Two Weeks

Hola Familia y Amigos!

 

Well I´ll be honest, my district and I sort of feel like the big kids on campus. Two weeks under our belts! Haha It has gone by slowly and yet so fast at the same time. I´m still trying to just take everything in. But I have been learning so much! The language is coming pretty well, I stopped myself the other day and realized how much I was actually understanding (our classes are now 100% in Spanish)! I still have so much to learn...anytime I get over confident and try to strike up a conversation with a native here in the CCM, they get so excited and then once they´re through talking at a million miles an hour, I start to wonder if I have really been learning Spanish here. It´s pretty fun, they just laugh cause I say ¨si, si! Hasta luego!¨ Anyways, the people here are so nice, and the campus is beautiful. This week I ate some crazy good jalepeño hot dogs, chicken wings, tilapia, beans...I still like the food if you were wondering. We play basketball just about everyday and a couple times we played some Mexicans...we then understood why they play soccer instead. But then the guys who played basketball for Benemerito High School before it became the CCM showed up, and we got destroyed. Haha fun times!

So turns out, the ¨investigator¨ we were teaching became our Teacher after we finished teaching him the lessons in Spanish. His name is Hermano Rogers, he is the bomb! He brought learning Spanish to a whole new level for me and the district. One of my buds told me it was an answer to his prayers, because he had been especially struggling with learning Spanish from a native teacher (our morning teacher is Hermana Rodriguez) who is awesome but speaks super fast. Since Hermano Rogers became our teacher, the learning has become more fun, easy, and enjoyable. We love Hermana Rodriguez too, she has an amazing spirit.

 

So I got to hear a few different missionary broadcasts this last week. Two were from Elder Holland, and as always, my perspective on missionary work and the gospel shifted greatly. I wish I could just transmit all my notes onto this email, but I know you will all get bored. Pretty much the main point of his talks is summed up in the quote ¨Grab you socks, pull them up to your armpits, and get to work! We have high expectations for missionaries, and we do not apologize for that!¨ Classic Elder Holland. I love it, and it really makes me want to change. He also said, like many others, that we must be our first converts, or else we WILL NOT teach with power and we WILL NOT have success. Pretty strong statement, yet so encouraging. Last night we had Elder Andersen speak from Provo, he spoke about love and sacrifice. I had been praying for an experience that would teach me to be more humble, and this talk pretty much hit the nail on the head. he said ¨we sacrifice for what we love, and we love what we sacrifice for¨. I´m still learning from that, and the challenge to ¨forget yourself and go to work¨.

 

Well I am running short on time, Sorry if all my emails are just full of church stuff. I guess there isn't really much else to report on though. :) I´m loving my time here, I´m loving being a missionary, and I am continually growing stronger and stronger in my love for the Savior. I know that his Gospel has been restored. I know that God has a plan for all of us, and that he will never leave us on our own. He only asks us to come unto Him.

 

I love you all, you are always in my prayers.

 

Sincerely,

Elder Christensen