HAPPY NEW YEARS!!!!!!!!

Hey everyone i hope that you had a good New Years and are starting the Year of right by keeping the Sabbath holy ;) haha i love you all and i hope that you all have some really good New Years resolutions to be able to come closer to our Father in Heaven and for everything else :) but i just want to let you guys know that i love you and next week we have our Baptism for one of our Investigators and i am excited for the others because we will be helping them get everything ready for their wedding next week :) I am so happy to see the progression they are making. It is something you can't explain with how much joy you feel for the people you serve in a mission. and especially when you see them progress and see how God has been blessing them and help prepare them to make that First Covenant.

This week has been more crazy and not a whole lot of work has been able to get done cause the past couple days and even today we have to be home by 5 because of the Holidays and our President wants us to be safe. So it is for a good reason cause apparently they shoot off guns and just some other stuff but ya it is all good :) but next week i will let you guys know more about the progress of our investigators and the wedding and stuff like that :) and i will have a lot more to talk about or i will be to tired to email next week and there is a reason for that that me and my companion are going to be doing and were asked to try and so it should be real fun and challenging and will probably work us even more to death and will probably want us to carry the area book around with us hahahaha.... such a pain.... But i love missionary work and it is so rewarding and it brings so many blessings :) and i hope you have been receiving blessings as well and also New Years here is freaking crazy and so freaking loud.... pretty much you fall asleep and then at 11 you get woken up from all the crap that is going on throughout the town... haha but it was kind of weird but also good to be able to say welcome 2017!!!! and now we have 364 days till next year and to see all our progress and what not but i love you guys and i hope you have a wonderful day today and that Church was good for you all and you were all able to learn some new things :) Remember who you are. I love you all and miss you all!!!! 1 year now and makita ay kita liwat :) 

Keep Smiling :)

Pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill 

January 1st 2017

So these are some pictures are from last week and from christmas and ok there is a picture in here that i just had to take and it may be worthy to be in a pamphlet haha joke lang that may be bad but it was a really cool picture and i couldn't resist haha also here are some holiday lights from our area :) and from going out tracting for a super super far area.... a new family we are teaching, some super super cute baby goats :) and ya haha aslo our Christmas Dinner.... corned beef, noodles and rice... Members from Manila that were visiting, that fed us haha was happy for that...​

  

Images pending approval

December 25th 2016

shaving a dead pig... so sad to watch this.... 

Christmas presents!!!!!

1 WEEK TILL CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!! December 19th 2016

Hey everyone so i don't have much time to do this email cause we still haven't eaten yet and have to be in the city for splits later... but so what happened from the week....

We had our Christmas Conference which was nice and fun :) it was very helpful and inspirational :) it was just with our zone though instead of the whole mission but it was still good and i had fun there we had a good lesson with our President and got to do practice teaching with him about how to use the Book of Mormon more effectively :) but it was good also work didn't get a whole lot cause of all the time being out for meetings and my companion getting sick from eating at a place called minute burger for the first time haha... who saw that one coming?? i did a little bit... he hates that place now haha.... but MIRACLE we had 10 investigators at Church this last Sunday!!!!!! so freaking happy about it and am just so happy and love these families so much!!!!!! they have a Baptismal date for the 14th of January!!! so we are super excited for them and love teaching them and see them change and really develop their testimonies and strive to live the Gospel!!!! they are two different families but we had them meet at the birthday party of the other investigator and they were able to talk to each other and get to know each other as well and guess what they talked about???? The Gospel and the Book of Mormon!!!!! i was so happy when i heard their conversation :) we also got to teach the Molita family about the Word of Wisdom at the others house while we waited for the party and honestly the field is already white. and Heavenly Father really puts people in our paths who are ready to receive the Gospel when we ask Him for families to teach. but they are so ready and were just like oh well it sounds like i should do this cause i would rather not have my kids be doing this stuff or drinking this stuff when they get older or seeing us do it! ahhh i just love them and am so happy to be able to share this wonderful gift with them and see them grow. as in i feel like they are one main reason why i have been called to Miag-ao is to help this family to receive the Restored Gospel but super awesome and this week  that is all i can think of right now but ya haha....

Also we went to a place called Garinfarm today and it is a super super cool place to go to but a lot of people stare when they see the nametag haha because it's a Catholic place type thing and there are some questionable things there but oh well but super fun and we got to see a monkey!!!!! haha he was really cute you will all see in the pictures so dont worry but i love you all and i miss you all and i will wish you guys a early Christmas right now :) but i will talk to you all again on actual Christmas :) i love you liwat and Remember who you are.

Keep Smiling :) 

Pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill

December 19th 2016

December 19th 2016

Alright so pictures anay ah! So these are some pictures from our Branch Christmas party!!! really fun :) umm Some from a Birthday party of our investigators :) They have a date for the 14th of Jan!! Two cute little babies!!!!!! especially the really fat one haha...  so i have more that i will send after this from earlier today :) we went to a cool place in my area!!

2 weeks till Pasko!!!!!!!! December 11th 2016

So i am sorry but this email will be short because not much has happened this week mainly cause i was without a Companion for almost 3 days this week and was in a different area until i got my companion cause right after finishing training i am training again. but this time my companion doesn't know anything other than English... haha ya good luck to me to teach someone how to speak ilonggo... difficult... but it is kind of cool to translate for him cause i get to see how well my language is so it's got it perks ;) haha but ok so one of the main things from this week that i really wanna be able to talk about is again follow up about the Light the World how that is going??? i wanna see some pictures now to see that you guys are doing the acts of service haha!!!! so no cheating ;)

So we have this awesome family that i am so excited to have Baptized and to receive the Gospel!!!! they are amazing but actually we found out that they can't get Baptized on the 24th the original date we gave them because for one the tatay he was married once before but they have been separated for 10 years so that isn't the problem but the main one is with the son... so pretty much our president has to be the one to interview this family and the son has to write the first presidency to tell them why he wants to be Baptized and so on but our president told us to wait until about January 7th or 14th and just keep committing them to read and come to church and all that for one more month... but the lesson we had with them was so amazing we had a recent family that we helped prepare and go to the Temple to get sealed come with us and help as we taught the Plan of Salvation which was awesome and they asked about some Baptismal interview questions and asked about beer haha go figure... but it was awesome cause the mom only drinks coffee one cup in the morning and the dad drinks sometimes but they both committed to live the Word of Wisdom and to help themselves prepare for Baptism cause they are super excited about it now and like i said before they have two daughters in america that are member's now and ya :) so we really are trying to work with the to really gain their Salvation and to have the wonderful amazing gift of the Holy Ghost and to achieve that goal of having a Temple marriage and sealing! but they are more than willing to do what it needs to do to receive these blessings in their life and for their family. but i know that yes they have some challenges right now but it will just strengthen their faith and their testimony about the Atonement and about how the Gospel really helps and blesses lives and we know that they already know this Church is true we are just helping receive the rest of the Restored Gospel and Doctrine and to Endure to the End at this point until they are able to be Baptized as a family and to have this wonderful joy. but i will keep you guys updated on it on about this family and their progression :) so don't worry! I love and miss you guys so much i hope you all know that and are all doing well and had a good week this week and even though the Devotional for Christmas was last week i hope you all watched it and enjoyed it cause it was amazing!!!! we just got to watch it last night :) and also we have our Christmas Conference this week so i will let you all know how that goes in my next weeks letter!!!! Remember who you are. Palangga ko kamo

Keep Smiling :)

Pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill 

1. me and my new bata (trainee) he is samoan.

2. picture of us walking to a old nanay of ours to give her a blessing haha ( mainly a picture of me walking) enjoy the view of the philippines ;)

MALIPAYON NGA PASKWA!!!!!( MERRY CHRISTMAS) December 4th 2016

Ahhhhhh MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!!!!!!! So i hope you are all enjoying the Christmas spirit and can feel it in the air now :) and i hope you all have been doing Light the World because i have been making sure me and my companion are doing it everyday and i feel so happy to be able to do it and to help others even more out here and to follow the example of our Savior :) i know that as we keep doing the things for the rest of the 20 days till Christmas we will come closer to our Savior and will remember Him so much more this Christmas and feel his love for us and for everyone. So keep pushing through 20 days left!!!!! :)

So this week was a very good week, So remember those referrals i was talking about from last week? So we went and taught them and honestly answered prayers and miracles!!! so we taught them and i am pretty sure i told you about one of the lessons from the first referral but from the second one, Awesome!!!!! so we taught them and a little sad cause the tatay wasn't able to be there cause he had a meeting but we taught the nanay and her son's which was awesome cause she actually has two daughters who live in America cause they were adopted by Mormons and they are helping her daughters with school and things like that but super awesome cause we were talking with them and they said that they talk with the daughters all the time or at least the son does, the mom doesnt know how to use facebook haha but they are all very close so it was good and even more awesome they accepted our Baptismal invitation and they came to a Baptism right after we had taught them to see what it was and the Nanay was super excited and so were the kids they told us ya we wanna get Baptized and so awesome to just see how the mom felt when she heard the testimony of the person who got Baptized she just started crying and was so happy to be there and to experience to see that and to hear the lady's Testimony!!!!!

So transfers are this week and honestly i have no idea what they are doing cause they aren't telling anyone about transfers... but from what i know is that my companion that i just got done training is transferring and that i will being staying here and will be training again. Oh my gulay...  i honestly thought ok finish training maybe do follow up training for my companion spend Christmas with him and then transfer but nope.... finish his training and then train a new missionary again and still be DLT.... also i will be spending my 1 year mark in Miagao :) haha 2 areas 1 year... time goes by so freaking fast... but ummm ya that is pretty much a lot from what i can think of from this week! sorry i don't have many pictures from this week it has been a hassle haha but i will have more for you next week from Christmas party and sa mga FHE and of when we hopefully get our house Christmas looking and of course with my second bata!!! but here are some pictures of Christmas already coming haha Thank you to my lovely sister for the package ;) and i love you all i hope you had a wonderful day today you guys and were able to watch the General Christmas Devotional today!!!!!!!! i can't wait to see it!!! Remember who you are and i love you all and miss you guys!!!!

Keep Smiling :)

pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill

1. This is how you know you are a missionary haha and you have been out for awhile when your belt rips....

2. Paskwa na!!!!!! haha :) tapos may missionary calendar para sa duha ka tuig 

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!! :) November 27th 2016

Ayos ah!!!!! so everyone these links are for something super awesome that the Church is doing for Christmas and they will be launching it very very soon for the rest of the World!!! but they gave us missionaries papers of the list already but i challenge you guys to view this and to do the list :) there is something we can do for everyday for the month of December :) and i have read them and they are super amazing and will be awesome!!!! they focus on attributes!!! :) and how we can be the Light but i wanna do a little follow up with my challenge from this month for Thanksgiving :) it is very close so i hope you have all been able to complete the challenge :) but anyways about this week

So one really awesome things that happened this week was we went to a less actives house that we had just barely met but as we went to go teach them we didn't really have a set plan to teach cause we didn't know them but instantly we felt to share 1st nephi chapter 8 to them because the tatay i guess has a background of using black magic and has a long long backstory with it but anyways we went and shared with them cause when we got there and started to talk i realized that you know i can really relate to them and so we had such an amazing lesson with them and his wife told us she had lost her faith.. but she really wants it back and so we gave her a blessing after the lesson but it was just super amazing and one of the awesome things was after our lesson with the family they said that ya they will return and the tatay looked at us and told us that he was thankful we came to them and that just the spirit was so strong and he was grateful to feel the spirit and to remember how it felt.

Umm we have also found some really good families that we barely just started to teach and so i will update you a bit more about that :) next week after some more visits :) but one of them super awesome she asked us about the L.o.C and W.o.W and so we explained it a little bit and she said oh i should probably follow these then huh? basta super super awesome :) haha 

Also i dont have pictures but here are some videos from a hike we took trying to find an oym of ours and found out that they live 3 hours up the mountain if we walk and there were no vehicles going up there at the time... sooo sadly we had to turn back around at that time... but we will get there someday soon this week :) but ya hope you enjoy!!!!

I hope you all had a wonderful week and Sunday :) i love you all and miss you all. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving :) Remember who you are.

Keep Smiling :) 

Pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill

CHRISTMAS SEASON!!!!!! Make Miracles happen!!!!! November 27th 2016

Alright everyone it is now here!!!!!! Light the World!!!! So i hope you are all prepared for an amazing December this year!!! because i am and i know that by doing this it will make and help us feel closer to our Savior and to our families and to our Father in Heaven. so here is the link for the whole 25 days and what the challenges are for us to do each day https://www.mormon.org/christmas/in-25-ways-over-25-days. So i hope you guys are excited for it!!!! Day 1 is a worldwide thing actually so it should be a bit easier to do :) So day one is Jesus lifted other's burdens and so can you. So my challenge to you guys it to watch the videos for each day and to share it to help others and to read the list of the things you can do to complete the challenge for the day and pick one or to think of your own idea to complete the challenge. I know nga if we do these things that we will receive more blessings than we have room for and that is a promise to us. I know nga we will feel the Saviors love for us and will be able to brighten up someone's day especially if it is someone close to you like a family member or something. and i know nga by the time Christmas day is here we will be able to remember our Savior and what he has done for us so much more and it will strengthen all of our testimonies and faith in our Savior and nga our families will be able to come closer and will feel happier and more peaceful on Christmas and this December so that is my challenge to you guys and i will be doing them as well with you guys so don't worry you're not alone ;) haha but i love you guys and am excited to here of some of your stories from these challenges for this December!!!!!! so i will be expecting feed back when i follow up with this ;) I love you all :)

Sooooo i will start the rest of my email now :) so this week was a kind of long week and had some ups and downs throughout it but it is all good. :) buhi pa ako kag gaginahawa pa man!!!! thankfully :) but let's see so this week has kind of been full of meetings and traveling to the city and last few days was Thanksgiving!!! which i hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving cause i didn't haha... they don't celebrate it here... buuut the closest thing i was able to have for Thanksgiving dinner was pork adobo with rice :) so at least i got to eat some type of meat for Thanksgiving and also i made some homemade fried rice :) haha totally just winged it but it turned out pretty dang good i would have to say😎 but ya umm so this week we have been working with some less actives actually and we have one specific family that i talked about last week i think... Ame family so we went back and visited them Saturday and taught them and checked up on our assignment and read with them in the Book of Mormon and honestly wow did Nanay have some concerns and issues but it was good cause we were able to follow the spirit to listen and to help her resolve those concerns and at the end of the lesson nanay prayed for 30MINUTES. ya that was a fun prayer to listen to haha :) i love her and i think she felt like she needed it even though it was so freaking long for a closing prayer haha but it is ok but at the end she told us she didn't know if she would be able to come to church cause of some of her concerns but we challenged her and promised her some blessings and gave her an assignment that has promised blessings and miracle!!! the whole family came to Church yesterday!!!!!! and i could just see the light they had in there eyes after renewing their covenant with our Father in Heaven. and at first nanay was hesitant to take the Sacrament but when she did i could just see a difference in her mood and attitude. that she really could feel the love of our Savior and that the Holy Ghost had just came over her and let her know that this is where she needs to be because the kids wanted to go home or at least one of them did but nanay was so determined to stay for the whole 3 hours of church and it was just amazing and also Second miracle: we went with a beloved but yet crazy nanay in our group haha her name is nanay Ester, she had some referrals for us and so we went to go teach them and the first family is a tatay of about 56 and his wife 43 and they have 6 kids but as we taught them tatay asked if our church had people who smoke, drink, or gamble cause he hates that people do that in the Catholic church and we told him no that is part of the WoW and he just laughes and told us that sounds like a good and true church to me! we will come this next Sunday! as in super awesome lesson 1 with him!!!! the second one was a family of a nanay that is 43 and her husband is 60 they have 4 little boys and 1 older son and 2 girls that were actually adopted by a mormon family in California to help them out with schooling and everything so because of that it kind of made nanay and tatay more interested in our message and to know if it is true because of their daughters and the family that took them in. Also the 4 little boys instantly sat down with the pamphlets and the Book of Mormon and started reading them quietly in the corner cause we didn't have time to teach but they were reading it and honestly i felt so happy and the spirit there with us and i can honestly say that just seeing the kids like that and the family i felt so good and so happy to be there at that time and to be able to have this chance for them to come to church and to teach them more about this Gospel and for them to have Eternity because this family is a family that i saw a big future with them. So i am excited to be able to tell you more about these visits next week :) but i think that is all i have for this week... Also shout out to my one and favorite MOTHER MALIGAYANG BATI INA!!!!!!!!! I love you and i miss you tons but you are such a big inspiration to me Mom. Dumduma pirme na. (always remember that)

I love you all and i miss you tons!!! Remember who you are. Palangga ta kamo liwat :) haha kag here is a quote that was sent to me and means a lot to me and i read everyday but i wanna share with with you guys :) "He will bless our efforts beyond our fondest expectations as we give our all in His service." - President Eyring

Keep smiling :)

Pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill

November 27th 2016

November 14th 2016

Pictures pending approval

The Month Of Thanks!!!! Nov 6th 2016

So i hope that you all were able to have a wonderful Halloween this week you guys!!!!! it was a little weird to not be in america or celebrate Halloween but it was cool to experience a different cultures way of celebrating it :) but we werent able to really work cause literally everyone was at the Cementario that day.

So this week has been an interesting week and we haven't been able to work that much which was a bummer.... so the main reason why is cause we went to go get support and the atm didn't work so we went the next day and found out that it took our money but the atm had no money at the time so we had no money at all and had to talk with the bank about it which it was closed cause of Halloween. the next day it took about 3 hours to figure that out so we didn't get much work done that day either.... but one of the cool things is that we are teaching lesson 2 ang plano sang kaluwasan to all of our investigators right now and after Halloween perfect time to teach it :) Heavenly Father works in amazing ways :) but we have been able to find some more families in the week :) Super happy to teach them

So one of our families we taught we taught them about the Plan of Salvation and after the lesson we talked about Baptism and extended an invitation to them and the Father was telling us about how he is already baptized and then he said one of the things no one wants to here " Sano kamo maguntat sang pagtudlo sa amon" when will you guys stop teaching us? freak does that hurt to hear.... it breaks my heart when i hear that... but we are gonna go back and teach about Baptism to him and his family and hopefully he will understand the difference and why it is important but we will hopefully be able to do that this week! 

the other main reason why we haven't gotten much work done is because my companion actually got the flu on saturday after we went trackting and gave a blessing to a whole family with the flu but it got really bad around 11 am so we went home and since then he has just been resting and trying to feel better... i won't go to deep into this but so it has been sitting at home and taking care of my companion these past few days!!!! haha it's alright i am taking advantage of it and learning things for the future ;) also yesterday we had stake conference! for me this was my second one in the past two months!!!! wohoo :) but it was really good and we got to hear from out President :) and i was able to learn some new things so it was worth it :) also super exciting we get to hear from an Apostle this week on the 13th!!!! Elder Cook will be coming here and talking with all the Missionaries :) so i am really really looking forward to that and to be able to meet him :) so i will let you know how that goes :) haha but other than that, that is all i can think of from this week :) also here are pictures from this week :) i hope you enjoy :) Remember who you are. Strive to do your best. Write down things you are Grateful for in your life :) you have 17 days till Thanksgiving, write down things you are Grateful for and how you can help serve others :) try and set something for each day and look for something in each day till thanksgiving to thank Heavenly Father for :) try to find something new for each day :) I love you all Palangga gd ko kamo kag nahidlaw gd ako sa inyo!!!!

Keep Smiling :)

pagpalangga,

Elder Merrill 

1. Some puppies of a member :) they are so tiny and super fat and decided to fall asleep by my feet at our dinner appointment, 2. District Meeting!!!!! haha ya district meeting was definitely interesting this week.... Especially for me the District Leader. 3. Stake Conference :) haha this little girl with a bow every time she sees a phone or camera she says sige mapaselfie kita :) which means lets take a selfie haha she is super cute :) 4. So i decided to experiment with some food at the house while my companion was sick last night and made a pancake type thing but it was more like a german pancake for those who don't know what that is google it and make them!!!! they are the best!!!! but it was a weird thing i made but it turned out really good :) haha also i put a thing called choco mucho in it which is like a candy bar that has like cookie in it and caramel and covered in chocolate but basta super good haha weirdest thing i have made or experimented with but it worked out :) haven't gotten sick :)