The Tree of Life

Hey!

Thanks for all the emails! Hopefully I can respond to all of them!

Sorry Mom, I have no idea where my ACT/SAT books are. Might be in my closet...or in the dump...? No idea. Dad, that’s way cool that you're going up to AK, hope you have a safe trip!

Dad, I also like what you said about the fruit in the vision of the tree of life. I was kind of thinking about that. I hadn't really thought about the option of throwing the fruit, but I had thought about Lehi taking some and walking over to his family. But that would kind of take away their agency. Plus they wouldn't get the experience of overcoming trials to get the fruit for themselves. Probably a lot of other reasons too. Cool stuff. Another thing I was thinking about is how the whole time, Lehi seems able to see everyone that is in the mists of darkness, but they don't seem able to see him. That could be about how prophets are able to guide us, or how people who aren't actually facing the problems are able to see it with a better perspective, and a ton of other stuff. I love studying that vision.

That’s way cool that my letters got there on Hailey's birthday! I hope she had an awesome time, and hopefully I'll have time to reply to her email too.

Anyway, this week was pretty good. Yesterday was way cool. Every other week the Spanish group goes to the English sacrament meeting and we're supposed to translate for them. Only one of us has to do the translating, but during the week I was thinking about it and realized how scared I would be to do it. I know fear and faith can't both be there, so I didn't like that I felt nervous. So...I volunteered to translate. It was way fun! Sitting in the back of the chapel talking into the microphone. Haha I was so bad at it though. I ended up handing it over to my companion while they were singing the sacrament hymn because I felt bad that the people listening to my translation had missed like half the announcements. It was way cool though and I'm glad I tried it. I kind of wish I had tried doing the whole meeting but I felt bad for the people that had to listen to me do it. In honor of that, the verse(s) of the week is all of D+C section 9. It talks about the Holy Ghost, but it also talks about Oliver Cowdery (if I remember right) and how he had been given the gift to translate, but because he had failed to use that gift during his window of opportunity, the time had passed and he had lost the gift. So, yup. Use 'em or lose 'em. (Dyc 6:36 is pretty cool too)

Also, almost everyone we're teaching went to church this week! But since we teach in like 5 towns, everyone that went was at different church buildings, so we didn't even get to see all of them:( Glad they went though.

Another cool thing was on Friday I got to go on exchanges again. This time with one of our zone leaders, Elder Haymore. He's pretty cool. Grew up in Idaho on a ranch. Anyway, at the end of each transfer we're supposed to help each other learn from it, and he basically just told me that he was super impressed and that I acted and taught like I had been out for way longer than I have been. So that was cool. Not that I want  to go getting a big head or anything. It helped that he's an English missionary, and I was in his area, so I got to teach everyone in English, which made it a bit easier.

Mom, you said you hope that I'm actually happy and not just trying to sound happy in my emails. I'm happy! It’s hard and long, but it’s also fun and rewarding. I wouldn't feel right if it wasn't hard. But I like it and it’s an awesome experience.

Hmm... I feel like there's more to say but I can't think of anything.

Jace

Also, got an email from the church about my visa today. It basically just said "thanks for waiting, we're trying to get your visa. Have a good time in Oregon." So yeah, I still have no idea, but at least they're working on it.