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