First off I truly hope that everyone had a wonderful Christmas Holliday and had the chance to reflect your life upon Christ. The whole reason why we celebrate Christmas is to remember the birth of our savior Jesus Christ. Here in New York a lot of people don’t think about Christ or a lot about giving. I feel a lot of negative feelings flowing within people and thinking about how much they can receive compared to how much they can give to others. This was my first Christmas Holliday away from my family and I was filled with love for others and I was constantly looking for ways to serve others and I know that as I did that I was blessed with the Christ-like attribute of charity, which I know that I am still working on developing that charity. I know that as I did that I helped others understand the meaning of Christmas.
This Christmas I had the wonderful opportunity to talk to my family and a few of my loved ones back at home. I know that God truly does answer prayers. There have been a lot of things that I have sincerely been praying for in behalf of my family and loved ones. After talking to them I came to understand the love that God truly has for me and for each of us if we will pray to him with real intent and having desire to follow the path that Christ has set for each of us. I am so thankful to hear of the wonderful changes that some of my family members have made in there life since I have been away. I pray that they can continue to move forward with that same desire to grow closer to our Father in Heaven so that they can be eligible to receive those blessings that God has in store for each of them. I know that if they do that, then God will bless there lives with what they need in his own do time if they are continuing to move forward with faith and putting their trust in him. This week was a little hard for missionary work, considering that everyone was stressed out about Christmas. But we still did the best that we could to carry the gospel message into others homes and lives.
This week I was on exchanges with my District leader, for those who don’t know what exchanges are they are when you get put with a different companion for 24 hours. On this exchange my district leader came with me in our area that we have been teaching. There is an investigator that we have been working with for awhile now. His name is John Rivera he has come to church for the prior 4 weeks in a row. So on this exchange I felt strongly that we should call John and hopefully be able to commit him to baptism. So when we were about to call him, we received a phone call and sure enough it was him. I then asked him if we could meet him at the church and talk for a bit. So we went and we met with him and we ended up committing him to baptism for Jan. 17th. He was so excited to have a baptismal date. Also on this Sunday we confirmed Autumn as a member of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and she received the gift of the Holy Ghost. I am so thankful for the success that I have had thus far on my mission, I constantly give thanks to God for that, because I know that it is not through me that these people are making these big steps in their life to come unto Christ and be baptized in his name. I know that it is through the gift and power of the Holy Ghost that they are making those changes, and the Holy Ghost truly does fill them with much comfort as they are learning of the restored gospel.
Ok so anyways I have never had Meat loaf in my whole life… To make a long story short my Dad seemed to eat meat loaf a lot during his life growing up. So this week we went over to a members house for dinner and they gave us some meat loaf. When I mentioned that I have never had meat loaf they looked at me as if I was crazy. It was actually pretty good. “Dad, you need to start enjoying meat loaf again because I thought it was actually fantastic.” Ha ha ha..
Well I don’t have that much to say today and that is the update that I want to leave with you all. I also want to leave one more thing with each of you that is to remind each of you to build and find desire from within you to follow Christ and to be willing to make those proper necessary changes in your lives to grow closer to him. I know that as you do that then each of you will find that eternal happiness that everyone desires to have. I also know that as you make those changes your lives will be blessed with the things that you desire to attain here in this mortal life. I love each of you so much and I am always praying for all of my friends and family back at home. I hope you all have a good week and can always look for ways to serve others and to not yield to your selfish desires, but to look for ways to serve.

Elder Doyle