example will greatly bless her family. :)
Sunday we met with a man named Jeffrey who has come to church every week for a year but he's not a member yet (he's more active than half the ward!). I guess there were some issues with him and the sisters who taught before us, which was all misunderstanding, so he never got baptized. He still has a word of wisdom issue, but as we met with him, we could really feel his sincerity in wanting to change his life and follow the Savior. He was really sad and even got teary that all those mis-communications happened because all the sister missionaries were 'scared' to teach him. I just felt so bad for the guy! We felt like we should try teaching him, despite whatever's happened in the past, because everyone deserves to hear and accept the Gospel. I'm glad we gave him the chance because he's got a really good heart and truly has the desire to change his pretty crazy life for the better.
All in all, it was an amazing week, full of tender mercies and miracles, just like always. :) I'm so grateful for the love I feel for these people. I was thinking this week about how we can do everything Heavenly Father wants us to do, in the way He wants us to, but if it's done with no feeling or love, it's as if there was no point to it. Charity and love is so critical for this work. Without it, there would be no change in the lives of those we teach, and in ourselves. "If ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth." I'm so grateful for our Savior, and His ultimate expression of Charity and love through His Atonement. Without His sacrifice through charity and love, there's no way we could improve and obtain the same attribute. I really do owe everything to my Savior. I'm grateful that I can show my gratitude in the smallest way by expressing charity and love to my brothers and sisters, His children, in the Philippines. It's something I have to pray for every day to improve, but luckily the Filipino people are so easy to love, and the Atonement of Jesus Christ just makes that love stronger. I truly do love this work. I love these people. I love this Gospel. I love my Savior. And I love all of you too!! I hope you have a great week and I'll talk to you next week. :)
Love,
Sister Dixon
PS HAPPY BIRTHDAY Grandpa Warburton! Sure love you!! And congrats to Wade and Laura and their new baby!! :)
Family sized corned beef. Jessica says she usually buys the small one!!
"An FHE game where if you get out, you get a mark of lipstick on your face!"
Home Sweet Home
Such simple entertainment for such poor kids but they love it! "
Sister Dixon and Sister Ve'ehala
Sweet little Bo-Ding
"Cristy's baptism! She is a strong one"
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