Hello Family!
This has been another great week here in Jordan. I am happy here and enjoying my time here on the mission. Just to let you all know how close I am to coming home if I hadn't extended I would've gone to the office today for interviews and departure meeting and would've flown to Manila tonight. This is now the first week of my last transfer on a mission. I'm not being trunky... just accurate. HA. I was in a tripanionship. Elder Doig, Elder Faran and I just combined areas and had a blast working with each other. I have known them ever since the MTC so it has been fun to work with them. In fact Elder Doig will be going home with me in October (he goes home to Cardston). We weren't able to work in my area very much but we got lots done still. The work is still moving really slow here in my area and I am still trying to find out what needs to happen to get things going again. We have been contacting LOTS more less active members these past couple weeks. So I feel like I know the are much better now and I am excited to get my companion here on Thursday.
I am way excited for tomorrow as Elder Bednar will be visiting us here for a day. You cannot even imagine how excited I am to get to learn at the feet of an apostle of the Lord. I am so excited to hear his message. He assigned us to study a couple talks he has given in the past and those talks were just fantastic. I have learned so much about learning and teaching and I am excited to see what his training will be like tomorrow. I will take lots of notes and fill you all in next week. Then when I get home that will be a big part of my report I'm sure. I got my clothes all ready this morning... meaning I literally did laundry for about 4- 5 hours this morning. My hands look like ground beef.. they are rubbed so raw. I was pretty lazy last week and didn't do all my laundry because we were in the city for most of the day. So I had quite a pile of clothes to wash (by hand) and I did it! But it literally took all morning. I will be so grateful for a washing machine in a couple weeks.
The work has been tough and my big focus is just contacting and teaching as many less actives here in the area. There are so many of them and I want them back. I don't care if I don't baptize another person as long as I can have some people come back to activity. That is what the branch really needs right now and so that is what my goal is. I think this last month we contacted 12 less active members for the first time. So that gives us a LOT more people to work with and hopefully through them we can find more investigators that will progress in the gospel. We have taught lots of people but they are still not wanting to act according to the message yet. That is always the tough part... getting people here to do something. They would much rather just listen. I also feel like some people require a visit from the missionaries if they are to go to church. But if you don't visit them... no chance. So that is another thing that needs to be fixed.
Yesterday I had a cool experience with working in the area next to mine... We got to take the sacrament to a woman in the hospital who is going to die of cancer soon. She is pretty old now and the other Elders bring her sacrament and we had a little sacrament meeting with her... it actually reminded me of when Dad and I would bring sacrament to an older woman in the ward. But we administered the sacrament and shared a message. For my part I just had to express thanks that we were members of the church and that no matter what our circumstances are or where we may be when we partake of the sacrament we can enjoy the presence of the Spirit and have that peace that Jesus Christ promised to leave with His Apostles. It was such a testimony to me that I was where I needed to be and doing the right thing as I sat in this hospital room (an over packed noisy place that you don't think could ever be peaceful) and enjoyed the companionship of fellow members and the Spirit of the Lord. Another one of those experiences that mkes you just sit back and thank God that you went on a mission.
I think that my goal for this area before I go home is to just get things moving here in Jordan B. I wanna leave this area with a good sized teaching pool and with investigators that are at least progressing. I have had some good weeks here but getting any consistency has been quite the challenge for me here. I am praying way hard that I get a sweet companion that is ready to work hard... he's gonna have a hard time here in Jordan if he isn't ready for that. I am excited to push hard through these last weeks of the mission. I am happy I extended and now I get six more weeks to enjoy on the Philippine islands. I know I can get things going here and get Jordan branch bumping again.
This next week is looking to be quite an exciting one for us here and I am way excited to get through it and report back to you all what all happened. It sure sounds like everyone is having a great time over there and keeping busy. I'm sure the next transfer will fly by and be over in no time. After all we are only talking about 42 days or so until I'm home... get excited!
I love you all and hope you all have an awesome week.
Elder Lowry
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Monday, August 20, 2012
Week 101
Hello Family!
This has been another good week of hard work here in Jordan! We had some good success and we are still struggling with some of our investigators and members to "choose the better part" when it comes to Sunday activities. I'll talk more about that later. The big news for this week happened yesterday... We were at the church early waiting for a couple more people to show up so we could start our PEC meeting President Pagaduan called. I answered and he had his usual small talk asking how I was doing and stuff and then he asked to talk to my companion. So I called Elder Johnson over and they talked... turns out my companion is going to be an office Elder as the supply manager. So he is leaving TODAY to go be trained as the supply manager. So for the next two weeks I will be on splits here in Jordan until Transfer Day on the 28th. I am excited for him to be an office Elder I think he will learn alot. He is super nervous... mostly because he is just a nervous person and doesn't handle pressure very well. We will just have to see how he does... I am confident he will rise to the task.
I have been thinking about the Sabbath Day alot since that is such a challenge for people in this country. They just get so caught up in the mundane everyday things of life and find it hard to pick what to do on Sundays. I have though lots and it really just comes down to what Jesus said to correct Martha and said, "choose the better part." Out of all the good things she could have been doing for Jesus Christ like cooking food or cleaning the house... Mary had the mentality that the most important thing she ould do at that time was to listen to the words of the Master. And that is what set her apart from Martha. She focused on the best thing to do rather than a million good things she could be making herself busy with. That is such a good and difficult trait for us as people to obtain. That is what I think a big struggle fr alot of people here is... to pick the better par when it comes to Sunday. Some people think it is ok to miss church to go do a service project or to help a friend... but the best thing we can possibly do is to sit and learn from God though his servants. I am still trying to find a good way to helo them actually go from hearing this message to applying it to their lives. It is always pretty tough.
We had another good success with a family this last week. The Ogaya family came to church (with the exception of Brother... still not quite there yet) and they all seemed to really love it. We had a FHE at their house last night and just had a blast. The cool thing about this FHE was that they asked for us to have it. So they are really getting more and more excited for the gospel and we are really seeing some improvements with them. Another one has been this part member family tat we have been working with since I got here. The mother has come to church now twice and is just loving it. We still need to get the rest of the family on board but again... it's progress I'm looking for. The work here really is pretty difficult and for some reason people here have a harder time keeping commitments. I am looking to evaluate my efforts again this week and make some changes.
This next week ought to be fun as I will be in a tripanionship with the Zone leaders. We are excited for it as well. We are going to Iloilo right after this to go drop off Elder Johnson and eat some lunch. Both Elder Faran and Elder Doig are good buddies of mine and we are gonna have a blast working together. I am just excited and making lots of plans for the upcoming weeks. Some of my last in the Philippines... we've got so much to do in so little time!!!!! Man I love this place, but at the same time I am so excited to come home and see everyone again. My mind is one confused place right now. But no worries... I am working hard and loving every minute of it!
I love all of you and can't wait to see all of your faces again in a few weeks!!! It is so close. I love my mission and am doing great. See you all soon
Halong,
Elder Lowry
This has been another good week of hard work here in Jordan! We had some good success and we are still struggling with some of our investigators and members to "choose the better part" when it comes to Sunday activities. I'll talk more about that later. The big news for this week happened yesterday... We were at the church early waiting for a couple more people to show up so we could start our PEC meeting President Pagaduan called. I answered and he had his usual small talk asking how I was doing and stuff and then he asked to talk to my companion. So I called Elder Johnson over and they talked... turns out my companion is going to be an office Elder as the supply manager. So he is leaving TODAY to go be trained as the supply manager. So for the next two weeks I will be on splits here in Jordan until Transfer Day on the 28th. I am excited for him to be an office Elder I think he will learn alot. He is super nervous... mostly because he is just a nervous person and doesn't handle pressure very well. We will just have to see how he does... I am confident he will rise to the task.
I have been thinking about the Sabbath Day alot since that is such a challenge for people in this country. They just get so caught up in the mundane everyday things of life and find it hard to pick what to do on Sundays. I have though lots and it really just comes down to what Jesus said to correct Martha and said, "choose the better part." Out of all the good things she could have been doing for Jesus Christ like cooking food or cleaning the house... Mary had the mentality that the most important thing she ould do at that time was to listen to the words of the Master. And that is what set her apart from Martha. She focused on the best thing to do rather than a million good things she could be making herself busy with. That is such a good and difficult trait for us as people to obtain. That is what I think a big struggle fr alot of people here is... to pick the better par when it comes to Sunday. Some people think it is ok to miss church to go do a service project or to help a friend... but the best thing we can possibly do is to sit and learn from God though his servants. I am still trying to find a good way to helo them actually go from hearing this message to applying it to their lives. It is always pretty tough.
We had another good success with a family this last week. The Ogaya family came to church (with the exception of Brother... still not quite there yet) and they all seemed to really love it. We had a FHE at their house last night and just had a blast. The cool thing about this FHE was that they asked for us to have it. So they are really getting more and more excited for the gospel and we are really seeing some improvements with them. Another one has been this part member family tat we have been working with since I got here. The mother has come to church now twice and is just loving it. We still need to get the rest of the family on board but again... it's progress I'm looking for. The work here really is pretty difficult and for some reason people here have a harder time keeping commitments. I am looking to evaluate my efforts again this week and make some changes.
This next week ought to be fun as I will be in a tripanionship with the Zone leaders. We are excited for it as well. We are going to Iloilo right after this to go drop off Elder Johnson and eat some lunch. Both Elder Faran and Elder Doig are good buddies of mine and we are gonna have a blast working together. I am just excited and making lots of plans for the upcoming weeks. Some of my last in the Philippines... we've got so much to do in so little time!!!!! Man I love this place, but at the same time I am so excited to come home and see everyone again. My mind is one confused place right now. But no worries... I am working hard and loving every minute of it!
I love all of you and can't wait to see all of your faces again in a few weeks!!! It is so close. I love my mission and am doing great. See you all soon
Halong,
Elder Lowry
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Week 100
Hello Family!
Well first thing is first... Look up at the title. WHAT THE?!!! How did this happen. It has honestly been 100 weeks since I have been home. We've only got a few more to go! this last week has been fun and has been quite the challenge for us here. It seemed like we were off in our timing all week. We would show up and no one would be home or they would be so busy with something that they couldn't give us any time. It was just tough for us to be able to teach anyone. Like there were two days where we walked around for like 6 hours going between appointments and no one would let us share with them. It was actually quite ridiculous. So things were a little slow moving in the area and I am confused on how we went from such a successful week to nothing it seemed like. We still had a couple people come to church but this was the problem... all the people who came this last week didn't show up yesterday... so we lost that momentum we had built up and I am worried that the people might just fall back into the habit of not coming to church (mostly because they haven't even made it a habit yet to come to church). So now you know the stress and worries of this missionary.
I am not too worried about it though because we really are trying our hardest. I am definitely concerned about the fact that none of the people we made progress on this last week progressed this week, but I feel like with some good follow up this week we will be able to find the problem and make some solutions. I look forward to the challenge and hope I am up for the task. The work here seems to be super inconsistent and I am trying to get things started but it seems like everyone is only willing to hop on board for like a week or two and then they are tired or discouraged or a number of different things may happen so that they can't continue to persevere. This next week will be another one where we are gonna have to work our butts off to see any progression. These people are proving tougher to motivate than some other areas.
We did have one BIG family come to church that we have been working hard with since before I got here and this is only the second time that they have come to church as a family. They are the Ogaya family and they are the ones that made me my birthday dinner. They are such a cute family and all the kids are just like little brothers and sisters to me. They have 6 kids and they are all still young. The oldest is 14 I think. But they are just so special and I love them already. I love going over there and teaching them as a family. They also just LOVE the missionaries and it is jus a fun place to be after a day of hard work and you are just exhausted. They usually have food for us and always know how to lift my spirits. So I was so happy that they all showed up and last night we shared the Restoration video again with them. They all said that they really enjoyed church and I really hope they can keep this momentum and keep going strong.
Overall I am happy and doing well here in jordan. I enjoyed my pizza this last week even though it was Pizza Hut. I am well aware that it is the bottom of the pizza chain at home but in the Philippines it is a sit down fancy restaurant. Fancier than anywhere else I have been here. So I will be more than happy when I get home and I get to eat Pizza joint and Mellow Mushroom an Dominoes. Ahhh... my mouth is watering already. Like you don't even know how excited I am t eat pizza and dad's hamburgers, mexican food, and Miyabi's. I will eat SO much rice at Miyabi's. I am a rice eating machine here!!!! I will challenge anyone to a rice eating contest at Miyabi's when I am home. BRING IT ON!
I love you all and miss you all so much. 100 weeks, MAN! That is so long. But I can count the weeks left without even taking off my shoes... so you know we are close. I can't wait!
Halong,
Elder Lowry
Well first thing is first... Look up at the title. WHAT THE?!!! How did this happen. It has honestly been 100 weeks since I have been home. We've only got a few more to go! this last week has been fun and has been quite the challenge for us here. It seemed like we were off in our timing all week. We would show up and no one would be home or they would be so busy with something that they couldn't give us any time. It was just tough for us to be able to teach anyone. Like there were two days where we walked around for like 6 hours going between appointments and no one would let us share with them. It was actually quite ridiculous. So things were a little slow moving in the area and I am confused on how we went from such a successful week to nothing it seemed like. We still had a couple people come to church but this was the problem... all the people who came this last week didn't show up yesterday... so we lost that momentum we had built up and I am worried that the people might just fall back into the habit of not coming to church (mostly because they haven't even made it a habit yet to come to church). So now you know the stress and worries of this missionary.
I am not too worried about it though because we really are trying our hardest. I am definitely concerned about the fact that none of the people we made progress on this last week progressed this week, but I feel like with some good follow up this week we will be able to find the problem and make some solutions. I look forward to the challenge and hope I am up for the task. The work here seems to be super inconsistent and I am trying to get things started but it seems like everyone is only willing to hop on board for like a week or two and then they are tired or discouraged or a number of different things may happen so that they can't continue to persevere. This next week will be another one where we are gonna have to work our butts off to see any progression. These people are proving tougher to motivate than some other areas.
We did have one BIG family come to church that we have been working hard with since before I got here and this is only the second time that they have come to church as a family. They are the Ogaya family and they are the ones that made me my birthday dinner. They are such a cute family and all the kids are just like little brothers and sisters to me. They have 6 kids and they are all still young. The oldest is 14 I think. But they are just so special and I love them already. I love going over there and teaching them as a family. They also just LOVE the missionaries and it is jus a fun place to be after a day of hard work and you are just exhausted. They usually have food for us and always know how to lift my spirits. So I was so happy that they all showed up and last night we shared the Restoration video again with them. They all said that they really enjoyed church and I really hope they can keep this momentum and keep going strong.
Overall I am happy and doing well here in jordan. I enjoyed my pizza this last week even though it was Pizza Hut. I am well aware that it is the bottom of the pizza chain at home but in the Philippines it is a sit down fancy restaurant. Fancier than anywhere else I have been here. So I will be more than happy when I get home and I get to eat Pizza joint and Mellow Mushroom an Dominoes. Ahhh... my mouth is watering already. Like you don't even know how excited I am t eat pizza and dad's hamburgers, mexican food, and Miyabi's. I will eat SO much rice at Miyabi's. I am a rice eating machine here!!!! I will challenge anyone to a rice eating contest at Miyabi's when I am home. BRING IT ON!
I love you all and miss you all so much. 100 weeks, MAN! That is so long. But I can count the weeks left without even taking off my shoes... so you know we are close. I can't wait!
Halong,
Elder Lowry
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Week 99
Hello Family!
Another great week here in Jordan! We actually did see lots of progression in the area and it made me really excited for the work. A lot of people we have been working with the past transfer all decided to come to church yesterday... so that was awesome to see. I really felt like yesterday was a big step for a lot of people in our area. I think we had five people in attendance yesterday that hadn't been to church in YEARS. So I was just happy all day yesterday that they finally took that first step. We have been waiting for this to happen for a good 5 or 6 weeks now.
I feel like Elder Johnson and I made a lot of adjustments this last week and it really payed off for us. We saw lots of good results and so I am just excited to continue adjusting and getting better. This is just the beginning... these people are still far from hanging their lives. SO I am happy that we have started and these people have taking those first steps forward, but they have still got a long ways to go. I think that is what I have been thinking about the most this last week. How we can never be satisfied with where we are. We always have to be hungry and looking for more. I think that might be one of the main problems with some attitudes here in the Philippines. They are satisfied with the changes they have made in their life and see no more reason to work for more. They are content and don't feel the need to continue on to bigger and better things. I think that has been a big challenge on my mission... to get people to be excited for moving on in the gospel. For preparing for the temple or for getting ready for moving on in the gospel. Baptism is not even close to the end of our journey. If you think about it any great story consists of a person of group of people that would never be satisfied with how far they had gone... they still have things they want and they never stop working to get them. Every one wants to have a great life story but I don't think many of us actually want to work for it. So I have just been thinking on how to get people excited for the work they have to put into the gospel and then at the end they will have that great life story that everyone is praying for. So this is something I have been wanting to work on for myself. To get rid of the laziness and other bad qualities so that I am never satisfied with my accomplishments in life and always be looking for more. More to learn more to study and more to do. I think that is what makes a person great.
It has been fun trying to pass this along to other members and investigators. It has really lifted their vision and you can see that they get a bit of inspiration. They catch that vision of what their life could be and then they have that desire to work and sacrifice in order to achieve their goals. It is quite contagious and I have seen a bit of a morale increase among the members we work with. It is tough sometimes being the missionary because they have to catch that fire from someone and if you don' have it you can't expect to give it to them. So it has been a trial for me sometimes to have that excitement... even when they don't keep commitments or even when you are dead tired at the end of the day. That has been my goal this last week to walk into every lesson as if that lesson was going to be the one to reactivate them or to convince them the message is true... it is pretty tiring I have found, but completely worth it.
We had one less active family come to church that was just a miracle. We have been visiting them for probably about three weeks now and they really are poor and live really far from the church. So we just decided to focus on the basics before we tried to focus on getting them to the church right away. We decided to focus on scripture study. We kinda did a family scripture study with them one afternoon and made sure it was super fun and they just loved it. So then we would give them assigned chapters to read and the kids have really been reading their scriptures everyday for like two weeks now, and that is when the changes happened. Every time now when we leave they pray that they can afford to go to church that weekend. They pray that the weather will be ok so that they can walk the kilometer or two out to the main highway and catch a ride... So we really saw their desire to go to church even though we weren't necessarily committing them to every visit. It was awesome to have them come to church and the kids just had a blast. I was super happy for them and hope that they will continue to have that excitement and desire to draw closer to Heavenly Father.
I am way excited for this next week! I can't wait to get out there and work super hard. I love the work and can't believe yet another week has flown by. I don't mean to get anyone worked up but I think I only have 9 more of these to write to you all after this one. That is so hard to believe! I am way excited to finish strong... a lot of my batch goes home here in the next three weeks. SO that will be interesting to be one of the few oldest missionaries in the mission. I love you all and I'm sorry I can't write a longer letter. I have to get going to iloilo city to withdraw my support and eat my pizza hut! I am excited. I am also going to get the belts for Dad, Matthew, and Graham ordered. We are kinda packed in our schedule today. I love you all so much though and can't wait to get your emails next week!
Love,
Elder Lowry
Monday, July 30, 2012
Week 98
Hello Family!
This has been another fun week here in Jordan! I am really enjoying my time here and it seems to be just flying by. I thought the other day of how fast the weeks have been just flying by lately. It seems like the longer you have been out the faster the time seems to go by. My companion is still pretty new in the mission and is always talking about how slow the time is going by for him and I always get confused because it is just flying for me. It does seem like a long time ago, though, that I had my birthday. It was a great day for me here though. We had interviews with President Pagaduan in the morning... just the regular every other month interviews... nothing interesting happened. SO it was fun to see him and sister. Elder and Sister Dyer (the senior couple here) had made a delicious squash cake and had bought tons of fruit. So we got to eat grapes (first time I've had grapes since 2010) and had delicious cake. The cake tasted a whole lot like carrot cake... SO I had to tell everyone the story of when Dad made a carrot cake for a little girl that we home taught. Everyone got a good chuckle out of that one. Sister Pagaduan also made me homemade brownies... DELICIOUS. The work even seemed to go super well that day and at the end of the day I went to a LA family's house and they made my favorite food. Bicol Express. Sister Ogaya made is just PERFECT too. I brought some candy for the kids too. I shared the Swedish Fish and the Gum balls. I also gave all the kids squirt guns... That was a big hit. It was quite the evening of good food and games. So I had a GREAT birthday and I will never forget turning 21 in Jordan. It was a fun fun day.
The work is still having a tough time here. It seems like anyone that we visit decides to stop going to church...haha. That is HORRIBLE. But seriously, out of EVERYONE we went and taught this last week 2 of them showed up at church yesterday. SO Elder Johnson and I sat down for a couple hours yesterday and had a long chat on how we needed to adjust what we were doing in order to get some different results and see some progression here. We figured out some important things that we feel our investigators and members maybe don't quite understand yet and we have set some goals to fix that. We taught some lessons last night as well and I feel like they went pretty well. To be fair to us... we have had some super weird weather and that might be contributing to why we are having a tough time. It has been storming all weekend long and it seems like ANY minute the heavens will just open up and pour down rain.
I think this is good for us here in Jordan though. We are learning a lot about how we need to change more and adapt more. My companion seems hesitant to ever change what he is doing so it has been tough to get him on board for the new plan. I don't mean to point fingers or anything but I can definitely see that this is something important for him to learn right now and when we can both be united in our change I expect to see the work take off. So I am trying my hardest to help him accept that we need to do things differently in order to expect something different to happen to us. So that is my main focus this week... to help the both of us change what we are doing and then we can expect different and better results.
We are, however, working our hardest and we are definitely not slacking work wise. We are tracting a lot and trying our very hardest to help others come closer to Christ. I just don't think we are doing it the most effective way right now. I, myself, am doing lots of thinking and studying on what exactly we need to be doing differently in order to help the people here change and repent. I feel like every area is different and what we did in Hamtic won't necessarily transfer to Jordan. So that is always tough and I don't feel like I am quite there yet. I don't understand how to help these people effectively yet. So that is another goal for this week. Strive for some more understanding and to act accordingly. So we still got lots of things to work out and I think we will get there slowly but surely. I feel like this area has kinda died... for like 3- 4 months now. It is just so hard to revive an area. My goal is to just get some life in it and to get things rolling... that will be a good accomplishment and then I can go home. Just like Hamtic... it was kinda dead and until right now it is just thriving. I still get emails from Elder Domincel and it is doing really well apparently. They are baptizing a guy that E Domincel and I started teaching and gave a baptismal date to. So that is super exciting! That is what I want to happen here in Jordan. Then I will be happy and content.
Well I am excited for another week of the missionary grind. I am sure this week will just absolutely fly by and then August will already have been started. This is CRAZY. Graham leaves in September and then I go home in October. It is sure going by quick. Also, I can't believe I almost forgot this... Elder David A. Bednar is visiting here on August 30! WHOOO!!! I will get to have an apostle visit the mission. We get a training from him on that day. I am so excited. And the funny thing is that if I didn't extend I would've flown home on August 29th. Would've missed him by one day.... in fact most of my batch is gonna miss an apostle visiting their mission by one day. HAHA SUCKERS! I am glad I chose to extend and I am sure I will love getting to see him. This is the first time an apostle of the Lord will ever set foot on the island of Panay. How cool is that? And I will be ther. If you remember too, he came and spoke to us in the MTC the week before I left to the Philippines nearly two ears ago. It will be sweet to be able to shake his hand and meet him for real this time. This is a nice end of the mission present from God.
Well I love you all and can't wait for next week's letters! I love and miss you all so much.
Halong,
Elder Lowry
This has been another fun week here in Jordan! I am really enjoying my time here and it seems to be just flying by. I thought the other day of how fast the weeks have been just flying by lately. It seems like the longer you have been out the faster the time seems to go by. My companion is still pretty new in the mission and is always talking about how slow the time is going by for him and I always get confused because it is just flying for me. It does seem like a long time ago, though, that I had my birthday. It was a great day for me here though. We had interviews with President Pagaduan in the morning... just the regular every other month interviews... nothing interesting happened. SO it was fun to see him and sister. Elder and Sister Dyer (the senior couple here) had made a delicious squash cake and had bought tons of fruit. So we got to eat grapes (first time I've had grapes since 2010) and had delicious cake. The cake tasted a whole lot like carrot cake... SO I had to tell everyone the story of when Dad made a carrot cake for a little girl that we home taught. Everyone got a good chuckle out of that one. Sister Pagaduan also made me homemade brownies... DELICIOUS. The work even seemed to go super well that day and at the end of the day I went to a LA family's house and they made my favorite food. Bicol Express. Sister Ogaya made is just PERFECT too. I brought some candy for the kids too. I shared the Swedish Fish and the Gum balls. I also gave all the kids squirt guns... That was a big hit. It was quite the evening of good food and games. So I had a GREAT birthday and I will never forget turning 21 in Jordan. It was a fun fun day.
The work is still having a tough time here. It seems like anyone that we visit decides to stop going to church...haha. That is HORRIBLE. But seriously, out of EVERYONE we went and taught this last week 2 of them showed up at church yesterday. SO Elder Johnson and I sat down for a couple hours yesterday and had a long chat on how we needed to adjust what we were doing in order to get some different results and see some progression here. We figured out some important things that we feel our investigators and members maybe don't quite understand yet and we have set some goals to fix that. We taught some lessons last night as well and I feel like they went pretty well. To be fair to us... we have had some super weird weather and that might be contributing to why we are having a tough time. It has been storming all weekend long and it seems like ANY minute the heavens will just open up and pour down rain.
I think this is good for us here in Jordan though. We are learning a lot about how we need to change more and adapt more. My companion seems hesitant to ever change what he is doing so it has been tough to get him on board for the new plan. I don't mean to point fingers or anything but I can definitely see that this is something important for him to learn right now and when we can both be united in our change I expect to see the work take off. So I am trying my hardest to help him accept that we need to do things differently in order to expect something different to happen to us. So that is my main focus this week... to help the both of us change what we are doing and then we can expect different and better results.
We are, however, working our hardest and we are definitely not slacking work wise. We are tracting a lot and trying our very hardest to help others come closer to Christ. I just don't think we are doing it the most effective way right now. I, myself, am doing lots of thinking and studying on what exactly we need to be doing differently in order to help the people here change and repent. I feel like every area is different and what we did in Hamtic won't necessarily transfer to Jordan. So that is always tough and I don't feel like I am quite there yet. I don't understand how to help these people effectively yet. So that is another goal for this week. Strive for some more understanding and to act accordingly. So we still got lots of things to work out and I think we will get there slowly but surely. I feel like this area has kinda died... for like 3- 4 months now. It is just so hard to revive an area. My goal is to just get some life in it and to get things rolling... that will be a good accomplishment and then I can go home. Just like Hamtic... it was kinda dead and until right now it is just thriving. I still get emails from Elder Domincel and it is doing really well apparently. They are baptizing a guy that E Domincel and I started teaching and gave a baptismal date to. So that is super exciting! That is what I want to happen here in Jordan. Then I will be happy and content.
Well I am excited for another week of the missionary grind. I am sure this week will just absolutely fly by and then August will already have been started. This is CRAZY. Graham leaves in September and then I go home in October. It is sure going by quick. Also, I can't believe I almost forgot this... Elder David A. Bednar is visiting here on August 30! WHOOO!!! I will get to have an apostle visit the mission. We get a training from him on that day. I am so excited. And the funny thing is that if I didn't extend I would've flown home on August 29th. Would've missed him by one day.... in fact most of my batch is gonna miss an apostle visiting their mission by one day. HAHA SUCKERS! I am glad I chose to extend and I am sure I will love getting to see him. This is the first time an apostle of the Lord will ever set foot on the island of Panay. How cool is that? And I will be ther. If you remember too, he came and spoke to us in the MTC the week before I left to the Philippines nearly two ears ago. It will be sweet to be able to shake his hand and meet him for real this time. This is a nice end of the mission present from God.
Well I love you all and can't wait for next week's letters! I love and miss you all so much.
Halong,
Elder Lowry
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Week 97
Hello family!
This week has gone by just about as fast as the others have... man the time seems to just be absolutely flying now. We had a good week of work here in Jordan and I feel like we got a good amount done. We are still not quite seeing everything we would like to see happen but I think we are closer than we were last week. It was awesome getting everyone's letters. If you don't know how much I LOVE getting letters and emails let me explain... it is what keeps me excited during the week. I love reading letters after a good hard week of work here in the Philippines. Such a treat. So keep 'em coming. You time is almost up to write me on a mission. Before too long I won't be a missionary anymore. It is never to late to drop me an email. I will respond and love you forever.
We are working super hard here in Jordan. I am still really trying to find more people to teach, but this week we got a LOT more new investigators. We got a cool new family we are teaching... The Enriques family. They are still brand new and we have only taught them once but it was a very nice lesson and they seemed super interested in what we were sharing with them. We will be back to visit them again on Wednesday... MY BIRTHDAY (I will talk about this more later). We have also had a lot of people we have just contacted and invited to hear the message. Some turn out ok and let us at least share a message... some just tell us to come back and then never are home at that time. We will find the golden ones sooner or later. That has been the big story of this last week. We did our one hour of tracting everyday and just got kicked around by all the people here. It was tough but I think we are doing better about getting more investigators and not focusing on members nearly as much. We have the same goal this week and I think it will really get some momentum for us in the work here. We really need someone to progress and get some momentum here in the area. It seems like nothing has really happened for 3 months so it is tough to get things rolling again. We can do it though.
We do have one really cool investigator that has shown some really promising signs. His name is Joetay... the name is funny here because "Diutay" (pronounced the same as Joetay) is the Ilonggo word for small. He is a way cool guy and seems really sincere and loves to have us over at his house. He prays really sincerely and does all of his reading assignments. We just taught im about the Book of Mormon the other day and we are going to follow up his reading on Tuesday. We got to stop by his house yesterday and he said he has been reading and he likes it so I am excited to get to talk to him more about it on Tuesday. I am hoping that we can get some more people we have been working with at church this next week. yesterday was a nasty rainy stormy day and not a whole lot of people showed up at church for us. It always stinks to wake up on Sunday morning and here rain pouring down. You immediately think... Ah crap... no one is gonna go to church in rain like this. I have only been proved wrong once with that and it was one Sunday in Molo when even though it was raining we had like 8 investigators at church. I have faith that this next week will be fair weather and we will have lots more people attend church!
In other news... I turn 21 this Wednesday. How did this happen?! I feel like I am just a kid but now I am really an adult (or on Wednesday I am). I would say that this would mean I have to act like an adult. Like that'll ever happen. I have a dinner appointment set for Wednesday and I am bringing candy from my birthday packages I got to share with the Ogaya family. Mom and Krista are AWESOME and sent everything I could want for my birthday... I love you all so much! Anyways the Ogaya family is a less active family we are working with and they are super nice. They are gonna make me a dinner on Wednesday and I will bring the water guns that Mom sent me and some of the candies and it will just be a super fun little birthday party. I am super excited for it and it will be a good time with the less active family that needs some help. Sister has 6 kids and her husband just doesn't help too much with anything around the house. So she has a tough time especially with her husband wanting her to work as well. So I think this will be a good time for them and maybe we can talk to Brother Ogaya a little bit more since he runs from missionaries like the plague. Maybe if food is involved he will stick around and we can get him to like us a bit more (even though he is a member he doesn't want to be taught by the missionaries). Hopefully this will be a good opportunity for us to bond with them and help them become active again. Don't worry I will have my camera and we will take lots of pictures. Then there is an active family that has a birthday this Saturday and they invited us over to the birthday meal since my birthday is just couple days before... So don't worry about me... I'll get my birthday fun.
Well I am going to wrap this letter up. I love you all and I am having a great time here in Jordan. I am working hard and doing my best. I am excited to see you all again and we can tell each other stories about what has happened over the last two years. Take Care and know that I love and miss you all!
Halong,
Elder Lowry
This week has gone by just about as fast as the others have... man the time seems to just be absolutely flying now. We had a good week of work here in Jordan and I feel like we got a good amount done. We are still not quite seeing everything we would like to see happen but I think we are closer than we were last week. It was awesome getting everyone's letters. If you don't know how much I LOVE getting letters and emails let me explain... it is what keeps me excited during the week. I love reading letters after a good hard week of work here in the Philippines. Such a treat. So keep 'em coming. You time is almost up to write me on a mission. Before too long I won't be a missionary anymore. It is never to late to drop me an email. I will respond and love you forever.
We are working super hard here in Jordan. I am still really trying to find more people to teach, but this week we got a LOT more new investigators. We got a cool new family we are teaching... The Enriques family. They are still brand new and we have only taught them once but it was a very nice lesson and they seemed super interested in what we were sharing with them. We will be back to visit them again on Wednesday... MY BIRTHDAY (I will talk about this more later). We have also had a lot of people we have just contacted and invited to hear the message. Some turn out ok and let us at least share a message... some just tell us to come back and then never are home at that time. We will find the golden ones sooner or later. That has been the big story of this last week. We did our one hour of tracting everyday and just got kicked around by all the people here. It was tough but I think we are doing better about getting more investigators and not focusing on members nearly as much. We have the same goal this week and I think it will really get some momentum for us in the work here. We really need someone to progress and get some momentum here in the area. It seems like nothing has really happened for 3 months so it is tough to get things rolling again. We can do it though.
We do have one really cool investigator that has shown some really promising signs. His name is Joetay... the name is funny here because "Diutay" (pronounced the same as Joetay) is the Ilonggo word for small. He is a way cool guy and seems really sincere and loves to have us over at his house. He prays really sincerely and does all of his reading assignments. We just taught im about the Book of Mormon the other day and we are going to follow up his reading on Tuesday. We got to stop by his house yesterday and he said he has been reading and he likes it so I am excited to get to talk to him more about it on Tuesday. I am hoping that we can get some more people we have been working with at church this next week. yesterday was a nasty rainy stormy day and not a whole lot of people showed up at church for us. It always stinks to wake up on Sunday morning and here rain pouring down. You immediately think... Ah crap... no one is gonna go to church in rain like this. I have only been proved wrong once with that and it was one Sunday in Molo when even though it was raining we had like 8 investigators at church. I have faith that this next week will be fair weather and we will have lots more people attend church!
In other news... I turn 21 this Wednesday. How did this happen?! I feel like I am just a kid but now I am really an adult (or on Wednesday I am). I would say that this would mean I have to act like an adult. Like that'll ever happen. I have a dinner appointment set for Wednesday and I am bringing candy from my birthday packages I got to share with the Ogaya family. Mom and Krista are AWESOME and sent everything I could want for my birthday... I love you all so much! Anyways the Ogaya family is a less active family we are working with and they are super nice. They are gonna make me a dinner on Wednesday and I will bring the water guns that Mom sent me and some of the candies and it will just be a super fun little birthday party. I am super excited for it and it will be a good time with the less active family that needs some help. Sister has 6 kids and her husband just doesn't help too much with anything around the house. So she has a tough time especially with her husband wanting her to work as well. So I think this will be a good time for them and maybe we can talk to Brother Ogaya a little bit more since he runs from missionaries like the plague. Maybe if food is involved he will stick around and we can get him to like us a bit more (even though he is a member he doesn't want to be taught by the missionaries). Hopefully this will be a good opportunity for us to bond with them and help them become active again. Don't worry I will have my camera and we will take lots of pictures. Then there is an active family that has a birthday this Saturday and they invited us over to the birthday meal since my birthday is just couple days before... So don't worry about me... I'll get my birthday fun.
Well I am going to wrap this letter up. I love you all and I am having a great time here in Jordan. I am working hard and doing my best. I am excited to see you all again and we can tell each other stories about what has happened over the last two years. Take Care and know that I love and miss you all!
Halong,
Elder Lowry
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Week 96
I just sent my response form to the office checking all my departure information. Holy Crap! I'm coming home in 12 weeks. That is all I want to say about that right now though. It could get me feeling trunky. this was a great week for me. It was super busy and kept me on my toes. I really have felt tired alot lately and when I get home I am racing through everything just so I can pass out on my bed sooner. It has also been such a challenge for me to get up a bit earlier and workout. I absolutely despise every minute I am awake before 6:30. It is the worst ever. I feel like I am working super hard still though and that Jordan is really not going to let me slack in my work. The area is still having some struggles with investigators. So bad that I made a goal this last week in weekly planning that this week we will have at least an hour of tracting everyday. We really need to find some people who will actually respond to the message.
Hannah included something good in her email and it is something that is so hard to get across to people when you teach them the gospel. When the lesson is over... something has to change. If nothing is changed after the lesson than all was wasted and you will eventually just forget it all together. That is why when we come back to people's house they eventually just say that they had forgotten the lesson from the last time we were there. It is because they did not consciously change something in their lives according to what they had heard/ learned. That also applies to anywhere we are as members of the church. If we leave any church meeting and do not leave with an attitude of repentance and change we might as well have slept the entire time (PA!... joke). That is really something that we struggle with here in the Philippines... anyone will let you teach them but the toughy is helping them actually change in accordance with what they learn. Good point Hannah and the quicker we learn that simple lesson the better.
We are still working really hard with the less active crowd in our area. We are seeing good change with them...l but not nearly as many of them went to church as we had hoped. It used to really just set me off when people wouldn't show up to church... but I am learning not to take it so personally. Now I enjoy my church services alot more because it seems every week that at least one or two people that you were expecting don't show up. Now I kind of have the attitude that at least I am there and that I am where I am supposed to be. I did all I could to invite others and to help them understand the importance of being at church... nothing else I can do. Some people get shy when I follow up with why they weren't able to go to church so I try to explain to them now that they shouldn't be shy to me. I am just a missionary and should not be accounted to... I was at church and had a GREAT time. I am simply just trying to help them enjoy their Sunday as much as I enjoyed mine. So that is what I think about people not showing up to church.
Right now I am just cruising through the mission. I am really enjoying the work and am excited to see what else the Jordan area has in store for me. The members here are super nice to us and love to have the missionaries around. I am also giving a big boost here at the end of my mission to really master the language more. I think I have learned more these past two months than I did my first six months. I have gotten lots better and I really feel confident in my ability to speak Ilonggo and Karay-a. Those are the two languages that I have spent alot of time with in my mission. At the very beginning I thought that all I could ever learn was Tagalog... but now I am much better at these other two dialects than I ever was at Tagalog. It is nice, though, that they are so close to each other cause the concepts of the languages usually are the same... just different words.
Going back to Molo was a fun trip this last week. I actually got to work in my old area Molo 1b. I had a nice dinner appointment at the Gaje's house and that whole evening I took the new Elder there and introduced him to all the people I was close with. I think the big thing that happens here in the Philippines that sometimes kills the work is some missionaries don't know how to hand off an area to someone else. People are always falling through the cracks and end up lost. I have seen that here in Jordan. I am trying to help my companion right now help me know the area better. I feel like when a missionary leaves an area that he hasn't left all the knowledge of the area he has to the next companion. So it was fun to take him around Molo (he is still just new there).
Overall I am doing great and excited to get back to work this next week. It is crazy that the mission is actually going to end. I will be fun t get home and see everything again. Dad said something about a store going up at Washington and Gibbs road... It took me this whole email to remember where Gibbs road is. I thought it was downtown somewhere. It'll be fun to get back and remember everything. I love you all and miss you a ton. I hope you all have a great week and don't miss me too much.
Halong,
Elder Lowry
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)