Caitlin's Chronicles (Sister Bingham in the Philippines)

Maayong hapon!  Sorry again I don't have a lot of time. I did not get transferred but I was informed that I will be training a new missionary. 9/10 arriving sisters are American so she will probably be American. I'm excited for this experience to help me grow but also terrified at the same time. I know Heavenly Father will back me up after all I can do and I'm counting on that this transfer. We had the mission tour this week with Elder and Sister Teh and it was great and inspiring and he shook each of our hands and I learned lots which I unfortunately do not have time to share.  Sister Gellian was baptized this week. She is such a valiant spirit. She is 12 years old and she would always come and listen in on the lessons we had with Seny May. She started coming to church with Romnick and the group of kids you might have seen in pictures. They are from Isio so I have taken to calling them Isio-ites. She wrote us a letter about how she appreciated us teaching her a...

Maayong aga liwat sa inyo tanan! So we had follow-up training meeting last Tuesday for Sister Nanlabi so we went to Bacolod and I saw Sister Hostetter and Sister Clarke and Elder Keller! That's like almost the whole batch from the MTC! It was fun and we learned a lot. I played the piano for the meeting and then Sister Nanlabi and I had to do a practice teaching about the Book of Mormon in front of everyone! It was a little nervewracking but it was good :) On Saturday, it was Sister Nanlabi's birthday and we had a FHE (family home evening) activity at Seny May's house. We invited members, less active members, and nonmembers we are teaching. We taught an object lesson about the Atonement using betadine, bleach, and water :) about how the Atonement can cleanse us of all and any of our sins. We played some games and ate food and made s'mores (shoutout to Elder and Sister Willis). On Sunday, Sister Jan Grace came to church again! With her husband, Eriberto! We were lit...

Maayong adlaw sa inyo tanan! Favorite lesson: We took a whole lesson for the Tablason family and just focused on the Atonement. Most of the people here understand who Christ is and that he sacrificed Himself to save us from our sins but they don't understand the true depth of meaning of the Atonement. The Spirit was incredibly strong and I could see their understanding deepen and it was cool to see. The Atonement means everything, if there was no Atonement there would be no way to progress, no way to change and become better, no way to return to the kingdom of God. The Atonement gives us a way to access healing even from things like physical sickness and mental illnesses and feelings of hurt or loneliness or weakness. Through the atoning blood of Christ, we can be healed, we can become whole and eventually, perfected. Funny story: we were working with Elder and Sister Willis and we were at one house when it began to rain really really hard and the path was already muddy so it j...

Maayong aga sa inyo! Is your faith stronger than the rain? I hope so. That's a question or a phrase they say a lot here. It's been pretty cold and rainy (like home except the cold here is 77-83 degrees) and a lot of people have been deterred from coming to church because of it. They tell you that if the rain is strong, your faith has to be stronger. So we had a fun P day in Kabankalan last week! It was kind of a continuation of my birthday cause Monday here was Sunday (my birthday) in America so. Kabankalan was having a charter festival and each barangay (like neighborhood) made a little building out of bamboo, I took some pictures of some of them. And they were all selling fruits and veggies and I tried the spiky looking one call rambutan, it's so good! We had a lot of fun and we had to keep Elder Willis from buying everything. He did put an offer on the carabao (buffalo) horns that you see in the pictures. He was trying to figure out how to take it home haha. I bought...