500 Days of Serving : She's ok!

Hey everyone!!

So I already sent my disclaimer to tell you all that I am 100% A-OK. I debated whether or not to fib and say how crazy it was and how I almost died, but really the worst part for Sister Becerra and I was that we didn't have power to use our fans for a day. And our chicken in the fridge went bad from no power too. I was all psyched and excited to experience a super typhoon (I haven't been scared of a single thing since being set apart. Honest, it's sooo uncharacteristic of me haha) and the thing that worried me most was knowing how much you would all be worrying at home, most of my prayers went out to comfort you guys :) In our area we had some wind and rain on Thursday, and a little bit stronger wind and rain on Friday, then completely cleared on Saturday. Turns out that as the storm was heading towards Bacolod it split in two and went right around the city. I know of other areas in our mission that had some damage and cell phone towers went down in a few areas so we weren't able to contact some missionaries for a while, but we're all totally fine here. I heard from other missionaries that areas like Tacloban were reallllyyyy badly affected. I have quite a few friends in those missions so I'm apprehensive to know how they are... everything there was basically flattened and they have no contact to know if everyone is ok. Apparently Bacolod was the only island that was missed? Geez. Thank you all so much for your prayers and concern! Keep praying for those others and their families!

I wish I had more excited stories to tell you from our "super typhoon" but honestly all Sister Becerra and I did was clean, sing, read, watch the district, and draw faces on our chins and make videos. On Saturday we had a mission-wide CSP to help with cleanup and such, so we got Mormon Helping Hands shirts from our ward, put on our work clothes, and went out to do some good! Yeah, everyone was finished before we even woke up. There was NOTHING to do. We just walked around and looked for something, anything, to do and everyone just laughed at us in our bright yellow vests and asked if we were out jogging -__- So we just taught everyone like normal and swept up some leaves in front of one old woman's house.

On Wednesday we had our Zone Meeting and Sister Becerra and I were asked to do a musical number, so we borrowed the violin from the members again and made a musical number of Silent Night. Sister Becerra sang the first verse while I played harmony (She has a CRAZY good voice. I make her sing to me alllll the time), the second I played violin, then the third we sang acapella harmony and melody. Yes everyone, I sang in public! First time. I could just imagine Sera saying "Meg, just sit down. Do the violin part then just sit, kay?" hahahaha. But thank goodness everyone was just looking to feel the spirit, and I don't think my voice chased that away too badly! ;) (We recorded a video and I'll try and send it). It was really fun though, it reminded me of when Cam and Trevor did that crazy sagad piano duet in their mission. We don't compare to that at all but it was still fun!

I finally got to open the last package you sent! I DIED when I saw all the Zip Fizz!!!!! I did a little happy dance. And the study journal is perfect! There is a place here that does really cool covers for books and things and its super cheap, like 6 bucks, and I was trying to find something I could cover and I'm gonna do that!! I'll send a picture once its done. And Clay, you are THE BEST. I love all your little notes!!! I have them all around and look at them every day and they make me so happy :) *point* You're the best, bud!!

We were teaching our recent convert, Derek, and while we were talking about repentance with him I had this analogy come to mind (you know me and analogies haha) and repentance without the complete process of the restored gospel is like trying to cut a lawn with nail clippers. It doesn't matter how bad you want to cut the lawn, all you have is nail clippers, and by the time you are finished with one patch the last has already grown back. But with the perfect process of repentance from the restored gospel it's like cutting a lawn with a riding mower. It's still work of course, but it's effective gid. And instead of constantly being behind and being overgrown with grass and weeds, with a riding mower you just need to stay on top of your work and you can keep your lawn nice and clean :) Kind of silly, but I liked it!

I read Quincy's email from last week (thanks for sending that mom! If they have some sort of forwarding list put me on there cause I want to keep getting her emails!) And I loved what she said about noticing the little miracles! I definitely did what she did when I first got into the field, I kept waiting to walk past some house and recognize it from somewhere and get a burning impression to go to the door and when I did there would be a man that would answer and say that he had been praying for guidance and then I knocked on the door and he wants to be baptized and we all live happily ever after. And while those things are not impossible, or unheard of, it's the daily "mini-miracles" that I've learned to love. For instance, we were teaching our investigator, Josie, the Word of Wisdom and she tells us that she randomly decided to stop drinking coffee three weeks ago. Which means that she's been living the Word of Wisdom completely for three weeks and we won't have to push back her baptism date. It seems small, but when you start to notice the little miracles they pop up everywhere! I also scored and found an old liahona from when President Hinkley died and all the bretheren wrote special talks about him, and looking for the little miracles is exactly how he lived his life :) Shout out to Sistah Ellswaath for being on the same page as me ;)

Well, thats all the time I have for this week! Thanks again for everyone's love and concern, please keep sending your prayers to the missionaries that were badly affected by the typhoon! I hope you all have the best week!! LOVE YOUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!

-Sister Manwaring :)

My district!