Tue, Jul 23, 2013
HELLO FROM THE MTC!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh man!! Where do I even start?!? Maybe with this analogy. I am thirsty for the gospel and all forms of learning... But this past week I have been drinking out of a fire hydrant. Yep, that sounds about right. My head is always hurting from an explosion of knowledge and I always look forward to sleeping, but man do I LOVE it here!!!!!!!! And every day gets better and better!We have an investigator named AHTOH (pronounced Anton) and have been teaching him a lesson everyday. In Russian. He had the desire to get closer to God, but had no idea how to pray! So we taught him how and he is finally doing it on his own now! We also gave him a Book of Mormon and taught him about the Restoration. He committed to read Moroni 10:3-5 before our next lesson tomorrow! Although I have absolutely no idea what he is saying half of the time... okay, more like 99.8% of the time, I can still feel the deep love that Heavenly Father has for him as I bear my testimony to him. I am learning how to listen to the spirit while teaching even though I don't have the vocabulary yet to completely switch my lesson to something we didn't plan on teaching him. But that will come! :)The Lord told Nephi to go and build a boat. How? He didn't know, but yet Nephi still found the means and accomplished it. I have been told to learn Russian. How? I HAVE NO IDEA!!! But am I doing it, OHHH DAAA!!! [which means yes in Russian!] I have learned that the gift of tongues isn't the ability to all of a sudden go and teach AHTOH and then magically say everything that I want to say. The gift of tongues is currently helping me learn Russian quickly and effectively. I think one of my biggest trials right now is Satan keeps tempting me to speak Chinese. When people talk to me in Russian, I instinctly start responding to them in Chinese. There are lots of missionaries here learning Chinese and I desire so badly to go and help them because I hear the mistakes they make as I walk by. At first I kept thinking to myself, that should be me. But through prayer and through my very inspired, super, duper, awesome Russian teacher, I know that I have been called as a missionary to speak Russian because that is God's will for me. And he will not put any trial in front of me that I am not capable of accomplishing. I have found it best to not even say the the "C word" [Chinese] and to truly set my heart upon learning Russian.My District- Such cute little boys! They all are 18 and just barely graduated from high school! They asked us yesterday, "How do we do laudry? Are suppose to sepperate colors? Why?" They are like our little brothers! You can tell they have never been to college because they have a really hard time focusing for more than one hour at a time. But they are definitely improving, and as a district we are growing and learning so much from each other!
Everybody in my district know me as the happy person! They say that I never stop smiling and get too excited and enthusiastic to learn! :)My Companions!!! What a blessing it is to be with two wonderful people with such strong testimonies! Sister Taylor is 23 and from St. George and already graduated. Her strength is listening to people and gaining their trust. We all feel very comfortable talking to her! Sister Biorn is 20 and is from Rexburg Idaho! She has already had 2 semesters of Russian and her strength is definitely patience! We all ask her for so much help and she is always so willing to teach us! I love my companions so much and we get along super well!Daily Miracles -
I have been trying to write down a couple that happen each day. One of them happened last Friday. We were all feeling SUPER DUPER stressed and overwhelmed when in the middle of class, our teacher stopped teaching and pulled out his scriptures. He gave us some very inspiring words and let us go outside and write in our journals for ten minutes. He truly is an inspired teacher. I am so grateful that he was listening to the spirit that day.Another miracle- We were getting ready for the day on Thursday morning when I asked Sister Taylor if she remembered what "My Purpose" was and if we could write it down and hang it up so we could memorize it faster. Later that day she told me that at that moment she was thinking to herself, "What am I doing here???" And by just saying what popped into my mind, I answered her prayer.Sunday was AMAZING!!! The spirit was soooo strong is was the BEST. DAY. EVER. I'll admit, the first few days were very hard. But once we made it to Sunday, everything felt better!I am so blessed to have the opportunity to serve a mission! It is so much fun learning more about the gospel, learning Russian, studying scriptures for over an hour a day, and learning from the people here at the MTC. I can feel my testimony building!I love you all so much!! Thank you for your support!Love,CECTPA Miller
P.S. My toe is getting better, I think. I dont really pay attention to the pain when I am busy. Yesterday it was kind of bluish and today it is white? But dont worry, I washed it out and put some magical cream on it! All is well!P.P.S. Elder Lundquist is here and says hello to everybody! I know like 10 million people here. I can't walk like ten feet without running into a friend. :)
