Be Baptized...in the name of Mine Only Begotten Son

Hello, How are you guys doing? This week has gone pretty well and was very fulfilling; we had a couple baptisms, a great Family Home Evening, and a lot more people we're teaching came to church, so we were kept busy, it was good. Tuesday went well. After district council, we met with a member family and some of their friends for a celebration they had, which went well. Then we met with Cristine and Queenie, and we were able to teach Queenie's mom alongside the rest of the family (who are members), which was great, she seems like she's interested as well, and we'll be planning a family home evening with them soon. Afterwards, we visited Jorlie and John Lloyd to prepare Jorlie for his baptism on Saturday and what it will look like, and it took way longer than we expected since he's so excited and was easily distractable haha. We then headed home to cook some food, text/plan with some of our members and investigators, and did some social media work. On Wednesday morning, we had a social media council with all the Philippines Area social media missionaries to be updated on new initiatives/information/content from the Church for us to use and prepare for in our online proselytizing efforts. After some lunch, we visited Rizalyn's grandmother, Emma, to try to teach her as well, bit she was busy, so we just headed all the way to the western part of our area. We first met with Hermie; on Monday, he told us that he wanted to push back his baptism to June so that his father would be in town for it, but today, he told us that his father actually would be in town for May 28, so we moved his baptism back to its original date of May 28, this Saturday. Lots of back and forth, no stress at all lol. The lesson with him went well, and afterwards, we visited Rosalinda. We then biked and walked (when my bike broke lol) over many hills to reach some referrals we received and asked if we could come by again later this week or the next (since we didn't have time today to teach all of them) before heading over to Jorlie and John Lloyd to prepare Jorlie for baptism despite his distractable and excitable nature. Thursday was also interesting haha. After some lunch, I fixed my bike real quick, and then we reviewed the Restoration with John Raven to prepare him for his baptism on June 11, which went well, he remembers a good amount of it. We then started to head over to Hermie, but shortly after we started biking, a piece of my gear shifter broke off lol, so we had to use a tricycle to go to and from Hermie's house. His lesson went really well, it was almost like the ideal lesson haha, we're excited for him. We then travelled back to our apartment to meet Seth, a member of the branch, and a couple of his friends to help us fix the bike. Eventually, with the bike now fixed, we headed over to the Saduestes for the night to plan for our Family Home Evening tomorrow with Cristine/Queenie's family, which we're hoping goes well. Friday was quite the day; very busy, tiring, fulfilling, and a little stressful haha. In the morning, we had a brief zoom meeting with one of the online/social media trainers for the Philippines Area to introduce Elder Gernale and I to our new Digital Finding and Teaching Coordinator (DFTC) assignments. After some weekly planning, we biked over to meet Jorlie for his baptism interview...but he wasn't there 😅 so we biked over to Hermie's house a little early for his interview after we answered a couple of his questions about the plan of salvation. After the interview, he asked me to baptize him; Jorlie also wants me to baptize him, but their baptisms are at different times (Jorlie's at 10am, Hermie's at 2pm), so, in the words of Elder Gernale, I'll "get wet twice tomorrow" lol. We then headed over to Jorlie's house again, but he still wasn't there, so we started riding to our FHE appointment that was going to start soon. Along the way, we ran into Jorlie (a miracle right there haha) and we told him that we'd visit him later for his interview since we had an appointment at the moment. I was a little worried for the FHE and praying that it would all go well, and it actually went pretty well haha, I think left a good impact on Christine and Queenie's family, and our topic (eternal families) is a great transition into what we wanted to talk about next time with them (the plan of salvation). We then visited Jorlie for a third time and quickly reviewed the baptism interview questions with him before our district leader interviewed him. The interview was successful, and we just ate mangoes with his brothers, cousin, and grandparents while we waited haha. Relieved and tired haha, we headed back home to end the night. On Saturday, Jorlie (young kid) and Hermie (young adult) were baptized, yay! In the morning, we headed over to Jorlie's baptism, which went well. We then headed back to our house, I threw my baptism clothes into the dryer/spinner real quick so that they'd be ready for Hermie's baptism in a couple hours haha. Hermie's baptism also went well and he gave a good testimony about his journey and how he was prepared and helped by his family and friends to join the Church, it was nice. And Jorlie was there too haha, so that was neat. It started raining really hard after his baptism, so we walked back to our apartment to reach out to a couple people over Messenger. The rain soon stopped, so we met with John Raven before heading over to get to know Rogelio and his family a bit better. We then met the mom of a couple kids we are teaching so get her permission to teach them (and to remind them to come to church tomorrow), and then we headed over to Jorlie and John Lloyd to remind them to come to church, especially Jorlie for his confirmation haha. Afterwards, we headed back to our place to have dinner next door with the branch president's family again before we had a zoom meeting with our zone to talk about our goals for June. Sunday was pretty good, one of the better ones in my memory. We had the Primary Program today, and those Sundays always happen to be the best haha. A lot of members helped some of the kids we are teaching to come to church, and the Primary and Youth welcomed and fellowshipped the kids and youth that came as well, which was awesome to see, we're very grateful for their help. The Primary Presidency somehow got Jorlie, John Lloyd, and Andrei (one of the kids we're teaching; he's friends with Jorlie and John Lloyd) to join in on the program despite either attending Primary once or not at all. This was also only Andrei's second time at church, so I was hoping this wouldn't scare him away 😂 Anyways, that went well. I basically felt like a parent up until church was over trying to get these kids to church, encouraging them to participate in the Primary Program, keeping them from running home after sacrament, providing incentives (stickers) for them to stay until church was over haha, it was tiring but also a little fun lol. After church, we had some lunch with a member family and had our branch mission coordination meeting, and we then went to one of the furthest parts of our area that has a lot of hills lol. After meeting with a couple people there, we then came back to the area near our house to talk to a couple more people before our dinner appointment and before we had to report our numbers for the night and I had a social media meeting for our post content for June. All in all, it was a pretty good Sunday, and our efforts to get people to church is starting to pay off. It's a lot of work trying to help people come closer to Jesus Christ through acts of faith such as baptism and coming to church, so it's very worth it when people are able to do these things and take these steps to come closer to Him. I know that Hermie and Jorlie and everyone else we're teaching is being blessed for their faith, and I know you will too as you act in faith as well, whether those steps are big or small. I hope you all are doing well; let me know if there's any updates or anything you want me to hear about or if there's anything you want me to pray for. See you next week, Elder Enger Pictures: 1. Hermie's baptism 2/3. Jorlie's baptism 4/5. Some of the many hills Elder Gernale and I get to bike over

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