July 7, 2014

Hello there everyone!

What a crazy week! We were so busy and it honestly doesn't even feel like it's been a week already. However, it was so much fun!! First off, we had a huge meeting with almost all of our missionaries where everyone got to meet President Ostler and his family. So over at the Buendia chapel we had about 180 missionaries gathered together to meet them and see them for the first time. It was a super awesome meeting. President Ostler shared with us a ton of things that he learned from the new mission president's seminar and we got to learn so much. I never knew how involved all of the general authorities were in this work. At one point in his message, he explained a time during the seminar when he asked one of the seventy why ALL of the general authorities have to come to the new mission president's seminar. He said that it is because the Lord loves this work and wants all of them to be fully engaged and love it too. I was taken back when he said that and I was so grateful how involved the Lord is in His work, as well as all of His servants. Then Sister Ostler and Caleb shared a ton about their family and they even had a sweet video of all of the family members where they got to share their feelings about the call for President Ostler. It was a great meeting. We also had another missionary leadership council! It was so different but it was so great. I think the main point of this missionary leadership council was to help President and Sister Ostler to know more about the mission and get a feel for what things we need to work on. So we had a huge question and counsel together part of the missionary leadership council, which was different than all of the other ones. However, it was so great because they got a ton of information and we were really able to help them get a feel for what the mission is like. I enjoyed the council and getting to learn from all of the other leaders as well. One of the things I really learned from the meeting was the importance of having the council. President Ostler shared some scriptures about the importance of councils and the idea I got from it was that councils are held to talk about specific concerns and challenges, and then to receive revelation through the Spirit in order to know what to do to solve them. I learned that councils are held in order to help the work of the Lord continue. I loved the council and the things I learned from it. At the end of the week, President Ostler started on the interviews for the whole mission. He did a few zones last week and they all went great! President Ostler changed it up this time and did all of them at the mission home! I have never experienced that before in my whole mission. Anyway, it was different but it was so awesome. All of the missionaries had a great experience being at the mission home. I have been there so many times because of meetings and stuff, but I learned that was the very first time for some elders and sisters! So it was awesome for them to be there and a ton of them said that the interviews felt a lot more comfortable because of it. One thing I love about President and Sister Ostler is their love for family. One of the reasons for the interviews being done at the mission home was so they felt like they were part of a huge family here on the mission and of course, the home was a good place to make it fee like family. Another reason was so that they could still do their family prayer and family scripture study at home and still spend time together as a family. So I just love that so much and how much they love family. I hope to apply that to my own life in the future. This week we have a ton of interviews again and so I get to spend a bunch of time with missionaries again this week! I love this mission and I love serving here. I am so grateful I get to be a missionary in the Philippines Manila Mission. I love President and sister Ostler and their son Caleb. They are awesome and they are so loving. I can really feel that they love us and I can feel a part of Heavenly Father's love for us, through them.

Elder Stephens