Subject: Past the Halfway Point
Hey, Everyone!
It's really neat how time is speeding up! It feels like this past week has flown by. I keep thinking back to the joke that ''the weeks are days and the days are weeks.'' There hasn't been any major news for the week, other than a giant rainstorm last night that lasted for about six hours. I haven't ever seen it rain so much anywhere. The streets looked like rivers around the MTC and my pants are still soaking wet from yesterday! My companions and I have been very busy teaching lessons, and we are making progress. I still feel like I have so much to learn, but I love it here. My only wish is that it was warmer (only two weeks until I get to Arcadia, though!). It's about 75 everyday and rains every single day for about an hour between 5:30 and 6:30.
Friday, August 30th, 2013:
I was a little worried about yesterday, seeing that Elder Metro was having a rough day. Elder Mask and I were trying our best to include him in everything, but he is very quiet and has a different personality than the two of us. However, today was fantastic! I can tell Elder Metro is gradually breaking out of his shell and is more outgoing than when we all first arrived. More joyous news: for the third week in a row, we got to clean the kitchen again! I love service and all, but I'm not going to lie... cleaning isn't my favorite form of service haha. I envy all the people that get to stack the fifty-pound jugs of water. There isn't clean water in Mexico City, so we get Ciel water sent here everyday. Later in the evening, we had another lesson with Andrea and Luis. Our lesson plan was to teach the Word of Wisdom to both Andrea and Luis, followed by the baptismal invitation for Luis. We only had twenty minutes, and, unfortunately, we took twenty-five. As a result, Luis had to leave before we could invite him to be baptized. The lesson was fantastic, and Luis and Andrea both said they would try to stop drinking their morning coffee. I was just a little bummed that we didn't get to extend the invitation. We always take longer than we intend, which is largely due to our inability to fluently speak Spanish. However, Hermana Powell told us after the lesson to study the second chapter of the book of Acts, specifically in verses 37-41. She also instructed us that everyone needs faith, which is ''hope for things which are not seen, which are TRUE.'' We can't have faith if what we believe isn't true; that would merely be a belief. I had never thought of that principle, which was very interesting. My companions and I always feel at a loss after talking to Hermana Powell because we're always unsure how to apply what she tells us. It seems like we try to apply the principles prior to her telling us, but we obviously need help haha. She told us she will observe our companionship study time on Monday, which is making all three of us nervous. On a side note, I'm now officially sick, which sucks. I have a headache, my nose won't stop running, and it has been spreading to our entire district. I think eight out of twelve of us are now sick. I merely view it as a nuisance that is testing my dedication to the work.
Saturday, August 31st, 2013:
The day began by teaching Fernando about the Word of Wisdom. It helped to have just taught it to Andrea and Luis, so my companions and I were familiar with the vocabulary and lesson plan. It was exactly what Fernando needed to hear. We are beginning to do better at teaching people, not teaching lessons. Fernando was very receptive, and he informed us that he will try his best to end his addiction to smoking and quit drinking coffee. He has had a monumental change in his demeanor and habits since we began teaching him just a mere two weeks ago. My companions and I have set a goal to be more focused during our study time to best meet the needs of our investigators and invite the Spirit into all of our planning sessions. Due to the fact that the MTC is nicknamed ''Spirit Prison'' (It´s a running joke because it feels like an isolated compound where the Spirit is always present, and we don't have much freedom to dictate our schedule), we were required to begin fasting Saturday after lunch, instead of dinner. I would much rather prefer to fast dinner to dinner. However, my companions and I decided to fast for the desire to focus ourselves during our studies on the needs of our investigators. I know for a fact that the rewards we will reap from fasting will be much greater than the sacrifice of food and water for 24 hours.
Sunday, September 1st, 2013:
September is here! Where has the time gone? After Fast and Testimony Meeting today, I got to break my fast. I was able to feel the Spirit very strong during Leadership Meeting and also during Sacrament Meeting. I know the Lord is blessing us, as missionaries, for our sacrifices. I have not, however, been blessed with the ability to be healed of my sickness yet. It has progressively gotten worse and is more annoying than hindering. I love Sunday Devotionals because we always have the opportunity to listen to General Authorities (and most often, Apostles!). Everyone always tries to guess who we will hear from. I was guessing it would be Robert D. Hales, but tonight we got to listen to Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve! It was very imformative because Elder Christofferson recounted all of the things he would have done differently if he could do his mission over again. The main point he tried to drive hoem was focusing on working hard in accordance with our purpose as missionaries; he told us that he worked very hard, but didn't always work hard to fulfill his purpose as a missionary: to invite others to come unto Christ. He also informed us that peoples' opinions about the Church are largely based on how they view us as missionaries, so it is our solemn duty to focus on meeting the Lord's will at all times and in all places. I love that he talked more about what will happen in the field, as opposed to just the MTC. That is one thing that I wish the MTC would be better at; the MTC doesn't tailor the training to how life in the field will be (for example, we don't ever actually have time allotted for companionship study, so we have to make our own time for it). I love how excited all of the Apostles are for all of us as missionaries. It truly inspires me to want to improve and live up to my potential.
Monday, September 2nd, 2013:
I love teaching, so it's weird when we don't have anyone to teach during the day. As a district, we take turns teaching the investigators, so there are times when my companionship doesn't get to teach at all in a day. We didn't have any lessons today. It was weird. This sounds terrible to say, but it almost feels like a waste to go to classes when I don't have anyone to teach because I feel like I should be serving instead of focusing on learning. I hope that means that I'm beginning to improve with putting the needs of investigators ahead of the my own needs. Hermana Powell was supposed to come join our companionship study today, but she never showed up. Elder Metro, Elder Mask and I have all begun to move our companionship study into the Thomas S. Monson building, which is where our Sacrament Meeting is at. It's hard to focus in our classroom in the Lorenzo Snow building when there are so many people there. It's easy for one person to get off task out of twelve people, and then it's contagious. When we go to the other building, we are much more focused and are able to learn more. We spent our hour together reading Mosiah 4 in Spanish. Everyone, please read verses 2 and 3. The verses talk about the need to be humble and repent. We ended up using that scripture for one of our lessons on Wednesday. Tonight, language study was rather chaotic. It was so hard to pay attention, and I earnestly wanted to learn more about the subjunctive mood. As a result, Hermana Powell told the entire district that we will use this week to focus more on review and pronunciation. I was quite frustrated because I want to continue to press forward, not take a step backward. She later told my companionship that, although we are advanced with our grammar, when we get into the field, grammar will be the last of our concerns. The natives will talk must faster and won't annunciate, so we need to improve the basics of Spanish before we move forward. I then set a personal goal to be able to roll my r's by the end of the week and speak Spanish as much as possible. It was good that she was so blunt with us and told us exactly what we needed to improve with. My companions are extremely bright, and we have all made it through every single grammar lesson, but it was humbling to know that we need to know more about the simple things before we focus too intently on the more advanced concepts.
Tuesday, September 3rd, 2013:
We were supposed to teach Fernando this morning, but other companionships took longer. We ended up running out of time and didn't ever teach him. It's alright, though, because my companions and I have the reputation for going way longer than we are supposed to haha. We need to improve on that. The day was fairly routine, but we made a serious effort to speak Spanish more. And to cut out the awkward silences during meals while speaking Spanish, we decided to attempt telling stories in Spanish about our childhood for practice. It is very difficult, but proved beneficial. I'm already almost to the point of being able to roll my r's! I sound (almost) normal while speaking in sentences, but I can't continuously roll them by themselves like most people can. However, I'm happy with the improvement I have made thus far. I want to be able to roll them by the end of the week. Learning a language is a monumental struggle for me. This evening, for Tuesday Devotional, we had Elder Villalobos of the 4th Quorum of the Seventy speak to us in person. He spoke of the importance of leadership in missionary work, specifically at the levels of Bishop, Stake President and Mission President. All three positions have different keys, but they all need to be aligned for the work to progress. He then told us that we must obey each one and follow their individual policies on the local missionary work in order to find success in the mission field. It was interesting to hear his opinions about missionary work because he oversees so many missionaries. It was truly enlightening. Most importantly, he told us to pray for the members, in addition to the investigators. He said that we will find success if we pray for the members because they are a missionary's aid to finding people to teach. Members have the ability to fellowship and work on people even moreso than missionaries can in many situations! I will definitely heed his advice. Plus, the devotional was made even better after having pizza night! Pizza + Devotional = Happy Missionaries
Wednesday, September 4th, 2013:
Since we ran out of time yesterday to teach Fernando, we got to teach him first today. Our main focus was on the Gospel of Jesus Christ (Lesson 3 in Preach My Gospel), but we really wanted to tailor our message around the blessings that come from the proper process of repentance. As was expected, Fernando had many questions relating to repentance. We only covered the first two steps of the Doctrine of Christ (Faith and Repentance), but it was such a spiritual message. I had woken up this morning with an unusually optimistic and happy attitude/feeling, and I just knew today was going to be a great day; that lesson alone lived up to the feeling I got. I could feel the Spirit bare witness to Fernando that our message can help him overcome his addictions and regain his agency. He committed to being baptized already. It has been such a rewarding experience to see the changes that he has made. Nothing too exciting happened during the day, with the exception of the torrential downpour that I mentioned at the beginning of this email. We had to walk through that on our way to TRC during the evening. However, my companions and I were in for a rude awakening. Hermana Powell told us that we would be teaching her and Luis, instead of talking with members during TRC. I was SO NERVOUS. She didn't tell us, so we hadn't used our companionship study to prepare for the lesson that we would teach. We would have to go in completely unprepared and rely on the guidance of the Spirit. Hermana Powell told us that it will be good practice for the field because we may be called upon to teach lessons in the field without prior formal preparation for the lesson. We acted as if it was the house that they live at, and we decided to knock on the door to the TRC room. It truly felt like a ''real'' lesson. The beginning of the lesson was somewhat jumbled as my companions and I tried to teach off of one another in some sort of structured manner. However, as is typical of the Spirit, we were directed by what to say. We tried to focus on Luis' faith in Jesus Christ. We testified to him that Christ, God and the Holy Ghost are all separate and distinct beings. We also shared with Luis that God and Christ have bodies of flesh and bone, like we as individuals have. He told us he was concerned with the fact that he hasn't felt anything different when praying and reading the scriptures than what he has felt going to his own church. I don't even remember what I said, but the Spirit spoke through me. I asked him something along the lines of ''Have you prayed individually about our message and about the Book of Mormon?'' He looked startled, and then sat back in his seat. He then responded that he had only prayed with Andrea. I testified with what may have been my most powerful testimony ever that he will receive an answer if he prays with real intent to know for himself. Then, Elder Mask was prompted to ask Andrea to tell Luis how she came to know of the truthfulness of our message. Andrea then testified to him about the need for a true desire and intent to know the truth. She even then shared scripture that she had read about the need for a sincere desire with Luis. It was awesome to have the Holy Ghost work through an investigator and help us teach Luis, too. The lesson was very powerful. Luis then told us he would be baptized if he receives an answer about our message. We concluded and returned to the classroom through that awful rainstorm. Hermana Powell then told my companionship after class (we talked for over twenty minutes past the conclusion of class!) that we are excellent teachers. She told us, however, that we need to be more bold and direct with investigators. My companions and I have a tough time seeing the good in the teaching that we do, but Hermana Powell cheered us up. We were nervous because of how scattered the beginning of the lesson was. She pointed out to us that Luis said he believed us when we told him about the nature of God - He is a personage of flesh and bone. That isn't normal for Catholics, especially for one as devoted as he is. She even admitted that she was floored when he said that and she was very confused as to why he said it. Regardless, she then pointed out to us that clearly our message is meeting his needs if he is so willing to believe that. Her advice is always so uplifting, though it is often confusing. My companions left utterly lost by her advice, but I took from it that we have been making the progress we need to and that we need to be more direct in our application - that is, we need to do the ''checklist'' kind of things, such as invite the investigator to be baptized in the first lesson, commit them to reading the Book of Mormon after every lesson, etc. Hopefully we will get to talk to her more tomorrow night and find out what Hermano Peterson (the person who plays Luis in the lessons) said.
This has been an incredibly exhausting, spiritually-filled and rewarding week. My love for the work grows more and more by the day. This is where I'm supposed to be. My testimony of the divinity and inspiration from God grows daily, too. Every one of the members in my district has been there to support me and support each other, and we are like a family. I can't believe it has been almost a month since I left for the mission. There is a level of happiness and feeling of accomplishment here that is found absolutely nowhere else. I cannot wait to get to California and assist in the work there for real people. My message this week for everyone is that the sacrifice to be obedient is always outweighed by the blessings that we receive. ''Obedience brings about blessings, but exact obedience brings about miracles.'' Like I have said before, in the words of Gene Griffith, ''The will to prepare to win is more important than the will to win.'' In the Book of Alma, Captain Moroni was occupied with building up his defenses in times when there was no fighting. It is like our own lives: we cannot be complacent. We must prepare NOW for the trial that will arise LATER. We can't expect to receive the strength by our own will to win in the time that we face our spiritual battles, but rather, we must prepare to win now to be ready for the spiritual battle before it arises.
I'm grateful for all of your love and support. You all mean so much to mean, and I love hearing from you all. The mission is undoubtedly the most difficult thing I have ever done. It isn't the most physically tough, the most emotionally tough, nor is it the most spiritually tough trial I have endured; yet, the mission is, overall, the single-toughest process and trial I have ever experienced. I love every minute of it, but the sacrifice is immense. I know, for a fact, that by the end of two years, I will be a different person. I cannot wait for that change to come about.
Love,
Elder Gabriel Valley
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