June 15th

Family,

Thank you for all your letters and support. 

Dad, I received your letter in the mail this past week and I'll be sure to look for the last remaining ones in the mail at some point either this week or next. And Karen, thank you for the offer on the new phone! I kind of feel spoiled lol but at the same time I am truly grateful and blessed:) Again, thank you guys.

I can't believe the time has come to this. I only have 2 weeks remaining... But because the Lord has blessed me to endure to the end, I will have the privilege to be a part of another baptism held in our ward this upcoming Saturday. This is for an ex-communicated member, ______, who has been faithful and worthy to re-enter into the waters of baptism. This is someone who the missionaries have been working with for a long time. And now he has finally been approved by Salt Lake City to become a member again. We are all excited for him! 

Everyone will find out their new companions this Friday, and then next week on Saturday (June 27th) is when we will hold our transfer meeting. It will be the farewell for President Packard, his family, and 30 other missionaries that are going home as well. I am grateful to have been companions with Elder Villar. He has strengthened my testimony and has helped me grow, even only during the 2 months that I've been with him. To be honest, I believe he has taught me more than I have been able to teach him. He has been one of my favorite companions by far! I know why the Lord has put us together during this time.   

As I explained in my last email, this will most likely be my final email that I will write to you all on my mission. Elder Villar, A___ D______, and I are planning to make the trip to Boston next week for my final P-Day. No better way to end the mission than being in the city I love, while being with Villar and my other best friend A____, who I had the opportunity to literally see change his life by accepting the gospel! It's a storybook ending for a roller coaster ride of a mission that I experienced. No doubt, we'll have a great time:) 

I will end it all with my testimony that I know that our Savior lives and loves us. I've come to a knowledge of these truths by the Holy Spirit. It is real. This gospel is real. People do change by accepting Jesus Christ in their lives, I am a witness to that. I am a witness to the power of the Atonement. I have been able to exercise it myself and experience the divinity and power of the atonement on my mission. At a certain point of my mission, I have felt the lowest I've ever felt in my life. Only coming to realize later on that it was only to experience true joy, in a sense. That is what this gospel is all about. The Lord humbled me to know this. It's not about me, it's not about the personal gain, or popularity, or any of that. No, it's about the Lord and being a  blessing for his children. This is my purpose as a Saint and a servant of the Lord. It is my humble testimony that I know this church is true. And how blessed I am to have been raised into this church by an amazing family to help me get to this point in my life! 

I accomplished His work as a Full-Time Representative of Jesus Christ here in New England by the hand of the Lord. And for this, I couldn't be any happier.

Pat, I will hopefully be seeing you and your family soon! Jazzy, I can't wait to give you a big hug as well:)

This is it. See you all in 2 weeks! Les Quiero mucho! 

​Go Sox! 

Elder BerthelsonBostonStrong

October 6th

Family,

I will keep this letter short. I am sending an email out to Sarah Edwards and reaching out to her. She is so strong for remaining on her mission during this difficult time for both her and her family. I too have a testimony of the Plan of Salvation, and knowing this is one of the greatest blessings that I have been given personally in my life. Just as Sarah had mentioned from her email, I too know that families are eternal. Yes this life is difficult, but its the only way that we are ever going to know of Him. To know what He has gone through and what we must do to become like Him. The atonement is real and is for everyone, no matter their back round, members or nonmembers of the church, etc. Please let Pam Edwards, Bro. Edwards and Alex know how much we (our family) love and support them. But I'm sure you have already done so. 

I am doing well. And yes, General Conference was the biggest event that took place for us. I like to think of it as the "Super Bowl for Missionaries." lol. But that is what it basically is. I am able to get a great spiritual high after watching and hearing from the leaders of the church on what we must do. Well I definitely took a lot of insight on what I needed to do. Anyways, it was great. Favorite talk was by Pres. Uchtdorf, in the Sunday Morning session of conference talking about Truth and how to self discover it. I'm blessed for the given opportunities to feel inspired and uplifted in my life.

Glad to know everyone is doing well. Karen/Dad- Thanks for the letter and package. I'll look for it this week. Oh and Karen, did you happen to hear from Tami Thurber about my comp E. Lee?? I just found out about that connection. That is way cool! Again, small world... Everybody has a connection somewhere if you're LDS haha. Its true though. But yes, I will send out an email after my visit with the Doc. I have an appt scheduled for tomorrow at 11. I'll follow up on it.

I'll be praying for the Edwards family. Keep working hard. I love you all!!      

Family,

This week has been a good week for both Johnston and I! To tell you a little bit about what we did for our 4th of July weekend, we were able to get permission from our AP's to drive down to Boston to stay and watch the fireworks. The weird thing was was that the 4th of July was actually celebrated on the 3rd this year, due to Hurricane Arthur that hit the East Coast pretty hard during the actual day of the 4th... But we were still able to celebrate it that evening with a member who also lives down in Boston. It was so cool to see how many people were along the Charles River during that time!  We were able to find a good spot along the River to watch the fireworks, while also being able to hear the Boston Pops being played in the background. Immediately after the fireworks though, the storm (Hurricane Arthur) came in and it started to downpour like crazy! It was pretty much all of Boston in one area trying to run for the train station over by Park St. Man we were drenched! Just like it was in Philly- Great memories Dad haha. But it was such a cool experience to be able to go to Boston to celebrate Independence Day! You guys can probably guess the plans that I might have next year during that time:) 

As far as the work is going, we are continuing to find small successes here and there. For example, yesterday, one of our less-actives members came to the pulpit and bore her testimony for the first time in a long time. We also had 31 total people attend our Group, so our numbers as far as attendance is slowly starting to increase as well. Other than that, we have been working a lot with our Bishop to finalize our ward list for the Lowell Ward to determine if these people still live in the area. This has basically been our assignment ever since we've gotten here and now we are almost completed with it. Our next steps are to continue to work with the less-actives that are here in the area along with continuing to invite. That's what we do.

Johnston and I were able to pick up 2 more investigators while tracking the streets- Jose and Segundo from Ecuador. We were able to teach them a solid lesson of the Restoration and the Intro to the Book of Mormon the other day. Jose seemed to have a lot of interest as we were teaching and wanted to continue to learn more. We ended up inviting both of them to church this past Sunday but they didn't attend... We hope that we can still be able to work with them, along with a couple others that we have met either by street contact or door to door knocking. I am learning how difficult it is to find investigators in this way and also understanding how non-effective it is, compared with working through the members. That is why starting a Group is also difficult, we don't have too many members and the members that attend don't know too many of the Hispanics that live in this area. We are continuing to chip away and have faith nonetheless.

One of the things that I've enjoyed learning about was actually a talk that was given in this month's issue of the Ensign- "Becoming Perfect in Christ." This talk actually helped strengthened my testimony by reminding me of the importance of understanding that perfection doesn't happen immediately. Sometimes I want so bad to know the right answers right away, to understand a new language, to strive to have perfection- for me, that is typically how my mind works, to have that desire to immediately know right away. As I've mentioned before, this talk was a great reminder for me to realize the importance of building faith to rely on the Atonement of Jesus Christ during difficulty and to have patience during those times. These are concepts that you can never really learn enough of. I am always willing to learn more about the Atonement of Christ- Something that is personal and different for each individual person but centered around the same person, through and only through Jesus Christ.

I know that He lives and loves us. 

I'm blessed to know that you all are doing well, along with our friends and family like Devin Hampton and Lauren Dodd- They sound like they are doing well on their missions!

I'm looking forward to the letter Dad, thank you for that. Keep up the hard work everyday!  Les quiero mucho!   

(I love them very much!)

              

Elder Berthelson

BostonStrong