Thursday, April 18, 2013

First and Only Letter From the MTC


Family, Friends, Loyal Fans,

I AM SO HAPPY ITS MY P-DAY. I have had dreams about emailing you for the last three nights. (I only have 1 while I'm here). I've been here for a week and one day now. This was the longest week of my life. In a good way. The MTC is really nothing I expected. It's better than anything I could have ever imagined, and the biggest emotional roller coaster I've been on. The spirit here is so consuming. I can't even count on my fingers and toes how many times my mind has just been blown and I've gotten goosebumps all over. (And not because It's 40 degrees). SERIOUSLY, It has snowed, and all I have is light clothes for Jamaica.

My companions name is Sister Savage. She is from good ole' Lehi, Utah. She has been such a blessing because she has the most contagious laugh in the world, and frankly, it gets really tough here, and she always makes me feel happy. We have so much fun. When we are not "studying," we are just laughing about everything. I feel like so much has happened and I don't know how to summarize this last week. 

First off, all we do is eat and sit, eat and sit, eat and sit. The food is just like regular cafeteria food, nothing special, but each Wednesday and Sunday is ICE-CREAM for dinner. Well, I make it ice-cream for dinner. (You could eat other stuff). Seriously, the ice-cream here is the best in the world, I'm not even kidding, I've never eaten anything better.

Okay let's talk about all the amazing things that have happened! This is probably going to be out of order, but I seriously don't even remember when I did things. All the days have melted into one. Okay, so guess who came to our Tuesday Devotional? Everyone said not to expect an Apostle or anyone really high in the church, but RICHARD G. SCOTT came! It was so awesome. His talk was so amazing. He spoke about prayer, and about pouring out your heart to your Heavenly Father. It really made me want to be better about communicating with the Lord, and believe me, I have said so many prayers while I've been here. Probably like 20 a day. But, I still need to have that constant communication with my Heavenly Father. The most amazing part of his talk was his testimony of the Lord. He said, "I know God lives, because I know Him." It seriously gave me chicken skin and I felt so warm all over my body. The way he said it, and the conviction he had in his voice was so powerful. It really made me think about how many prayers he has said in his life to be able to say that he knows the Lord. I loved it. ALSO He gave us an Apostolic Blessing. That seriously blew my mind. I couldn't believe that. He blessed us with strength and with hope. He blessed us that the Lord would answer our prayers. 

The first few days I was here, everyone was just saying, "You just need to make it to Sunday," and how right they were. The first few days were so overwhelming, but once Sunday rolled around, I was so joyous. Relief Society was awesome. The speaker was Mary Edmunds, who has served about 5 missions for the church. Her whole talk was hilarious. She was sooooo good at uplifting all of us and helping us realize that we are meant to be here. For about a minute she talked about not touching the Elders. We were all cracking up. She then proceeded to say, "Don't touch the Elders..... but keep in mind who you want to touch later. So, no touchy now, but as soon as you get home and they are home, TOUCH." I don't know, it was kind of like a you-had-to-be-there moment, but it had all us women rolling. SPEAKING of all the women, there are SO many sisters here, it is really amazing at their power they have. So many people were effected by the mission age change. The Lord is really hastening his work. Anyways, back to Mary Edmunds, she also spoke about how you will never regret serving a mission and how we have journals that need to be filled with our adventures. I think she knew many of us felt discouraged, but she said, "All you can do, is the best you can do, and the Lord will do the rest." How right she is. Even in one week I have felt that. 

My District is amazing. They are soooo awesome. It is made up of four sisters and four elders. Elder Williams is our district leader, he is 25 years old. He has been in the military for the last couple years I think, and decided to serve a mission. He is so dedicated and works so hard. He is so funny, because I can tell he gets irritated with the rest of us, because we are all 19 and 20, but he is also patient. He is going to West Virginia, just like the rest of the elders and sisters in my district. Elder Hohneke is his companion, and he is 6'5". Elder Williams is like, 5' 4". It is so funny watching them walk around. Elder Shepard and Elder Cagel are the other Elders in our District, one word to describe them is, "DORKY." But they are the comic relief. Elder Cagel, I have never met someone so funny in my life, and he seriously doesn't even know he is funny. For example, Elder Cagel came into the room the other day pretending to be blind and we were like, "What are you doing Elder Cagel?!" and he created this long elaborate story about how he lost his eye sight. I couldn't stop laughing. Also, Elder Shepard is hilarious. He always asks my opinion about everything. "Sister Pitt, what do you think of this quote?" "Sister Pitt, what do you think the significance of this butterfly in the painting is?" And the list goes on and on. Sister Wines and Sister Holden are the other sisters is our district and they are so sweet, softspoken sisters. It makes up for the loudness of Sister Savage and I. We have really grown together. I have also felt really bad, because there are times after I teach a hard lesson (to a fake investigator), and I just cry. None of the Elders know what to do. I can't help it. 

Speaking of lessons, I've also had some amazing ones, as well. I have really felt like I've learned so much, and I am learning so much about teaching Doctrine. But, it's not easy, and it takes so much work. I AM NOT QUALIFIED FOR THIS. I seriously have so much to learn and I don't know the exact order or scriptures and biblical stories and what not, but I really have learned it's not about that. Yes, teach the Doctrine correctly, but meet the needs of the investigator. Find out what they want in their life and what not. 

Elder Cagel just walked by and pretended to be stuck in the washing machine. He is so random, I love it. hahaha

UGH I feel like there is so much I have to tell you. OH, my companion and I were called to be Sister Training Leaders (basically Zone Leaders), but for sisters. We also gained another companion yesterday because she got a rash or something and couldn't leave. Anyways, I'm so stressed out, I will cry tears of joy when I get to leave here. I feel like I'm trapped. I love the sisters in my room. We just sit there and giggle for 20 minutes and talk about the future and what not. We are all so excited to serve. Only three sisters are going to Jamaica here. And about 8 elders. I am so excited. AHHH.

The days are long, and short. The hours are forever, but end so quickly. Time is an illusion here. I like it. I also hate it. Overall, I'm loving it. Don't worry about me. Every little thing will be alright.

Peace and Blessings,
SISTAH PITT

I'm official!
My Companion, Sister Savage, I love her!
We're going to JAMAICA!

My MTC District!

1 comment:

  1. OH MY GOODNESS!!! How did I not know you were going on a mission? One of my dearest friends son is serving in Jamaica. Look for Elder Gray.
    Tell him his white mama loves him.

    So happy for you girl. You will be amazing!
    Love you, Sister Mahaffey

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