August 29

Dear Family and friends,

As you probably guessed it has been another great week in Burgos. It wasn't without challenges but it was great! This past week we had a mission tour where the new area 70 in the Philippines Elder Ardern and his wife came and visited the mission. Elder Ardern is from New Zeland, has a great accent, and is just awesome. Our zone conference with him was such an incredible experience. I think my favorite message from Elder Ardern was about the scriptures. He said, "The Lord packs more into the scriptures than we unpack". He then went through his own personal scriptures study from that morning and how he tried to unpack the verses. It was awesome. Since then my personal scripture study has completely changed. I'm not thinking so much about how many pages I'm reading or how close I am to finishing the Book of Mormon but how I what can I get out of what I read. By doing this I have been amazed with the things I have learned and found. There are treasures on every single page of the Book of Mormon. It's up to us to unpack them. I have found that the Book of Mormon is a powerful source of personal revelation. Often times we find the answers to our prayers in the Book of Mormon. Sister Ardern talked about how we need to "match our message" through obedience, conduct, language and appearance. This was a good reminder for me that I am a missionary of Jesus Christ. I need to represent him in all I do. There are unseen eyes that see the things we as missionaries do so we really need to match our message.

Yesterday was my last sunday of church in Burgos because this week we have stake conference and then on September 11 we will start at our new chapel! I don't know how much I have told you about the new chapel but I'm so excited! Right now our meeting house has literally been a house that the church rented. I have grown to love our little crowded meeting house but I am also so excited to have a real chapel in our area. The member are super excited to. This new chapel is doing awesome things for the work right now because it is in a different area than our meeting house and it's by the main road so everyone sees it and has questions. We also have a lot of progressing investigators close to new church who are preparing for baptism, including Nora, her daughter and the Alcantara Family (Mayann'es family). Our branch continues to grow and become stronger and it makes me so happy!

Here in the Philippines investigators often describe the spirit as "magaan", or "magaan sa loob", which means light (as in not heavy). They say that the heaviness inside them leaves and they literally feel light. I have really thought about this. I love this explaination of the spirit because it is so true. When we spirit isn't with us, the world can really weigh us down. Our sins can make us feel heavy too. Through repentance and through the spirit the things of the world leave us and we come closer to our Heavenly Father. We feel magaan.

This past week we had one teaching experience that really stood out to me. We have an investigator with some real Law of Chastity concerns. Elder Tating and I planned really well for this lesson. When we showed up to the teaching appointment I felt a prompting to change our approach. We did and our lesson ended up being very different from our plan. However is was just what our investigator needed. Through the whole experience I literally felt guided by the Holy Ghost. I felt like the questions I asked and the things I said didn't come from me but from the Holy Ghost. It was a powerful lesson and afterwords Elder Tating said he felt the same way. Our investigator commited to live the Law of Chastity. He knows it's a commandment of God and it's what he needs to do. I also learned the importance of being bold. Not overbearing, but being bold with love. For me not beating around the bush. As we are straightforward with our commitments with our investigators we can show are love for them and invite them to repent. Really it all comes back to love. The gospel is about Love, about our Heavenly Father's and Christ's love for us. I know that Christ loves us all more than we can understand.

Well I love you all. Mahal ko kayo.

Fight the Fight of Faith!

Love Elder Leishman