The Breakup

Hello Everyone!

  I don't remember if I mentioned it last week but we had an earthquake last Sunday and it was really tiny and not that big of a deal but now I can officially say I have lived through a volcano eruption, earthquake, and 2 typhoons on my mission. Woohoo! Missionary protection!

  This week my companion was sick. HAVE I EVER MENTIONED HOW MUCH SICKNESS ON THE MISSION IS THE WORST? So we couldn't work for a couple days. But the cool thing was that my trainer, Sister Mccoard came back for one day and we went on exchanges for one lesson together. We went to Annie and Marvin, the recent converts that we had started teaching together a while back and it was so surreal to be together again teaching them. It was like flashback except this time they were members and I could speak Tagalog (kind of) haha it was cool. I miss my trainer! The whole time walking back I was asking advice on how she did everything back when she was training me! 

  The highlight of my week was probably church because the Losantos family finally came to church after like 7 months teaching them off and on! Brother has been recovering from a foot injury and this week he recovered and said " Well, God healed me so I have no excuse not to go to church. We'll be there Sunday". We went to pick them up and they were all ready and wearing church clothes! Even baby! and they were so great at church and made lots of friends, they are so excited for their baptism now and of course we are way excited for them too! 

  The hard part of this week was that we had to drop investigators or "breakup" with them. As missionaries, we invite people to act or make changes in their lives to come closer to Christ but sometimes. people just never want to do anything or act to know the truth. In those cases we do our best to help them progress (towards baptism, towards Christ,etc) pero sometimes they just aren't willing and that's when the breakup comes. Missionary work really is a lot like dating. We have the expectation of baptism and they know our expectation but eventually if they decide that they don't want that goal either they will break up with us(hiding, yelling,politely saying they aren't interested) or we have to break up with them for a time so we can focus our time and efforts on people who are willing and ready to make the changes in their life to come closer to Christ. Last week we realized we had 86 investigators and only 6 who were progressing. So this week we did a lot of commitment extending, reexplaining of our purpose and sadly, "breakups". IT IS SO HARD. I have such a hard time giving up on people because I know that heavenly Father never ever gives up on me but I know that ultimately it's not giving up on them, it's just giving them some time until they are ready to accept the gospel of Jesus Christ and then we can go back to them. I was studying this week about the apostasy and I realized that Heavenly Father did kind of the same thing with us people. He had given us the gospel of Jesus Christ but obviously people chose to reject that truth, they killed Jesus Christ himself and his apostles and the fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ was lost. There was a time Heavenly Father allowed us to live in a sort of "spiritual darkness" because we were not yet ready to accept the truth but when he knew the time was right, he restored ALL the truth through a living prophet again. I know that there is a time and a season for everything and that's what I tell myself even when things don't go my way or people won't act  on their faith or times are really hard. I just have to trust Heavenly Father and his timing. He knows it all. I'm really grateful he is in charge. I can't believe how much he has already changed me on my mission. It's like I can't even describe how I changed or pinpoint what it is but I know that I am forever different and much better than before. 

I love you all! Keep the faith.

Sister Turner:)