Letter #41 (May 16th, 2012)

Hey all,
... pastilan! Wa'y claro ang mga computer diri sa Philippines! This
computer doesnt want to read my memory card and tells me that it
doesn't recognise the device... stupid computer.
So I guess next week again you'll have to wait for the pictures. >>>
... oh wait, now it wants to work! so here are some pictures... thats
a karabao Dad... NOT a Caraboo... (or whatever you said it was). It
got annoyed with me after a while and tried to head butt me off its
back... so i just grabbed his horns... jejeje.

Now about the work... this week has been great as we have visited with
the less active members and been able to share with them. Right now we
are working on overcoming various problems in the branch with our less
actives. We have recently come to find out about some conflicts of
interest with some of the members and some members were offended in
the past and we are working with them to overcome these problems. It
has been really difficult to judge the progression of our work this
past week because of the Fiesta in Zamboanguita yesterday and all the
preparations and celebrations leading up to the event. Just past
Sunday we learned which of the members are really focused on the
spiritual things in there lives and who has a little more trouble
avoiding following the trends of the world. At 9am we had 8 members
including us in the chapel, but luckily that increased to about 30 by
the time we started sacrament a little later. There were so many other
members who were more concerned with preparing for the Fiesta than
going to church to renew sacred covenants with the Lord. I was very
saddened about that, but was proud to see some of our young men there
ready to pass the sacrament. I was great to see that they understand
the responsibility they hold even as Aaronic Priesthood holders.
I have learned so much from Elder Dela Cerna these last two weeks in
terms of teaching. I have felt my teaching abilities improve so much
and this last week he has shown me how to be really bold, but caring
at the same time. He is just amazing in terms of teaching and always
surprises me with a whole heap of new knowledge every time we teach. I
have begun to notice how effective the question "why?" is for the less
actives to stop and think about things in their lives, especially the
question "why did you stop going to church?".
I have started to apply that in my studies as well, asking "why?"
about the things I read in the scriptures and about the things I learn
to really help me think about things and to apply them. I have been
studying from the New Testament recently, from the Saviors parables
and the types of questions he asked the people. I have noticed that
more often than not he answered the questions of the people with
another question to have them think about the answer. We had an
opportunity to talk to Elder Cropper about this principle the other
Tuesday, and about how we can apply such to our teaching to help the
less active to think about the things they already know but may have
forgotten.
Other than that...
we avoided the Feista like the plague cause it just ends up lots of
drunk people who want you to eat at their houses.... Wa'y claro... We
caught the bus that night from our house to Dumaguete and the bus
driver and the conductor worked so hard to avoid getting any drunkards
on their bus. They were very skillful, like slowing down just enough
for the person getting off to jump out and speeding off again... or
just the classic closing the door in their faces so they cant get on.
But thats about all this week... Next week we'll be in Cebu when we
email most likely. We'll catch a bus from Dumaguete at 6am so we get
there about 12 midday... oh what fun! Almost the same length as
Finley... not quite.

Miss you,
Love you,
Elder Taylor Addison Cox