November 14, 2011

Hey Family! Hope all is going well. This last week has been CRAZY! I got all those goodies from Aunt Carol. She so nice.. So Elder Snelson had a freak accident. We had been talking about what we could do to help some of the missionaries get up and excersize in the morning and we had decided that we could play frisbee so that everyone could be involved and we could at least heklp these missionaries get outside and excersize. So on Friday morning, we went out to play frisbee and as we were playing Elder Snelson and another Elder went to throw the frisbee and as he was running to get the frisbee he tripped on a sandbox. The sandbox was a square so he tripped on one side and his momentum took him to the other side where he smashed his face on the concrete completly shattering his jaw. I sprinted over there and saw tons of blood then sprinted home and got the phone and car. We called the ambulence and he was taken to the emergency. He shattered his jaw. It was an extensive injury. He lost 10 teeth including his front 2. It was so hard to see him in so much pain. He underwent surgery Friday night from 6pm-2am. It was an extensive surgery as well. It has been a crazy weekend. I was with him in the Hospital for about 2 1/2 days. He has been since Friday and he wil be released today at 6. His mom is flying down from Ohio to be with him until he is well eniough to go home. He will have to go home for a couple weeks to recover. But he will definantly be back. I am grateful for the Gospel. Especially in hard times like these. There is so much understanding and hope. The comforting thing is that we were doing it to be obedient and it gives no room to think it is not apart of Heavenly Father's plan. Although we dont understand why this happened, His plan will unfold sooner or later. It will all play out. Although it is hard to see him in pain he is being strong and he is being positive. It has been a new and unforgetable experience. I have learned a lot from this.
As I was with Elder Snelson in the Hospital, it has invited reflection on the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I couldnt help but think how Heavenly Father could give His Only Begotten Son to suffer and die for us. I thought if the pain the Savior went through and It literally is uncomprehendable. It has stregthened my testimony of the goodness and power of God and His son JEsus Christ. Although hard to comprehend, I know that the Atonement is real. I know that the Grace of Christ is an enabling power that one can recieve as he excersizes faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement. I know that it is a sustaining power that comes into our live as we are obedient to the Gospel. Elder Snelson will be so blessed. I know that as he is faithful and keeps his positive Attitude that he will be blessed beyond measure. I know that the Lord is preparing him for something. I truly know that everything happens to us for a reason. We can use the experiences that we have in our lives to bless and lift others. Thanks for all that you do! I love you all so much.
Elder Soza extended his mission so he will be going home with me in February! I was so excited when I heard that. Elder Soza was my follow up trainer and is a ZL in Santa Maria. One of my best friends!

Thanks for everything! I love you all so much. If you need anything PLEASE let me know. I will be in an english ward now ha! Love Elder Bills

November 7, 2011

Family! How are you all doing?? It is so good to hear from you. This past week I will not lie I was looking forward to recieving your emails. My testimony has strengthened for why our Father in Heaven has put us into families. I cannot tell you how much it means to me to have all of your support for this new assignment I will have. I am nervous, however I know that the Lord will bless me and that everything will work according to His time and wisdom. It was definantly a suprise when I had an interview with president Castro last Tuesday. It was after Zone Leadership Council and he asked if he could speak with me. When I went in I was nervous becuase he just kind of paused and looked at me. I didnt know what happened ha. But he extended the assignment to me and said that he had recieved strong promptings that I should be his next assistant. I didnt need to think about it because I trust President Castro. I know he is a man of God and is worthy and sensitive enough to recieve direction for this mission. I definantly have had to rely on the Lord this past week. I was worried at the beginning with what will happen with football and school and if it would affect me at all, but the Lord has comforted me. I do not need to know why the Lord needs me here right now and why he doesnt need me home during January but I do trust the Lord and His will. Wheather it be in a month that I find out why I stayed or in years it doesnt matter, because I know the Lord has a plan for me. I am grateful to be apart of His work.

This past week was awesome! We had 3 exhchanges and it was super fun! I love exchanges and I learn so much each time. On Saturday I went with a district leader Elder Bashien and it was great! It was a very edifying exchange. We were able to focus on the Doctrine of Christ. That it is the ONLY way that anyone can return to our Father in Heaven. Also how our purpose as missionaries is to invite peopl to come unto Christ by helping them recieve the restored gospel (i.e The Book of Mormon, Temple blessings, Priesthood ordinances) THROUGH faith in Jesus Christ and His Atonement. It is all surrounded around the Lord. Something that I tried to train him on was becoming a successful missionary. We studied from PMG under this section in the first chapter and it was awesome! With these focuses in mind, it helped our attitudes as we worked and we were edified throughout the whole day! I am so grateful to be able to work with different missionaries. We were in Camarillo all saturday and man, I LOVE IT! It is so beautiful.

We are teaching some awesome people right now and we are trying to help them see the importance of church. They have so much potential but they wont come to church. We are trying to figure out what their road blocks are and what doctrine they dont understand. Pray for our investigators that they will at least come to church. I know withiout a doubt if they come once they will feel and see Christs true church and they will be accountable and have a desire to come back.

I love you all so much . Thanks for all you do! Thanks for your examples to me. Please let me know if you need anything from me. I love you all. Love Elder Bills

October 31, 2011

Hey Family, hope all is well. Things are going great here. I love this place. I love the members so much. It is good to hear that everything is going well with you all. We had a great day at church yesterday. Elder Snelson and I spoke in sacrement and then all of the missionaries in the ward taught the 3rd hour. It was awesome. Member missionary work is so important. We HAVE to share the gospel. My talk focused on understanding and studying the Atonement to have a desire to share the Gospel. When we understand better the Atonement, we will have an increased desire to share the gospel. 2 nephi 2:8. We have to let people know about the Atonement. It is not just something that we will recieve blessings for when we pass away and are resurrected, it is a Power that we can use every day of our lives! PResident Howar W. Hunter said that when we recieve any blessing from the Atonement, our desire for the welfare of others will increasingly grow. He said that a great indicator of our pesonal conversion is in our desire to share the gospel with others. I have been so gratefl for this past week and the opportunity that I had to study and focus on this. I am so grateful for the Atonement. We had a lot of awesome things happen this past week! We went to visit an investigator and she had read the first 4 chaoters of the BOM and has a huge desire to learn more pray and go to church. The BOM is key to conversion. I love you all so much. Study the Atonement and pray for opportunities to share the gospel. Reach out to the less actives. I know this is our duty! Love Elder Bills

October 24, 2011

Hey Family! Thanks for all the emails and support. I am so grateful for you all. Grandparents and Aunt Janet! Thank you so much. I wish I had more time to write you all back but please know that I deeply appreciate your love and support and I love you all so much.

This past week was BUSY! We have been super busy with our respnsibilites this week. It has been a change from East Bakersfield for sure. But I love it very much. An Elder we live with was had a migraine for about a week and he was in a ton of pain so we called the mission Presidents wife and she told us to find a urgent care to take him to. We spent about 3 hours looking for a place that would accept our insurance. We finally found a place and he was able to be checked out and got medicine. The Elder is from Mosembiq in Africa and he is doing a lot better. The reason I tell you this is because Elder Snelson and I were talking about how we spent those hours trying to help him and we had to cancel some appointments, but because we were helping an Elder and fulifilling our responsiblity as leaders the Lord made up for the time that we missed. We have recieved 4 referells since that time. It is incredible. The Lord is very aware of the things that we do and He will bless us if we do our part. It led me to think about magnifying any calling we have in the church. If we sacrifice other things to fulfill our respnsibilty and do all we can to magnify our callings, the Lord will make up the difference and bless us in the areas where we need His help and blessings. When we put our trust in the Lord and our faith in Him, i know that we can do things that we, on our own, wouldnt be able to do. We can show that trust and that faith by the good righteous things that we do. It was a good lesson that I learned!

We had an amazing lesson with some investigators this past week! It is a family who we taught. We taught them about the Book of Mormon because we left the daughter and mom to read 3 Nephi 11 1-17. When we got there the daughter told us that she had read the whole chapter! We were so excited. She then told us that she has a bad memory and probably couldnt tell us what she learned. We invited her to try and as she started telling us about the chapter, she was explaining perfect! She explained the whiole chapter so well and at the end of explaining she was like wow! I cannot beleive how much I understood! This was awesome because we were able to see how the Holy Ghost was working with her at that point and how he was bringing things to her rememberence. She had a lot of good questions and we answered them all with the BOM. The lesson went well and the spirit was so strong! There were times when they couldve gotten distracted with things that were around, but they were completely focused on what we were talking about. The Mom at the end seemed doubtful. We asked her what was wrong and she told us she wants to follow the Church That Christ started when he wa on the earth. So we gave her a restoration pamphlet and testified that it would answer her questions. She then looked at us and told us that she had talked to other people from other churches before but she said there is something about you. She looked at us and said you bring such a peace and a comfort when you come and the way that you actually answer our questions is so special to us. She said everything about you boys is glowing, your eyes and everything you say brings a peace. (It reminded me of Stephen in the book of acts 7) She was recognizing the spirit. We then paused and let her words settle and testified that what she was feeling and describing was the Spirit of God. We invited them to be baptized and they said when they receive an answer they will.We invited them to remenber how they felt because that is how they will recieve their answer. We have another appointment with thenm this week.

I love you all so much. Miracles happen! God lives and loves us! Pray for spiritual experiences, look for them , and that is what will happen! Thanks for all you do! Have a great week

Love Elder Bills

October 17, 2011

Hey Family,

I hope all is going well! Things here are great. Last week was a good week filled with finding and working with the members. We are making it a goal to meet all of the members in our area to teach them the Plan of Salvation and invite them to refer us to their friends who are ready for the gospel. We have taught some lessons about the importance of family to a few less active families and we have had some very spiritual lessons. I am so grateful for you all.

I love Oxnard. The weather is beautiful! Last P-day we went to the Camarillo outlets which was fun. We didnt stay too long but it was fun to walk around. It is so fun to be in a place that is close to where you all lived.

Last night we had a very good lesson with an investigator named Freddy. We took our ward mission leader Tone with us and had the lesson at the Church. There was no way that we couldnt have felt the spirit! We had planned on reading with him from D&C 20:37 to help prepare him to accept a baptismal date. When we got in there and started asking him about church, the spirit directed the lesson in a completly different way. We began to teach him about forgiveness. It was an incredible feeling to know that the spirit had completly made known his need at that point and how he was guiding our words and testimonies. Our ward mission leader told of an experience in his life when he needed to forgive and how during that time he felt like he was living in darkness. He couldnt let go of the grudge that he had. He then said when he finally recieved the strength to forgive, it was as if he went from a black an white life to a colorful vibrant life. After tone testified, we read from Helaman 5:40-43. It talks about how the Lamanites were surrounded by a cloud of darkness when Nephi and Lehi were in prison and how they desperatly wanted the cloud to leave from them. When Aminadab tells them that they need to have faith in Christ and repent they do so and the cloud of darkness was disperesed and it was as they were circled about with pillars of fire. It was an incredible lesson that I learned as we taught him. When we dont forgive we will be spiritually blinded. We will have a darkness about us because it is almost impossible to recieve the whisperings of the sprirt if we are holding a grudge and preocupioed with what someone has done to us. When we come unto the Savior, as we recieve power to forgive, our lives will be brightened by the power of the Atonement. I know that it is hard to forgive, but when we come unto the Savior we will recognize actually how weak we are and how hard it can be to forgive, then if we try are best and rely on Him HE will strengthen us and we will be able to forgive. When we rely on the Savior and do all we can, He will do the rest. He will fill in the gaps and help us acheive our goals that allow us to fully live the Gospel and become fully converted. I know the Atonement is real. I know that the Holy Spirit guides us when we are willing to follow and listen. When we teach, and listen with love, we will be taught by those we are teaching and by the Holy Ghost. The Gospel changes lives and it helps us to see the Lords hand in our lives. He lives and loves us. There is no doubt in my mind that we are here on the earth to grow and progress. Everything that we have in our lives helps and and prepares us to return with our Father! We are so blessed!

I love you all so much. This is Christs Church and His true Gospel. I love the Lord and am so grateful for all He has done for me!

Thanks for all you do! You all are such good examples to me! Hope you have a great week.

Love Elder Bills

October 12, 2011

Hey Family! How are things going?? Today is our Preperation day because for the past 2 days we had Zone Leaders Council in Ventura. It was awesome! I recieved so much personal revelation and was uplifted, edified, enlightened, and blessed! President Castro is a man of God. He has been called of God and he wants the best for this mission becuase he loves the Lord and knows that this is His work and we are inviting His children.

Last Sunday we had the Camarillo Stake Conference. I couldnt help but think of you Mom and Dad. Do you remember what ward you were in? What buliding you met in? We met in the Camarillo Stake Center on 1201 Paseo Camarillo. I love it here! The weather is honestly perfect. And Mom its happened, I want to move here! Haha. I love it and I am excited to continue to get to know the members here and those who are waiting to hear the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.

Yesterday Elder Snelson and I had the opportunity to do the morning devotional at ZLC. All the Zone Leaders were assigned a talk on pride to study and we led a discussion about it. We put a lot of preperation and thought into it. The participation from the Zone Leaders was awesome! It was so special to be in that room and dicuss how we cann overcome the universla sin of pride. The spirit was so strong! As Elder Snelson and I though and studied about what we wouold share we both were impressed to talk about how service kills pride. We focused on pinpointing three questions. 1) What is Pride and how can we recognize it? 2) How do we have pride as leaders? 3) How can we be stripped of pride? We focused on thes questions and discussing how we can overcome the enemy of unity. We watched part of a talk from President Uchtdorf called, Lift Where you Stand from the 2008 OCT GC. (you should watch it) One thing that President Uchtdorf said in his talk Pride in the Priesthood stuck out to me too. He said "The moment we stop obsessing about ourselves and lose oursleves in service, our pride diminishes and begins to die." I love it! we need to forget about ourselves and serve. That is what I am going to focus on. Serving those around me.

We are teaching a kid named Freddy right now who is doing pretty well. Last night he discovered the Book of Mormon and committed himself to read it daily. We read Ether 12:27 with him and he said, " I think I get it now. If I read the Book of Mormon, my life will be better." Ha it was sweeet! The Spirit testified to him of the truthfulness of it! It is true!! I love the Book of Mormon!

Thanks for all that you guys do. I love you all so much. My adress is 701 Janetwood apt. # D Oxnard, CA 9303. I love you all so much. I am so skinny right now its scary! I have lost over 20 pounds! Its ok though. The Lord will bless me!

Love Elder Bills

October 3, 2011

Hey Family! Conference was unbelievable! I loved it. The spirit was incredible. I was sitting waiting for the last session to start and was overwhelmed with the spirit. It was a feeling of complete security and love. It wasnt just a good feeling. it was an incompasing feeling that gave me confidence and hope. I am grateful for the Spirit and the love of our Heavenly Father. I enjoyed Elder Scott's talk and I loved President Uchtdorf's first talk. I have almost memorized my favorite scripture (alma 32:42) and it is true what Elder Scott said. Memorizing scriptures can help them have more power. I had all my questions and concerns answered during conference. The gospel is true the Spirit is real and Heavenly Father's love is real.

We got transfer calls today. I am going to be white washing into Oxnard! I will be training a new zone leader as well. he has been out for about a year now and I am excited! I am confident that the Lord will guide us as we go into a brand new area together and have a desire to work and work harder than we ever have before. The Spirit will guide us if we have prayers of faith! I had a lot of success here in Bakersfield and I enjoyed my time here. I love the people I met and baptized and I know that it was inspired for me to come here, to meet the people I have and to be with the companions I have. The Lord knows our specific needs and will bless us according to our faithfulness. Thanks so much for all that you do for me! I love you all so much. Mom and Dad thanks so much for your hard work and love. Please always know and remember that I think often of the lessons I learned from you. You are amazing parents. If there is anything that i can do for you all please let me know.

I am sending you some boxes. Sorry about all of the letters in the box. You can throw them out if you want. I just didnt feel good about throwing them away! Could you save my planners? Thank you! I love you all so much! Thanks for your examples.

With all my love, Elder Craig Bills