The Fun Never Ends!

Hello.

I never really know what to say in these e-mails because there is always too much to say.

We are looking for a new apartment because we can't take the rusty water anymore. Actually, I've had a UTI for about 10 days now, but it hasn't gotten too terribly bad-- just doesn't want to go away. And I suspect that it came from bathing in the rusty water for too long. yuck.

Anyway, on to brighter things... we had 15 investigators at church yesterday. My beloved Cauilan family is just thriving in the church. The mom and dad always come and work with us and it just makes my heart swell to hear their testimonies and the stories about their conversion and how the gospel changed their lives and brought so much happiness. And often their testimonies are more powerful and can touch the investigators more than anything sister Villamor and I can teach or say.

Esperanza (Mom Cauilan) told me that Bong (their oldest son that used to hide from us, but is now begging us to teach him more about the gospel) used to turn on the TV when he got home from work, and he would stay up late just texting on his cell phone. BUT NOW... when he gets home every night, he goes straight to his book of mormon and reads, sometimes late into the night. He has been begging us for a bible, and is now regularly attending Institute classes. HA, he's not even a member yet! He has this little notebook he bought and he uses it when he studies. He brought it to church yesterday and he was writing down scriptures that were used in sacrament meeting and Sunday school.

Oh, my heart is just so full. I still don't dare believe its really true, it truly is such a miracle. I love being able to see investigators who really are so hungry for the gospel. It is such a privilege to teach them and be a part of their conversion.
Wouldn't it be great if we, as long time members in the church, were still just as hungry for a deeper gospel knowledge and conversion?

One of our recent converts Mario Villaluz (68) just never ceases to amaze me. He is kind of like Bong. He really STUDIES the scriptures. We left him some verses to read in ALMA 13 about the priesthood and he ended up reading the whole chapter. I'm guessing he read it several times, because he was able to tell us the whole story about Melchizedek and why the higher priesthood is named after him. I was just shaking my head in disbelief with this big old grin on my face. I don't think I could even tell you the story of Melchizedek, but he has it memorized. So cool.

Well, story time is over.
I'm still happy
still healthy (mostly)
and still your very own Sister Webre

Rediscover a hunger for the scriptures and a deeper conversion this week!!

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The Week Has Arrived!

I had another FANTASTIC week.
I know I promised you a longer e-mail this week, but I had a project to finish, which left me with little time AGAIN. But I still love you more than ever and I am sending you a more long and detailed snail mail letter tomorrow!!

I hope you enjoy the wedding festivities and I'll try not to think about you too much.
We have so much work to do here!!

We are teaching more families than ever and it is a truly amazing feeling. We just baptized our second family on saturday (Grace and Marlon Olimon) and they bore such strong testimonies afterwards, I just sat there and cried and I wondered if I could ever feel more love or joy than I felt that moment. The gospel really changed their lives, and I got to see the transformation. They radiate happiness now, and Marlon was able to get rid of his addictions to alchohol and cigarettes.

In fact, I told sister Villamor that I don't want to go home because I don't want to leave all these people I love and I don't want these amazing feelings of complete joy and love--the spirit so strong ALL the time-- I don't want it to go away.
The gospel changes hearts and lives. The atonement is the center of all things. God's plan for us is happiness. This is His true CHURCH! I love being a missionary!

Have a wonderful week and continue to conquer the enemy of righteousness (Satan)

Sister Webre

These are my favorite verses of the week!

33Wherefore, be not weary in well-doing, for ye are laying the foundation of a great work. And out of small things proceedeth that which is great.

34Behold, the Lord requireth the heart and a willing mind; and the willing and obedient shall eat the good of the land of Zion in these last days

Happiness is God's Plan For Us

It was a GREAT week!
Mario Villaluz was baptized saturday. He is the sweetest little man ever. (68) We are praying his family will have a change of heart and someday join him! Brother Rolan Cauilan was his baptizer (Rolan was just baptized last week--he is the father of my favorite family) It was really neat, they are both part of the same town and they are the "pioneer mormons" there. We are slowly going to convert their whole little town called "Amulungan". We are teaching a ton of people there. A lot of them are progressing too! No missionaries have ever been there before us because its a neighborhood thats sort of in the boonies. Its soo exciting!

My companion is super talented in sketching. She drew the design for our district T-shirt. Isn't it cool!! Try to find me on the front if you can!
I'll try to write more next week!
I love you all so much!

Remember the plan is happiness, and we get to choose!

sister webre

Happy 24th of July!

Hi everyone. I am happy. I am well.
The Cauilan baptism was great.
We have started teaching Ferdinand (Bong Bong) and Babet (their two oldest children)
This is the miracle of the week. Ferdinand told his parents they could all get baptized but he would not be joining them. But because of the big changes he has seen in his family, mostly how happy they are, and how now they pray together and things like that, he now wants to be baptized too.
This has seriously been my deepest desire, and though I believe that Bong Bong would someday join his family, I didn't expect it to happen while I was still around!
I just cannot express the joy and gratitude I feel! It is truly a miracle.

Many other things happened this week, but I have no more time.
We went to the rice fields to catch frogs this morning. We use these long wood poles with string and snail tied to the end. I guess the frogs were all sleeping because it wasn't very successful, we only got one frog and it was tiny.
Luckily, our investigators had caught a bunch of frogs yesterday, so we ended up just eating those. We were in charge of killing and skinning the frogs.

Have a wonderful week.
Love you all!

sister webre

Bikes, Bread, Chickens and 21 Souls!

This has been one of the BEST P-days of my whole mission.

We woke up at  530 (Sis. V, and the 2 other sisters that live with us) so we could leave at 6 and go fetch the bikes we would borrow from the members. This is the first time I have ridden a bike in a year! My companion doesn't know how to ride a bike, but luckily we borrowed one bike with a side car and she got to enjoy the ride. It was fun! We rode the bikes to our investigators house ( my most favorite and beloved Cauilan family who's baptism is THIS SATURDAY!!!!) and we started right away making BREAD. That's right, Rolan (Dad Cauilan) has his own little bakery behind his house with a big oven and he uses coal! Is that not totally bomb?? 

So anyway, actually the plan was to go to the fields and catch some frogs for our lunch, but they said the frogs are still just small so we'll have to do that next month. We made a TON of bread. We spelled our names, we made flower shapes, frogs, people, we just had a ball. And we made my favorite bread that has a coconut sugar spread inside! We brought a big old honking box home earlier and Its gonna be our weeks worth of food. This is not helping my diet. But it is sure tasty.

Another one of my dreams came true. I slaughtered, de-feathered, chopped, and cooked a chicken. Yes, It's true. It was crazy. I can get my boy scouts award now. And they all got a good laugh at me doing such a job. It was a great time.

We were also able to borrow the guitar of a member and I got to play and sing a bit for them from the hymns and primary song book. I will be playing/singing "I feel my saviors love" at their baptism this saturday.

But bike rides, making bread, and slaughtering chickens is only a small part of the excitement that we experienced this week here in the mission field!

We had 21 investigators come to church yesterday! I still don't know how it happened, but it's no lie, 21 wandering souls attended our sacrament meeting yesterday morning and It was just a magical thing. About half of them are solid and they have baptismal dates, the rest are fairly new investigators and this was their first time. The members were just going crazy trying to greet them all and get their names and everyone just had a big smile on. It was just so special. It really is harvest season for us right now, and the neat thing is that we were the ones that planted as well. Now we get to taste the fruit and it is SO SWEET!!! 

Three of our priesthood investigators wore a white shirt and tie for their very first time and It just made me so happy seeing them, they looked so handsome! 

We have two new investigators that I have already fallen in love with. Marlyn(24) and Fernando(24) Batara. They are siblings and they were among the 21 who came to church yesterday. They both work in the fields every day, but they come home early on the days we teach them. We can see they have a strong desire to learn and to change. We were so surprised when after our second visit, they told us they were already in 1 Nephi chapter 4. I can literally feel their hunger for the gospel. Marlyn called us the other day and we were in the middle of a teaching appointment. Sister Villamor rushed outside to answer it, thinking it was something important, but she had just called to shoot the breeze. So cute! Ah.....just love 'em. 

Missionary work is the best. I'm just on cloud nine. I'm so in love with these people.

Have a wonderful week! Share the gospel with everyone you come in contact with!! 

Feed your own soul through meaningful scripture study and prayer! (It gets hungry you know)

All my love, 

sister webre

Pics:

That is the rice that we planted last month. Isn't it beautiful!??

The picture where I'm cutting the chicken-- the man on the right is one of our recent converts (Renato) and the girl behind me is Rhea (10) and her parents to her side. Bro. Rolan is holding the chicken in the back (Those three are the ones getting baptized this week, plus their son Christopher (15) They have two more youngin's-- Froilan (6) and Ryan (5) and their baby, Riza (2) 

Their two oldest kids Ferdinand (19) and Elizabeth (16) makes 7 in all. They are such a special family!

The good news is that Elizabeth has finally arranged her work schedule and was able to come to church last week. She will be baptized sometime in August. As for Ferdinand, we are still praying hard that he will join his family soon!!

 

 

Sugar Cane

Hi, it sounds like we're having the same weather--RAIN. I absolutely LOVE it, you know me, but everyone here is afraid of the rain. Our church attendance goes down like 40% if its raining.
It started to rain just as we were finishing an appointment with a new member. I wanted to go out and keep teaching, but my comp and the member we were with wanted to wait in the house til it stopped. Well we waited for about 30 mins and I just couldn't help but think the whole time that we should still be out finding and teaching.
I was thinking that they were being silly worrying about getting wet but then I realized that they're  just normal I'm the weird one. HA!

We found out that Olivar is not part of any cult. He doesn't have any secrets. He has a CRAZY past but he is for real and he is gonna get baptized on August 6, long hair or short. On fathers day last month, they gave out little hand towels to all the fathers, and his is pink.He carries that thing everywhere and I just think its so cute. It makes me smile, he's always got it in his hand or hanging out his pocket.

This week discovered a new part of our area, its in the middle of the rice fields at the farthest end of our area. I love going out there, Its just quiet and beautiful. It was the first time I saw pure sugar cane, just growing in our new investigators yard. I asked if I could try and she cut me down a whole big stalk with her machete. I felt pretty cool chewing on that thing.

We take turns teaching the gospel essentials class for investigators and new members at church. Last week was on the sabbath day. Sometimes I forget how different LDS are from the world, but when we teach about the council of our latter-day prophets, that we shouldn't buy on the sabbath, participate in worldly entertainment, etc, etc. I just think, wow, there are TONS of big changes that these people need to make as they become members of the true church of Christ. Growing up in the church I just don't realize that many of the things I have known and done my whole life are completely foreign to them. But it amazes me how many are willing to make those changes and sacrifices. But of course IT MAKES SENSE. Because this is the TRUTH!!!

Anyway, I'm happy, the work is moving along, no drastic changes, all of our baptismal dates are coming to church and growing their testimonies, so its a beautiful life.
I love you
Be good
Dance in the rain
Conquer the enemy of righteousness

sister webre

p.s. that pic is the sugar cane before you take the skin off. its a cream color inside and instead of swallowing it, you just bite off a piece, chew it and get all the flavor and then spit it back out. That piece I'm holding is only a fourth of what she gave us!