Final Sunday Meetings

We had a departure devotional tonight. Members of the MTC Pres spoke to us. One of the counselors talked about 10 character traits of a good missionary. Basically forget yourself and think of others, keep the rules, work hard, avoid discouragement and love the people. He said many of you will be referred to as "greenies" when you get to the mission field. He told them "don't worry about that. Green things grow and ripe things rot. So be glad you're green."
One of the counselor's wives spoke about when her husband was a Mission Pres. One night they sat down for a farewell dinner with several missionaries. Her husband asked the missionaries to share a spiritual experience. The first Elder he asked said he couldn't think of any. She was very surprised. So her husband said " well you think about it and we'll come back to you" As the other missionaries were sharing their experiences, she could hear this Elder saying " Oh that happened to me." So she said to him - "see you have had spiritual experiences" He said " I guess you're right. I guess I wasn't paying attention." So she told the missionaries to "Pay Attention". Be aware of when the Spirit is speaking to you.

Our final fireside tonight, the speaker was Stephan Allen from the Missionary Dept. He began by allowing people to stand who met certain criteria. Who is going to a foreign mission, please stand. Who has had parents serve a mission, please stand. Who has a sibling in the MTC right now, please stand. Who has a sibling on a mission right now, please stand. Who has had a "Dear John or Dear Jane" written to them since being here, please stand. He was alot of fun and everyone enjoyed him. He then talked about being in an airplane with alot of turbulence. He said as a missionary, you are going to have turbulence, so you need to know how to deal with it.
Consistent obedience will help you avoid turbulence. But you will still have it. Just know that when you do, God is helping you to grow, unless it is the result from you doing something wrong.

He told us when things get hard, trust in the Lord. Proverbs 3:5-6. You can't have success if you don't trust in the Lord. Your progress will be accelerated if you allow the Lord to lead you.
One cool thing he said, if you aren't sure you have a testimony, teach yourself what you will teach your investigators. Moroni 10:4-5.
He was such a good speaker. He then had all of us sing "Jesus Savior Pilot Me" God will guide you thru the hard times, if you allow Him to help you.

They really know what they're doing here. They help missionaries in every way possible to be prepared for their mission. But the missionary does need to do his or her part for it to be effective. Just a few more days and we are off to Hungary. We are getting very excited.

Sunday Meetings

Today for Sacrament Meeting we met with the International Branch. This is the Branch where people from foreign countries meet as they are learning English. It was great to meet with them. The Branch Pres was just diagnosed with Leukemia, so he was released. They asked all of us to fast for him. His counselor who was just sustained as the new Branch Pres said they had all been assigned a topic "Feast on the Word". Then he called two of them out of the congregation to give their talks. The sister was from South America and the Elder was from France. They did a great job. I was so impressed with how well they both spoke English. It was a great meeting.
Then the Sisters went to RS. The speaker was Ann Dibb, Pres Monson's daughter. She was a wonderful speaker. She told us when we trust in the Lord we can accomplish so much. She also talked about the newest YW value -Virtue. She said we will find this value is not taught in many countries. She quoted from Jane Eyre. She was a virtuous woman even though she's a fictional character. When tempted to do wrong she said "No, here I plant my foot." She told us the protection against sin is an unshakeable testimony.
Then she allowed questions from the missionaries and she told us some fun stories about her father. At the end she said " I know my father is a prophet of God. He has told us, he has walked where Jesus walked. He has been to Jerusalem and Gethsemane. But he would rather walk today where Jesus would walk if He were here." She said she knows her father tries constantly to do this and help others in any way he can. It was a very inspiring thought. We as missionaries need to remember to do that.

P-Day

After the temple we went to Deen's house to do some laundry. We also did a little shopping to get a few things we needed-- emphasis on "few" because we don't want to overload our luggage. It was snowing so I thought it would be fun to take a picture in the snow. Deen and Cheryl thought I was crazy, but they forget I'm from California and don't get to see much snow. It was a nice day. We were able to get caught up on a few things and relax a little.

P-Day

Yesterday was our P-day. I had never been to the Mt Timpanogos Temple so we decided to go there instead of the Provo Temple. We actually saw another couple from our group there as well. We had such a nice time. It's probably the last time we will get to go for the next 18 months. There aren't any temples in our mission in Hungary. We were glad we were able to go. Deen served in this temple so she showed me around a little. We needed to rent clothes but since we were serving a full-time mission, we didn't have to pay. We were also able to meet the temple matron. She was thrilled we were serving a mission.

Me and Mathews Elder

As many of you know a former seminary student of mine, Jake Mathews, is going to the same mission. He has been in the MTC for almost two months but he doesn't leave for Hungary until March 14th. Deen and I are leaving on March 4th. I hardly ever see him. So one night I saw him as he was coming in for dinner and I was leaving for a language class. I wanted to get a picture of him so I hurried and took one. I was late to class, but I really wanted to have this picture. It's going to be fun serving in the same mission as him. He's a very nice young man.

Russian Missionaries

We have several senior missionaries who will be serving in Russia. It's the only country in our group with duplicates. Of course it is a very large country. The first couple Elder and Sister Burnham (man with red tie) are going to serve in Vladivostok. It's on the far eastern border of Russia near Japan. They live in Gilbert. Their son and daughter live in Megan's ward. Small world - I just found that out today. The couple in the middle Elder and Sister Huffaker are going to serve in Novosibirsk. They were in our District. The last couple Elder and Sister Williams - will be serving in Samara. It's pretty exciting to see how many couples they are sending to Russia. Some of them have heard from their Mission Presidents who have told them it's 50 below in their area. You want to talk about being cold. YIKES - yet all of them are so excited about their call and working so hard to learn the language. It's amazing.

Name tag

Here's my name tag in Hungarian. They say the last name first. Brother Ruggles says the Hungarian name for Smith is Kovacs. I don't know why they didn't put that on my name tag. He says they don't pronounce "th" so Smith would be a hard name for them. It's fun having our name tags in Hungarian. Sorry it's so blurry. It was really hard to get a good picture of it.