Letter from Seth July 13, 2009

Another week has already passed. Time is passing faster as I get used to the schedule. This week our Tuesday devotional was by Angel Abrea, who is an emeritus member of the first quorum of the seventy. He pretty much just taught from the scriptures about the companionship of the Holy Ghost. It was very intellectually inspiring from the scriptures. I learned a lot. Our sunday night devotional was given by a member of the MTC presidency and his family. He has 7 sons and 2 daughters and all of them served missions. So, they all shared one tip for us and the grandkids sang some songs and there were other musical numbers. It was a very fun message about missionary work. One of the things that stuck with me was that we should remember who we are on our missions- a phrase that we often hear in our lives. But not only that he added that we should remember who we are so that we can tell others who they are. To find those who are searching for purpose and direction and the assurance that they're children of our Heavenly Father. Dad asked about gas- everyone here has gas. I think it's more the inactivity and sitting around then the food though. A district from our zone left partially yesterday and some more are leaving tonight. So, I'm losing my two roomates. One of them left for Nicaragua last night and the other is leaving for Panama tonight. I'll miss them, it was good having older roomates who could ease the MTC transition because they knew the ins and outs. They say the two nights you don't sleep here are the first night and the last and my roomate definetely didn't sleep last night. At one point he actually was writing in his journal in his little closet so he wouldn't keep us up with the light on. It's sad to see the district say bye to each other. They've spent 9 weeks together as brothers and they've shed a lot of tears. One cool thing about them leaving though is they leave behind lots of free stuff that won't fit into their bags. So, I got a brand new pair of black shoes from a guy who had four pairs and some face wash, and some granola bars. I don't think that leaving the MTC will be as hard for me, I'll miss the guys in my district who are going to Baltimore, but I'll be seeing the other 5 a lot in Canda I assume. Two guys from my district leave today for the Guatemala MTC, so there has been 12 of us. 6 calgary, 3 baltimore, 1 boston, and two guatemala. The ones leaving for guatemala are very nice but if this was survivor and i was forced to vote two out of our district it would be them, so it works out well. I got nathan's package last monday i believe. thank you for the laundry bags and gummy bears. I don't think that there's anything else that I need right now. We go to the referal center once a week in class and then can go in our free time as well. There we can chat online with investigators or make phone calls for follow-ups to see if people recieved free DVDs or bibles or BOM's from the commercials and from online. The real reason for calling though is they want us to discuss the content with the people and bare testimony and try to teach them a lesson. This is kind of scary but also really exciting. At the RC, we get to practice why we're here. It's pretty neat to be able to talk with real people. Most people aren't too receptive, but every once in a while someone in the district will find someone truly searching and will have an amazing discussion and we'll be around kind of cheering them on. It's exciting because you get the nature of your calling. Some missionaries even find investigators who they teach all the lessons to strictly online because for various reasons they can't see the missionaries personally. Every once in a while you'll call someone with a song as their ringtone on their cell phone which is weird after not hearing worldly music. Here hymns get stuck in your head instead of the radio.It's about time for another apostle to come for a devotional, they said that about every 3 or 4 weeks one will come. So that should be pretty neat. Pretty much all the teachers here show a video called The Miracle of Missionary work by elder holland. It was an MTC address given in 2000 i believe. It's probably one of the most powerful talks I've heard and if you can find it online i encourage you to watch it. You'll know why once you watch it. It's very passionate and can apply to all our lives.Everything is going well, we should get a new district in our zone this week and two new roomates. I'm mailing my SD card with pictures and video either tonight or tomorrow, I plan on getting some short video clips later today. Con Amor Elder Dunlap