KUMUSTA!

Well, it has been another GREAT week here at the MTC!! :) SO much happens each day that reporting on 1 week feels like trying to remember a whole months worth of things! I could honestly write a whole book each week about all that's going on around here! I'll just stick to the main things though! :)

This week has been a lot of teaching lessons in Tagalog. We teach 1 lesson each day to someone acting as an investigator. We also just started TRC. In TRC we meet with 2 members that speak Tagalog and share a lesson with them. That was really fun, because whenever we forget a word they help us out! It's also nice meeting with them because they all served missions in the Philippines and know how to speak Tagalog well, so it gives me hope that I will too!! :):)

One thing I'm proud of is that I have the missionary purpose and baptismal invitation all memorized in Tagalog!! Now I'm working on memorizing the first vision!

I absolutely love Tagalog! I think it sounds so beautiful!!!! I don't know a whole lot yet, but I'm definitely learning so much and the language makes more and more sense each day! :) I can't wait until I know how to speak Tagalog well!! :) Something pretty crazy is that there are more people here at the MTC learning a Filipino language than there are learning Spanish!! I thought that was so crazy!

We have three new districts coming into our branch this upcoming Wednesday! That's at least 30 new missionaries!! :) One of mine and Sister Lor's responsibilities as the Sister Training Leaders of our branch is to, with the Zone Leaders, hold a meeting with the new missionaries the day they come in. I'm not sure what the details of that meeting are going to be, but I'm so excited to meet all of them! I'll find out about what we are supposed to do during that in branch council this Sunday. I'll tell you all how it goes next week! :)

Well, I have to talk about the 4th of July!!! Really, it was like any normal day until that night! They let all the missionaries watch the Stadium of Fire fireworks from one of the MTC buildings facing the stadium. Our branch got assigned the very top floor!! It was so cool seeing all the fireworks across the valley! We actually saw a house catch on fire! It was so sad!! We saw the firetrucks arrive and they put it out quick though!! So that is good!

Usually we have to be in our residence by 9:30 but they changed that to 10:30 so we could watch the fireworks. Watching from the building was cool, but you couldn't hear them! So, my district and I left the building early and went to this large garden balcony on the 2nd floor of one of the buildings and watched the fireworks from there! That was even better, even though we weren't as high up!! We saw some people jump out of a plane and land in the stadium too! It was a fun night! :)

At the MTC you just constantly feel the Spirit. It is amazing! I loved our devotionals this week. One of my favorites was by this man John B Dickson. A little before his mission, he got diagnosed with cancer. It was a tumor on his arm. I can't remember the specific type of cancer, but he said they told him that even if they amputated his whole right arm he would still only have a 1-3% chance at surviving. Even with the odds against him, he lived. He talked about how challenging it was to learn how to do everyday tasks with one arm. He said it was really hard too because he had to learn how to be left handed as well! And he adjusted to all this at the same time as adjusting to missionary life! One big challenge he said he faced was tying his own tie. He didn't give up though, and learned how to do it!!! He can do it really fast too!!!!!! :) He mentioned the quote that "your challenges can either be barriers or stepping stones towards success." I loved that! Everything is about your attitude. His story and message just really made me think how you can accomplish anything if you put your mind to it and put your faith in the Lord, because through him we can do all things!!

A poem was shared this week that really hit me. It talked about a boy that was about to open his mission call the next day, and this was his dream that night before. It was about him in premortal life and he was with a boy he'd never met but was his best friend there. They attended the grand council in heaven and agreed to follow God's plan and come to earth. They received envelopes, like a mission call, telling them some details about their life here on earth. He opened up his. It said that he was going to live during a time where the restored gospel is on the Earth and he would be born into a family who has accepted the gospel. He was so excited! His friend then opened his call. His call said that he would come to earth at a time where the restored Gospel was on the Earth too! However, he would not be born into a family that knew of the restored gospel. His friend's eyes filled with tears and turned to him. His friend said, "please come find me and teach me the gospel." He replied back promising he would.

It just reminded me that I am going to be able to teach and bring this precious restored gospel to people in the Philippines. And if I made promises to others before this life to bring this gospel to them, I can't wait to keep those promises.

I hope everyone has a wonderful week :) 

Mahal Kita!

-Sister Durrant

Pictures!

1. Eating lunch today with most of our district!

2. Watching fireworks from the balcony!

3. Taking a Tagalog speaking assessment