At 5:30 in the morning, these two elders woke up to water up to their ankles on their apartment fllor. Typhoon Tino had hit and their neighborhood and street were flooding. Within a half hour, they were standing on their desks and the water was up to their waists and rising. They had been told by a well-meaning individual to stay in their apartment because the flood waters would carry them away, but they knew they needed to get out of their apartment. They broke open a window and swam out. Somehow they climbed up an outer wall and got on their roof, and then walked across rooftops until they were invited into a woman's balcony. I have video footage of them on the balcony with the flood waters down below. The waters carried parked cars down the street and piled them on top of each other. We feel God's hand in their escape!

Though saddened that many of their belongings were carried down stream or are now completely covered in mud, they salvaged what they could from their apartment. We offered our power hose to them and they spent many hours in the front yard hosing off their items. It was our pleasure to offer them a few meals, laundry soap, and listening ears.

Imagine our surprise when they showed up at the house this week with flowers for us and a thank you card for helping them through their ordeal. How can they think outward when they have been dealt such a blow? They are amazing men! I admire their patience and faith. I admire the way they have handled this. They are trying to be optimistic. They are heroes to me.

 

We were handed a surprise today and the contents of the bag made us very happy. A sister missionary who had served her mission in Cebu finished last week, but she did not fly home because her parents were coming to get her, but for some reason they did not come until today. The sister missionary and her parents came to a church building where we were having a meeting, and we stepped out of the meeting to greet them and tell them what a wonderful daughter they had. The mother of the sister missionary handed me a bag and told me it was from our family!  What?! How could that be? Somehow this mother had tracked down one of our children and told him that they were traveling to Cebu and would he like to send something to us. He gathered cards and notes from the grandkids and filled the bag with things like Trader Joes chocolate almonds, powdered sugar, and coconut, all items that are hard, if not impossible to find here. What joy! We were blessed by the thoughtfulness of others.

 

I find this arrangement of "I Feel My Savior's Love" performed by Nicolas Guisti and Gerald Causse to be exquisite! 

I appreciated something specific that happened this week. This little miracle began several weeks ago when I was doing video apartment inspections. As I looked around at the apartment of four sisters and we discussed the supplies they already had, and supplies that needed to be added to the apartment, the sisters requested a bookcase to hold their study books and also copies of the Book of Mormon which they pass out. I searched different stores and found a bookcase which I purchased for them and put in my garage, along with other supplies they requested/needed. The sisters were able to take the other purchased supplies home with them when they came into the city on bus or taxi, but they could never fit the bookcase. This week we had interviews with the missionaries in their area and I thought, "If we are going to be near their apartment, let's take the bookcase in the back of our car and drop it off at their apartment on our way to interviews."

Getting to the missionary apartments is like finding your way through a maze. Most of the time Google Maps gets us there, but a couple of days ago when we were trying to find this sister's apartment, we wound around narrow streets and finally came to a small pedestrian bridge which we could not drive over. We had to back up, call the sisters for help, and approach the apartment a different way. We never would have found the apartment on our own. Thank goodness it was daylight and the sisters could help direct us.

Fast forward to today when an emergency transfer had to happen in the mission. There are 48 apartments in the mission and lo and behold, the emergency transfer involved sisters in that very apartment. As we drove to the apartment again today and the sun was setting, we knew the way and found the apartment without trouble, which was a blessing because this time it was important and time-sensitive.

I think you probably have to be here to imagine the maze of narrow streets and the difficulty of getting around in a vehicle on some of those streets. It is not fun and not safe to be lost or turned around in the mazes, especially in the dark. We are thankful for safety in each and every one of our trips, errands, transfers, deliveries, and rides. We are thankful for a God that looks out for his missionaries. Because we happened to deliver a bookcase to an apartment on Wednesday, we knew the way today:)

 

We are at a training seminar for all of the mission leaders in the Philippines. It is our pleasure and blessing to be staying at a nice hotel. Amidst the hours of formal training, we were given a "free" afternoon today. What a treat it was to sit on this beautiful deck, look out at the ocean, and take time for personal study. There was actually a bit of a breeze which made the heat bearable. I read these words written by John Greenleaf Whittier, and I loved them:

Yet, in the maddening maze of things,

And tossed by storm and flood,

To one fixed trust my spirit clings.

I know that God is good!

Yes, He is good! The pace of life sometimes feels like a maddening maze, and I am tossed about by earthquakes, displaced missionaries, and a flood of responsibilities. Yet, I have a fixed trust in God, and my spirit clings to the testimony I have of His goodness, His strength, His mercy, and the power He bestows on each of us as we strive to keep our covenants.

For he [God] has all power, all wisdom, and all understanding; he comprehendeth all things, and he is a merciful Being. Blessed be the name of my God, who has been mindful of us, wanderers in a strange land (Alma 26: 35, 36).

 

Another city, another restaurant, another mango shake.

It is difficult to find places that are safe to eat, until we ask someone who we trust who lives in the city, and then they point us towards a hidden restaurant, and the food is good, and we don't get sick, and the restaurant serves mango shakes. For a minute we forget about the issues and concerns of the mission, and we enjoy the cool and delicious treat. Cebu Island has the best mangoes in the world!

 

Sometimes mission miracles are large and sometimes they are small, but I appreciate them all. There are many elders in our mission who barely have enough clothing to get by. We have been working on quietly (and individually) supplying them with white shirts and ties, but they are left to find pants on their own. Pants are easier to come by. The missionaries can sometimes find pants at thrift stores, but fresh white shirts are hard to find. At a recent mission conference, a sister told me that an elder sitting across from her had a hole in his pants. This elder was only in the city that day, and would be going back to his assigned area later. I knew that someone (I don't remember who) had given me two new pairs of pants and told me to give them to an elder. I went to my mission supply cupboard and put the two pairs of pants in a bag. When an opportunity arose, I spoke with the elder and asked him if he would like to try on a couple pairs of pants. He was delighted to try them on. I told him that the size may not be right, and to our great surprise the size on the pants was exactly what he needed. How can that be? How can I not remember from what source I received the pants? Whoever gave them to me was directed! They were exactly the size that the elder needed, and he was happy to receive them! I am amazed at the goodness of God.

 

 

I am blessed to have lived on the earth when President Russell Nelson was the prophet. I will miss him! The breadth of the direction he gave was immense! He challenged me spiritually, and I accepted several of his invitations which stretched my testimony and learning. One such was his invitation to "Learn about God and how He works." I am sure I never would have delved into the scriptures with the intent to learn about God the Father in detail, were it not for President Nelson's invitation. As the prophet of God on the earth, he offered many promises to us, and blessed us, along with inviting us to do certain things. He lifted us as individuals, as a church, and in my opinion, he lifted the world with his light. He is a man of unmatched intelligence and dedication, a man who adored his family and showed his devotion to them, and a man who taught the world to love one another and live as the Savior did. Thank you President Nelson!

 

I received word this week that a dear friend passed away. How I love her! I now have another friend in heaven and I look forward to the day I see her again.

Here is what I learned from Sally:

Sally remained upbeat and cheerful, even humorous, though her health and mobility declined. She was attentive to others and interested in conversation. 

Her love of the Book of Mormon was evident. I often walked into her room and saw her with the Book of Mormon on her lap, reading from it. She told me it was her favorite book and that she loved it. 

Sally adored her family! She loved showing me pictures of them and telling me about each member of her family. She knew about their lives, their concerns, and their joys. She prayed with faith for them, and she looked forward to phone calls from family. Surely the best treat of all was when one of her children picked her up, and it was not for the purpose of driving her to another doctor's appointment, but it was to take her to one of their homes for a family dinner or event. She lived for those special occasions! 

She faced adversity with patience and perspective. She lovingly served her special-needs daughter until she could no longer physically do so. And, Sally loved music! She begged for me to play the piano for her, and her knowledge of classical composers impressed me. She would name the composer as soon as I began a classical piece. She loved classical music best of all, but she also loved church music and songs from musicals. 

I am truly grateful to have known her. Her life and example strengthened me.

 

You can get to this pretty mall in less than ten minutes from our house.  I really like the outdoor terrace section of the mall. There is a large array of stores and restaurants in the mall. Two things happened this week at the mall that made me feel like I was losing my mind. One day Matthew and I parked in the underground parking garage. We took a different elevator to the parking garage than we had when we came up from the garage.  I did not think this would be a problem because we remembered we were parked in the J8 section, and we could just find the letters/numbers to find our section and spot. We were carrying heavy grocery bags because we did some grocery shopping while at the mall, and we had purchased a couple of reams of paper from the paper store. When we exited the elevator into the parking garage we noticed we were in the D section and it felt like it was 110 degrees. We walked from D to E, then F and G and then a parking garage exit appeared. But wait, where was section J? We knew we were on the correct parking garage floor, and that we had parked in J8. We went back to the elevator lugging our heavy sacks and asked a security attendant where section J was. He said simply, "J is by A." Oh, well! We didn't know! How would we know that J would be by A!?

Another day, a senior missionary and I went to the mall to purchase supplies for missionary apartments, and we ended up with a large cart of items. We entered an elevator and told the elevator attendant that we needed parking garage level B1. I noticed as the elevator stopped on each floor that the red-numbered signage in the elevator did not match the signage on the wall of the floor just outside of the elevator. Sure enough, when the elevator stopped, the red numbers in the elevator read B2, and we reminded the attendant that we needed floor B1, and she said, "B1 is B2." 

I am so confused and I feel like I am really dumb. I am learning to smile, nod, and just go with it.