Hej!
This is my last week writing
from the MTC! It's been a party! Something I've learned from my
companion here is that life really is what you make of it. It's all
about the perspective you choose to have. People all the time would tell
me different things about the MTC. That I'd like certain things or hate
certain things... Something my companion and I discussed is that if we
told ourselves our time here would suck, it would be or if we told
ourselves it would be great, it would be great instead. He's so
passionate about what he calls "positive I am's". The idea is that if
you stand in the mirror every day and tell yourself you are the things
you want to become like, "I am humble. I am confident. I am a hard
worker..." anything like that, eventually you'll start acting like it
and they will come true. "You bring about what you think about," he's
always telling me. Our whole district has made the goal of doing our I
am's every day and it really does work! We'd write them out and then
just say them every day. Now any time I start to think to myself how
tired I am or how much I miss something from, my mind is in the habit of
saying things like "I am wide awake. I am so pumped to be in class..."
and so on. It has really done wonders for me. Moral of the story is, my
companion is a stud. I'm going to miss him after we head to Sweden, but
we'll keep it lit.
At the beginning of my time here, I
was worried. Worried I wouldn't develop the relationships I wanted with
my companion and my district, or that I would be too homesick to work
hard and lots of things. Something I've learned here and especially from
President Uchtdorf this conference is that you don't have to be
anything more than you are right now to serve God. All it takes is
willingness. You don't have to be smarter, more charismatic, or anything
like that. The less I have worried, the more useful of an instrument I
have become in the Lord's hands. I came up with a little formula for
success I'm going to follow on mission. It goes like this: Love in your
heart and faith in your step.
Some sad news this week:
our sisters as of yet don't have there visas and have been reassigned to
Orem, UT and Carlsbad, CA until they get their visas. When your heart
is so set on somewhere, it's hard to push it off even longer, but
they're taking it really well. Also one of my favorite missionaries in
our district had to go home this morning for a month or two before he
can come back out. We all went to see him off this morning and we're
hoping to see him back as soon as possible.
Our devo
this Tuesday was by Bonnie L. Oscarson and her husband who apparently
served as mission president in Sweden when they were very young. Like
seriously, she was twenty-five. There were probably some missionaries
older than her in her mission... Anyways, she had all the Swedish
missionaries raise their hands and told us stories about Sweden and then
gave a message that was so needed with all the sad news that day about
visas and stuff. She shared the story Hugh B. Brown gave of the current
bush. Elder Christopherson gave a general conference talk about it and
there's a cool video about it on lds.org, so go look it up if you're curious. But it basically talks about trusting that God knows us and letting Him lead the way.
I get to go pack now so that's all for this week! I'll tell you about Sweden next week!
Again, thank you for all letters and pictures sent my way!
Love you all!
Äldste Denton
The Finns and Danes left on Monday. That's them with some of us Swedes.
This is us seeing Elder Slaughter off. He's the one on my right.
Some of our branch after some especially lit volleyball.
The Elders in our district with o.g. lighting.
New haircut. Kinda looks the same :)
Sunset from the good ol' MTC. "BeaUTAHful" as Elder Dumas says.
Elder Holmstead!
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