Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Almost 1 Month!

Wed, 9 Sep 2009

Hello everyone!

Another busy week here at the MTC. Lot's has happened but once again I find myself struggling to decide what to share. I love being here at the MTC! As a district we have gotten the chance to talk to a couple people that served in our mission and ask them some questions. It was fun to learn a little bit about the people/culture, but I also learned some suprising things. I am still very excited but also a little nervous for the day we leave. I can't believe I have almost been here a whole month!

To start off the week we lost 4 elder's in our district that left for the Dominican Republic at 2 am on Tuesday morning. It was pretty weird having them gone for the first day or so, but now we are used to it. First thing we did the morning they left is rearrange the classroom, and e have a ton more room now which is nice considering that's where we spend most of our day. Of course we still miss them and we're hoping to hear from them soon, but I'm sure they are doing great.

I don't know if I mentioned last week that we got a new teacher. His name is Hno. Shulca and he's from Ecuador. He actually served his mission here in Utah and learned english at the MTC. This fact gives me a lot of hope for learning spanish! He is an awesome teacher and has already helped us learn so much. He has a very strong testimony and I think he fits in really well with our district. I'm convinced we have the 2 best teachers at the MTC.

Fast Sunday this week was also a new experience for me here at the MTC. It is so much easier to fast when you are busy studying and focusing on other things! I have learned to love personal study time almost more than anything else while I have been here. It's amazing how much you can learn from the scriptures and how it applies to us even today! They truly are/were inspired words for our day. Anyways the fasting went really well and along with fast sunday came my first Mission Conference. The MTC presidency spoke to us for about 2 hours and I learned so much! Luckily to break our fast they gave us a really nice dinner. I'm getting pretty sick of all the cafeteria food. (Eating at the temple last week was fantastic!)

Of course I must mention the devotional last night since that is usually the best thing that happens all week (next to getting letters). Last night the speaker was Pres. Hinckley's son, Richard G. Hinckley. It's amazing how much he reminds me of Pres. Hinckley! He shared a great message about the articles of faith and how important they are for missionary work. We are so blessed to have these simple, yet profound statements that even a child can understand what we believe in. As missionaries we strive to teach with simplicity, so he challenged us to keep the articles of faith in mind as we teach. It's amazing how many questions can be answered simply by sharing one. Of course he also shared some great stories and passed on the love and support of the First Presidency.

Without hearing too many details I heard BYU had a big win this weekend. It's amazing how sheltered we are here from the outside world. I really have no idea what is going on out there! This is probably for the better but of course everyone here was pretty excited about the game. Sounds like they are going to have a great season!

My spanish I think is improving more and more each day. We are starting to prepare to teach lesson one in spanish, and we will be teaching exclusively in spanish starting next saturday. Of course I am pretty nervous, but I think I can say more than I think I can. Reading through Predicad Mi Evangelio and El Libro de Mormon, I am suprised on how much I can understand. Of course reading and speaking are two different things and I think it will be quite a while before I am completely confident with conjugating verbs, etc. I love the language and I am always excited to learn more!

My thought for this week has to do with Humility. A couple days ago Hno. Cragun shared a quote with us about Humility that I think made everyone feel a little guilty. It talked about how pride is trusting in yourself more than God, and comparing yourself to others. I think the hardest part of humility is submitting your own will to the will of God. I think too often we think we know what we want without taking it to the Lord first. This is pride. While I have been here at the MTC it has been a lot easier to involve the Lord (through prayer) in everything we do, because basically everything we do (even gym) starts and ends with a prayer. Prayer is a great way to show humility because we are recognizing that we need the Lord.

Anyways it was great hearing from Mom, Kristine, Grandma and Grandpa this week! I hope everything is going well for all of you! Strive to be humble and always remember to go to the Lord in all things!

Love, Elder Wheelhouse

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