I love it here! This is absolutely my new favorite place in the world. Everyone is continuously reminding me that I just need to make it to Sunday, and there are some Elders that say they think it is taking forever or having a visibly very difficult time. I am not, it has been an absolute breeze and it already feels like it is flying by. I have less time to personally study because of companion study and classes, and they are trying to get us to role play studying for different investigators.
It is very different here than I expected. I have not seen Elder Deweese and have only seen most of the Elders going to Toronto in passing. In my district we have only two companionships including mine that our going to Toronto, but they are our room mates so that is pretty sweet. My companion is Elder Ward and he is amazing. He is a farm boy from Idaho, and is even a state football champ. He played tackle but he looks way to skinny to play tackle. Anyway he's super cool and we've hit it off right from the start. Our roommates are Elder Bakker, who went to Corner Canyon, and Elder Tarter who I believe is from Boise, Idaho. they are both super sweet and everyone is way into praying all the time and are super nice.
Contrary to what I was told I have heard the words exact obedience only once as a passing comment, and while they do want us to be obedient, it is FAR from the focus of anyone including leaders here. In addition the food is great (It is not all you can eat) and I have very little gas. Also I have sang called to serve only twice, and only standing up when we met our zone leaders because one of them was sad that she hadn't ever done that in 2 weeks at the MTC. Anyways, very different than I was told would happen here.
It is weird seeing other young men my age and myself serving as missionaries and realizing that we are still real people.
My district is super cool and my teachers are amazing. One Elder from our district got called to be our District leader, and he is super sweet, his name is Elder Maybell I think. He is one of the most naturally funny people I have ever met. He actually came home from a previous mission and is now coming back out. He is incredible and everyone is super stoked he is going to be our district leader.
My favorite class thing we have had was titled "People and your Purpose 2" where we talked about our purpose not being to teach the Gospel but to help ALL others that I come in contact with to recieve it, and thereby live it. They also had a bunch of short video clips of Apostles testifying of this principle and the spirit was very strong.
I have seen tons of Elders that I knew before entering the MTC.
Elder Ipson, Elder Allen, Elder Jones, Elder Avei, EFY Trevor(can't remember last name), Sister McDonald, Sister Klein, Elder Huber, Elder Ashton, Elder Lee, Elder Barnette, Elder Cooper, Elder Newhouse, Elder Riley, Elder Nelson, Elder Williams, and a bunch of others that I can't think of at the moment. Everyone of them look so pure and full of light, and I feel so much more pure and full of light than I ever have for this long of a period of time in my life.
The coolest thing that has happened so far happened last night at about 10:00 at night. Elder Higgins came in who is not in our district and has been here for a couple of weeks. He said he was going to share something that is much more difficult than a mission. He said that he was planning on coming out a year ago, but then his mom was found to have stage 4 cancer which is incurable. His plans obviously changed as he spent his mom's last days with her. He said that his mom made him promise to still serve a mission after she passed. However, after she passed he chose to blame God a little bit and fell away from the church. Then later he was brought back slowly by friends. His dad is not a member of the church and strongly discouraged him from going on a mission and encouraged him to go get his education. However he chose to serve and is now here, and his dad is already begging to believe in the Gospel based on how he has already changed in his time at the MTC. I felt the spirit so strongly as he shared this with us. I realized that while my sacrifice is a sacrifice, there are many others who are sacrificing so much more. Their sacrificing because they know it's true, because it IS true.
The absolute focus here is on Christ, and I love it. It's his church, and in it we come closer to Him, as missionaries our purpose is to bring others to Him. The Gospel is how we do that the most effectively and the only real way we can do it forever. I know this is true.
Elder Dixon
