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| Hermana Best said about these photos, "That's me and my companion studying on the porch. There's no real story there ha. It was just like hour 9 or 10 in that classroom and it was the most delightful thing ever." |
I wanted to share an experience i had the first week that I forgot to mention from choir. The director is amazing and always inspires us about the songs we sing so that they really mean something. The song we sang that week was "Where Can I Turn for Peace?" You should try to find the story online more in depth because it's just heart wrenching. So the woman who wrote this hymn was driving on the freeway when a crowbar from a truck flew through her window and it crashed into her face. I think she was also dealing with some extremely huge other life stressors at the time. She had to have reconstructive surgery on her face and just felt awful about life. This is why she wrote 'where can i turn for peace'- it was literally her question. The choir director then told the story of Christ walking on water. Peter wanted to do it but he didn't have enough faith. When he was drowning he reached his hand up and said "Lord, save me". Christ reached down and pulled him up. Hence the lyric "reaches my reaching". It doesn't matter how far down we feel like we've sunk- Christ reaches our reaching. When we're in our Gethsemane he 'answers privately'. Of course tears were streaming down my face and I could barely choke out the first verse. I will never forget this experience or sing the song the same again.
Still learning and growing here! Our main teacher, Hermano Glock, said its easy at around week 3 to fall into a pattern of mediocrity. I really needed to hear his warning because I think our district has really mastered at this point the ins and outs, so to speak, of the MTC. And now sometimes it just kind of feels like I'm sitting in an apartment complex all day speaking Spanish with a bunch of girls that also don't really know Spanish- pretty odd haha! That's why our 'PURPOSE' is very important. A speaker at one of the devotionals said that missionary work used to be something along the lines of : FIND, CONVERT, BAPTIZE. Now everywhere at the MTC we have the PURPOSE hanging up. I recite it in Spanish so I'll try the english version: We invite others to come unto Christ by helping the receive the restored gospel through faith in Jesus Christ and his atonement, repentance, baptism, receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost, and enduring to the end. WOW I had to have my companion help me with the English of that.
This purpose is very important when you're stressing about the language, worrying about what you need to teach, or wondering why you're doing this. I'm learning Spanish so I can better help the people in Puebla come to Christ! The Spanish is getting intense- cramming a lot more tenses and grammatical things that took entire semesters in high school. At testimony meeting they said we could bare our testimonies in English but without talking about it my awesome companion and I both did it in Spanish. It's not to show everyone how I know Spanish- its stilll pretty elementary- it's because that's how I'll be testifying in MExico so I want to be able to express that well so might as well practice now! Afterwards the branch presidency said they couldn't understand what we were saying but they knew it was true! What a relief!
Another awesome devotional we had was the man who is the head of internet proselyting. He had a SUPER cool 'prezzi' presentation about the Book of Mormon back in the day when people were first giving it to each other to read. This was people like the Whitmers, the Taylors, Woodruffs, etc. Each time the graph branched out it would show a picture of that person- it was SO cool to see the old fashioned pictures of everyone! My fave was definitely Porter Rockwell- he seems like the man. He shaved his long hair when his wife was sick to make her a wig. Idk if this presentation is available online but you should look for it, the man's last name is Hemmingway.
What this all lead to was a picture from Facebook headquarters of the globe and all these blue lines shooting across the seas and within the country. It was only a portion of the connections being made on that site- the actual amount is too much for a computer to generate. Elder (?) Hemmingway emphasized that 'social networking' isn't some new 'invention'- Heavenly Father created it from the start. And now we need to use it to share the message. When Elder Hemmingway was at some zone conference a while back I guess he sat down for lunch with some missionaries and one turned to him and said 'I joined the church because of facebook'. He explained that his cousin had posted that he was baptized, so this young man emailed him asking more about it. The cousin invited him to Stake conference and the rest of history...now here was this kid, a convert, on a mission, talking to the head of internet proselyting. The Spirit was so strong during this story. I urge you all in the next week to share a gospel message on FB if you feel inspired to do so. I think those of us that were born in the church sometimes take for granted what we have- I know I do sometimes. So you don't have to knock on a door or approach someone on the street- just share an uplifting message or express your gratitude for being a member.
Thank you for the love and support. I am at my limit for snacks- please do not send me any more goodies!!! It's more than I can keep up with and I'm actually feeling really strong and healthy here at the mtc- probably due to actually sleeping 8 hours a night, eating 3 solid meals that aren't deep fried sushi, exercising for a full hour a day, and drinking lots of water. I love that you're thinking about me but if you want to send me something send a picture of us and a note about your week or if you really want to nourish me send me a gatorade or something- no more sweets! Haha!
Well as always I wish I could share more but that will have to be it for this week. I have a very strong testimony about church attendance - it literally changed my life. Please attend your meetings - there's a reason God set aside the Sabbath for us to learn more about the gospel, rest from our labors, and feel the Spirit.If you do the blessings will flood in that you can't even picture, just like they did for me! Hope you're enjoying your summer! Attached is a picture of my super good friend Hermana Dalrymple and I because I pointed out we looked like postal workers that day. Love you!
Hermana Best
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| Lovely Lauren with Hermana Dalrymple |
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