Moms note: I will not be able to add any pictures to Matthew's blog until he leaves the MTC. Upon arriving in Guatemala they take all of the missionaries' cameras. I guess for safety reasons.
I can't believe my first week of the
MTC is already over!! Time is seriously warped down here! It’s insane how much
I have already learned and how you can change in only one week’s time! The
plane ride down to Guatemala was quite the trip, the layover in LA was pretty
rough and flying through the night ... definitely not the best idea ever, but
alas I made it here safe and sound!
The CCM (MTC) is in the middle of the
city and so there are big fences around the entire thing and body guards by the
gate. Almost every major store has at least a few guys out front with shotguns,
watching the area. Crazy stuff! The actual CCM is really nice, everything is
remodeled and new. The food is pretty good, Most days it’s just a variety of Latino
food mixed in with normal American food. There has probably only been like two
meals so far that I have had to stomach down. (Not eating all your food is like
literally a sin) The schedule for each day goes a little bit like this.... wake
up at exactly 6:30, shower, eat breakfast, personal study for an hour, language
study for an hour. We then get taught by our teachers, Hermano Bonilla or
Hermana Bruno, both of which are extremely great. We then have lunch, followed
by a grammar lesson, then usually using TALL a computer Spanish learning
program. We then have sports, which generally is basketball with my district.
Except for one day when we played Futbal! It technically got banned by the
President but for some reason we went outside one day and all the Latinos were
playing, so we joined in and boy was that AWESOME! They are such kind and fun
loving people, its just great! Eventually a guy came and told us we probably
shouldn’t play because its against the rules, which we didn't know at the time
but now we do! Sad day :( I guess the Nortes, (North Americans), kept kicking
the Latinos and hurting them too badly... we Nortes just need to practice the
worlds greatest game more I suppose!! After sports we have dinner, followed by
teaching our investigator, who is one of our teachers. The very first time you
teach, two days after you get here you teach in only Spanish, it’s insane!! You
have zero idea what to say but you just rely on the Spirit and go with it! Our
lessons have improved a lot ever since! After teaching we get refreshments,
usually cookies and milk, so that we have a chance to talk to the Latinos.
Pretty much every meal you are required to go sit with the Latinos so that you
can work on your Spanish. Sometimes it’s awesome, usually it’s just
embarrassing! haha We then plan as a companionship and go to bed, promptly at
10:30! Every single day you are dead tired but that just means you are giving
it your all! That’s about it for the schedule...
Some of
the best experiences so far have been...
- We pray
soooo much, it’s crazy. You think missionaries are always exaggerating about the
amount of times they pray? They aren’t! Prayer is such an amazing gift from God
and so we try to use it constantly down here in the CCM.
- We listened to a talk on Sunday, which, by
the way, the first week here you have to prepare a talk in all Spanish for
Sacrament meeting. But anyway we were listening to a talk given to the MTC in
Provo by Elder Scott and it was such a blessing to me. He talked about God
answering our prayers and how sometimes we get a strong answer, sometimes we
get a stupor of thought if what we are asking for is wrong, and SOMETIMES we
have to ACT in FAITH and we will get our answer later in life. Sounds kinda
familiar eh? Probably because this was something I really struggled with and
talked about a lot during my farewell talk!! Neat stuff!
- Another cool experience was last night my
district, who are totally awesome, got together to discuss our weekly Spanish
goals and stuff. My expectation for the
meeting was that it would be five minutes, and we would mess around for the
rest of the time we had. I couldn't have been more wrong. We discussed our
goals but then starting talking about being here and it just slowly turned into
this testimony meeting that I was totally bawling over. I had been praying to
be able to feel the Spirit stronger at the CCM and boy did I get an answer!
Elder Hale from Draper and Elder Laing from Provo gave the best testimonies
ever! Laing talked about how we were all stressing so much about our Spanish,
when we really should be striving to learn more about the gospel each day. It
was just what I needed to hear because I was stressing a ton about my Spanish
and letting it consume my personal study time. Not good. We study the gospel
our entire lives and still don't fully understand it, while Spanish is
something one can practically master within a year of being here!
- We also
watched a sick video from Elder Holland, the gospel guru himself, and he taught
that as a missionary, all we want is for our investigators to read the
scriptures more fervently, pray with more conviction, study with more purpose,
love others with more Christ like love, etc. ... but, instead of converting
others, we must convert ourselves first, by doing everything we want our investigators
do first. It really struck home with me and made me realize that all of the basic
principles of the gospel I could do with more purpose, more love and more
conviction. I need to convert myself fully first.
- Last
cool experience, when you first get here, you get told about a million rules,
and to be honest, a lot of them seem pretty dumb from the beginning, but
eventually you learn that it’s through obedience that you are able to learn and
grow more here in the CCM. Elder Laing shared a quote last night in our
"testimony meeting" that said: Obedience brings blessings. Exact
obedience brings miracles. Awesome stuff. I am now trying to be exactly
obedient in everything I do here. It’s vital for us to grow as much as we can
in the short 6 weeks we are here.
Sooo, taking one from my sister’s book,
my challenge for all you loved ones at home, find something you do each day and
do it with exact obedience, like for example, get on both knees on the floor by
your bed each night for prayer. Not in your bed, not laying down, not half
kneeling. Just do it with exact obedience and I promise you will be blessed for
it.
That is
about it for the week, I love you all and I pray for you each night!
Elder
Crump
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