My Missionary Service-Training

As part of my service I spent 10 weeks at the Missionary Training Center in Provo, UT.  (This is how everyone's service starts.)  My parents dropped my off, I was issued materials, assigned a dorm and given a couple hours to unpack before classes started.  My time there consisted of training which was vigorous.  Our instructors were amazing.  They were college students who had served full-time missions and taught us doctrine, language classes, and built up our faith by sharing their experiences.

 

Our average day we got up at 6:00 AM and went until 10:00 PM.  There is a cafeteria there and a gym (we had assigned times to use the gym) and we spent most our time in classes.  We learned to teach the basic principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ first in English and then in Spanish.  We took turns teaching other missionaries in training and had two hours of personal study each day to work on our knowledge base.  The schedule was rigorous but it was amazing how quickly we progressed.  There were challenging moments as we spent most of our time in a 10 X 15 classroom with the same 10 other people everyday but in the end I had 10 great friends who had shared their story of their faith growing and helped my faith to grow.

 

When the time came to fly out it was hard to say good bye to the MTC.  I was so touched by the people I met there and the experiences I had helped me be more prepared to go and give of myself.  One of the biggest lessons I took from the MTC was the realization that the Lord uses regular people to teach the gospel and do His work.  Peter was a fisherman who became a disciple and teacher, he wasn't an educated man or a man who was a great public speaker yet he was chosen.  This gave me some confidence that the Lord could shape me into someone that could help others.

Mother Tereasa once said something to the effect that I am just a pen, the Lord is the author, I am just an instrument.