Hey I got two packages this week, there is a funny story with one.  Last Tuesday I lost my glasses.  I wok e up in the morning and they were definitely nowhere to be found, I assumed that they would  turn up, but until now they have not been seen.  Tuesday is also district meeting. We went to district meeting in Urdaneta and while there I was given two packages.  One of those packages contained contacts and although I still don't have glasses I didn't even go through a single day sightless.
    This week I met an interesting person named Lourdes Tabelin.  She is John Bytheway's first convert.  She told me she was the first baptism in a certain area and then later mentioned that was John Bytheway's first area, and now she lives in Pozorrubio.  She had a lot of things saved that  Elder Bytheway had given her. She also told us some stories about Elder Bytheway back then.  Sister Tabelin also has a big Pit Bull.  A very nice and friendly pit bull, but big nonetheless.  Elder De Jesus is afraid of dogs, really afraid of dogs.  When we got to that house, the Pit Bull was very excited to see people, it had a leash, but it very much wanted of the leash.  I could tell it was playful and nice, but Elder De Jesus didn't want to go anywhere near it. When they saw he was afraid they decided to help his fear.  They went to the dog to calm him down, and then took him of the leash to bring him closer and show that he was friendly.  Elder De Jesus was not happy with this change.  I told them to put the dog back,and they did and then we were able to go into the house.
        Speaking of dogs, I got attacked by one.  Probably doesn't help Elder De Jesus'  fear very much.  The dog tried to bite my leg, but instead bounced of my leg like there was a wall an inch in front of my leg, which left it stunned and then we walked away.  The dog didn't even touch my pant leg.   That is the first dog that I've met that is aggressive in any way, the rest just run away from me.  This week we found a lot of Less Active member.  It is interesting to see the Less Active members because a lot of them know the truth.  One less active would ask us trivia type questions about the church and then answer them to prove he knew about the church.  When he arrived at  his house he said' Elders I am immersed in sin.'  He essentially knows everything he should do but doesn't do it.  He even used to work with missionaries when he was a teenager.  He stopped going to church because his friends aren't members and he wants to keep them.  Another less active told us they don't go to church because they don't want to face a certain member.  It is very sad to see people who know but still don't go to church.
     This last week I gave a few blessings to some members.  One blessing I gave was to Sister Gladys Mundo because she is pregnant and wanted her child birth to go well. She was particularly worried that her baby was overdue and she wanted the baby to come soon to avoid any possible problems.  I asked her when her due date was...May 1st.  She said she got a check up and the doctor said she wasn't closer to having her baby now than she was then.  I gave her a blessing Sunday night (Yesterday) and said her baby would be coming soon and the Lord would take care of everything.  We got a text this morning at 8am that said she has had the baby.  12 hours from the blessing to the child birth that doctors said would not be happening any time soon.
Those aren't all my events I'd like to share, but it will have to do for this week.

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Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,
                                                                          Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

It has been another great week here in the Philippines.  A lot has happened.  First of all on Wednesday I got my new companion.  My new companion is Elder De Jesus, straight from the Manila MTC. He of course is Filipino and he is from Manila.  Being from Manila means that he speaks Tagalog.  He speaks pure Tagalog, not other Philippines dialects, which is good because that means he knows Tagalog very well,and he can definitely still help me in Tagalog. We are doing well and are teaching well so far.  

         In the Philippines there are 3 seasons.  Hot, Even hotter,and rainy.  Right now it is almost into the rainy season.  It doesn't rain every day, but it rains more often now than it did before.  One day this week it very suddenly started raining very hard.   We walked in the rain for a few minutes until we passed a house with people playing outside in the rain.  They invited us to come sit on their porch, so we spent some time sitting on the porch and talking to them.  It turned out that none of them are members, but that they have a lot of family who are members. We were glad that they were nice enough to let us avoid the rain and they told us we could come back and share about the gospel.  It's funny that we only found this family because of the rain.  This week we happened upon one other great investigator. A few weeks ago I mentioned one of our investigators close to baptism left town, well he left his wife and two kids here while he went away for work for a month.  We decided to visit his wife (who is a member) and share with her about the importance of baptism hoping to help strengthen her faith in baptism as well.  It just so happens that because her husband is gone one of her cousins is staying with her to help with the kids.  We decided to share about the Restoration, and then when we came back she told us she had prayed and knew our message was true.  Essentially we could end up with two baptisms from this family instead of one.  All that came because Brother Christopher went away for work, which we saw as a great downside at the time. Of course his baptism was postponed, but if his cousin gains a testimony in the mean time it will all be worth it.  

        This week we had one kind of funny lesson.  We were teaching a little girl and her grandmother.  The little girl is 10, her name is Jenalyn.  Her grandmother was not paying attention at all while we were teaching, so half way through the lesson we developed a new strategy.  We taught Jenalyn, then we would ask Jenalyn to tell her grandmother what she had learned.  Her grandmother paid attention to her.  So we would teach Jenalyn well enough and simply enough for her to understand,then she summarized it for her grandmother.  It worked surprisingly well.  Afterwards they were both paying attention to us and both understood.  

            I am out of time here, but I would also like to mention I met some people from Provo.  Well they are from here but now are living in Provo.  The Edos family (i am pretty sure)  Anyway Sister Edos teaches Tagalog at BYU.  She also told me there was a Filipino teacher in the nursing department. 

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Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,
                                                                           Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

How is everyone doing?  I hope you are all doing great wherever you happen to be.  A lot of things have happened this week.  We have a couple investigators that are just golden investigators.  We got referred to one family this that will most likely become a great family.  When we went to their house they said ‘Where have you been?’  It turns out that more than 6 months ago the missionaries here met them and set a return appointment but never managed to come back.  The missionaries only shared there once, and the member that referred them to us didn’t even know about that time.  They even kept their commitment from 6 months ago to read the pamphlet that was given them.  They were very receptive to our message.  Our other great investigator is Sister Villanueva.  We have only been able to teach her a few times, due to schedule misunderstandings, conflicts and unavailabilities, but she has been to church 4 times and last Sunday the Bishop told us she even paid tithing.  The only reason she can’t get baptized now is that we haven’t taught her all the lessons needed before baptism. 

This week we had the National Day of Service in the Philippines.  Well sort of.  The National Day of Service was April 28^th, but our ward did the service project for the National Day of Service this last week.  We cleaned out drains in an area of Pozorrubio.  We wore the Yellow shirts you always see in LDS service project pictures.  I was there with Elder Savage because we had exchanges that day.  Elder Savage is a pretty new American missionary.  He is a good guy, it was fun to work with him.  I feel like I see myself progress a lot when I look back.  I’ve worked with new American missionaries before, and I remember it being very hard, and also sometimes uncomfortable.  This time I felt very able to teach even though I was doing almost all of it.  My Tagalog has improved enough I don’t worry too much.  I was also able to focus a lot more on helping Elder Savage than previous.  Previously I was worried about pulling the lesson together, but now I could easily go through the lesson and I was trying to help Elder Savage to do as much as he felt comfortable with.  It was a good experience. 

I also went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders.  I was with Elder Teodoro, an Elder I really have a lot of respect for.  He was never in my zone before now, but in the few short times I talked with him I was highly impressed, and now I got to work with him.  However Before that, earlier in the day, Elder Tolman called.  My Trainer and now one of the Assistants called and told me I was going to be training a new missionary next transfer.  I still feel fairly new, but Elder Teodoro was very helpful for my confidence in training.  He acted in a way like a trainee by always asking me questions, he also as a Zone leader talked to me about some important things for trainers.  He is a very good missionary. I will find out who I am training at transfer meeting, I am excited but a little nervous as well to be training.  

This is a short letter, I am sorry for that, but those are the major happenings right now.  

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Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,
                                                                           Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

       This week went pretty good.  I guess I will start off this with the sadder part of news.  We were supposed to have a baptism yesterday, but our baptismal candidate left last Monday for work in Manila.  He won't be back until June, which means he won't be able to be baptized until July, if he gets baptized.  Elder Trujillo was pretty disappointed about that.  That was going to be his last convert baptized, but now he is not going to see another baptism on his mission.  Although we won't be having another baptism this transfer we still have a lot of receptive investigators and less actives we are teaching.          I met a man this week that is RLDS.  I didn't think that church existed in the Philippines but there exists at least one.  It was a very different conversation because he believed and accepted our basic truths, he just didn't completely understand them.  He isn't from Pozorrubio so I probably won't ever talk to him again but it was very strange.  He is closer to the truth than I normally see, but yet at the same time he is further from finding the truth.  In Preach My Gospel it talks a little bit about culture.  It says to embrace the aspects of culture that support the Gospel and discard those that do not.  Philippines is very family centered.  They are very close to their families.  This is very good.  It seems to me however, that there is very little organization in those families.  It is kind of an anything goes game.  I've begun to notice that through the church, the young parents here who never had good parenting can learn how to raise their families.  Everyone loves the family here, and the church really helps pull the family together.        Yesterday before Sacrament Meeting I was playing prelude music from the children's songbook.  As I was playing a young boy came up behind me and began to sing the song I was playing.  He was joined by a few more shortly afterwards.  As they sang the spirit was so strong.  The little children are very pure and precious.  They are very close to heaven.  It was a great moment for me as I sat and simply listened to the singing of such precious souls.  This week I felt very good about everything we were doing. I feel very good about my skills as a missionary as well.  One of the hardest people we have to teach is a little 9 year old girl.  It is very different when we teach to a child, and in some ways much harder. You really have to make sure everything is simple and cut away anything that isn't necessary.  I am glad for the opportunity to teach children.  I feel that teaching children helps very much to improve the overall teaching skills.  Children you will always teach as a child, but sometimes it is forgotten that even for the adults here the information is so foreign and new that in some ways you must treat them as a child.  If we teach so a child can understand the teaching is more effective for all who are present.   -- Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,                                                                            Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

Hello to you all. I had another good week here in the Philippines.  I forgot my camera at the apartment so I won't email pictures this time.  To start off Trixcel Martinez got Baptized this week.  Her Baptism date was set for Saturday, but then on Monday she called and says she wouldn't be there on Saturday.  We of course were saddened but then she asked if she could have her baptism on Tuesday instead.  (which was the next day.)  So we hurried and informed our ward  about changes and arranged to have people come to her baptism.  As it was it went well.  It could have gone a little smoother though.  The person who was supposed to be baptizing her didn't show up, so Elder Trujillo performed the Baptism himself.  It was really great though.  Trixcel was very excited.  Afterwards she kept saying 'Now I'm a finally a member of the church.'  I should also mention that Trixcel was found because of our less active effort.  She was a referral from a less active member.  Anyway we were very excited to see her baptized.  

     This week we also had a wedding.  The wedding was on Saturday so maybe it was good that Trixcel's Baptism was moved, that would be a lot of activities for one Saturday.   Christopher Nasis got married, he is an investigator right now and if all goes well he will be baptized soon.  His new wife is already a member.  At their wedding I was playing the piano, and after I played the Bishop got up and was talking about the program.  The Bishop said there would be four witnesses, he named the first three and then he was kind of stuttering and looking around, then he looks over at me and says 'Elder Merrill will be the last witness.'  So I ended up being the witness for the wedding.  It was an exciting event, especially because we can see the Progress of Christopher as he prepares for his baptism.  We are excited for him.  The wedding was very simple, only about 20 people there, but the Nasis' were happy for their wedding.  A wedding is a huge commitment in the Philippines, especially because the country doesn't recognize divorce of any kind.  The Stake President came up from Urdaneta to perform the wedding and I got to talk to him afterwards.  The Stake President is a really cool guy, he is a really good man.  He also really loves the Church.  He asked me a bunch of questions about Utah and how the Church is over there.  

        This week I went on exchanges again.  I worked in my area with Elder Tiempo.  Elder Tiempo is a Philipino trainee right now.  I know my area fairly well now.  On our exchange it started to rain during one lesson.  While Elder Tiempo was speaking the rain was loud, but bearable, then I started to speak and the rain was so loud that I was yelling and I still wasn't being heard.  Then Elder Tiempo started to speak and the rain subsided.  As I tried to speak again the rain again became overbearingly loud.  It seemed like every time I spoke the rain was loud every time Elder Tiempo spoke it was not loud.  That was the only lesson that it rained though, and the rest of our lessons went really well together.  Elder Tiempo also speaks pretty good English because he worked in a call center before his mission.  If you are wondering, yes, the people that call you over the phone are from other countries.  Elder Tiempo's accent is pretty good, but he says sometimes people would ask if he was from India.  

         There is one recent convert in our ward who has a lot of trees at their house.  They have many different varieties of fruit trees.   Every time I go over there they give me a different fruit to taste.  I have learned that there are many different kinds of Mangoes.  At least one is native to the Philippines but others were introduced later.  There are also many different bananas.  Some are very delicious.  I have also had some very sour kinds of fruit.  There are some that are shaped and colored impossibly  strange.  It is pretty fun though to see all these strange and different foods that don't even exist in America.  It is also fun to be able to eat mangoes and bananas right off of the tree.  

     I am doing great here  right now.  I am excited to teach.  I am glad to be working in this great area.  The work is progressing here in Pozorrubio.  

Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,
                              

                                             Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

This week was good, as usual.  We have a baptism later this week.  Her name is Trixcel, and just yesterday her older sister Jenary asked if maybe she could be baptized as well. Trixcel is very prepared for baptism.  She has been being taught for a long time and has been attending church for about 4 months.  She is also very excited about her baptism which I am very glad to see.  She was so nervous/excited yesterday when she met with the zone leader for her interview.  We will also be having one of our investigators , Christoffer, get married this Saturday.  He also has a planned baptismal date of May 5th.  That's what will be happening later this week

The stuff this week is exciting too.  I had to give a talk yesterday.  I gave an alright talk. I did write a talk,but then I ended up just winging it when I got up there.  The disadvantage of winging it is I didn't have my Tagalog scriptures with me, so I would think of scriptures to use, read them in English and then try to translate them.  Difficult to translate scriptural language.  I got made fun of this week at a dinner appointment.  They said I hold my spoon like a pencil. That is apparently wrong. We are working a lot with active members in this ward.  They have a lot of ward missionaries, and are really trying to help.  We find ourselves going to active members and teaching them principles from preach my gospel about how to teach the gospel.  The nice thing about that is that I am getting to know the ward very quickly.  I know many members because we are really trying to incorporate them. 

    Not always quickly enough, this last week we had a companion exchange and I led the area.  I was with a trainee American in my area.  We taught well our lessons were good... until our last lesson.  I couldn't find the last house we were supposed to go to.  I knew sort of where it was but not exactly.  It was near a church of another faith, and they were just getting out of a meeting, and were not very nice.  They wouldn't give us any directions so we just wandered around for a while until it became too late and we should head back.  The next day with Elder Trujillo we went back to that missed appointment.  I now know where the house is.  And all is well. I will also mention that yesterday is the first time she has come to church since I've been here, so despite our missed appointment it was alright.  

     We gave a few blessing this week, one of them particularly eventful.  Elder Dickey and Elder Tiempo, the other missionaries in Pozorrubio, told us someone in our area requested a blessing.  A nonmember showed up to church to ask for a blessing, and then was referred to us.  Elder Trujillo and I went to give this blessing to this nonmember lady.  Her daughter is a member in another country.  It just so happens that her husband is American.  We are going to teach an American.  Suddenly the tides have been turned, it's no longer me who has trouble with the language. but my companion.  It's not me who can't say what he wants to.  It will be very different, a lot more weight will be on me in teaching.  I don't know what will come of this, but I know it will be an interesting experience for me.  This is the first non-missionary American I've met here. Elder Dickey from the other companionship in Pozorrubio told me he his jealous and says when we go on exchanges he wants to come with me.

          Anyway things are going well.  I like it a lot here in my new area.

Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,
Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

Elder Merrill Letter

Today I am in Urdaneta City for P-day. We had to go to visit the mission office. Let me just say that Urdaneta is way bigger than Agoo or Pozorrubio. I am in a computer shop in a mall. They have a mall.
This week was good, it went by fast as most weeks do. I am getting to know the people in my new branch, and they are getting to know me. This week we went to a wedding for someone in the branch that was held at the church. We, the missionaries, said that we would try to attend if we had time that day. We ended up being able to attend but we were a little late. When we arrived they said they were waiting for us, and then informed me that I was playing the piano for this event. So with no time of notice I played the piano. That was somewhat exciting. They also later asked me to play for the ward choir when they sing next Sunday. There is another wedding this week. And another wedding the week after that. One of those weddings is for an investigator that wants to be baptized. He wants his wedding and baptism on the same day. That will certainly be a memorable day.
This week we met a lady on the street that was from Agoo. That was fun because I was able to talk to someone from a different place than I was and actually know what I was talking about. I felt like I was able to gain her trust and interest because I knew exactly what she was talking about. We taught her a lesson and she was very receptive. I gave her the names and phone number of the Elders in Agoo. I won't ever see if she progresses, but I do know that we here in Pozorrubio did our part.
This week I went on Exchanges with the Zone Leaders. I worked in an City called Binalonan. That is an area that John Bytheway( probably spelled wrong) opened up years ago. Some of the members there are his converts. I got to work with one of the Zone leaders and he helped me with a lot of things. Another thing about Binalonan, they have a hot shower. I don't know why or how, but they do. That was my first hot shower in months.
One exciting thing this week was a recent convert family went to the Temple to do baptisms for the dead. We taught them about the Temple before they went, then they went, and then we reviewed their experience with them and reemphasized preparing for eternal marriage. It was really exciting to hear them talk about their experience. I am so very happy for them. I am so happy to see people making changes in their lives and also to be a help in their change

Good luck to you all and have a wonderful week,
Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill