你们好!
This past week was probably the hardest for me so far, for a lot of different reasons. First off, I was sick a good amount of the week. So that really made it hard for me to focus, and just made me frustrated. And then I had a really hard time keeping the goals I was setting for myself, especially language wise. I only actually reached my language goals maybe 3 days this week. So that really just made me feel like I was letting myself down, and not reaching my full potential. I remember a moment I had on the day when I was the most sick. It was during language study, and I just wasn't understanding what I was trying to learn. We were outside, and I remember looking up and right there was the UK flag. And that really reminded me of my purpose. I'm here to learn, so I'm able to bring the gospel to the people in the Manchester England mission. To bring them the happiness and joy that comes from the gospel. So with that thought, I had a newfound determination to learn, to work hard so that I will be able to teach others and invite them to come unto Christ. So after that moment, I was able to accomplish my goals for the rest of that week!
TRC's went really good this week! We ended up teaching about families. The first lesson we taught ended up being to 3 people! There was 2 sisters from Taiwan, and a former missionary that went to Taiwan. We ended up spending pretty much the whole time just talking to them, and getting to know them. We only had a couple minutes near the end to fit our message in. And even though we didn't end up teaching as much as I was expecting, what we ended up doing was the most useful to me at least. I feel pretty comfortable teaching some gospel principles in Chinese, but what I struggle with most is having normal conversations with people-getting to know people more (they don't really teach us much conversational chinese here, just gospel terms, grammar principles, and the occasional every day life terms). So that was really helpful to me. The second lesson we ended up actually being able to teach our lesson, and it went really well. We had taught the second person before, and in his feedback he said we improved a lot better from last time! That was one of our last member TRC's! We have one next week and then the monday after that, then it's native speakers/non member TRC's over Skype. And we'll be doing that 4 times a week. So I'm way nervous for that, but also a little excited!
Yesterday when I was waiting in the line to get lunch, a random Japanese elder started talking to me. I guess him and his companion had challenged each other to bear their testimonies to a couple people every day, so he ended up bearing his to me. He was super nice! But while we were talking I mentioned that I'm from Logan, and he said that his parents used to live in Millville, and that his grandparents live there now! So I looked at his name tag, he was Elder Stringham. And I remembered that the patriarch for our stake is Brother Stringham, so I asked if his grandpa was a patriarch, and he said he was! I just thought that was a super crazy coincidence, that I got to meet the grandson of the person who gave me my patriarchal blessing!
Time for the spiritual note! This past week, we did an activity where we discussed repentance with someone else, and asked/answered questions. We had to tie Ether 12:27 into our discussion, it says "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."So the most obvious thing I got out of that was that if we humble ourselves, God will make our weaknesses strengths. The second thing I got was "If men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness". That stuck out to me, because I didn't really realize that we often don't know what our weaknesses are, but God does. And he'll tell us so that we can improve ourselves! I love that thought, because I want to become the best missionary and the best person that I can possibly be. And that's not possible without God's help. He loves us and want us to succeed!
That's it for this week! I'm over halfway done with the MTC! 4 weeks to go! 我爱你们!
-Elder Ensign
Also for anyone wondering, I don't actually know how to write/read most characters, we don't get taught that at the MTC, but we will get materials to help us learn characters after we've been out for a year. I have a keyboard on this phone where I type in the pinyin (the pronunciations of words in english), and it turns it into characters. So the title of this email, translated by me to the best of my ability, means "Let's get this bread"
Also sorry I don't really have any pictures from this week, but here's a picture of me and Elder Hsu, the missionary I hosted last week!
And another one with me, Elder Beam and the MTC cat! I promise there's no filter, our eyes are actually that twinkly haha. No I actually have no idea why we look like that. But anyways, all the languages have different names for her. The mandarin speakers call her 毛姐妹 I think the english speakers call her Sister Mittens, and the Cantonese speakers call her chong maosy or something like that. The legend is that some elders baptized her in the fountain and gave her the priesthood and they got sent home because of it. Super random but I wanted to share cause I thought it was funny
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| me and Elder Hsu (the missionary I hosted last week) |
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| me, Elder Beam, and the MTC cat (Sister Mittens or Chong Maosy) |
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