Hump Day!!

We hit MTC hump day last weekend! I have been here for more than half of my time, and in less that 4 weeks, we will be leaving for Finland!!

Not too much going on this week. My district will be hosting the new missionaries today, which means we help them one-on-one to find their residence hall and classroom. It kinda sucks that it's on our P-day because that means we have 3-4 fewer hours to do P-day stuff and relax, and the whole week will be go go go. But, we did get up early this morning (5:50am) to go to a 7:00am temple session, which was nice, whether or not I was completely awake for the whole thing. 

The two districts of Finland-bound missionaries currently in the MTC

The new Hungarians have been here for a week now, and I love them so much! The only sister, Sister Feil, is staying in a room with Sister Owen and me and she comes with us to things like breakfast and gym and other activities she doesn't do with the elders in her district. She is amazing! She came right in and got to work. She has such an amazing positive attitude and hasn't had any problem settling in. She is such an example to me of patience and hard work. 

Our lessons are going pretty well. One of our "investigators" is almost committed to baptism, and the other is finally having a breakthrough. We started teaching each other as investigators too, and the elder "investigator" I'm teaching is thinking about baptism too!

I honestly cannot think of anything else exciting to talk about right now. So that's about it for this week! I hope all is well with you guys! May the Lord bless you all! Kirkko on totta!

Rakaudella, 

Sisar Hillebrant

Halfway There, Living on a Prayer

Rakas friends!

My companion Sisar Owen and I in front of the Provo temple.

We've been here for four weeks and we have just under five weeks to go. This last week has been mostly uneventful, so this email will be short. Our lessons with our investigators have been going pretty well. My Finnish has gotten to the point where I am pretty good at communicating gospel ideas, and I can give a pretty good simple testimony. I have a pretty good grasp on the grammar, but putting it into practice is what is kicking me. Practice practice practice! Fun fact, Elvish from Lord of the Rings was based on Finnish grammar (but the words are a smattering of all sorts of stuff). As for the investigators, we have one who would like to be baptized, but is baptized into another church. We didn't have time in the lesson to talk to her more about it, but this evening we are teaching her all about baptism and hopefully will be setting a date. And so no one is confused, this is still our teacher posing as an investigator. This is only for practice. But it's good practice!

We had a special devotional last night an Elder David A. Bednar come to speak to us again! At the Christmas devotional, when he passed out the cell phones so we could ask questions, they received around 1000 questions, so he spent the evening answering more of those questions. All of his answers were so inspired and he answered a lot of things I've been thinking about. I have no doubt that he truly is called of God!

Sisar Owen and i have been called as Sister training leaders, so we have been attending leadership meetings for our district. Today, we are getting 8 new Hungarian missionaries. There is only one sister in that group, so she will be moving into our room and will be in a "tri-panionship" with me and Sisar Owen when she isn't in class. We are very excited to have a new sister!

Well, that's about it this week. I am doing very well and am really enjoying my time here at the MTC. My testimony is growing so much. Jesus is the Christ, and this church is so true!!

Love you all!

Rakaudella, 

Sisar Hillebrant

The view from my residence hall.

In front of the Los Angeles temple. It is huge!

At the Los Angeles temple Visitor's Center. Notice the awkward appropriate space between me and the elders.

At Santa Monica beach. You would not believe the amount of sand I got in my shoes! 

Rakas everyone!

This week has been really busy, but has gone by so quickly. I have had a lot of cool experiences this week. I experienced the Training Resource Center for the first time, which is a program where church members come to the MTC and we get to practice teaching them in our mission languages. It was kind of scary, but the people were really nice and understanding of our minimal grasp of the language and tried really hard to help us understand them and express ourselves. I felt the Spirit very strongly, even though I had no idea what they were saying. It was amazing, but also a little frustrating because I knew what they were saying was incredible but couldn't understand most of it. I've been praying a lot for humility and patience, and I think it's been helping a lot.

On Sunday, the sisters in my zone performed Nearer My God To Thee in Sacrament meeting. We checked out the MTC violin so I could play for part of it, and it was so nice to play the violin again, even for just a little while. Sisar Owen and I were called to be the Sister Training Leaders for the zone, since the Hungarian sisters are leaving. Basically what we do is go to Tuesday zone meetings, and we interview the sisters once a week or so and make sure they are doing ok and basically just be a support to them. Which would be great if we weren't the only sisters in the zone after next Tuesday. But the new Albanians are coming at the end of the month, so hopefully we will have some new sisters to check up on.

Sisar Owen and I taught one of our "investigators" this Monday. We've been struggling to get her to understand the importance of the things we are teaching her and wasn't following through on her commitments, so we took a step back and had a lesson all about why she needs to pray and why God wants to hear from her. She was way more interested during the lesson than she had been in any of the others and she made comments that sounded like she was finally understanding the importance of prayer. We committed her to read the Book of Enos, which, for those of you who aren't familiar with it, is all about Enos's experience with prayer, and she actually sounded interested and wanted to do it. We couldn't get her to pray at the end of the lesson, but we are starting to feel more confident in her progress.

Yesterday, those of us in the Finnish districts who still need to get our visas straightened out flew to Los Angeles for the day. We got up early and there was a lot of waiting (I hate waiting in airports), but we got to the Finnish Consulate and got everything taken care of. It took only about 20 minutes total for the five us, because all we had to do was sign a couple papers and have our fingerprints scanned. We did get to do a little sightseeing. We went to lunch, then to the Los Angeles temple, which is HUGE! We went to the visitor's center and watched a really cool video about eternal families. They also have a Christus statue there with a short presentation about Christ. After we took a bunch of photos in front of the temple, the shuttle driver took us to the Santa Monica pier. We wandered around the pier for a while and on the beach and took pictures and enjoyed the balmy 64 degree weather (although I do prefer the cold of Utah, especially in January). The worst part of the day was when we got to the airport and our flight was delayed for close tot two hours. We didn't get back to the MTC until about 11pm. But was nice to have a break from the MTC just for a day, even if it was a loooong day. And we had an amazing conversation with the shuttle driver, who had a lot of experience with missionaries, and has been trying to find the right path to Christ. We (and by we, I mean mostly Vanhin Johnson. He's a little ultra-enthusiastic, but that's better than not talking about the church) basically gave him the first discussion and left him with a Book of Mormon. Plus, the sister missionaries at the LA temple visitor's center got his contact information so they could get in tough and answer his questions. It was a very cool in-field type of experience and got me very excited for the work I am preparing to do. It taught me that the Lord has prepared people to be ready to hear the gospel, and we never know who or where we might meet.

This morning, we got to go to the temple. I used to think the Provo temple was...well, less than pretty (honestly, I still do, but it's almost as dear to me as the Columbia River temple, since I've been to it almost as much, so it's grown on me). But it's amazing how much your perspective of what's on the outside changes once you get to go inside and do the ordinances. Plus it is beautiful inside, so that's what really matters :) The temple is super important, guys! I can't wait to share that with people.

Well that's about it for this week. Three down, six more to go!

May the Lord bless you all. Thank you all for your support and love!

Rakaudella,

Sisar Hillebrant

Happy New Year's, everyone! It's P-day, and that means pants! 

Week two has come and gone, and I have been in the MTC for just over 14 days. And already it feels like I've studied more than the rest of the year combined. The language is super difficult. Yesterday I had a one-on-one review session with one of my teachers and we went over the grammar principles we have learned in class. I knew all of them and did pretty well with the practice examples she gave me, but using them in conversation is not going so well. I have to remind myself that I have only been here for two weeks and I can't expect myself to speak well already. But it is pretty frustrating when we are having a role-play lesson with an "investigator" (one of our teachers posing as someone they taught on their mission) and I have things I want to say and don't know how to express myself. If anything, this is just a test in humility and patience, which heaven knows I need more of.

Christmas last week was pretty much the highlight of my stay here so far. New Year's was nice, but there wasn't any kind of special celebration, so it really just passed without much noticed. We had a devotional in the evening from Stanley G. Ellis of the quorum of the Seventy and his wife. Sister Ellis talked a bit about the angels in the Christmas story and how we need to be angels to the people wherever we are going in the world (I honestly dozed off during part of it since I was up so late the night before) and Elder Ellis spoke about the new year and voluntary repentance. He talked about how the beginning od the year and how it's the perfect time to begin again and put 2013 behind us and become the person we want to be (a little cliche, but there seems to be a bit of a theme of repentance in talks I've heard lately, so perhaps there is something I haven't learned yet). So this week has not really been very eventful all in all. We've just had a lot of class and study time (when we actually focus, which we are getting better at), and we've started teaching two new investigators (actually our teachers, as I mentioned). I have to say, one of my favorite times of the day is Gym. I have gained a new appreciation for gym clothes while I've been here, and I'm getting to be a pretty good four-square player, if I do say so myself. The Albania-bound missionaries (close to half our district) all left for the mission field this week, early Tuesday morning. Sister Owen and I stayed up past curfew Monday night to spend a little extra time with them while they packed. We got to be really good friends, so it was rough saying goodbye, but they are on their way to the best and biggest part of their mission, and I have no doubt they will be wonderful missionaries. There are only 5 sisters in our zone now (we got another Hungarian sister on Tuesday), but the Hungarians leave in two weeks, and it will only be Sister Owen and me until the end of the month.

I'm going to LA on Tuesday to get my visa, hopefully for real this time. Last time was such a fiasco, so I'm a little wary, but I don't think we're expecting any snow storms that would ruin the trip. Hopefully (fingers crossed) we will have time while we're there to drive past the LA temple. I hear it's beautiful. Speaking of temples, the Provo temple has been closed the whole time we've been here for cleaning, but it will be open next week and we will get to go next P-day, so I'm pretty excited for that.

That's really about it. My weeks will hopefully be a bit more exciting when I get to Finland since the entire week won't be exactly the same day repeating itself over and over. Also it's kind of another country, but whatever. No big deal. I just hope that Finland has down comforters because golly gee I sure miss mine. A sheet and blankets just don't do it for me.

I hope you all enjoy your weeks. Remember to make the most of the turn of the year and fix anything you don't like. Put your trust in the Lord and He will direct your path for good. He wants the best for you and He wants you to see that you can have it if you put in all your effort and lean on his arm. He is there and he loves you! 

Happy New Year!

Rakaudella,

Sisar Hillebrant