"Walk With Faith"

Well howdy fam! i loved reading your emails and sounds like your doing great! this week flew by and it's hard to believe i'm already at the computer again. well this week was a challenging one. my companion is super shy and i can't get him to crack that shell. we also had a lot of traveling to do this week so it cut alot into our proselyting time. it's all right though we still got in some good work done. well rainy season has hit in the phillippines and it rained everyday this week! the rain here is crazy and we are only starting according to all the natives. they say it's gets even worse later on so that should be exciting! i actually like the rain cause it cools down and we aren't walking in a oven. haha but this week was good and filled with good adventures! some great things happened this week and it was neat to see! maybe it's just cause the gloomy weather but i swear all are LA's and investigators just had some big problems and we had to do are best to nourish them with the word of god and invite them to come closer to christ. a neat experience we had this week is we were teaching our investigator brother willy and we gave him a priesthood blessing after we taught about it and he was like "oh that's exactly what i need!" so he has great faith and he said he felt some improvement so that was really cool! it's just amazing to see the spirit of the lord work through us and the people we teach. we were able to meet some new LA's this week and it was good cause they were priesthood and that's exactly what we need in our branch! anyways sunday was kinda of a bummer cause we woke up and it was pouring outside and i immediatly thought to myself this is really going to test our LA's faith. when sacrament meeting started we had like 30 people there and by the time it ended we had like 50 maybe. so it was kind of a bummer not seeing some people that have really been progressing! but there are always days like that on the mission and we just have to push forward and keep enduring. i honestly think there was something the lord wanted me to learn this week and he set some trails in our path and really tested our endurance. i've learned it's times like those when you just think you can't do anymore and want to give up is the time that we need to stand tall by kneeling. then stand up and little taller and walk with faith and everything will be alright. it may be scary at times and we may be down in the dumps but Christ will always be there and we just have to trust in that. And always smile! haha that's at least what i try and do. just be happy. it took me awhile out here to learn that but it makes all the difference! i love you guys and want you to know that i honestly couldn't be happier right now! i love it here and i love this work! this is honestly a marvolous work and a wonder! hope you guys have a good week and enjoy! remember to always read and pray and be strong! i love you guys Elder Machen