Siam I Am: Sifting Sand to find Gold Flakes.

October 2, 2013

1.5 weeks left! holy cow were did the time go?

i remember thinking that october would never come. (first august 14... now october 14...) i remember the wives of our branch presidency saying that it would just fly by. and me thinking - this was the LONGEST 3 days of my life!!! there is no way!!! and yet. here it is.

i think one of the cantonese elders said it best. "before i came to the mtc, i expected to leave with this amazing testimony, a ton of doctrinal knowledge, and to speak the language fluently. now we are about ready to leave... i don't have a perfect understanding, my testimony still has a lot of room to grow, and i have to explain it all in a language that i don't even know." amen elder.

so i think pretty much the whole world knows what i did this week. i sang in the conference center! (must be read using a sing-song voice). talk about amazing. i got the best seat ever. right below the biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiig pipes! my feet kept vibrating when she'd play the big huge chords. i was pretty close to heaven right then. i kept praying that they'd show me on the screen for just one second. enough for you all to know i was "ok". but he was good enough to bless me with a few more.

i can't even explain to you how much stress there was in preparing for it. a mulititude of make-up checks, dress checks pretty much every single day before we sang. they told us they wanted 'jeweled-toned-collared-shirts'. ummmmm. i'm going to thailand? what part of that means that i have a jewel toned collared long sleeved blouse in my suitcase? yeah. that's what i thought. but we were blessed by the old navy fairy. i knew they still had some good! i had more blush on my face then i knew what to do with... it felt like she took a drill with a blush brush attached to the end of it right to my face. and then trying to make my face as long as possible all week long so that my vowels would be nice and loooooooooooooong. just in case you didn't see the sheer concentration on my face. and then they tell us to have happy eyes. i think my brain is going to explode! ;)

but by the goodness of heavenly father, he waited until the day after. i woke up the next morning with some sinus something. i didn't know a person could make that much mucous in such a short amount of time. i have a personal kleenex box on my desk.

i think i have a few more favorite songs now. but it was quite an amazing experience. we didn't get to hear as much of the talks... as strange as it sounds, the conference center is built for the audience. not the singers. by the time the talks echoed back to us, there were about 4 different talks all going on at the same time. so it's a good thing they re-broadcast it to us this saturday. so we get to go watch it when the elders go to priesthood.

on sunday we had mission conference. they usually do a devotional for the sisters instead of relief society (which is always amazing) but mission conference is equally as fantastic. this week, i have so many notes my hand was rebelling and refusing to hold a pen anymore. the computer is defnitely a nice change.

president brady talked about "something that will help you learn faster, grow closer to the spirit, and change your life in ways you never imagined..." sounds pretty awesome huh? he talked about having a nightly devotional between you and the lord. a time when you can give an accounting to the lord for how you have used the time that he has given you over the course of the day. something i really liked was something he heard from a missionary "you won't have a wasted life/mission is everything EVERYDAY is right between you and the lord." he talked about it being our personal appointment with the lord. (we wouldn't be late to one of those right?) and that the answers we are seeking will come gradually as we continually approach him and live our lives more and more in harmony with his will.

sister roach is one of the mtc president's wives. i really liked one thing she said. "we wait, watch and WORK for promised blessings to be fulfilled."

president roach was talking about eternal perspective. we need to stand back and look at the big picture. this helps us realize and confirm our place in the lord's plan. to keep an eternal perspective, we need to 1. know who you are 2. know your purpose and 3. strive to be diligent and obedient. he talked about what his mom said when he was on his mission - "when you are discouraged, work. when you are homesick, work. when you are sad, work. when you are happy, work." and "you only need to decide once to be obedient." he also told a story about someone giving you a handful of sand and promising that there is gold in it. what do you do? do you just throw it away? or do you sit there and sift through it, slowly turning that sand over and over again... until you finally see the flecks of gold that were there all along? :)

sister nally is my favorite. she gave a list of things for us (missionaries) to do in order to receive power from the lord. but i think it goes for anyone. 1. set goals. 2. be obedient. 3. be selfless. 4. be diligent. she told a story about tad r callister wrestling his children when they were younger. he would pin them to the ground and ask them if they gave up. if they would say yes, he would say "no! you never give up!" eventually they started to get it. "do you give up??" "no dad! we NEVER give up!" sister nally then said that you can see it in the eyes and faces of good missionaries. HANG IN THERE.

president nally got up and spoke last. i don't quite get how all of these old people can still be all googly-eyed... he told the story about samuel smith, the very first missionary. in describing effecitve missionaries, he said the lord uses dedication and effort. that they are unafraid and bold. that discomfort never interferes with their labors. and that they have an unshakeable testimony of joseph smith.

i'm almost done with the book of mormon! i managed to read alma in 4 days... and most of 3 nephi in one. the speaker from yesterday talked about reading the book of mormon like a book. instead of reading simply verse by verse. but i can definitely feel the power of the book of mormon as i have been trying to understand the stories behind it. i don't know who said this, but "there is power in the book of mormon that will begin to flow into our lives the moment we begin a sincere study of it."

other random (but good) quotes of the week:

miracles come from diligency, not ability

life is good. but it is SWEET because of the gospel.

sometimes the only way out of a problem is THROUGH it.

we are rewriting the course of history.

this sacrifice is hard for me... but it will mean the world to someone else.

tonight you will hear english as it was meant to be spoken. (our speaker last night had an english accent. so awesome.) he basically told us how awesome our church is. i agree. and i am proud to be part of an amazing church that only does what the savior would do. he talked about after the earthquake in japan, missionaries going out to help clean shinto shrines. and after the tsunamis in india, helping rebuild some islamic villages... they asked us if we could help them find some more scriptures, because theirs had all been destroyed. so we bough 700 korans. it really made me aware of how i need to be as a missionary. this is god's work. i may be his missionary, but those are his children. and i need to be respectful of all of their beliefs as i go out and teach.

random story. we have a plethora of bananas in our room. do i know how they got there... not really. and i don't know if i really want to. but i overheard a few of the elders debating the best method of hanging bananas. when i asked why (dangerous question) they replied that they were going to hang them from a tree. and see how long it took for someone to take them down.....

i have also seen an elder jeffords and sharp here. i think they recognized me before i recognized them. (maybe because my clone is running around in rexburg)

i also met a sister jamieson from nampa. small small small world!

and a pre-happy birthday to my little brian-man! :) happy number 12!!! love your guts!

i love you all!

the work is working!!!

sister ellis

Life at the MTC: