Next Monday, I'll be in Palawan!

Letter to Mom....

I can't send pictures that easy because I'm on all clean computers now, but my camera might have a virus from using it outside a lot, but I'll try one day... but thanks for all your pictures! hahaha.

Keep Jesse healthy and alive, that's your job.  (I told him how our dog Jesse has gone a little senile and is super annoying!) 

Here is a cool story for you.  President told us to choose something to present to the mission this Monday for zone conference and we've been trying to use Family Home Evenings as a finding tool.  We just knock and then walk in and have one and boom! We have a new family to teach!  It has been working awesome, but one of them was extra special.

It was the first day that we were trying it and we knocked on a random door.  A young mom answered and before we could say anything, her two year old son ran outside, got behind us and pushed us in the house.  Her husband arrived a few minutes later and we taught them.  It was good but the real miracle happened in our next visit.  This time only the wife was there and we taught her the restoration.  As we got to the apostacy, she started crying and told us how she has searched and searched in all the churches that she knew about for the truth, but she never has seemed to find it.  She told us of how one night she was asking Heavenly Father where she should be and which church she should join and she felt a really warm feeling in her heart.  She said that she has been searching to feel that again and hadn't felt it until we did the family home evening at her house.  We extended baptism and she was like "YES!!!"  haha it was cool.  Keep praying for the area, I love you mom sorry my email is at weird times now haha.

Elder Zesiger

Letter to Dad...

Yesterday I drove around the mission for 6.5 hours getting mattresses (I'm assuming for the missionaries that are coming over from the island Palawan.) from all the houses before Elder Bednar comes.  It is pretty crazy to drive in the Philippines.  The rules are a lot different, I actually got pulled over but they let me go haha.

There was another pretty cool experience that happened with the Priesthood this last week.  We found this little old lady that lives with her husband and her son in their broken down tricycle on the side of the street.  She is blind and her leg had some crazy arthritis thing that made it impossible for her to walk with out a cane.  We taught her a little bit and found out that her faith in Christ was super strong and that if she could go to church, she would.  So, we gave her a blessing and told her that if she would promise to go to church, then her leg would be healed.  After the blessing, we told her that in the morning, before we came to get her, she would have to walk down to a post, without her cane to practice and she said she would.  

That night apparently she had a dream, she was watching herself like third person and she saw herself coming out of our church building with no cane.  Her leg didn't hurt in the dream, so she walked all the way home.  That morning, her leg didn't hurt as much, but it was really sad because when we went to go get her, she wouldn't come because her son's wife who was supposed to come with her didn't show up, so she said that she will come next week, but she is really cool.

I don't think that I will get to spend any time with Elder Bednar, it sounds like he will have pretty strong security around him all the time, but I'm still super excited.  Next Monday, I'll be in Palawan!  

I've got another cool miracle for mom that I'll send, the Lord is really blessing our area with a lot of new investigators, thanks for you prayers.  I love you!

Elder Zesiger

The lesson was pretty regular until we got to the part about Joseph Smith...

Letter to Dad...

Thanks for the awesome email today dad.  I'm super lucky that I have you two as parents, I always hear about other missionaries with family problems and teach people with broken families and that has caused me to think many times how lucky I am that you are such great parents and that I have such awesome siblings, no wonder I was so homesick at the beginning haha.  

I wish I would have understood how awesome Elder Craven was back when I was at home, I didn't know anything about the quorum of the 70's or mission presidents and I remember that every time that we went to that temple class, I would just watch the clock until we could go home haha.  I am super grateful that they took the time to teach me though.

As for being an assistant, I've taught a few classes now and I've driven a couple of times.  I usually don't know what I'm doing and then I just get up there haha, but I taught the mission a couple times as a zone leader.  Look up on your phone the underground river in Puerto Princessa, it's one of the 7 wonders of the world and we are going to go there in March!  We're going to Palawan to teach at zone conferences in the end of February too!  It's awesome!

Our area hasn't baptized anyone in a year and the assistants haven't baptized anyone in about 8 months, so we've been praying pretty hard for miracles since we get about half the working time of a regular missionary.  Our prayer was answered last night.

Two nights ago, no one wanted to hear us, they were all just telling us they were busy, so we stopped what we were doing and said a prayer that Heavenly Father would lead us to someone who was ready.  We all split up on the street and each knocked on a door (there are 3 of us)  The door I knocked on had a small family in it watching tv.  They didn't want to talk to me, so I switched to speaking to Ilokano, (a province language) to get their attention haha and the mom, came over and talked to me.  They said that they were busy as well, but that we could come back the next day. 

Yesterday, we returned and they let us in to teach.  The kids weren't there, so we taught the mom and her husband.  Before we could say anything, Gemma told us that she was a "devoted Catholic" and that she would listen but that we better not try to convert her.  We said we wouldn't (but we were lying haha) and we started the lesson.  As we talked to them, we found out that Billy and Gemma both have family that are members and that when Gemma was a teenager, she attended church a couple of times.  The lesson was pretty regular until we got to the part about Joseph Smith.  The atmosphere in the room changed as the Spirit entered and as we handed sister Gemma a Book of Mormon, she began to cry.  When we asked why, we heard the story about why she opened the door the night before, it had nothing to do with my Ilokano skills haha.  A couple days before, she was talking to her friend about how the word of God should be free and how they shouldn't charge people for the Bible and that she wished that someone would give her one.  Then, a couple nights ago when I knocked on her door, she said she wanted to just ignore me, because missionaries for all religions apparently, including ours drop by there all the time and they annoy her, but she said that she felt something whisper to her to open the door, so she did.

At the end of the lesson, we extended baptism and they accepted.  I know that Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers and I know that He will help us set this area on fire so we can be a better example for the mission.

Follow up:

How is the trans am?  You don't have much longer and if its not done, then I'm just not going to come home. Haha

Letter to Mom...

I just sent dad the best email in the world, so you can read that too, but yes we have a microwave!  And my first p day in the mtc I bought some popcorn and saved it, just in case I ever got a microwave.  I ate the whole box this week and it was awesome!  

I love you mom, thanks for that awesome quote!

I am super lucky that I have you two as my parents, pray that we can have some great stuff happen in our area and also that dad will start working on the trans am.  

Heavenly Father is really preparing people for us!

I got transferred!  I will be in the Makati 1st ward now and I have two companions, one American, Elder Zeyer and one Filipino, Elder Billariña.  I still had a cool spiritual experience a couple days ago tho, even though I won't be in Las Pinas anymore.

We were sitting in a house of one of our investigators and we were looking for a third lalaki (man) so that we could teach.  There was this guy who kept passing back and forth by the doorway looking at us, so finally we told him to come in.  He was like "OK, Elder's"  and we were confused because people are usually like "father" or "pastor" or "apostle" or sometimes even "prophet",so we asked him if he had met any missionaries before.  He said that he was supposed to be baptized a couple of years ago, in fact all of his friends were Mormons, but as they all turned about 19, they all left on missions and since he didn't have any friends anymore, he stopped going, but he said that he knows that the church was restored through Joseph Smith and he knows that it is true.  He accepted a date for baptism and it was awesome!  And then I got the news that I'm transferring haha.

But it was just another testimony to me that this work is true, that we are not just walking around everyday, but that Heavenly Father really is preparing people for us and leading them to us and leading us to them.

Oh yeah, and with my new calling I get to go to Palawan! ( He hasn't been able to serve there because it's not near a hospital for his eye condition.)