Merry Christmas to all!!!

Merry Christmas to all my friends, but lucky for the family-I'll make it a personal "Merry Christmas" to you all!

I can't even believe Christmas is here and I'll be honest- the Christmas spirit isn't the same here..I definitely was missing our "traditions" at home. But, here it's just been normal days of work, work, work! :)

Monday-Pday as usual..we went with another sister companionship to the mall. of course :)
Tuesday- WE worked like crazy where we taught 3 investigators who are preparing to be baptized.
Mercy: is the wife of the less active who we are reactivating and she is progressing so well!
Aguado: we struggled with him because his girlfriend was in the last lesson and is hard core Iglesia ni Cristo and sat there laughing at the lesson the whole time..
Melvin is a less active that we are reactivating who brought the investigator Benjie who it extremely nice!
Wednesday-We worked so hard and that night we went to the mission home.  It was so fun to see everyone you haven't seen in forever-like a family reunion..our training was all on companionship and how to have the divine companionship..it made me miss Sis. Boncales because we truly had the perfect companionship, but even though Sis. Person and I are complete opposites, I'm grateful for the opportunity to love and serve her.  That's when we see and feel the true love of Christ!
Thurs- The conference continued as we received training on repentance again and how to become more Christlike.  But, one thing that I loved that Pres. Lopez said was in 3 Nephi 27:13- Do we see yourself in Christ? Do you see Christ in you? Christ condescended and yet we did too as missionaries...from our comfort zone of families, friends, home, cars, etc. to a missionary! Christ had the result of his work when he condescended and saw people change.  The question I ask is: What will be the result of my work? We left that conference on such a spiritual high and it continued throughout the day.  WE committed people to be baptized, our lessons were 100% led by the spirit with Less actives and all we could say was "it's raining ..spirit".
Fri- We saw progression of Bro. Cruz who is our investigator who has been an investigator for 2 years not but smoking is keeping him from baptism.  Well, he started at  7 sticks a day, and we committed him to get down to 5 by that day, but he was already down to 4.  WE continued with our investigators and less actives so we could see their progression on Sunday-if there was any...
Sunday- 12 NEW LESS ACTIVES ATTENDED CHURCH AND WILL START ELIGIBILITY TO RETURN AS ACTIVE MEMBERS..INCREDIBLE.  That truly was our tender mercy of the week and I am so excited to help them continue.  We were speakers and I talked on gifts we can give to the Savior emphasizing kindness thanks to Grandma Jolene's talk and told the story of Tyler being asked to GR.  And bishop followed us and one thing that really impressed me as we're closing the year of 2012 is:

Where did you want to be 5 years ago? Did you make it?
Where do you want to be IN 5 years? How will you get there? ..food for thought!

I am so grateful for this holiday season here in Bacolod..I am grateful for the best gift that I can give which is the gospel.  I truly become so excited when I see progression even in less actives all the way to investigators accepting change and the gospel! I am grateful for the power and authority of my calling and for the love and support that I've felt at this time of year.  I definitely am missing all of you at home, but like you all noticed...it'll be no time before I'll be home..In the mean time, I have work to do! xo
The church is true! I know that Christ performed the perfect act of kindness through the Atonement.  The Atonement IS the gospel and we have every opportunity to apply it in our lives.  I am grateful for the support and guidance the gospel has given to me as I've grown up and grateful for the path that I am on now. 

Merry Christmas to all!! xoxoxoxoxo :D
Sister Arnold