Monday, August 19, 2013

Week 6

Well today is my last day here at the MTC! I leave tomorrow morning at 3:30AM to head to the Salt Lake Airport. I then will fly to Atlanta and catch my flight to New York, New York. I am very excited to be temporarily reassigned to the New York New York Mission! I have loved my time here at the MTC but I am so ready to go! Most missionaries from my district left early this morning (2 are heading to Brazil and everyone else is going somewhere in the U.S) so there's just a few of us left.

This week has been a good last week. First, on Tuesday I sang in the MTC choir again for the Tuesday Night Devotional. We were told that the devotional would be broadcasted to all the other Missionary Training Centers in the world. We didn't know who would be the speaker because it is always a surprise but it ended up being Richard G. Scott of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles! It was an amazing experience. Our choir song was "Jesus, Once of Humble Birth" and it was awesome to sing that song at such a special devotional with about 1,000 other missionaries. Elder Scott shared with us stories from his mission and also talked about the importance of prayer and patience. He said sometimes the Lord gives us struggles and challenges because that's what makes us grow and develop. He also addressed just the missionaries who are learning a new language and motivated us to keep on working hard and the Lord will bless us and we will be able to learn the language. I know that this is true because there is no way I could have learned as much as I have here in 6 weeks without the Lord's help.

I feel like I have plateaued just a little bit with the language this week. Also, with the excitement of getting reassignments there has been a lot more energy in our district and a little less focus on learning the language. But I continue to work hard at it, but it is frustrating at times. I am still working on conjugations, and I know them all but it's sometimes hard for me to apply them in the correct ways. I know over time that they will come more easily as I continue to work at it.

Yesterday was our last Sunday here so typically the Branch Presidency picks two missionaries from the leaving district to speak. They just announce it over the pulpit seconds before you are supposed to speak. I don't know if I've explained this but everything is in Portuguese for us here! Including all of church, so we have to speak in Portuguese. Anyways, much to the relief of the other missionaries in my district I was called on to give a talk in Sacrament Meeting. I was a little bit nervous because the missionary that spoke right before me was super good at Portuguese and she had only been here for like 3 weeks. Anyways, I got up and shared my favorite scripture from the Book of Mormon, Ether 12:27, and talked for about 5 minutes about it and how we can become better people through Jesus Christ and His Atonement. There were times where I would start my sentence and then not know how to say a word and kind of stumble through it but I think I did okay overall. We also sang a musical number as a district in Sacrament Meeting. We sang a song called "I'll Find You My Friend". It is a really cool song directly about missionary work.

Last night we had a devotional and a former BYU Football player came and talked to us about his missionary experience. His name is Vai Sikehema. It was awesome and a great way to end my experience here at the MTC!

Anyways, there's not much else to report on this week. It was a great last week and I will miss many things about the MTC but I am very excited for New York! I hope everything is going well for everyone. Thank you all for the support and love!

Until next week.

Love,

Elder Helvey

 Reassignment Letter!

 Me with Elder Shreeve, Elder Barnes, and Elder Nielson (Elder Shelton's and my roommates)

 Elder Larkin and me. He is also going to New York New York North Mission 
and eventually Fortaleza as well.

Said goodbye to my Portuguese teacher, Irmao Whitaker this morning

 Irmao Hickman, my other Portuguese Teacher at the MTC

Here is a picture of my old roommate Jose and me. He teaches Spanish at the MTC.

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