Well! It has definitely been an eventful week but it has been really good! We started off the morning with the temple which is always good. We did more of Dad's family names. I even had the Elders do some today and I am hoping that after next week all of them will be completed and then I can send them home. To answer a question, yes we do get a full p-day next Friday.
Last Saturday we started off the morning with service. I wasn't a hero and didn't fix anything this week but service was good. Saturday night we had class with Sister Jolley and for our demonstrating teaching lesson she had 2 of us be missionaries and one person be an investigator but at any point she would pause it and have us all switch places so we never knew if or when we would be called to do something. And it was in Croatian so we had to pay really close attention so that we knew what was going on and being said. I got to be the investigator for the last half of it. I started out with two of the missionaries teaching me. They started out doing really well and I was understanding what they were saying but after awhile they weren't making sense and left me completely confused. Sister Jolley than paused it and two other missionaries began teaching. They were able to really focus on me as an investigator and what I needed and why what they were teaching was important for me to understand. It was a first lesson so they were talking about the Book of Mormon. At the end of the lesson one of the missionaries was bearing their testimony and said If you read the Book of Mormon I promise you that your life will be better. I don't know why but this statement hit me really hard and I liked it. It's so simple and so powerful and so true. While being here at the MTC I have been reading the Book of Mormon faster than I ever have in my life and I am getting so much more out of it than I ever have before. And I love it! I have definitely seen my life change because of the Book of Mormon and I know that if I can get my investigators to read the Book of Mormon their life will be better.
Sunday was a great day too. We had relief society and the guest speaker was Janice Kapp Perry. It's hard to explain why her talk was so good but it just was. She wrote an arrangement of some of the Primary songs that we sang with her and it was so cool. She talked about how if we weren't serving a mission missionary work would still go on without us but what we are going to get out of our mission and the person it will help us become could happen no other way. At the end she had us sing a song that she wrote. It was As Sisters in Zion but she changed it to The Sisters of Zion and changed the words to apply to us as missionaries. It was a very powerful song when all of the Sisters sang it. She said we were the first ones ever to sing it but it would be released soon so if you can find that within the next few months I encourage you to because it was really cool. Anyways my favorite line in it was The Angels of Heaven are Walking Beside us. With it being the crap month of May I have definitely felt this as I have been here. I know without a doubt that I have angels walking beside me every step of the way encouraging me when I do something good and picking me up when I am struggling. When we were sitting in relief society I saw a branch presidency members wife that looked super familiar but I couldn't figure out who she was. And then I saw her name tag and it said Sister Robison. It was Jordan's mission presidents wife. I talked to her for a few minutes and she said to tell Jordan hi.
For our Sunday District meeting one of the MTC District Presidents was in our district. We were all super terrified to have him there but it went really well. Afterwards he told us how impressed he was with what we had talked about and that we would all be just fine when we got out in the field. It was good to hear from someone who is high up here at the MTC. The MTC devotional was someone from the Missionary Department pre-field training. His name was Shane Littlefield. He talked about how our attitude makes all the difference and it is our responsibility to set a good culture in our mission and determine what our mission will be.
Monday night we had a lesson with our investigator Edo. It was our first lesson with him and it went so well. I know without a doubt that the entire lesson was directed by the Spirit because of how strongly I could feel it. When I left that lesson I was on such a spiritual high for the rest of the night. We had an equal balance of talking between me, my companion, and him and we were able to ask him questions, get to know his background, and apply what we were talking about to him.
Tuesday night we decided we were going to go to choir even though we hadn't gone on Sunday. So we went to the practice before hand and it was super crowded. There were several people that had been there on Sunday that couldn't find seats so after a few minutes I started feeling really bad and could tell Sister Peel was feeling the same way. So I turned to her and said let's go. So we left and gave our seats to some of the other Sisters while the other Sisters in our district stayed. So it was just me and Sister Peel for devotional. We went straight and got in line for devotional so we were at the very front of the line. So when we got into the devotional room we booked it to the front of the room. We ended up being in the very center on the sixth row so we had awesome seats. And the speaker was Elder Nelson! It was so cool and we got so excited when we saw him walk in and realized how close we were to him. He talked about our purpose as a missionary and about family history work and how the ancestors of those we are teaching are cheering us on and helping us to help their family members recieve the gospel. At the end of the talk he told us that every day the First Presidency and Quorum of the twelve pray for us for our health, safety and success, which was really cool to hear from him. Before Elder Nelson spoke they had a special musical number which was an opera singer. I thought of Tyson and how much he would have loved it the whole time. HAHA!
Wednesday night Brother Jacobsen taught us alone for the first time. He is super smart and went through our entire grammar textbook that is written in alien language and made us an index of the important stuff that we will need and how we can use it. He also gave us a huge stack of very useful papers explaining the differences between Croatian and Serbian and when we should use certain words and which case they take, etc. They are super helpful! The language is still coming but it is still hard and confusing and I am still struggling to apply the grammar principles. I understand them all but speaking them is a completely different story. I am really good at spitting out words but sometimes I have a hard time making sense of my sentences.
Thursday before lunch I decided I was going to do SYL and I wasn't going to speak a single word of English. Not even to explain to people what I was trying to say. Even if they didn't know Croatian. It was really hard especially since I was the only one doing it. And half of the time even my district had a hard time figuring out what I was trying to say because they didn't know what the words meant. But I made it all the way from lunch to dinner without speaking a single word of English. I will explain why it stopped at dinner in a few minutes. I was pretty proud of myself. We are all supposed to be SYLing every day until we leave but some days we do better than others.
We had been told that we would be getting our travel plans on Friday, so today. Last night after dinner we all followed the Elders to the mailbox as we usually do. In the mailroom we wait back while only the district leader goes up to the mailbox. We told Elder Stuart that when our travel plans were there he needed to give us some sort of a sign so that we would know. So we were all standing back waiting and talking and all of the sudden we heard Elder Stuart sing la at the top of his lungs. We all started cracking up and jumping up and down with excitment. We were laughing because Elder Stuart absolutely hates singing so when he sang it was really funny. And as much as I love getting letters from you all I would dare say that this is the best thing I have recieved from the mailbox so far. We were seriously jumping up and down and screaming with excitement. So anyway we leave here on May 27 which is Monday. We leave the MTC at 7:30 and our flight leaves at 11, we fly to Seattle then to Paris and then to Croatia. I'm not really sure why we go to Seattle because everyone else in our zone that is going to Europe is flying to Chicago but that's what we are doing. I am assigned to be the Travel leader. I'm not really sure what that means but I'm sure they will tell me. It was funny because when we read that everyone in our district was like, they chose the right person because you are the most organized and on top of things out of all of us. So that's our excitement for the week. And that is why I stopped talking in Croatian for the day because I got so distracted that I forgot about it.
Now for some funny stories. We joke all the time when someone says something or does something that we are going to shun them. So we were sitting in the cafeteria and Elder Fausnaught told us he could shun any of us for 5 minutes. So we told him to shun all of us. So we of course were trying to get him to acknowledge us. We were having peas for dinner and he took a bite of them. So I said how does that taste, does it feel like you are popping a bunch of zits in your mouth (thanks for that one Carrie!). He started busting up laughing. Actually everyone did. It was great!
The other day Elder Stuart put on a one man show of Napoleon Dynamite for us. He can seriously quote the entire movie and can even do the voices of each person. It was hilarious. The best part was when he put on Sister Rankin's glasses and sung the song at the end that Kip sings. It sounded just like Kip and I was cracking up. We can tell that we have all been together too long because of how comfortable we are with each other. Some of the things we talk about are really funny. The other day the Elders came back from the bathroom and one of them told us about their experience in the bathroom. And the worst part is none of us were phased by it and acted like it was a normal thing to talk about.
On Monday of last week we were talking about Church and how we can receive revelation through church. Brother Hansen told us of a thing he used to have his investigators do. He would have them write down a question and keep it in their pocket all week and then take it with them to church and be thinking of it all week and that at church they would recieve an answer to their question. He encouraged us to do it. So I did. I wrote down a question and kept it in my mind and my pocket and at church I did recieve an answer. I would encourage you all to try it. Think of a question or a concern that you have and take it to church with you. And I promise you that in some way whether it be through something that is said, something that you feel, or through the music you will recieve an answer if you are truly seeking for it. This week has been great! I love the MTC and it is scary to think that we are leaving soon! But it is exciting! I love you all! I love this gospel! The church is true!
Love
Sestra Clark
Shoutouts!
Happy Birthday to Grandpa this week!
Letters from Dad, Mom, Lex, Carrie and Jordan
Instead of a messy desk, she now has a messy corner
Cute hairdos!
Sister Clark & Sister Rankin-funny face photo
Travel plans came in the mail
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