Quick Update!

quick update!

this week was good! I learned a lot. 

I was asked what color my skin is. by a very cute kid. I'm not sure. He was really confused though.

I said "wow there's a lot of Utap (a cookie like snack) in the sky!" should have been ulap...

We had a baptism! Ivan is 12 and he is awesome. He knows this is true. He really reads and prays. Lets all try it and remember our feelings when we knew the Savior loved us for the first time.

I'm sister Untong's left arm! It's so fun to help her. It's hilarious to see her try to do things alone. But we have great companionship unity.

I love this work. I don't really like cockroaches. I don't mind lizards. I did not really enjoy my experience of eating pork blood. 

My mission is difficult for me. But It is also the perfect opportunity for me to grow. And I see miracles every day. I love you all. Remember to pray because people are waiting for your help. And you can answer their prayers and obtain answers to your own. 

--

Sister Smith

Letter to Mom:

(side note: Both Brandon and I asked her if she got our emails, since she sometimes didn't say anything about what we wrote... we just wanted to make sure they were going through, so she didn't think we were forgetting her. So, she told us what was what, and wrote us each our own email. ;) Gotta love that girl!)

Hi!

First of all, I get your emails every week. I read them, I try to answer them and remember what you wrote. Haha. But I would like you to try to read around 10 emails, write your mission president, try to answer the people you care about and write a group email and upload pictures and do it all in less than an hour with sometimes stupid keyboards and computers. :) Also I feel like you guys never answer my emails directly either. ;)

I love the things you shared from the ensign. Hopefully I can read all of those. I don't know if the Liahona has all the same articles but I will probably get the Liahona tomorrow. I've been really trying to focus on patience and hope and just letting myself be satisfied and happy. It is hard for me to do but I am seeing huge changes in myself lately. I feel like I am starting to really love the work.I liked how you talked about your attitude. It was something I was pondering about myself earlier this week. Also Me and you have similar personalities. 

My companion is pretty great. She's kindof frustrating sometimes but I like her. She believes in ghosts and witchcraft and likes to talk about it sometimes,and things like apparently there's a sister serving in our mission whose patriarchal blessing says she'll die on her mission (what if she chose not to go on a mission?) things like that. But I just let her chat sometimes and don't really respond because I hate that kind of stuff. I have been trying to not pay attention to the things that bother me but focus on loving and serving and the companionship is really enjoyable like that.

I got a cute shirt at the ukay ukay (like used clothes?) around 62 cents. It's cute. 

I have studied hope a lot this week. I read one talk in the RS session from 1996 Oct conf. It hit me really hard because she said by being hopeless and despairing we are actually allowing the adversary to kill our spirits. It was very direct and bold and then I studied more about itand I feel like I'm starting to really understand hope. 

Keep praying for me and believing in me. I know that if you say the light is coming it's coming. I think a lot about what you said about the sun. I hope someday you can see a sunset here :)

Love your daughter.

p.s. tell cooper that the boy he wrote got baptized. IT is a MIRACLE. He's only 14, so he couldn't be baptized unless a parent was reactivated. his parents were inactive for 30 YEARS. and so I don'tknow the story but I do know it had to have been a miracle. 

p.s.did anyone tag me in a pic on Facebook?

Letter to Dad: 

I don't know if you read my emails either. I always read them I just can never decide or remember what to reply to in the short time I have. 

My new area is okay. The apartment is rough but I will live. I am right in Urdaneta so the air is horrible but other than that, it's pretty in my area. Lots of fields and stuff. Lots of farmers. Farming is a lot harder here. 

The camp sounds like lots of fun. I hope you are feeling better. You should probably stop playing. Almost every time you play you get hurt. 

One thing I wanted to share with you is this. Ashley Hill sent it last week. 

Want to hear something cool that I learned? So when one of the counselors was on her mission Elder Bednar came. On the way to the mission home he told the President to pull over. Then he looked at him and said, "The only way this generation will escape a pornography addiction is through doing family history, because their ancestors know how important it is and will protect them." I thought that was super intense when I heard that. The only way? Makes me want to make everyone do family history. Especially my family! But that is a super good thing to be able to share in my family history class! 

I thought that was pretty cool. Along with the other promises Elder Bednar has given, family history is pretty important.

Oh yeah. My bishop's wife's family lives in Roosevelt. Their last name is Sasser. he's a bishop. THought that was funny.

I read a good talk/article this week I think called "Always Remember Him." It was about how we need to remember Christ's suffering, and that He suffered so badly for the sole purpose of bringing us to repentance. It had some cool insights about the sacrament and stuff. 

My investigators. Helen and Jomar. they are 21. they will be baptized the 29th. they are really excited. they are boyfriend/girlfriend but they don'tlive together. jolimar is tyler's age. We really can't teach him if we can't teach his family. And to teach his family we have to go far in the bukid (fields). But I hope we can find a way. There are 8 kids in his family. They have no electricity. They all have to work really hard to survive. But I hope there's a way. Others Nesty/Jun. Lori/Joshua. A RC-Salmasan family. My ward is URdaneta 2nd ward. 

You can also pray for me to have more faith to find people. 

One story...hmmm.

We were teaching an old man who is less active. He doesn't have a testimony of Joseph Smith or the BoM. But after we battled for a while (we were very nice) and tried to explain why Nephi isn't in the bible, we invited him to pray. In his prayer he asked for forgiveness for arguing the truth, and asked for Heavenly father to lead us to more people. It was a very specific prayer. so I hope he understood more than he let on. I am becoming more and more convinced that you cannot become less active or leave the church if you are truly reading and studying the book of mormon. LIke Jeffrey R Holland said something likeyou will have to go over or around the BOM to get out of this church.

Well.I better go. Now that I answered you and mom I don't have time for the group email ;) I  love you. I am so grateful for you. I can't imagine being in my comp's place. Her parents are muslim still. Thanks for the support and patience.