Well it has been a crazy week to say the least. How would I describe the MTC? Well it is the worst/best time of your life! First off, there is the food. I am so hungry here and I just keep eating and eating, even though the food isn’t great. It was a mad house on fast Sunday, I thought I was in Vietnam during the war--everyone was yelling and trying to get food because they were so hungry.
The thing that still kills me is waking up at 6:30 every morning, it is so hard but the days are so long and so much more productive because of it. For anyone who says that Portuguese is just like Spanish let me tell you something....IT IS NOT! I get so frustrated because I think it is pronounced like Spanish but there are a lot of "sh" and "uah" sounds in Portuguese. It sounds like we all have marbles in our mouths. The Portuguese is coming along pretty well though! I pray in Portuguese for all of my prayers and I am getting the hang of it! Our second day here Elder Day (my companion) and I had to teach our fake investigator in Portuguese and I was so nervous! Right before we went in we prayed and asked for the gift of tongues. We then taught a lesson on prayer and the gift of the Holy Spirit. It was very shaky and very bad Portuguese but the Spirit was so strong it was unbelievable! That testified to me that the gift of tongues is not just learning your mission language, but it is learning the language of God and helping others feel the Spirit.
My companion is awesome! He's a little weird and does some weird things (which is true of all of us) but man he has such a strong testimony and he is such a great example to me! It’s so funny how I see all of my friends here. I have seen Elder Robins, Elder Dayton, Elder Lawrence, Sister Jordan, and so many more every day! My district is awesome, we have 13 people in a super small room so when we have our classroom time which is 9 hours a day it is very cramped and chaotic. I have not heard my teacher speak one word of English, he only speaks Portuguese. At first it was so hard but now I can understand some of what he is saying. I love Elder Tester who is from Draper, and Elder Scott who is from Colorado. We are always hanging out and laughing. In the middle of a 3 hour study session it’s fun to get distracted and laugh with them!
Something that is so awesome is how strong the Spirit is here! For example, I’m not really into church music but lately I love it so much and I am always humming some sort of church hymn haha. You learn how to be so outgoing in the MTC, I love talking to everyone and just having random conversations!
I have learned some things this week, one of which is, “To grow you need to get out of your comfort zone!" I really love this because it is so true. Trying to speak Portuguese when I hardly even know any and talking to random people and bearing testimony in front a lot of people is definitely out of my comfort zone--I’m definitely growing! Another take away was from Elder Bednar’s talk a couple years ago in the MTC. He talked about the characteristics of Christ and how to develop them by focusing outward and not being the natural man. The natural man is only thinking about "me", and "my wants", just like the cookie monster, "I NEED COOKIE NOW". If I want to grow and be the best missionary I can be then I have to stop worrying about stuff with me and focus on others and having that outward mentality.
I have loved the MTC so far, it’s amazing but slow. I want leave to Portugal so badly!! The more experienced elders say, "The days are long but the weeks are short." I don’t know how that works but man am I excited to go teach! I hope you know I love you all and would love to hear from you!! Write me through “Dear Elder”, it’s a website that prints your emails and delivers them right away to my mailbox so I can read them throughout the week instead of just on Mondays, so please write me!
This gospel bring so much happiness!
eu amo voces! guardo voces em mau oracaos!
- Elder Herrmann
No comments:
Post a Comment