September 13, 2010 - Kevan

Hola querido familia,

how is everybody doing? Everything here on this side of the world is going great! I am feeling great too. Today is such a beautiful day. Right now the other elders are playing soccer and so when im done well go do that and eat an asado. We had a meeting with president and a planning meeting this morning and the rest of the day is pday. I am way happy here and am really excited for my new assignment. I am with Elder Smith and he is from Raymond, Alberta Canada. K.C., do you know that place? He says that there are tons of members there. We are traveling assistants. So every week we will be traveling to a different zone to train and work with the elders. I hear it is really hard and i am so excited for that. This week are going to Chimbas in San Juan. Tommorow we head out. So i will be working with Elder Gomez who is the conmpanion of Elder Frischnect. That will be great to spend a week with Elder Frischnect. I am way happy and this will be a great expirence for me these next few months. I feel way humbled to have this calling and am excited for the challenges and things which the Lord will give me. I keep hearing that He is preparing me for the future and I believe that. Thanks so much for your support and prayers.

this ended up pretty good in Alvear (Pacifico). I think that it was one of my favorite areas. I loved saying bye to the members there. You never really know how much of an impact you have on someone until it is time to leave or when they are not there anymore. One man, Juan Romero, has always been a tough type of guy. but as i said by to him he was just crying. I hope one day he can follow the example of his children and especially of Jesus Christ and get baptized.

I spoke with Elder LeBron yesterday. It was so great. I am so incredibly happy that he was able to visit with you. I love him tons. That is great. He said he loved being with you all and really enjoyed his time. So thanks for everything Family. I know that that really helps him alot.

I was studying this morning in Mosiah 29. I really love the Book of Mormon and I know that it is true. I thought that it was really interesting that God truly will bless us and make us free if we really become humble before Him and put all of our trust in Him. When people are not humble and do not have faith in Him they get farther away from Him. Not only I think will they be alone but they will be on satans side. As we all know that he does not want the best for us. But as long as we put our trust in Christ and become humble before God we will be made truly free and be blessed greatly by our Heavenly Father. I love this perfect plan of God. The Atonement is real and Christ is truly the way that we will be able to live together for ever in the Presence of God!

Please tell connor and Keaton and uncle steve and karen congrats! That makes me so happy!

Family, Hold tight onto the rod of iron. The path is made. Christ is the way. Keep the Spirit with you all this week.

I love you all so much!

Love,

Elder Kevan Bills

p.s., that stinks about BYU. It sounds like they are lacking a Bills on the field.

September 7, 2010 - Craig

hEY Family i hope all is well. We are going to the temple tommorow and i am really excited. It is such a beautiful temple and its where this all began pretty much for this little ole family ha. But it will be awesome to be in the house of the lord and feel of his love and closeness. I was so happy to here byu won!!! I was so sosososoo excited and the t birds too. Yess. This past week we found 4 news and 1 new yesterday. The lord has blessed us and put us at the doors of these people to bring them this wonderful message of happiness and hope. I am so grateful that i can serve the lord and i am loving the mission more and more. It is very very hard. Ha i never expected it to be this hard. In every aspect. Physically, mentally and spiritualy hard. Its is great though. The more i try to become like the savior the farther i feel i am from this goal. But it comes day by day, action by action, decision by decision. Juoquin the guy who we are baptizing oin the 18th invited us to his sons party on saturday and it was fun. Ha They had some goood fgood. Carbe Asada tres leches flan and napoles(cactus eww) ha But anyway it was fun and he will be a solid member. In the branch there is a lot of confusion. Most are converts and dont qwuite know. In priesthood they were talking about blessings and someone asked if you can give blessings to yourself and this guy was like oh ya! And we said no you cannot. Then he like stood and testified that he has layed his hands upon his head and given a blessing to himself. OH boy. It was interesting. Dad Kc Kelly, why cant we do that?? I think that we have the priesthood to bless others not ourselves we can recieve blessings from others and feel the blessings of using the priesthood righteously but yeah ha. We can pray for ourselves with faith and hope. Anyway. I love you all. I cant explain the love i have for you guys. I am so grateful for the gospel. It is the path we need to take. Continual repentance and faith in the lord will bring us so much happiness and closer to Jesus Christ. I love you all and i love Jesus Christ. He is my savior and is truly the light of the world! Joseph Smith restored this gospel to the earth and we are so blessed to have this truth! I love you All!!!! We have all been blessed beyond measure! Thanks for all the support Love Elder Bills What is connors adress??

Eating Lunch and Waiting for the Bus

September 6, 2010 - Kevan

Hey fam!

I hope that everything is going great! It is so excited the football season I love it. Elder Fowler and I left a lesson the other day and were walking in the street and we were just like, ah no today is college football live! But everything is going great here. That is so great about andrew cusick. I cant even believe it. So that is fun though. that makes me want to play so bad. So you are looking for apartments? Where are they and are they good?

We had a baptism on saturday of a kid named gabriel Romero. He is 9 and all of his family is member. His sister is even going to Chile for her mission in november. I dont know why he never got baptized but he just turned nine and so we took over and he is now a member. I dont know why but he loves me. We asked him who he wanted to baptize him and he said me and is always just staring at me. He is a funny kid. So that was a big blessing. Baptisms always are for us and for the people. This week we are going to try and baptize the girl named Yanira who never got baptized. I tried putting a date with her yesterday but she still wanted to think about it. It'll either be this week or the next. We have transfers next week. I am sure that i will be going. I have just been a zone leader for way too long, 9 months. I love it and could end my mission doing it but I am sure i'll get leave this area.

I found probably one of my favorite stories and examples in the Book of Mormon this week. It is in 1 Nephi 16:9/31. It is when Nephi breaks his bow. To me it is a huge lesson of how our attitudes affect us and also of how we react in the situations we are in. Nephi was in the same situation as his family. Tired hungry, afflicted. I know that is was hard for all of them. But instead of murmuring, complaining and not doing anything, he went to work. He had to have been positive and had the Spirit. So he built the bow. Something that for sure anyone in his family could have done. but he listened to the Spirit and had a good attitude that he could make a difference. So he did. And he was an amazing blessing for his family as he trusted in the Lord and was guided to obtain food for his family. I love this story. This life is hard. but really our Heavenly Father has given us the easiest plan and has provided the perfect way to do it. He is so loving to have sent Jesus Christ to eart. He truly prepared the way. We have such an amazing family. All we have to do now is keep the commandments and our covenants. We can do it and Heavenly Father will bless us. LEts just be like Nephi and have all of the faith that He really will be with us, protect us, and fulfill His promises with us.

Este evangelio es verdadero. Se que Cristo vive. Estoy tan agradecido por la expiacion. Aun que no entiendo todavia lo que Cristo hizo por nosotros, yo se que es la manera para vivir con Dios un dia. Jesucristo es nuestro Salvador. El es el Hijo do Dios.

Family, I love you all so much! Thank you so much for everything. Make sure to tell everyone hi and that i love them! Have a great week!

Love, Elder Kevan Bills

P,S. thanks for the red shirt and the BYU pants. THey are awesome. Also, I am pretty sure i have grown a little bit. My pants seem shorter and I tried measuring myself and it says i am just below 6 foot 4. So thats good!!!

August 30, 2010 - Craig

Hey family i hope all is going well back in Utah!! This past week was a pretty good week. We had two cool experiences with the lord leading us to where we needed to be. The first we had an appointment and it went a little over and when we got out we remebered the sisters said we could join them for dinner with some english members because they invited us but if we couldnt make it then it was ok. So we were about 30 mintues late and we were deciding if we should go to dinner or not and we were just like alright we will go. SSo we went and turns out the brother waas sick and really needed a blessing. So the lord guided us to go there so we could administer a blessing of health! It was awesome for me! Then we were driving on our bikes and we needed to be in ventra in 30 minutes and it takes 20 to drive to ven. from S.P, but we though that we could make it to this members house in time to just set up a time to go see them and find them all home. So we went there and the girl was leaving to college the next day and waa very nervous. And she was like i was goiing to call you guys to come give me a blessing but i forgot b/c i got way too busy. So we gave her a blessing of comfort right before she headed off to college. It was a blessing for me and a testimny builder that the lord will direct our paths if we are beinmg diligent and doing whats right. Also i taught the Book of Mormon class on thursday and the spirit carried me through the class. I taught Jacob5!! Hard in english to teach let alone spanish ha. I couldnt have done it without the spirit. Yesterday i had the opportunity to baptize this little boy in my ward. it was the first baptism i performed so i was nervous ha. there was a ton of people there becuase there was 2 kids being baptized. I really felt the spirit so strong during the service and as i baptized him. I know we have the priesthood of god! It is so powerful. After he was so cute i was like im happy fopr you buddy! And he was like oh i know elder! So am I! It was a great experience. I am so grateful for you guys and all you do. I cant beleive i have been in Santa Paula for 5 months! I feel like i have lived here forever ha. I am so grateful for the guidance that i have recieved and the comfort i have recieved for these first 7 months of my mission through the Book of Mormon. I know it is word of god. The lord will bless us, we will find never ending comfort in this gospel, if we do our part. I am so grateful for the time i have had so far and i am so excited for the time i have left. I love you all so much! I hope Everyone is well.!!! Tell Hailey and the boys i love them!! I love you all with all of my heart! Love Elder Bills. Mom I am going to send a letter to Max to you. Forward him this email please!!! Love you all!

August 30, 2010 - Kevan

It sounds like a lot of things are going on at home. Here there tons. We were going to baptize a little kid named Gabriel this last saturday. But his dad said he had to work in the night. It was a little frustrating. I do not know if he really had to work but oh well. He will get baptized this week. We are also working with a girl named Yanira Sosa. She is a good girl but is offended by some of the members and also said she got offended by a question in her interview. I dont know but we will see what we do with her. THe other family that we are teaching, THe family Miranda, is a great family. They are one of the poorest i have seen. Maybe just as poor as the ponce family from Arroyo Claro. They need so much help. We have had good lessons with them and really have promised them great things if they just keep the commandments. But i dont get it, they will not pray read or come to church! (Actually they dont know how to read so that is a good excuse). We will try again this week so hopefully they will accept.

I am reading in the book of John and it is amazing. I am studying a lot about the questions that Jesus Christ made to teach and help people understand. It is amazing how simple everything is that He did. I am using some of the questions that He did and trying to act like him.

After baptizing these people two weeks ago we are againg in the looking process to find the people who are ready. Some off the days this week were pretty hard. It was great though. I was just so tired. Really, throughout the day i didnt really think about how hard it was or noticed it. Then when we got back at night I thought about the day and realized how hard it was. I love it though. I studied the other day alma 17¡-26. THe sons of Mosiah! Amazing. THey had so much success but also along with that success came many many afflictions. It must have been really hard for them. But they understood and kept preaching and had so much success. I marked what they did to have so much success and noticed 3 things that it always talked about. THey FASTED and PRAYED and had CHRISTLIKE ATTRIBUTES: I love it. These are the things they did. I know that we can do these things too. what an amazing blessing we have to know the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Now we can do these 3 things and do them in the way that Heavenly Father wants us to do them. We can become like Christ because we know who He is, We know how to fast correctly, and also we know how to communicate with our Father in Heaven in the right way. What amazing blessings! I love the restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Joseph Smith is a prophet and the Book of Mormon is true! No doubt about it! I have met many lyers this week who attack 2 things always: Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon. And why, Because they are true! I hope that one day all can come to the knowledge of the things that will truly bless them and help them return to our Heavenly Father!

I love you all so much family! Thanks for everything! Say hi to all the fam for me!

Love, Elder Kevan Bills

Go BYU!

August 23, 2010 - Craig

Hey family how is everybody doing?? This week was a Great week! We put our investigator with a date and his whol;e family came to church. On thursday we taught this lesson tyo these people who were just bashing the spirit wasnt there and i was just like kind of shakin up because theyu were like attacking us and the spirit was NOT there. We left and i was like oh man that was a bummer, my spanish didnt work because i didnt have the spirit they were just errogant and it was bad. Anyway i said a lot of prayers because wqe were going to this guys house to teach him. We got there and talk him the word of wisdom he accepted it. And said he had been thinking about that lately and how he wanted more dirrection with that!! Then he said i know its true. So we put him with a date and he was happy the spirit was there and it was awesome. That was the happiest i have been in any lesson my whole mission! I was so happy i literally felt joy through the spirit! It was awesome! The lord really does answer prayers! We tagught that guiy who has the byu jersey and he is reading and praying. He is awesome too! We asked him about his prayers and he said he gets a beautiful feeling and he feels peace!! We are going to invite himn to be baptized tonight on 18 of Sept. I have been really trying to thinmk act and look at things like Jesus did just like connor said. It is hard, but it really invites the spirit a lot. He is the perfect example. He gives us the way for everything in our lives. I am truly grateful for the opportuniy that i have to be a missionary and to be apart of this church. This is a time that i can develope attributes of christ, find the gifts that heavenly father has given me to bless others, and to use the priesthood that i have been trusted with. I am so grateful for the blessings i have recieved. When i take a step back, and look at the things that happen during the day/week, i can honestky see that this is the work of the lord and he is with us. It is hard work. But i love it. I am starting to really love the members and people in Santa Paula! I feel like i have been in S.P for a year ha. I love you all so much. Thankj youy so much for all of the support you give me. I know that this is the true church. I know that Jesus Christ lives. If we will truly strive and exort ourselves to become like him in every way we will have happiness, peace, and confidence. He is the Savior of the world. We need to look unto him in all we do and we cannot and wioll not fall. I love being able to testify of Him EVERY DAY. People might not accept us and our message of him all the time, but that doesnt change his love for them. Thats how we need to be! I love being a member of the church of jesus christ of latter day saints!! I love you . Love Elder Bills