From Dad

Hey there sweetheart,

It was so nice talking to you today. You're doing so many amazing things. I am so proud of you. Keep pushing hard with the Spanish. At some point, it will just click. You received a gift, Heavenly Father will help you. There's a reason it isn't super easy yet, there are things you are learning right now, that you wouldn't learn any other way. Love you, keep hanging in there.

I wanted to tell you an experience I had this week with the Book of Mormon. You may or may not see this there, but there sure is a lot of Apostasy here. It seems to be growing in intensity. So much of it centers around criticism of the early church leaders, specifically Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. Anyway, I started the Book of Mormon over again this past week. When I was reading the intro and testimony of the three and eight witnesses as well as the account of Joseph and Moroni, I had such a feeling of how true that Book is. It was a wonderful feeling.

A couple of days after this experience I was talking to Uncle Darren. He told me how he was reading ALL of the negative stuff on Joseph Smith, just because he was curious.  He read it and said, some of it may be true, or not true, it didn't matter to him, he knew the church was true. Anyway, he was at church, sitting next to a good friend, and he had the distinct impression that his friend was falling away from the church and he needed to talk to him. After Elders Quorum, he talked to him and the subject of Joseph Smith came up. His friend, a doctor, has read all of the same information on Joseph Smith, and knows it's all true. Darren took the opportunity to bear his testimony to him and hopefully help him. I'll follow up with him and see how he's doing. Darren did share another experience one of his neighbors had in Pleasant Grove with the same issues. His friend in PG decided to study all of the negative stuff on the church. After spending quite some time on it, he decided he was going to leave the church. But before he did, for some reason he decided he would read the Book of Mormon one more time. At first, he hated it, because of all the negative stuff he had read about Joseph Smith. Over time he began to enjoy his reading and the negativity began to fade. After a little while longer, he began to crave and thirst for the Book of Mormon. He came away, knowing the church was true, and possessed with a stronger testimony of the gospel. If you have any investigators that are unsure, get them reading the Book of Mormon. If you're struggling, dive deeper into your personal study of that book. It doesn't matter what the struggle is, the spirit and words of that book will help you. If the struggle is the language, companion relationships, singing, personal confidence, or anything else, the spirit you will gain from reading its pages will give you strength in everything you are doing. 

I love you, am so proud of you!!! You're busy because the Lord knows he has two Sister Missionaries that are good girls who have testimonies and want to work hard. The Lord is using you in ways you don't even know. Have a great week!! I look forward to seeing and hearing from you again next week!!

Love, Dad