Merry Christmas family! What a wonderful time of the year this is. I am so truly grateful to be able to serve the Lord on a full time mission during this wonderful Christmas season. This is a great blessing to be able to be able to serve our Heavenly Father and help his children draw closer to the Lord Jesus Christ. I also have been reflecting on the saviors live and birth. I am so truly grateful with all my heart to Heavenly Fathers gift to us, his beloved son Jesus Christ. My gift back to Our God and our Savior is by serving them faithfully for two years of my life.

Thank you so much family for all the love, prayers, and everything you do for me while I am serving the Lord. I have drawn very close to the savior and that has brought me even closer to the people that matter most in my life, and that is all of you. I am truly grateful for the gift of our family. I love all of you with all my heart and I'm so grateful I was sent to such a wonderful family. I am truly grateful for all that you do for me and for raising me to be where I am today. It takes some righteous parents to raise a righteous child. I know that I wouldn't be where I am today without your love and support. I pray to God every night and thank him for the gift of his son, for the gospel of Jesus Christ in my life, and for my beautiful family. I just love each and everyone of you.

It was great to read your e mails and find out that you've all had a great week and are having a wonderful holiday season. Thank you mom for sending your talk. Wow that was a very spiritual uplifting talk mom. I loved it very much and I'm sure everyone that heard it felt the spirit and the love of God. You can tell it was truly from your heart and you meant everything you said. That really helped me and gave me the spirit of Christmas every more during this season. That really is what Christmas is all about.

Yesterday was Stake conference at our stake here in Rotorua and the stake presidency was there and they spoke and also Elder Grow from the 1st Quorum of the Seventy. Wow the spirit was very strong when they spoke. Elder Grow made it very clear as has President Monson that the Lord needs more worthy missionaries. Ryan please do all you can to be worthy and ready to serve the Lord. It truly is the best thing you could ever do. I have never and will never regret serving a mission. It is the best thing I've ever done and I love it so much. Mom and Dad you should also be thinking about serving a mission together when your older. I know it will be the best thing you could be doing when your that age.

This past week was great. We have been working really hard and mainly focusing on increasing our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. When we have faith and qualify by our exact obedience and by our purity and righteousness, then anything we ask Heavenly Father that is right he will give it to us. We have experienced that in our whole week. I have seen many mighty miracles and I know this is Gods work and that he wants all of his children to return back to him. Saturday was Philippas baptism. Wow it was just great and a wonderful experience. I wish I could have wrote down her testimony. She bore her testimony after she was baptized and it was so heart felt and amazing. She got really emotional and said she knew that the Book of Mormon was the word of God.

Well I wish I could type a lot more but I got to go now. This week I'm really excited because we have a Christmas mission conference in Auckland on Friday. President Collister will be there with his wife. Thanks again for the Christmas package I will be looking out for the other one.

Well Ryan it is almost your birthday! I'm sorry I don't have very much more time to write much. But I just want to say Happy Birthday Ryan! I love you. Have a really great day and just know I will be thinking about my buddy Ryan.

Love Elder Kitchen