Hola Familia and Amigos
It was so great to hear from you this week. Thank you for all of your love and support and your letters and your emails. You have no idea how much it means to me and how much it helps.
Well I got the news about the BYU game . . . and well Go Cougars! They'll win next week. It's too bad about the perfect season being gone and all that nonsense but it's OK, the BCS is done in a few years anyways.
So Mom and Dad thank you for the package. It was so great to get it! Thank you so much for your love and support. Did you get the memory card that I sent this week?!?! I sure hope so, it has all of my pictures on it.
Trent, man, surgery :( That's rough. I am so sorry. I know that you are going to make it through and I want you to know that you will be in my prayers for a long time. Don't ever be afraid to ask your earthly father for a blessing. And never, ever, ever, ever, be afraid to drop down on your knees and ask your Heavenly Father for a little extra help. I know every thing happens for a reason bud. There is a divine plan and vision for each one of us. Yours happens to have shoulder surgery in it, lucky you :) I love you man and I am praying for you. Let me know how it goes. And enjoy the love and support but not the pain :S Love you bro!
So this week was a good solid week of work. I felt really good about what we did this week but the thing is that we just did a lot of working and teaching and there weren't really any crazy stories that happened to us. So I am sorry if this email is kind of boring. But hey, you get to hear about beautiful Puerto Rico so I hope you enjoy.
Today I am in Aguadilla. I just got my Puerto Rican Driver's License so it's official estoy boriqua! (I am Puerto Rican). It was hard to give up my Utah license and take the new one. It felt like I was giving away part of my old life. But it was still cool to know that I am officially here for two years!
Anywho, yeah . . . so I am writing you this email and I can look out the window and see the beautiful west coast of Puerto Rico. You guys are way out there. I just waved to you so hopefully when you get this you'll wave back! I love you.
OK, so this week we had one investigator in church. Maria, who we have been teaching for a long time, came with her cousin this week and it's a good thing we came. Saturday afternoon we biked an hour to her cousin's house to teach her and in the middle of the lesson, a lightning storm developed. The lightning struck the street in front of the house! It was crazy! We totally moved and my vision went all blurry for a few seconds of the loud thunder. Anywho, Sunday she came to church and got to participate in Sacrament Meeting with us. That was awesome. I think she really enjoyed it and she is really starting to get a stronger testimony of the gospel. Hopefully the Lord will bless us with a baptism in the next few weeks.
Our other two awesome investigators, Milton and Myra (12 and 11 years old) didn't come to church yesterday. These are the kids of Hermana Carmen who lives about 45 minutes away by car. The edge of our area haha. Anywho, they don't have a car and so they have to rely on their dad for a ride to church. Apparently he couldn't give them a ride yesterday. Anywho they are great and they are going to get baptized they just need to come!
This family is so sweet they don't have that much. In fact, they barely have anything but they know so much about the gospel and they have such a desire to get baptized. Every time we teach them the spirit floods the room and we have an awesome conversation. The Lord knows these kids and knows what's best for them. I have no doubt in my mind that is the reason why we were led to them. Anywho this Saturday they had written our names on the wall along with the member who always comes with us and also their own names. It was so cute and so special. I will take a picture of it and sent it to you. It's cool because they feel a special joy when we come over and it's not because of us, it's because we bring the message of the God. The love and joy that they feel when we come over is the love and joy that we can all feel with the message of Jesus Christ and His gospel.
This week was a pretty hard week for me. For some reason I was really thinking about home and for some reason my Spanish was just down. I was so down this week that I started to look for all of the bad in every day. Satan was working me so hard I couldn't believe it! Saturday was awful. It seemed that everything that could go wrong did go wrong. Nearing the end of the day all of our goals were basically gone and we needed a miracle in our last two hours of contacting to reach our goals for the day. I was so angry and negative. But luckily, the Lord helped to change my heart.
We had a miracle and we got to teach 3 first lessons in 2 hours, which absolutely never happens. Usually it's 0. And as we started to walk to a less active member's house to visit her, we were talking about how we needed to get a lesson with a member to reach our goal. The lesson needed to include a non-member with a member present. We arrived at this sister's house and there was a non-member friend visiting her. Many of you might say that it was luck/ No it wasn't. I know for a fact that it was the hand of the Lord helping His son and His missionary who desperately needed a lift. I had a change of heart that night and I realized that often in life, we do the things that the Lord wants us to be doing. Often in life, we have goals that He wants us to work towards. And often in life, we have a picture in our mind of how God will work for us to help us get there.
This is so wrong and it's been a problem that I have had for a long time. God is there and He loves us. We are His children and He wants the best for us. When we do what He wants, He will bless us. And when we work towards the goals that He wants us to accomplish, He will bless us with the ability to reach those goals. But what is cool is that most of the time it will be in a totally different way or manner then we think because we are on His timetable, and He knows what is best for us. We will usually always accomplish our goals of what we know He wants. But He builds us and shapes us into even better people, and helps us reach even better goals, by taking us on His path, on His plan, which can be a totally different path and plan then we usually expect.
I know that sometimes life just seems like it's crap. You're down in the dumps and there is nowhere to go. But these are the best times to look at all Heavenly Father has blessed you with and all you have been given. You have the opportunity to learn and grow from this crappy experience and grow closer to your Father who loves you with a perfect love.
I hope that whenever you guys have a hard time this week that you will get down on your knees and ask for help. I promise that your Heavenly Father is there for you and He loves you and will answer your prayers.
I read a scripture this week that I love, Ether 12:27. If men will humble themselves before me I will make weak things become strong. God is everything and when we humble ourselves and look for His hand in our lives, it's amazing to see how much strength He has given us.
Well that was cool. I wasn't really planning to write all of that but it's amazing how the spirit works so yeah!
Well that's about it for this week. I want you all to know that I love you so much and I pray for all of you every single night.
I miss you like a freaking pain, but there is nowhere else in the world that I should be right now.
Thanks for all of your love and support and all that you all do for me. I know that you will be blessed.
Until next time, your son, brother, friend and missionary
Elder Oviatt
P.S. Good luck with the move grandma and grandpa! Thanks for all the letters and love
Oh and
P.P.S. GO COUGARS!!!!!! 11-1 :)
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