Mission Adventures of Elder Clark Lovell

Hello everyone! Because I may not be able to send a mass email next week, I decided that this will be my last weekly email of my mission. We have had a lot of great experiences this week, including inviting another person to be baptized on Sunday, and seeing her progression since we started talking to her. We also had two devotionals with general authorities over Zoom! One was this morning with President Paul Pieper of the Presidency of the 70. He spoke about how it is by the grace of God that we are here still serving. After seeing many of my fellow missionaries and friends go home early because of COVID-19, I couldn't help but feel grateful that my mission has been able to be the way it is. Elder Kikuchi, an emeritus 70 who actually knew our mission president when he was a young missionary in Japan. He spoke about how critical our personal preparation at the beginning of our day. Later that day I had my final interview with President Youngblood over Zoom. It was a very...

Hola todos! I have seen a lot of miracles this week. Anyone who says "Oh those poor missionaries, they aren't able to do anything" no offense at all, but that is completely not true. I have seen the Standard of truth come to life within my apartment. The Standard of truth is a prophecy that the Prophet Joseph Smith gave shortly before his martyrdom. Here it is: “The Standard of Truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; … the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done.” The work of the Lord is still progressing even within the walls of a tiny missionary apartment in Henderson, Nevada. Last night, we saw an incredible, unprecedented miracle happen when our neighbor, a young lady who we have been texting back an...

Hola todos! I feel like I have to pop out the journal to write this email like I did in the MTC because I have to think really hard about what happened! I have learned a lot this past week about myself and about my mission. I am super grateful for my companion Elder Gonzalez because he really is helping me see a different perspective. Recently I have been trying to work as hard as I can, sprint to the finish line, and it has been good, we have been seeing good things happen, but it also has had some adverse effects on me, like making me a little more impatient or anxious than usual. My companion, thankfully has helped me see the big picture. He has only been out a month and a half less than me, and is a great missionary. We have seen a lot of cool things happen with the members in our area. I have seen the long term effects of simple things like not reading the scriptures or having family prayer through some of the members here, and the adverse effects that has on th...

Hello everyone! We have had a pretty packed week! We have been teaching a lot of lessons to members and non members, but one of the other highlights this week was the fact that Hna Pecjak's (Alta Vista Relief Society President) grandson was born on Friday! The crazy thing about that is that I was in my first transfer here in the branch when I was at her house when her and her husband found out they would be grandparents! When I finish my mission, I will have been in this wonderful branch for 10.5 months! Some of the lesson highlights were: -we had a lesson with the Coreas family in which we talked about them going to the temple to be sealed as a family for time and eternity, and wrote down their goals on a whiteboard. We texted Alma a picture of the whiteboard, and she then posted it on her Facebook story, which simply told me how important that was for her  -we had a lesson with Cesar and Jesse and our branch president about the Priesthood, and how important it...

Hello everyone! This week had its ups and downs, the biggest highlight was definitely watching General Conference, and I learned a lot. I invite all of you, if you want to hear some inspirational talks, regardless of you religious beliefs, to watch General Conference. You can find it at   https://www. churchofjesuschrist.org/ broadcasts?lang=eng It is the opportunity we get to hear from living prophets, or men chosen by God to represent Him to the world and give His word to us, just like anciently in the Bible. My favorite part was watching President Nelson get emotional when he told the world that there would be a temple of the Lord built in Shanghai, China. He did a lot of surgical and ministering work there in the past and he loves those people a lot. That was touching. I was also pumped to hear about the temple that is going to be built in Pittsburgh! PA! Boo yeah!  My other favorite part was a talk given by Elder Neil L Anderson of the Quorum of the 12 A...

Hello! We have had quite the week down here in Henderson, Nevada, and it all took place inside one tiny little missionary apartment! On Wednesday, we had to say goodbye to our companion, Elder Palmer, who finished his mission that day. It was sweet to see how happy he was to be with his family again. After that, a missionary that Elder Troya and I had served around in the past became our third companion. His name is Elder Gonzalez. He is from Clarkston, Utah. Cool name for a town, right?  On Thursday we had a really cool lesson with this family we started teaching in our South Valley Ranch Ward. All of our lessons are over video chat now, and this family, of four kids and a mother, we taught them the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It was cool, Elder Troya especially had a lot of fun teaching them. The coolest part was at the end of the lesson, the oldest kid said that he thinks that this faith is the right path for him. Apparently he had not liked any religions in the past, bu...

Hello everyone! Week one of working remotely is just about up! We have done our best to work with the members to help them help us, because that is the only way we will get work done in this mission. We are trying to get the members to share our Facebook posts, and have their friends see them in the community. During all of this, I was struggling a little bit with the idea of potentially working remotely for the rest of my mission, and I decided to ask my companions to give me a priesthood blessing. For those who aren't familiar with priesthood blessings, part of what we teach is that the same authority that Christ gave His followers, called Apostles has been restored to the earth, which gives men the ability to bless in the same way that they blessed people, in the way that the Savior blessed. When I received that blessing, so much peace came into my heart. It was gradual, but now, with the fluctuating circumstances surrounding the term of my service, I fee...

Hello everyone! So...... This week has been interesting, to say the least. It has been quite a blur, and lots of things have happened. Primarily, this afternoon I received a phone call from my mission president early this afternoon, and he informed me that because of the issue with COVID-19 in the United States, the First Presidency and The Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (the prophets that lead and guide the church) determined that all male missionaries who reach their 21 month anniversary on or before September 1st will go home early. With that direction he received, President Youngblood told me that my finish date for my mission was moved from June 24, 2020 to May 13, 2020. Needless to say I have about a million different emotions in my head, so much so that I think my brain is just numbly confused. If anyone has any advice, please let me know, I would love to hear it. He told me that I would "finish my honorable mission on May 13, 2020" those words stuck out to me in th...

Hola todos! Sorry this email is going to be shorter, I am low on time. I had an unconventional week this week, because due to the health of one of my companions, we had to stay in the apartment on Friday and Saturday. Don't worry, he didn't have the Corona virus... But he did have the flu. Word to the wise, get your flu shots when you can. We tried to make the best of the situation by making plans and studying extra, and proselyting over the phone. It was a new experience for me, and by the time we went out again on Sunday, I was itching to talk to people. It felt good to talk to people again. The other experience happened on Tuesday night. We had a lesson with a mom and her 16 year old daughter. The daughter was struggling with believing in the existence of God. She didn't understand faith, and it was clear that she wanted to believe, but her own pride got in the way. She spoke very directly to us, and didn't hold back at all. For some reason, the Spirit didn...

Hi everyone! This week has been full of ups and downs, and I don't have time to write about all of them, but here is one: We had the baptism of Cesar and Jesse on Saturday, and it was a beautiful service! When we went to fill up the font, we turned the lights on, and there was a scorpion in the font!! So, naturally, we baptized him.... Just kidding.  But we did obviously have to take it out of the font, but that was a fun chore.  The people who came to the baptism were completely all the way to the back of the Relief Society Room (which is a larger classroom in our chapels). When we got in the water, it was cold! And Jesse, who is 12, got in with me, and he was freezing. Right after I baptized him, the water got really warm! I couldn't feel the cold anymore! I knew it was the Spirit of God warming us up. It was a beautiful experience. The down of the week was yesterday when the lady who had called us last week to teach her family, she told us ...

Hello everyone! This week has been a week full of miracles! It was a busy one, due to transfer duties being taken care of. It's fun being in a trio, especially with a former companion of mine.  We had a pretty amazing experience on Sunday. We had just gotten home from church, and we got a call from someone, who asked if we would please come and teach her son. She had received a card from missionaries with our phone number on it about a year and a half ago, and her son was really struggling, and so her and her husband decided to call us to have us come teach their family. That never ever happens to us, and so of course we would! We went to their house, which was in a part of our area in which we didn't really go much because of the lack of Spanish speaking people there, but they lived there! We had the most powerful conversation with the family. This wonderful Sister and her husband were crying as we taught their son that yes there is a God, and that he was a son of God...

Hello!! It's been a great week!!! And it got better this morning when I found out I would be staying in Alta Vista for a 6th transfer, and with Elder Palmer my companion.... And... Elder Troya, my trainee from all the way back in 2018, is joining our companionship!!! I am very excited! Honestly the past week or so it has been hard to find new people to teach and I was kind of expecting a change of area, but when we visited the Coreas family last night, and I looked at this family that I loved so much, I thought "I can't leave this family, I love them just too much" and all feelings of just wanting a change of pace, instantly left me. I could not sleep last night literally just wondering how I would handle leaving that family. And I won't be just yet!! On Saturday we had an event that our district and a few other districts helped out with. It is called the "Saints and Sinners 1/2 Marathon". It was organized by a member of the church about 10 y...

Hello everyone! We have had a great week here! We have a few more people progressing in our area, and we are helping prepare them to make the sacred covenant of baptism. We have seen several miracles this week. The title of my email comes from Elder Shane Bowen, a member of the Seventy, a General Authority of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. He came to our stake conference this past weekend, and he met Ana, the Guatemalan lady that we have been teaching. When we told him that she was getting baptized on Saturday (the 15th) he shook her hand and said "Welcome home" it was so sweet, because he said it in Spanish. He served in Chile when he was a missionary, and in Spain as a mission president. She has been through so much to get here. She has changed so much, and it has been amazing teaching her. What else... We went on exchanges twice, and learned some wonderful lessons. I learned from one lesson that I need to be better at putting myself in other peopl...