Week 4

HOLA MI FAMILIA (clearly I'm really original at subjects for emails.. and first liners on emails)

I'm sitting here and I don't even know what to say! 

THINGS THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK:

-So yesterday, Wednesday, was officially my one month mark in the MTC. What in the world right?! So crazy.

-Also yesterday we got a new district in our zone.. so now we are no longer the only district in our zone! I'm way excited. It's fun to have new missionaries! I hope I can help them in some way!

-So every week volunteers come to the MTC (usually they are RM's who are trying to keep up their Spanish or something like that) and we teach them like a member.. so a member lesson. Anyways.. this week we didn't do that, but instead we got SKYPE a girl in Argentina. I was way nervous but it was SO cool. I was actually able to understand MOST of what she said, even though she spoke fast and had a weird accent. We taught her like a 25 minute lesson on enduring to the end. The guy that was supervising our skype sessions said something really cool.. he said "This is the first opportunity you have to serve and uplift the people of the country that you are called to serve in".. Isn't that COOL?! I loved it. It was a highlight of the week for sure. I just CAN NOT wait to get out there! (ONLY 11 DAYS LEFT IN THE MTC! Does that blow your mind? Because it sure blows mine)

-Choir was the bomb this week as usual. LOVE love choir. Brother Eggott (our choir conductor) shared this story with us.. it's not super long.. but SERIOUSLY it helped me understand the Atonement SO WELL. 

-We had our last lesson with one of our investigators that is from Gautemala? (shoot.. I'm terrible at spelling.. Sorry). It was sad to say bye.. BUT HONESTLY YOU GUYS. José changed my life, and he wasn't even a real investigator, but just a member pretending to be, and I've had some of my most spiritual experiences with him at the MTC.. look for the picture. He's the bomb. Love him. 

-I had maybe one of the hardest days on my mission so far this week. Literally discouragement had just taken over my whole body.. But in personal prayer that night I realized that I was CHOOSING to be discouraged with myself and that the Lord was disappointed in me at all. Then next day I woke up and decided to not get discouraged one time that day, and just decided to have a good day.. and it totally worked. I just decided that I was going to be so full of faith, that the Lord wouldn't let me fail. It ended up being one of the best days on my mission. 

President Faust in October 2001 General Conference:

"Some years ago, President Gordon B Hinkley told 'something of a parable' about a one room school house in the mountains of Virginia where the boys were so rough no teacher had been able to handle them. Then one day an inexperienced young teacher applied. He was told that every teacher had received an awful beating, but the teacher accepted the risk. The first day of school the teacher asked the boys to establish their own rules and the penalty for breaking the rules. The class came up with ten rules, which were written on the blackboard. Then the teacher asked, 'What shall we do with one who breaks the rules?' 'Beat him across the back ten times without his coat on' came the response. A day or so later.. the lunch of a big student, named Tom, was stolen. The thief was located-a hungry little fellow, about 10 years old. As little Jim came up to take his licking, he pleaded to keep his coat on. 'Take your coat off,' the teacher said. 'You helped make the rules.' The boy took off the coat. He had no shirt and revealed a bony little crippled body. As the teacher hesitated with the rod, Big Tom jumped to his feet and volunteered to take the boys licking. 'Very well, there is a certain law that one can become a substitute for another. Are you all agreed?' the teacher asked. After five strokes across Tom's back, the rod broke. The class was sobbing. Little Jim reached up and caught Tom with both arms around his neck. 'Tom, I'm sorry that I stole your lunch, but I was awful hungry. Tom, I will love you till the day I die for taking my licking for me! Yes I will love you forever!"

Holy right? That story hit me hard. I loved it. Each time I read it I learn something more about the Atonement and our role and Christ's role. I love it. I was so humbled when I heard it. 

WHAT I LEARNED THIS WEEK: (I'm learning more every week)

-I learned that there is no word for "awkward" in Spanish and I'm pretty sad about it. You can say "weird" or "uncomfortable".. but there is not word for in between those.. so dangit. Shoot.

-Spanish is coming.. Every day. I'm just so excited to get out to the field.

-I learned that I can still be courageous and bold yet humble. That was one of my goals this week. I wan'ted to be courageous when I was teaching and inviting, yet humble. Courageous in the way that I know what I'm saying and testifying of the SO TRUE, but humble in the way that my message can't reach their hearts without his Spirit, and I can't speak Spanish without him, but if I rely on Him than my message can touch them even my Spanish is muy malo... yikes. Does that make sense? So yeah.. working on that this week.

-I learned about Satan this week.. and that his attempts to bring us down are REAL. Gah.. it was a good realization for me this week. It helped me to recognize him, and then push Him away. Discouragement and fear are definitely of him, and not of God. So whenever I got discouraged this week I would immediately pray to not be, and to have the The Lord's spirit to be with me.. and I learned that if I was sincere about it.. THEN IT WORKED. Guys.. it was awesome. Those feelings would leave my heart and head. It was great. 

-I learned that sometimes it's easier to feel bad for ourselves, and get engulfed and swallowed up in ugly feelings.. and that is the work of the Adversary!! He WANTS us to feel like that. Yeah.. it was seriously just great revelation for me to recognize him and his efforts on me. 

-Last Sunday, we had a PHENOMENAL devo by Elder Stephen B Allen.. it was seriously incredible. Honestly it was exactly what I needed to hear. I love how the Spirit works like that. Some quotes that I wrote down quickly from him.. direct quote "My sacrifice is not going unnoticed in the heavens.. and there are angels taking specific notes on my sacrifices". Woah.. hit me like a ton of bricks. Super cool. 

The Lord is SO AWARE OF US. He truly is. 

LOVE YOU ALL. Hope your week is great! 

xoxoxoxoxo

Hermana Ehlert

One of our teachers made us signs that say "no hablo Inglés y entiendo Inglés. Lo siento"... translation: "I don't speak or understand English.. sorry" yikes. If only that were true. Also.. those are the desks that we sit in for 9 hours a day. Joy.

Hermana Jackman and I matching and wearing Christmas colors on total accident.

Herman Jackman and me with Jose

WEEK 3

HOLA MI FAMILIA!

Goodness is it already Thursday?! I can't even believe it! Another great day in the kingdom! So crazy.. The days at the MTC are LONG, but the weeks fly. This week I hit my halfway mark at the MTC so that is crazy... 

Right now, it seems like all my mission is, is being at the MTC. It blows my mind that I will actually be leaving to another country in 17 days to teach people I don't know, in a language that I struggle in. Isn't that crazy? I can't comprehend it fully.. but wow, am I ever excited. 

THINGS AND HAPPENINGS OF THE WEEK :)

-We were sitting at Sunday night devotional, and we were talking to everyone around us. I love talking to other missionary's and finding out their story, and where they are from, and where they are going and stuff.. and one of the Elder's behind me asked if I was part Latina or if I had Latina blood in me.. I literally was so shocked and then I could not stop laughing. I'm pretty sure I'm the whitest girl at the MTC. Me and my companion joked about it the rest of the week. So super funny. Also I noticed this week.. I don't have a single tan line on my entire body... so that's great.. hahaha

-This week was another one of MANY huge ups and huge downs, but honestly you guys, I've never been closer to my Savior, and felt him more in my entire life!! So.. anyways. I've been looking for tender mercies everyday, and here are two that I can think of right now. One day we were able to go outside and sit on one of the benches and plan, and it was just SO warm.. and the sun was right on us, and it was just the best. I felt so blessed in that moment. The next tender mercy was at choir this week, because I'm so dang short, they moved some of us midgets closer to the front so we could see the director, and I was sitting next to a girl from Ecuador!! The same place where I went! It was awesome to talk to her. She spoke a tiny bit of English, but she mostly spoke to me in Spanish.. and you GUYS.. I understood probably 80% of what she was saying.. and she was speaking FAST. So that was awesome too.

-Family.. THANK YOU FOR THE PACKAGE!! I read every single one of the cards from all of you, and I appreciate it so much! I just sat there on my floor grinning so hard. It was the best. I'll send a picture of it! Packages MAKE missionary's day. I kid you not. 

-Something missionaries do in the MTC, is we do service two times a week. On Saturdays our district is in charge of going to the Senior couple rooms, and cleaning the rooms that were moved out of the week previous. We're basically maids, but it's really fun. I've definitely developed a new talent of changing bed sheets really quickly, efficiently, and making it look good. So that's sweet. The other service we do is sweep and mop the stairs in our residence halls. I'll send pictures of us doing that this week. It's great, and we just go over Spanish the entire time.

-I SAW ADDY THIS WEEK AND IT WAS THE BEST. Of course, burst into tears, but they were happy tears!! It was great to see her. I don't have a picture, but if I see her again, hopefully have my camera. 

WHAT I'VE LEARNED THIS WEEK :)

ahhh.. where to begin. I'm sorry if I repeat things from last week, but it's hard to remember what I've already talked about.

-This week we were talking about growing and our capacity becoming larger, and my AWESOME zone leader said something that I really liked. He said: "There is little growth in your comfort zone, and little comfort in your growth zone.." I've heard that before but I never really understood what it meant. But I think that I do now.. being a missionary.. at least for me is an uncomfortable thing. In the MTC, we do a lot of role-playing, and it can be weird to be role playing at first, but if you take it seriously, you can honestly learn a lot. So the elders were pretending to be random people on the street, and we had to go and start a conversation with them and start talking to them, and I was actually really scared to do it! I don't know why, but it was hard for me! So getting out of my comfort zone, and being bold, and extending invitations, is definitely a struggle for me, but while I prayed for the strength to do those things, and fulfill my purpose as a missionary, Heavenly Father blessed me. Sometimes in role plays I don't even know what to say, but when I show the Lord my willingness to open my mouth and at least try to step out of my comfort zone, he blesses me! It's awesome. Does that make any sense? I hope so.

-Another thing I learned.. the Lord's timing is perfect you guys. Holy cow. The testimony of that grows more every day here too. This is the right place for me to be. I honestly believe that part of the reason that my teachers got a job teaching at the MTC is because they needed to teach me. They are SO awesome. Hermana Tuft.. gah  you guys. I wish you all could meet her. She is THE BEST. I'll try and take a picture with her this week. She has helped me in so many ways. This week..she taught our district about the theory of circles. It's super super hard to explain in words over an email, but maybe google it if you get a chance? We can't get on google here so I don't know what will come up, but if you haven't heard it.. it's really cool. Basically, life is full of ups and downs and God gives us them to learn and grow. When we over come an obstacle we are "on top of the world!" but then all the sudden we have another hard thing in our path, and we feel low again. But we forget to look back and see all of the circles, or the hard things that we have accomplished. I don't know if that makes sense.. but yeah. I hope you are able to find that somewhere on google the way she explained it. It rocked. 

-I learned just because that I have been set apart and am in the MTC on my mission, doesn't mean that I will be a perfect right now.. and that's hard for me, but I'm slowly learning. poco a poco. 

-Our devotional on Tuesday was literally SO awesome. I was praying that whole day that I would be able to feel the spirit and learn something from it that night, and I did! It was great. Elder Don R. Clarke spoke.. he's in the first quorom of the 70? Or something like that.. but anyways. Instead of standing at the podium and talking the entire time, he had a tie clip mic and walked around and talked with people in the audience. It was so engaging. He talked about 10 things he thinks that every missionary should know before they go on a mission. A few things that I loved from his talk: 1) If my sister or brother or dad were inactive or not a member, and I was the missionary assigned to teach them, how hard would I work and pray and teach them? He made the point that I should look at every person like someone's brother or sister or father and work as hard as if they were my own. I hope that makes sense. It's hard to put things into writing. 2) "Revelation comes on the move, and I need to be a missionary of action. Faith without works is dead. 3) I need to KNOW the realness of my calling. I didn't know this before, but in Preach My Gospel, there is an entire chapter dedicated to my call as a missionary.. and I literally represent the Savior. I need to continually be thinking, how would  Christ deal with this situation, or what would he do in this situation right now? That's what I do as a missionary. I was thinking.. when Christ was on the Earth, he healed people.. and that's exactly what I can do.. I CAN HEAL. I have the right, authority, and ability to HEAL people through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I think that is an awesome thought. I'm smiling as I'm typing that. How cool. How lucky am I?

I hope you all have the BEST week.

HAPPY 16TH BIRTHDAY TO MY GIRL ANNACLAIRE. I HOPE YOU HAD THE BEST DAY YESTERDAY. I'm so sad that I wasn't there to celebrate, but don't worry, I ate an ice cream sandwich to celebrate. I love you so much AC. Thanks for being such an incredible example to me! 

love from the MTC, 

xoxoxox 

Hermana Ehlert

Picture numero uno.. you know you're a Spanish missionary when this was the funniest thing that I saw all day. 

Picture numero dos.. SO EXCITED TO SEE MY GIRL HERMANA DAYES. I was SO pumped. She is in a different district than me but we live on the same floor. SO happy to see a face from home. She rocks.

picture numero tres.. it was PIE day.. and we were also wearing all the primary colors. Shoutout to DI dresses. ;)

picture numero cuatro.. opening my package and it made me SO happy! Thank you for the LOVE mi familia! 

picture numero uno.. We love SERVICE 

picture numero dos.. Hermana Jackman is having a niece and she found out this week! Her family sent pink mustaches! I love mine! It reminded me of Grandpa Bruce's!!!!