letter to homies

TyBlog11.26.2012

Hello everyone out in the world - just another month gone by. It has been a good month for us out here in Stop Aguinaldo, Escalante. I have been here since July and it was actually transfer day last week and I am staying here with my trainee Elder Agustin. We will be here for Christmas which is exciting because I really love this place and these people. We had a lot of fun with four in our house. Elder Delos Santos (my old comp) was transferred though, and Elder Hagen, my comp from the MTC will be training too. We live in the same house. Actually his trainee is a Filipino from America and had trouble getting his visa so he hasn't come yet.  Until he does we will be a threesome for a while which is like the MTC all over again ha but should be fun. So this month was good. The work here in Stop is so sweet. I have said it before but I love this place. Every day is like an adventure out here. It is so jungle bukid out here. Everyone mainly is very poor and just have bamboo houses. Some have concrete though. There are a bunch of small mountains, sugar cane, rivers, and muddy trails that we walk on every day. It feels like I am on a hike every day and we do a ton of walking so I have stayed in pretty good shape. When it rains here it pours and gets so muddy that I have mud up to my ankles and calves and lose my shoes sometimes. One night I forgot my light because I gave my other one to a member. I fell and landed on a sharp sugar cane pole and my touch screen camera broke. Just the screen though - at least all the memory is ok. Oh well I just got a new one though, and the spiritual things are much more important than the temporal things. Sometimes stuff like that just happens and we need to just keep moving on. Something cool this month was that we had a mission tour. Elder David F. Evans came and he is in the missionary department. It was a way good mission tour. He didn't know at first what to speak on. He followed the spirit and first focused on the importance of the spirit and the need to have it to succeed and receive the promises of God.  Also, to have the Spirit we need to be obedient to the rules which is hard sometimes but worth it. He then focused on the atonement and repentance. The atonement is central to the gospel and the most important thing. I am so thankful for the atonement and the chance we have to repent. God is so merciful and I know we have all done some stupid stuff in our lives but true repentance is true change and we don't go back to our old ways. Sometimes it is a process though so never give up if you aren't perfect. In Alma 36:12-24 it shows true repentance. Alma was the worst of sinners and became the prophet and in verse 24 shows that to have continuing repentance we must truly change and then do our best to serve God from then on. So really serving our missions is showing God how thankful we are for the atonement and repentance. Evans said that the reason why it is such a problem here with the less actives is because they don't understand repentance.  Sometimes people are just baptized unto less activeness ha, but he focused how our calling is to preach repentance. So we are focusing to help these people understand repentance and apply it in our lives too, so we can have true converts. I had so many pages of notes and he blew my mind on his understanding of the gospel. He talked about many great prophets in the Book of Mormon and how their teaching of the atonement build on each other as the book goes on. Also at lunch I got to sit by him and had a normal conversation with him, he is just a normal guy, but I know he is called of God by the power and spirit of his message. He also talked about Mosiah 2:36-37 and said the gospel is a circle, if we want to stay inside and be blessed, prosperous, and preserved we must be obedient.  If not we are cut off and will be until we REPENT and come back. Anyways - way good. We are continuing to have success and enjoy it here in Stop. We had two more baptisms in November from referrals from the Gepiala family that we had a bunch of baptisms in October. This month we hope to have more baptisms. On Dec 8 we plan to have 4 more. 3 more are from the Gepiala family - such an amazing family and I know they are true converts. Then one is a future missionary - crazy how he is so ready but he loves the church. Later in December we hope to have maybe three or four so it should be a good month. We found them in a crazy way which shows that God knows what is going on. When I was waiting in Bacolod in October for Elder Agustin my trainee I worked in a certain area for three days. I could have gone to like 20 areas but I went to this place and the guy there used to live in Stop and just handed me 7 referrals. One of the families is way elect and have been to church three times and we hope to baptize them in December so pretty crazy. We are also focusing on less actives and recent converts here just trying to stay balanced. We never give up on the less active and recent converts. It is hard to see some never progress but we invite them every Sunday before church, it is always hot and a lot of walking, but some are coming back to church and lately we have had the most sacrament attendance since I have been here. So I know we need faith and can never give up and do our best but people still have their agency. Thanksgiving here doesn't exist which was kind of hard ha hah cause I love the food and my family. It's ok though. I love you all and I love my family. I know that God has a plan for all of us we just need to let him guide us through obedience. I know this gospel is true. I know you guys are all doing miracles out there and I can't wait to hear from you all when we return. Keep going. Time flies. It is trunky season ha ha meaning very hard, just want to go home, Thanksgiving, Christmas, ha but just keep going and we will keep doing miracles. Just take it one day at a time and do your best that day. I am so thankful for the atonement and know it is infinite and God has infinite love and mercy and we always need to repent and then do our best and serve God and others to keep a remission of our sins. Merry Christmas to all!
Love Elder Mifflin aka Nature Man