Jake Lewis West Indies Mission: Letter Number 56 and 57....

A Request from Jake:

Please send me your conversion story and stories of times when you chose to keep the commandments.

I hope we can all send these to Jake so he can share them with the people he is teaching and serving in the Martinique.

The spirit of the Lord is incredible. As it enters our lives it fills us with this love and this joy and makes us want to change. If there is one thing that I will take home with me it will be that. The way that the Spirit has entered into my life is incredible, it has changed me and pushes me to change every day. There are many times when it tells me what I need to change and opens scriptures to my mind. The more and more profound it becomes the less I am capable of denying this wonderous work. This is truly the Lords work, he is at the head of it and everything that is happening is in his control. This week as we have gone out working there have been so very many people who he has put in our paths. Even when we are not bold enough to talk to them, they build up the courage to talk to us. It is cool to see that happen. There was a man about my age who came up to us and started talking in English, he started to explain that he had seen us on the bus the other day and he was really wanting to know how to have faith, where he could find it and how it could change his life. He looked up our church that night and asked us about the tablets in the ground written in Egyptian, we looked at each other and said "the gold plates?" we continued to have a wonderful lesson with him and showed him how the Book of Mormon answers questions of the soul and is here to help us know who we are and where we are going. it was incredible.

I love you all, I hope that you are searching to draw near unto God.

There is only forward and backward.

Elder Lewis

Response from Jake when asked about the recent mugging on the bus in Martinique?

One day I'll tell you all of the stories that will really scare you;) that is like not even the most scariest by far. The Lord has really protected me in some times when my demise was sure. Where there is the greatest light there shall also be the greatest darkness to oppose it.

Le Jardin De Balata "Mahogany Tree"

Letter 57

I found it interesting that Jake says at the beginning of his letter that he really has nothing to say, but then says the most beautiful things about the Atonement and about Lance and I as his parents. As parents it is just so true that every single prayer in some part is asking for protection to be placed around our children.

This last week I have used to atonement to comfort myself over an issue that has long be bothering me, and one I feel will take many more years to work itself out. I do believe and know that Christ has felt our every pain and suffering...literally. I hope we can share our testimonies of that with others

today.

Please pray for Jake's feet in your prayers...they ache constantly. I am working on a solution.

Heeeyyy there agian,

It looks like we find ourselves here agian, Elder Lewis with nothing really to say.

We met some sweet people this last week, this one guy was washing off his car and I thought he was going to spray us I thought "do it, after i walk up this next hill ill be just as wet, " unfortunatly he didnt, but it turns out we got a church hedquarters referral from his daughter to delive a book of mormon.

Also we met two families from Trinidad, Guyana, and Saint Lucia, they are some pretty sweet people, we taught them last night and we are seeing them again Wednesday.

This last week I contemplated the greatness of the sacrafice that my parents have made for me all my life. I remembered to have seen my Dad one morning when I woke up to go to swim practice kneeling in his office. I didnt realize it till now, but I immagine that he was pouring his soul out for mine. I am so glad him and my mom did that for me, all my life I have felt these walls of protectiona and warnings around me, whether I heeded them or not is another story, but the prayers of the faithful and the sacrafice of others is a great motivational power. That is why the atonement pulls us to it, and it gives us the motivation to keep going. Because Christ suffered all and truely stepped in for us, he has the power to draw us unto him. 2 Nephi 26:24

I love the Gospel, I love my family, and I love you all,

Elder Lewis