Faith

March 3, 2010

Dad!

Happy birthday to Elle Sophia indeed! The big 0-1! March 4th will be a great day for that young one I am sure. I am looking forward with great anticipation for the time that I get to meet her for the first time.

Sadly Greg and his wife didn't accept, but we are still going to be working with them! They are great people who I am sure will accept baptism soon. We have found a lot of people who are searching for the gospel lately. Ray is still out of town but we met his grandson Clay yesterday and will begin teaching him. There is a man named Loyd (with one L) who was a media referral that we are teaching. Also a few others. The Lord is pouring His blessings down upon the Texas Houston East Mission. We have really been focusing on building our faith so miracles can happen and that is what is occurring. We have had 66 baptisms as a mission this year and at this same time last year we had 35. I know that our mission can and will double baptisms this year. We have been focusing on the Book of Mormon a lot lately and this time through it we are highlighting every time Jesus Christ's name or one of His titles appears, pronouns included. It's incredible how central He is to the Book of Mormon.

What an honor that will be to speak alongside Sam Reed! He is a great example to me and always has been. I remember seeing him in the MTC and what a joy it was. You could tell that he was going to do amazing things in Taiwan. Do you know what my topic will be? I don't know what the cost will be to ship the bike home but I'll get on that. That was so nice of the Scarpinos to say hi, tell them hi back ha. I love that family. Sister Scarpino is on my mind quite often.

That is so awesome Hillary got her blessing! I have grown to love my patriarchal blessing on my mission. I actually had a dream some time ago in which you had asked if I'd read my blessing lately, for the next few months I read it everyday and it benefitted me greatly. It is such a comfort in times of trial.

I can't wait to see you and the family again Dad. What an incredible blessing it has been to serve a mission but I am ready to come home. I will do all I can to fulfill my purpose up to the last step in Texas.

I read an ensign article from the February issue by Elder Bednar that really outlined one of many blessings of my mission. That is I have learned to love learning. I look forward everyday to studying the scriptures and experiencing new things that allow me to grow. I know that this life is about learning and preparing and my mission has been the best thing I could have done to benefit me in those two categories. I love this work. I love you dad.

Elder Jarman