Christmas letter 2018

Hey Y'all,

Merry Christmas! I hope that this time of year is great for you! I am so grateful for this time that I have to share my experience with you about what I have learned on my mission already. I hope this can benefit you or your children's missions..

The time that we have right now to serve a mission is amazing. I am so glad that I have the chance to dedicate my life to the Lord right now to serve him all day every day. That is not to say that there aren’t challenges in missionary work. There sure are a lot. I know that Heavenly Father blesses those who serve a mission either full time or every opportunity they get outside of full time missionary work.

My favorite experience so far would probably be the help that I was able to give to the Beach family. They were a less active family that I was able to be a part of reactivating them while serving in the North Port ward. I was very excited to see them try to change their priorities to try to come to church on Sunday  and they attended at least every other week by the time I left. I am so glad for what I was able to learn with them and that hopefully I was able to have a positive impact on their life as well.

Heavenly Father has also definitely sent tender mercies my way as well. He has helped me learn a lot about Jesus Christ's atonement and how it can apply in my life. That makes it so I can share that same joy with other people. I can promise you that Heavenly Father answers prayers and blesses you as much as he can. He places tender mercies in our path as missionaries every day. Most days here in Palm Harbor we are able to find someone with interest in the Gospel. Those are tender mercies in my eyes. I know that as you try to align your will with Heavenly Father's. One tender mercy that I have seen is that this week Elder Christensen was not thrilled with how well the work was going in our area this week. We had only been able to contact 16 people in 3 days which we usually did in one day. Then the next day we decided we were both going to be really diligent and we were able to contact 20 people in between 10:00 A.M. and 5 P.M. which was really cool. That was a tender mercy since that lifted both of our spirits.

I would also like to bear my testimony that I know that this church is true. Everything that I have learned before and during my mission have pointed me in that direction. I know that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ knows me and everyone by name and that he restored the same church here on the earth that He set up when He was on the earth. I know that President Russell M. Nelson, Joseph Smith, and every prophet in between were called to be the Prophets of this dispensation. I also know that the Book of Mormon contains the Fulness of the Gospel. I know that missionary work is one of the greatest callings he can give to us and I look forward to continuing to do missionary work when I return home. I  know that Heavenly Father wants each of us to be his missionaries and that as long as we try our best to endure to the end, that we will inherit not only salvation, but eternal life. I say this in the name of Jesus Christ.

I hope this can bless your life. I am so grateful for the missionaries from the Richfield area and for my chance to know many of them serving right now. I hope they can all have as great of an experience as I have. Have a great day!