Sorsogon's Silver Linings

This has been a very exciting week. It feels like 2 or 3 weeks have happened since I last emailed. I think time just moves slow when you first start something new. Like when you get to the MTC or start school again after summer. This week has been adjustment. But it has also been good. And OF COURSE there have been countless miracles.

So in our new area, we don't know where anyone lives that the other sisters taught or members. Plus in the Philippines, there are no addresses for houses. Which means we literally spent 6-8 hours a day knocking on doors, asking people if they know any of the names on the list and trying to find people we need to while teaching everyone we can along the way. Let me tell ya, it is EXHAUSTING. But it's also awesome! The members here are so unbelievably kind. The branch feels like a family. And the investigators we have found through tracting are so golden. In each area as I work and find people to teach I truly feel my call there is inspired of the Lord. And here in Sorsogon is just the same. I was worried when I got here that maybe this area wasn't inspired because of the circumstances in which we arrived but as I taught and talked to and fell in love with the people here, I knew it was all part of Heavenly Fathers Plan. Even if the way we got here was a little strange, I know I am supposed to be here.

This week we had exchanges and I went with sister Magsisi(which literally means "repent" in Tagalog haha). We had a great exchanges. She is just finishing her training but she is so talented. She is a convert and her faith and love for the gospel really inspired me a lot. I learned a ton from our exchanges and we had so much fun. Their area is by the sea so we took some pictures by the water and oym'd some girls and then helped them draw water out of their well(which is this super awesome canyon thing in the ground) and as we helped them, they told me how their mom had died and I had the opportunity to bear my testimony to them about the plan of salvation and how they would see their mom again and it was so great. I love being a missionary. 

At the beginning of the week I honestly had a hard time adjusting but as I prayed and tried my best to just work hard, I felt the Lord strengthening me! I still don't speak bicol, I still feel scared sometimes and I'm still a little more reserved than normal but mostly I can work hard and feel the spirit. I know everything will work out.

I'm almost out of time but I just want to share two experiences I had this week.

1) We were going house to house and trying to find someone to teach. It was about hour 2 of rejection and no one wanted to listen. I saw one house I felt we should try before leaving to try another area.Immediately when the man came out, he basically told us to go away because he wasn't going to become a Mormon. We get responses like that all the time and I normally just smile and try to leave a pamphlet and a good memory of Mormon missionaries with them but this time the spirit prompted me that I needed to be bold and almost as if I couldn't help it I found myself fighting for the opportunity to teach this particular family. I don't remember all I said but I remember  telling him that I wouldn't be walking around 8 hours a day, going house to house to share something that wasn't true and I knew if he would listen to us even for 10 minutes, he would know for himself what we said was true. And HE LET US IN. We taught his family and the spirit was SO STRONG. Then when it was going so well, the spirit started prompting me to give them a book of Mormon, which is sometimes hard to do in the first lesson but I've learned by now to never ignore a prompting. So we testify of the BOM and leave them one and they committed to read and pray about it and the brother who didn't even want to let us in is now praying about baptism and if what we said was true. The spirit is so awesome. Heavenly father knows everyone perfectly and even though I don't know why we needed to stop at that house and leave a book of mormon, he does and the spirit did testify to the dad it was true. So a promise i made to him in the spirit was fulfilled by the spirit and that is pretty amazing to me:)

2) We were walking home one night and decided to knock on one more door. The lady who came to the door was SO RUDE and her attitude bothered me so much that even though I smiled at her and let her a card, I found myself feeling angry inside because of what she had said and the way she had acted. I know that is bad and the way I felt shocked me because I have never felt that way about anyone on my mission that has rejected us. So that night I repented and prayed to be able to love her. The next night, as we were walking home we bought some bread rolls and as we passed her house I had the impression to say hi to her and offer her some bread. The natural man in me was like "no! you don't like her! she's rude, yada yada yada" and even my companion was like "really? were going back?" but my dad always taught me to serve someone you don't like until you love them. Anyways long story short, we explained to her why we were there and she surprisingly let us in and started sharing with us her life story and heavenly father blessed me so greatly with the ability to see why she was the way she was and I started to love her. I realized as I sat with her that every single person is a son or daughter of God and he loves them dearly so I should too. I also learned that we need to have the diligence and love to go back to those who reject us because Christ never gives up on us:) The first time we met her she told me "don't you dare try to talk to me about god" but the second time as we were talking she opened up about her past relationship with religion and god and we were able to testify to her that god really does love her. It was a very enlightening experience.

I love you all

Have a great week!

Sister Turner:)