August 14th, 2012

Well guess what!     I transferred this week.  I believe I said I probably would.  I now am in Lingayen 2nd ward.   My companion right now is Elder Sagayno from Manila.
I included some pictures of investigators in Pozorrubio as well as some pictures of Lingayen. ( A really cool family in Pozorrubio that is so so so golden)

So here is the funny thing about this transfer.  My buddy Elder Harrison was in the MTC with me, and we got to the Philippines at the same time.  Then we were both assigned in the city of Agoo.  We both transferred out at the same time and went to our separate areas, then we both found out we were training at the same time.
We both just finished training and were transferring again this transfer, and it just so happens that we both are follow up training each others trainees. We just switched areas.  We have essentially had the same mission for the first year.  We have had the same areas, but in different orders, and we have had at least some of the same companions in those areas.  So thats pretty cool.

     A good way to describe Lingayen would be Flooded.  It is right next to the ocean, and so if it rains a lot it is flooded fast. However did you saw the plus in that sentence? Next to the ocean.  We have a beach in the area.  I walked on the beach the other day.  I saw the ocean.  There are some people we teach that live right on the beach, it's pretty cool.  But, it does get really flooded if it rains.  My first night I found myself walking through water up to my calf.  Up to my calf.  We were walking in the middle of a road.  Why is the water that deep?  That's nothing they say.  We will see.  Hopefully I'll send pictures sometime of me walking through this water.  I have met some of the people in this ward, it is super organized.  I don't play the Piano anymore, this ward has a piano player.  The Bishop is pretty young as well, well not that young but he looks young. The chapel is also really nice. (probably because it's a stake center.)  Lingayen happens to be the capital of Pangasinan, the state capital building is pretty close to the chapel.

    I met one family that has an English speaking child.  She speaks English.  She decided that when she was young she wanted to learn English so she always read English books and watched English movies.  Now she speaks English, she also loves to read.  Probably could be Elizabeth's best friend. We have a lot of peole to teach so I expect good things here.

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Have a good week, keep your head up, and smile.
                                                                          Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

August 6th, 2012

This was a good week.
     We met some of the nicest less actives this week.  These very
nice less active members very nicely told us they were not coming back
to church, but that if we wanted we could have dinner at their house.
Win-lose there but I think they can come back, we just need to find
out more about some of their concerns so we can help them resolve
them.  Besides that most of the people we taught this week actually
came to church.  There was actually one less active that we ran into
this week, and then he came to church.  We asked him directions one
day and he walked us to a house.  As we were walking we found out he
was a former member and invited him to church.  After a brief
interaction like that I didn't honestly expect him to come to church,
but then on sunday as we were waiting for people up he came. We ended
up with a very large number at church and quite a few of less actives
and investigators.
    This week one of our investigator families asked us if we could
give them longer reading assignments.  We usually give them a reading
assignment of a chapter or so to read before our next visit.  Then
they asked us if we could give them longer reading assignments so they
have more to read.  Yup, they love the Book of Mormon.  Yeah, they are
very excited to be baptized and I am excited to have the opportunity
of teaching them.  Another great less active family told us they never
want to miss church again.  The work moves forward.

          I would say their is a very good chance I will be
transferred this week.  Transfer day is coming up and I have been here
longer than Elder De Jesus.  This is a great area with great people,
but I shall probably be moving on.

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Have a good week, keep your head up, and smile.

Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

July 30th, 2012

Hello again.  I have had a good week here.  I talked to Sister Idos and she gave me the stuff you sent with her.  It was fun, she showed me pictures of you guys in Utah as well.  How tall is Jonathan?  He is definitely taller. 

   You know how sometimes people say you will find people that have been prepared by the Lord, while we found some this week.  We met a new investigator and started teaching him and his wife the first lesson his wife wasn't present, but in the next lesson we quickly learned that she had been taught before.  Actually her entire family are members, they just went less active and so she was never baptized.  She knows most all of the basic things we teach.  We started teaching and they picked up very quickly.  After we challenged them to read and pray about the Book of Mormon they came back and told us about their experience.  They said they felt a feeling that was hard to describe and told us it was the Spirit.  We challenged them to come to church and they did...they were 40 minutes early church because they didn't want to be late.  Wow they are doing so good.  They readily as well have accepted the Word of Wisdom.  They are pretty much my favorite thing that has happened this week.   We have another great family too right now.  A less active family that we've been working with.  This family is just so fun.  They have been coming to church for awhile now and we continue to visit them.  We just have so many people coming back to church right now. 

       It seems to me there are 4 religions we deal with in the Philippines; Catholic, Born Again, Iglesia ni Cristo, and the Jehovah's witnesses.  I haven't dealt much so far with Igelsia or the witnesses, but this week we ran into a lot of Witnesses.  We had an investigator get attacked by the Witnesses and was very confused asking us a lot of questions.  (Funny enough the Witnesses attacked our church for believing that God and Jesus Christ were one being, we reminded our investigator of Joseph Smiths vision and showed a picture that clearly shows 2 beings talking to Joseph.)  Besides that we seemed to meet Witnesses everywhere.  I got very good at my Bible scriptures as learned how to very quickly and effectively answer all their questions.  We got pretty good at talking to them and getting them to the point where they were asking us questions (as opposed to questioning our message).  It was an interesting experience, they seemed to want very much to "Bible Bash".  But we avoided 'bashing'.  

      It rained again this week.  Every day.  That is just the way things are.  It will rain... you will get wet.  Even if you have the biggest umbrella, when it is raining hard with a harsh wind you get wet.  Nothing we can't handle though.  Thanks again for the stuff you sent with Sister Idos.

--
Have a good week, keep your head up, and smile.
                                                                           Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

July 23rd, 2012

     Last week I think I mentioned that I gave a talk in Sacrament meeting.  Well it was so good that I was asked to give a talk again... well actually no, I don't know why I was asked to give a talk again but I did give a talk again this week.  It makes me at least feel like the Bishop trusts me, which is a good thing.  

    So this week it rained a lot.  Rain isn't bad, not really, the only problem is that it makes it a little bit harder for investigators and less actives to keep certain commitments.  Yesterday at church not too many people came, there was one person who has just barely returned from Manila and he said to me 'Elder you must be working hard there are a lot of people here'  I responded our numbers were low today and he said' yeah but it's raining, no one comes to church when it rains.'  When it rains on Sunday the numbers apparently drop.  For the most part only people who live really close to church and the really active members came yesterday.  It is a little difficult for less actives who haven't come regularly in years or investigators who've only come once to come when there is heavy rain.  It's all right though although we had only a few the ones who are really progressing came, and it also helps us see some of the people who need to strengthen their faith.  

      This week we worked a lot in an area called Imbalbalatong.  I have seen so many people in this barangay ready to accept the gospel, there is only one problem; one side of the street is ours, the other side is the other wards.  We talk to people on the street, give them pamphlets or Books of Mormon, make a return appointment, and then when we go to their house we realize they belong in the other ward. When we talk to people or ask referrals, 50% are in our area, and 50% in the other.  It's hard, because every lesson we teach there is a good lesson.  Everyone that I've met there has been receptive, the only problem is after half our first lessons we go tell the other Elders we have a referral for them.  The work is really good there.  We ended up going to almost the very end of the street and we found a whole compound of people who were willing to listen to us.  I think we will start going there a little more often and we will see what will happen. 

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Have a good week, keep your head up, and smile.
                              

                                             Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

July 16th, 2012

    Well we have had an interesting week this week.  Our week started rather slow, we were not having very many lessons or meeting receptive people.  On Tuesday after not having a single lesson in the day we were heading home and some kid yelled something.  I though he was talking to us, but he wasn't, but when we approached he said 'I'll go tell my sister the missionaries are here.'  We found a former investigator family that has been taught before.  They were very receptive towards us and already knew a lot about the restoration. 

      This week we found a few new less actives here in Pozorrubio.  We found a lady that has been less active for more than 20 years.  She was super nice, but she super didn't want to come back to church.  It's harder when the people are nice but don't accept you.  Sometimes when somebody is mean you find it hard to love them, hard to care for them, you walk away and might think "boy that guy was mean.'  But when people are so nice it's sad.  It is so easy to feel for them, you know that they are making a horrible choice by turning you away, but there isn't much you can do.  The thought is more like "boy, she is nice, I really don't want her to go to hell."  We have some investigators and less actives that are very nice people, but they just don't accept the message, it is so very sad.  

      We had one investigator family that is very nice, they are also receptive, and they also recently moved so we are not teaching them anymore.  Their move came somewhat suddenly, suddenly enough that they thought they weren't going to be able to tell us before they moved.  What happened was they were talking with a member and they were in tears, because they thought they were going to move before seeing the missionaries again.  We were informed that if we had time we should visit the family, so we did, and we found out they were moving and taught a last lesson there.  We later found out from the member how excited our investigators were that we came again and how sad they had been when they thought we weren't coming.  We are going to have to refer them to missionaries in their new location. (Very far away from here.)  

       In church yesterday I gave a talk, the other speaker went long so the Bishop told me I only had 5 minutes.  So I gave a very shortened condensed talk, it was alright.  The real news from sacrament meeting though was from other talks.  One of the other speakers spoke on the Law of Chastity, they gave a very fine talk, our only problem was we received a lot of questions from investigators after that.  Most of them thought the Law of Chastity was just a good suggestion.  We had to teach the Law of Chastity a lot more times than we expected on Sunday.  Overall it was good.  

     Do you know what I miss most?  I want to go to the Temple!!!!!

--
Have a good week, keep your head up, and smile.
                              

                                             Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill

July 9th, 2012

    This week has been a rather good week.   First off, we met President Monahan this week.  He is really great, he is really smart too ( he is a lawyer).  We went to our district meeting on Tuesday in Urdaneta and afterwards I went to pick something up from the mission office, and there was President Monahan.  We talked with him for a little bit, he is trying to learn Tagalog.  He said that Elder Oaks blessed him before his mission that he would be able to learn Tagalog.  

     The next day, Wednesday, we had a meet the President conference in which our entire Zone as well as 2 other zones came to Urdaneta for a quick zone conference.  President Monahan spoke and taught us about the Gospel.  He talked a lot about obedience and prayer.  It was really good, we are really glad to have him here.  He is really good at the scriptures.  He knows and can quote a lot of scriptures.  He also mentioned that sometimes he will come work with the missionaries for teaching appointments. He didn't say just Zone leaders or District leaders, but all the missionaries, so he may come work with us sometime.  That will be fun.  

This week I have seen a lot of part member families making progress.  There are several families in particular that I was told that the nonmember was very unreceptive.  In each case we went to the house, spoke with the nonmember and asked them to join with us for our short lesson.  Every time the nonmember joined with us and as far as we saw was receptive.  Of course it is only one visit, but in each case I was told these people wouldn't even face the missionaries or join in discussion.   So far, every time we have gotten return appointments and it is looking as if we will have the chance to complete some of these part member families. Sometimes the part member family is only part member because the missionaries didn't focus much on the family and left one member behind, not so much because that person is unreceptive.  

This letter is really short this week, I have a lot of things I am trying to do today.  

July 2nd 2012

          So we had a good week this week.  Especially with our church attendance.  Sometimes although we teach a lot we don't see much from Sunday attendance.  This week we had 20 people we were teaching come to church.  There was one man who works on Sunday and told us he absolutely cannot take of work, ever.  We taught him a lesson a few days ago about the importance to obey all of God's commandments.  After our lesson we asked if he was going to attend church and he sat still for about 90 seconds.  After saying nothing for more than a minute he finally answered that he would come to church, and he did.  It was a really good to see him able to come to church.  I also had the opportunity of teaching a young family. A family with a very active 6 and 4 year old.  We were given the challenge of entertaining two children by our lesson and also making it relevant for the Adults present.  We essentially told Book of Mormon Stories and then applied it to their lives.  I would say we were successful because they came to church yesterday.  All in all it was good. 

      This week was slightly sad because one of our investigators moved this week.  We found out they were moving last Wednesday because we taught them a lesson that day.  They asked if we could come back before Sunday because they were moving on Sunday.  It was very sad because they were so receptive and nice.  We went back one last time on Saturday, and they cooked us dinner, yes they are very nice.  On Saturday we taught them about the importance of prayer and scripture study and told them to talk to missionaries in their new location (which is very far away... in a different mission)  we also decided we are going to send a referral to the missionaries there to go and teach.  I feel very good about them though.  From what we've taught and how they've been keeping their commitments I feel that they have a good chance of being brought to the church in their new location, but it still saddens me to see them go.  I very much hope they find the missionaries, or the missionaries find them.  

        My companion, Elder De Jesus, is from Manila.  A member from our ward recently went to Manila and happened to find Elder De Jesus's mom.  So he brought back stuff for Elder De Jesus, and me from Elder's mom.  Dessert.  He also told me pretty much everything that Elder De Jesus's mom wants Elder De Jesus's trainer to know.  I was also said that Elder De Jesus's trainer is a good cook.  That was fun to hear.  

         We have a new mission President now.  I haven't met him, but I know he is here and that President Jensen is gone.  Our new mission President is President Monahan.  

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Have a good week, keep your head up, and smile.
                                                                           Elder Nathaniel J. Merrill