Chicken Legs

Hello there everyone,

Since we just emailed on Wednesday this email might be kind of short, but it was a good couple days! ha On Saturday Rufina was baptized!!! YAY! Two little girls from less active families were also baptized with her and she joked that she's like their grandma getting baptized with them..ha but it went great. I really love her so much :)

However the day of her baptism was SO hot, we were trying to teach people and just dripping sweat, it was even hard to breath. Then we rode the jeep to the church and it started to sprinkle and then it dumped on us while we were walking and we had one little broken umbrella! We showed up to the church looking like we'd jumped in a pool...but it was crazy weather. Sadly because of that Sister Clark got a fever of 101 that night, but I was a good doctor and she was all better the next morning :)

So I can't remember if I told you this but I'm starting to write a miracle a day in my journal, and I decided I could share a few with you now. One day it cooled down a little bit at night and me and Sister Clark realized that we had chicken legs!! We never realized how small they are when they're not all swollen!! So Elder Kumar couldn't tease me about my "chubby leg" as he calls it :) haha It was awesome! It gave us hope that when we go home we'll be smaller! Also, another miracle was that little broken umbrella we had for atleast a little protection because actually it was one we had borrowed from Rufina and bringing back to her...neither of us had our own with us. And then another good one, one night we were both not feeling good from walking around all day in the HOTTEST weather you can imagine and there was orange juice on sale for 25 pesos!! And for the size it was, it usually would be like double that. I was so excited! I drank it all (800 mL) in like 5 minutes. ha It was great :)

That's one thing though that I don't think I could have imagined before I came here-the heat. It might only be around 100 degrees, but then when you add the humidity it literally is hotter than anything I've ever been in. You just have sweat pouring down you all day, and literally when I change into pajamas my clothes are just wet...it's so nasty! There are tons of ants everywhere, even in our water, that we have to pick out and you just feel itchy from the sweat. Not going to lie it's a little miserable sometimes, but it definitely makes me appreciate laying in my bed each night with the fan full blast blowing on my face :) It's an adventure for sure.

Well the rest of this week was good, Sister Evelyn is still doing great preparing for her new baptismal date, and then our other investigator sister Luz is really doing great too. Neither have drank coffee again so I think they'll be ok! :) Sadly transfers is next week so I might not be here :( But me and Sister Clark are hoping we can have one more together.. Oh I also spoke in sacrament and that went pretty good. I spoke about the "it" from the story of the 2,000 stripling warriors, saying their mother's knew "it" and I think it was pretty good :) ha But that was basically my week.

I love you all so much, thank you for all your support! Hope you're doing great :)

LOVE,

Sister Benesch

ONE YEAR

Hey familia,

Can you believe it's been ONE YEAR that I've been here in the Philippines? I cannot. That's pretty exciting :) Hope you're all doing great...I have SO much to tell you from this week.

Let me give you all the bad first then I'll give you the good... SO probably the hardest experience of my entire mission happened this last week. Sister Evelyn was not baptized on Saturday, and I'll probably be transfered before she even is. We went to teach her on Thursday (2 DAYS) before she was supposed to be baptized and she was so so excited...and then she told us that that morning she'd been so hungry, and she didn't have money to buy food, so she took some coffee from her sister to mix with her milk...and as she told us the story I literally felt my heart break. Me and Sister Clark's new motto is "A teaspoon can kill you" because we realized that Satan really can get us to do those tiny little things that'll lead to so much greater consequences...like not being worthy to receive those saving ordinances. So that broke my heart and I think I cried myself to sleep that night..But we've gone back to teach her twice and we've really helped her back up on her feet and she's working toward being baptized on May 17th! Hopefully this time it all works out :) And then that same day everything just went wrong...Almost none of our appointments worked out and we were just walking in the hot hot sun, and then I ripped my skirt Big time on a tricycle and we didn't know what to do, so I tried to cover it up with pulling my shirt down, then I saw this rusty safety pin on the road and said "Yes! God loves me!" And then it broke when I tried to use it...so that was sad. haha But then a less active had one that helped so that was good. But it was just kinda a hard day.

But Easter was great!!

Me and Sister Clark wore real cute Easter outfits and made a huge feast! We had our french toast, eggs, and bacon and it was so delicious! We even found stuff to make guacamole and bought expensive tortilla chips and it was Amazing!!!! We taught Sister Criste and Sister Andres to decorate eggs with crayons because they don't do that here...so it was lots of fun :)

Today was temple day so that has been great...I love the temple so much! And since it is my 1 year mark, I woke up to Sister Clark "flopping" on me at 3 am and there was a big sign that the sisters made saying "Happy One Year!!" and little notes to me...I felt like it was my birthday :) ha BUT I didn't really like waking up at 3..I'm a little tired and it's only noon. ha But do you remember Elder Ferrin? He is the one that called you when I landed here in the Philippines before going to the MTC to say I was safe, and he's from Farmington? Well we saw him today when we were by the temple so we went and talked to him and his wife. They're so nice! He showed us some information on our new mission president though! It's President Burton and he's from Bountiful! So that'll be way cool :)

And finally, the best for last. Sister Luzviminda :) Our new investigator that lives with members...is incredible! We asked if she'd read her assignment and she explained it all perfect to us, and then told us that as she read and then prayed she really felt the spirit tell her it was true and it was such a great feeling, different than she'd ever had before, and then she said "I think I need to be baptized." YAY! We were so excited :) She's so smart, and she just gets it! The spirit is strong and she's so excited to do all she can...so she'll be baptized on May 17 also because she has to give up coffee also. I love her so much :) We really have great investigators right now...Rufina will be interviewed later tonight because she was on vacation but I'm pretty positive she's all ready to be baptized Saturday!! I really don't want to transfer in 2 weeks. I love it here so much! The work is great :) But definitely my lesson this week was how important each decision we make is. Even the little tiny things that we think no one sees or doesn't matter...God is always watching and we're in charge of ourselves to return to Him. It really matters what we do and who we are.

I love you all so much, wish me luck because I am speaking on Sunday! Hopefully it'll be good :P ha LOVE YOU!!!!

Love,

Sister Benesch

Clouds and Rainbows (and mirrors)

How is everybody?? Actually I heard about the earthquake Colton experienced and thought it was crazy how he's experienced more than me and he's still in the states! ha This week was actually really good though, not too much happened with work, because we had a Great Zone Conference, and we also got to go to the broadcast of Women's Conference! I was super excited about that because I thought we wouldn't be able to, but we did and it was so great!! And yes mama, the Philippines was part of it, it's the big group of cute primary kids in like 3 rows with the whitish background :)  You can hear the word patnubay pretty clear..it means guide :)

But zone conference was so great this time. Everybody did great workshops, especially Sister Sperry's with just the sisters about virtue and remembering who we are as daughters of God. And then President Sperry did one about the scattering and gathering of Israel and our role in it as missionaries and members and it was INCREDIBLE. I wish I could just send you the notes I took on it...he's so incredible with scriptures and history. He definitely is the reason why I LOVE reading the scriptures so much now, it's incredible! But it was hilarious because me and Sister Clark were sitting in the back row and Pres. and Sister Sperry right behind us...at one point I was looking in this mirror trying to fix my crazy hair because it was so humid and all the sudden I see President's face Way close behind me looking at me in the mirror! I can't explain it as funny as it was..but it was hilarious!! And then later on while Sister Sperry was giving her workshop to everybody she said a quote that "We should try to be a rainbow in someone else's cloud" and Pres. leans forward between us and whispers "I'd like to be a cloud in front of someone else's rainbow..." and of course knowing me..I BURST out laughing!!! And could Not stop. The rest of Sister Sperry's workshop!! hahaha It was Hilarious!! Then he goes "Don't you dare tell Sister Sperry I said that!" haha I love President Sperry, I'm sad he'll only be here a couple more months.

Besides that our investigators are doing pretty good. Honestly though, I'm worried about Evelyn. Every time we teach we find another problem...like before it was basically everything with the Word of Wisdom, even law of chastity, and now we found out she has to interview with President because of abortion. She also shared that she owes a lot of money to the Municipio (I donno in English..) and just things that make us worry...so we're really praying about what to do and if we should postpone the baptism or not. Because where she lives there are Terrible terrible influences all the time and she'd be totally alone. But she's made a lot of changes and progress so hopefully she'll be ok :) Rufina is also doing Great...but on Sunday the funniest thing happened! We walked in and I saw her but her hair was Way super short! I tell her I like her haircut and she just goes OFF...talking about how mad she is about it and she doesn't know what happened, she was so mad she didn't even pay for it! She said "panget" about 50 times which means ugly..hahahaa I was trying so hard to not laugh, but it was hilarious! Poor lady..I'm sure it will grow back though :)

Also brother Jose just keeps doing better and better! He wore a white shirt and tie to church this week and he looked so great! It's incredible to see people just be more and more converted to the gospel :) When we were teaching him this week about the temple he just started crying talking about his family and how grateful he is for all the gospel has brought into his life...he's seriously amazing. I feel so so grateful and lucky I got to teach him!

Also this week I read two Really amazing talks from October Conference 2012..."Converted unto the Lord" by Elder Bednar, and "The First Great Commandment" by Elder Holland. I recommend both :) They both just have incredible messages about really being deeply converted to the gospel, not just having a testimony, and showing our love for God by obedience. I'm SO excited for conference next weekend!!

So it's been really great here, I'm still just trying to hold on to every single day because it goes SO fast!!! I can't believe I've practically been here a year...it's too fast! But I love it :) Love you all so much, hope you're all doing great!!!!

Love,

Sister Benesch

PS here's me and Sis Clark at zone conference :)

Welcome Sister Clark

Hey Hey everybody :)

Hope everyone is doing great at home, this week has been really great! We had transfers last Wednesday and my new companion is Sister Clark!! She is So great...probably will be one of my very favorite companions. She's from San Jose, California and is so much fun! I really feel like we're just like best friends, I think the hardest thing about our companionship is that we have a hard time getting out on time and getting to bed on time because we just keep talking and talking! ha I told her that she'll be added to the list of things me, Sister Miner and Sister Kalama will be doing when we get home :) So I'm way excited for this transfer...we've had tons of fun and I think we'll get lots of great work done.

As far as our investigators go, everyone is doing great! Sister Evelyn is working towards her bap. date of April 19, and then Sister Refina will be April 26. They're both still just really progressing and it's been so incredible teaching them because the spirit is so strong and you can just see the light changing in their faces! It's incredible to see what changes the gospel actually brings into people's lives, and I feel so blessed and lucky to be a part of it. Sadly we haven't really found any new investigators so besides them we don't have much news...that will be something we work on this week!

This week though the other sisters had a baptism for Sister Dionisio, the mom of my "boyfriend"! ha It was so great. Her husband was just baptized last transfer so he was able to baptize her and it was so great to watch. Then when she came back in they asked her favorite hymn to sing and she said Praise to the Man...when we all started singing the spirit was just SO strong. It was incredible to feel and know that I'm here doing this great work, and people are receiving the gospel all because of Joseph Smith. I really have strengthened my testimony here serving, I know that he saw God the Father and Jesus Christ and that through him the true church of Jesus Christ was restored..I'm so grateful. It was a really great experience.

The work really is going great though, we're busy all the time going to appointments and it's really a blessing because most my mission I've spent so much time every day just walking and walking not really knowing where to go..ha But we have lots of less-actives in this area and we've had some really great experiences just dropping by those that we haven't seen in awhile and sharing with them. We have one less active that has had tons of way hard challenges, and now she doesn't have money to go to church, but as we were sitting there sharing with her about putting our trust in God and staying true to the covenants that we have, the spirit was so strong-even with the karaoke Blasting outside at her neighbors. ha It's just so great to see that even when the world is noisy, the spirit can still speak louder if we're listening. I really feel so lucky to be serving here and learning so much. I feel like every week I just learn more and more and appreciate being her so much. I feel like the longer I'm here I just love my mission more..I can't believe that I'll be hitting ONE year here just this month! The time goes so fast. But I've been so blessed :)

Hope you all are doing great, thank you so much for all your support and love!! I love you all SO much!!!! Hopefully I'll have some funny stories for next week :)

LOVE,

Sister Benesch

PS Here is me and Sis Clark, and then a picture from the baptism..

Look who my boyfriend is looking at ;) haha