Monday, July 18th 2011

Oí Família!

Just let me begin telling you that this week was full of blessings from the sky. Just when I start to think that all hope is lost and that I am a failure in life, Heavenly Father seems to bail me out time and time again. For example, there was a time in college when I was taking a Nutrition class. This class was one of the most time consuming and difficult classes I have ever taken in my life. It required more than two hours of studying every single day. When it came to the final exam at the end of the semester, I studied more than I have ever studied and even still I walked into the classroom thoroughly unprepared. I looked at the test and it was missing half of the questions. The teacher´s assistant had messed up while printing, therefore our professor gave us all 50% free on the test. I walked out with an A even though I knew that if I had taken the full test, I would have failed miserably. It was truly a blessing from the sky. This week was not much different. This Wednesday we had a special training with the our mission president which was really good! We learned a lot about the Holy Ghost and how we need to refocus on our missionary purpose. We headed home and had to go straight back to work. There wasn´t any time given to go home and rest or anything, even though we all had woken up at 4 in the morning. My companion and I went to visit a kid who was getting ready to be baptized that week and we found out that he had just had surgery on his eye and couldn´t be baptized that week. I lost all hope. He was our only investigator ready to be baptized that week and now we have no one. I said a little prayer to Heavenly Father to bless us with a family or someone to teach and baptize. As we were walking down the street, my companion and I were really tempted to just go home and call it quits for the day. We were both extremely tired and neither of us wanted to keep walking around with nothing to do. Then I felt something come to my memory. We had received a referral from another missionary last week about a woman who was attending Church in my first area of the mission, but she lived in this area. I suggested that we went to visit here. We knocked on the door... and there it was... the answer to my prayer. We walked into the apartment and there was a mom and her daughter sitting in the living room waiting for us. We found out that she had been going to Church in another ward and we felt the Spirit tell us to invite them to be baptized that Sunday. They both accepted!!!! I walked out of that house with the biggest smile on my face and I knew that Heavenly Father had blessed the lives of that mom and daughter because we didn´t give in to our selfish needs. We could have went home to sleep, but if we did that woman and her daughter wouldn´t have had the chance to be baptized and start on the true path. I was so extremely blessed and happy and I really cannot express my true feelings about the mission here in this e-mail. I am so glad that I am having this experience. I know that the Lord put me here in this part of the world for a reason. Thanks for all the updates that everyone sends me. I love hearing about what´s new with the family :) Read the scriptures, say your prayers, the Lord is always watching and listening. I love you all so much!

Love,
Elder Clark