Hi sweetie! I can't wait to hear about your week! I hope it was a week of hard work that paid off. I hope you saw some blessings this week. How did it go with your Mission President? Tell me all about it!
We had a good week. Dad was off work, Abby was off of school and Sam was here most of the week ( he went' to Trey's ranch for a couple of days). Sam got his first deer so he was really excited about that. Now we have about 20 lbs of deer meat in the freezer...eek! We saw a couple of just OK movies... nothing good is out right now at all! New Years Eve we had our Fondue night and I sent you some pictures of that. We had the Smiths, Waltons, Tius and Kevin over. Chels and Erik had to work and Ama and PopPop are in CA because Ama had a show for NYE. We played some fun games and of course Dad cracked everyone up. One of the games is the one where you put that dental piece in your mouth so no one can understand anything you say but you have to get your team to guess what you're saying. Pretty funny.
We went to Calvin Schofield's farewell on Sunday. He did a great job and is so excited to get to Mexico. We talked for a little bit and he loves your letters. He said he is hoping you guys can room together for a little bit back at BYU after your missions. He reports 1/9/18.
I can't remember if I told you, but I was able to surprise Sam with scripture covers from Guatemala from a woman that was a great support to him on his mission. They turned out really nice. I'll try to send some pics. Speaking of great, supportive people to missionaries, I cried when I read the letter that the Silva family gave you! How beautiful and how sweet that family is! It means so much to me that they are caring for my son and treating you like family. Tell them that I'm so grateful and that I hope to meet them someday.
It is FREEZING here! Tomorrow the high is going to feel like 16! It is colder here than in Utah. It is supposed to remain very cold for a week or two. I bet Brazil is feeling pretty good right now:)
I have a little spiritual thought for you... I was talking with Noelle and Gregg a few weeks ago about missionaries struggling. Gregg said something that I've been thinking about. We learn a lot about how Satan temps us from the movie in the Temple. But it is interesting to think that Satan was only in his infancy of evilness then. He was just learning how to tempt us and make us turn away from God. Today, he has had all those thousands/10s of thousands of years to fine tune his craft. He is so skilled at how to lure us and tempt us… so skilled to know how to tear down families which then causes generations of problems. I think if you look at what has happened in society in the past 25 years, you can see how much he has accomplished in a short time. Then Gregg was talking about how someone at the church offices estimated that about 57 billion people have lived on the earth. If you just take that number and calculate how many spirits followed Satan during the war of heaven (1/3 of the hosts of heaven) that is about 28 billion. All of those 28 billion are around us now trying to persuade us to turn away from God. It feels like we are out numbered.
But then I think about the line in the temple movie where God says to Satan, "you will be able to bruise man's heel, but he will be able to crush your head." It shows me how much more power there is in goodness and righteousness. We don't need to fear if we don't walk the line with one foot in righteousness and one foot in evil. If we can stay far from that line, stay safe, then it's not soooo difficult. But we put ourselves close to temptation, and that just makes it easy for all those 28 billion spirits that want us to be miserable. I would imagine Satan would love to get missionaries to quit, give up, fall to temptation, because they have the power to do so much goodness. So here is a quote I read and I keep it in my scriptures. I think it shows how satan plans to ruin us if he can…
"There are 3 things in Lehi's dream that are obscured by the mist (of darkness) and that correspond to the reality of our mortal lives. Satan does not want us to see the tree of life (the LOVE of God). He does not want us to perceive the rod of iron (the Word of God), which will keep us on the path when the tree is lost from our view. He is also desirous that we know nothing of the filthy river or the consequences of misery, both temporal and eternal, which come for those who leave the path." - S. Michael Wilcox
The mists of darkness in Lehi's dream are not random. They are designed specifically by satan to keep us from certain things that will help us reach eternal life. I just thought this might help you with some of your investigators and new members. It's something that I never thought of before. Think about it in your own life too.
I love you my amazing son! I love our monday "chats". They are the highlight of my week. I love you infinity + infinity and even more than that!
xoxoxo
mom
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