More Pictures!

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Pictures!

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Weeks of September: a bountiful year in the mission.

Hello family and friends!

I was thinking of how to make it up to you because these emails stopped coming this transfer cycle. I owe you stories and photos.  I hope you still got all my love in the personal emails I sent. Truth is, I had a hard time keeping records in my journal so these came rather sporadic too. But hey, I still delight in keeping records, I promise. 

Baptism: John Paul got baptized! It was lovely. His sister and his mom who we are trying to get back to church attended. His mom attended he sacrament too. :) This little one is precious. This made our day after traveling back and forth for exchanges. It was a sweet day to witness someone make a covenant with Heavenly Father. 

Investigators: Ryan and Raquel attended the sacrament once. They are neighbors with our recent converts and they referred them to us. Teaching with the members present is my favorite. We just can see how the Pia couple glows as they share their conversion story and testimonies every time. Work hindered Raquel to to attend church but we just starting. :) Brother Arnold, a part member family continues to attend the sacrament and activities. He is progressing wonderfully with his entire family as his solid support system. He said that the time for his baptism will surely come. We know it will come, he will be ready. Nanay Juana decided to stop meeting with us and it was devastating but all is well because there is a time for every season. We started visiting which I think is the farthest purok in our area. We had to pass through  a vast ricefields. The S family is a referral of Bro Arnold's family, They were reading the Liahona and Book of Mormon and soon requested for additional copied for other members of the family. It's great! 

San Francisco: I love San Franz. I know I always say this but I really do. I wish I get to spend the Christmas here. President Galgo is a jolly servant himself and that makes almost everyone a jolly servant too. We had a branch home evening just before the couple missionaries departed. The members brought non member friends and we found new people to teach. We had a caravan and each family had their own tarp printed with a prophet message or a scripture verse about family. I like how the branch gives us opportunities to serve and at the same time open our mouths to share the gospel. We joined several measles campaign in our pday and a tree planting called Treevolution. It turned out Mindanao  is trying to beat India in a tree planting record. 

Exchanges: We brought the Bislig sisters to work in our area. It's 2-3 hour drive and the travels were doubled but it was a legit plan :)) I worked with S. Velasco in San Franz while S. Distrito worked with S. Madrinan in Bislig. S. Velasco is the best in using the scriptures to teach. When I listen to her I get excited like its my first time to hear about 1 Nephi 3:7! I traveled back to Bislig to work with S. Binalingbing. Sister missionaries are unstoppable. She was suffering from menstrual crumps on the day of our exchanges :( She rested a while and led me to the area and lessons like there is no more than important but to teach the gospel. Sure, it is. She was brilliant. Sister Mercado, one of the other sistersin the aparment is a baby but not in teaching. Im not sure if I told you already about her but she is from Tacloban and she is strong and just fantastic. 

Companionship: The Ilonggas is in the house Companionship is going great like how we both expected. Sister Distrito sure laughs a lot. She is a medicine. You know I tend to get serious about stuff more than I should do and she is the perfect ray of sunshine Heavenly Father send me. Ha! We are planning on what to do already when we are back up there. We spend our 1year anniversary in the mission together. 

I turned a year already, can you imagine? Remember those little stones we got when we arrived here? Those are still shining. 6 months will pass so swiftly so trust that I am doing the best I can. I love each and everyone of you!

I told you I will make up with the photos. More to come :) Enjoy! 

Love, 
Sister Javelona

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Week 50 & 51: Create your own subject here :)v

Dearest family and friends,

How's everyone doing?! I can't believe my princess turned 8 already. We have another covenanted girl in the family. :) I am more than grateful. I love my Haley!

Sister Calugay was transferred. :(  6 weeks went by very fast but the great news is my new companion is Sister Distrito from Talisay Ward! She was in the airport too when you send us off, I hope you remember her :) JP is progressing very well, her sister Mary Ann is very supportive of her and she is returning to activity step by step. We are excited to see their mother attend JP's baptism on the 20th. We had home evening with them. Sister Distrito taught about divine potential and the elders led the games. We are still teaching Aj and Sun, our recent converts. Juana has been out of town so we were not able to continue her lessons. Jhon Roi is now more engaged in missionary work. We were receiving several referrals from the members and they are receptive.

Ever heard about the members who are in address unknown files? The church provided the list to us so we can search them out and use it as a finding tool. So let me tell our experience about it. Finding the names is hard. We gave the names to the branch missionaries to search them out on facebook etc. We are still working and hoping it will provide results. We started looking for those names listed in our area and we did not get any results. One day we were inspired to look for the names whose addresses weren't listed. We knew the chance was very slim considering we didnt even know their addresses but we followed the promptings of the spirit. We We found the C family the next day! They haven't attended church for more than a decade now.  How I love them! We are now teaching some of their part members. Please pray that they will open their hearts to the gospel again. I know that the Lord will help us do his work.

Sister Distrito and I attenedd our first MLC together. The couple missionaries gives us ride everytime to Butuan so that makes the travel even fun. I love Sister and Elder Torio. They are like our father and mother here in the mission. They are going home in a couple of weeks. We also launched the Self Reliance Services. It was an opportunity to find people to teach too. 

This letter is not long enough but I will make up next week. I love each and everyone of you. Thank you for your prayers!  Have a great week! Create your own subject! Happiness is always a choice. And by keeping His commandments we are choosing to be happy!

Your sister in zion,
Sister Javelona 

 FHE with Magabo family

MLC with the sisters, couple missionaries and Sister Torres

. I taught them how to make rice rolls on our pday. It felt like I can't teach  them anything else but this for now haha 

 FHE with Sun, AJ and family 

Self Reliance Services launching

FHE with JP's family 

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Week 48-49: Origin, exchanges, how much i love you and more!

Hello family and friends,

I love you is an understatement. You are the best ever. Just so you know, you taught me lessons very well despite the distance. Thank you for the not changing support this week. I cant believe John Paul is another year older. 4 more years and he will be another Elder Javelona. Happy Birthday to Scarlette too! Remember that aging is beautiful. :)

We had exchanges with the Bislig sisters. Its in Surigao del Sur. The travel went well and whats overwhelming in a good way is the follow up of the leaders from 2 zones asking how we are doing. People are kind. On Wednesday I worked with Sister Madrinan. We stayed in the same apartment in tagum so it was great to see her again but this time is more special because we get to be companion for a day. S. Maravilla was my companion on Thursday. I super love her. She was S. Comiso's companion before too so I was excited to work with her. Overall the exchanges were very spiritual where I had opportunities to teach the sisters and was edified by them too. I love being a missionary!

There were many other things that we did in the last two weeks. We had family home evening with JP's family. Yay! It was great. He sister who went less active told us that she really missed FHE's! We were like "Yes!" because that is a great indicator of love of the gospel. JP continues to progress, he reads the BOM regularly and his prayers are improving. He used to ask for bike everytime we pray together but right now he prays for his family and health. We had FHE together with the couple missionaries with the C. family. Elder Torio talked about the role of the priesthood in the home. I love and respect the priesthood. I am glad mission taught me more about it. We had lunch with the couple again when they asked me to help in editing the project proposal for the area. Happy to serve!  Too sad 3 weeks from now they will be home bound. We were invited to one to an Relief Society activity where we made curled cards. I will send a photo when I can. It was a great opportunity to know them and encourage them about missionary work/visiting teachers.

Did I tell you Sister Calugay is going home in 6 weeks. We are not even sure yet if she won't be transferred on her last cycle. We are both hoping she will stay here in San Franz so pray with us. :))

I love the Book of Mormon. I don't even know how put eloquence on this but I love the Book of Mormon and I know that it's true. I am falling in love with both Mormon and Moroni. The chapters in the Mormon helped me but admire their courage and steadfastness. Despite living in a wicked world since their childhood they were obedient. Moroni knew God raised him up to keep the records so we will be blessed in our days. I try to feast upon the Book of Mormon more than I usually do. Haha I set realistic goals I promise! I mean I still get upset when I cant do a lot of things I want to do like study the Old Testament even more and finish the Liahona May issue in one month time but Im working at it. I manage stress. :))

Here's my favorite video of the week. It helped me understand prayer and revelation which I plan to study about more this week. Let's go to our origin.

https://www.lds.org/pages/mormon-messages#origin

I will talk to all of you next week again! Have a great week!

Your sister in zion,
Sister Javelona 

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