"Elders Share With Me Some Gospel"

Kamusta Fam! Well i wasn't expecting to get transfered and i didn't think my comp was either....and we were right hahaha we didn't get transfered! hope i got ya there for a second! anyways it was good we got a new roommate at the house elder slaughter from utah. he brought with him a football so i'm pumped! we actually went to the beach today and played catch on the sand it was way nice! it's always good to play and get rid of some stress and have some fun once in a while! my comp goes home in 6 weeks! it's crazy i've ended up killing 2 out of my 3 compions on the mission so far haha. so things went good this week it was a hectic week though because of transfers and we did lots of traveling so it was exhausting but again went by way fast! so lets see what happened this week? well so much happened i want to tell you a cool and neat experience i had the other night. so before our dinner appointment we went and taught a lesson to this family that is kind of less active. so we were teaching and after the lesson we asked if there was anything he wanted to say and he said well actually elders would you mind giving my kids a blessing? they are leaving tomorrow and i want them to be safe. so of course we said we would be glad to. so 1st off instantly my mind shot towards conference and how many talks were on the priesthood and how special it is that we use it only for rightousness and so i said a quick prayer in my heart that the spirit would help me give this blessing and i had the most comforting feeling come over me and i knew the spirit would be with us, well that was my experiance but then we asked brother if he had the melckezidek priesthood and he said he did and so we suggested that he give the blessing. he looked down and said so humbly elders..i don't know how. my heart melted for this father but i was so excited for the opportunity to teach this father how to give blessings. we went over the steps and and with our help he was able to give his children a fathers blessing. after that i really pondered of what he had just done. Here was a man that held the power and authority from God but didn't know how to use it. I thought wow, we truly our just intrusments in the hand of the lord helping these people in any way possible. as i thought of conference and the talks that were about the priesthood and how special it is i couldn't help but smile knowing that from now on this father is able to use his priesthood power for his family. it was a great and humbling experience for me to know that what we our doing is truly the lords work!!! another cool and funny experience we had this week is we went out to our member out by the beach. he's 70 yrs old and his wife died in January and he always says he thinks he's going to die soon and so he doesn't have much hope for life. i love this guy. every time we get to go teach him i get so excited because we help him water is plants cause he has a lot haha. and he always tells us he doesn't know if he's going to be able to eat cause he has no food and says he can't come to church cause he has no money but week after week he shows up! its amazing the faith he has. anyway so when we teach him we usually try and boost his spirits and help him out and this time he was really down in the dumps! it was so hot outside and his arthritis was really hurtin him so we helped him water his plants and then he was like "alright elders share with me some gospel." we all started laughing and for some reason the whole lesson we were just laughing! we had no idea why but we could barely talk because we were laughing so hard! slowly this man started to lighten up. we saw him start to joke and laugh with us and he even started doing magic for us and telling us stories about when we was young and "macho" haha after we left we asked each other haha "elder why were we laughing so hard there?" haha we honestly didn't know but i couldn't help but think it was for us to help him and lift up his spirits a little. it was a great week with things that just testified to me that this is where i should be and doing the lords work! i love it here in the philippines. you remember how i always used to say at home if i could live in any time era it would be the 1950's. haha i think i said that haha but that's what i feel the philippines is like. life is just simpler here and i love it! and that's a blessing from the lord for sure! i love you family and hope things are going well for you back home! i love and feel your prayers for me and thank you so much for them! oh bytheway conference was way good but i won't really try to expound to much on them because the Prophet and apostles do a lot better job haha. President Uctchdorf's talk was amazing and that was truly inspired!. well i love you guys and can't wait to share with you my experiences from this next week! love you! Elder Machen