Week 25

Hola,

This week I've been trying to be like President Myres, more on that later though.  This week was in a word, long.  My first two weeks here were met with a lot of success.  We found in those two weeks, 31 new investigators, many of them had accepted the invitation to be baptized, and I thought, ya.  I'm an awesome missionary.  Give me another transfer or two here and I'll baptize the entire town!  Maybe my pride got to me a little bit, because this week we found hardly anyone to teach, all of the appointments with the progressing investigators fell, and it was hot all week long.  One of our investigators did get married though, so that´s always good.

On the bright side, my companion and I have started eating healthier and we've learned that it's possible to live off of about ten dollars a week for food.  Beans, tortillas, and eggs go a long way.  And then if we want to add a little bit of flavor we have tomato and onion to add with it.  

This doesn't mean that I've stopped enjoying the abundance of coke in this country.  On Saturday, in honor of my ability to chug water so quickly, my companion decided that I should chug a liter of coke.  If anyone knows what the world record is for that tell me.  Right now I can do it in 47 seconds.  With a bit of practice though, I bet I get I can get it down to about 15.  Dealing with carbonation though is a bit different than plain water.  

As I said, I've been trying to be like President Myers, or rather, the missionary that he wants me to be.  One of the things that he has tasked for every missionary to do is memorize the Living Christ and share it during lessons.  For those of you who don´t know, the Living Christ is a church document that was published seventeen years ago to commemorate the 2000th anniversary of the birth of Christ. Contained with in is a summary of his life, the meaning that it has for all of us, and the promise that one day He will return to rule and reign over the earth as it´s king.  The fun thing for me though, is that I had to learn it in Spanish.  Speaking the language is one thing.  Learning how to memorize something and to say it with meaning is another.  

I started back in August, when I still barely had enough command of the language to teach in the lessons, but now, as of this past Saturday, I've been able to memorize all of it.  Believe me though, it was one of the harder tings to do on my mission.  Especially when I had Spanish speaking companions that some times made fun of my pronunciation or on accident said another word.  There was one time I tried to say it and ended up saying that Christ died for our fishes instead of our sins.  At the end of it though, President Myers was right in saying that memorizing this sacred document would bring us closer to God and give us a better understanding of the sacrifice that our Savior made for all of us.

This week, I want to invite everyone to read the Living Christ and think for yourselves what the sacrifice of our Savior means for you personally.  Think about what his death and resurrection mean in your life, and pray to find our how you can improve that relationship and feel more of his loving influence in your life.

That's all for now

Elder Gooden

Week 24

This week I've been trying to be like Moroni, the son of Mormon.  More on that later though as always.  This has been a week full of interesting things, and I only have a little bit of time to explain all of it.  Some of the highlights include:

Nearly being hit by a drunk driver in the middle of the afternoon, JWs knocking on our door, being asked repeatedly if I support Trump´s politics, Our toilet got fixed in time for the fridge and shower to die, and our land lady decided that we should have our floors re tiled.  She might be my new favorite person in Mexico by the way.  The strangest thing though was when my companion and I realized that if only six people in the branch don't show up for church on Sunday, we become the presiding priesthood holders.

As for the week, my companion and I have been missionary superstars.  Our numbers for the past two weeks have been better than any other companionship in our district, including our district and zone leaders.  If we keep up the hard work, we'll have a ton of baptisms in no time.  I don´t want this to sound like I´m only worried about the numbers though.  We've really just been trying to do what we can for a few investigators, and their families keep showing up to the lessons.  I love small Mexican towns.

As for why I've been trying to be like Moroni, I've been focusing on the promise in Ether 12 that says that if we have a weakness, we can seek the help of the Lord, and if we go to him in faith and humility, he will make our weak things strong.  

Seeing as how I'm an American missionary with only five months here, I have an imperfect knowledge of the language, and I've inherently disliked talking to people for as long as I can remember, and I'm supposed to teach a new missionary how to do something I'm not fully sure how to do, I've had a lot of weaknesses to come to the Lord for help with.  And yet our progress here in Bamoa, and the improvement we've seen since I've gotten hear show that the Lord has been helping me out with this, and has been doing his work through me despite my weaknesses.  

As always, the Lord doesn't work in ways that we always expect. For example, with the language, I haven´t miraculously learned how to speak Spanish over night.  Rather, I've just had more promptings from the spirit telling me things like I should start to share a certain experience or that I should talk about this point of the lesson to help the someone understand better.  As a result, the people have grown to trust us, and feel that we are genuinely there to help them.  I might not have a single idea about what happened in a lesson, but the spirit does, and he can serve as an interpreter when I need to understand something.  

What I like most about this chapter though, is that afterwords, Moroni talks about all of the things that he remembers about the blessings of the Lord.  What I like about this though, is that we can all do that.  Almost everyone can remember a miracle that they saw in their lives, or a warm feeling they felt when they prayed with real intent.  Everyone that has been baptized has felt the truth of this gospel in their lives.  These are the things that we build testimonies on.  These are the small simple, sometimes scrutinized pieces of evidence that we all have as evidence of the truth that we have a loving father in heaven.  it's the evidence we have that Christ really did die for our sins and lives again.  So like Moroni, I invite everyone to remember.  Remember the things that you have built your testimony on.  Remember that this should be our faith in Christ and the hope that we have through his resurrection.  Most of all, remember that it is faith that builds miracles, not miracles that build faith.  

That´s all for now

Elder Gooden

Week 23

So this week I've been trying to be like Peter again.  I know it sounds like I've been trying to be like him a lot, but I find him to be relatable, and there is a lot to learn from his life.  I´m going to apologize now, by the way, to everyone that wrote me last week if I don´t get a chance to respond this week.  There is one cyber her and school is in session so we had to spend a lot of time waiting, and then the Internet crashed, or at least LDS mail.  As a result I'm pressed for time and praying that the Internet will last till I've finished writing.

My first week of training has been interesting.  For one, everyone hates Gringos and they don´t want to listen to missionaries.  Everyone has to admit though that we are the nicest people in the entire area though (as said by one of the Catholic ladies that is trying to "save our souls".  At the same time, I've been able to remember just how much Spanish I actually know and how great it feels to be the leader in a companionship.  It´s been a very strange balance of I know exactly what´s going on, I can do this, and we´re two lost American´s in the middle of Mexico.   

As I said at the start, I've been trying to be like Peter again, and for the same reason that I wrote about in my very first email. I've been called to walk on water.  Except this time, drowning was only a hypothetical idea. I was never in any real danger in the MTC; all of my investigators were really my teachers, at the end of the lessons, I could speak in English to everyone, and we never had to worry about getting lost.  Now, If I don´t know how to say something, it doesn't get said. If I can´t convey the spirit in my lessons, the investigators don't progress. And not only will they not progress, but I've got a companion that thinks that I have all of the answers.  As much as I want to say that I have them all, I don´t. Amazingly though, we've got some of the highest numbers in our district right now, so I think we´re doing something right.  The hope right now is just that we´ll be able to keep this up. First week is luck, second week´s dumb luck, and the third week is mastery. At least I think that practice strategy works in the mission.  

Needless to say though, with every week that I focus on Peter, it is a sign of my continual recognition of my dependence on my Savior each day.  Anyone that doubts that God lives and is a God of miracles can look at the fact that my comp and I are here in the heart of Mexico holding lessons and helping investigators progress.  That isn't our work.  This isn't dumb luck.  This is the Savior guiding His servants as they assist in his work to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man.  

Like Peter, we all have the ability to receive Divine help and let ourselves be led to his "green pastures".  It´s like the hymn says, "I´ll go where you want me to go dear Lord... I´ll say what you want me to say... I´ll be what you want me to be."  

With that in mind, we can all do as Peter and walk on water.  We can all do what is seemingly impossible, but we have to surrender our own will to do it.  We have to do as Peter did and leave our nets behind to follow him.  This is not an easy thing, and we don´t get to pick one day to do it and another day not to.  It´s an all or nothing deal.  And the result is a lasting, permanent change in character and relationship with God.  

So my invitation this week is to work on building that relationship. One of my older companions once asked me, If I was in Peter´s shoes, and Christ asked me, "Do you love me more than all these?"  and then he asked me a second time, and then he asked me a third time, with his loving but knowing eyes staring strait into your soul, what would your answer be?  Could you answer yes to all three times?  Would you perhaps doubt after the second or third time?  Would you honestly say no, that you loved him, but you didn't want to give up your biggest addictions or sins?  

I´m not going to say how I answered this question, and I don´t expect anyone to tell me their's either.  Just ponder the situation in your mind.  Try to imagine the Savior sitting in front of you asking the same question, and evaluate how your relationship with him is based off of how you feel that goes.

That´s all for now

Elder Gooden

Week 18. I'm a zone leader...

Psych! 

But I have been trying to be like my mission president this week.  

This week has been very interesting.  Elder Sanchez and I had our last week together.  Plot twist: he left Valles and not me.  He's now serving as a zone leader in a different area.  I've finished my training in the mission field, and am now a regular missionary here in the field.  I've also gotten to the point that Spanish is coming more naturally to me to speak than English.  This will probably start to reflect in my letters after a little while.  So if my grammar sounds a little funny,  please understand that I'm thinking half of the time in Spanish.

Last week, I invited everyone to think about how the priesthood has blessed their lives or how they could magnify their priesthood callings.  To share my personal experience with the challenge, I've been thinking about the significance of priesthood blessings.  As priesthood holders, we have the power to call down blessings from heaven to satisfy the needs of other people.  As a missionary, and a holder of this priesthood, I have the ability to bless the lives of everyone that I see and teach.  This power is one of the examples of how the Lord has put his trust in me to help the people of Obregon.  

As for why I've been trying to be like my mission president, we had a special lecture this week where we learned more about how to teach with the Spirit.  In this lecture, I learned something very interesting that he said.  He was talking about how the Lord had commanded him to give the mission this special lecture and how because the Lord had commanded him to give that lecture, It would be irrational to believe that his spirit wouldn't be with him during it.  

As a missionary, I can apply this same level of confidence in my lessons.  I have been called of the Lord to preach the Gospel here in Spanish.  As his representative, it is irrational for me to believe that he wouldn't give me his spirit as a guide to help me in my lessons as well as to learn Spanish.  This has led me to reflect upon one of my earlier emails about how true freedom and happiness comes when we submit ourselves completely to the will of the Lord.  He is the Good Shepard.  He knows what is best for us.  And we can understand his will through prayer and following the promptings of the Holy Ghost.  

Following the pattern I set last week, this week also has a challenge.  I want to invite everyone to pay more attention to the promptings of the spirit this week.  For those that are unfamiliar with his voice, he communicates with us through our thoughts and through our feelings.  At times he has been described as a warmth and other times as a still small voice.  He always communicates with us though in a way that we can understand and recognize that his message is from God.  

Also, because I like getting emails and what to hear everyone's experiences of how following the spirit has blessed your lives this week.

That's all for now

Elder Gooden

Week 15

Hola

So this week I've been trying to be like Jesus as always though, I'll cover that in the later end of my email.  

This week has been amazing!  I had my first baptism on Saturday which was awesome.  It was a nine year old kid named Rayez.  It was awesome to be able to do such a cool thing like that, and I learned a lot about the nature of the ordinance from having to memorize it for a second time in Spanish.

In other news, the ward that I'm in has nearly doubled its attendance since I arrived here (though this isn't hard to do when membership is as low as fifty people)!  The people here have been so friendly and welcoming that it's been easy to talk to less active members here about the importance of attending church.  It's also been interesting to see how my companion and I work together.  In a lot of ways, we are very similar.  We both like to study and read the Book of Mormon, and have each read it several times.  We both tend to lose track of small things that end up being important further down the road.  So it's been an interesting learning experience to basically see myself through a mirror.

As for why I've been trying to be like Jesus, I've been thinking a lot about why I'm here on my mission.  One of the things that I've learned here is that my mission is about the last place that Satan wants me to be.  And because of that, I've learned a lot about how he tries to tempt missionaries.  One of the most common things that he likes to do, at least with me, is when it's been a rough day with the language or when all of our appointment fall, he likes to ask the question, why are you here?  If you are truly a missionary, why don't you have the gift of tongues; why don't your investigators keep their appointments; one of your investigators is sick, if you have the priesthood, why don't you heal them?  In other words, he tries to get us to believe that there is no power in our calling, and challenges the legitimacy of the message of the gospel.  

But I also remember a talk that Jeffery R Holland gave at an MTC devotional, when he asked the same question of why isn't salvation easy.  His response was: salvation doesn't come easy.  It was never easy for him [Jesus Christ] why should it be easy for you?  and then I remembered a scripture in Mosiah 14: He is despised and rejected of men.  A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.  And we hid as if it were our faces from him, he was despised and we esteemed him not.  Surely he hath born our griefs, and carried our sorrows.  But we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted.

I also remembered that it's his name that I am wearing on my chest, and that I've been called to be his representative while here on the earth.  And so, this scripture has a very true message for missionaries as well.

We are despised and rejected of men; more often than not, people don't want anything to do with our message, some people even have anti-Mormon feelings.  We are men of sorrows and acquainted with grief; it's always sad when an investigator decides to stop progressing, because we know how much this message can help them.  And they hide as if it were, their faces from us; it's always a little annoying whenever we can hear the TV on inside a house but no one wants to answer the door.  We are despised and they esteem us not.  

Surely we have bore the griefs our our investigators and carried their sorrows; we have spent countless hours in fasting and prayer over the well being of our investigators.  

And so, I've learned that being a representative of Christ means taking the good and the bad.  But just like the bad parts are rough, the good parts are really great.  Take for example the ordinance of baptism.  One of the things that makes baptism so unique, is that it is the only ordinance that I can think of that is done in the name of God and Christ.  All of the other ordinances that are performed in the Church are done in the name of only Christ.  Everything from prayer to priesthood blessing, to temple ordinances is done in the name of Christ.  But baptism is done in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.  The only other time within all of the scriptures that this is done, is when Christ atoned for all of our sins and died on the cross.  And just like the atonement makes of free from sin, baptism symbolically cleanses us from sin.  And so I thought that that was a pretty neat comparison.

The last thing that I want to talk about is the Abrahamic covenant.  For those of you who don't know or remember, we read in the Bible that God covenanted with Abraham, and that one of the signs of the last days is that this covenant will be fulfilled through the restoring of the lost tribes.  But we often forget, just exactly what that covenant is, and that it is the purpose of the church to fulfill this covenant.  as for what this covenant in tales, we need to go to the book of Abraham.  In there, we read that Abraham was baptized, received the priesthood, and was sealed in celestial marriage, as explained in the bible dictionary, the covenant that God made with Abraham was that all of his posterity would have the opportunity to receive these covenant blessings and the possibility of exaltation.  Through baptism, all of us are adopted into this covenant, and have the responsibility to bring others into this covenant so as to restore the house of Israel.  If we aren't striving to make and keep the covenants in the Abrahamic covenant, we are apostatizing.

That's all the time that I have for now.  

Elder Gooden

Pictures from this week . . .

Week 13

Hola,

So this week, I've been trying to be like Nephi.  In 1 Nephi, we read about Nephi's reaction to leaving Jerusalem.  Contrary to popular opinion, at this point in time he isn't in his I'll go and do phase.  In the beginning of his story, Nephi, like Lamen and Lemuel, he is skeptical.  This is why in 1 Nephi 2 we read: wherefore, I did cry mightily unto the Lord; and behold he did visit me and did soften my heart that I did believe all the words that had been spoken by my father.  

I've felt a lot like Nephi.  At the start of this week, things were rough with my new companion; the language barrier has made things difficult, he only likes to talk about and read his scriptures (I never thought I'd meet another person that has studied the scriptures as much as I have this early in his life), and he's obsessed with cleaning.  At the same time, I really liked my last companion.  In a way, I feel like Nephi must have felt when his dad took him to the valley of Lemuel.  I've left the land of my inheritance, and all my dad wants to do is teach my brother's repentance.  

And so like Nephi I prayed.  And like Nephi I received comfort, and a reminder that I've received a promised blessing to learn my mission language and baptize converts.  At the current rate that I was going with an English companion, I wouldn't learn my language fast enough, and if I don't learn my mission language, I can't help converts.  

In other words, In order to receive my land of promise, I need to spend a little bit of time crossing through the wilderness.  And like Nephi, I will receive comfort and direction as I continue to progress.

That's all for now

Elder Gooden

. . . . . . . . . . .

Extra email to mom:

Hey mom,

Happy Birthday,

This have been an adjustment; Elder Sanchez and I don't speak much to each other unless we're in lessons.  He likes to clean though, so that has made things nice for me.  The sisters in our area had a baptism, so I got to attend that, but I've been yet to actually baptize.  Also, all of our progressing investigators, apparently have gone apostate and don't want to make their appointments anymore, so we've been doing a lot of contacting.  

My companion also likes to study a lot, so I've been able to make a lot of progress on my elder bednar library.  I don't know what else to write about though, and you've started chatting, so I'll finish this up.

Elder Gooden

Week 12

Hola,

So this week, I've been trying to be like Elder Bednar, but as always,more on that later.  

This week has been a rough week.  All of the appointments that we had fell.  Which is kind of sad considering that we had about fifty of them.  In addition to that,we had transfers today, and I lost my dad.  in addition to that, my new comp doesn't know a word of English.  I guess the Lord got tired of hearing me speak English so much.  On the bright side of things, I'm no longer the newest missionary in the mission.  I also learned that letters take about six weeks from the time they are sent out. 

Because, I don't want to depress to many people with the bad things that happened this week,I figured that I should just skip to the I'm trying to be like segment.  It's much more interesting than talking about how my investigators act while drunk.  As I mentioned, I've been trying to be like Elder Bednar.  I say this, because at the MTC we watched a devotional where he talked about his Book of Mormon Library.  In it,he explained how he likes to take a blue missionary copy of the book of Mormon and pick a doctrinal principle to study from it.  He then goes to the index and topical guide to read all of the scriptures related to that principle and mark them and take notes.  I'm now doing a similar thing, but rather than rely on the topical guide for help, I've decided to read through the Book of Mormon every time that I pick a new subject.  I started my second edition this week on faith.  

It's been fascinating to read through,because I've been able to see how much faith ties into obedience.  I've also grown to develop a greater love for the scriptures.  There is so much that I can learn from them. I invite everyone to read the Book of Mormon from cover to cover, whether it be your first time or your hundredth.  There is always something more to learn

That's all for now

Elder Gooden

Week 10

Happy Belated Forth of July everyone,

This week I've been trying to be like Moroni.  

First though, I need to say that my mission knows how to have an awesome Fourth of July celebration.  So this past week, on P-day, our mission president put on this huge celebration for us with water games and Mexican hot dogs.  It was a welcome break from the heat.  I've also come to learn that Mexico is very superstitious.  As a result, everyone is awestruck whenever they hear that we have given a blessing (many people think that the power to do so died out with the apostles) and everyone likes to worship the Virgin Mary or Saint Jude.  By the way, if anyone knows what Saint Jude is the saint of, that could help me out because he apparently is the patron saint of Mexico and no one knows why.  Also, children have been our most receptive investigators so far this week.  That is at least when they don't believe that the second coming is when Jesus steals all of the children and then burns the earth.  It turns out that a lot of the work here is just expelling false beliefs that the gospel is something attainable to only a few chosen disciples, or that some great feat has to be performed.  The path to salvation is as Alma says, easy.  Through the principles of faith, repentance, baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, the laying on of hands for the gift of the holy ghost, and enduring to the end everyone is eligible to obtain eternal life.

As I said, I've been trying to be like Moroni this week.  I say this for those who don't know, that Moroni was the last prophet of the book of Mormon and witnessed the entire destruction of his people.  He also was the narrator of the book of Ether.  In Ether Chapter 12, Moroni takes a break from his narration to talk about the importance of faith and the future of the Book of Mormon.  In it, he talks about how he and his father aren't very good writers, and how he fears that those who will read the book of Mormon will make fun of it, and on the basis of their terrible writing skills, think that it isn't the word of God.  But then he goes on to write:

26 And when I had said this, the Lord spake unto me, saying: Fools mock, but they shall mourn; and my grace is sufficient for the meek, that they shall take no advantage of your weakness;

27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them.

28 Behold, I will show unto the Gentiles their weakness, and I will show unto them that faith, hope and charity bringeth unto me—the fountain of all righteousness.

29 And I, Moroni, having heard these words, was comforted, and said: O Lord, thy righteous will be done, for I know that thou workest unto the children of men according to their faith;

In a lot of ways, I can relate to Moroni in this sense.  Spanish has been a lot harder than I originally thought that it would be.  And while I can participate in the lessons, I only know the doctrinal points that I was taught at the MTC and a few other words that I've been able to pick up since getting here.  And when I do speak, my language is very slow and with very broken grammar.  But one thing that my companion pointed out to me is that because I speak with such rarity, and it requires effort on my part to say what I want to say, people tend to pay a bit more attention.

In a way, I guess that the Lord has been working the same promise.  I am a missionary of many weaknesses, especially when it comes to speaking.  But I have also seen that the gift of tongues is real.  The spirit has been guiding me as to what I need to say in the moment, and what I need to understand.  

I'm not the same missionary that I was before my mission, or even during the MTC.  I've found that all of my scriptural knowledge is practically useless here.  For one, not to many people read the Bible or Book of Mormon here, so they don't understand the scriptures half of the time when we read them.  Secondly, in the time it would take me to open my scriptures and point to a doctrinal point, my companion is able to explain it.  On the bright side, it's fun to be with a guy who is as well versed in the scriptures as I am.  

I've also come to see things that were written in the scriptures differently.  I've found that a lot of the stories that I thought were just parables or some other thing were more literal than I originally thought.  I've been able to learn so much from my mission, it's hard to fit it all into one weekly email.  If anyone has any specific questions, about my mission, or what I've learned about the doctrine of Christ since I've gotten here, feel free to email me.

Elder Gooden

Pictures from this week . . .

Week 6

Hola Todos,

This past week, I'd been trying to be like Jesus, but I'll get to that in a minute.  I first want to celebrate the fact that I'm officially in the field.  As such, my P-days have been moved to Monday, so you can expect my emails around now from now on.  

I said that I was trying to be like Jesus this week, and when I say this, I want to focus on Christ's obedience.  As I mentioned in my last email I accepted a challenge to only speak Spanish for my last week of the MTC.  Later on Wednesday though, my district and on other district that had arrived at the same time decided to perform a special musical number in half English and half Spanish.  The expectation was that everyone would sing half in English and half in Spanish.  I immediately said that I would be unable to sing in English, and offered to sing entirely in Spanish, as the entire group needed help with that part.  This idea was initially denied, and so I declined to participate.  

That made a lot of people mad.  One of the other missionaries decided that my judgment was off, and asked me to pray about what I should do.  Thinking that no harm could come from prayer, I followed his advice.  As soon as I started to pray that night, the thought came into my head that I already knew the answer to this. And then I was reminded of a talk the Elder Holland gave at an MTC devotional.  In it he said that we need to become out first converts to the Lord.  The spirit then asked me, what kind of investigators do I want to have?  Do I want investigators that will keep their commitments and obey God all of the time, or do I want them to just do it when it's convenient.  So long story short, I made a lot of other people mad again the next day.  It got bad enough that my companion took me in to seek couple's counseling.

But then after the trial of my faith, miracles started to happen.  For one, the promise that I would understand the language better was made manifest in my online assessment score.  I scored 28% higher than I had on the practice test just a few days before.  Secondly, my mission president got wind of what was happening, and spoke to the leaders of the two districts.  I'm not entirely sure of what happened behind closed doors, but the next thing I knew, everyone recognized that we needed more Spanish singers, and then President Bennett was commending me for my dedication to learning Spanish.  I guess the moral of the story is, after every trial of faith, miracles are brought to pass.  In the words of Thomas S Monson "may we always choose the hard right instead of the easier wrong."   

I'll try to write more about the field next week.  It's just hard to describe a place when you have only been there for on day and spent the entire time inside a church building

Elder Gooden

Pictures from the Mexico City Temple before he left the CCM

. . . . . . . .

A few extras from Mom and Dad's email -

Companion's names is Elder Casey

When we asked if he needed anything he said dry ice because it is "as hot as it can get here"

"The apartment has no drinkable water, I have a single AC system in the bedroom, and I haven't tried the bed yet.  Right now I'm drinking powerade, and I've been given a bottle filter that can make sewage drinkable."

Week Five

Hola,

This week, I've been trying to be more like the prophet Isaiah, but more on that later.  

I feel as though my last email was rushed and lacked much of a story to it, and that's probably because I spent the last two minutes of my emailing time writing it.  So to make up for this, I decided to get an in depth explanation of what the MTC is like for all of the future missionaries out there.  

The MTC experience is comprised of six weeks, with almost completely the same schedule each day with  only a few exceptions.  Week one technically isn't a full week.  all of the new missionaries arrive on Tuesday, and the weeks here end on Sunday.  It's actually the most different of all the weeks simple because of all the orientation affairs.  Every Tuesday to celebrate the arrival of new missionaries, we get pizza for dinner.  Wednesday marks the official start of our missionary work.  We are given a basic orientation of the MTC, which consists of a tour of the campus, we meet our teachers, and at the end we are assigned a district leader.  While district leaders are important in the field, at the MTC, he only is responsible for getting the mail, and answering to the branch president at times.  Weeks two and three are identical in that you spend your entire time learning Spanish and how to teach people the gospel.  I say learn to do this because every sucks at it.  Week four though is the week of miracles because everything starts to click.  Week five is the day that we all do awesome and start spending entire days speaking Spanish, and then we get to week six.  Week six is almost the same as week one except  that you're are expected to speak Spanish the entire time.  

AS for an average day, it starts with forty five minutes of personal study followed by breakfast.  we then have about four hours worth of languages study/mock investigator time before lunch.  We then have a daily planning session, and then gym.  after gym, it's already three in the afternoon.  We then have another four hours of study in the evening until about seven.  The nice thing is that our teachers in the afternoon are better than the ones in the morning.  After that we have diner, and then another hour and a half of personal study.  We then get an hour and a half to do whatever we want in our rooms.  

Now as I said before, I've been trying to be like Isaiah.  i say this because i had an experience very similar to Isaiah.  In Isaiah, I think 9, but you might have to double check me on that, Isaiah describes how he was called to teach.  He starts by proclaiming that he has unclean lips and is among a nation of unclean lips.  In response to this, and angel takes an ember our of a fire and places it to his Isaiah's lips.  It is then after this that Isaiah is qualified to do the work.  I had a very similar experience at the start of this week.  I was the first of many in field orientation that we had, and at the end, one of my teachers offered me a "candy".  It actually was a piece of mango with chili pepper powder over it.  It's actually very good, but it was hot.  After I ate it, I was challenged to speak only in Spanish for the rest of my time in the MTC, for the exception of personal time after nine at night.  AS a result, I have gotten really creative with my language, and driven everyone else in my district insane.  The next few days will most likely revolve around preparing to leave, and meeting my infield mission president.

More next week

Elder Gooden

. . . . . .

A few extras from Mom and Dad's Mail - 

We asked - 

What insights have you gained while at the CCM? What have you learned about yourself?

Elder Gooden Said - 

I feel as if I've gone through a sanctification process while here.

So, president Lyeons, the former first councilor here(he was released last night) had been talking about the sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost.  He describes it as the same event that we read about in Mosiah 5.  Before, I just saw myself as someone that knew that the gospel was true, and knew that I had to follow the commandments.  But when I went to the temple last week, something changed within me.  I felt this closer bond with my Heavenly Father and with my Savior.  I felt as though I wanted to keep the commandments not because of a fear of sin but because of a love of God.  

I've always thought as enduring to the end as this idea of, I've made it to a clean state after baptism or repentance, and now I have to hold firm and let the adversary beat down on me with everything it has.  Enduring is hard and annoying, and it's something that I have to make happen.  But I was reading in Alma the other week about how the gospel of Christ is easy, including endurance.  The purpose of the Gospel is to bring joy to our lives, whether it be through repentance or service or eternal families.  and so when the scriptures say we need to endure, it doesn't mean to hold still and see how many hits you can take.  It means that we are supposed to continue to press forward with a joy in Christ, knowing that if we will let him, he will fight our battles, and he will take our hits for us.  And so I've renamed that last part of the doctrine for Christ continue in joy.

We asked - 

Are there still times that you're really angry?  Are you happy?

Elder Gooden Said -

I have a few moments of anger with some of the more immature members of my district, but I've been trying to see them more as God sees them and it's been helping.  Yes, I'm happy