Hi everyone!
Sorry this email is getting out so late, it’s been crazy…But this is my first P-day email I’m sending out. My time at the MTC was exciting, full of lots of learning, tons of walking, and what feels like little sleep. And it’s honestly emotionally, physically, and even a bit spiritually draining. No one said the MTC was going to be easy, in fact I’ve heard returned missionaries and missionaries that are just about to leave, say that the MTC is the hardest part of their mission. One of the sisters that was getting ready to leave said, “you can tell who’s been here a while and who’s new because of the bags under their eyes” and when I was getting closer to my departure date I could see how true those words were haha. But even with how hard being at the MTC was, I’ve started to see some of the blessings. I had a wonderful district (the group of Elders and Sisters you’re paired up with to act as your ward in a sense) and even though they are rowdy at times, they are some of the most spiritual and inspiring people I’ve ever met, they make the gospel so easy to understand. Of course we all still have a LOT to learn about teaching other people, and making sure we don’t over complicate things so that others can understand, whether they are from a religious background or not. That’s where our wonderful teachers Sister Kenny and Brother Pulley come in, they are both RMs (Returned Missionaries) and help to teach us the principles from preach my gospel as well as giving us valuable insight from their experiences on their missions. They teach us what ways are effective, what potential questions could arise, what things to try to avoid, and so on. We practice the things they teach us and the things in lessons from preach my gospel in role plays, as well as in helping others appointments (helping others is when we set up an appointment with someone who is either a convert, a member, or a friend/investigator, we don’t know who is who though so that our lessons are authentic, these can be pretty awkward but it’s good practice because that’s kind of how it’s going to be on the field so it’s prep to get us used to teaching, used to even changing things on the spot, and just used to talking with people about the gospel, making us more comfortable and even passionate about speaking about Jesus Christ’s Gospel.
Now a little bit about my personal study, I’ve been reading the Book of Mormon for my personal study and praying to really understand how powerful of a tool it can be/is and I’ve started seeing that the Book of Mormon really does have answers to ANY questions that we have, as long as we intentionally pray and look for answers. I’ve also been reading the stories written in there as stories, not just words to get through to check off finishing the book. I feel like most of the time when we read the Book of Mormon we don’t really read them in the way that they were written, we read them rather monotone without adding the emotions that those who wrote their stories had felt, there is so SO many emotions in every story, each chapter, each page, each verse was written from the heart, it was written with deep intent, and written with the Holy Ghost. So one invitation I would like to extend to you all is to try reading the Book of Mormon with more emotion, for example if you’re reading in Nephi, try putting yourself in Nephi’s mindset, try understanding how passionate he was about seeking for the Lord, how hurt he was when Laman and Lemuel refused God after so many spiritual experiences. We all have emotions and when we tell our own stories we incorporate the emotions that come along with it, the stories in the Book of Mormon are real humans stories, sure they’re people from ancient times, but they were still real beings with very real feelings, and I feel it’s an injustice to read their stories without emotion. (The Book of Mormon videos also help portray that)
My time at the MTC was so busy and full, but now out here on the field it’s a lot more “free” in the sense that I don’t have classes and actually not too many confirmed appointments yet, and more so just meeting a lot of the members.
Now I’ll just talk about the journey here to Georgia; me and my MTC companion and 2 Elders from our district had to wake up at 2:40am so we could double check we were packed and be out at the mission office by 3:30, once we left the MTC we had to hop from bus to train, to bus, to airport, there’s 21 of us each with at least 3 pieces of luggage…So you can probably guess how intense that was haha…once we finally got to the airport though we got our luggage checked, everything passed through security thankfully! And then we went up and waited for our flight, we all made it ontime and the flight departed right on schedule, we even arrived early! God was really watching over us. This was also my first time flying! And it was actually a little scary, just at take off though, once we were in the air it was better, it was so truly amazing seeing how far away from the land we get in such a short amount of time, and watching the terrain change, it’s fascinating! And to remember that God made this all for us, his children, because he loves us.
Once we got to Georgia, we met our mission presidents, President and Sister Judd, they are so sweet, I couldn’t ask for better mission presidents, I know I’ll be safe here and they’ll watch over me. Once they gave us an introduction, and run down to what we’ll be doing here we got to meet our trainer(s)! But before we met them we had to play a game where we’d walk up to people and give them a Book of Mormon and if they were your trainer they’d accept it, if they weren’t they’d refuse you, that was pretty fun. I have 2 trainers! Sister Cochmane, And Sister Tibbits. They’re also the sister training leaders, they’re so awesome and have taught me a lot so far! I’ve had 2 actual lessons where I was helping teach a recent convert and then also helped teach some friends about the Book of Mormon and gave it to them, they were chinese though so we brought some members that spoke chinese very well to help teach so that our friends could understand better. It was truly amazing watching the work happen, seeing how excited and interested they were to receive the Book of Mormon, I’m excited to find more people to teach and to bring closer to christ!
The members here are also truly amazing, everyone’s so willing to join in lessons, to tell us about friends we can teach to, and also feeding us, at least the area I’m in (I’m covering Milton and Webridge areas) we have dinner appointments almost ever night, it’s really wonderful how nice the members are here, and how accepting they are of a new missionary joining, it’s helped me feel more welcome in this place where I know no one. Having Sunday as a missionary is pretty cool too because you attend 2 services so you get to take the sacrament twice, isn’t that interesting? Well I’ll close off this message now, you can look forward to my next one next Monday! I miss you all and wish you the best, God loves you ❤️
Helaman 12:1
” And thus we can behold how false, and also the unsteadiness of the hearts of the children of men; yea, we can see that the Lord in his great infinite goodness doth bless and prosper those who put their trust in him.”
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