October 23, 2017

Hey everyone! We have had a pretty solid week this week! First of all, my companion and I were just chilling at a bus stop waiting to go to a part member/investigators house. While we were sitting there we saw a HUGE moth! Seriously, this thing was like the size of my hand! My companion dared me to catch it, I came up behind it with an empty plastic bottle and caught it. Once I caught it our bus rolled up, so I was stuffing a mothy water bottle into my bag... super weird but funny haha we got to our appointment and we showed the kids, they absolutely loved it! They started finding even more bugs and were throwing them into the bottle haha. These were the same kids that were at my first baptism at the beach. While we were at the beach they saw me picking up seashells cause I think seashells are sweet and now whenever we go over they give me more and more shells, I love those kids!!!

Another fun story.. We ran into a drunk guy that was pretty funny. He called us over from way down the street. When we walked over he was just way drunk but he still pulled out some chairs for us to sit on and then he told us to teach him. He was talking in english, ilacono, and tagalog. Whenever we showed him the restoration pamphlet (which has a picture of jesus) he would take it and kiss jesus then give it back. We would be talking and he'd randomly say "wait wait wait" and just pause looking off for a second then open his arms and tell us to continue, then at random times in our lesson he would just hold at both of his hands palm down and wait for Elder Manarang and I to shake his hands again. haha We'll go back again sometime and hopefully teach him while he's sober!

That was my week, I hope it was entertaining for everyone! I'll try to pick up some good stories for next week! I know this Gospel is true, not easy but true! Alam ko na sa pamamagitan ng Ebanghelyo na ito  pwuede natin maging masaya sa buhay na ito at sa buhay pagatapos dito! (Translation:  I know that through this Gospel we can be happy in this life and in life end here!)

Love,

Elder Payne

a local jeepney

Missionaries in the district plus the two Assistants to the Mission Presidents (AP) that go home soon

There are a lot of colorful moths.

Rice drying along the road

October 16, 2017

Just a quick one today! My pictures struggled to load so I will say sorry in advance! This week we had two branch baptisms. The children had their dads baptize but Elder Manarang and I were able to be witnesses. After, we were able to participate in the circle to confirm them members of the church! The very moment their fathers began the prayer to confirm them I felt a power rush through my body. It was real and tangible. I can testify that the priesthood is the power of God. It is the power to act in the name of God and is the power to bond both on earth and in Heaven.

 This church is true and I am so very grateful for it! Life is hard but God loves us eternally and wants us to be happy, I testify that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the way for us to be truly happy in this life and the life after this! I can feel God's love through my family.  Families are so special and are truly the way we can be happy. My family means everything to me and I am thankful God has given them to me! Everyone do me a favor when you read this, call your mom and tell her you love her or better yet, run up and give her a hug and a kiss in person! 

Love you all and stay safe! 

Love,

Elder Payne 

2 Weeks - October 9, 2017

Sorry about last week. I sent a group email but something must have went wrong... So here is a 2 weeks update! We had 2 baptisms a week ago! I was able to baptize them and it was such an amazing experience. I felt the spirit in such a way I cannot put it into words. There was such a joy and peace in those moments. It was beautiful. I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to be involved in their conversions. Brother M. was one of the investigators we baptized. His family was baptized about a year ago but he has been an investigator for about 3 years! He and his family are now preparing to enter the temple and be sealed for time and all eternity. Is there any greater thing in this world then being able to be with our families forever? I can promise you that this blessed truth shows the love that God has for all of us, all he asks is that we turn to him. 

This week has been wild! I had my first "Bible bash" And let me promise you it was very much so involuntary. So we were contacting this one day, just going door to door, and we found this guy in a pretty nice house (considering the Philippines). I Tao Po'd his house and he was way excited to let us in. We sit down on a bench in his patio and he asks us to begin. Elder Manarang started out with talking about how There is a living prophet on the earth today. At that the guy just says "1 minute" runs into his house and comes back out with his bible and slaps it down on the table and says "Teach" We tell him the living prophet today is Thomas S. Monson and he didn't like that it didn't have President Monson's name in the bible. We then tried to teach baptism but he didn't think that we have need of baptism. We tried to help him understand that Christ taught the importance of baptism both through his example in Matthew 3:13-17 and teachings in John 3:5. We just wanted to provide him a way to come closer to our Savior but he wasn't willing to try. It was sad for me to see him reject a way that he could come to know his Savior better. We ended the lesson on a positive note though as he prayed for our well being. It was an interesting experience, but I'm glad we could respect each others beliefs and end positively. 

Then of course conference this week! That was a much needed experience! The words of the apostles are so strong and encouraging. It was such a blessing to receive instruction on how to make it through these troubling times. I am truly grateful for the revelation which they are able to receive in order for us to stay safe in a dangerous world! Plus it was so fun for me to see so many friends in the choir at the Priesthood session! I saw everyone like the McEuens, Coach JC, The Nielsens,The Diamonds, The Baughs, Mr. Baer, and some friends from high school! I'm seven thousand miles away and it was the best treat to be able to see them all the away here in the Philippines! 

I love you all and sorry for the lengthy email but that's about what happened in the past two week of my life! I hope everyone is finding joy in these troubling times. One of the most powerful lessons I learned from conference is that times in which it's hard to turn to God are the very times in which we need to the most! Stay safe and trust in God. See you all next week! 

Much love,

Elder Payne

That's the rice that I eat here.  They dry their rice on the street like that and then scoop it into bags to be sold at the markets. 

That goat was stuck like that.  We had to go over and Elder Manarang held its head as I lifted it up and freed it. haha. The babies were still trying to get milk as it was stuck like that!  She was pretty calm while we did it.  I think she was grateful that we got her out.

The next few photos from an early morning hike.

A final picture for fun

A Week Without A Letter - October 2, 2017

Elder Payne had some technical issues with his computer this week so he wasn't able to send a group email out before his time on the computer ended.  These are some pictures he sent to our family email account before he had to go. We hope to get more information about these pictures next week, but we can tell you that he was able to baptize two individuals as new members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints this last week.  He's very happy for them and their families.  He said he'd fill us in more about this experience in the group email, but he lost the draft of that email when his computer malfunctioned and he ran out of time to rewrite it.  For now, he said he's finding his joy in service and gets to stay in his area with his current companion until the next transfer round in 6 weeks.  

Here are some other things from the week that he shared with us:  

We need to do a lot of finding!  Our teaching pool is getting pretty low.  We found some promising people last week so we will visit them this week.  We have two kids who want to get baptized so all we really have to do is teach them.  One will get baptized on the 14th of October and the other on the 5th of November!  For door approaches, you don't knock on the door.  It's kind of funny.  You walk up and yell Tao po! which means "People!  Haha.  Sometimes, they will yell "Bakit!" which means "Why?' and we just tell them we are missionaries, ha ha.  We are currently teaching this old tatay (dad, grandpa- the term for dad or "tatay" is used a lot here).  We tao po'd him and it's going pretty well!  Sometimes people won't open or they also like to hide a lot.  You just have to be at the right house at the right time.  We lost power for like all day yesterday so that was rough!  Turns out the Philippines is hot and without fans, it's crazy hot.  And our water depends on electricity so that was a little stressful... it came back on by the end of the day, though. 

This is a bamboo raft that people (and their cycles) travel on to cross bodies of water.