By Small and Simple Things

Hello Everyone!! Maayong Gabii!

Not a lot has happened this week. Its kind of been a routine week which is nice. That is so awesme you had the missinaries over for FHE! Ive been meaning to tell you that yu shoud have them over so that's awesme that you did! Sorry this keyboard is really awful so it's going to a bad typed email. Worse than usual haha. Anyway that is so awesme you had them over! We love when members invite us over for dinner and FHEs. And Jimmer thats so cool! Keep trying to look for opportunities to share and really listen to the spirit becasue the Spirit knows all things and will tell you what you shoud say. Its hard and takes practice but its true. Focus on asking inspired quesions. That is the key and that's how the Savior taught. He always allowed the people t think for themselves and learn frm the Spirit and then he added to their response and learning. That's been the focus of our mission, asking inspired questions. Anyway but that is so awesome! Keep it up! So a quick update on JJ. He is really catching fire. It's been so fun to watch. When me and Elder Murdock taught him he didn't have the biggest desire to really progress but all of the sudden he has caught fire. He is coming to church and asking us questions which means he is really thinking about thinsg. And he is sharing scripture thoughts with us every lesson as the assinment we give him. It has been so fun and so satisfying to watch. I'm so grateful for the chance i have to be here watching this change. So yeah Feb 8 is looking like the day which will be right before I transfer so that's awesme! Things are goin well here in Tagbi. Elder Ymas is awesme and the other elders in our house are aweswme too. It's been reallly fun. We have a good time together. One more quick thing about grace. Robert Millet's bookk or soomthing on grace is awesme. ive been listening to that and it's amazing. He said the ne thing he wished he wouldve known and understood more about when he was young is grace. He said he probably wouldve lived a little differently not that he has regrets but he said he would have lived a litte differently had he really understood grace. I thought that was interesting. But lately ive also thught a lot about small and simple things great things are brought to pass. This is such an amazing principle to me and so merciful. All the Lord asks us to do are small and simple things. I'm startig to see the importance of just doing little things everyday. I know bac at home its super busy and you all have a lot of stuff to do but tha's the amazing thing is the Lord just asks us t do small and simple things. I'm also findin the importance of just taking a little time like 5 or ten mintues to jus ponder and think. I've been doing that lately on the trikes or in the house and it's amazing what it does. I am able t just feel Heavenly Father's love for me and for everyone. I know that by smal and simple thing great things are brought to pass. My challenge to all of you is to just take a little time to think and ponder and read a few verses a little bit every day if you aren't already. If you have more time than thats awesome but even 10 minues is good. I promise yu all tht if yu do that you feel the Spirit and Heavenly Father and Christ's love for you nt just at that mment but always. Nephi described that love as the most joyus to the soul. I testify that that is true. I love you all. I love this gospel. I love our Heavenly Father and Savior. I am so grateful for their mercy towards me. I love and pray for you all!!

Love,

Elder Fox

We Are All Enlisted

Hello Everyone!!

This week has flown by!! It probably went extra fast becasue I was finally back to work and not laying in bed 24/7! It was nice to get back to work! Really tiring but nice. Things are going well here Tagbilaran. I feel 100% which is awesome and the work is movin along. JJ, an investigator, is finally starting to come to church and we set a date for Feb. 8! We are super excited about that. Elder Ymas is great. It's different having a filipino companion but it's awesome. I think I mentioned last week that he is from Davao so he is a native Cebuano speaker which is helping or hopefully helping my Cebuano. He and his family are converts. They were converted in 2002 so he was 12 years old and so that's really cool! He said his dad was a heavy drinker before but is completely clean now. They were catholic before and he said his mom new that they had to be baptized by immersion and the catholoic church doesn't do that so she started searching for churches that do do that and she found the missionaries. Really cool. elder Ymas is super nice and funny. so I have been studying grace the past few days and I have a lot to say and not a lot of time to say it. i've learned so much about grace. It's amazing that as we search, ponder, and pray and desire knowledge, the Lord gives it to us. all we have to do is desire, ask, and search. I've had some amazing personal studies the past few days. Some of the best on my mission so far. I read "His Grace is Sufficient" by Brad Wilcox in the September Liahona and it was amazing to say the least. You all need to go read it right now! I'm serious it opened my eyes to what grace really is. Also read in the Bible dictionary, the definition for grace and John chapter 15. Grace is the constant power and strength we receive from Heavenly Father and the Savior to do what they have asked us to do. As we put forth our best effort to do what they have commanded we receive immediately the strenght to do it. it says in the scriputres that the Savior progressed from grace to grace also until he received of the fulness of the Father. We too, progress from grace to grace. We receive the strenght we need for the given moment, for the given trial, and when another trial comes, we receive the strenght or the grace to overcome that one. I hope this is all making sense. Grace is also the power that saves us from our sin. When we fall short, and as we repent grace is given and we are forgiven. That is the most common understanding of grace I would say. The other part, the constant strenght and power part, is something i didn't know but I love. I've seen it so much on my mission so far. I have to wake up at 6:30 every day which I was really worried about and you all know how worried i was about it but i've been doing it for 4 and a half months. as I've done my part, the Lord has granted me grace to be able to do it. He did the same thing while i was sick the other week. He's done it time and time again and I can't begin to describe how grateful I am for Him and His mercy towards me. I love Him so much. i'm just amazed at how merciful our lives are. Everything in our lives is proof of how much our Heavenly Father loves us and how merciful and kind He is. I love Him and I'm so grateful for Him and for His plan for us. I'm so grateful that families can be forever and that we can live with our Father in Heaven and Savior Jesus Christ for eternity. My last thought comes from a talk Elder Holland gave a few years ago in priesthood called "We Are All Enlisted." You all should go listen and read that talk. It's amazing like Elder Holland's talks always are. But he talks about how we need to be a voice not only against evil but for good. Our Heavenly Father needs children that will fight. He ends the talk with lyrics from we are all enlisted. "Haste to the battle, quick to the field, truth is our helmet, buckler and shield. Stand by our colors, proudly they wave. We're joyfully, joyfully marching to our home." I know this church is the Church of Jesus Christ. I know that this is His work. I pray that we will fight for Him who fights so dearly for us. I love Him and am so grateful for Him. I know that He is the Christ and that He will come again. I love you all and pray for you more than you'll know!!
Love, Elder Fox

"so first i was iron man, then joseph smith, then superman, and now i'm a jedi haha this is what we did last night after a long day of work."

Happy Birthday Anna!

Hello Everyone!!!

Wow it's been so long since ive been able to email! It feels like it's been since skype that ive been able to talk to you guys becasue on new years I didn't really get to email as much as normal. Anyway its good to email all of you again!! Lets say the past week and a half hasn't been very fun and I don't really want to have to do it again. Before I dive in i have to wish Anna a HAPPY BIRTHDAY IN A COUPLE OF DAYS!!!! I will be thinking of you all day Anna and I hope you have the best day ever!!! I'm so sad i'm going to miss being there but I promise i will give you the best brother/sister birthday date ever when I get back!! Deal? So the day that Elder Murdock transferred was the day it hit. Everyone was saying i got sick becasuse i missed him haha. Anyway so I started to not feel well that Thursday and I started to get a fever and headache the night I picked up Elder Ymas. he is great by the way. He has been so nice this whole time. He's cooked for me and fed me his food and has taken really good care of me which was nice. It was nothing like you mom though. He's from Davao so he is a native Cebuano speaker which is good for me learning the language but is also tricky. He knows some english but he's not too good at it which is hard but it's all good. It was really hard while I was sick becasue it was just another thing that I had to deal with but its not bad. I don't know a lot about his family. we haven't really been able to talk about all of that becassue Ive been sleeping but i will find that out and tell you all about him. I believe he is a convert but I'll have to find out more about that too. Haha i'm such a great companion huh! So yeah he is really nice, really caring, and a good companion. There is that natural Filipino/American barrier which makes things kind of lonely but he is awesome. Anyway so I got sick that night but still went out to eat and pick him and stuff and then in the morning it hit hard. I had a fever and a nasty headache and my back killed and so i just went back to bed. I took some advil and yes I remembered the advil/tylenol combination that you always told me mom! Thank you so much for teaching me about all that by taking such good care of me when I was sick becasue I knew what to do before I got instructions from Sister Tanner. The only bad thing was that with dengue you aren't supposed to take advil becasue it thins your blood and dengue is a virus that attacks the platelets or something. I'm not completely sure but all i know is if i started bleeding out my nose or my teeth started bleeding from brushing them then I wouldve had to go to the hospital. That luckily didn't happen. So I just had to take tylenol and drink lots of fluids, rest and wait it out. It was never life threatening, it just wasnt fun to say the least. So yeah I stayed in bed for about 7 days straight just sleeping. I didn't feel like eating a lot so i ended up losing a lot of weight. Not scary loss but i lost quite a bit. Enough to be able to see it on my face and stomach and stuff. I'm back to eating now though. But yeah so it was a hard week in bed. I felt so homesick and pretty alone the whole time. I wanted to be home in bed or on the couch with all of you, and with you taking care of me mom. I understood how Mckade felt when he was super sick a few months ago. I never had the thought of going home but it was hard. But just like every hard thing that comes, it passes. I look back now and i did it. I made it through and that's how it is in our lives. Hard things come but they will always pass and we will come out stronger and better if we endure them well, if we rely on the Lord and let Him change us. I listened to a lot of talks and things while laying there which was nice and they helped so much. I listened to some john bytheway and michael wilcox. The Michael Wilcox one was probably my favorite, "The Jesus We Need to Know." Listen to it beacsue its amazing and i learned so much about the Savior and who He was and is. Although I felt alone sometimes i knew I was never alone. I knew that Heavenly Father was there and that the Savior was there and He knew what I was feeling becasue He felt, He has had dengue fever. Prayer has become the most important thing in this world to me out here on my mission because with it, I always have a best friend to talk to about anything I'm feeling or going through. I have my companion, other missionaries, President and Sister Tanner who are all awesome people that I can turn to for help but none of them can replace all of you. I can email once a week and receive help from all of you but that's once a week and last week I couldn't email.So the one thing i have always, one thing that we all have always, is prayer. I can always talk to my Heavenly Father whenever I want, whenever I need and He is always there to talk to me. He talks to us more than we think. If we listen in our prayers, or just at random times during the day, we will hear Him speak to us. I am so grateful for prayer. I'm so grateful to Heavenly Father for always listening to me and answering me. I know that through prayer we can receive strength and help in our lives. I'm so grateful for the relationship I have with Heavenly Father and our Savior Jesus Christ. I'm so grateful for Them and love Them so much. I know They love me and love all of you. Through them all things are possible. If we want to be healed, if we want to feel Their power and influence in our lives, then we must do what it says in Mosiah 29:20

"But behold, he did deliver them becasue they did humble themselves before him; and becasue they cried mightily unto him he did deliver them our of bondage; and thus doth the Lord work with his power in all cases among the children of men, extending the arm of mercy towards them that put their trust in him."

I know this is true. I know that He will deliver us from all things as we put our trust in Him. I know Christ lives. He is our Master, Savior, and King. He will come again. I love Him and will serve Him forever. I love the hymn we thank Thee o God for a prophet where it says, "we feel it a pleasure to serve Thee, and love to obey Thy command." He will bless us with all that He has, with exceedingly great joy as we serve Him. I love Him so much and I love all of you!! Thank you so much for the many prayers! I felt them so powerfully so thank you. I pray for all of you always! I love you all!

Love, Elder Fox