Heavenly Father is working wonders in our area!

From Coby's letter....

Aright buddy I've got a story for you.  One of our investigators, Geralyn, had a cool dream that I believe was a message from our Heavenly Father to help her along with her conversion.

She dreamed that she was standing on the bank of a river with really fast water.  On the other side of the river, i was standing there with my companion and all of Geralyn's ward friends.  She knew that she had to get across so that she could be happy with us.  Her husband was on the side with her and she knew that she had to bring him with her across.

She interpreted her dream to mean baptism and marriage and she is super excited and committed to be baptized now!  Heavenly Father is working wonders in our area!

Mom's letter....

I have a cool miracle for you.

I was in the temple again for the first time since June with all of the going home missionaries, and I was once again praying for an experience or a feeling so that I could  have a stronger testimony of temples.  Kind of what we talked about a long time ago if you remember.  Nothing really happened other than a small feeling of peace and once again, I was kind of bummed because I have felt way stronger than that in little houses made out of garbage, why could I not feel it in the temple of the Lord.  Those were kind of my thoughts. 

At the end of the day, President was giving his opening remarks for the going home testimony meeting and he said that he had prayed to know of what to speak of and he felt that he must speak about temples.  He testified of how they had helped him in his life and how he receives power every time he goes.  As he closed, he said that he never does that for going home activities, but that he just thought that he should.  I know that it was an answer from Heavenly Father.  It might not have been time for me to have an awesome experience in the temple, but I think that God set that up to let me know that He heard my prayer and will answer it when I really need it.  It was awesome!

I love you mom, thanks for making a shrine to me, that way the baby might at least recognize me haha, maybe you can put her crib in front of it. hahaha.   I love you so much and I am grateful that you are my mom.

Letter to Dad....

This week was awesome.  A lot of miracles happened in our area.  We got to see 7 missionaries die (go home) and it was super spiritual.  One, Sister Savea had a crazy experience.  On February 26, she got to Skype her father who was dying of cancer.  He was not a member but she was able to teach him the plan of salvation over Skype.  He died the next day.  Over the last 2 weeks of her mission, she was able to teach almost all of the 40 principles from preach my gospel and she said that she felt her dad's presence with her in all of them.  Before she left on her mission, when she was set apart, she was promised that her father would join the church because of her example and her family, like the ones she would come to teach would become an eternal one.  She said that it did not happen in the way she expected, but she knows that her family will be together forever and that the gospel is true.  It was amazing to hear.

I am super grateful for you guys.  I'm glad that you did send me here and I am super glad that you went too to be an example to me.  I am glad that I endured the first couple months when it sucked so that I can experience everyday now the miracles of the Lord.

A lot of other miracles happened, but I'll email them to the others, but I just thought that this one fit in with what you emailed to me.  

Letter to Caden....

I have a cool story for you.  One of the girls that we are teaching and will be baptized later in April, Danica, told us a cool story about her and her sister, who we are also teaching.  After she accepted a baptismal date, she told us that her sister, Karen, had been praying one night a couple of weeks ago, asking God which church was true.  The next day, we knocked on her door and taught her and her husband.  We had also prayed to know who was prepared for us to teach that night and then climbed up to the 4th floor of this building we had never been to and knocked on her door.  She later told her sister Danica, so she prayed too that we could come to her.  The next day, we showed up at door and taught her.  We didn't even know that they were sisters until about a week later and until a couple of days ago, we never knew this awesome story about how we were led to them!

I know that Heavenly Father prepares people and He leads us to them if we will ask.  He will do the same thing for you in your mission.

Some great pictures on Palawan and in the Mission home.

Letter to Mom....

This week was really fun and really weird.  I have a lot of pictures for you.  We went to Palawan again to teach at zone conference and we spent one day doing the underground river!  It was super awesome mom.  You go into this river through a cave and there are just 500 bats above your head at all times!  It's super cool.  I also taught a couple classes in a bamboo hut on the ocean.

When we got back, we stayed in the mission home for 2 nights while President was gone.  I had cheese chips and salsa for lunch and cinnamon toast crunch for breakfast!  I also had my first hot shower in 17 months!  It was crazy!

As I was in a boat, sailing across the ocean in the most beautiful place I've ever been.  I had a cool moment of prayer.  I just felt super blessed and was amazed how everything has worked out for me.  I was so bummed how everyone else in the mission got to go serve in paradise except for me and that I just had to stay in Manila all the time surrounded by smog and garbage.  But as I zoomed across the light blue ocean, surrounded by cliffs, watching the monkeys sit on the beach, I realized how much I actually have and how amazing my life and mission have been.  I thanked Heavenly Father, it was cool.

I also got to see Elder Davis since he's assigned there right now, he's doing great.  The other crazy thing that I noticed was once I was done with my little heavenly adventure to Palawan and American food and hot showers, all I wanted to do was go back out to our area in Makati and teach haha, that is where the fun actually is.

I love you mom, 

Elder Zesiger

Teaching a zone conference on Palawan

Elder Zesiger and Elder Davis

Letter to Dad...

Ok.  My week was kind of weird haha it didn't really feel like a mission.  We spent half of it in Palawan and the other half living in the mission home, I got a couple hot showers, so it felt weird to go back home and have a freezing shower this morning haha.  But through all of it, when I was in paradise, the best part of the week was being able to come back to Makati and teach our investigators.

We found another cool lady this week named Jhei.  Her family is kind of interesting.  She is like 40 but already a grandma and the baby's great great grandma is 80 and still lives with them in the house.  So they have been getting pregnant early for generations haha.  She wouldn't let us in her house cuz she thought we would bug her family, so we just taught her on the street next to her balut stand.  As we started, she just said that before we shared, she wanted to know what we could do to "Mahikayat" you can translate that but it pretty much means to convince her, that Catholicism was wrong and why she should join our church.  We had a member with us and we asked her what happened to her.  She shared how she how she felt that it was true by the spirit because of the things she did, like reading and praying.  Jhei started to cry, she said that her life has been so hard, that all of her three children have different dads and that she has been a single mother now for 7 years and it's really hard.  We gave her a Book of Mormon and promised that it will help her.

As we left we asked when we could come back and she said anytime, she then offered that next time she would make space for us in her house so that she could listen better, an idea that she had adamantly rejected 30 minutes earlier haha.  Our message is true.

Can you send me another cool story from your mission, they're my favorite and I remember them.  I love you dad

Elder Zesiger

PS that picture of bubba is cool

PS again: WORK ON THE TRANS AM

haha

I had a cool experience this week about seeing Heavenly Father's control over the work and it increased my trust in him.

Letter to Mom...

That's so crazy!  I'll finally get to say that we are "lima magkakapatid" (5 siblings) intead of "maglilima magkakapatid" (almost or becoming 5 siblings)!!! haha. I love you Mom, thanks for all you do for me.  I don't know what will happen with my eye, it attacks a lot, but I'm ok.  I did get the journal and it is awesome!  You did great!  It was just in time too cuz when I got it I was on the last page of the big black one.

Here is another cool experience that happened this week:  We were teaching this one lady at the top of this giant tower building thing, and she was ok, but one day we oymed her neighbor, Danica.  Apparently, Danica had read the pamphlet that we left with the other girl and knew that it was true and really wanted to know more!  That's our job!  We only taught her once and then she went to church yesterday!  We are really excited about her, but it was just another cool testimony that Heavenly Father is preparing people for us to teach.

I love you mom thanks for the amazing email today, I did know that kid who died.  I'll be praying for you too.

Elder Zesiger

Letter to Coby...

ok I've got a story for you, it's defiantly your turn.  One night, we were walking and all of the sudden this super drunk guy stopped us and started yelling at us to make his wife give him a gun.  Apparently, he was a police officer, he got his license out and showed us.  But since he was so drunk, his wife had taken it and he wanted it really bad.  He kept trying to get us to help him look for it in his house, but since drunk people aren't very fast, we got out of there haha.

Letter to Dad...

I had a cool experience this week about seeing Heavenly Father's control over the work and it increased my trust in him.  We had an appointment with this guy named JR at 4pm, so we started to walk to his house and on the way, we felt prompted to talk to these girls, so we did.  One of them ended up being a less active member that was baptized in 2014 and was here in Makati for about a month visiting.  She hadn't been to church for about a year, so we shared a short message with her and left.  She ended up coming to church in our ward on Sunday.  Then we resumed our journey, about 4:30 now, and we felt like we needed to talk to another guy.  After talking for a couple minutes, he let us teach him, but it was a trap.  He was just a member of Dating Daan which is a church here that just likes to bash, so we were stuck there for a while and when we finally escaped, it was 5:30pm!  We hurried over to JR and were surprised to find him on the way, walking back home from the market carrying stuff to make dinner.  We taught him and it was an amazingly spiritual lesson and he made a lot of progress.

I thought it was cool because of the way that God set it up.  If we would have come any sooner, he would have been at the market and we would have probably just gone another day and missed the spiritual opportunity.   If we would have gone any later, he would have been eating with his family and it wouldn't have worked either.  But everything worked perfectly because Heavenly Father knows what He's doing and because He loves JR.  It was awesome.

Few words but lots of PICTURES!

Letter to Dad...

We still get to procelyte, we just work about half the week, cuz there are a lot of meetings.  I forgot my journal but the spiritual experience that I remember is from MLC (mission leader conference).  It was my first one as an assistant and it was cool to see all the zone leaders and sister training leaders from the front.  We split into groups and did a practice teaching about asking questions.  Since we were able to set it up, I used the experience of the Maglaque family from Santa Mesa.  Their baby died about a week before we started to teach them.  The missionaries didn't know the situation and they had to figure it out.  It turned out awesome.  President came and watched our groups and it was like the most spiritual experience ever!  The missionaries who were in it all started crying and then after, one stood up and testified that the gospel was true, like a movie.  Then President was like "isn't it amazing that how strong you can feel the Spirit even in a practice teaching? It's all true..."  It was awesome.

Next week I'll remember my journal, I love you dad

Elder Zesiger

Letter to Mom....

haha thanks for the pictures mom, but I dont need a pregnant selfie every week haha.  This week was pretty cool, but I'm kinda tired and I cant really remember any of it, my journal is at home.  I haven't gotten the package yet (with a new journal in it) , but hopefully it'll get here fast cuz I've only got 3 pages left in my journal.

For p day, we went to this place called Ocean Park which was cool, it is like a Sea World kind of place with sharks and stuff.  I was petting some sting rays but then the sting ray lady got in an argument with us cuz she was super baptist and wanted to know the exact date that we accepted Jesus in our hearts and were saved haha, we tried to explain that we need to do that everyday and endure to the end, but she wouldn't listen so we left.

Don't worry mom, next week I'll bring my journal so I can remember what to write better.  

I love you 

Elder Zesiger

Letter to Dad...

Palawan is the coolest and I can't wait to go back, I think it's cool how Heavenly Father answered my prayers and still let me go there  I'll try to send some pictures later on tonight because I forgot my cord at home.  But dad, I'm kinda addicted to having a laptop now and I think that we should start a tradition that when the missionaries come home and go to college, they should get a lap top, I think that would make them happy.  haha

Elder Bednar came to our mission and it was super awesome!  I got to sit right behind him up on the stand.  It was super cool to see the whole mission, even Palawan all together from up on the stand too.  He focused mostly on being an agent.  How we should never make ourselves into objects but always know who we are and always have control of it.  When he bore testimony of Jesus Christ, it was crazy.  It was one of the strongest spirits that I have ever felt in my life.  

Zone conference in Palawan yesterday was cool too.  President was sharing about listening and he told a story that reminded me of you.  He said that he  was being interviewed one time by this lady to see if he was be able to manage her portfolio and he said that she talked so much that he maybe only said about 5 words.  At the end of the interview, his company was chosen because she "liked what he did", even though she didn't even know what his company did, besides listening haha.  That is super awesome about Bishop.  How did Landon do as our home teacher haha that sounds awesome.  

You should read the talk called "Becoming Men and Women of integrity" by Tad R Callister it's awesome, I read it on the plane.

I love you dad,

Elder Zesiger

Manila Mission With Elder and Sister Bednar. Elder Zesiger is on the back row.

P.S. guess what I missed out on today.  Apparently, at the Puerto Princessa house, they have a hot shower, but I woke up really early and got showered first and apparently used the wrong one!  When they told me I was already dressed and I almost got undressed just to try it haha.  I'll have to do it next time!

Letter to Mom....

Yep, I went to Palawan, it was awesome!  El Nido is cool and it is one of the places we will be going.  I met a ton of cool people in the airport, a couple from Denmark and a lot from Australia and England.  But hardly any Americans go to the Philippines cuz they just go to Hawaii.  It was super fun teaching the zone conference too.  I only got to work a couple hours there with the zone leaders on an exchange, but it was super fun!  

It is mostly dirt roads, but a couple times we just journeyed into the jungle.  It was super dark and one time when we were in the jungle part with just a little path and surrounded by trees on all sides, we heard some dogs barking.  So the elder that I was with told me to pick up a stick and some rocks and then we saw this small pack of dogs that I guess always chases the missionaries around.  It was crazy!  They wanted to come at us, but we just pointed the sticks at them and kept pump faking them with rocks and they left us alone.  It was kind of scary still though haha, but it is fun to think about now. 

At the end of the day, we bought like 11 fish for $3 and went home and fried them, then this morning, we flew back home and now I'm just in the mission office again haha.

But in a couple weeks we are going back and this time we'll go to Narra which is a lot more jungley and we'll also do the underground river!

It was also super cool when Elder Bednar came, but I'll put that in dad's email probably.

I love you so much mom,

look up Boracay, Coron, El Nido, Honda beach, crocodile farms, Rizal Park, Inra Muros,and strawberry fields so we can go there.

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.