Nabanyigan na si Emil! July 16

Dear Friends and Family, This past week has been a good Week. The highlight of the week was definitely Emil's baptism. I have talked about Emil in a few of my emails but he is a man who's life has completely changed because of the Gospel. He was baptized 12 years ago but we was never confirmed and didn't go to church after his baptism. Because of the Gospel he has found a new hope for life and is always happy. He says that his family is much happier as well. It rained all day before Emil's baptism but the rain let up about 30 minutes before it started so people were able to attend. The spirit was so strong throughout the entire baptism program but especially during the ordinance itself and during Emil's short testimony. During his testimony Emil talked about how he felt like an entire new person and that he didn't know how to explain what he was feeling. We all know that what he was trying to describe was the spirit and we could all feel it so we knew exactly what he was trying to say. One of the great things about the baptism was that Emil's wife attended. We have been trying to teach her for months but she hasn't really wanted anything to do with us. She looked really happy at the baptism and she even attended church yesterday as well for the first time. At church she told us she wanted us to teach her that afternoon so we went and talk her the restoration. She has seen the change in her husband and she told us that from what she has seen and felt she already believe that this church is true. Emil added his simple powerful testimony in the lesson about the Book of Mormon and Joseph smith and it made the lesson amazing. She commited to a baptismal date of August 11. I love bringing families the Gospel. It's what it's all about. This past week we had a lot of punted days, where none of our appointments worked out. At times it can be a little frustrating but I have been trying to think about how Heavenly Father has a plan for everything and will guide us to the people we need to meet and need to teach. Thinking positively makes a big difference. This past week the Lord led us to some wonderful people. One of them is Ronald. Ronald's Father joined the church a couple of years ago in nueva Viscaya and he met the missionaries there. After moving here to San Jose we were the first missinoaires he has met. When we knocked on his door he quickly told us to come in and told us his Story. He wanted to know more about Joseph Smith and we taught him a great lesson. We are going back tomorrow to teach him and his wife. I know that the Lord led us to him. If our schedule had worked out the way we wanted it to we wouldn't have met him. This past week has been a week of learning. I learned a lot. I learned that the Lord will bless us, but not always in the way we want or the way we think he will. For example yesterday most of the investigators that commited to attend church didn't, but as two investigators who we didn't expect at all to attend church did. They were a little bit late to so it was even a little bit more of a surprise. We just need to trust in the Lord and trust that things will work out for the best. But that doesn't mean just waiting. We need to be consistently working and do our part as we wait for the blessing of the Lord to be fulfilled. I love Being a missionary. I love the Lord. San Jose is awesome. I my area and the people here. mahal ko kayo Love Elder Leishman pictures: 2 our from the baptism. 1 is with Elder Revillo and i with Emil and his wife and son.

Rescue! July 9

Dear family and friends, This past week has been amazing! We are seeing so many good things happening in our area. This past week on of our big success has been with the rescue program for less-actives. We have seen really the church be established here in San Jose over the last few months. Yesterday at church we still had high attendance and we had so many less-active members attend church that there was no room for anymore people in our Sunday School class. It was so full. This week we also have temple preparation class starting this week for all the former less-active members and recent converts namin that are preparing to go to the temple. It has been so amazing to see less-active members come back to activity. It brings true joy. One of our success this past week in with the rescue has been with Vincent. Vincent is 21 and belongs to a strong active family. He is the only inactive member and hasn't wanted anything to do with the church. The first time we went to his house to meet him he wouldn't come into the room to talk to us. Our following visits to the family resulted the same way but finally we were able to teach him and started to teach him about the very basics of the Gospel. Prayer, the Book of Mormon, the Restoration and plan of salvation. Over the past few weeks he has rediscoverd his testimony and finally attended church yesterday! His father (a former Bishop) was shocked when we saw his Vincent getting dressed in the morning to go the church with the family and expressed his joy and gratitude after church. He told us he has been praying and fasting for his son and is so excited to see him come back. It made me think of Alma and Mosiah praying for their Sons. Vincent was was warmly welcomed back yesterday and it filled me with joy. This past week we have been struggling to find new investigators. We have been talking to so many people and most people don't want to listen to us because their busy, but we aren't getting down about it. We are still opening our mouths and know we will find the people the Lord is preparing for us. Last friday I went on exchanges with Elder Blackham a trainee in our zone. He is in his second transfer in the field and we worked in Lupao (his area). It was a great exchange. It reminded me a lot of my first exchanges with the zone leaders in Burgos. Working with new misisonaries is always fun becuase they are just so excited about missionary work. They are just filled with excitement and want to work and learn. While working with Elder Blackham I felt his love and sincerity in everything he said as he found and taught. Since he is new he is still really working on Tagalog. Even though his Tagalog wasn't perfect i know the people we taught felt the spirit and the truth of what Elder Blackham said. It made me realize how important it is that we as missionaries speak from our hearts. We need to be sincere and love all people. It's sometimes easy to go though the motions especially when talkilng with people on the street or in your finding but if we love all people we will tough lives. I also told mom a funny story early about the exchanges. You can ask her about it! I love love love this work! mahal ko kayo Love Elder Leishman

July in San Jose! July 1

Dear Family and Friends, This past week was another super busy week! It was still an awesome week and things are starting to pick up in our area! We are working really hard, have found some great new investigators and we had lot's a people attend church yesterday. Last week we had all of our big reports, transfer announcements, and Zone Leader Council in Angeles. ZLC was awesome! The only part that wasn't awesome about ZLC was being late. It takes longer to get to the mission home from San Jose than any other zone for ZLC. So we have to get up really early to make it on time. However last week I set my alarm for p.m. instead of a.m. and we woke up late. We still woke up really early but later than we were supposed to. Then nothing went right with bus's we took. However we ended up getting to ZLC just fine and we weren't too late. I just hate being late for things and always try to be early. However I learned I need to double check my Alarm clock! At our ZLC meeting President Martino talked about Sanctification and it was an amazing! I learned so much about sanctification and the importance of be a clean vessel and sanctified. A couple weeks ago I think I told you about Emil. A less-active who we have been teaching who was experienced a mighty change a heart and has completely changed. His family life is better, he is happy and he has a sense of peace and hope in his life that hasn't been present before. It has been a complete joy watching him change! His 6 year old son Hero's current teacher is a member in our ward as well which has been a big help in bringing them back to church. For the past few weeks we have been trying to find his membership record on mls but we havn't been able to find it. Yesterday we taught him about Baptism and Confirmation and we found out that in 2002 he was baptized but was never confirmed because he moved the day after his baptism. He also doesn't remember who baptized him. This means that he needs to be baptized again. He has already meets the requirements for baptism and we are now helping him prepare to be baptized next week! He is so excited to really be confirmed a member of the church. He also really wants us to teach his wife. We have tried to teach her a few times but havn't been successful yet. We are praying that this week we will have an opportunity to teach her the Gospel and that she will be receptive to our message. Yesterday was fast sunday and I had a wonderful fast. We decided to have a zone fast for our baptisms and less-actives who will return this month and yesterday we saw some miracles happen. I know one of the reasons it happened was because of our fast. One of the miracles was having I have really come to love fasting and the spiritual strength it gives us. When I fast I feel so close the Lord and I my faith increases. Yesterday Brother Vergel De Dios ordained his son Ezekiel (our recent convert) to the Aaronic priesthood. It was a really cool experience to see a father exercise his priesthood to bless the life of his son. The spirit was so strong during the short and simple blessing and they were both glowing when the ordination was over. Kiel is way excited to pass the sacrament next week! The work here in San Jose continues! I really love it here. I love my ward. I love Elder Revillo. I love this great and wonderful work! mahal ko kayo Love Elder Leishman 2 of the pictures are from transfer announcements. One of me and the announcements(we made a puzzle for announcements to have some fun with the zone) and one picture of the zone wearing our zone t-shirts. The last picture is of Elder Revillo and I at ZLC.

Transfer Week! June 23

Dear Family, This past week has been another good week... but a hard week as well. I have never been punted (that's the term we use when our apointments and plans fall through) as much as I have this past week. It happened with investigators, recent converts, less-active members, new contacts and just about every one we could think of. However despite of this all we saw the Lord's hand in the work and were had some awesome unexpected opportunities. One of the Success's of the week was having 3 less-active Melchizedek priesthood holders attend church yesterday. All three of these members are good friends and have all been part of a bishopric. We have been working with them for a long time now and they finally came to church!! It has been a long process due to many concerns but they are finally feeling the joy of the Gospel in their lives again. We were able to visit them more times this because of all appointments that fell through and I think that, that is one of the main reasons why they decided to come to church. It's always exciting to see priesthood holders come back from inactivity! Over the past two weeks Elder Revillo and I decided to use the Book of Mormon more in our teaching. We always use the Book of Mormon but usually we only use a few verses about whatever principle we are teaching. We decided that the thing that would help our investigators , recent converts, and less-actives the most would be simply reading the Book of Mormon. What we have been doing is choosing some of our favorite chapters in the Book of Mormon (ex, Nephi, the Anti-Nephi-Lehi's, the strippling warriors, Lehi's dream ect...) and reading them with whoever we are teaching. Because of this we have seen big changes in the people we teach. They are now excited to read the Book of Mormon and are reading on then own. Because they are reading, they are also coming to church. The Book of Mormon combined with the spirit truly is the most powerful tool in conversion and we all need to feast in it's pages everyday. This past week when we were teaching a referral from Mary Grace (the recent convert from Hawaii) we were teaching about baptism. It was a super powerful lesson and both of our investigators commited to baptism this July! However we asked one of them to say the closing prayer and when she was praying she prayed about Joseph Smith, the Church and Baptism. She started crying and had a hard time finishing her prayer. She didn't know why she was crying because she was happy and her sister was able to explain that it was the spirit. It was a powerful spiritual confirmation to everyone in the room of the Truth fullness of the Gospel and how the Lord answers our prayers through the Holy Ghost. As the subject of my email says it's now transfer week... Usually we don't know what transfers are going to take place until tuesday night but we had our Stake Missionary Correlation meeting yesterday with President Martino and our stake president here and President Martino told me drumroll please........ neither of us will be transfered! This means I will be here in San Jose until the second week of August! I get to go 6 months here. I have been blessed in my mission to be able to spend a good amount of time in all of my areas. I really love San Jose so it will be good to spend another 6 weeks here. I love the ward, my investigators and the less-active's I am working with. I'm excited to keep seeing the progression of San Jose ward 1. I love being a missionary! I just really really Love it! I feel so blessed to be here in San Jose. President told us there are going to be a lot of changes in our zone this week and I am excited for what will happen and for the great work we will do this transfer. mahal ko kayo Love Elder Leishman

Zone Conference, CSP, and Baptisms, Oh My! June 11

Dear Family and Friends, This past week has been amazing!! It was a very busy productive week with lot's of events and lessons. This past week we had a zone conference, 2 exchanges, a service project with the ward, a baptism and the highest sacrament meeting attendance we have had in San Jose for a long time! It was an awesome week! The Vergel De Dios baptism was great! Brother Dexter baptized his two son's Jeremy and Ezekiel. Brother Vergel De Dios only got ordained last week so it was so cool that he could use his priesthood to bless his family. It has been such a joy to see this family come into activity and to re-embrace the Gospel in their lives. J.P. and Kiel's grandma came all the way from Manilla for the Baptism. She is a temple worker there and was overjoyed to see her son's family back in the church. She even bought all of them new sunday clothes that they wore for their confirmation yesterday. The spirit was so strong during the baptism. It was a special thing. One of my favorite parts of the baptism was when J.P (9 years old) enter the font and then look at his family and wave at them with a beaming face. It was a really cool experience. I love the Vergel De Dios Family! This past week we also were able to help two members in our ward with a service project. They are both teachers a little elementary school. On satruday morning we joined a bunch of members and help them clean out the school grounds and painted their tables and desks bright green! All the Elementary schools here are painted in bright neon colors. I love service. It was especially great to work hand in hand with the members. This past week we had two exchanges. One with a companionship in the zone and one with the assistants. The assistants came and surprised us with exchanges Saturday morning. They then attended the baptism with us, worked all day, slept at our house and attended our ward. It was great to work with the assistants again! I learned so much from that exchange. The assistant who worked in our area was Elder Leedom from McCall Idaho. He is an awesome missionary and he teaches by example. It was so fun to teach and find with him and Elder Revillo. When you do misisonary work right it's so much fun! Exchanges are always a great opportunity to learn and grow and I am thankful I get to take part in so many of them. Right now San Jose Zone is doing good. Almost every area is having great success in the work right now! We have set some high goals this month as a zone but the missionaries here are working hard and we are seeing some amazing miracles. In San Jose Zone we have the highest oym's (open your mouths) in the mission right now. We are talking to everyone and because of that are finding the people that God is preparing to receive the Gospel. In our area we have been struggling to find new investigators the past few weeks but this last week we found some awesome investigators and one of them even came to church the day after we taught him! I know that the Lord is preparing people for us. We don't always know who they are but if we open our mouths we will find them. I love being a missionary! Mahal ko kayo, Love Elder Leishman p.s. I started reading the Bible more in my personal study and It has been incredible. I am learning so much through using the Bible and Book of Mormon together. I recommend that!

Tag Ulan Na! June 4

Dear Family and Friends, This past week has been a good week! The Vergel De Dios family is doing awesome as usual! Yesterday Brother Vergel De Dios was ordained to the office of priest, because was only a deacon before. That means that he will be baptized his two son's this saturday! I am so excited for their baptisms. Ezekiel and J.P. and doing great and are very ready for their baptism. The passed their baptismal interview with flying colors. Our district leader was surprised about their understanding of Gospel. This saturday Kiel and J.P.'s grandma is probablly going to up for their baptism. She is a temple worker at the Manila Temple and know she is thrilled that her son and his family has finally come back into activity. This past week we made some good progress with Von who's wife is a member. Teaching him is really different because he knows so much about the church and church doctrine. He know's it better than a lot of members to tell you truth. We have really had to adjust our teaching to teach to his needs it's been a challenge but through revelation and the spirit we have had some great lessons. His main concern with Joining the church is with the word of wisdom but we are workign with him and i know that with his faith and the support of his wife he can overcome his word of wisdom addiction. Faith is so important in everything we do! This past week while studying Ether 12 I was better able to understand how humility, faith and love are connected. With out faith be can't have love for God and without Love and faith we can't be humble. But if we are humble God will show us our weaknesses Ether 12:27 and then we can rely on the Lord with faith and humility to grow and become strong. This week was also the start of Tag-ulan or rainy season. When It's tag-ulan you are lucky to get 1 day where is doesn't rain. Even if you have an umbrella you still get wet so I have tried to take advantage of rain to serve people by offering my umbrella to people who get caught without one. It's been a really good way to serve others in a simple way and take the opportunity to talk to them and introduce the Gospel. It's sometimes hard to find people to talk to when it's raining but it makes finding more a challenge. It's actually really fun and i've been loving it! Funny story of the week: This past week I was on exchanges with one of my housemates in his area and we were walking through a field where a Kalabaw (Caribao) was eating grass. The path we were going to was pretty close to the Kalabaw and I didn't think anything of it because the Kalabaw are usally friendly and are actually scared of people. When we walked past the Kalabaw it looked up at us and wasn't to happy and started after us. Elder Servancia and i took of running with the Kalabaw on our heels! I had never seen a kalabaw move so fast in my life. Thankfully it was tied up so nothing happened. His rope however was about 70 feet long so we still got a nice sprint in. After that we laughed a ton! It was really funny. It was a good moment. It's been a good week. We are working with so many amazing people and I feel so blessed to be assigned here. I know that this is the Lord's work. I love being a misisonary. I feel like we have been working so hard these past couple of weeks but I know that we can work harder. Hardwork, Obedience and Love are the keys to missionary work. mahal ko kayo Love Elder Leishman

Mission Tour with Elder Nelson! May 27

Dear Friends and Family, This week has been quite the week, the highlight of the week by far was our Mission tour with Elder Russell M. Nelson! This was the first time that the entire mission has met for a conference so I was able to see all of my batch and old missionary friends. However the best part of the conference of Course was hearing from Elder Nelson. We were all seated in our seats reading the scriptures when we came in and then we were all able to shake his hand. He was on a really tight schedule so our conference wasn't very long. We first heard from a member of the Area preisdency Elder Neilson and his wife who talks were both amazing but my favorite was Elder Nelson's talk. The spirit was so strong in that room and I listened in awe so the things he said. He gave us some opportunites to ask him questions and the way he answered the questions and his Gospel Knowledge is just on a whole other plane. Right now I want to share some of my favorite things that he shared with us. He talked about the way we look at people and this what he said, "We see what we see, but beyond what you see, see what they can be". He talked about how we need see people for their potential not just as who they are at that moment. He also talked about how the future potential of people is contingent on their encounters with us. He shared a story about meeting a chinese man in china and seeing him in white baptismal clothes. Many years later that man was baptized. This has helped me change the way I now look at people. When I see them I picture them at baptism or in the temple. This has also helped me a lot as I have worked with members of my zone. I seeing the great potential they ahve and it just makes me excited. I feel a greater love for people and am that much more excited about missionary work. Elder Nelso also talked about how it's important to find common ground while teaching people like Ammon did with kind lamoni in Alma 18. That has helped me a lot to. He said so many things that I want to share you. He talked about what a prophet of God see's when he looks in our eyes and he also talked about our families while we are on missions and the blessings they will recieve (D&C31). It was just an amazing experience. I feel truely changed because of the spirit I felt, the promptings I felt, the things I heard and the revelation I recieved. The spirit is just a wonderful thing and I am so thankful for it. I am so thankful for the opportunity I had to be a part of our misison tour I hope that one day I can share more of what I learned with you. This past week we also saw some great success in our work. Our church attendance yesterday was 104 which is the highest I have ever seen it and it's all because of our rescue efforts with the less-actives. I really feel like we are establishing the church in San Jose by helping priesthood holders come back and by helping families get to the temple. This past week we taught a lot of very spiritual lessons but some of my favorite were to the De Dios family, who I have talked about in Previous weeks. We taught them about tithing and it while we were teaching it they talked about how most of the time money is really tight for them. Brother Dexter then told us that he realized that things were hard financially because he hadn't payed his tithing in 10 years. It was really cool to see the spirit testify to him that if he paid his tithing the Lord will open the windows of heaven and pour out blessings on their family. Right now Brother Dexter is getting ready to be ordained as a priest so he can baptize his two boys this upcoming june 9! I love this family so much and love seeing them live the Gospel. Things are going really good here in San Jose. Elder Revillo and I are working well together and I know that this is going to be a great transfer. The zone is also really excited and we have a lot of good missionaries here serving in San Jose right now. June is going to be a month of Miracles! The pictures I attached are all from the conference. The first picture is of my MTC Batch. The sisters in my batch go home the first week of August which is weird to think about! The second picture is of Elder Tomasi and I. It was so good to see and be with Elder Tomasi. The first time I saw the entire mission was at transfer announcements so it was good to see him again! I really really love Elder Tomasi! The last picture is the Burgos family tree. All of us there besides Elder Pioquinto got trained and trained in Burgos. The Elder With the Red hair is my great, great, grandson in the mission! It was also really good to see Elder Pioquinto again. This is his last transfer and I probablly won't see him again before he goes home. I love being a missionary! I love San Jose! Mahal ko kayo Love Elder LEishman Fight the Good Fight of Faith!