crazy week!!

Blog: This week will be the last week of transfer! and transfer day changed from thursday to tuesday!!!! but of coarse we have no idea what will happen till next week! but this transfer went by so fast, and i only have FOUR left!!!! that's why i'm asking President for an extension! hopefully i'll get it i'll gladly extend six more months!
we had a crazy week this week! we went to the temple on tuesday to attend a session, it felt so good inside, I could really feel Gods love. then we went back to the temple on saturday as tour guides for the temple tour for investigators, we stood in the sun for about 5 hours straight and took peoples pictures in front of the temple and helped them feel welcome, it was so nice to see all there smiling faces filled with the spirit of christ and gods love for them! but my companion and i did get a little sunburned. then there was sunday the busiest craziest sunday ever! first we had 7 investigators!!! 5 were filipino, 1 was chinese, and 1 was korean!!! so we had to arrange who was sitting with who so that no one sat alone and who was going with them to class, the chinese lady needed a translater and our bishop's nephew happen to be visiting and he happens to be recently back from his misson in Taiwan and speaks mandarin chinese so that was aranged, the korean girl stayed with her friend but after sacrament told us she was going to start going to church closer to her house. i happen to have acquired a korean Book of Mormon, but had left it at the house cuz we had not seen her for a few weeks, so once every one was settled in suday school: gospel principles class, sister Schostak and i slipped away, went back to our apartment got the Book of Mormon and went back to church. after we gave it to her, she was so excited and happy she cried and promised she would read it. then we had to arrange with the chinese lady when we could visit her and find out where she lived exactly, which took two sisters tagalog, english, and chinese and the bishops nephew to finally get directions written and a map drawn!!!! after it all sister schostak and i sat down and looked and felt like we just came out of a whirl-wind! is was awesome! love this work, love this people, and love that i know know at least 2 langueges so i can know what is going on!!!!
love you all! write me!
-Sister Stephens

I'm speakin' English!!

blog: "I'm speakin' english!!!!" This would be my most used line this week, strange?... no cuz my very new american companion is at the stage of here mission where she doesn't know what anyone is saying, right before everything makes sense. so some times i'll say stuff to her in english and she'll be like 'what did you say?' so i'd say it again, 'what?!' -"i'm speakin' english Sister!" it's okay soon she will understand everything and we can just speak in tagalog!!! lol!

our area has been struggling a little or we have been struggling with it, because it's sooooo big! we spend a lot of time traveling to and from appointments and spending a lot of time and money sitting in traffic. we are going to try condensing our area to focus on smaller parts, hopfully this is sucessfull! "Go! Fight! Win!" salamat sa lahat supportahan, mahal ko kayo!
-sister stephens

Some fun in English!

Blog: well sister schostak and i had fun this week teaching 2 lessons in english! yeah we are teaching a lawyer and he doesn't really speak tagalog and he only reads in english at first the lesson started in tagalog then taglish then straight english it was fun! then on sunday we had two Korean students visit Min Young Lee and Min Ji Lee, they were so cute. but they wanted to talk to us and they don't know tagalog but they know enough english. sister Min Young was raised a christian and beleiving in jesus as her savior but Min Ji had no christian background and didnot know who christ is or why he is important so it was awsome to teach and talk about Christ from the basics and in english!!!! i guess i got a small portion of sister Patterson's mission except in engish! hahaha! well it's been a fun week thime to start a new one!!!!
ingat kayo!!!
-sister stephens

we're safe

blog:
1st happy birthday Callie!!!!!!!!! congrats!!!!!
2:everything is fine here since the tsunami we didn't feel a thing, but we are all praying for japan. work here is good, we are finding people willing to listen but few willing to go to church and few families so we are praying a lot that we can find lots of families. It's hot here again, back to sweating all the time. my companion and i are really getting along really well. she's like 5'10'' so she doesn't quite fit in the transport here so this one time i got in the tricycle first then she got in i felt the air get squeezed from my lungs as the dynamics change and as this happens i manage to say, "OH MAY GOSH YOU DON'T FIT!!!" oh we laughed and laughed. things are so small here, like the people.
3: oh i've been on my mission for one year, and in the philippines for 10 months and i got only 6 more short months left to work hard!!!!
4:lovin' it here it's going to be wierd to go ... home.


love you all!
--sister stephens
ps shout out to Hannah Keller for the letter, thank you loved it, i hope to go to home ward for a bit when i get home so we'll get to know each other then! SALAMAT!!!! (thank you)

new transfer

Blog: Well it's a new transfer! and i'm in a new area again! i've been transfered to Malanday Ward, Valenzuela stake! it use to be an elders area but they switched it to sisters to help 'clean it up' ... joke! not really. but the area book really needs some work! haha! oh and i'm follow-up training! Sister Schostak is a very tall blond american and her tagalog is pretty good but her understanding isn't, and she talks a lot, but it's still fun. This area is very big, and there are so many people!!! and we have one part that i call "Pirate's Cove" cuz see it reminds me of Pirate Island in Disneyland! It's all wet cement, with dripping water from clothes lines, and tunnels for streets, cuz everyone builds houses on top of each other till it covers the road and it's right next to a river that smells like silt and mud (luckily) and you can hear the chatter of children and the cackling of some drunk old man. thus Pirate's Cove. yeah it's going to be fun getting to know this area! sana i'll get some letters out this transfer.
Mahal po kayo!
-Sister Stephens
ps: for those who don't know what Follow up training is...
1st companion= Trainer
2nd companion= Follow-up Trainer
3rd companion= 1st Sr
Then you are usually made a Sr or Co-Sr, but most all companionships have a Sr comp and a Jr comp, it has to do with experience and confidence but mostly it is all just insperation from God cuz He knows you best, your ability, your potential, and what you can do!

I'm soooo tired!!

Man! sister ockey and i are sooooo tired everyday we walk and walk and walk, we desided that it doesn't matter how for we are not going to ride transport but walk and find. and it has definitely paid off we went from having 10 investigators to 31!!!! even though we are sooo tired and we are lucky to have our PJ's on when we wake up it's all worth it! sister ockey and i are sooo happy we finally feel like full missionaries, not newbies, not tag-along juniors, but full out missionaries!!! yay!!! can you believe i've been here for 9 monthes now! times almost up and i want to end it like a STEPHENS all in or nothin', gung-ho, two fists up, with my whole heart, might, mind, and stength. HOORAH FOR ISREAL!!!!!!
Mahal na mahal kita,
--sister STEPHENS

The Spirit Guides Me

Blog: Work is great here we have some great new investigator families, and have really felt the Spirit direct us as we walk and teach. A member gave us a name and a neighborhood a couple of weeks ago but we never went to find them cuz we didn't have an address. But this week we found ourselves in that neighborhood, so we asked the member if he knew where this potential investigator lived. He gave us a general area which we thought wasn't very helpful, so we started walking. My companion asked what should we do, I said, walk. So we walked and asked a few people but no one knew this family.
Finally, I paused, took a breath and walked down this ally way.
"Where are you going?" my companion asked. "I don't know." I answered. I passed a table of some people eating outside then turned around and asked, "Kilala po ba kayo, sina dickonson pamilya?", before I realized what I was doing. One of them said he knew them and took us to their house just a little way further! We talked to him and found out that it wasn't even his real name! But we got a return apointment! Later I was looking in our area book and FOUND his name AGAIN!!! The missionaries contacted him 1 year ago but did not continue to teach (didn't say why). It was crazy!
I call it following my feet but really it's the Spirit.
Like another time we were walking trying to find a member's house and we were reaching the end of the road and there was a man sitting on his stoop smoking and staring at us, my first thought was to ask him if he knew the member, but after I took about 2 steps toward him a feeling of fear entered me, by the 5th step I couldn't breathe, so i turned around and walked away. With every step away from him i felt better. "Where are we going?", my companion asked, "Not there," I said, "It's bad news over there, we'll go a diffrent way." I know the Spirit leads every aspect of this work, it's not my work, or any person's work, it's God's! And I know that He loves all of us and wants to all know the truth about Him and He wants us to be happy and safe. Isn't it great!
Love you all!
-Sister Stephens