Success is in the Invitation

December 30^th, 2013
Hello and Happy almost New Year!

The Philippines have been getting ready for the New Year by lighting off their preparatory fireworks which are made for the sole purpose of making lots and lots of noise. For both New Year’s Eve and New Year’s night we have been instructed to keep a strict curfew of 5 p.m. and not leave the apartment at night since there tend to be a lot of injuries that happen here due to people getting a little too enthusiastic with the amount of powder they put in their often home-made explosives. :) Wish us luck sleeping these next few nights.

I was so grateful that I was able to video call you all back home. I'll have to try and be more prepared for next time and hopefully I'll have something good to say. I'll also have to remember to tell you to come with questions prepared since I have the hardest time thinking about what to talk about or what you want to know. I am also very grateful I was able to share my testimony, albeit on the second try, and share a little bit of what I feel and how much I love you all. I have a hard time expressing my personal feelings sometimes in person and I hope I'll be better next time, but I'm sure you got the message.

This Christmas week was fairly successful for us in the work. We were unable to hit all of our goals, granted we set them pretty high so we could stretch, but I am finally starting to feel like we are making some real progress with the members and with finding whole families to teach.

One blessing this week has been a family that we having been teaching for the last week and a half or so where the wife is house help for one of our very active members who is the Stake Primary President. She asked the parents if it was OK if she brought the kids in the family to church. That is where we met them and asked if we could also teach the parents, to which the parents agreed. Since then they have been progressing every single visit and are preparing to be baptized at the end of January.

One of the interesting things I found though was when I asked about what her experience has been with our church before and religion in general.  She said, "I've wanted to go the Mormon church for a long time now, but nobody has invited me until you two did."  I found this fairly surprising since I'm sure she has been surrounded by missionaries coming through and visiting this very active member of the church for which she has worked and hadn't ever had a chance to hear the message herself.

It just built my testimony of how you never know if someone is ready to hear the gospel until you extend the invitation, and sometimes there are people placed right in front of us that are just waiting to be asked. Sister Nene (the mom that works for the member) is such a prepared person and really feels and recognizes the Spirit. She said just last night, "I've learned about Jesus before and I've gone to other churches, but this time it just feels different and I keep getting excited every time I think about being baptized here. I can't describe it, but it's just different from anything else I've felt."

This is the first whole family that I've found and hopefully will be able to baptize so I feel very privileged to have the chance to be a part of their conversion.

I love you all so much!

Keep keeping the faith,

~Elder Butler   

The Best Remedy

Hello and Merry Christmas! Paskwa!

Well the Philippines is all up and about getting ready for Christmas to come. Today was probably the busiest I've seen of just about everything. Long lines and lots of crowds rushing here and there. Still sweating it out since it is still a consistent 80 degrees here (Fahrenheit) and showing no signs of changing any time soon.

A thing they do here that I find funny is that lots of people here go "caroling" at night, especially kids. But when they do caroling it’s more of them chanting some Christmas related poem at you in Tagalog and not leaving you alone until you give them something. (And I thought the "bring us some figgy pudding, we won’t go until we get some" part was a joke... apparently it isn't here...)  So we have been giving out lots of pamphlets and such to the little kids who come by spreading Christmas cheer with their best "you'd be really mean not to give me something" face. :)

In other news, I get to call you all in a few days! I guess we could try the Google hang out again if you want. I will be getting on probably around 10am or 11am on Christmas day here, which will be Christmas Eve for you at home. I can't wait to see all of you again!

We are still working hard to make use of the Christmas spirit and invite as many people as we can to come unto Christ through His restored gospel. I've been studying the writings of the apostle Paul in the New Testament a little and I really feel like I have a friend in Paul. His passion for the work, along with the fire in his heart for the Savior, and also the love that he felt for the early saints before the Church was lost. The scriptures seem to just jump right out off the page for me now more and more, whether I'm reading the Old or New Testaments, The Book of Mormon, or any of the words that Christ has revealed to us.

We've set some pretty high goals in our companionship this week since the best remedy for homesickness is work. So we'll be stretching ourselves and showing our faith by giving everything we have as our gift to Jesus this Christmas. 

I love you all so much! Take care until Christmas!

~Elder Butler

A White Christmas

Hello and a Merry Christmas to you all!

This week has actually a very rewarding week in our area here. We've found many new investigators and we've seen many of them progress so quickly in their faith and testimony in just a few visits. We only have one of our investigators being baptized this Christmas, but after this last week, we are looking at having a very white January and February in place of our hopeful white Christmas.

One group of people we are teaching is a family whose parents have been less active for over 12 years that we found through the ward membership records. The first time we met them was interesting since they live a good 15 minute walk away from the main highway, and the whole time we were looking for them my companion was having some lower bowl problems, to put it delicately, from some bad water that he drank earlier. So that 15 minute walk for him probably seemed a lot longer, especially since we had to ask around a bit to find the house. Once we found the group of houses where their house was suppose to be, my companion was just about to nearly “burst", so he urgently asked one of the neighbors to use one of the bathrooms that was there (which was basically a cinder block out-house, but we're in the Philippines so we can't be picky).

It was at that time, while my companion was otherwise occupied, that I met the mother of the family who came out because we were asking around for her name. I still remember introducing myself and then pointing to the out-house and saying "and this is my companion Elder Ballad...say hello Elder!" to which my companion’s voice sounded from the inside of the out-house and introduced him self very politely.

After my companion had finished, we then talked a little more with the mom, who was a little resistant, but agreed to let us say a quick prayer for them and share a short message.

After we said the prayer we saw her countenance completely change. After we shared about the blessings she and her family could receive from living the gospel again, she told us that we could come back again and reteach them the missionary lessons.
Ever since we've been coming back she and her children have just been soaking up everything we've been teaching and her kids are all preparing for baptism. This Sister is looking so much more at peace. She shares with us that she feels better now that she is coming back to church.

I am just so grateful for the Spirit which led us to them. I know that the Gospel has so much power to change hearts and to give peace, which nothing else is able to give.

I can't really think of much else to say--there are more stories from some other families that we have had success with, but all of them would take a long time to write, so I'll save them for next time.

I love you all!

~Elder Butler 

Just Ask

Hello and maayong aga sa inyo tanan! 
 
During a lesson this week that we had with a member of the church and his nonmember family members, I could see that they were just willing to listen, but had no desire whatsoever to actually know if what we said was true and it made me a little sad. And I felt the Spirit teach me a lesson as I also shared with them about the principle of asking our Heavenly Father and His willingness to give us what we want.

How many times does it say in the scriptures that if we ask we receive, seek and we'll find, knock and it will be opened? And in what I realized in teaching it, it doesn't say you "can" ask, or "if you want to" you can knock, instead it is put in a way that it becomes a command, not optional, and if we want to receive something, we must seek it first.

These family members of the member we were visiting were good people, they had good hearts and the light of Christ, but they had no desire to ask, seek, or find. They are content. And even though the gospel may be sounded in their ears, they will never see or hear it unless they want to see or hear.

So it just taught me about how important it is for me, that I never become "content" with what I know or the light I have received. I am far from having perfect knowledge and far from celestial glory still, but I can never receive it unless I am constantly seeking it, and I will only receive it line upon line and in the amount that I can handle now. Enduring doesn't mean just continuing, it means growing!
 
I love you all and have a very merry month of December!

~Elder Butler    

Thankful All the Time

First picture is another cool sky/view of the tubo (sugar cane) fields in one of our outside areas. Man I love being back in the country. :)

And as my mission president would say, Aloha! :) 

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving! I'll admit that I didn't know it was thanksgiving day until one of the mission couples texted us wishing us Happy Thanksgiving, and since Thanksgiving is an exclusively American holiday, I actually was not able to get stuffed with turkey this year and fall into my annual turkey coma.