This may be the end....

Hello Family!!

Right now, we are in the mission office cranking out trainings for my last MLC tomorrow! It is 3 am, I am running on 4 hours of sleep from the night before and we are loving life. Amidst all of this craziness, I remembered that I hadn't had time to send out an email yet! So here we go!

This week was CRAZY. We set some crazy goals this week to try and push ourselves to find new investigators and to rise to a new sense of responsibility. We pushed ourselves so hard, and we were able to reach our goal. It was great to see so many other Elders an Sisters to reach that same level of dedication and determination that we learned.

This starts the last week of my mission now... It's so sad.

I'm sorry this is yet another short letter, but right now I can't finish a sentence without nodding off in the middle of it. Just know that I am alive. Rest will come soon.

I love this work!!

Elder Welton

Rain pa more

Hello Family!

This will be the shortest email I have sent you!

Last week was good! We got rained on, worked, taught people, and attended Zone Conferences.

This will be my last week of uninterrupted work for the rest of my mission, so we are going to teach EVERYONE.

Take Care! See you soon.

Elder Welton

Hello Family and Friends!

We were able to get in a solid week of work here in Minoyan! So great! Miracles. This may have possibly been the last straight week of work that I will have the rest of my time here. We have Zone Conference and then MLC coming up in the next few weeks and then I'll be home. That's so crazy.

Working was really good this week. One of my biggest weaknesses as a missionary for my whole mission has been talking to people everywhere; OYM'ing, as they call it (open your mouth). I have always just been to afraid to talk to random people. I feel as though I am "inconveniencing" them by stopping them to share this message. But lately, in the words of one of the sister missionaries here, "If you were bringing around free gold to people, would you hesitate to offer it to them because you thought it would inconvenience them?" I pondered that and realized that I AM offering gold! I got so much more bold in talking to everyone this last week. I realized that if I don't open my mouth right now, I can never know if someone else ever will! As we were more diligent and dedicated about OYM'ing this week, we were blessed with great new people and contacts. We hope to see them progress.

I have been reflecting a lot on myself and trying to figure out what exactly I have become on my mission. I feel like I still lack a lot of attributes that missionaries usually have, but when I read a friend's letter the other day, I realized that I feel the same thing! I will now quote Kimber Young's email.

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"I realized how bold I am getting as a missionary/person in general. I was kind of bummed about it. Before my mission, I always pictured myself returning home as a quiet, kind, gentle, meek, submissive, sweet, and humble girl (. So on my mission I have tried hard to be like that person I wanted to become and it wasn't working!! Instead I have found myself being more bold, strict, diligent, organized, and always speaking my mind. I was so confused and frustrated by this because I have been learning all these things and feel closer to God than ever before but I wasn't becoming the person I wanted to become! But my "a-ha!" moment this week was this: it's not about becoming the person I want to become, it is about becoming the person He wants me to become. Maybe He wants me to be bold and loud and organized and obedient. My strengths now are not the same strengths I had before my mission. I am becoming a different person on my mission but not in the same way as I expected myself to. And that is a good thing because it is not about changing myself but allowing God to change me."

--

Now, I don't desire to become a "sweet, and humble girl," like she said in her email, but I have always hoped to obtain those attributes. She took the words right out of my mouth. The biggest thing that has been on my mind lately is: "Have I reached the level of potential that God had in mind for me by the end of my mission?" I really hope so. I have realized how much we need to improve all the time. And I realized, as it explains in Doctrine and Covenants, that our rate of improvement in the next life will probably be the same as our rate of improvement before we died on earth. If we die unprogressive, we will remain unprogressive in the life to come. And if we are improving at a slow rate, we will STILL be moving slowly in the next life. So I guess we really only have right now to build up that pace and to maintain a high pace for the rest of our lives.

That's all for this week!

Elder Welton

Here's a picture of our area. We went up further than we had been going to see if there was potential. This area is the prettiest one I have been in my whole mission!

P.S.:  Here's a fun description from a message Tanner sent to his dad:   

"I know you love the small details of missionary life -- We came down from the mountain yesterday wearing our long sleeve shirt (for church meetings) to go to a meeting with president and we haven't had time to go back to our area all day because of errands. We went to sleep at 2 last night because we were getting numbers and making reports. We don't have any clean laundry or food left at the house and we have to wake up at 4 to get on a bus and then get to Cadiz for a Zone Conference at 9. I have to hand wash my long sleeve shirt tonight in hopes that it will be dried by the morning. If it isn't I will hang it in front of our standing fans in our house to get it as dry as possible.

 I figured some of this might just bring back some fond memories of yours to remembrance. Such a great time."

Minoyan 1E1

Hello!!

Things are going great!

For those who don't know, I was transferred last week! NOOOOO! I loved Ma-ao. It was so great... But now I am in the area right next to it! It's the same mountain, but facing a different direction. This area is even PRETTIER than my last! It's incredible! Wow... What a blessing to be able to finish my mission up in this place.

Elder Warnick is my companion (he's from Payson) and we were both assigned as APs, which is weird because we don't live in Bacolod! It's actually a super awesome setup. President actually has four APs for this transfer, like he did in January. The other set is split up with two different areas with different companions. Elder Duero is one and Elder Wade is the other. They are great. They take care of most of the office work that President needs, and we are just focusing on making a model area that we can take other Zone Leaders into to learn and to develop their skills and give them feedback. It's so cool! So right now, we are just focusing on finding and doing all that we can to try and set a good example. It's hard..!

I am practicing my English right now. It's pretty bad. I mumble when I speak and it's hard to speak properly. My written English is still fine, but my spoken English is still just conversational and casual, unless I am giving a training or in a teaching situation; it's normal then. Hopefully I can practice refining my communication skills before I get home so that I don't sound like some high school student... Pray for me!

Something interesting about this week is that I go home in four weeks, which means that all of the investigators that began their four weeks of church attendance required for baptism this week, then everyone else I find after this will be baptized after I leave. I'm not sure how clear that sentence was, (probably pretty bad english) but basically what happens now is that I am now finding people that I will not get to see enter the waters of baptism... In preparation for this, I have been reflecting upon my desire to help others and trying to determine whether that desire was centered on self-achievement or on the salvation of others. I have seen so many missionaries just kind of give up on the last month because they know that they can no longer baptize anyone else that may begin progressing. Proud to say, I still have the same desire I did last week to teach repentance and baptize converts. It hasn't dwindled in the slightest. I love this message and the happiness it brings. It makes me sad when people choose not to accept it, and makes me delight when people chose to humble themselves and follow Jesus Christ. What a great thing. I wish everyone could understand what I know. And I wish they could understand how many better doors will open for them when the decide to close the ones that they think will make them the happiest and then seek to understand what God has in store for them. I hope to help as many people as possible to understand this message as I have done so myself.

Have a great week!!

Elder Welton

Build People

Hello Family and Friends!

Good week! Busy week!

This week was another week of growth and work! I am so grateful for the experiences that God has been providing me with during my last few strides towards the finish line. It's been so interesting lately as I have pondered my progress as a missionary. This has been such an interesting time because I feel like I am back in my training again. Everything seems to have the same feel as when I was in my training, but in reverse in some ways. I'm not 2 months into the field anymore, but rather 2 months left in the field. My email has seemed to populate itself with messages of excitement and anticipation of return, rather than messages of well-wishing and farewell. I now reflect on the memories of my current home for the past 22 months, rather than the memories from my old home of 18 years. I don't understand why I have been blessed as much, but I feel as though I have had a lifetime of experiences in just two years.

This week has been full of a lot of work, as usual, but personally, I have been seeking to know my Savior better. I feel the same desire right now to come ever nearer unto Him that I felt when I was in my training, striving to overcome the pride that kept me from progressing. I have been pondering His life and ministry and the way that He called His Apostles and it made me wonder what He did during those 30 or so years before he actually began His ministry. We know so much about is ministry and his life during that time, but how did Jesus influence those people around Him before he revealed himself as the Son of God?

I have been reading a lot about leadership and building people and I read one book called "The Servant Leader," which bases it's leadership principles upon the characteristics of Jesus Christ. At one point, it talked about how Jesus called is Apostles and they followed Him. After reading the short section, it made me think, "Why did His soon-to-be-Apostles follow him so quickly, without hesitation?" One of the simplest answers to this question would probably be: they knew Him. I would love to see how Jesus had built relationships with these people before he called them. I imagine it must have been years of preparation. What I learned overall from this book is that we need to put time into building relationships with people. We really can do a lot to influence people around us, we just need to take the time to be willing to share what we know.

Sorry to cut this email short, but I'm almost out of time! Hope everyone as a great week!

Elder Welton

Dalagan

Hello!

Man. This week was nuts - so many people taught, ENDLESS hours on the bus, and so much more. We worked SO hard this week and we have been finding many new quality investigators! It's so amazing how much we have been blessed recently. This work is truly a joy!

This Saturday was such a crazy day. We had been working so fast and traveling around so much the whole week that we weren't able to visit our investigators as much as we had planned. Our schedule for Saturday involved visiting all of our investigators on the mountain, the farthest part of our area, and then attending a wedding/baptism in Bago City for the Sister's baptismal candidate. We had missed so much sleep this week because of our travel and fitting in teaching appointments that when it came time to plan on Friday night, it was already 10:45pm, we hadn't eaten dinner, and we were sweating buckets because of the Summer heat right now. As we looked at the time constraints for the following day, we said, "Well... It looks like we are gonna have to run tomorrow if we want to visit all those people....." So that's what we did. We traveled up to the mountain, got off the tricycle, and just started speed-walking/jogging. We made a 30 minute fast-walk through the field into a 15 minute jog. We got to the first appointment, tried to let our clothes dry out, taught a lesson, and then started running to the next one, which was about a 30 minute jog through the fields again. After all that, it started DUMPING rain, so we had to hide inside the only member's house in the area. Because of the time restraints, we had no choice but to run through the rain when it didn't let up. The rain was actually quite nice, seeing as it made the intense heat cool down. It guess that's a blessing.

We did our best to dry off on the ride down the mountain, and then grabbed Elder Rabila's clothes from the apartment and got on the bus. We made it JUST in time for the wedding. I then assumed my place at the front and conducted the opening part of the wedding ceremony, picked whatever hymn that came to my mind, introduced the speakers, and then gave the time to the solemnizer. I then assumed my position as wedding photographer, just like the good ole days, and documented the entire wedding. It was a WONDERFUL wedding. Sisters are so much better at setting up weddings than Elders, that's for sure!

We are teaching one young man right now that is about 14 years old. Last night, we looked for him at his house but couldn't find him. We then went to the basketball court that we always see him at and, lo and behold, he was there! Elder Rabila said, "Hey, look at him right now. He's a big fish now," observing that he had somehow managed to join in with guys a bit older than him. That's such a big deal growing up, I totally forgot about that! I said, "I don't think he's gonna want to listen right now; he's with the 'big fish'." He then replied, "Oh yes he will. Especially if a bigger fish calls HIM," referring to us. I realized he had a point! We asked him if we could teach him when he was done playing and he was fine with it! We ended up just standing by and watching them for a while. As I watched this group of somewhat rambunctious young men, the words from Joseph Smith History came to my mind. He said, "I was guilty of levity, and sometimes associated with jovial company, etc., not consistent with that character which ought to be maintained by one who was called of God," very similar to what I was witnessing on this basketball court. I realized in the moment, that this investigator that we had been teaching seemed to parallel the life of Joseph Smith. As we taught him, we asked how he was doing following the Word of Wisdom, to which he responded, "I haven't had any problems! I don't drink coffee anymore, and I don't do any of the other things. I stopped after you taught me about it last time." We asked him if his mom had said anything, to which he replied, "I told her that I want to follow whatever the Elders teach me because I know that it's true and that it's for my own good. Then she just said, 'alright, whatever you want to do as long as you are being good.'" We were so impressed by his desire to follow Christ. I reflected upon it as we walked home and talked to Elder Rabila about it. God must really know his children if he knew he could trust a 14 year old boy with such a great calling. Just like this young man we were teaching, I think Joseph Smith must have had the same attitude of, "I'm gonna follow this because I know it's true and that it's for my own good."

What cool experiences. I am so blessed to be in this area. I hope that things continue to improve and that these people come to know Jesus Christ even better. I have recently realized that EVERYBODY here in the Philippines loves Christ, but very few of them actually KNOW him the way that we do in this church. They don't understand his compassion, his sternness, his loving voice, and his call to obedience. I had always figured that they already knew Christ, but have recently learned that the Christ I know is much different than theirs. I'm grateful for the Book of Mormon and for the testimony it gives of Jesus Christ. We need this second witness if we want to be able to recognize his voice when he comes.

What a marvelous work. I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Welton

Saved by Grace

Maayong hapon sa akong mga abyan!

This was a GREAT. WEEK. What a great opportunity to be a missionary.

We had a baptism this week! Angel Y-------, the grandchild of Sister P------- we baptized in March, was finally baptized! She is great. She was SO SO SO excited to get baptized and has been waiting for a long time. She has actually been an investigator for a long time, but was lost when the Elders were pulled out of one of the proselyting areas that we are now covering. We were able to recontact her and start teaching her again. On our first visit with her back in February, we found her house and then taught them. When we were talking about their religion, her friend said, "I'm Baptist" and then Angel said, "I'm Mormon!" quickly following it up with a, "ah, well I guess not QUITE yet..." She is great. The baptismal service was wonderful, and it was just great.

This week was full of a lot of learning for me. I finally decided to finish the book that you sent me, Mom, titled "Believing Christ" I think my procrastination of actually reading this book must have been part of God's plan for me because it couldn't have been more timely. I shared last week about Elder Holland's talk about TRYING and being found "spotless before God at the last day," and I thought about how HARD it must be to be spotless. I guess I didn't quite understand the concept of grace last week. This book described the principle of grace so clearly. I have only recently started to understand the doctrine of Grace in the LDS context. I had always kind of ignored the idea of grace, thinking it to be more of a Baptist doctrine that provided a "free ticket" to heaven if we just "received Christ." I have recently come to understand that it is nothing like that. We don't get a free ticket to heaven just by believing, but through this grace we can become perfect. WE ourselves won't become perfect, but because of the covenant relationship we have with Christ, we can be CONSIDERED perfect when we face our God at judgment because of our flawless partner which has paid for those imperfections we have. In the book, it explained how Christ knows that we will not be able to keep all of the commandments all of the time, but that he expects us to TRY. He ASKS for us to be obedient exactly obedient all the time, but doesn't EXPECT that we will be able to meet that commitment all at once. 

When I think of all the mistakes I have made and am currently making, it makes me realized how BADLY I need that saving grace in my life. It also made me more fully understand this work that I am a part of. I am beginning to understand exactly WHY I need to help people to be baptized. If only I had learned and understood that doctrine more fully a bit earlier, you know? What an important thing for missionaries to understand. If you don't yet understand grace or haven't even begun to understand it, you are missing a BIG piece of the puzzle. I hope to learn even MORE about it in an effort to believe Christ's promises a little bit more.

As I have tried to come closer to Christ, I have started having so many feelings of inadequacy, disappointment, and many other things that make me feel like I can NEVER make it closer to him. Perhaps Satan was trying to hinder my progress and keep me from coming closer - I have no idea! But as I started reading the scriptures, I came across a classic verse that I have read MANY times, but had not yet understood it in this context; Ether 12:27.

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And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

--

So, apparently those feelings of inadequacy I had were NOT from an enemy, but rather from a caring friend that wants me to be better. Those feelings I had were not a sign of me distancing myself from Christ, but rather of me drawing nearer to him. I guess we sometimes think that coming unto Christ is like getting a big old giant warm hug from a good friend, but I guess once a solid relationship has been built with Christ, been neglected, and then picked up again, He makes sure to let us know what we have neglected in our absence. It's not because He doesn't love us, but rather that He DOES love us and wants to make sure we make the right choices and become what the Father needs to accomplish his plans. What an interesting thing. So perhaps when we feel inadequate despite our best efforts to draw nearer to Christ, that is his way of telling us we are doing what he wants. I hope that all of my "weak things become strong."

I hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Welton

Conference

Hello sa tanan!

Man... Things are starting to feel so weird lately. I feel like I just barely got here and now I have my flight itinerary! Wow. I really feel like I need more time, but I guess there's a reason that missions are timed so precisely. It seems as though I am just barely getting a hang of it all!

Conference this week was so great! I really learned a lot that I want to apply in my future life. I find it weird how much my view on conference has changed. I really tried my best to prepare myself for conference this week and it was amazing when it came time to watch it. The topics that stuck out to me this time were mostly about marriage, school, and fatherhood, which was so weird, because I didn't really think I would find that interesting at all. The talks that talked about families and eternal partners and stuff are the ones that seemed to influence me the most. It's weird to be close to moving on in the next few years to these kinds of things, but it's exciting and unknown!

We had a very HECTIC day Sunday. One thing I have learned here is that technology really only works in two places: America and inside church buildings. Elder Holland talked about the viewers of conference being comprised of people in the conference center, people in their homes, people at the stake centers, and then the people crowded around a computer screen... We were that last one... We worked for two days trying to figure out how to show this to the members in our area and we failed at EVERY corner. Every idea we came up was ruined by old dvd players, wrong file formatting, corrupted files, laptop chargers without power adapters, and straw that broke the camel's back: the wifi hotspot ran out of prepaid credit... In our final efforts Sunday morning, we were able to get a members laptop and show just one hour of the morning session before it ran out of credit. It seemed as though Satan was really against us yesterday, but I hope that there was something gained from our sacrifice and efforts. It's hard to see it now, but I imagine I will find out what good was done at some point in the future.

We made it down to Bago to catch the tail-end of the afternoon session. As Elder Holland spoke, I felt as though he was talking to me directly. After such disappointment, I felt somewhat dejected by our failure. Elder Holland then talked about those who will receive eternal life.

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Please remember tomorrow, and all the days after that, that the Lord blesses those who want to improve, who accept the need for commandments and try to keep them, who cherish Christlike virtues and strive to the best of their ability to acquire them. If you stumble in that pursuit, so does everyone; the Savior is thereto help you keep going. If you fall, summon His strength. Call out like Alma, "O Jesus,  have mercy on me."   He will help you get back up. He will help you repent, repair, fix whatever you have to fix, and keep going. Soon enough you will have the success you seek.

-

I hope that I can feel "spotless" before God. I am so grateful for Conference and our Prophets!

I hope everyone has a good week!

Elder Welton

It's not what you thought it'd be....

Hi.

The work is so great in Ma-ao! I just love it here.

So, the volcano blew up this week! I guess that's pretty cool. We were actually really surprised when we found out that it blew up because we didn't feel or see anything! We were just walking around, proselyting ON the volcano when it happened. The way we found out was pretty funny...

About 6 pm, we were far from the road, out in the sugarcane and rice field looking for a house. We crossed this super awesome bamboo bridge that I will try to send a picture of next week. But, anyway, when we got to this guys house, we were greeted like this;

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Him- "Oh, hey, what are you guys doing out here, it's late! There's no more tricycles!"

Us- "Yeah, we know. We were just planning on walking back to Ma-ao."

Him- "That's like 5-7 kilometers!"

Us- "Yeah... We're kind of used to walking places. It's no problem!"

Him- "Ah, okay...."

Us- "..."

Him- "The volcano erupted."

Us- "WHAT???"

Him- "Yeah!"

--

It really wasn't too big of a deal - just some ash came out - but we were a little surprised by the news!

We had a miracle this Sunday! We have been making an effort to fast for our zone and for our area every week on Sunday. We were praying that everything would go well on Sunday because we were expecting a lot of investigators to come to church and members as well. We brought our fans so that it wouldn't be hot and tried to make it the best we could. When we got there, it felt like NOTHING went right... It was so frustrating. But once we got to testimony meeting, we heard some of the most BEAUTIFUL testimonies I have ever heard. The investigators and members we had there were in tears. It was so weird that the what I asked for to go right was not what God gave us. I wanted them to feel comfortable and to not have anything go wrong, but what ended up happening is God prepared the members to bring the Spirit to the meeting. After all, that's all that's needed anyway. GREAT EXPERIENCE. Sometimes the things we ask for aren't always what we really need. But it's always BETTER than what you asked for. That's a comforting promise.

I hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Welton

Name Change

This was a great week!

We were so busy this week! We had a hard time working in our area because so much happened... Goodness.

On Tuesday, the AP's called and said that we would be going on exchanges the next day. I ended up going to Bacolod and was with Elder Cicon while Elder Derecho went with Elder Rabila in Ma-ao. It was a fun exchanges! It's always fun being with Elder Cicon. Good missionary. It was great to see the area that they have been resurrecting since January. Great progress! We went to eat after work and we ate at this cool restaurant that you sit on the floor at. It was like korean style, but I ended up getting a burger... I don't regret it at all! Super good burger! I mostly just liked sitting on the floor around the small tables though.

We had a baptism this week! We baptized James R-------, someone we actually met while looking for a house our first week. Their house was the first one that we looked at, but when we realized that they would be kicking out the current residents for us to go there, we just decided to keep looking. We met his mother there when we looked for just a few short minutes and then we kept waving to her whenever we would go by their house. A few days later, we decided to go talk to them. Long story short, she listened to LDS missionaries over 20 years ago and was very willing to listen again. After we taught her family, James was the first to be prepared and baptized. There's actually a super funny story behind all of this though! The birthday on James' birth certificate has been wrong for years; 2012 instead of 2002. His mother went and talked to the registrar office in Bago and they told her that they could fix it, but they would need to create an entirely new record for him. In order to prevent issues, they told her she needed to add something to his name to make it unique. A few days later, while I was on exchanges in Bacolod, she found out that Elder Rabila

's first name was James and so she said, "we'll just put 'Welton' as his middle name so that he can remember you guys!" Hahaha! When I got back, we ended up telling her that she should just put "Tanner" so that it would be two first names. SO... His name is now James Tanner Bacornay R-------! What a good way to be remembered! I don't think many people can say they renamed someone and then baptized them with their own name haha. Successful week!

We had a great lesson with James about obedience after his confirmation. I always find it so frustrating that I have learned so much about obedience and yet lack so much in that area. I think we all feel that sometimes; we know that the commandments are there for us to be blessed and to be MORE free, and yet we still get distracted and think that we can do things our own way and be more free than God can give us. About a month ago, I was singing some hymns and started singing "Keep the Commandments". For such a simple song, I was impressed so much. The words, "In this there is safety, in this there is peace," really made me feel that that promise was 100% true. Often times, if not all of the time, there is nothing too exciting when we follow the commandments. The commandments and the teachings of the prophets and apostles are often rather conservative compared to our world's standards. But when we follow the commandments, we are promised two things that are SO rare in today's world: Safety and Peace. Those are things that can ONLY be had through the gospel and living principles therein. I hope that I can not only know these things and be able to teach these things, but to also be able to apply them in my own life and to be content with the safety and peace that is being offered to us all.

I hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Welton

A picture of our azwesome baptism of Brother James (Tanner) R-------

This sign is super funny to me hahaha! There was an english version somewhere on the road but I missed it. It basically translates to "Segregation is needed for a clean living area" There was another that said, "Segregation starts in the family" I think that's probably the most correct word for talking about separating your garbage, but it sounds a little like we are teaching racism, right..?

Here are some pictures of us working out on the mountain.  We had the only Melchizedek Priesthood holder in our group working with us.  Great guy!

Mission Tour

Hello Everyone!

This week was a very inspiring week. We were able to have an awesome Mission Tour with President Haynie from the Area Presidency in the Philippines. The spirit was so strong and I learned a lot!

We had a special MLC the day before the Conference where Elder Haynie was able to teach us about becoming better leaders and the obligation we have to teach and inspire those around us. Elder Cicon and I were chosen to give a musical number and we sang and arrangement of "Be Still My Soul". I can't remember if I have told you this, but I have been assigned to be the musical number in MLC every MLC for the past 6 months hahaha. It started with Elder Fraire and I and has just kept going since then haha. I'm not sure why, but I just go with it! I'm getting less afraid of singing in front of people! It's still definitely not my favorite, but I don't die anymore doing it, so that's improvement!

We had another baptism this week! Sister Ana E--------- was baptized and she is just awesome. She is so golden. She is 19 years old and went to school for information technology. She was taught previously and she shared in her post-baptism testimony that she really just wants to serve the Lord and do his will. Probably one of the best baptismal testimonies I have heard. We did this baptism in Bago, which is SO far from their house out in the mountains. They got up early and made the long trip down the mountain and actually beat us there, even though we live about 20 minutes closer than they do. It's so great to see faith like that.

One thing that I learned from Mission Tour is about Prayer. Elder Haynie invited us all to study "prayer" in the bible dictionary. I have NEVER read something more enlightening about prayer than this entry in the Bible Dictionary. I learned that we can often prayer using the name of Christ at the end of our prayer, but only the way we can TRULY pray in the name of Christ is by aligning our desires to his. How often do we throw Christ's name on the end of our worldly prayers? I know I do it all the time. Once we can learn to seek the Father's will through prayer, rather than our one, we will be able to better understand how to pray in the name of Christ truly. Everyone read that entry in the Bible Dictionary, okay? I really liked it.

I hope everyone has a good week! Sorry I don't have a lot of time to write anymore or answer questions! I'll you when I get home!

Elder Welton

Bunyag sa Suba

Hello Everyone!

This was a GREAT week.

The biggest highlight of this week was our baptism! We have been teaching the Y------- Family since my first week here. They are awesome! Sister P------- has been raising her grandson Kyle since he was little. I guess it must have just been part of God's plan for them because Kyle was actually the first one to talk to the missionaries. He's only ten, but he started listening and eventually led his grandmother, Sister P---------, to the missionaries. She is SO funny and has such strong faith! She has had a lot of her family and friends say, "Why are you joining this church?? It's just like the Catholic Church!" She has gotten that so many times that she finally just started saying, "Eh! I just want to!" It's funnier in Ilonggo, but that's the idea. She wants to bring her whole family with her, so we are going to start teaching them too. Hopefully!

The baptism was AMAZING. This was my first time baptizing in a river, so it was super cool. The day before, we went and scouted out a good area to hold the service and we found to PERFECT spot. The water was deep enough and it was quiet and the large rocks off the riverside were arranged as if they were situated specifically for a sermon. Wonderful. The Sisters actually came up with the bishop to see the baptism for their first time as well. They got some AWESOME pictures that I will try to get from them.

This week was really tiring and it really tested our faith. I am always amazed at how DIFFICULT it is to actually make a baptism happen. SO many things go wrong right before the baptism that make it seem like it will be impossible. Satan really does try to keep God's children from following the commandments. We were blessed to be able to overcome the problems that arose, and we are so grateful for that. It's so crazy how hard things get these days. Evil is all around us. Sometimes I think, "How are we expected to make it through all of this evil when these temptations around us are becoming bigger and bigger for each generation??" I guess it really requires a lot of faith. We can't afford to lose focus! I look forward to the days of Zion being established on earth once again!

Sorry for not sending pictures in a while. I can't use the USB drive on this computer so I can't even send pictures! Hopefully I'll find a good computer sometime to send some good pictures!

Take Care!

Elder Welton

Moved

Hello Everyone!

This was a great week!

We have been having some MIRACLES this last week with our work. It's so great to see the Lord support our desire to help strengthen a barely beginning group and to find new people to teach. We were able to have an total attendance of 31 at church this week and it was great! Things are really progressing here in Ma-ao. We are really excited about the progress being made.

We had an AWESOME time at our Mission Leadership Council on Tuesday. We had some great trainings given by the APs and President. We have noticed a lot of issues with finding lately and want to try and improve it. It's always so cool to go to those MLC trainings because you get to sit in a room of some of the most powerful servants of the Lord in our mission. There really is so much wisdom and experience in such a young group of people. It's actually really sad to think that it's all coming to an end for me. Things right now are finally starting to "click", just as many RM's have described to me when they too started approaching that final stretch of their missions... It's going quick, so I hope that I can make the best of it!

Our Zone Training on Thursday was awesome. Elder Rabila and I have never given a Zone Training before, so both of us were kind of curious as to what exactly needed to be taught at the meeting. We had already given an impromptu training two weeks before about all the topics discussed at MLC, so we felt that we would only be repeating it! As we sat the night before, we were super tired and couldn't think too well. We got some good ideas down, but we couldn't really come up with anything concrete and hit a dead spot. I can't remember exactly what happened, but we were just sitting there and then Elder Rabila said something about the ironing board that was sitting right behind me... It struck me like a bolt of lightning! "YES!! That's it!" He obviously was pretty confused with this outburst of excitement towards his ironing comment. I explained to him that we could relate everything we had talked about to an IRON. We had all these great ideas that would help our areas improve and everything like that, but in the end, it really just comes down to our Zone having the Spirit with them in their work; that's the only effective way to do anything. We then broke the forming analogy down into one sentence: "Keep your iron plugged in"

So many times in our life, we unplug the iron. We see ourselves straightening out the wrinkles in our clothing, almost effortless sometimes. The question, though, is, "have you ever tried ironing without the iron plugged in?" I have. It's hard. Yesterday, actually, the power went out before my companion ironed his shirt. I said, "hey let's try to iron it! Maybe if you do it fast enough, it will get the wrinkles out using the friction." ... It totally didn't work... "I guess our training was true, Elder..." No matter how hard you work to get those wrinkles out, with only a cold iron you will never be able to get them out. This is what we shared with our Zone. We can work as HARD and as LONG as possible, but without our "iron" being "plugged in" to the Spirit, our efforts will be quite a waste. With the Spirit in our lives, we can get things done SO much quicker than without. So the only question that we have to ask ourselves every now and then is, "Is my iron plugged in?"

I hope everyone has an awesome week! I am still growing and learning a lot, even in these last few months of my mission. I hope to be even further refined as I continue.

Elder Welton

Workin

Hello Friends and Family!

I apologize for this email, but it is going to be a short one. We have been working hard this week and that's really all I have to share! We work, work, work, and work. We are super excited this week because we will finally be able to move up to our area! That should allow us to teach for another 3 hours in the evening and not have to leave so early in the morning. We should hopefully be able to start teaching more families and focusing on finding people to build up the church!

I have been reading the Bible lately to try and refresh myself on all of the proselyting skills I've kinda lost lately. I really enjoy it because I realized that I have been taught so much doctrine over the years as I have gone to church, but never know where to find it. I keep coming across things in the Bible that ring a bell in my mind and connect that doctrine to the verses I am reading. It's so cool! It's actually really hard for me to study lately, most likely a mix of me just wanting to go out and talk to people and because of all the little tasks buzzing around in my head; but every time I can get my mind isolated enough to learn from the scriptures, I feel that the "eyes of my understanding were opened," and I can understand the things of God so clearly. I get a very similar feeling when I can write and explain my thoughts on paper and share those things that are in my mind, but it is slightly different when we are partaking of the words that someone else has written with that same Spirit. It's so wonderful that we have these things available to us.

I read a few verses in Mormon the other day that really interested me. In the last chapter of Mormon, chapter 9, Mormon finishes his record by explaining the way they wrote their records.

--

30 Behold, I speak unto you as though I spake from the dead; for I know that ye shall have my words.

 31 Condemn me not because of mine imperfection, neither my father, because of his imperfection, neither them who have written before him; but rather give thanks unto God that he hath made manifest unto you our imperfections, that ye may learn to be more wise than we have been.

 32 And now, behold, we have written this record according to our knowledge, in the characters which are called among us the reformed Egyptian, being handed down and altered by us, according to our manner of speech.

 33 And if our plates had been sufficiently large we should have written in Hebrew; but the Hebrew hath been altered by us also; and if we could have written in Hebrew, behold, ye would have had no imperfection in our record.

 34 But the Lord knoweth the things which we have written, and also that none other people knoweth our language; and because that none other people knoweth our language, therefore he hath prepared means for the interpretation thereof.

--

Having learned a second language, I can understand exactly what Mormon is concerned about. Seeing how things work here, many people write in English rather than write in lengthy Ilonggo or Tagalog. So as the language of Lehi and his family developed, they started using that shorter language, egyptian, to write easier. He probably wasn't confident in his Egyptian writing, seeing as they spoke mostly Hebrew. It's so wonderful to know that even these great men had their insecurities and difficulties, just like us. And I think it's more amazing that, just as Mormon said, "he hath prepared means for the interpretation thereof." God know what he meant when he wrote and allowed that spirit to be preserved across translations. I am so grateful that they wrote for us even though he wasn't confident.

I invite you all to read that passage! I don't have any more time so I hope you all learn what I learned!

Take care!

Elder Welton

President Nelson

Hello sa akong mga kaibigan!

This week was so great! So much is being done in the Lord's Work here in Bacolod. We were able to finish up the house contract at the beginning of the week and will be moving up at the beginning of March! This should help us to be able to work better and to teach more families all together. It should also help us to be able to actually work on a normal missionary schedule, rather than the crazy one we have right now trying to make things work with the travel schedule. Despite the difficulties with travel, I really enjoy it a lot. We get to travel up there early every morning and then we get to catch the sunset on the way back most of the time. I have been increasingly grateful everyday for the awesome chance I have to be a missionary here. Great place.

The work here has been progressing well! We were blessed to have 8 investigators at church this Sunday! That's up from zero the week before I arrived, up to two the next week, and then eight this week. So we are really, really excited for the work to continue. We are praying for these investigators to continue to progress and to be baptized within the next few months. Please pray for us to keep finding more people these next few weeks. That's our focus!

We had the awesome experience of having President Nelson visit our mission this week! I was part of the choir and we were able to perform a lovely rendition of "I'll go where you want me to go"; one verse being the Ilonggo translation and the rest in Engish. It was so good! We got to sit on the front row and see him real close. I shook his hand!! I'll make sure to include a picture of the entire mission. It was also really awesome because I prepared the booklet with program, the Mission Vision that I sent to you, conversion stories, and other stuff which we gave to them. They ended up using parts of the vision I designed as points in their talks! I was so happy! So now the President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles has seen my design work. Awesome!

They talked a lot about exact obedience and how it will truly form us in our lives. It was so great to listen to Sister Nelson.  She had such a strong presence and spoke so plainly that you could really see how she has supported her husband in his sacred calling. It was just as interesting to observe President Nelson and see how reverent and closely he seemed to observe us and listen to the Spirit. It was so powerful to hear from someone who has obviously been seeking truth for his entire life. As he spoke, you could feel that the spiritual, intangible things that he spoke of had become clear and simple facts to him in his search for the truth. He gave his entire sermon based on a single question that caused an outpouring of life experience and spiritual confirmation that this Gospel is true. It was so interesting to listen to him speak. He said a lot of things, taught a lot of amazing principles, but what I really remember most was just the power that came from him as he spoke. One thought that specifically came to my mind was, "God's glory is knowledge." The knowledge that backed President Nelson's words seemed glorious. His carefully picked words and sentences, his transition from principle to principle -- all of it seemed rehearsed! But you can see that he really has just spent a lifetime of study and pondering. The Spirit has continued to refine the knowledge that has been given him to the point where he is simply sharing what comes natural to him. Although I felt all of these things, it was so comforting of a feeling to feel that "he is an ordinary man, just like me." It made me realize that this type of power and humility is NOT out of reach. Although he spoke greatly, I could feel that he once came from something as unrefined as all of us are. It's frustrating to know that we can't achieve perfection in this life, but it's more comforting to know that there are people leading us that have gotten closer and closer to it than most others have as their lives go on. Amazing experience.

Things are just gonna keep going forward here in Bacolod! Hope everyone has a good week!

Elder Welton

President Nelson's visit!  I am two rows behind him - right behind the sister in white who is behind President Nelson.

                                      A picture of our pretty area.  This is what we call the "bukid"

This is a picture of our little meetinghouse. It's a work in progress, that's for sure... We area actually gonna look for another one. Attendance has gone up, though! we had 29 yesterday! Slowly, but surely!

Here's a wonderful picture of a guy with a cigarette in his ear. I was hoping to get the mountain, but that's a nice addition!

Infinite Noodles

Hello!

This was such a good week! I feel so happy being out in the field again! I got pretty sunburned this week, I guess because I spent a while in that office haha. But it's great to be out here trompin' around in the mountains. Ma-ao is so pretty! Wow. I love this area. Part of our area is RIGHT on Canlaon Volcano. So cool. I got some good pictures, but I couldn't find my SD card reader earlier. I'll try to make sure and find it next week so I can send some.

We looked for a house all week while we were working, and we actually found one! We needed to find one by the end of the week, but we had no success the whole week. We ended up looking at a house on Friday, but it was not a good house at all. As we were leaving, a man who we had talked to the week before when Elder Wade and I came to look for a house came up and said, "Hey, any luck finding a house?" So far it had been pretty poor findings. We told him no and he said, "hey, well I asked around like I told you I would and I know some people that have a house here that they might be willing to rent to you. You can go talk to them if you want!" He didn't have a contact number, so he just wrote down the general area she lived in and her first name and then waved a tricycle down and told him where to take us. We asked if it was close because we needed to catch the last bus going home, and he said, "Ah, of course! It's just right down the road a few minutes! It's still early, you have plenty of time!" So we got on and went up the mountain... About 30 minutes later, we got to the place! We found her house! We talked to her and set up an appointment to meet with her the next morning. We looked at the house and it was perfect. Quite an answer to our prayers. We really need the house because right now, we have to take a 1 hour bus right every time we go up and then every time we go back to our house because we don't even live in our area. We're hoping that by having a house up there, we can focus on teach more and actually being up there when every one gets home at night. So exciting!

We had a miracle this week! Elder Rabila and I had absolutely NO money this week because of transfers and then having to pay double bills. I had 1000 pesos left and we were able to buy a small amount of food at the store at the beginning of the week, but we had to save most of the money to use for traveling around our area. We got a few packs of Pancit Canton, the Philippines version of Top Ramen, and then a few cans of pork sisig with a carton of eggs and hoped for the best. We tried to withdraw personal money, but literally every ATM in the city was BROKEN. So, around the middle of the week, we were down to a can of sisig and four packs of Pancit Canton. We had been working SO hard the entire week, and we were just so hungry. We said, "okay, we can only eat two packs of those noodles tonight because we won't last the rest of the week if we eat more than that. Normally, two packs each will get you decently satisfied, but one pack was a little bit lacking. We decided to just eat a lot of bread with it to make it go further. Elder Rabila went outside and did laundry while I put the noodles in the pot and then took a shower. After I got out, I pulled the pan of the burned and then set it down and started dishing it out. As I started dishing it out, I realized that the amount of noodles left in the pot as I scooped, seemed like it had no end! There was SO much in that pot! I was confused, because by the time I had finished dishing it out, we had two bowls with a mountain of noodles in each one. I thought for sure that Elder Rabila must have thrown the other two packs in while I was in the shower, but was surprised to see the two packs still sitting on the shelf. As I looked at it, as simple as it was, I began to feel so much gratitude for a Heavenly Father that watches over his servants. He knows how hard we had worked that week and how tired and hungry we had been. I brought the bowl outside and showed Elder Rabila how much it was and he two was just as surprised as I was. We happily ate it, feeling grateful for the small miracle that had been given to us.

I hope everyone has enough to eat this week! Don't eat food like I eat, it's not healthy. Take care!

Elder Welton

Transfers

Hello Family and Friends!

TRANSFER DAY. I am no longer in the office! I learned SO much being in the office and was able to take part in a lot of wonderful things. That, so far, has been the most demanding part of my mission. I am really excited to be back out proselyting and being with the people of Negros.

I am now assigned in Bago 1st ward, but we will be focusing out in the mountains on a special sacrament in an effort to open a new area. I am really excited to be back in the mountains again. I am probably gonna start losing a little bit of weight soon and I'm probably gonna have to walk off my "office legs" hahaha. It will all be good. Elder Rabila is my new companion and he is SO nice and so funny. He's from Fiji, near Suva (he says he can't remember if he met you two, Sarah and Dad) and we are both newly called Zone Leaders. And the District Leader(s) as well. So excited!

I am so excited to get back into proselyting full-time. Sharing the gospel is just such a wonderful experience.

We are SUPER excited because next week, we will be having President Nelson come visit our mission! That's going to be so cool. I was able to prepare all of the programs and stuff that would be given to him before I left the office, so that will be really cool to know that he is going to see something that I designed! We will get to spend just a few hours with him and get to hear his counsel. So excited.

Thanks to all who wished me a happy birthday. I am now 20 and I sure hope I got a little bit wiser too, but I'm not really sure about that. Hopefully I've learned something!

I don't have a whole lot to talk about today; things are a little bit crazy for me right now, but it should be good!

Take Care!

Elder Welton

Lay not this sin to their charge

Hello!

Great week!

It has been a bit of a rush trying to get all of our work done before the end of this transfer. We have some big events coming up including Mission Tour and a bunch of houses being moved or closed that will squeeze us a bit. But we are excited and are planning to make it as smooth as possible. How exciting!

I was assigned to create the Mission History starting from July when President Barredo arrived in the mission. It has been really interesting to learn the history of the mission as I have looked through the past histories created by past mission Presidents' office staff members. The Lord's Work is constantly evolving; realigning, shrinking, expanding, and spreading depending on the needs of God's children. I actually learned about some of the things that happened when Brother Sturgill (that former AP that sent a picture of me to you, mom) was serving here. History really is a cool thing and I have started learning about how important it is to keep those kinds of records. We always need to know where we have been and where others have been so that we can apply their success and learn from their mistakes.

I actually bought a new set of nice scriptures off of the LDS store a few weeks ago and it finally got here! It's a quadruple set with a little button snap and I got it so that I could get this clay design put on it. They are SO cool. I am so excited to get it. It's expensive and I don't want to talk about the price and stuff, but I came to the decision that "I can't get this done in America, so I'm just gonna do it while I can!" In the meantime, I have been reading it a ton because it's NEW and EXCITING for some reason!

I have been focusing more on the Bible lately because I haven't given it much time during my mission. I have been more focused on the Book of Mormon and Preach My Gospel, so I haven't been able to fully dive into it. I have read a lot of Matthew and Mark and started Luke, but then decided that I wanted to finally get to Acts since a lot of the events in the four Gospels are fairly similar. I got to chapter 7 of Acts and some verses there really stuck out to me. It starts in verse 54 after the Apostle Stephen has just preached repentance unto the people:

--

 54 ¶When they heard these things, they were cut to the heart, and they gnashed on him with their teeth.

 55 But he, being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God,

 56 And said, Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God.

 57 Then they cried out with a loud voice, and stopped their ears, and ran upon him with one accord,

 58 And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man’s feet, whose name was Saul.

 59 And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.

 60 And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

--

I find many things fascinating about this passage. First, we see how CLEAR the doctrine of the Godhead is! I have been realizing lately how unfortunate it is for those who do not clearly understand that we have a Heavenly Father who gave His Son, Jesus Christ to us. We see in this passage that Jesus was able to return to our Father and stand on His right hand, just as many of us will be able to return to Him as well. So many people DON'T have that simple truth!

The second thing I liked was what Stephen says as he is dying. Stephen's dying wish parallels our Savior's dying wish for the people that crucified him on Calvary. Just as the Savior said, "forgive them; for they know not what they do," Stephen similarly pleaded for mercy upon his attackers by saying, "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge." Stephen must have understood the Atonement of Jesus Christ SO WELL that he had been able to feel a love similar to Jesus Christ for those who persecuted him. He desired their salvation so much that he asked for their forgiveness as his last words. If only we all could have such great a desire to see those around us receive the same treasures that await us in heaven.

I hope everyone is doing well at home!

Halong Kamo!

-Elder Welton

The Widow's Mite

Hello Family!

Another week has gone by! Kadasig sa tion ba. It's so crazy to me how fast the time flies by now...

I went to Sagay again this week and I heard some great news! At the beginning of my mission, we baptized two kids of a less-active sister that we met. The R------ family was one of my favorite families to go to in my first area and I love them so much. We had worked on teaching their father after the baptism and we had some amazing lessons with him. I was really sad last year because I was transferred a few weeks before his baptism, but I was SO happy that they were now all members of the church. I have always wondered if they were still going to church and growing in the gospel. I was super happy when I asked the Old Sagay Sisters how the family was doing. They told me that Brother R-------, the one I didn't get to see baptized, actually became the High Priests Group Leader! That made me so happy and grateful that the Lord had watched over them and helped them stay strong as new members. He was always such a great father and really was good about making sure things were being run correctly in his household. It's nice to see that he has been able to take on that calling, especially as a new member! I heard that he was actually in Manila right now working a bit, but when he comes back he'll be able to continue his calling.

I was also super excited to learn that the family of 6 we baptized in Sipalay, the D--------- Family, will be sealed in the temple at the end of May!! They will be sealed almost exactly on their one year date! I don't think I will be able to attend the ordinance because we don't have a temple in our mission, but I am so happy for them and the fact that I got to teach a family that was so prepared and converted to this gospel.

I had some really good studies the other day. And when I say "the other day" I might actually mean a week, 2 weeks, or 2 months ago... It always kind of blends together nowadays... But it was really good. I happened to read about the Widow's Mite in multiple contexts this week and it really helped me realize how important it is to give much out of our own desire.

--

1 And he looked up, and saw the rich men casting their gifts into the treasury.

 2 And he saw also a certain poor widow casting in thither two mites.

 3 And he said, Of a truth I say unto you, that this poor widow hath cast in more than they all:

 4 For all these have of their abundance cast in unto the offerings of God: but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had.

--

As I read this passage, it made me wonder which of those I am; the widow or the rich men. Do I give when I have little, or do I wait until I can give comfortably? I think many of us are the latter; giving freely when we feel comfortable; when we feel that we ourselves have been given enough to become qualified, perhaps even obligated to start giving to others. What I realized with this, however, is that we must ALWAYS give. That's hard! I always think, "Hey, I worked for this! I deserve this!" We all have many things that we deem "expendable" and "indispensable", but in reality, everything that we possess has been given to us by our Heavenly Father and we must be willing to relinquish that at any given time should the Lord call on us to do so. I hope to become the type of giver that gives not just when it is convenient or when I feel that I have enough, but the type that follows the Savior's example of giving freely of that which has been given so freely unto us.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Welton

Fear Not, Little Flock

Hello Family!

Great week! Hard week, but great week.

I don't have a lot to report on this week! Things have been pretty normal for the most part! I have been doing a lot of design work lately. It's so cool to be able to use talents I have been given to help the work progress here. It's been really interesting to me as I have started designing again to see that I haven't gotten worse like I thought I would! I totally thought that after over a year of not touching any sort of design program or anything that I would be struggling to get back into the zone. But I have actually created some of my best designs while here! It's been really cool. I love it.

I learned something in my personal study earlier today that I really liked. It was in Luke 12:29-32. It was talking about taking no worry about earthly things.

--

29 And seek not ye what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, neither be ye of doubtful mind.

30 For all these things do the nations of the world seek after: and your Father knoweth that ye have need of these things.

31 But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you.

32 Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

--

This is such a simple doctrine that I think all of us seem to forget. Sometimes I think we forget that God wants to give us EVERYTHING. God wants all of his children to receive forgiveness through the gift of the Atonement. He offers it freely to those with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. He wants to give us all His kingdom; it's His PLEASURE, in fact. That was my favorite part, the last verse. "Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." It made me think about the term "to GIVE you the kingdom"... Perhaps we are already being given the kingdom right now, here on earth! As we live the commandments and follow what we know to be true, we gain knowledge and happiness; two eternal concepts. I used to think that it meant that we WILL receive the kingdom after we have died and go through judgement, but my perspective has now changed to that of actually receiving it right now! CURRENTLY. It makes me reflect upon the BYU devotional talk by Brad Wilcox that talks about "Learning Heaven", which I have shared with you before. What a great opportunity we have to LEARN the kingdom here on earth and to become more like our Heavenly Father. Awesome!

I wish I could elaborate on that concept more, but I have only just barely started pondering that thought. I am so grateful for a Father in Heaven that wants to give so freely to us. Sometimes we are hard on ourselves and we alienate ourselves from God's love... But I know that He always wants to help us and that He always wants to give His kingdom to us -- His "little flock."

Hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Welton

Training and Children

Maayong Hapon!

We had so many great things happen this week! I always love sitting down on Mondays to email because it gives me some time to reflect on what all has happened. The weeks for me just FLY by now and I always think, "Well, there goes another week. Doesn't feel like much happened..." But then I think back to all of the things I did and how much was accomplished and I realize how great it is to be serving a mission and to always have such a great purpose.

Being assigned in the office has always seemed interesting to me because it has the same sort of feeling as when I was in Student Government. As it was described to the office staff during the time of President Lopez, "The mission is an elegant swan that gracefully glides across the top of water. When you see it, you only see that beauty, the magnificence, but rarely does anyone notice that that swan is paddling like crazy underneath the water. The office is the legs and the rest of the mission is everything above water." I thought that was quite a humorous analogy because it feels so true. We do a LOT of things that nobody really would think about or notice, but it is helping that swan move across the pond. Being able to see the mission from a wider perspective has made me really realize that God accomplishes most of his miracles through his children here on earth. Most of the wonderful things that we are blessed with here on earth are most likely because of our Heavenly Father's inspiring or softening of the heart of someone else to act in our benefit. I imagine that we all probably do a lot more good for others than we do bad. How wonderful!

We had an MLC this week! I loved it. I had the opportunity to give a training again and it was one of my favorites that I have prepared so far. I decided to talk about "accomplishing a vision" and how having a vision for your work can make miracles happen. I even made this neat little graphic/flowchart/diagram thing to show the process of creating a vision, what supports it, and how we measure our progress in achieving our vision. It went really well! I am always so grateful for opportunities to teach like that because I always get to learn a lot from myself and from what the Spirit inspires me to say. So cool how that works!

We left the meeting at lunch to get Elder Wade's license. I love the DMV in America, but I think this place has topped it. The LTO is a wonderful place here. After a few hours of waiting (nodding off occasionally) we got his license! That was great for me because it meant I didn't have to drive the whole Sipalay journey by myself! It was so great to be able to go down there again. Love that place. So many cool things to see!

Elder Wade's training has been going well! He's very quick and determined and wants to learn his job so bad. It's been hard because so much of his job has to be learned by experience, though! He's been very good at asking questions, he's started creating plans to organize supply deliveries and make them more efficient, and a bunch of great things. The learning curve for this job is so steep though, and I know he just wants to learn it all and NOT make mistakes. It's been really interesting to observe all of this because I can see just how similar this is to parenting and teaching children. All I have been able to do this far is just DUMP all of the knowledge I have about this job and hope he absorbs it. I remind him of things, I offer my input on what he's planning, but at the end of the day I just have to hope that he is learning from what I am trying to teach. I realized that the biggest part of this job is to just be a logistical thinker. I can't teach someone to think that way, but I can give them things to do and show them the way to go in hopes that they will follow. President said something the other day that I really liked. It was something to the effect of, "Teaching your children to avoid the mistakes that you have made or are currently making is great, but the best way to do it-- the way the Savior did it-- is to live in a way that you can say, 'come follow me'." I am grateful for parents who have lived in such a way that has expressed the words, "Come follow me."

Things are going great here! I hope everyone has a wonderful week!

Elder Welton

Here's a picture of our baptism! Such a great baptism!

Also, here's a picture of a dog at a recent convert's house. He looked pretty beat.

Here is the mission vision statement that Tanner designed a few months back.  He was able to put his Photoshop skills to work.  

New Year!

Happy New Year!

This week was awesome! We did a lot of good work. It's been fun training Elder Wade as the new Supply Elder and seeing his excitement about it all. I have been reminded of all the exciting changes that happened when I was first assigned here. It's good to see that fresh attitude and excitement for everything!

We had three baptisms this week! That was so awesome! We had R------- and his daughter interviewed, but we were sad to hear that his second daughter would be going back to Victorias for school before the weekend and wouldn't be able to be baptized with her dad and sister. We were sad, but we decided that maybe it was just meant to happen at another time! What ended up happening is that we got to the church on Saturday to set up and the family was there waiting for us. We opened everything up and got it all set up for the baptism, but it was still a little bit early. As I looked around, I saw the two who were going to be baptized, R------- and J--------, but then I noticed there was someone else running around! It was his daughter! It took me like 10 minutes of being there to realize that she hadn't actually gone home! We talked with R-------- and found out that she just stayed with them longer because the person that was supposed to come get her never came. So we made some quick calls and got permission for Elder Wade to interview her, seeing as he had never actually taught this family and just came from being a Zone Leader. So we got the approval, and then I got to baptize them! It was such a great baptism. I talked with R------- after the baptism and asked how it all went. He just had a smile on his face and just said, "Ah, Elder, it was so great. I feel so good!" It was just such a good feeling because he had finally gotten through such a long process of wedding papers and the teaching and everything. Such a great guy. Great family.

It's so crazy to me that it is 2016 already! We always laugh in the office because we are now getting batches of missionaries that go home in 2018! That seems SO far away, but then I remember that I have almost already made it that far myself. That's so weird. But I am excited for the fresh feeling of a new year and a good chance to change our lives.

Last week was actually a bit of a perspective-changer for me. Taking the departing missionaries to the airport has always been an interesting thing for me. I have seen many people come and go and have always felt it such a privilege to be close to those missionaries that have finished the race and to those who have only just begun. This time, however, was one of the hardest ones for me because we sent home our group of Sisters. It seemed so unreal that those few sisters that had been with us from the start were now finished... It seems like just yesterday that we were all just trying to make sense of what in the world our teacher was babbling in front of us that first day. Now, they have finished what they set out to do! I was SO happy to have been part of their first moments and their last, but it was hard to see all of them go and move on to different things. A few of them got a little teary-eyed, even I almost got to that point (but I wasn't gonna let them see that)! They were all wonderful missionaries and I hope that I can become even close to the caliber of servants they were for the Lord. I think the difference in length of missionary service for the men and women is so important because it helps us perspective-less elders get a little reference point on how fast this truly is. I was sad to have seen them go, but their departure alone has helped me realize that I won't get to do this forever. I am so grateful for the opportunity that I have.

We had an interesting meeting yesterday night at the mission home. We got a text earlier that morning saying, "We will be having a goal-setting meeting for 2016 later this afternoon at the mission home." It ended up being a really good meeting and I actually came out with a lot that I didn't expect to get from that kind of meeting. We talked a lot about leadership and setting standards of excellence to measure our work in the mission and how we can get everyone else to see this vision of success. Something I realized while we were all counselling together is how important it is to make others successful in reaching their goals. There are many leaders who think they can do it all on their own or that they can do things better than someone else can and then expect to have good results. The test of a true leader and follower of Christ is to not only have your own vision and to be capable of making it succeed, but rather to accomplish our goals whilst helping others to catch that same vision an accomplish it themselves! Jesus Christ is THE teacher on this subject, as with almost any other principle. There are so many things he could have done by himself while on the earth. He could have went to all of the far away places that He sent the Apostles to and probably could have been a more effective teacher than they were. But it is evident in Christ's character and teachings that He valued "building" people and helping them to catch the same vision He and our Heavenly Father have for us all. They see such wonderful things in store for us, yet we continue to be blind to that, usually due to a lack of faith on our part. But what Christ and our Heavenly Father see in us is pure, untapped potential. Christ picked his Apostles from a group of fishermen, tax collectors, wise, and unwise. They all had flaws and strengths that Jesus wanted to build and develop. These character trait differences are evident in that of Peter and John, two of the most well-known Apostles. Peter had such a spontaneous attitude that it caused him to dive off a boat to greet his Savior. John sat calmly near Jesus, talking with him and listening intently. However different they may be, they had the same calling and the same love from Jesus Christ. Jesus saw their differences, but He was able to help them catch a vision of happiness, salvation, and prosperity and then built them enough to help them see the need to share that with others. Wouldn't it be amazing to see everyone's potential like He does?

I hope everyone has a great week! I need to finish preparing a training for tomorrow's MLC!

Halong!

Elder Welton