Letter #77 (23rd Jan, 2013)

Hey all

Both Elder Harris and I have been sick for the last couple of days... it sucked... it messed with our work a little bit as well, as much as we both tried to keep going everyday. But just these last two days have been great as we have had our energy come back we have been staying on track for our goals and we are having some good success in the area. Just this last week we pulled out the master list of the ward and started going through it marking off all the members we are working with and the ones we haven't met yet. We have 648 members on the list. Yes! 648! That's like tons! And I made it my goal to find out about every one of these 648 before I transfer, whether they are active, less-active, in-active, have moved or have passed away (we have one that says the guy is 107 years old... either he's dead, or I really want to meet him!). We have started sorting them into areas so we can work on finding them all. We have already started with some success, and have found quite a few.. and realized that the task ahead of us is quite daunting. But we are excited with the new energy it is giving us especially when we are punted from our lessons and when people are not home, because it gives us something we can done with our time that is really productive, and gives openings for FTEs as we go around asking where these people live. We have been taken round in circles in some areas looking for people and even ended up asking at the baranggay hall if they have a record of the person as well. It has really helped me to see the importance of constant home and visiting teaching. The immensity of this task is exciting for me and I feel like it will really help me to gain a love for these members in really getting to know every individual.

Another thing that Elder Harris and I have been focusing on with the less-actives we are teaching is praying everyday, reading the Book of Mormon everyday and gaining a testimony of the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith and of the Church. I has had some amazing results with members coming out with their true concerns, and even some who have no testimony, who we are trying to help to gain such. Its like having to start all over again with them. We have even began focusing this towards the active members too, that whenever we have an opportunity to teach them we teach reading the Book of Mormon everyday. We have found we can count the members in the ward that read daily on our fingers... and that's pretty sad to be honest. We would like to see that the members are reading from the Book of Mormon daily and with their families too. We have a determination as a companionship to not move on to any other doctrine until those we are visiting are reading from the scriptures daily. We have come to realize unless they are reading there is no point teaching other doctrine because they have no foundation without their reading. It has had a profound effect on our teaching that has really helped us to help the people we are teaching.

We had a meeting with Pres. Mondig the stake President, this past Sunday about the missionary work in the stake and about how the wards are doing in preparing to receive missionaries. We told him about the progress or lack of in some of the areas and he said he would work on some of the issues we talked about, such as PEC happening every week. There are some wards that are still only doing it once a month... and still have in-active ward mission leaders. So they will not be ready for missionaries yet, but we feel that Basak is ready, and are going to look for a house this week. We also have some big problems with the ward boundaries in the wards... we don't know what they are... when we checked on the church website with out clerk and printed them out, and showed them to the Capitol and Arlington elders in our zone they told us that it is a big problem for Arlington ward, because half of their leaders are actually in the Capitol ward according to the maps on the churchwebsite maps. So we're gonna have to check them some how with the stake and get them fixed.

Miss you lots,

Love you tons,

Elder Taylor Addison Cox

 

Letter #76 (16th Jan, 2013)

Hey all,

Just to let you know I got my license today from the LTO. It was an interesting experience to say te least... first was some lecture by this woman who kept telling the people that when the results of the written test were checked, they could argue about it cause it was checked by a machine. She informed us about some things to do with the rules of the road here, then we started the written test. 40 multiple choice questions with a 30 correct pass. So I got my license.

Things have been doing pretty well this last week. The area is very slowly improving and is very different to what I was expecting. The work is harder than I expected but I received some inspiration and ideas from the workshops yesterday at our zone interviews (just the 6 of us elders in the zone...jejeje) of how I can improve and make things a little easier in terms of teaching.

Elder Harris and I get along really well, and have some times when we get depressed a little about the work, but we try to help each other to push and stretch ourselves. We had this one night that we hadn't reached our goal for FTE's and the people were all being wa'y claro when we tried to talk with them. So we stopped under this street light, and weighted for about 5 mins and we had 4 people basically come up and talk to us, and we were able to FTE them. It was an interesting experience.

I have started studying more in the Doctrine and Covenants, and using my old seminary scriptures as well, so I have been learning quite a lot and coming up with many questions which I have been asking President Schmutz.

I have been feeling a bit under the weather but i think its just getting used to the city air. My throat has been a bit raspy lately, but i think it may just be the pollution from all the sakyanan's. But things are all good.

We have been working a bit with te other areas, especially the PEC in each of their wards and we are excited for Basak ward with all the work they are doing to prepare for missionaries to be assigned in their ward and we feel that their ward could really be helped by some missionaries. We are looking forward to the incoming missionaries into the zone and for being able to continue to strengthen the areas in central stake.

Don't know what else to say this week...

Miss you,

Love you all tons,

Elder Taylor Addison Cox

 

Letter #75 (9th Jan, 2013)

Hey all,

I have never been so tired in my mission before! The city has really pushed me and I feel exhasted every night. I feel like I am giving my all everyday and then the next morning somehow find extra strength to continue pushing forward. Not to metion we walk so much! Been trying to get to know all the places and routes here in the city, and am still really confused... hopefully this week will be better and i'll start to see some familiar landmarks.

The work has been kinda fun here, but there are so many hard-hearted LA's here that you can lose hope petty quickly if your not careful. You really need to have ethusiams in the work and a desire to enjoy it even though there are all these really depressing people around you. The dicussion we had in ZLC will really hit home with some of these people. We talked about how will inherit a glory according to the law we are willing to obey in this life, and that those who dont follow the celstial law dont get there, so its gonna be hard for te LA's to take that, cause they are definitely NOT living a celestial law, or even a terrestrial law for that matter, in some cases. We have a really good RM who has been working with us every second day. Its been really good as he helps out in the lessons and with finding new LA's to visit.

O yeah, I think I forgot to tell you my comp is Elder Harris from my senior batch. We are having fun tearing it up in the city! Elder Harris and I are doing great. I have never heard or spoken so much English for 6 transfers now, since I was with Elder Seumanutafa. I has been interesting trying to make that adjustment and I find myself thoroughly confused sometimes, trying to say things that make no sense what so ever. It has also been interesting working three areas, and attending the PEC's in each of the areas. We cover three areas here in Labangon (our area) and Basak and St. Nicolas, as the other two don't have missionaries yet but are trying to prepare to be ready to receive them when the bigger numbers come in. It is good training for working with ward and stake leaders. We both have a good feeling for Basak ward, that they are ready for missionaries and we are exited for the work they are doing to ready themselves in that ward to be able and ready to help the missionaries in the work there. They had an incident there before when the members were like "we don't need missionaries here..." so President Schmutz was like,"is that so... well..." *missionaries pulled-out of area*. So its good to see that the attitude has changed since then and members are looking  forward to missionaries being back in their ward.

things are doing great. Miss you all,

Love you tons,

Elder Taylor Addison Cox