1st Week in the MTC

I kid you not this is the most amazing, but hardest thing I've ever done. And I'm not even in Mexico yet! I got dropped off a week ago exactly and its felt like so long ago its just a blur. Literally like it was part of my distant childhood. Our teacher is Hermano Brown and hes such a cool guy. All he does is speak Spanish to us all day every day. At first I hated it but after a while I realized how much it is helping us to learn!

I'm not kidding when I say that only God's help could have us progress this fast. We were giving lessons in Spanish literally two days into the MTC. Don't get me wrong its not like we're speaking flawless Spanish and people were overcome with the Spirit but our memory of our lessons, and what we are taught is Amazing! The Gift of Tongues! So far we've learned how to pray, how to bear testimony, how to say basic phrases, and about 1000000 gospel words. 

So my companion is Elder Adams, he is from Olympia Washington and is going to Torreon as well. He's an alright guy. The other Elders in my district are Elder Locey (from Hawaii), Elder Stephenson (From Las Vegas), Elder Cazeau (From Twin Falls, Idaho), and Elder Page (from Bountiful). They are all going to Augas Callientes Mexico. We're already like brothers, when your with people for every hour of every day you can learn a lot even in a week! The best times are gym times! Basketball gets intense because we've all been cooped up in a classroom for six hours and we only get 50 minutes of exercise - so we make it count!! No ones cried yet.... Gotta work harder!

As far as mail it's honestly a little embarrassing. Since I got here I've gotten three packages and seven letters... everyone else in my district has gotten.... one letter max....Hahahaha even now they're talking about how much they hate me. It's cool. One of the packages has an awesome coat in it that someone sent me but I don't recognize the address. Whoever it was THANK YOU!! The other two were Christmas packages and I'm very grateful for them, as are my companions when 10 pm roles around and they want something to eat. 

The MTC really is an awesome place! Were assigned to West Campus (Where they send all Spanish speaking missionaries), and everyone is super supportive. The crazy part of it is the mock-investigator stuff. Our districts investigator's name is Diego. Although we can say alot more than we thought we could to him in Spanish it sometimes gets really frustrating when we want to say something and don't know how! He never breaks character but luckily he is a pretty easy investigator. I honestly expected to hate the MTC but it's actually a really cool place!

We've had two devotionals so far. The first was the BYU men's chorus who came to sing to us and share spiritual thoughts, and the second was Elder Rasband of the Seventy. He talked to us about spiritual gifts - those we have, those we want to develop, and how they are to be used to benefit God's children. He invited us, so I'll invite you to think about and write down at least one spiritual gift you have and how that can benefit others. As well as devotionals we got to see a talk given by Elder Bednar that is only shown in the MTC that every new district is supposed to watch their first Sunday. He talked about how the mission is NOT ABOUT YOU! Whenever things got tough for Christ He would turn outward, and reach out to help others whereas we as humans are constantly thinking about well what about me? Why is it so hard? Why am I not getting all the blessings. If you came on the mission to find yourself and that is all you focus on you never will, it's only once you do as The Savior did that you will find why you came and how your challenges are for your good.

I've felt so much strength and confidence since I got here. This email really can't cover what the first week in the MTC is really like but let's just say it's only been a positive experience so far for me. On our first night staying in our residence the heat was broken so we were FREEZING! The next morning we told our Zone Leaders and within hours they had it fixed and blazing at 90 for when we came back home. That's just the kind of attitude that is here and it's awesome!

TENGA FE! (Keep the Faith)

Elder Roberts