 |
| Holding the best book in the world! |
Hola everyone:) This has been a long week full of incredible experiences and growth and I love every minute of it.. Starting off with later in the day last Tuesday we had a devotional broadcast and this one was special because it was a LIVE broadcast from the Provo MTC. Quentin L. Cook and his wife Sister Cook spoke and I thoroughly enjoyed it. First of all Sister Cook talked briefly and she brought up Primary songs and how they contain many gospel principles and she sang little bits and pieces of some of her favorites. This touched my heart as I was taken back to my days as a primary child and envisioned myself singing those songs.. It was really powerful to me because it made me realize how lucky I am to have grown up in the gospel. Although at the time I was too young to understand a lot of the messages, but now I can see that these gospel principles became an impression on my heart. I just want to thank you Mom and Dad for raising me in the Church, my love of my life has grown considerably since leaving and so has my love of those I left behind. I know that my Heavenly Father is looking out for all of you, and what a wonderful assurance that is. This idea was actually spoke of by Elder Cook in his Devotional. He spoke on how serving a mission will bless everyone you love, but what really hit me was when he further endeavored on the subject by explaining how it will not only bless your family now, but also in the future it will bless your spouse, your children, as well as everyone else you come in contact with for the rest of your life. It´s amazing to think that my hard work I put in now, will directly benefit my family, now and in the future. There is literally nothing better I could be doing with my life at this point then serving my mission. I doubt many people in the world can confidently say that and what an incredible blessing that is. It brings me so much joy to know these things and I know these impressions could not come from anyone on this Earth. My Father in Heaven loves me and wants me to be happy which is why he called these wonderful Apostles to lead his Church.
After the Devotional we headed to our classrooms to discuss what we learned
just as we always do. My District has a spiritually uplifting discussion during
which we started talking about our circumstances leading up to our missions. As
we shared our thoughts a storm was brewing outside. The wind picked up first;
followed by lightning and thunder and finally hail as big as marbles shot down
from above with great force. The storm grew so furious that the sound overcame
our voices and we had to yell to each other and finally the power went out after
a bolt of lightning so close that the thunder followed immediately and the
tremendous crack silenced us. The room was pitch black and silent for almost a
minute when the lights came back on finally. After the power came back on our
District came out of our room and heard that an Hermana next door was having an
anxiety attack and needed a blessing. She was frightened by the storm so much
that she was in tears. Roughly ten of us Elders encircled her and laid our hands
upon head as Elder Reese gave her a blessing. Immediately as the first word came
out of his mouth, the hail directly above us ceased and the storm quieted
significantly. He gave her comfort and ensured that she would be kept safe that
night. I truly believe this was a miracle because while we gave the blessing the
hail parted from above us, but I could still hear it next door and outside. It
made me think of a story in the New Testament where Jesus and some of his
Apostles were in a fishing boat and a storm almost overtook their ship when they
pleaded for help from their Master. He then proceeded to calm the skies and they
did not perish. I hold the same power and authority that Jesus Christ used to
perform all the mighty miracles during his ministry. That power is called the
Priesthood which is the power and authority to act in God´s name. Also as a
Missionary I have been called and set apart specifically to represent Jesus
Christ. I have heard this statement many times since arriving here at the
Missionary Training Center in Mexico, but I never realized what that truly means
until after this experience. After the blessing all the Districts in our
building came together and began to sing Hymnos together. I don´t know who´s
idea it was, but I am very grateful someone thought of that because it was
another powerful experience. Almost 50 missionaries were singing and it was
amazing. Our voices soon overtook the storms fury and it brought great comfort
to all of us. Once the storm for the most part was gone, we then said a prayer
and gave thanks for our safety thus far and asked to be watched over as we walk
to our houses. We all did arrive home safely, but our streets were flooded and
in one street near my house it flooded so much that some missionaries were out
there in shorts wading in it. That wasn´t very smart of them though, because
it´s against mission rules and being exactly obedient is what keeps Missionaries
safe, but I´ll talk about this in a minute. All this happened between after I
sent last week´s email and that night when we went to sleep.
 |
| Wet bag from the storm |
 |
| Wet suit from the storm |
On Thursday I got discouraged after a rough lesson with our "Investigator"
Miguel. He asked us questions about baptism that we didn´t know how to respond
to and there was a silence for a good three minutes. Ultimately I just told him
we are sorry we don´t know how to answer his question right now, but that we
would study about it and come back next time with some answers. Luckily later
that day my confidence came back when we had TRC which is where we give a lesson
to a real native speaker, generally they are a member but it´s still a really
good experience. I was amazed at how much I had improved since last week and how
much more I could understand. Of course I still missed a lot of what they were
saying and spoke slow and probably with a lot of mistakes, but I´m almost
getting to the point where I´m functional at the most basic level. And it had
only been roughly 3 weeks. How´s that for a miracle! This is the Lord´s work so
he provides a way. I know I have a long ways to go with the language and even
farther with understanding the gospel, but I also know that if I strive to study
and search diligently, I will accomplish many things that will be in store for
me.
On Friday our afternoon teacher Hermano Cayetano gave us some words of
advice that we need to take our language seriously if we want to reach our full
potential of growth at the CCM. He challenged us as a District to commit to
speaking completely in Spanish. All day every day. It was a bold challenge but
it´s also exactly what we need. The language will never come unless we are
practicing continually. It´s what improves our speed and ability to speak Spanish. We took this challenge seriously at first and it was a really cool
experience. We were able to for the most part refrain from using English. Of
course our talk we very simple, but we were functioning. Sadly this has kind of
broken up since then and we aren´t keeping the commitment. Some of us are trying
to continue this task, but it´s hard when not even our whole District is
following our example and also hardly any other non native missionary takes this
seriously. I know that if I try my hardest to speak as much as I can without
using English, that my skills will grow tremendously.
 |
| Working out in the awesome weight room the CCM has, I´m going to miss it :´( |
Saturday was PIE DAY!!!! Not only that but at 9:26:53 PM it was 3-14-15
9:26:53. 3.141592653, that's 10 digits long!!! I hope
you appreciate this as much as I do Mom, it won´t happen again for a very
long time. I love math!! And I miss it too which is kinda funny to think about.
Anyways also this day a helper named Hermano Polo gave us a pep talk explaining
how the general trend of Missionaries here at the CCM is that when they arrive
they are super excited, but as the time passes by their excitement slowly
diminishes. He encouraged us to break this trend and try to constantly strive to
be happy and excited because we should be and he´s so right! I´ve been working
really hard on this because I realized that I am habitually down looking and
sometimes appear angry even when I´m not actually. I´ve already started to see a
change in my outward appearance and it actually makes me feel even happier and
positive just by trying to do it. Fake it ´til you make it I guess. haha.
I LOVE SUNDAYS!!! I´m sorry if I always say that but it´s so true! The
spirit is so much stronger, I receive answers to my prayers, I am able to hear
amazing words of wisdom from Mission Leaders, General Authorities and from
fellow Missionaries and also this week I was able to sing in the CCM choir! That
was a lot of fun, we sang a medley of "Hark all ye Nations" and "I hope they
call me on a mission". It was really cool and also another Elder asked me how
long I´ve been taking voice lessons which was a huge compliment, but I know I´m
really not that good. I just love singing in a choir and since there weren´t too
many Elders singing so I sang super loud. I can´t let the Hermanas overpower the
Elders! Anyways later our CCM Presidente Tenorio spoke on "Specific Prayers".
This is something I´ve never been taught before and it´s super cool. It´s pretty
self explanatory; it´s very difficult, but also very possible. Basically it´s
asking for something very specific in prayer. This takes a lot of practice and
you must be very in tune with the spirit. I hope to be able to say power prayers
like this someday, but I realize I am still fairly inexperienced and need
practice.
Later we heard from the Director of Training and Operations for the CCM
named Shawn Cates. This man amazes me. He is only in his early thirties and yet
he is very successful both in landing such a high up position, and more
importantly his understanding of the gospel and missionary work. He talked about
the Gift of Tongues and how we can qualify for it. I´ve already seen the
influence of the Gift of Tongues in my growth in the language, but I realized I
wasn´t fully taking advantage of it and I still am working on qualifying for it
in it´s full glory. The first thing is to be motivated by your love for the
people and the culture enough to learn the language.. Second we need to have the
spirit which means we need to be exactly obedient. This was the overall message
I took from this week. Exact obedience. Third we need to speak and study the
language as much as possible. To make a commitment to do everything we can at
all times to practice the language. This is a big difference for missionaries
growth is how much they are practicing the language and it´s a fairly simple
concept, but also extremely difficult to follow be cause of the temptation to
speak your first language. Fourth we need to cry our guts out for the gift of
tongues constantly. This is something I´ve neglected because I didn´t really
understand how it works. Then the last thing Cates talked about was the
importance of leaving our life before our missions behind. We can´t keep one
foot stuck in the past and expect to succeed in the future. He told us how he
had this problem at first on his mission, but he saw a huge change in his growth
and success when he finally made an effort to let go of his life before.. I
don´t think I have this problem as much as a lot of missionaries do, but I
recognize that I do find myself thinking about my life before and everything. Of
course we aren´t expected to completely forget our lives before like our
families and friends, but we don´t need to be constantly dwelling upon them
because they will be taken care of while we are pushing forward in the Lord´s
work.
One last experience that was one of my favorites. Yesterday while our
District was studying in our classroom, Hermano Polo came in and asked if anyone
had consecrated oil on hand. It took me a second but then I remembered my little
vial on my keychain that Bishop Alston had given as a mission present before I
left so I offered it to him. He then told us that an Hermana was having problems
with a stomach sickness and needed a blessing. He said that he would anoint the
oil in Spanish and asked if I could say the blessing, but that I could say it in
English.
I was terrified at first because I´ve never given a blessing before and I
didn´t even know how, but I quickly turned to the back of my Missionary Handbook
and found out how to say it. The necessary part is fairly simple, but the rest
is kind of on your own. I agreed to give the blessing and we headed over to her
classroom. I was still nervous, but as I put my hands on her head with some
members of my District, I took the leap of faith to open my mouth and that´s
when the spirit kicked in. Looking back afterwards I realized that for the first
time I truly felt like I had been a mouthpiece for the Lord and that he had
filled my mouth with words. I am really excited to strive to progress and be
able to act as a mouthpiece more often because it´s an incredible experience.
This week has been incredible and I love being here. I will be sad to have to
leave in two weeks, but I´m also super excited at the same time.
 |
| Taking a break on Preparation Day |
No comments:
Post a Comment