Truth

Gandang Hapon!!

WOW!!!! That Gates of Hell pic is incredible!! Haha, everyone here was telling me about the big dust storm in AZ....they said it was on the news....isn't that cool, the Filipinos are informed of the AZ happenings. Well, sounds like your 4th of July went well!! I love those family reunions in Showlow! Nothing beats being with family!
I am lucky to have a family here in Lal-lo who I know love and care about me just like a daughter. I may have talked about them before but I will again.....its the Pascual family--they are all members (well, except their 12 yr old son who was baptized 2 yrs ago but was never confirmed, only in the pines....so we are teaching him again haha) They have lots of kids but only 5 live at home. 3 girls 14, 15, 17 and 2 boys 12 and 19......we LOVE them so much!!!! They feed us dinner like every night and they always want us to be comfortable and happy. They love to have us over there! On Saturday we made chocolate chip cookies and no bake cookies over there, they were so excited!! They are such a humble, hard working family and very obedient and have seen so many blessings because of their obedience. Nanay is the relief society president. But the bad news is that Tatay and the older boy are less active and have word of wisdom problems......its rough when the rest of them are so righteous and obviously want to go to the temple and be sealed......hmmmm, sounds familiar.

Johnpaul is their 12 yr old son we are teaching and what progress this kid has made!! He is our favorite ever!!! When me and sis Habla first started teaching him he wasn't going to church and didn't know ANYTHING about the gospel. he really didn't progress much up until sis Whitley came. he wasn't reading the book of Mormon, praying, or going to church so sis Whitley and i decided to show him how cool the book of Mormon really is. We started giving him chapters like about Ammon and the arms, Nephi slaying Laban, the stripling warriors and he began reading on his own and wanting to understand, he remembered to pray and he went to all 3 hours of church. Now, he gets so excited for us to teach him and for him to explain what he read! His mom said he is helping more around the house too and he told me the other night "nagbago ako sister!" (I've changed!) It's so exciting!! The gospel is the only thing that can really leave lasting changes on people.....we need to use it to its fullest.

So there is always this idea that the older people are very hard and set in their ways as catholics...and yes, sometimes that is true and its a little scary talking to them right at first, but holy cow, sis Whitley and i have found so many only ladies and couples lately who are SO READY!! It's been way awesome, I love the Spirit, it's all Him that does the work!! And I'm just so grateful that we follow.
We taught one older couple for the first time last night who had very soft hearts and accepted everything we taught about infant baptisms which is a super random thing to teach but thank you spirit, they totally believed it all, how little kids don't have original sin and don't need to be baptized. Then Nanay started telling us how last year after her stroke she started becoming more religious and reading the bible and realizing that there is a lot of wrong with the catholic church so she didn't follow what they were teaching....um, hello!!! Thanks Heavenly Father. What a wide open door for us. It's funny really, all those of other faiths who say they know and believe the bible.....cause if they really did, they would realize that their church has lots of missing pieces and start searching for the TRUTH!!!! But almost everyone we run into says, it doesn't matter what church you belong to, as long as you pray and have faith in God, that's all that matters. Can we say WRONG?! Wrong on so many levels, why did Christ establish a church when He was on the earth? Why did he preach repentance and baptism, why was He Himself baptized? Our church makes so much sense if you actually study and try to understand. There are no holes or missing pieces.

That leads me to the prophet, in another lesson this week with an older lady, we started teaching about prophets and i asked her what would happen if there was no prophet....she said, nothing really, as long as a person believes...then i told her....."if there was no prophet, we wouldn't be saved" I was surprised by my boldness, i wasn't planning on saying that, it just came out, but holy cow, how true that statement is, and how much she realized and longed to know who our living prophet was. She was excited to hear that we have a prophet today. Only in this church will we find a living prophet, we have a means to be saved, there is light in this world of darkness and confusion, and he points the way. Why would we not listen to and follow every word that comes out of his mouth??? He knows...

Funny thing about cockroaches in our house....we find them all over the place (inside) but most of them are on their backs dead, don't know how or why they end up that way, I'm not complaining though! The weird thing is that sometimes there are ones in a certain spot that are gone a couple days later and we don't know what happens to them.....and no, we don't do anything with them, just leave them on their backs cause we are too lazy to sweep them up. Just adds to the grandeur of our house. Also, the live ones.....I've gotten really good at throwing my flipflop at them at killing them instantly---what has this mission come to? Not gonna say that I'm not proud though!

Haha, I think in all of my recent emails i just talk about how true this church is......just in case anyone is having any doubts! That's just what comes out now, i love just stating the truth. But I hope y'all are liven life according to God's will, it's always easier that way. We can only be happy through true obedience to him and His perfect plan. And you all deserve to be happy!! I love you all and am so grateful you are all back home supporting and praying for me :) This work isn't easy, but nothing in life ever is.

Ingat kayo ah?!

Sister Carroll