Elder Nathan Stagg: MTC Week 3

안녕하세요!!!!! How are you all doing?? I am loving it here at the MTC!! I am almost 1 month into it!! The schedule now feels normal to me and its weird to see my friends that came in on the same day as me already leaving!! When I still have 6 weeks left!!! The language is coming along and I have our purpose memorized in Korean and am 1/4 of the way done with the first vision! I can read a page of the Book of Mormon in about 8 minutes now... even though i have no idea what i am reading! It was really cool to notice the other day that when i look up and see a korean letter on the board that instead of having to remember what that stands for i just automatically think of the sound that it makes!

Some highlights of my week!

Thursday

So for the past 2 week we have been teaching an investigator who turned out to be our second teacher. This week our first teacher Sister Goodwin became our second investigator! Our first lesson with her we taught about god and how he loves her and just went over that basics then we asked her if she would prepare to be baptized on oct. 15 and she said asked how she could prepare and we answered her question to the best of our language abilities allow! It was really cool to see how strong the spirit was there even though it wasn't a real investigator!

Friday

So Elder Johnson has been having very bad pains in his stomach so he went to the doctor to get it checked out, and the results came back and they said he needed to leave the MTC and go to the Provo hospital to get more tests, so today he and Elder bunker got to leave this place and go to the doctor! Which happened to be 5 minutes from Elder bunkers house! haha Turns out his gal bladder has something wrong with it and they are gonna do another test sometime this week and then if they need to cut it out they are gonna send him home for a while!

Sunday

Today was fast sunday!! I don't know what it is but as a missionary you are constantly hungry?!? so this fast was harder than usual! but we all made it through and it was one of the most spiritual fasts ive ever had! But most things i do in here are the most spiritual then they ever have been before! Its a spiritual powerhouse in here!! We had a devotional tonight from our MTC Leadership! Sister Snow talked about asking and how it is a commandment! Something that i thought was really cool that she said was "Satan doesn't need to be invited to enter your life, however god, jesus, and the holy ghost respect our agency and wont interfere unless we invite and ask them to! And then Sister Burgeous talked about growing our spiritual roots! And giving them constant nourishment like a tree or else the roots will grow week and it will soon die! Today all the 9 weekers left and i got to go say bye to all of them! they all have been an example to me of where i want to be atin 6 weeks! It was cool to see Elder Green (one of my friends from highschool) ready to leave to korea!

Monday

Mondays are awesome!! We get to wake up and then study for an hour in our dorms then go eat and then workout! So we don't need to start learning korean till like 11!!! They had Chick-fil-a catered for lunch! Now a quick sidestory, I have never seen more greasy food then what the MTC has! Literally everything is just soaked in grease!! So we all look forward to mondays because they cater in food!! But somehow the MTC even managed to make the Chick-fil-a sandwiches super greasy!! The buns were literally soggy in grease! I couldn't even finish one!! so instead i just ate captain crunch for dinner! LOL Tonight we had our second TRC which is where we teach members! Me and Elder Vongsayo decided to teach on family's! We talked about how god loves family's and how they are an essential part of his plan! Then we showed him pictures of our family and bore our testimonies! Usually during our Korean lessons I will feel the spirit in the room helping us speak and helping them understand what we are trying to say! But when I bore my testimony in Korean i felt the spirit so strong in the room! and i didn't mess up once!! It was soooo cool!!

Tuesday

Tuesdays are like fridays in the outside world! You have a full day of schooling but you have the night off and we have a devotional! and the next day is P-day or (saturday in the oustside world) Tuesdays night devotional was really cool! We had D. Todd Christofferson from the quorum of the twelve come and speak to us!! The spirit was so strong in the building! They showed it live to all the other MTC's in the world! Elder Christofferson talked about True repentance! And how when we are out teaching we need to understand how amazing that gift we offer is! we are the only church in the world that can provide that! He said that when we go to the door we need to realize that we bare the kingdom of god in our hands.... Baptism, but without repentance you can't be baptized! Repentance is the foundation of all our ordinances in this church! It was such and awesome talk and changed my outlook on my mission!

Wednesday

Today was P-day and we went to do Sealings at the Provo temple! Ive never done them before and it was such a cool thing to be able to do! I kept thinking about me and my wife kneeling there in who knows how many years and it was really cool! (after 2 years of course!) then we went and did our laundry. On our way back from lunch we saw our mission presidents son, he had just got here and is going to the marshal islands! He told us that he had lived in Busan for the past 2 years and we are going to love it! He talked with us for a while but it was so cool!! I mean what are the chances that we met him??!! Also today we get a fresh new batch of Koreans and we are know the intermediate group! I remember when I first got to the MTC and looking at the 3 weekers and how much they knew i was convinced they were all fluent and i was never going to be like them! well here i am and i know just about as much as they did! so know we get to be the example and teachers!! Its so weird how fast time flies by here!!

There are 2 quotes I want to share with you guys cause they are awesome and are gonna help me change my outlook on my mission!

"Don't just endure to the end rather always strive to improve to the end!" That was from Elder Bunkers, best friends farewell talk!

"you only have 2 years to serve a mission, but you have a life time to think about it" - President Perrington!

I am still loving it here and know I am always going to look fondly back at this time of my life!! I know that this call to serve the people of Busan Korea came directly from my father in heaven! I know that the gift of tongues is real and that if i do my part god will do his! Love you all

Elder Stagg!