MTC week 1

Hello Everybody!

What a week it has been. Today is my P-day so if you are looking to reach out to me during the next 8 or 9 weeks, Saturday is the day when I'll be able to respond to your emails. I'm hoping to write a short version and a long version each week so those of you who are busy can still see my emails without committing a huge chunk of time to reading them.

Short Version:

The MTC started on Wednesday and I've been going non-stop since then. There's always something for me to be doing but I was able to squeeze in a 30 min power nap yesterday that was well needed. So far we've only learned basic pronunciation of the Cyrillic alphabet, memorized 2 short scriptures in Russian, and learned about 50 simple words. The next week will have a lot more language learning so that's both exciting and frightening. Whenever I'm in class or studying, I've been able to feel the Spirit so strong which has been wonderful. That's testified to me that I'm really doing God's work. My favorite quote said by the Provo MTC President from one of the workshops is, "The first lesson you will teach, you will teach before you ever say a word. The first message is you." I hope you are all doing well and hope to hear from you!

Long Version:

If you're here, that means you must really like reading. That or you're my mom. Anyways, my typical day looks about like this:

- Wake up @ 6:30 and get ready

- 1 hr workshop

- 3 hr of class with my district

- 1 hr companion study

- Exercise 1 hr

- Shower and Eat Lunch

- 30mins-1 hr language study

- 3 hours of class with my district

- Eat dinner

- 1 hr personal study

- more language studying

- family scriptures and personal journaling

- Go to Bed @ 10:30

The funniest thing that has happened so far happened on Day 1 at the beginning of class. We started class by singing "Called to Serve" and our MTC teachers told us to mute ourselves because singing over zoom would be so chaotic. One of the Elders thought he was on mute but was not. He sang the entire first verse until someone pointed it out to him. For the rest of the day, whenever I looked at him, I would remember him singing and had to try not to laugh.

Another funny experience happened during all the workshops. A workshop is basically just a fancy name for another hour of class but you're with 200 or so missionaries instead of just your district. This makes for an interesting chat in the Zoom. During the workshop they'll ask you to answer questions in the chat bar so you can imagine how that goes. If you can't imagine, I'll tell you, don't worry. Imagine 200 super excited missionaries putting their answer(s) into the chat as quick as they can. There are so many words on the screen going by that you don't have nearly enough time to read anything anyone is saying. I've still learned lots of things from the workshops, don't get me wrong, but that is one of the downfalls of being in an Online Workshop.

I bet some of you are wondering how the language is going so I'll include that. Learning Russian is definitely helping me out with Matthew 18:2 where Jesus commands us to "humble [yourself] as this little child." Me and my companion read 10 verses of the Book of Mormon yesterday and it took us about 45 minutes to complete. It was so painful to read that slow. To all parents who read/have read the Book of Mormon with their kids and made them sound out every word, I salute you. To give you an idea of the difficulty of Russian I'll type out the name of the Church: Церковь Иисуса Христа Святых последних дней. Roughly it translates to, "Church of Jesus Christ of Saints of Last days." You'll notice that it doesn't include the word "the" at all. A fun tidbit about Russian is that they have no articles (a/an/the). They also have no word for "to be," it's just implied. So in English we say "I am a brother" or "They are a family." In Russian you say "I brother" (Я брат) and "They family" (они семья). Its feels like you're a caveman for the first little bit.The Cyrillic alphabet is somewhat similar to the Greek alphabet so I'm thankful for the Greek and Latin class I took the first semester of college. But I still get tripped up because some letters look the same as the English alphabet but make very different sounds.

My companion is Elder Rockwood and is from Texas. Turns out we actually were in a class together last semester but had no idea at the time. Online MTC has made it a lot harder to get to know my district and my companion as well as I'd like to, but luckily I've got 9 weeks with them so by the end I'll be family, right?

Elder Rockwood (my comp) and I were able to teach our first lesson yesterday and it went pretty well. The lesson is taught over Zoom to someone who may or may not be an actual investigator. We taught it in English of course, but we're hoping to schedule a lesson in Russian either this next week or the week after. What better way is there to learn than to force yourself into an uncomfortable situation. I'm sure Moses was at least a little comfortable going to Pharaoh asking him to free the Hebrews, so am I really one to complain about half an hour of awkwardness?

Lastly I'd like to share a scripture with you all from Alma 32:27. "But behold, if ye will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if you can do no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words." All of us are at different points in our lives and have varying degrees of faith. With all the chaos that's happening in the world these days it can be hard to understand where God is in all of this. I've had times in my life where I have doubts about the church or about if God really could forgive me, but I've been able to learn for myself the answer to each of these doubts. Sometimes we must have hope before we can gain faith. If you can do "no more than desire to believe," that is enough. I'd encourage all of you to take on Alma's challenge and experiment upon his words. The last 3 days have been some of the most fulfilling and satisfying days for me and my mission has just begun. I love you all and can't wait to share the next 103 weeks of my mission with you!