Then the Lord answered....out of the whirlwind

Hello, How are you all doing? This week was pretty great; lots of miracles and lots of new people we either are teaching or could start teaching soon, and we all survived a tropical storm hitting our region of the Philippines haha. Tuesday was a little interesting haha. Right after we finished our amazing, beautiful plan for the day, we got a message from our zone leaders saying that we had to stay in our apartments for the rest of the day because the tropical storm had hit our mission, and President wanted us to take precautions. It was probably way worse in other areas (the zone leaders even asked us if we still had power since Cauayan apparently had no power at some point), but we were just chilling in our area, we only got some medium-heavy wind and some heavy drizzles every so often. If it was a normal day, we honestly probably could've gone out haha, but we followed President Cobing's counsel to stay inside just in case it got worse, even if it meant we would look outside and see some or zero rain lol. To make use of our time, we tried calling/texting a bunch of people (but no one answered lol), updated/cleaned some of our Area Book, and we filmed me singing a song for our Facebook page because my content team really wanted me to haha. Right when we finished that, while we still had a couple hours of the day left, we got a message saying that we could leave our apartments again if the weather permitted, so we altered our plans for the evening (it was just going to be more phone calls lol), and visited a couple families. We tried to meet with the Bulan family, but they were busy, so we headed over to the Inson family, where we met their kids who haven't been baptized yet (their parents aren't active), and they seem totally willing to have us come back some more, which is a great blessing, so hopefully that continues to go well with them. Wednesday was alright. Brother Nick joined us for the day, and he doesn't have a bike, so we ended up walking for the whole day again like last week, and our plan was to visit the same area as last Tuesday, which meant we walked a lot again haha. We visited the Caberto family, but only one of the daughters was there, and she was sick, so we gave her a blessing and headed back out. We then visited Helen, the mom of Sister Joan (friend of Ivhana), since we figured Joan/Ivhana would be at school anyways, and we scheduled a time to come back on Sunday to share a message with her and her family (she's not a member, but all of her kids are, though most of them have moved out). She seemed pretty open to having us come by to share a message, so hopefully that will go well. We then visited a member of the branch presidency, where we also met Sister Joyce so that we could visit Jessa, someone she knows that used to be taught by missionaries before the pandemic. We were able to meet Jessa; her boyfriend, Carl; and some other members of her family, and they said we could come back on Sunday too, so those are two nice miracles in a row haha. Sister Joyce headed home after that while we visited the Bulan family, which went pretty well. The mom shared some experiences on how the scriptures have blessed her life, and she started to open and read a little bit of the Book of Mormon that we gave them a while back while we were teaching and before we even invited them to read a certain chapter as a family (since only a couple of their kids have read it so far), so that was a good sign since my main concern was that the parents wouldn't read the Book of Mormon or be open to change, so that was another neat miracle, and it was a pretty Spirit-led lesson. We then took Nick home and picked up some food and headed home to end our long day of walking haha. On Thursday, we left a little bit earlier to arrive early/on time for district council which went well, I think it was one of the more edifying district councils I've been to in a while. It took a while before we got home, but we still had a good evening. We met Ashane, someone Elder Anor has been trying to introduce me to for the past while, but he and his mom are always busy or gone whenever we stopped by; he's 10, and he kept asking when he could be baptized haha, but he's only been taught/has gone to sacrament on and off for the past few months, and he has to have consistent teaching/sacrament attendance (plus approval from President) before he can be baptized, so it'll probably be at least a few months haha. We then visited Romarilyn for a little bit before we went home and picked up some food, and we just called some referrals and did some other tasks to end the night. On Friday, we had some weekly planning, and afterwards we tried to visit Romarilyn and a couple other families, but they weren't there, so we headed to visit Sister Elaine to talk about a couple people she knows that want to meet with us. We then visited one of those people, Bing, who's a co-worker of Sister Elaine's sister-in-law and actually came to church once a couple weeks ago at the invitation of Sister Elaine and her sister-in-law, but we haven't been able to meet with her again since then. Our meeting with her went well, and we scheduled to come back again on Sunday, after we visit Sister Elaine's other friend that wants to meet with us haha. We then tried to visit the Inson family, but they weren't there, so we stopped by the Calimag brothers instead. Only one of them was there at the moment, but we were still able to talk to him a bit and share a message and schedule to come back to meet with his other brothers as well next week. With some people not being home like we expected, we started to head back home since we weren't sure where to go, but then we were prompted to visit the Bulan family, even if to just leave them with a prayer. We headed over there, gave them a prayer, and right when we finished, one of their neighbors, Mary, walked up to all of us; we were able to talk with her for a bit, and she seemed interested in joining our lesson with the Bulan family tomorrow, so that was a neat miracle, hopefully it goes well with her tomorrow haha. We then headed home for the evening to have some dinner and make some calls/contact media referrals (people who signed up to meet with us from an ad on Facebook or other online source), and we were actually able to share a message with one of them and schedule a time to call him again next week, which was pretty neat. The only issue was that he didn't understand me that well when I answered the call and talked to him at the beginning since I don't have a good Tagalog accent, still American apparently haha, which makes phone calls a bit more difficult for others to understand me. On Saturday, we first biked through the cornfields to try to visit some people we haven't visited in a while. We first visited the Libron family (they're mostly members, but one of the daughter-in-laws has been taught before by missionaries, and we're trying to meet with her again) before visiting an older man nearby named Edgar that Elder Anor has met before. We then briefly met with Cristel/Althea before heading back to visit Romarilyn and the Bulan family. Even though Mary wasn't there, it still went pretty well. On our way back to our apartment, we briefly stopped by the church to meet the YSA/youth there playing volleyball, I saw some bats flying nearby haha, and I did some DFTC work when we got home. Sunday was pretty good, despite only two of our investigators coming to church. At church, we also met this woman, Jennifer; she lives in one of the further parts of our area (at least a few hours walking distance), so it's a surprise to see her at our church despite never meeting her before haha, and she told us about her area of town and how she wants us to visit there and share the word of God. Long story short, she said that her family/neighbors live without God and seem to reject religion, so she wants us to visit them since she believes that we can help, and she also said that their dog knows how to talk, so that's exciting haha. Since it's one of our further areas and we're very busy this week, we told her that we wouldn't be able to come this week but that we'd try to go there some other time, so we'll see what comes out of that haha. After some lunch, we went with Brother Nick and Sister Joyce to visit Sister Joan and her mom, Helen, but they were busy, so we told them we'd come by again next Sunday. We then visited Jessa and started to review what she has been taught before, which went alright, and we then headed back to visit Sister Elaine and her referral, Cassandra. We first met with her parents for a while with Sister Elaine, which was pretty good, and even though they didn't want to join us for the moment, they were still ok with us teaching Cassandra. While we were talking with them, they (her parents and Sister Elaine) also talked to one of their neighbors to ask if their kids would want to join us as well, and Cassandra and her friend, Maribel (member), grabbed another friend and her younger siblings. I was a little skeptical about it since it seemed like we/they were just plucking kids off the street in order to teach them lol, but it all went well, and we made sure to tell them that we plan on visiting their parents this weekend to either share a message with their whole family (i.e. not just teach younger kids; the option I prefer the most haha) or at least secure permission for us to teach the kids, so it all relatively worked out haha. We then had a little bit of food at Sister Elaine's house, which was good, and we headed home for the evening so that we could finish some reports for the week and so that I could meet with the content team to create our content calendar for the month of September, which went well. Anyway, I hope you guys are all doing fantastic, and if there's anything you want to tell me or want me to pray for or whatever, always feel free to send me a message if you'd like. I know that Christ lives and that God really is our Father in Heaven, and I know that as we trust in Them and in Their power, They will help and support us in all our trials of every kind, and They will show us miraculous demonstrations of Their power and love for us. As it says in the Book of Mormon, "ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith," and "neither at any time hath any wrought miracles until after their faith; wherefore they first believed in the Son of God," (Ether 12:6, 18). I know that there is always a light at the end of the tunnel, and I know that God will work His miracles in our lives as we endure for Him and as we continue to exercise our faith in Him, no matter what's going on around us. In fact, He promises that "if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high," and I know that this is a sure promise, one that God will uphold, in this life and in the next (Doctrine and Covenants 121:8). I love you all, and I hope that you continue to do those things---even small and simple things---you need to do to become closer to God and receive His miracles in your life. Talk to you next week, Elder Enger 1-2 - Some district council and lunch 3 - Brother Nick joining us in our visits