February 8, 2010

My letter for everyone else

Sorry im writing you now and not on Wednesday like usual. We have had crazy snow! Its a record or atleast thats all we have heard were just missionaries so we dont get the most up to date news. We had 2 1/2 feet at our apartment. We spent the last couple of days(Saturday, Sunday) and Today shoveling out Cars, Driveways, Sidewalks, EVERYTHING!!! The snow plows are not helping either.

The area is still going great Church was cancelled which sucked for alot of us because that meant the cancellation of Baptisms(not us) But Good news actually GREAT news rememeber Daphne? Well her Mom is so in tune with the Spirit and she doesnt even have it yet! Crazy!!! Well she has finally decided she wants to be baptized she says she feels its the right things and she knows it but she is going to wait until her two boys Daniel and Gabriel understand the Gospel enough so that they can be baptized all together and then they will be an amazing family which they almost are now all they need is the Gospel :)

The work has been a little hard with the earthquake in Haiti still but when we talk about the Plan of Salvation with them it really brings comfort to them. One thing Ive learned so far(3 1/2 months) You can never say to many prayers. I counted how many prayers we said in one day it was 10 prayers and thats just for us not including the other 7 we said with investigators. 17 prayers in one day. Do you think Heavenly Father is up there going oh no Elder Van Dyke not another one? Of course not I bet he is up there saying Yes! Yes! Time to talk with my Son :)

Have you ever thought deeply about prayer. No you havent well serve a mission you will learn to appreciate prayer alot more. It has taken me 11 years to really understand what prayer is. Prayer is how we talk to God. Your probably saying Elder Van Dyke I knew that before you were born well let me ask you this. How often do you pray? How long do you pray? Do you really say your prayers with all your Heart and Strength? If you answered no to any of these then dont worry start now make today the day that you are really going to talk with your Father in Heaven but when you finish dont just say Amen and walk away Stay on the "line" let your Father talk back to you as much as we love getting advice from our Earthly parents how much more should we hunger for advice from Our Heavenly Parents? They want to talk to us and give us advice and help us along we just need to ask for it and then LISTEN for it. I have a testimony that Prayer is one of the most important things we could do here right now. Even if you dont have the same beliefs God still wants to hear from you even if you dont think anyone is listening just remember there is ALWAYS one person listening and watching out for us and wants to help us along our way so I would ask you to say a meaningful prayer tonight and really bear your whole heart and soul to your Father in Heaven and I promise if you do this you Will feel his Love for you and the many blessings that come with that Love.

I Love you all too but I cant love you as much if you dont write me :) (See how I turned this around) I will write later this week if not I will for sure write next Wednesday. "See ya next week and remember keep your stick on the ice" (Red Green show)