December 16, 2018

From Dad:

Dear Sam,

Mom will likely write you this week, but wanted to share a couple of things with you. 

First, I've attached Mom's talk that she gave to day in Church. It was powerful and delivered, as usual, with the spirit and with grace. I love your Mom, most especially for her love of the Lord and the gospel.

Second, I've attached some of the pictures I took of Ben during his play (on the sly as they generally don't want your phone on during the play).

Finally a couple of pics from this last week with Mom making us a healthy supper and Cody helping with Christmas baking. 

We also found a bunch of sheets we had typed up for a family newsletter in 2009. Attached your page to remind you of what you were doing almost 10 years ago.

Love you lots, Sam.

Dad.

From Sam - The Importance of Personal Revelation:

Hello everybody!!!

This week was a blast. I've been getting used to my new companion, Elder Jonah, from Nigeria. I've been able to teach some great people. Some of the people I feel like I knew them before we met. (I don't know if it's a pre-mortal thing or if i'm clueless about the people I pass on the street) 

I'm still alive in the Warm Heart of Africa, which is sometimes too warm for comfort. I'm slowly losing the ability to speak correct English. But I'm in the work of the Lord, the second greatest work in the world next to Temple work.

I've had great conversations with drunk people telling them to go to bed then them actually going home to sleep. It's crazy how persuasive you can be when someone is willing to do what you say. All in all, I'm loving Malawi(Africa) and ready for another year of excitement.

The revelation of the week was about Nephi and Laman and Lemuel.

Nephi is the great example of following God to the extreme. All of us want to be like Nephi. We learn very early in the Book of Mormon that Nephi always sought personal revelation.(1 Nephi 2:16) Laman and Lemuel on the other hand always fell into wickedness. They saw an angel, they felt the power of God, they saw miracles, and they were also literally shocked before they started to live the gospel and repent.

Sometimes we do have to be "Shocked" into living the gospel. But if we don't seek for personal revelation, just like our prophet Russell M. Nelson said, we will not survive in the world we are living today. Laman and Lemuel were "Shocked" into living the gospel, but because they didn't receive their own personal revelation like Nephi, they turned away from the gospel and its blessings. All of us want the blessings of the gospel but we are not living the gospel. Live it because you want to, not because you have to. "Desire always beats discipline" 

I love you all, Stay awesome and on the covenant path,

-Elder Smith

Pictures:

-Lunch everyday

-My beautiful study desk

-The bird that woke me up this morning

-My only taste of Christmas so far

-Me and my new companion

Video:

The black out

December 10, 2018

From Dad: Christmas Spirit

Dear Sam,

Christmas is definitely in the air. From the Light the World reminders to Christmas concerts to decorations, we are really enjoying the Christmas spirit. 

The girls have discovered the ultimate recipe for chocolate cupcakes and much to the detriment of my dieting goals, have made 3 big batches:

Community Caroling - this week, Ben and Abby participated in a Christmas concert with the school of music. At first I thought it was the typical recital format, but it turned out the school joined up with the Peace Lutheran Church for a Community Caroling evening. Ben played prelude carols, and Abby played a trio piece with Hannah Robison and Jackson Kruk. At first, Mom wanted to sit in the back so we could escape early, but we found ourselves caught up in the community spirit of singing carols together. They were all spiritual carols and a number of them were new for us. We felt a nice spirit there and it brought a Christmas feeling to our hearts.

Ward Party - We went to the ward party this week. It was a different format. Typically we have a huge meal, but this year it was more of an open house format with buffet hors d'oeuvres. Abby, Ben and I participated in singing a song "We Three Kings" for a special program. It was a very spiritual gathering and Ben remarked how it hit him and he felt the spirit of Christmas. 

Thursday night, I went and listened Ben's Choir concert. He has a new music teacher this year, so some slightly different flavors of music, but still pretty fun.

Friday Ben got to stay home from school and had no Musical theater, so he enjoyed a break to read and play piano. The girls went skiing at Rabbit hill and enjoyed that even though it was a bit chilly.

Today we heard from Eric DeVries who is home from his mission to Toronto. He is still Eric, but with a more stable and mature testimony of the gospel. He gave his talk about the importance of finding and confirming Truth. One analogy that was particularly powerful for me was comparing discovering truth in this life to putting together a puzzle. Sometimes pieces of the puzzle don't seem to fit or make sense, but we don't throw out the puzzle, we keep looking for pieces of the puzzle that will help connect the parts that don't yet make sense. So true of the gospel and the truths of the Universe and life. It takes patience and faith to continue to search for and discover God's plan for us and for his children.

At the Christmas party last night, I was talking with my Elder's Quorum president about unifying the quorum and some of the tensions and struggles he is facing in his leadership role. He referred me to a fascinating article that I'll attach here maintaining the importance of the Church in our salvation just as much as the ordinances and doctrines of the gospel. Not sure if your mission rules allow you to read articles like this, but enjoy if you can.

Today I got to teach SS and really enjoyed the opportunity to study the amazing stories of Daniel and his friends and the story of Esther. So powerful the testimonies of Shadrach, Meshach, and Aben-dego when facing the fiery furnace when they proclaimed their faith and trust that the Lord could save them, "but if not", they would still keep their covenants. Similarly the story of Esther choosing to sacrifice her livelihood to save her people and the concept of her being prepared "for such a time as this" and her faithful statement of "if I perish, I perish" just really struck me. I hope and pray that our family will recognize the Lord's hand in our lives and be faithful to our covenants because we have been prepared "for such a time as this" to make a difference in the world.

Just talked with Steph and Josh by phone tonight. Really enjoy keeping in touch with everyone in our family. Steph sent a picture of her Farmer's market table:

Have a great week, Sam. Love you lots.

Dad.

From Sam - Things I've Learned:

Hello Everyone,

This week was amazing, The biggest thing was my companion, Elder Williams, was transferred away. I have really enjoyed these three months with him. It has been the fastest 3 months of my mission, and come to think of it, I've been on my mission for a year now. Time sure does fly.

The two biggest things I have learned from Elder Williams was 1. The importance of following and listening to the Spirit, and 2. He helped my move my testimony from Joseph Smith to Jesus Christ. 

Since I've been on mission my testimony of the Restoration has become so great, but it was more on Joseph Smith. These past three months my testimony of Jesus Christ has become even greater. I've been able to read the Book of Mormon 5 times since I've started my mission, (I just finished it for the fifth time) Now for the sixth time I'm marking every reference of Jesus Christ, His words, His attributes and the doctrines and principles contained in the Book of Mormon. I hope by doing so I really can say I know that the Book of Mormon is Another Testament of Jesus Christ.

This is pretty much all the excitement that happened this week. If there is anything you want to know in specific, ask me questions

I love you all,

Elder Smith

Pictures:

-Me riding a mini bike

-Me saying goodbye to Elder Williams

(The other missionaries are Elder Funaki who is a Tongan and Elder Madsen)

December 2, 2018

From Mom - Winter for Real

Dear Sam,

I don't know why the weather must be talked about every email. I guess that's just the way it is. After the weather report we can get on to real life. 😊 So, yesterday morning it was brown and dull, the temps just below freezing. I went for a run and the snow started to sift down, gently at first, then in that big fluffy way. It was beautiful, absolutely silent with the smell that only fresh snow has. Coco and I returned after an hour with an inch of snow on us. If my phone hadn't died, I would've taken a picture to show you. And it hasn't stopped and won't stop until the wee hours of Monday morning and winter will be here to stay. (We've had 5 snowfalls since September but each of them melted. This one won't.) Just in time for the Christmas decorations and hot chocolate. 

To be honest though, we've all been converted to herbal tea. Finally. Family tradition to gather round on cold nights and sip the relaxing hot goodness before bed. Love it. 

This week was eventful! The girls came home from visiting Steph and Tyler, safe and sound. The security guard walked them out because he just couldn't believe a 12 and 13 yr old girls were traveling by plane by themselves. Apparently it's not a common occurrence. I should have known. They had a fantastic time. I'm SO GRATEFUL for family relationships and how we all strengthen each other. Steph and Tyler gave the girls many experiences that we couldn't give them ... rock climbing, Target shopping, Pandemic playing, etc, etc. And now they feel happy and relaxed and not so sad in missing Steph. 

I also heard a funny bit of conversation between Josh and Ben tonight. It went something like this ...

Josh: "I prayed for humility and God made me fall (slip on the ice) twice in front of some pretty girls."

Ben: "God moves in mysterious ways."

Dad and I were cracking up. 

Then Josh told Ben that he's so poor, he's mooching off his roommates. And he let a girl buy him custard. This is how far he's fallen. 

Ben: "Well, what would student life be if you didn't starve a little." 

Josh: "True." 

Hahahahaha!

Oh, I love it. I love my family and how good you are to each other. 

The big news at home is still the kitten, Primrose, and will be until she stops being cute. I'm a convert to kitten therapy though. We let her crawl on us and cuddle with us. The girls are getting happily all scratched up. Ben even plays with her every night before bed just for good measure. Her current obsession is the Christmas tree and gets stuck in it multiple times a day.

Oh, and Ben made the news again. He's the most famous out of all of us, so far. 

I adore December. It's such a nice feeling. We become more Christ-centered and generally just kinder and happier people. I don't think we do so bad all year, but in December, it's just all around loving. We went to the Stake Christmas Social last night. They set it up so there were 5 places to go that had Christmas-type stuff. 1) The Food Room; 2) The Singing Room; 3) The Nativity Room; 4) The Performance Room; and 5) The Christ Room. Attendees could walk around and go to whatever they wanted. My favorite was The Christ Room. Ron Patrick was in charge. We watched a couple of short videos then he bore his testimony about the Savior. In his long life, he's had multiple crazy experiences that taught him about the divinity and tangible reality of Jesus Christ. I walked away feeling strengthened and humbled and grateful for our belief in Him. It just makes life so much more abundant.

Having said that, the snowfall is going to prevent me from driving into Edmonton to mail your package tomorrow as planned. Hopefully this week though, then we'll be praying you get it in time. Otherwise, it'll have to be a New Year's package, like Josh got when he was on his mission. I'm about the worst for getting out packages. I hope you'll forgive me.

Love you forever,

Mom

From Sam - Contention is not of Christ

Hello everyone,

This week has come and gone and so has November. Now we are in December which is the Christmas season, some say it as x-mas but when you do that you cross the savior out of it. This past week me and my companion(Elder Williams) did a roleplay with the two other "young" missionaries in our compound(Elder Funaki and Elder Madsen) In this roleplay I acted as a person confused by all the doctrines in the world today and Elder Williams acted as a pastor for a church and a founder of a bible collage. The "young" missionaries were supposed to try to teach two unteachable people. Our goal was to make the two E.Funaki and E.Madsen mad or angry at us and as we did the roleplay I could see the frustration start to pent up inside them. We hit them with anti-Book of Mormon, Gift of tongues and seventh-day questions and used scriptures to "confound" them. It was a lot of fun but our end goal in this was to teach them that contention drives the spirit away. You may know the scriptures to prove people wrong but if you do it without the spirit you cannot teach them. In my first 6 months of my mission I got pretty good at "bible-bashing" but where I am now, I know that it gets you nowhere and wastes time. 

As a missionary and as a person you need the spirit. Without it not a lot gets done. Life is always going to be hard so it is our choice to either have God with us or not. God doesn't take our trials away, he helps us through them. When I left home to go on my mission my testimony was mostly based on Joseph Smith, as I have gone through my mission my testimony has shifted to Jesus Christ. I love this Gospel so much, I can't wait to be a regular member of His church and apply all the principles I've learned from my mission.

I love you all, Stay awesome!

-Elder Smith

Pictures:

-A little bit of heaven after a storm

-Breakfast at a Buffet

-Me being a baby on my companions back(The power of Chitenges)

-Elder Williams on Elder Funaki's back

-Mango season is here!!!

-Ways a chitenge can be worn

-Elder Williams and Elder Funaki doing their usual wrestling.