Mission Adventures of Elder Clark Lovell

Merry Christmas!! I hope everyone has been enjoying a splendid Christmas day, and week! This week has truly been a blessing to me, not just because of the birth of our Savior, but also because I got to see a family truly follow His example, and within that family, a couple experience the joy of repentance, and one of them follow His example through baptism. On Saturday, Alma and José were married, and shortly thereafter, Alma was baptized. I will not share the words said at that service, because there were words said that will forever be cherished in my heart very sacredly. The feelings I felt were indescribable, and were the greatest Christmas or birthday present I could ever have gotten, far better than any food, gadget, clothing article, or any material thing on this earth. It was the greatest gift Heavenly Father has given me, outside of His Son and my own family, to see this family finally, united in the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.  On Monday, for my birthday, the...

Hello everyone! Hope everyone is as pumped as I am for Christmas! I dont have a ton of time to write, but two things that were both cool and hilarious happened this week. 1.The Coreas family, the mom of which is the one getting baptized on Saturday, we had a Family Home Evening with them and our branch mission leader, and they were talking about whrre they were from. This whole time, I knew Hno Coreas was from El Salvador, but I thought Alma was from Mexico. I have thought that since I got here, but I found out that she is from El Salvador as well! Everyone, including Hno Coreas was like "Qué pasó, élder??" Oof. That roughly translates to: "What the heck, elder?" Or "what happened, elder" is probably a more correct translation. That was embarrassing. 2. The other thing is that I met a sister in our new ward who studied music at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, with two directors I had for festivals! She studied with Dr Ryan Beeken, and Dr. J...

Hello everyone! Once again, I have run out of time to write this letter to it's entirety. However. I do want to share a story from yesterday. This family that we have been working with for my entire time in the Alta Vista Branch, Alma and José, let me just say that the necessary plans were made for Alma to be baptized on the 22nd of December!! She chose me to be the one to perform the ordinance. The feeling of humility that came over me when she told me that she wanted me to do the ordinance was pretty overwhelming.  The best way to describe yesterday is a scripture that very accurately describes the feelings I have felt recently: 2 Nephi 4:21 "He hath filled me with his love, even unto the consuming of my flesh." And another in 3 Nephi 17:20 "And now behold, my joy is full" These past few transfers have been a struggle for me, but all of it was worth it just to feel the way I feel. Yesterday we planned out their marriage, her baptismal inte...

Hello everyone! This week was great! Well more like the past 5 days were great! I don't have a ton of time, but the highlight BY FAR of the week, was when Elder Palmer and I were translating in Alta Vista's sacrament meeting into english (for the spouses and family members who dont speak spanish) and then, Alma walks in with her daughters, late like usual, but then, José walks in with them!!! He is her soon to be husband, who is a less active that we have been working with for a while, since I got here! I literally was so excited, I forgot I was translating for about 30 seconds, and when I started translating again, my voice was super shaky, I could barely hold it together. And they stayed for sunday school, AND they are meeting with the branch president (leader of the congregation) tomorrow, AND he is coming out to a lesson with us tonight!! It was such a miracle. I felt physically exhausted afterwards because of how excited I was, and how much love I have for that family. ...