MTC Week 5

Oi, minha pessoas prefirido,

Como Vai?  I am doing well.  I have had another week for the books.  Considering this is the MTC, I still probably won't have a ton to write, but I will try to make this a good letter.  So the one of the best parts of this week was on Friday.  Because I GOT MY TRAVEL PLANS!!!  I will leave the MTC at 6am this coming monday, the 16.  I fly out of salt lake at 11:15, land in atlanta around 5, and get on a plane to Johannesburg at 8:30.  I fly for 21 hours, and then I get on a flight to Mozambique.  I am so excited, maybe not for 21 hours in a plane, but I am about to go to the greatest place in the world.  

This week I also got the opportunity to play piano in the opening devotional for the senior missionaries.  I played a song and I practiced every chance I got, and I had a really good learning experience.  As I was practicing I felt really good up until the day of, and then it seemed like everything was going wrong.  I was making a ridiculous amount of mistakes, and I was so nervous it was making me sick.  I knew the entire MTC presidency would be there, and I really needed to play my best.  Even my run through right before the devotional didn't feel very good, but I prayed super hard that I would be able to do my best.  Right before I got up to perform, I had the feeling to pray that I would have faith in my practicing.  I prayed really hard for the whole song, and as I played, I had very strong faith in my practice, and it ended up being the best run I think I have ever had with that song.  I encourage all of you to stop praying for help with things, God has the power to help, but he also honors preparation.  Therefore, I encourage you to have faith in your preparation, and It will be a much better experience, because I know that with faith, all things are possible, even so much that eventually we can be as the brother of Jared and have so much faith that our faith will tear the veil down before our eyes.  

We had a good week with our investigators, we committed Manuel to be baptized, and hopefully Michelle will accept the invitation this week.  I keep learning so much from the lessons, even though they are role plays, they feel so real.  I believe that God helps us as we all try our best to make it as realistic of an experience as possible.  

I want to tell you all about an elder I met here this week.  His name is Elder Mazivila.  I was at lunch on Thursday, and I was walking to my seat when I had a strong feeling that I needed to talk to this elder that I saw.  I kept fighting the feeling, but finally it got to strong to ignore.  I went and introduced myself to him, and it turns out he is from Mozambique.  He didn't speak much English, so I had quite a miracle when I realized I could communicate with him fairly well, it helped that he talked slow, but I got to learn a lot more  about the country.  I kept thinking what a miracle it was that he was here in the Provo MTC.  I know that most missionaries there don't come back here to learn, and they serve in missions around there native countries.  For some reason this Elder was going to Tampa, and he happened to be in the MTC the same time as me.  As we were talking I found out that he is the only member in his family, and he asked me to find his family and baptize them.  For some reason I had no fear about saying yes, and I did.  It was so amazing, and now I have a family that I need to work hard for, not only to find, but also to prepare for.  I have no doubt that if I work hard enough, the Lord will bless me, with the ability to find them, and if I am worthy of it, the spirit will be a tool for their conversion.  I like the 2000 stripling warriors, will "Doubt Not," because my angel mother taught me so.  I am so unworthy of being blessed to have her for my Mother, but God must have been loving me a lot the day he sent me to her, because without here, I would have this faith, because my faith comes from hers, at times when I didn't have faith, she was there stalwart and strong, looking to God, and I had her to lean on.  I am forever grateful and indebted to her for that. 

I guess I will tell a funny story or two to close.  So yesterday we were eating lunch, and Elder Ryan was walking to the table, on the other side of me.  Someone bumped into him, and put his tray off balance, he tried to adjust so he didn't lose his food, but in doing so, ended up dumping about half of his chocolate milk on a senior sister missionaries head.  I couldn't stop laughing, and her response was the best.  She said, "well it looks like you just got your first baptism."  The other sort of funny, sort of annoying experience is kind of an ongoing thing.  4 of the elders in our room are from cold places, and Elder Lunt and I are the odd ones out.  They all think its a good Idea to sleep with the AC on full blast, and because we are the minority we get shafted.  I resorted to stealing half the blankets in the room, and I now sleep in sweats, a hoodie, and like 3 blankets.  Boy are they gonna get an awakening when we get to Africa.  I just guess everyone would be more Christlike if it wasn't so dang hard.

Thank you all for love prayers and love, I really need them, and I feel them everyday.

With Love,

Elder Anthony Holt

Elder Holt & Elder Mazivila