We're on our way! First stop:Provo MTC. We entered January 24 with about 29 other couples, mostly from the western United and States and Canada. But, boy, the places we'll go! We are spreading around the world, like the stone cut out of the mountain without hands, to Cyprus, Panama, Russia, New Zealand, France, Ghana, Samoa, Alaska, The Philippines, Romania and Korea and points in between. It is thrilling to feel the courage, dedication and sacrifice of these fine couples, not to mention the more than 2000 young men and women we share the cafetaria and study halls with. We do not, however, share residences with them as we are being housed in luxury at the downtown Marriott. That part of our situation does NOT feel like a mission.
Our first week was filled with instruction and study periods as well as role-playing opportunities wherein we knocked doors of strangers pretending to be investigators. Jim and I found it is not always easy to hand the teaching responsibility back and forth in a smooth transition. Sometimes one would monopolize the teaching and sometimes one would have the ball dropped in his/her lap when he/she was not ready for it. In one exercise we had time to learn about a couple who was less active and then had a half hour to create a lesson for them. Jim and I took completely different approaches but we thought we had things resolved. I made a hopeful beginning but then got bogged down in the Garden of Eden (didn't know there were bogs there, did you?) and couldn't find my way out. Finally Jim mercifully rescued me and took us to the story of Alma the Younger's conversion (quite a jump, I know) and did a beautiful job with it having the couple read his carefully selected scriptures. Quite a learning experience for me!
Saturday we said good-bye to some of our new friends, did laundry, enjoyed (immensely) the Carl Bloch exhibition at the BYU MOA, relished a temple session and then babysit Sonora while Jared and Anepo performed some sealings at the temple--a perfect day.
Here's hoping my post will work tonight. Last night I wrote for an hour and nothing was recorded, so I will cut it a bit short tonight and see what is preserved for posterity.
We enjoyed reading about your experiences of week one at the Marriott. We went to the Carl Bloch exhibition in December with all of our daughters who live up north and enjoyed it immensely. It really helped to make our Christmas season more meaningful.
ReplyDeleteWe loved the exchange you and Elder Hinton had during the discussion. You'll have to tell us what got you bogged down with the Garden of Eden story, and how Jim was able to smoothly bring it around with the Alma scriptures.