MTC and the First Week!

To begin, I will talk about our district. Half of us are going to Macon Georgia(that's very unique for so many of us to be in one district)! Yeah :) and the other half are going to Washington. The elders all seem so young. It's crazy that the Lord trusts us with His precious work.

What we are doing will change lives and save souls, yet God trusts a bunch of 18 and 19 year olds to assist in that work. Amazing. We still have so much to learn, but, in the same sense, we already know so much more than the rest of the world. I love studying the gospel! I am now serving in a trio. We had four sisters in our district, but one of them went home due to anxiety. :( We all told her how much we loved her, and I bore my testimony on how I know the Lord needs His work done just as much in Arizona as He does in Georgia. We all can find our place in assisting the work of God. We already miss her tons, but I pray she will experience joy in serving the Lord wherever she is at.

Lindsay and the gang just before entering the MTC June 24!

To be honest, it has seemed just a little bit slow. That's most likely because I want to jump right into the work, but it's taking a little bit of time to set things up. For example, my zone is a pilot group with ipads. We do not take them into the mission field with us, but we use them in the MTC. Apparently....I have to learn how to use technology ;) Honestly though, technology is such a blessing. We simply have to be responsible and use it in the best ways to further the work.

The first night we were at the Mtc we had an activity where we were in a class of about 100 sisters and elders. We were all trying to teach these investigators, and that proved to be quite a challenge. I never suggest having 100:1 missionary investigator ratio. Regardless of the difficulty of the task, the spirit was so strong, and the love for these investigators filled all of our hearts to the point of overflowing. I didn't recognize it at first, but by the end of our first discussion, the elder leading the activity asked us to consider and identify what we were feeling for our investigator. As soon as he said that, I realized the overwhelming feeling of love I felt for Lance. I was so anxious for him to understand what we were trying to tell him and help him feel. The spirit is the true teacher. In order for conversion to happen, the investigator must form a dependency upon God and not the missionary. Because the spirit was in that lesson/activity, it turned out to be (what I thought) a success.

Now, for a crazy story. Thursday afternoon, there was a last minute announcement that all the sisters should leave their designated classrooms for some special instruction later that afternoon. This has never been done before. None of the teachers knew what was going on, so we all just rolled with the punches. This week, all members of the 12 and the first presidency are actually at the MTC because the new mission presidents are being trained. We don't see them often, because they stay in 1M and we stay in our classes(everything has been relocated from 1m that used to be there). Well, some of the sisters started to wonder if we were going to have an apostle come talk to us because it was such a special opportunity. We got to the auditorium, found our seats, and started singing songs together. Having hundreds of sisters sing together with great acoustics sounds incredible. The spirit was felt so strongly. One of the most incredible songs was "A child's prayer." While we were singing, I couldn't help but think as the child's verse being what our investigators would be singing. It was amazing. I am so excited to share the joy of this Gospel!! Anyways, after the singing, an elder stood up to speak to us. He said we were about to receive something live altering. Well..as it turns out, we were not given any incredible lecture from one of the 12. We were actually told we had to move buildings (which we had just moved into yesterday) because some sisters on the 4th floor had been bitten by bats which were found in multiple areas of the building. Ha. It was seriously one of the funniest surprises ever. The rest of the afternoon we relocated our things, and then went to meet our Branch presidency.

Our zone seems great although we haven't done much with them yet. We received our assignments yesterday. Sister Foster, Sister Meryhew, and I are the Sister Training Leaders. I am excited for this opportunity to get to know all the sisters on a more personal level and hopefully help them in their pursuits towards becoming better missionaries. I know they will teach me so much. I still have so much to learn.

The work is amazing, the feeling of being a missionary is so incredible. You fill full to the brim with purpose and love. It is like nothing I have ever experienced in my life. I am so grateful to finally be here! Keep serving wherever you are in the world. God IS our loving Heavenly Father. I know that. I know every experience we have is for our good. It is our job to endure to the end.

Until next time,
Sister Brown