#82 Meet the Mormons

Monday, February 16, 2014

Hello everyone,

  I am doing awesome.  We had a zone lunch earlier and now I am getting on a boat to go back to Camotes, should be fun. We had a sweet zone conference last week and got to watch "Meet the Mormons." It was a pretty sweet movie.  I would recommend it to anyone that hasn't seen it.  I had a really cool experience this last week.  We were teaching and the investigator wasn't really getting what we were saying even if we used scriptures.  It was kind of becoming a debate and then I just kind of stopped.  I didn't talk for a while.  I just let Elder Amata talk.  Just in the little time the spirit was able to bring something back that I studied a long time ago.  It was exactly what I needed.  It was the meaning of salvation.  Ephesians 2:8 says that we don't need to work to gain salvation. I realized it was salvation from physical death.  It was amazing.  I am so grateful to the Lord. We still have a couple investigators that are on track to be baptized. They just have to keep exercising their faith.  Always seek to have the spirit to be with you.  It is more important than most of us realize.  

Love,

 Elder Roskelley

#81 Lots of meetings

Monday, February 9, 2015

Hello everyone,

  This week has been another busy week.  On Monday we played some basketball with our district and some of the members.  It made me realize how out of shape I am, but I did block pretty much everything which isn't too hard when your opponent is 5'8".  Tuesday we got to go to the mission home and listen to workshops from President Tanner and the assistants.  It was a really awesome spiritual day.  Wednesday we had a Cebu island conference with President David Beck of the General young men presidency and Elder Bowen of the Area presidency.  He reminded us that we needed to talk to everyone.  I love the support that they gave us.  On Thursday we then had zone conference. Yes we have had a lot of meetings.  We still did work also.  We actually have this investigator named Rose who has been coming to church and is now set to be baptized on March 7.  We will see how she continues to progress. The rest of her family is actually members.  Also that is right before transfers so we will see if I will even be here.  One thing that we have been doing that is awesome is that we use last conference talks to teach less actives.  I have seen so many awesome blessings that the Lord has given me.  I know that the book of Mormon is true and I hope to help others know it is true.  We just keep working.  I had some great conversations with other missionaries about how great the mission is.  Also one thing that I have been realizing is the importance of obedience.  The Lord trusts me a lot more when I am obedient.

Love,

Elder Roskelley

#80 Lots of success

Monday, February 2, 2015

Hey everyone,

This week has been great.  We got to go on splits on the island of Camotes.  It was super nice.  Absolutely beautiful and wonderful food from a restaurant on the beach.  We have been trying to find new investigators and some less actives that no one knows where they live.  This area I have probably had the most amount of success.  We had a couple investigators at church and we have a couple close to baptism.  We are still just working hard. This morning we played some sweet b ball.  It is so nice to exercise.  Thanks for all the emails.  Sorry for the short email but I promise photos next week.  

Love,

Elder Roskelley

#79 District activity- planting rice

Monday, January 26, 2015

Hey everyone,

This week has been awesome.  It has kind of felt like it has been more like two weeks.  We had so much happen.  P-day we had some great visits with a part member family.  It was really cool.  Brother was talking about how he is basically treasure hunting for things that the Japanese left here.  They are doing pretty good.  Tuesday I was sick and I literally just slept the whole day.  Wednesday we had zone interviews with President Tanner.  It was awesome.  I love talking to president.  He is one of the nicest people that I know. It was cool to learn that he has rebuilt some cars too.  We talked about that too.  This week the members have been helping us a lot.  We have one member who will be leaving for his mission in February so to get ready he has been going with us.  It is super cool.  We have been working a lot on trying to find new investigators.  We just took a part of an area that got closed.  We just have 4 missionaries in our ward right now instead of 6 like it used to be.  On Thursday we got to help some investigators plant some rice so we did that as a district activity.  We also had to give some sisters in our district a blessing.  We have been super busy. I love it.  I feel like the Lord guides me so much in everything that I do.  He has definitely been my support this week.  I definitely couldn't have done it without Him. I hope all is well back home.  

Love

Elder Roskelley

#78 Got to ride in a car

Monday, January 19, 2015

Hey everyone,

Hope everything is going good back home.  We are doing awesome here.  We just had a transfer day.  I got a new companion.  Elder Tyler transferred to Lapu Lapu and will end his mission there.  My new comp is Elder Amata, he is from Luzon.  He is a little bit younger than me in the mission.  He will go home in September but he has been zone leader longer than I have. This last week we introduced him to a lot of the members and taught some of the recent converts here.   We had one of our new investigators come to church.  We taught him 3 times and then he came.  It worked so well because we had a lot of help from our ward mission leader who is actually in the same high school class as him.  On Tuesday I was also able to go to the island of Camotes.  It was beautiful and I got to ride in a car.  The area that I worked in has a car assigned to it because it is so big.  I kind of felt like an American missionary for a while but it was still really hot when we got out of the car.  We got to also ride probably the slowest boat in the world.  We rode for 8 kilometers and it took 2.5 hours.  Luckily there was a lot of cool people we got to talk to. Our area is doing is great and I am loving Danao.  

Love,

Elder Roskelley

#77 Working hard

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Hello everyone,

 I hope my email is okay today.  Let just explain why.  Yesterday morning I woke up at 3:30 in the morning so that we could catch a boat to be able to go on splits with the other missionaries that are on the other island.  We sailed 8 kilometers and it took 2.5 hours.  Talk about fun.  Then we had a normal work day.  Then this morning I did the same thing so that we could come back.  I have averaged 5 hours of sleep the last 2 nights.  Oh how I am grateful for P-day.   This last week has been awesome for us.  We have worked especially hard and found some awesome new people.  We have this one man that we are teaching that has started regularly reading in the Book of Mormon and we have only taught him three times.  On splits yesterday I met this guy that had some interesting beliefs.  He believed that Jesus Christ was just reincarnated many times after his birth and that is why religions have different name for their deities.  We get to meet some interesting people like this.  I guess you could say we get to meet a wide range of different types of people.  We have also been doing a lot of things for the zone.  We are doing great.  I love how the Lord has given us perfect principles that is followed will bring many blessings.  I am so grateful for the sacrifice of our Savior and for his grace.  It seems that I may be running on just grace power now.  I hope everything is going well back home.  I love you all.  

Love 

Elder Roskelley

  

#76 New Years

Monday, January 5, 2015

Hello everyone,

  I have been doing really good this week.  Work was a little hard with New Year’s but we still had a good week.  Monday last week we had a really good lesson with our new investigator and then we got a ton of rain.  We had actually planned to go over to the other island in our zone so that we could do splits but we had to cancel that because of the storm.  It ended up being okay anyway because on Tuesday my companion got sick, another stomach problem from the Philippines. On Wednesday we had a great lesson with a referral from one of our other investigators. They are doing good.  Then in the evening for New Years Eve we got to watch how to train you dragon 2 and played mafia with our district. We also met a guy that is named Medio Capoy.  If you translate that into cebuano it means "kind of tired." We also got some more rain.  The rest of the days it was normal missionary work and then on Sunday we had 2 investigators come to church.  This week has been amazing for relying on revelation.  I have realized how much we need revelation and how hard we need to work so that the spirit will stay with us.  I know that we will be very blessed for our obedience even if we don't immediately recognize the blessings. 

Love you all,

Elder Roskelley

Missionary power

Delicious pig rotisserie style, a specialty of the Philippines

Christmas

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