Happy New Year

HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone

I debate these updates weekly just because I never know where to start or what to say.....and here we go

Monday: Was Christmas Eve - my kabahays (roommates) decided to clean the windows and to be candid that was a nightmare! Behind the window sill next to my bed we found nests of a creature: hard big clumps of dirt with holes in it. Pretty gnarly! We all were in danger of tetanus (the rusty nail disease). And the cherry on top of this window cleaning adventure was that our faucet broke - and we were gifted with a fountain in our bathroom. Because it was Christmas eve my Filipino companion knew we would be receiving no help this day. So she grabbed our rolling pin and shoved it in the spout. We all slept downstairs that night. 

Tuesday: Christmas day! I got to talk to my family and what's better than that?

Wednesday: I went on splits with the STLs (Sister training leaders). My companion greeted everyone as if she knew them and that threw me (and everyone she greeted) off  But we were still well received. I learned that if you can get past the moment of awkwardness people are more likely to ask a question at the end of a contact - which is cool. That day we taught an hilarious old lady (at least I thought this was hilarious) we met her at a tindahan (a little store). This girl walks up with her hair clumped together and the old lady looks at her and makes a face. Then as she walks away the old lady mumbles a question to the girl while pointing and says, "Whats that?" (all in English). We begin to walk away and she says, "Very very very very very bad" super quickly while shaking her head. For some reasonI thought it was the funniest thing! Really you had to be there.

Thursday: A normal day. We've been focusing on the less actives in our area because we have so many of them and they're all so friendly.  Plus they will listen to our messages. But nobody likes commitments here, and we all know faith with out works is dead, so we're working on that. 

- I heard a dog cry for the first time and that was super sad.

- Delicious food I ate was called Kilawin. Everyones gotta try that 

I finished the Book of Mormon this week and really it's such a good book. But sometimes I think that fact gets forgotten because we're told read the book of mormon - like it's another task or thing to do. Everyone!  We are so lucky to have the scriptures - to have the Book of Mormon. In one of the paragraphs - I forget exactly where, but it's in the introductory part of the Book of Mormon - it says that the book is worth more than all the riches in the world (not a direct quote) but along those lines. WE ARE RICH! my friends. because we have something of such great worth. In Amos we're told people searched everywhere for the word of god - something that we have so accessible today. And in the Book of Mormon there are many verses about reading the Book of Mormon and praying to save ourselves from destruction, to keep ourselves away from temptations. This is the purpose. The Book of Mormon is not a burden or an annoyance. Find the joy in reading it. Make it your favorite book. I challenge everyone to find a favorite verse from the book of mormon! 

Mine 2 Ne 22:2 and Ether 12:41 

Love and miss you all!

Sister Crawford 

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!! 

I hope everyone is doing well. I'm almost to the end of my training which is crazy but awesome I just realized because I'll start the year as an Independent ... there's a much cooler word for that but I'm blanking on the name. Unfortunately I'm not sure how independent you can be when there's a language barrier the good news is that my understanding even when people talk fast has increased I still can't quite match or replicate them though ... one day. 

Monday: Always a great day - we went shopping at the plangke as always but we scheduled our day a little differently and so we finished shopping around 6 which is the same time it gets dark and apparently the same time tricy's go home ? Crazy thing so these crowds of people were standing at the four way street and when a tricy drove by they'd rush to pile in hahaha sister cabaraban and I weren't able to follow suit because of our groceries but it was a little scary to think we weren't going to be able to get home. We then saw a member tricy driver and recent convert pass us aka we were given 2 signs to act but they both passed pretty quickly to make a long story short patience is a virtue. 

This day I also made two solid contacts. In this mission we have a goal of 30 contacts a day. We introduce ourselves and testify to 30 people a day and it can be difficult but I saw a man with a missing leg dusting his car and I offered to help then contacted him and it was awesome. Nothing too special about that story but the lesson I learned is you feel good when you offer to help someone and they appreciate the effort whether it's accepted or not. Maybe that's how I'll phrase my contacts like we all need help. This gospel is that help. 

Tuesday: My eye kept twitching and IT RAINED. It's been raining and I love it. Sister Cabaraban said she needs to shower or she'll get sick so I was thinking the rain had something in it but no she just needed to get warm ... She took a warm shower! By boiling water. So the next day I did the same thing (boiled water while exercising) and I don't think I can go back to the cold water again. 

Wednesday: ZONE CONFERENCE that's when a bunch of zones meet and hear from the Mission President. Unfortunately I forgot my nametag but there were missionaries who brought 2! Assuming no one reads those things I put it on and then I had to introduce myself to new people who would read those things ... it quickly came off after a couple introductions. We got a cook of mormon apron which I find so applicable to my mission experience because here I've learned how to cook: rice, french toast, adobo, sinigang, and pansit. Catch me in the kitchen folks! 

Friday: The previous night Sister Cabaraban showed me a movie about John Tanner and I highly recommend everyone check it out because it really makes you want to increase your faith. Quickly: John Tanner had a leg that was going to kill him but he didn't want to remove it and through faith and the priesthood the leg was healed.  Anyways the next morning I got to the thinking about the movie and we have an investigator who is partially paralyzed and so I turned to sister Cabaraban and asked "do we lack faith" In all seriousness and she was thinking about the work and I was like no could we heal sister Tecla? Anyways it all sounds crazy but like really by and through faith miracles are wrought and I wish we all could be in a position similar to mine because it really allowed me to ponder about faith. I mean what would happen if we said she is healed and nothing happens? At that point we'd have to chalk it up to it's not Heavenly Father's will but still really interesting. 

I recorded me talking about my investigators but forgot the tape today ... so I'll quickly tell you about this cool find. We are currently teaching people who sell coconuts and homemade peanut butter so after teaching them we're given coconuts -bonus!

Last week I began my spiritual thought but didn't get to finish it. As I read the Book of Mormon verses about us being sheep have stuck out to me and there are a lot of them. So this Christmas season we should ask who is our sheppard? I'm not sure which scripture it is but theres one that says we can't be the sheep of the good and bad sheppard. But Jesus the good sheppard is calling out to us and is still calling out to us (Alma 5:37-41) we need to hearken to Him. We can't serve two masters (3 Nephi 13:24) but how can we know a master we haven't served? If we simply desire to be the sheep of the good sheppard then we're given the incentive of being protected from wolves (Alma 5:60)

Here are some other verses I didn't write quick things about 3 Ne 18:31, Mormon 5:17, Mosiah 14:16, Mosiah 5:13-14. Jesus will call us by his own name and if we do not know him we aren't of his sheep and he can't protect us. Let's become Jesus's sheep.... ps: if you love Him you'll feed His sheep 

Love and miss you all - have a very merry christmas 

SIster Crawford 

week 15

It seems I've forgotten the week I'm on haha 

I only wrote in my journal Wednesday and Friday- I should write about the less eventful days too but today I'll just be writing in depth about those two days. Everyone should keep a journal they're important. 

Monday: I went Christmas shopping for myself (kind of not really) I found these silky pants for 70 pesos I now sleep in, I got some nail polish, and a hair straightener for 225 pesos. I'm still so happy for the most part about these purchases. I went to straighten my hair and it didn't do the job as well as I'd hoped but I bought a straightener not a defrizzner hahaha 

Wednesday: Interviews with my mission president those went well except I failed at guessing the answer to his questions. He wanted to know about my companions problem which is that she hasn't had communication with her family for 2 months and I told him her problem was headaches. My companion and I laughed about that one for a while afterwards. 

Thursday: We taught Mike and his wife - I'm not sure if I've been updating you on their progress but they're an awesome couple who have their baptism date set for December 29. Anyways their old lady neighbor sat in our lesson and as we prayed she said, "yes lord. Thank you lord. Hallelujah" I'm not sure if that's irreverent but I want to incorporate it in our prayers in America. 

Friday: We were taught how to make Grey Ham cake by Sister Maymen. A member of our ward who has taken us in as her daughters (literally) she gave us clothes that her daughters didn't want anymore and anyways grey ham is how they say graham which is so funny when I discovered that. We teach her niece who is also 20 and super smart named JV. I really hope she'll get baptized but she won't read the book of mormon until she's finished the bible. Then we were contacting and Sister Cabaraban saw a foreigner (me/ people not from the Philippines) and she told me to contact him in English. I then went up to him and began my spiel and he says, "my life is too short for that". That isn't how contacts usually go here so it made me really grateful for the kindness of Filipinos and if anyone has insights as to what he was talking about please let me know. Then that night we were walking to our friday dinner appointment (in the dark) then BOOM a firework goes off and a white horse runs right in front of us. Hahaha we were pretty rattled and then each time we began to walk the horse would ran back across the path so we broke out into a run while fireworks were going off it was pretty funny. Come to find out it was the member lighting off fireworks he bought 9000 pesos worth of fireworks for Christmas. Then he taught me to eat the eyes of a fish....it's not as good as it sounds. 

In my personal Book of Mormon reading I've gotten to 3 Nephi and just in time for Christmas which is pretty awesome. But I'm going to be talking about impressions I recieved while reading Helaman 13:7 - I wrote: Does repentance bring glad tidings to your soul? If not we should try making it so. Jesus Christ did not suffer for us not to use the atonement. I know that as we use the atonement more in our lives we'll receive greater conversion to the gospel and will feel more spiritually prepared for the second coming. Ask yourself that question- are you ready for the second coming of Christ and if not why not? Get ready! Do not procrastinate the day of your repentance 

Love and miss you all Sister Crawford