Sunday, September 30, 2012

Another Week Down


5th Epistle from Elder Kaleb Erickson at the MTC - Provo, UT.      September 27, 2012    

Hello Family!      
Every day feels like a week and every week feels like a day here. I'm not even quite sure what time is anymore. We decided that it's because we do the exact same thing every day. It's hard to tell a week apart when you had the exact same schedule and were with the exact same people for 16 hours every day. It makes you look for ways to bring some excitement into the day. Like chilling with my new 330 pound Samoan friend. His name is Elder Silata. It can't be a bad day if you sat by Elder Silata at lunch.
Anyways, not much has changed since last week. We're still teaching Ezequiel and Jorge. Jorge seems to like the idea of the Gospel but doesn't understand why it's important to him. We teach him again tomorrow and we're hoping that we can apply the Plan of Salvation to his life. He has a family so I'm kind of banking on that lesson to hit home to him. Ezequiel is solid. His baptismal date is set for the 6th of October. I guess we're supposed to keep teaching him until we leave the MTC. I'd rather start with a new investigator, but I guess it's good practice to teach the post-baptismal lessons too. I like teaching Ezequiel because we hardly ever use our planned lesson. We always plan out a lesson to take to him so that we're prepared, but always listen to feel the spirit for where we should take the lesson. And I think with our last three lessons, we didn't use our plan at all. He would ask a question about something he didn't understand so I would scrap our prepared lesson and teach a new one on the fly. It's so baller to be able to pull out new Spanish that you weren't exactly prepared for.
We've also started teaching each other. It's helpful as a missionary to know how the investigator feels during the conversion process, so we have to pick somebody we know and pretend to be them while other missionaries in our district teach us. I really like playing the investigator because it helps me think of potential questions an investigator might have and how to answer them. And it lets me see the teaching techniques of other missionaries. Never a bad idea to steal what works for them.
I picked up my pocket sized book of Mormon last week and I am cruising along with my friend Elder Durkin. I just barely cleared the Isaiah sections in 2 Nephi, so things are definitely looking up. But we decided to focus on Obedience this readthrough. So every time somebody mentions obedience or gives an example of it, we highlight it in blue. Everytime God or Christ is mentioned, we highlight it in yellow. It's a lot of fun. I've never enjoyed reading the Book of Mormon so much before. I have learned a ton about obedience. It's the most important thing ever, I've decided. As long as you are willingly obedient to the Lord, you can't go wrong. I've also noticed that the more you study a specific attribute of Christ, the more you want to live that attribute. I've never wanted to be so obedient in my life before, it's crazy. Elder Durkin and I are striving for perfect obedience at the moment. It's difficult, but I feel like we can do it. One of my favorite verses so far is 1 Nephi 15:10. Nephi is talking to his brethren about their murmurring and he just says to them, "How could ye not obey the commandments of the Lord?" I just love it. Like he can't understand why they wouldn't want to be obedient. How could you not obey the commandments? That's my new policy about the mission rules. Not that I wasn't obedient before, I just have a whole new outlook on the purpose and my attitude behind it.
But that's pretty much it for the MTC at the moment. I try to learn something new in Spanish every day. It's tough, but I think I just need to speak Spanish more with people. I understand the rules of the language, I just need to put them into practice. I would write some in Spanish, but I find I'm better at speaking than writing. However that works.
That's about it for this week. I hope life is well in Simi! I miss you all and thanks for all of your wonderful love and support!
Love,
Elder Erickson

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