Week 5 - Can you hear me Hawaii????

With last week's worldwide broadcast, the MTC has been a bit shuffled. The main instruction/administration building was closed down for a week to accomodate for training all of the new mission presidents. As such, instead of eating our meals in that building, we moved into the gym, incoming missionaries came through other buildings, etc. Basically, this week has shown just how flexible the staff, administrators, and residents of the MTC can be.

Last Sunday, the worldwide broadcast went remarkably well. The broadcast was entertaining, inspiring, and full of lots of exciting news regarding the present and future of missionary work in the church. I learned a great deal from each of the talks/video presentations given. As the choir was warming up, the technical crew was doing a few communication checks, establishing contact with several people around the world. People from Hawaii, Washington DC, and even Peru were contacted. Truly we are living in an age of a worldwide church.

Speaking of the choir, last week I mentioned that I got to be a part of it. For a choir that was over 2000 people strong, it was very well organized and conducted. Watching our performance again, I think that we did great! Especially because the first time that we had met as a full choir was the afternoon before the broadcast.

This week, as we've been teaching our investigators, I've been starting to really be able to speak to our investigators. We've talked about baptism and it's importance and we've asked them to be baptized by someone holding proper authority. It took some persistence, but eventually, they agreed. I've been speaking a great deal more in our lessons, so I can tell that my Korean is really coming along. We'll have to see how well I speak when I get into the field, but for now, I'm really progressing at a language that I couldn't speak a month ago.

 

Speaking of which, today marks one month from the time that I was set apart as a missionary, and tomorrow will be my one-month anniversary of being in the MTC. To think that that much time has gone by is absolutely crazy. In some ways, I feel like I've lived here for years, and in other ways, I feel like I was dropped off only yesterday. The MTC has been an absolutely great experience, and while it's hard, the benefits, blessings, and experiences make everything worth it. I'm looking forward to another 23 months of doing this amazing, awesome work. I'm really looking forward to serving in Australia, which I leave for after another month here at the MTC, and I know that the experiences that I have there will help me to be the best person I can be.

 

Thanks to everyone for your thoughts and prayers, I know that they have helped me here and will in Australia,

      Elder Hayden Clark