Hey!
so yeah, this week was awesome! it has gone by so fast!!
so first off, we had exchanges on friday in Alang-Alang!! which was my second area, i was there for 6 months, and probably is one of my favorite  areas..i just LOVE the members there! so some of the members knew that i was coming back, so one of the sisters in the branch cooked lunch for us. she is a really good cook! her name is sister michelle cerdon. she actually served in this mission with Nate peters! she is really nice and will do anything for anyone...i'll just say that her mansion in heaven will be right next to Jesus Christ's cuz she serves people so much!
so a couple awesome things happened. in alang alang, i got to work with one of our converts! he is working on his mission papers! it made me really happy to see that he is still active and now preparing for a mission. so he worked with us. and i got to see a lot of the members that i visited! it was awesome to see them again. i would love to be assigned there again!! and then i got to visit the Branch president. he is doing awesome. he said that since i left, 3 families have been sealed and they are increasing in Mel. Priesthood! so that made me so happy to see that the area is progressing. the area presidency expects Alang Alang to become a stake in the future...that would be awesome! so yeah, it was really awesome to go to one of my previous areas again and see the members again. also, i saw the Branch President of my 1st area, i miss my first area too. so that was cool, i saw two previous Branch Presidents in one day! awesome! i have become really close to all the Branch Presidents in my areas. thats the first place you start to gain trust of the members.

so i want to tell you about one of our investigators..so this week, we have been teaching this investigator named Ephraim Medeja. and he is what you would call a Golden Investigator! he is only 17 and soon to be 18. he was the one who actually found us. and everytime we teach him, he just soaks it in and we are just amazed at some of his comments and questions that he has for us. i've never met a 17 year old that is so willing to serve God. i would even say he is at a higher level than i was when i was 17..spiritual wise. so his parents are Catholic, and they actually don't want him to be baptized. they have signed him up in seminary to become a catholic Priest. so thats the struggle right now, is getting his parents permission and getting him out of the catholic seminar school thing. but he really is awesome. like we taught him about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and he said,"i want to give my whole self to the Lord, i want to share this with other people"..do you know any 17 year old that says things like that?? awesome huh? we were like blown away when we heard that. and then he asked," can i be baptized even tho my parents don't want me to"?? unfortunately no, so he might have to wait till he is 18. but thats in October, so its not to far away. if it were up to us, he could be baptized now...or even earlier. like he is just so ready..it seems like it to us any ways. we asked him why he listens to us, and why he wants to be baptized and he said "this is where i feel the spirit of the Lord, and where ever the spirit is that is where i will be." and then he asked, "how do i find out my spiritual calling"?... amazing questions huh? he has like 20 written down questions just like these..like deep sincere questions. we are just blown away that he is only 17, and he is taking everything in. progressing so fast! has come to church 2 times now, and he even WORKED with us! amazing huh! in our first lesson, Elder Cypers(my Batch) and i were on exchanges and we taught him the Message of the Restoration, and compared the apostasy like a house (christ church) and then a storm came and house fell, and all the people grabbed all the peices of the house and made their own house (their own church). and compared it to why we have so many churches today. and that just clicked for him. he says that he has been going to all the churches, looking for the whole truth. and we testified that all the truths of the gospel has been restored and the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day saints is the Lords Restored church and has the fulness of the Gospel.. and he says that he knows that it is the truth. and he cares so much about everyone that he just wants to share this with everyone! its awesome! i can go on and on about him! cool how his name is Ephraim huh? so thats some of our success that we have been having in our area..so like i said earlier, our challenge right now is getting his parents to let him get baptized. if he gets baptized, which he really wants, he will probably get dis owned from his family. and so his parents are making him go to seminary in the Catholic church to become a priest. so if you could keep him in your prayers, that his family's hearts may be softened and that he can be baptized, that would really help. and that he can get out of the catholic crap, i mean class..haha so yeah, thats Ephraim.

so the mission right now...is doing Great!! i love it! absolutely love it! and next week elder Cook is comming! i cant wait! i have prepared some questions for him. do any of you have any questions that i should ask him?? i am so excited! my companion and i are doing great! we get a long like...cookies and milk! i really love our companionship, and hope no one transfers! which is next Week!! time is going so fast!
hope all is well, have a great week. you are all in my prayers! I love you all!
Love Elder Nelson

ps, idk if you saw on the news, manila is flooded, but not my mission. we are fine and safe..no calamities..yet. we did have an earthquake like two weeks ago, but that was really fast and was only for like 1 second. so we are safe..no worries!

Hey! so this week was awesome! a lot of things happened this week, its
been a hard week tho, meaning we have been working really hard. idk
why, but it just feels like we are working so much harder right now. i
feel like i have been doing my best my whole mission, working my
hardest, but now...maybe i am just seeing the results from the hard
work. for example:
this week we have been doing quite a bit of tracting actually. my
whole mission we have been focusing on reactivating the less active so
they asked us not to do tracting, but now its like half and half. they
want us to find those elect people who are ready for the gospel. so
this week we did some tracting, and it was awesome! so on wednesday
during tracting, we were led to this guy names Rodger, and we tried to
introduce ourselves to him, but he was kinda rude about it. he
wouldn't really let us talk. he told us that he worked Jordan Salera,
who is in our ward, and already knows about us. and he kept sharing
scriptures from the bible and saying that no man can enter in to the
kindgom of god with out a new life (he didn't mention baptism, but
thats probably what he meant) but anyways, he just didn't really give
us a chance to say anything so i told him, "brother, thank you for
sharing with us, we hope that you would be kind enough to let us share
with you too becuase you did all the talking. so we are having a
family home evening this friday with Jordan Salera (who is in our
ward, he works for him). and we would like you to come, so you are
invited." and thats about all i said, and left. i invited him to the
FHE expecting him not to come cuz i didn't think he was interested at
all. but what i said kinda hit him cuz on friday, Guess who showed up
to the FHE?? RODGER!! and guess what we found out? he is a pastor!!
for one of the Born again Churches. (no wonder why he wouldn't let us
share to him on wednesday). so we had the lesson and i explained all
the principles up to the restoration, and then we watched the
Restoration video. and it was awesome! he was quiet for the whole
thing.
then at the end, we asked if he had a question, and of course, he did!
so he pulled out his bible shared some scripture in tagalog, and then
said,"i have studied the Bible and i have never found Joseph smith in
the Bible, its not there!". as soon as he said that, i just got so
happy, cuz i knew the answer! Jordan(member in our ward) got really
excited too. so i told Rodger, the pastor, to open to Ezekiel
37:16.(about the stick of judah and the stick of Joseph) and he read
it from his bible, and he actually didn't have the king james version,
so we gave him our king james version and he read it, then pondered
it, then compared it to his bible and pondered some more. and i
testified to him the Joseph smith is in the bible, and that we know he
is a true prophet, and we need to pray and ask God if he is and thru
the Holg Ghost we will tell us that it is true. and ah, it was
awesome! Rodger had nothing to say after that.it stumped him, cuz he
was really positive that the bible did not include anything about
Joseph Smith. it felt really good to use the scriptures to answer his
question, and then to prove that our message is true. but even tho
that is evidence that it is true, it is useless if you don't pray and
find out from the Holy Ghost. so that was my experience this week with
a pastor.
also, during the FHE, we had two other workers of Jordan there, that
weren't yet members yet. and they loved the lesson. their names were
John carlo and Sam (young man and young woman both 17.) and they
really wondered how to know if it was true, and so we shared moroni
10:3-5 and that answered their question. and John Carlo, he told us
that he was wondering where the truth was. he said that it was
bothering him so much that he couldn't sleep at nights, and when he
would wake up it was like he had no sleep. so he was really wondering
where the truth was. and so we committed him to read and pray about
our message. and we know that he will find that truth if he does that!
man it was awesome! spirit was so strong!
a lot more things happened this week but becuase of time i don't have
time to tell you all of them but don't worry they are in my journal!
:)
just know im doing great! i love you all! and i love being a
missionary! my companion is the best! favorite companion so far!! so
hope you all have a great day!
Love Elder Nelson

maupay nga kulop ha iyo ngatanan!!
so yeah, We got Robbed this week! man it was ah, crazy. i've never been robbed before, and i want my stuff back! so our apartment has a gate on the door and then the door itself wouldn't lock. so we have just been locking the gate on the door. and i guess someone broke one of the bars on our gate and it was only big enough to fit a little kid thru it. and they stole our sandals, my companions tennis shoes, they stole my music speaker, laundry soap, and one of our cooking pots!! it stil had food in it!! we cooked mac n cheese the night before and it still had some left over in it..and it was probably spoiled by then..but they took it. so we reported it to the police and the next day we were talking to a couple members and they were like, "elders, did you really get robbed??" we were like "yeah, but how did you find out"? they said that they heard it on the news...we were on the radio the next day being announced that we had been robbed. they said that two mormons had been robbed from the neighborhood that we were in..so that was kinda funny that they put us on the radio..haha but they didn't take too much stuff..just enough to be bothered about it! luckily they didn't take any money. so we got our land lord to fix our door, so now it locks now, and they won't get in! we know that it was kids tho..cuz only kids can brake in thru that little gate...but idk why they would take our shoes..they wouldn't fit in those!!..so we went to the police station to report it and holy cow..they are really great...(cough cough) they all were like on face book, and they drove us to our apartment to check it out and they guy wasn't even in a uniform..probably didn't even have a badge! haah they are just funny...really casual.. you know, i actually have seen the police here do one productive thing here since i've been here..haha they don't do much....
so we had a baptism this week too. it was quite a miracle with what happened. before Darwin could get baptized he had to get married first. and getting married here is a pain the the butt!! there is alot of paper work and its very expensive. and the stake pres. and bishop didn't have their license yet to marry someone. so they were trying to get married by the mayor..and they just were asking for more and more money. but long story short, they got married on friday and got baptized on Saturday. it was awesome! he is solid! his wife is super small, but is already a member, and they plan on going to the temple next year! so that was awesome!
so yesterday, one of the members from AlangAlang (my 2nd area) came to our ward yesterday so i was able to get an update on all the members. and she said that Mark Boneff (one of our baptisms when i was there) just got his mission papers finished and is submitting them now! he's going on a mission! sweet!! so that was awesome to here! so i cant wait to go on exchanges in alang alang!! i love my zone, area, companion.
Elder Woolley, my companion, and i sing alot before and after we do something..like planning, studies, lessons..just everything. and its supper fun. im learning how to blend and sings parts like bass and tenor. its supper fun! i kinda wish i did choir before my mission...but o well.ha
so this week we have been putting extra effort in preparing lessons for our investigators..so we prepared a lesson for this guy named james. and it was about prophets and the book of mormon and praying to know the truth of it. and it was an awesome lesson. we taught in unity, the spirit was really strong, and he was understanding us....and long story short...he rejected our message! sometimes we just don't understand...no matter how simple or clear we teach, even if they feel the spirit and the truthfulness of it...they still have the choice to reject it. so thats what i've been noticing this week is they still have the free agency to accept our message..and its our job to teach with power and authority and thats what we have been doing. i love teaching! its so fun, and i just love seeing peoples lives change!
so yep, thats about all that happened this week. great week! hope you enjoyed it! i hope you had a great week too! i know that this is the lords work and i am so happy and proud to be apart of it! i love you all! have a great week! gotta go! mahal ko kayo!!
Love, Elder Nelson

so like i said, Life is great for me right now! i love my mission! i would love to end my mission in this area! i could def. stay here for a long time! the members are great, and the Sacrament meeting was REVERENT!! which is really rare! there wasn't too much noise during sacrament, i was really shocked and impressed, cuz all my areas...sacrament isn't that reverent. so so far, so good! i love it here. its my first area that is a ward!

and we have an american investigator names Joseph. and he is from california. and has lived her for 7+ years now. and he is what you would call a "Golden Investigator". he is awesome! it was hard to teach in all english, its really weird! hard! but was like, "i really want to know if this book( the book of mormon) is from God. I think it is but i want to be 100% sure, im at 80-90% sure that it is,  but i want to know for sure" and we couldn't believe what we were hearing. and we talked about the steps of the gospel (faith, repentance, baptism, HG, and endure to the end) and we found out that he had been a heavy drinker for years...like from age 13 to 46(his age now) drinks 7 days a week, and he has cut it down to 2 days a week. and he said that he has faith, and really wants to get rid of this addiction. so we ended up giving him a blessing, and according to his faith, we'll see if that helped him. i know that it well. i haven't seen so much desire and faith here like i did from this guy. he said that he really wants to follow Jesus Christ. and ah, he is just awesome! but still has a long ways to go. so i have hope for him that all will turn out great!

so life is great here. and i hope is is great for you all as well. i love it here, and am having a great time! i love you all! thank you for all the support and prayers! if there is anything i can do for you let me know! I love you!
Love, Elder Nelson

so this week has been full of exchanges! been crzy busy. it was fun, we had exchanges on wednesday with the assistants and that morning their car had a flat tire. so we had to fix it. and it took forever. it took like 1 1/2 hour to find a jack that would be big enough to lift up the van. and then we finally looked in a spot that we would never had imagined...that was were the jack was that belonged to the van. (the asian cars are weird!!) so we got it jacked up and got the lug nuts off that were super tight! and then, the tire would NOT come off! we were pulling, shimmering and jimmering that tire for like 20 mins! then we started kicking, still wouldn't come off. then we said a prayer to be blessed witht the strength to take it off. we said amen and acted on faith...Nothing! still wouldn't come off. so we were so confused why it wouldn't come off. then a guy that stopped by was telling us what we needed to do, and i told him, "we need to kick the tire so that it'll come off" (trust me, i know how to replace a tire..haha") then this guy told me, in english, "i know, but your kick has no force"...haha i was like Oh, you did not just say that...really?? so that got me a little...riled-up..so i went to show him my kick DID have force. so i just turned and gave that tire a kick, and the tire popped right off!! haha i was actually really shocked...but then it was funny cuz he just told me that my kick had no force. so that was the funny highlight of the week. i hope you understand, it made sense to me and is funny in my head.haha

but from the exchanges with the Assistants, elder Ausban and i visited our Recent convert, Ryan, and we talked to him about when we saw him with the cigarettes. and it was a really spiritual lesson. i looked him in the eyes and told him i loved him, and told him that everytime i see people that don't follow the commandments it hurts my heart. and i told him that what he did hurt me, but i assured him that he can be forgiven and that i am here to help him. both our eyes were wet with tears, it was really spiritual. and we got a peice of papper and made like an action plan for what he will do to stop. so i think it will really help. i really love that kid. i bought him a tripple book of mormon hard bound english and gave it too him. ..i still have faith and hope for him that he'll start coming to church...even though he DID NOT come yesterday to church...ah! but i guess he was sleeping..must have slept in too late. but at least he didn't go to the disco ... 

but what was cool., was his friend that was with him that i saw smoking came to church yesterday. and pulled me aside and told me that he had stopped smoking, and stopped doing what was bad, and said that he repented and got rid of his bad habits. he said that he realized that it wasn't good. so that made me happy! 5 of them are coming to church and getting ready to be baptized..so i'm exctied! but this week is transfer week, and there is rumor that the zone leaders are going to be put in Catarman, which means we would be pulled out...or i get transfered..which is possible..maybe i'll go to cebuano area...idk.

but i am loving it here! And learning alot! i love the work! i love my mission and i love our savior. thank you for your prayers and support! i love you! love you all!! so much! and miss you, and think of you(all) often!

have a great day!/week!

love, Elder Nelson

hi!!
so i'll try and be fast, idon't have much time. so this week has been awesome!! first was zone conference in Calbayog which is elder Ebisa's new area (my last companio) so afterwards i got to work with him in his area, and it was awesome! felt like we were companions again! he is really one of my favorite companions! then the next day, president Andaya had asked 6 of us from our zone to help translate and be volunteers for the medical mission that came to Samar Island. the US mercy ship was there along with the US marines and Navy doctors. so we got to help translate for the american doctors to the filipino patients. it was really awesome! and so nice to talk with AMERICANS!!!! and the doctors that had on a light blue shirt were actually members. i guess the church actually funded 75% of this medical mission. what they do is they go to a place for 15 days and do opperations on the ship and just help the people and its all free! so they were in calbayog for 15 days but we only got to help one day, and we had the yellow helping hands vests on. it was a great experience!
This week, the training that we recieved was to find professionals, those elect people. cuz most of the less active are these just really pore people, and what the church needs here are some good leaders. so we are looking for the elect. and friday night, we went to our investigators house (Jomar's house) and it just happens to be one of the biggest houses, and they invited us right in. our purpose there was to meet his father and teach him cuz he is a professional. and he was finally there! and so we meet him, built some trust and he let us teach him. we taught him and his family the message of the restoration. is was a great lesson! very spiritual! and afterwards he expressed that he always wondered why there were so many religions yet only One God and he wondered which one really was the true church. so we testified that our message was true and that the church was true. and we committed him to pray and to ask God if it is true..if our message is true. and he said that he would. and he is looking forward to our next visit. so i think something could happen from this. i hope and pray that he will continue to listen to us! his name is Carlito Mariano. so if you want, please keep him in your prayers that he will except our message! so i was so happy after that and feel like there is a lot of potential there! so that is one of our success stories. and guess what? one of my investigators, Jhonald, went to the temple!! just the other month or so..the one that got baptized right after i left. ah it made me so happy and brought tears to my eyes!! so glad that he isn't less active!! (there are so many less active here!!!) but really, i was happy to hear that!
we also had our stake general priesthood session, and i was one of the main speakers. it went good, and it was a good turn out. we then had permission to play basketball afterwards with the priesthood. it was fun! and some of these filipinos are ballers! they know how to play!! so it was fun!
so my week was fun and awesome! i love it here, and it has just been a very..spiritual week this week. i had a great fast sunday..even tho the start of sacrament started with 26 people there...but more showed up..(a lot of the priesthood that attended stake priesthood saturday didn't come cuz they were tired..probably from basketball..haha)
but i just want you to know that i know this church is true! i know the Book of Mormon is true, and i know that Jesus Christ lives! and i love him.
thanks for all your support! love you all!!
Love
Elder Nelson

hey, How is everyone?! how is life??
well my life is doing great! its full of ups and downs, and full of surprises!
so this week was crzy busy! so i'll update you about our baptisms!
yep, we had 2 baptisms!! Ryan, the investigator that i have been
telling you about every week, yep thats him, he got baptized. and his
5 friends are all coming to church and to activities and will most
likely get baptized on july 7! so keep them in your prayers!! i think
most of them are solid and will be great missionaries. one of them is
18 and is just soaking up everything that we are teaching him. he
still has a long ways to go. but we also had Sister Rose Marie that
got Baptized! she like begged us to baptized so we thought we would
let her. she is awesome! and i know that this decision that she made
will bless her life incredibly. so this week, i saw the fruit of our
labor. like i told you all before, i was kinda wondering if i was
making an impact in our area cuz we are always gone and feel like we
aren't doing a lot of work. but after i thought that, thats when i met
ryan. and now look at him, he is now baptized and now a member of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints! so its been so neat to
see this whole process in his life from the start all the way to his
baptism, plus more. and his friends as well! so thats the status with
our investigators.
I am enjoying my calling as well.i love working with stake leaders,
and i am preparing my talk for this saturday for the Stake Priesthood
meeting. im excited and honored to give a talk.
 
so these last few weeks, the church has organized or funded a medical
mission in the philippines.. and President has asked that my companion
and i volunteer to be translators. so we went on saturday and there
were a ton of people. and all the army and police men have these huge
machine guns (even security guards here have huge guns, like sawed off
shot guns and they probably don't even know how to use them...) and
once they saw us, they had us go straight to the front (probably cuz
they saw that we were americans) and so we went to the front and long
story short, they told us that they didn't need us cuz they had too
many volunteers. so we were so disappointed. we were so excited to
help. cuz the doctors are americans and most of them are members. and
they need translators. so i was really looking forward to talk to some
members from america. but the US navy and army was there..and wow, its
so weird to see americans here! its weird. its actually quite
comforting that i am not the only white person in the middle of no
where. and man, i forgot how big americans are. i was so use to being
the biggest person here, and when i saw how big some army men are, i
was like wow they are huge! but im sure in america its no big deal. so
this week, wednesday and thursday we get to help translate again, and
this time we'll get in cuz we are going with pres. Andaya. so we are
excited!
so thats about all thats going on. i am really enjoying it here, and
time is going by so fast! i cant believe its almost July, and time is
just counting down. its almost transfers i feel like. we are so busy.
lets just say it doesn't take long for me to fall asleep when my head
hits my pillows..im usually so tired that i am too tired to get into
my covers.. haha so thanks for everything! i love you all and thank
you all for your prayers and support! i know i couldn't do it without
you all. i pray for you all as well. have a great day! Just remember,
the Church is always True! its So true, and we are so blessed to be
members of the True Church!
Love you!
Love, Elder Nelson