10/29/2018 So so sorry Technology isn't my friend today

Hola everyone, 

I am super sorry, but my tablet decided that it didn't want to work today, and halfway through my email, it just turned off. I tried to turn it back on, but it said it was out of power. We didn't have a cord on us, and so it had to wait until we just got home, but as soon as i plugged it in, it turned on and has 37% battery now...Sorry mom. This week wasn't very exciying, i got sick, so we couldn't really go out. We did meet an incredible mother of 5 (ages: 1,5,7,8,9) that was super excited to hear more about the Gospel! I don't have any time, but I love you all tons! Super sorry I didn't respond to many of you today (explained above). The Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ is true, The Book of Mormon is the Word of God, and Heavenly Father really does love each and every person on this Earth more than we can comprehend! LOVE YOU ALL!!!

<3 Elder Fox

This is not how you get a Florida tan 1022/2018

Hola Todos!

I am so sorry, this email is going to be very lackluster, due to a very unlucky turn of events, my emai was almost finished, and it got deleted. Super, super sorry. I'm running very low on time though, so I'm just going to get going.

We met some really neat people this week. Main one would probably be Robin. She is a super cool young, single mother that met missionaries many, many years back. She remembers a ton of what she learned, but at some point, someone from a different church knocked on her door, and when she said she used to talk to guys like us, he told her a ton of lies and crap about us, so she has refrained from contacting missionaries again, but we ran into her, answered basically all of her questions and explained the truth to all the lies. She is now really excited to talk again! On another awesome note, our friend Annie finally made it to church! We were/are super stoked for her, and she loved it! She even participated a good amount and said the prayer for one part!

There will be pics to explain too, but to explain the subject a bit: we helped a member of our ward build benches all day Saturday for his Eagle Scout Service Project. It was super fun, but we ended up getting some really gnarly sunburns, on the bright side, it is both harder to get sunburns here, and they heal faster. Just do to the altitude, hummidity, etc. One good part about Florida's climate!

For the end of this letter I wanted to talk a bit about one of my favorite talks from General Conference: Truth and The Plan by Elder Oaks (https://www.lds.org/study/general-conference/2018/10/truth-and-the-plan). I loved this talk. I am very guilty myself of relying way to much on learning "truth" only though scientific means, but I love how he says, "We find true and enduring joy by coming to know and acting upon the truth about who we are, the meaning of mortal life, and where we are going when we die. Those truths cannot be learned by scientific or secular methods." Then, the way that he just lays out essentially all of the knowledge that is important about our lives and the 'why' of everything in super simple, direct, and powerful bullet points is just so awesome to me! It is another reminder of how simple, real, and important the Gospel of Jesus Christ really is! I know I have talked about this a few other times, but it is just so nice. The one thing that we really need to know and understand, is one of the simplest! Isn't that just awesome! I know that everything he said is true, and it is a real blessing to know that. It really makes life so much more joyful and peaceful, knowing the 'why' behind it all, and I hope you all can feel that too! It's all true! And it is incredible! I love you all, have a fantastic week! Thanks for all the emails I have been getting, super sorry I've been so bad at getting back to them all. No excuses, I'm just bad a prioritizing times on P-Days, I promise I'll get around to you all though! I LOVE YOU ALL!!!

<3 Elder Fox

No one told us about Michael 10/14/2018

Hola todos!

Hope you all had another great week. Parents are telling me that y'all got some snow in the mountains, so I'm jealous. No need for me to explain, but it is not snowing here. At all. Anyways, this week was pretty interesting, I'll explain the subject later, haha. But other than that, it was a pretty mellow week. Let's get into it.

We met quite a few neat people this week. One guy is named Steve Logae. He is hatian, around 26, and was aparently baptized in 2008, so he was stoked to see us, and is really wanting to come back. He is super cool, pretty solid english too. We also met a lady named Monica that is from Columbia on a 'vacation' (said she will be here for many months), that is super cool. She has two funny little kids and is looking for a local church, and remembers how nice the missionaries from Columbia were. Last person we are teaching now is Thomas, and he is AWESOME! He had us in real quick, and said that he believed in a God, but is looking for the true church. He as definitely done his research on ours though, and knew a lot of Gospel Doctrine. He is not going to convert easily though (which is super good)! He insists on seeing the "proof" of it all. He is very earnest in his search though, so I know that if he allows Him, God will show him plenty of proof! On top of the proof we will have the chance to show him! I am super stoked to teach him!

To explain the subject line. No-one really told us that there was a hurrican coming (because we weren't really in any danger), but we were about 10 min walk from our car, with no umbreallas or anything, when suddenly, the sky tried to drown us! :D We thought it was just a common Florida down pour, and it was gonna stop, but after hiding in a persons porch for about 5 minutes, we noticed it wasn't going anywhere, and the winds were picking up...So we booked it! Super glad my tablet didn't get destroyed, but all the books and stuff we had on us were trashed. It was super funny. But that's all we got, super sorry for the Floridians and people up north though, it was really bad for them. Please keep those families in your prayers, thank you.

Something really cool though from this week: I have been reading that new book all about the history of the church: Saints! It has been incredible! I love how every few sentences there is a source for everything, like even whe nit says it was raining that day or something. I have learned a ton more about the history though, and have really enjoyed it! I highly recommend it to everyone reading this. Its on the gospel library app. One of my favorite things I have seen throughout it though, is just how much God is in control of it all! So many things had to work out so perfectly to make everything lay out how it needed to. There is just no way that anything but a Loving Heavenly Father could have orchestrated it! This has helped deepen my testimony that He will help our lives work out exactley how they should as well, if we let Him! So if you feel like the reigns of your life may be to heavy at times, hand them over to the God that loves you and knows you better than you love or know yourself! He sees it all, and I feel like He is much more qualified, at least for me, to take the lead! I know my Father in Heaven is real, He loves me and every one of you more than we could ever comprehend! He and His son, Jesus Christ, are always there to guide, help, comfort, and above all: Love! I LOVE YOU ALL! Have a great week!

<3 Elder Fox

Conference! Yea! Pt2 10/8/2018

Hola Everyone!

Hope y'all had the chance to watch conference, I got to watch...about 1/2 so far, haha. Its a long story, but we missed a good chunk on every session except for the last due to some really unlucky circumstances, but we live in the future, so we are watching what we missed tonight! My dad also told me y'all got snow back home...meanwhle I have a 70% of dying from heat exhaustion just existing outside over here. I'm ot jealous. Not at all. Most of our ward is heading out this weekend too to help up in Carolina, super bummed we cant tag along. Met some cool people this week though!

We got to see some famiiar faces again this week (Kiner fam, Erilus fam, Annie), and they are all doing well! We saw a bunch of interesting Floridians this week, it was quite entertaining! Most importantly though, we met Leroy! He is an awesome guy. He is about 60, and his aunt was a member of the Church. When he was younger, a friend gave him a Book of Mormon, but he lost it when he moved. He had actually been looking for it recently, and was very grateful to get another one. He and his wife have been looking for a church, and were very excited to learn about ours. He is a funny dude, he is like 60, and has a lot of physical issues, yet refuses to stop working at his family business (because "they all don't know how to do it right!"). 

I managed my timr poorly and have to finish quick sorry y'all (mostly Mom). Its still been awesome here on my mission though! And from the bit of conference I did ge to see thus far, something I loved was the question from one of the speakers acting as Christ: "Do you trust me?". Its something I have always been horrible at. I'm really bad at being willing to let go of the reigns in any situation, but esspecially things that play a big impact on my life, but what more do I know than He does? Its interesting to think, but when we truly do just place our trust in Him, everything alse just works out. When we let Him lead us, He turns around and gives us back the power to choose what we will, but just clarifies why we should choose one way over the other. Trust Him, it'll work out! I love you all tons! Have an awesome week! Thanks for everything you all do for me and eachother! LOVE Y'ALL!!!

<3Elder Fox

Conference 10/1/2018

Hola Todos!

Hope you al had a nice week, mine was (drum roll please) interesting (cue applause). I know I say that a lot, but I just don't know how else to explain it. I do want to say really quick, Loaiza's baptism was AMAZING! Super great to see her again, especially seeing her make that step! I'll get into the other people though real quick, because that last paragraph is probably gonna be long.

We met a lady named Angie. We knocked on her door and before we said anything, she just went, "Oh, dont worry I still have it! Can you come back Next Tuesday at 7:00?" we were a little confused, but we figured out that she met some other missionaries and had a Book of Mormon from them. So that was pretty neat. I'm not sure if y'all remember sister Kiner, but she went to the hospital because of a pretty bad asthma attack, and we ended up stopping by that same day. We ran into her fiance just as he was getting home, so we figured it out from him, and asked if there ws anything we could do for him/her, he said no, but then said "I really want to sit down one day with you boys, and talk about your religion, because I have been to more churches than you can count, and not one has done more for anyone than y'all have done for Alicia (sis. Kiner)!" So that was awesome. We'll be seeing him tonight! We are also helping our friend Chirs and Ashley move. So that's sad, but it'll be really good for that family, just to much going on here for them.

For the end, mom has asked me to do something kinda different, and I get confused easily, so bear with me please. But first, a little about the mission. The Florida Orlando Mission is prettty standard as far as I can tell. My Mission President is an awesome guy! I don't think I couldv'e gottten called to a better mission for me (minus the weather, obviously), but Florida is such a melting pot (esspecially for spanish speakers), so I get to meet people from all over the world. Which is awesome for me because learning about other traditions, cultures, beliefs, etc. is one of my favorite things! Its just so exciting to see so much variety among God's children, and yet knowing we are all family is beautiful to me. One thing I don't want anyone to think though, is that any missionaries are perfect, or anything close to that. We all have faults, some more than others, but thats just fine! Because "God qualifies thoose whom He calls"! As for one of the biggest surprising things I have learned so far, its hard to nail it down to one; however, something that has really made a difference for me out here (and will for the rest of my life), is that God has been, is, and always will be a God of miracles. And he will preform them day after day, hour after hour, second after second, for me, for you, for anyone who really wants or needs one, all He asks in return, is your obedience to the protective laws He has put in place. Miracles are real. Its something I have 'known', but to see them as often as we get to...words honstly can't describe. He really does love us! Note: this does not mean He will give any of us a perfect life, or make our lives easy. We don't learn from easy. There is no growth in comfort, but He will provide where it is necessary, and when we really need it. He provides! Once again: He Love Us! Every darn one of us! No exeptions! Hope you all get the chance to enjoy conference. Love Y'all!!!

<3 Elder Fox