A rainy pday in the Philippines

Dear Family and Friends,

Right now it's a very rainy P-day. It's rainy season now so it rains a lot. The good part about rainy season is things are starting to cool down. My area is also getting very green and beautiful. As usual this past week has been a good one! It has been different to lead the area and to have a new companion but things are good. Elder Calianga is from Quezon City. He is really serious and doesn't like to talk a lot but he is a great teacher. We have only been together for 5 days and one of them was a split so things are just beginning. It will be a good transfer for sure. Right now our baptismal goal for this transfer is 6. I hope and pray that our investigators can continue to progress and gain strong testimonies about the gospel. This Saturday we have a baptism for Pepito and next saturday hopefully we will have 4 more. I don't know how much I have told you about Pepito but he is awesome. He has been the most prepared person to here the Gospel that I've taught yet. Before we met him he had been praying to find the religion with the word of Christ. A member casually introduced us to him as we were leaving an appointment and we decided to OYM him. From there on he has kept every commitment and has gained a testimony that this is the true church. The Tanedo family has been his fellowshippers and without them his church attendance wouldn't be possible. I am so grateful for the help of the members here in the work. I have realized that every investigator that we are teaching that is really progressing has some connection to the members. Members are so important in missionary work. Without them conversion and retention is very difficult.

Because the zone leaders are in my district, my companion is automatically the district leader. Because Elder Pioquinto and Elder Calianga have been district leaders I go on a lot of splits with the zone leaders. I even had a split with the AP's. Companionship exchanges are such a great opportunity to learn. I have been grateful for the opportunities to see other missionaries teaching styles, get feedback and set goals to improve.

Right now one of my barriers in my teaching is my Tagalog. It's coming slowly and surely but it's not where i want it to be. I can say pretty much anything I want to but not in the way I want to. I want to teach in clear simple terms but it's hard in Tagalog. However I have to say the gift of tongues is very real. There have been times in teaching situations where I have taught and said things I didn't completly understand in Tagalog but later learned the meaning of what I said and realized how it was what the investigator needed to hear.

This past week while studying about the atonement the phrase "infinite sacrifice" really stood out to me. I thought about how I have found comfort through the atonement in my trials and pains. I then thought about the pains and trials of the people of the Philippines, then the people of the world then about all the "living creatures" to ever live on the earth. I can't even come close understanding the magnitude of the suffering and sacrifice that our Savior Jesus Christ did for us. This helped me better understand that Jesus Christ knows our pains. Every single one of them.

Things are good in Burgos. I love the work. I love the Gospel.

Mahal Kita

Love Elder Leishman

ps. about the second picture. can you say zone jerseys?

A New Companion!

June 15, 2010

Dear Family, Friends and Sportsfans,

Drumroll please...... My new companion will be Elder Calianga! The actual transfer happens tomorrow so I havn't met him yet. I heard he's awesome and I'm really excited. This next transfer will be a great opportunity to set goals, to learn and to grow.

The work in Burgos is great right now and I pray that it continues to improve. Elder Pioquinto is going to be a zone leader this next transfer. Not going to lie, I'm going to miss the Elder. We have grown a lot closer these past two weeks. I've realized how much he helped me. I'm really grateful for the opportunities I had to be companions with him. This past week Hinckly's baptism was great! President and Sister Puzey came unannounced to the baptism which was a great! All the members, investigators and Hinckly were 30 minutes late..... The 45 minutes of sitting with President Puzey with no members or investigators were a very long 45 minutes! ha. However everything worked out just fine. It was a very spiritual baptism. Hinckly's father was able to do the baptizing which was what we were hoping for. I'll attach a few pictures of the baptism for you. Hinckly was confirmed on Sunday and is now a great happy new member of the church!

This past Sunday we had some visitors at the Burgos Branch. The Banson Family attended church in Burgos and it was great to meet them! They were so kind and so awesome! They showed me pictures of Tanner Leishman, Grandpa, Mom and dad in Manila last year. It was great to spend a few minutes with them. They really love Grandpa Lolo. After church they gave us a ride home and gave Elder Pioquinto and I 2 big bags of food! It was the good stuff too! I am so grateful for their kindness. Mom, it would be great if you could express my gratitude to them. I also am attaching a picture of The Banson Family and I. Last week dad asked about the food here. The question is where to begin. I love the Filipino food. My favorite food is fruit. Mango, Bananas, Pomello, Papaya, Guyabano, Pineapple and Langka. To say the Least I eat a lot of Fruit. I also eat a lot of rice. My favorite ulam (dishes) here are adobo, sinagang pork, paksiw talapia, adabong sitaw ect... Really it's all good.

This past week I think I put on a little bit of the weight I lost. I couple weeks ago I was pretty sick after eating at a member's house but besides that my nothing has made me too sick. The first week I didn't know how I was going to eat fish for two years but now I actually really enjoy a nice piece of fish. Needless to say the food here is amazing! Mom, also in my package I would love a copy of my mission call. This past week I got the deodorant dad sent! It was a great moment in my day and I have really been enjoying having my old spice back.

These past week I have spent some time studying ch 6 in Preach my gospel (Christlike attributes.) I have learned that just as important as what we do is who we are. As a missionary I am a representative of Jesus Christ and I need to strive to be like him. However becoming Christlike is a lifelong process that we commit one day, one decision at a time. Before I came to the Philippines I kind of had this idea that when I got here I would magically become a great missionary. I would be able to speak the language, be a good teacher be Christlike and all the other things that we picture a missionary being. It didn't take me one hour to realize this wasn't the case. These past two months have been very humbling and I have realized how we need to Lord in everything we do. I am nothing without the Lord. I can't become the missionary I need to be without the Help of the lord. Progress towards becoming Christlike and the missionary I need to become happens one decision, one day at a time. The time to focus on is now. I have also learned that If we aren't progressing we are digressing. Progress is more rapid when we set goals and strive to achieve them.

I am so thankful for the opportunity to be a missionary. I love the Gospel. I am so thankful to have the gospel in my life. I love the Lord. I love being a missionary. I love the Filipino people. I love my family. I'm glad you all had a great trip to California. I love you all so much! Everyday I realize just how much I love my family and how lucky and blessed we are in our family. I didn't get to write a lot of the things I wanted to write about investigators and the work but I'll give you a good update on Monday about the work and my new companion. If you ever have questions for me don't be afraid to ask. I love reading your emails and hearing about your lives.

Mahal Kita

Love Elder Leishman

Another Lunes sa Burgos

Dear family and friends,


This past week has been great!!!! It is amazing to see the Lord's hand in his work. Yesterday President and Sister Puzey attended our branch for church. Our attendance was 93 which is way more than our average of 65. We also had 10 investigators attend sacrament meeting which is by far the most we've had. It was such a powerful fast and testimony meeting. The spirit was so strong as the members bore their testimonies about our savior Jesus Christ. It was also great to hear President and sister Puzey bear their testimonies. The first time they attended Burgos branch was a year and a half ago and the attendance was 15. The area got reopened to missionary work a year ago and the growth in the strength of the Branch has been great! Everyday I realize more and more how blessed I am to be a missionary and to be assigned in Burgos. This week we have a baptism for Hinckly, the investigator who is 14 and is the only non-member in his family. He has a strong testimony and is ready to be baptized. His dad will be the one performing the baptism which will be so great! I really excited for his baptism and pray that things will work out this week. We found a new investigator this week named Jackielynn. Jackielynn is 17 and she really wants to know the truth. She reads all of her reading assignments and more. She also takes notes and writes down questions she has when she reads. Her cousins are members and have already helped her stop drinking coffee. We also have one investigator named Pipito who is from Bisayas. He struggles with Tagalog but is studying it so he can better understand the gospel. Right now his baptismal goal date is June 25. This past week really was a very successful week and it was largely due to the help of the members. Now with the help of the members we are teaching twice as many lessons as we were in my first few weeks. The lessons are also better because more than half of them have been with a member present. I have seen so much better misisonary work is when members are involved. I now have a strong testimony of the importance of members in missionary work. Being members of this church we all have a responsibility to be missionaries. It isn't always easy but it's always worth it. Right now two our our recent converts are struggling. Nicko and Joshua Haro. These two brothers are awesome. The problem is their mom is discouraging them from going to church. School started again today and now with their studies their mother wants them to think about school. It's a hard situation. Their mother is a former investigator and we are trying to gain her trust and teach her again but she doesn't want to. They have good support from the members but their parents are the main problem. I pray that we can find a way to help Nicko and Joshua.


This past week I spent some time studying faith. Ether 12:6 really stood out to me, "for ye receive no witness until after the trail of your faith". Faith is our foundation, our first building block. However it can't be strengthened until it is used, tried and tested. We all have trials, obsticals and barriers which try our faith. As we follow god's commandments when it's the hardest, when we use our faith when the trials are the most difficult that's when testimonies are strengthen and we feel the blessings of the Lord in our life. For a lot of our investigators they have real trials of their faith. However I have seen that as they try their faith they gain their testimonies and see blessings in their lives.


The work in Burgos is great. The field is white. I'm so thankful to be a missionary. This upcoming week is transfers so I will be emailing on Wednesday not Monday. Elder Pioquinto is going to transfer for sure. Next week I'll get my followup trainer but I have no idea who he is, but I'm sure he'll be great.


Fight the Fight of Faith


Mahal Kita


Love Elder Leishman


ps. the pictures are from a CSP. The brother is our branch president President Valdez.

June Malapit Na!

Dear Family and Friends,

It has been another great week in Burgos! This past month our attendance at church has increased every week and our work is increasing. May has definately been great. I can't belive that in two days it will be June! Yesterday in church our Branch President gave us 20 minutes at the end of our fifth sunday meeting to review the Branch Mission Plan with the members. It was so great to be able to coordinate with all the members. Through our little meeting we were able to establish a plan for the retention of our new converts, assign members to visit less active families and have more effective fellow shipping. When I first got to Burgos there was little work with members. They rarely would accompany us to lessons, there was no home teaching, and there wasn't a really strong spirit for missionary work. It has been so great to see the more members get involved with the work and see how much more effective the work is when you have the trust and support of the members. Right now one of the most active member missionaries in Tatay Remigio. The change that has occured in him is so amazing! A couple months ago he hated the missionaries. He has felt the blessings of the gospel his life and has changed dramatically because so. Now he wants to share the blessings he feels with others. Now the Tanedos are visiting less active families, Tatay remigio helps others go to church, he lets us use his house to teach an investigator and shares his testimony and he just is astig!

Right now we have an investigator named Hinckley. He is 14 and is the only non member in his family. He isn't a member because his family has moved around a lot. He was been staying in Burgos for his summer vacation. He has come to church everyweek and I didn't even know he wasn't a member till his father came and visited the branch and told us so. We have been teaching him but he already has a great gospel background. It has been really great to teach him. Right now his baptism date is June 11, the week before he goes back to his house to go back to school. The timing has worked out great with him. I pray that things continue to work out. We are already starting to coordinate with the missionaries in the area of his house for when he returns to school.

This past week I started the Book of Mormon again and I really love the example of Nephi. No matter how hard the situation, how big the task, how pesimistic his family is, the attitude of Nephi is "I will go and do". When the first attempt to get the plates from Laban failed Nephi said "Let us go up again". Nephi had great trust in the Lord. We need to become like Nephi. We need to be exactly obedient. When things are hard, when things don't work out, when we feel inqadequate we need to "go and do the things that the Lord commands". When we don't succeed and we feel down we need to "Go up again". As we do so our trust in the Lord will grow. We will become great like Nephi and be able to do all things.

Well right now we are heading into Tag-ulan or rainy season. From what I hear Bountiful has been having it's own rainy season. It rains every day and usually when it rains it pours. However the rain is pretty warm. The plants are turning green and farmers are starting to flood their fields. It is so beautiful in my area right now! One of the things I love about the Philippines is the babershops. getting a hair cut is awesome. The babershops are little hole in the wall places and the tatay's that cut your hair know what their doing! They use the old school tools and methods and are good at it. When their done they even give you a little shoulder massage. The Philippines is an amazing place. I have new experiences everyday that I could only have here. The Philippines is really starting to feel like my home. I am so grateful to be able to serve the Lord here.

Well till next week!

Mahal Kita

Love Elder Leishman

May Pics

What a treat to receive pics from Joe's first baptism in the Philippines! You can read the last blog entry for the narration on the pics. Nothin like a little rainstorm in the Philippines :)

Magandang Araw!

Dear Family and Friends,


This past week was a great one! Everything went perfectly with our four baptisms and confirmations! It was an awesome experience. As you can see our baptismal font is a river and it's beautiful. The spirit was so strong and there was a smile on every face there. You couldn't hold back the joy. It really was a different feeling but it was so great. It was especially touching to see the gratitude and happiness of Sister Tanedo. She spoke at the baptism and her remarks were perfect. For her it isn't just about the baptism of her husband. It's about becoming an eternal family. Tatay and Sister Tanedo have already started their family history and are now counting the time till they can go to the temple to become sealed as a family and perform ordinances for their ancestors. It helped me realize just how blessed I am to have the family that I have and to have been born into the church. This experienced also helped me realize how important it is to focus our missionary work on families. We need to try and find and teach families. The gospel blesses families in so many ways and only through the gospel can we live with our loved ones again.


This week I had another great experience. One of the things I have struggled with these past few weeks have been trying to recognize and follow the promptings of the spirit. The spirit is absolutely essential in every phase of missionary work. This past week I realized that I had been relying to much on myself, my own skills and what I thought should be done rather than seeking the Lord's guidance through the spirit for the things I should say and do. One morning we were on our way to our first appointment (Hinckly, who is the farthest from our apartment) and I decided to pray. I was sitting on the back of a noisy bumpy trike it wasn't quite peaceful or reverent but I prayed really really really hard to have the spirit with me that day as I taught so I would know what to say and do. Our next teaching experience was great. I taught the restoration and as I shared the story of Joseph Smith and bore my testimony about him I felt the spirit like I hadn't felt teaching for a while. The words came to my mouth. I taught the restoration a little differently than I usually do but it was what my investigators needed to here. I felt the spirit and I know that my investigators felt the spirit too. This experience taught me that to have the spirit as my companion I need to plead with the Lord for guidance. I also need to be humble enough to recognize the promptings of the spirit and follow them even if they don't make sense. I have a feeling that this is something I'm going to have to work hard for throughout my mission.


This week I came across a scripture in Mathew that really stood out to me. mathew 16:25 "For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it". This scripture applies all people. When we are focused on ourselves and our own personal needs we can't can't become true disciples of Christ. When we loose ourselves in the service of others we find out more about ourselves and about our Savior. When we serve others we are happy and we can really get to know our Savior.


I don't know what things were like this past week in the states but here there were tons of people that said the world was going to end on May 21 and 6:00. The world didn't end but it was actually really funny because at about 5:30 a big storm rolled in. I laughed.


As far as the pictures go. The first three are from our baptisms and the last one was taken last night. When it rains in the Philippines it really rains! It actually feels really good! Last night it started to rain right after we started the hour and a half walk home. Thankfully a nice man on a trike picked us up halfway home so we didn't have to walk the full way in the rain. However we were already as wet as wet could be! I actually love the rain here so no complaints on my part!


Fight the Fight Faith


Mahal Kita


Love Elder Leishman

Jubilee!

Dear family and friends,


This past week has been a good one! This upcoming week we have 4 baptisms and I am sooooooo excited! Tatay Tanedo, Nicko and Joshua Haro, and Rolando Organista will all be baptized on may 19. It's going to be a great day. They are all very prepared to be baptised. Besides these four investigators we have a lot of other investigators. The problem is most of them aren't progressing or are having a difficult time following commitments. One of these investigators is named Arturo Lenuza. He is awesome and pays a lot of attention during the lessons and has great comments. The problem right now is I think he is being more converted to us(Elder Pioquinto and I) rather than the gospel. He has expressed his concern that when we leave he doesn't know if he'll have the desire to go to church. Right now our focus with him is helping him gain a stronger testimony in the gospel and find effective fellowshippers in the ward to give him support. This past saturday there were Jubilee Celebrations all around the Philippines celebrating the 50 year aniversery of missionary work in the Philippines. President Puzey encouraged us all to attend. It was a great experience to go to the Tarlac Stake Jubilee and watch the primary, youth and young adults participate in cultural songs, dances, clothes, special numbers and watch some slide shows about the growth of the church in the Philippines since the first missionaries started their work. It was an awesome experience. Throughout the Jubilee thought about lucky I am to be here among these great wonderful people continuing the great work of the Lord here in the Philippines. I also had a very strong feeling about how great my responsibility as a missionary is here. I have seen how much of a difference the missionaries make here. In my area where there isn't a big church foundation the members look to the missionaries for everything. It has been very humbling to see how much of an impact we make and makes you realize that members and nonmembers see everything you do (so everything you do needs to me in done in obedience and diligence to the Lord)


This past week I had an exchange with one of our zone leaders which was a great experience. It was great to see another missionary's style of teaching and get good feedback about how I can improve as a missionary. One thing I learned was the importance of asking questions in effective teaching. For me I find my self talking too much and teaching too little. Talking isn't teaching. As we ask effective questions it helps investigators think about the principles we teach and find answers to their questions. It also helps me as a missionary be able to better discern their needs, concerns and understanding. I still have a lot of progression to make with my teaching skills but I have seen some great things happen as I have tried to teach more and talk less.


This past week I recieved a letter from Elder Tomasi which was great!! Elder Tomasi has to be one of the greatest people ever! He didn't have a church email when he came so his new email is eldertomasi@gmail.com. If any of you have a spare minute or two to drop him an email I'm sure it would mean a lot to him. In his letter he expressed his gratitude for all the support he recieved from all you while we were in the mtc. He is doing great!


This week is the 4 month mark of my mission..... It's crazy how fast these four months have gone by. It makes me realize how much I need to make everyday count.


Mahal Kita


Elder Leishman


Fight the Fight of Faith