A 16 Page Handwritten Letter!!

This letter was sent December 3, 2015, we received it January 5, 2016

January 4, 2016 Sister Evans in the Field!!!

Hello po pamilya! Kumusta po kayo?  Guess what, i am in my first area! I am out of the mtc and into the real world missionary life haha its so different from mtc life for sure! I am in Cabanatuan area ward 2. The  area is not very cityish but there is lots of house which means there are lots of people! YAYA! Haha i don’t even know where to begin actually! I haven’t been able to email for 2 weeks because of Christmas, speaking of which merry Christmas and happy new year from the Philippines!! J I hope you all had a wonderful holidayness with your familes! Its been awesome here to experaimce the different holidays. I had Christmas in the MTC and new years here in my first area!

30^th- we left the mtc around 7 and drove to tarlac which was about 3 hours away. There was lots of felids of rice and little huts in the middle of the field and then we got into the town haha and then it was all crowded tiny tiny houses. We got to the mission office and president clark and sister clark welcomed us, then we went straigt into a meeting haha i was asked to play the piano several times, i totally messed up but i was happy to provide some entertainment for them haha. We had lots of training and then that evening we went to the mission home and had a really nice dinner and a devotianl from the mission president and his wife. Oh in my batch which is the missionaries from the mtc going to the angeles mission the same time as me is 22 missionarires all of which are Filipino except for me hahah it is so much fun! They were tryting to teach me so much tagalong. Anyway we had a devotional, dinner and then went to a hotel for the night. The 4 sister fil;ipions and i just layed in bed laughing our heads off hahah they were laughing at me because i was trying to learn tagalog from them haha. It was fun

31^st- we went back to the mission office and after training I met my trainer!!!! Oh my goodness I love her. The moment I hugged her I knew she had been prepared for ME! Her name is sister Mepania. She is the cutest little Filipino ever!! She speakes really good English as well, she is so patient so loving and such a great example of an obeidint missionairy. I have learned so much from her all ready! We are always laughing, as we walk down the muddy streets of our area we practice tagalog and talk to EVERYONE!!! I love her, she is such a blessing to me and she is exactly what i need, heavenly father is so good at planning these things ;) after we met our trainers, all the missionaries separated to there separate areas. My area is about 2 hours away from the mission home. OOOOH i forgot to mention that me and my kasama are opening an area!! Haha i didn’t even know what that meant but, yeah we are both new to this area and know no one haha so these past few days weve been walking everywhere trying to find past investigators and members haha its been kinda stressful but its been an adventure and i am so grateful for sister mepania who is so good at what she does haha Im just her little puppy who followers her and testifies after she gives the whole lesson.

1^st- HAPPY NEW YEAR! Wow last night everyone was lighting off fireworks haha it was a war zone here in the Philippines but i had no problem sleeping because i was so tired. Today we started visinting people and trying to find out what to do here in the area because we are both new. Holy cow the people her are so patient! Haha I OYM to them and it takes me a while to get out my tagalog words but they just stand there and patiently wait for me to finish hahah its so awesome! Anyway to eveyhouse we visited we were fed a full meal haha holy cow i was about to explode!! I had shrimp for the first time and several other new things but i don’t know what they are called, I lloved it. But it is defiantly an adjustment haha. The picture with the family is the first we talked to, the spirit was so strong! Sister mepania really did the whole thing but i was able to share scriputres and tesify in tagalog, i think it went well. Thank goodness that we are not the real teachers but the spirit is.

2^nd-  I took my first bucket shower haha and not my last! Haha this will be my life for the next 18 months! Its pretty exciting! I did not know what i was doing when I was in the bathroom with a bucket of water haha but don’t worry i figured it out and now i am a pro ;) haha we don’t have air conditioning of course so i am trying to ajust to that and not getting hot and frusterated, like my family knows i get haha but its good! Thank goodness for little eletic fans!

3^rd-  first Sunday in the feild, first fast Sunday in the field! It was awesome. Sister mepania and i were able to introduce ourselfeves to all the members and to bare our testimonies sa tagalog haha I took my little flash cards up  when i did. Haha I am not nervous to just try and use tagalog because the people here are so nice and at least i can be a source of entertainment for them hahahhaha its fun! I love it here. Its been an ajaustment of course because the work that we are doing here is hard, and its hot and the culture is different but I love it and i know it is because of our heavenly father that all of this is possible and that i am able to be happy in this work!

We took a trike here....we take trikes everywhere, look it up online so you can see what it is. We are now in a tiny tiny ceyber shop emailing you fine people!!!

Wow i love you all, i feel your prayers! I miss you all soooooo much, especially my family of course. But it is because of all your support and prayers that all this is possible! I want these people to feel that same happiness and to be with their familes for eternity! I wish i had more time for fun details about my area but i only have an hour and i have to report to the president. BUT I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am greartful for you all, and i love this work and i am so greatful for my heavently father and this true gosepel that has been restored to this earth!

Have an awesome week!!! Sister evans here in the Philippines loves you all!!

Sister Evans

1-4-15

sorry if i dont respond to your wonderful letters, i dont have time ahh :( but thank youy!!

We heard from the Mission Office......January 1, 2016

need the letter and the map

We got to talk to Lillian

After about 10 dropped calls Lillian's phone call from the Philippines came through.  It was Christmas morning about 7:00 her time and 4:00 in the afternoon for us on Christmas Eve

Proselyting in a typhoon #adventures December 17, 2015

Proselyting in a Typhoon # adventures

Inbox

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Lillian Ruth Evans	7:48 PM (22 hours ago)
to alyssapeterson., brock_karina, brooklynfarar, cameron.morten., charlottepeter., crickmart4, dcsanders, dorntoflip6, Emclonts, gm_evans7, Janelle, jjwet10, josie.brinkerh., Kaelycluff2010, kcutchen, kdolan, Kempton310, lela_herrington, lisacaddy, marissa.green, missa567, nielsonbryn, patrick_eady, pollymaeevans, ryliealder

Haha I am sure you all  qucikly opened this email huh?? haha dont worry it was sooo mcuh fun!! it has been raining here the past 3 days. we are in a number 1 taypoon out of 4 ( they rate them like earthquakes and tornatoos etc.) but honestly we have gotten harder rain storms in AZ. But it was still a taypoon soo ill claim it and add it to my adventures here in Philippines list haha

Wow, is time just flying for you all beacuse it sure is for me! I have already been here a month! thats not even real! I miss all of you soo much, I feel all of your prayers and supoort and i cant thank you enough!

This week was awesome! It felt about an hour long haha but thats beacuse we are so busy and i love it. Welp where do I even start? let me just start off by saying that I havent seen this many americans in the past month then i have this week haha it used to be just me but now we basically role the MTC, besides the filipions obviiously but still! its excting :) a bunch of missionaries came from provo beacuse they didnt want them to fly during christmas whcih means my tiny district of 4 grew to 11! phew what a change! but its so fuuuun! I actully feel it is easier to lerarn the langage with more people!

On sunday we got to watch the 1 st presidency christmas devotinal, ahh that was sooo good! I hope you all watched it! I was soo happy to see all the christmas lights back in america! sooo pretty! After that devotinal we watched another devotainl by Elder Holland, "open your mouths" oh my goondess is it such a powerful message. and definalty a call to action! I liked what he said" we are the Lords investigators, he has given us commitments and we need to follow up on them just like how we asking our invesitagors to do the same thing" that really stood out to me. Its so true! Ahh i just feel soo blessed to be a missioanary, every time i testify I learn somehing new. something that i didnt know before but something that the Holy Ghost needed me to know. 

Now that I can talk english to all the provo batches that were added to my distirct time goes by soo mcuh more faster! dont get me wrong, i love my samaon people but its just nice to talk to some people from home some time :) also samoans feel like every american hates them, its kinda offensive and it hurts my heart that they would think that! so i just go tackle all the samoan sisters and squeeze them with love haha then they just pick me about and say its okay haha

we taght Jason, our pretend investigaor. he is a pastor for a diffrent church so wev had some intresting conversations, even more intresting in our tag-lish haha but from the very begining of our lessons weve asked hime to be baptized, hes really faithful but it has taken him a while to know for him self that this gosepel is true. Our last lesson i shared with him Alma 5: 62 ( read it ) i then said  something like " we are extending to you this invitaion brother Jason, but we are not the ones actually inviting you to be baptized. It is a direct invitaion from God to you!" we used the " power of a pause" and he just had this change in his eyes. The spirit was so strong. The Holy Ghost is defintly the true teacher, we are just ther to show our witnness and giver our tesimony of this gospel :) I love this power! ahh I cant get over it haha :)

SOOOOO about proselyting (yesterday) it is the happiest I've been in my entire mission so far, and I've been pretty happy haha! but honestly these people here just make me soo happy! Yesterady we started by driving an hour to a chappel in Manila, we met our "in-feild kasamas" we said hi, prayed, planned, prayed agian and then went out in the pouring rain and started proselyting! :) i was drenched within a miniute haha luckly i was wearing my crocs. the area that the 3 of us were going to was far far away so we immediatlly hoped onto a JEEPMY!!! haha ahhhh that was such a fun experiance! holy cow we fit about a million people on there ( luckly all the filipions are tiny) there was even people hanging on the back of the jeepmy. Eventually ill get a picture for you guys. as soon as i sat down I OYM ( opened my mouth) haha i dont know if english, spanish or Tagolog came out but something did and i tried talking to everyone! the in feld sisters kept handing me pass along card after pass along card to give to everyone in the jeepy. It was a pass along card about  christmas, the filipions i talked to just smiled and my kasama next to me was helping me out when i got stuck haha. we took several jeepmy rides and eventually got to our area where we were to teach an investigator Sherly. We walked down the streets of the actaull philippines. Little filipons were everywhere! they were all playing basketabll in the middle of the street just having the time of there lives! We got to the investiagtors house knocked on literlly a tin door with handkerchiefs covering up the spaces where the tin door wasnt covering. it was so humbling. We took off our shoes, and walked into a members home, about the size of Dallins room, or smaller and that was their entire house. The family was soooo happy to see us, they the investigator sherly living with them. we sat down on the floor and started teaching the lesson! The sheerly was sooo excited to see blue eyes! she was just staring at me the whole time, she is such a cute little lady! we taght her about the presithood. I was following the lesson in tagalog pretty well but not really catching speficis. My kasama sister Te'o asked me if i would share my experaice I had when my dad gave me a preisthood blessing! Ahh my heart was soo touched :) I love talking about the preisthood and I love talking about my dad adn family! I bore my testimony and shared my experaicne with her in pretty good broken tagalog. some words that i said i didn't even know myself, but they were real tagalog words! IF you just open your mouth and have faith, the spirit will fill your mouth with words. the spirit was soo storng! she is such a faithful investigator and was very patient with my tag-lish. our area was so far away from the chapel we only had time for one appointment so all of our contacting was in the jeempy. Traffic was craaaazy!  if you just reach your hand out of the window you can literally touch hands with the jeempy next to you haha soooo i took advange of that! traffic was jammed so i yelled out of my jeempy to the other jeepmy and said " kumusta sister!!"i shock their hands and  i showed them my name tag and smiled real big and gave her a pass along card haha i then yelled out " masaya mensage tunkols sa jesucristo!! " ( this is a happy message about jesus christ!!)  they reached out of their jeempy and grabbed the card! haha i did that several times ahhh it was the funnest thing eeeevr!!!  

I dont know if all the was understandable but I sure hope it was haha anyway I had a lot of fun and i got to see how it is to be a "real missionary" beacuse i still feel like im not a missionary beacuse ive been the the mtc for soo long haha i cant wait to go to my mission and talk to everyone! even if i dont have the langage yet! 

today is our pday so we woke up at 4 :30 and went to the temple! LOOOVED it! AHH i just loove this work! I love to be apart of it. I have come so mcuh closer to my heavenly father becasue i have needed to realy on him so much while teaching investigators and learing the language. I hope you are all enjoying the christmas season! This sesaon has given us the missionaries such an advantage beacuse our message is about christ and that is exatlly what christmas is all about. please remeber that! be happy with your friends and family, cuddel up next the the fire stare at the lights on the tree and just think of the ways that christ has been apart of your life. you will come to know just how loved you are and how important you are to your heavently father, no matter what you are going through! 

I just LOVE you all so much!! I get so excited when i email, i feel like a hyper minion just trying to type super fast hahah

with all my love 

Sister Evans 

12-17-15