Week 4 ... MTC

What's up everyone!

I'm heading off to Missouri tomorrow morning and I'm super excited. I'm waking up at 5 so I can board a plane at 10 so that'll be fun, but I'm just so ready to get into the work. 

Well my body is not ready, but my spirit is so I guess it'll work out.

This week was crazy. My last two trcs (practice investigators) went so good but both started out so bad. With our last TRC Jose, Elder Askelson and I looked into the room and nobody was in there so we waited 5 minutes, said a prayer and still nothing. Elder Askelson looked into the room after a couple minutes went by and said, "oh my goodness! I'm so sorry, we didn't see you in there" I thought he was being sarcastic so I straight up called him a liar, but he kept talking to somebody I couldn't hear in the room. So I glanced in and Jose was right there and he thought I was an idiot. He didn't really look at me the first half of the lesson and didn't like anything I was saying, but completely acknowledged Elder Askelson. At the end I felt the spirit and promised him some blessings from reading the Book of Mormon and he all the sudden opened up and the lesson ended so good, I was sad to leave him for the last time and that was a cool experience 

This past Sunday was by far the best I've had. We had our departure interview. The MTC President, President Martino and his wife spoke together on the impact of one baptism and one conversion for the devotional, and that was so good, but the highlight of Sunday was Elder Hollands MTC talk that we watched after the devotional it is titled "Missions are Forever" 

The best part of listening the Apostles here at the MTC is that they let loose and just say it how it is. The first two talks I watched were from Elder Bednar and they were really good but this last one from Elder Holland was just crazy! He warned of wasting your mission and said if your intention is not to work 100% every day then we should go home right now, and I'm not coming home so hopefully I wont let Elder Holland down. Being a missionary is the closest thing we can be to being an apostle other than actually being an apostle or general authority, this may be the only time in my life that I can have this kind of calling so my goal is not to waste it. 

Moses 1:39 "This is My work and My glory" as members of the church we must understand that this is the Lords work and that he's going to make it come about with or without our help but we just to get to be apart of the work and that's so amazing and such a blessing. After we understand that it's His work however then we must understand that in order to help we must do this work His way, D&C 50:13-14 "Preach my gospel" that whole book is meant to understand that we must preach with the spirit. Helaman 5:17-18 we can only teach with the power and authority of God, Mosiah 27:11-12; 18-19 the only way to convert people is to astonish them with the spirit. As a missionary or those with the priesthood we have the Authority of God, the power comes from out righteousness and our obedience. Elder Holland goes on to say, "Why is conversion so hard?'" and his answer was so profound, "Because Salvation isn't cheap ... why should it be easy for us when it wasn't easy for Him?" To truly follow Christ and to truly be converted unto Him we must feel some of what He felt

Pretty much other than all of that what I got out of the talk is that Every Mission is hard so I should not Complain.

Yesterday was cool because we just listened to mission stories from our teachers and one of them served in Iowa which is close to Missouri and it was so awesome, they both shared their testimonies and it was a sad but very spiritual day. 

I feel like this email is too long but I went to the temple this morning and had one of the coolest experiences ever, I read Ether 3-4 which is about the Brother of Jared seeing Christ and The Holy Ghost just testified that his experience was true and in chapter 4 Moroni talks how we can learn the truth of everything the Brother of Jacob saw. After reading I prayed for that witness and as I said before I did, I also prayed for a lot of other things and my words were not my own they came from the Holy Ghost. I know that Christ lives, I know that the Book of Mormon is true and the word of God and I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet and also that President Nelson is a prophet. I've only been here for three weeks but my knowledge and love for the savior has deepened so much, and I will not waste my mission! I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ Amen.

I love you all and thank you for all your support.

Elder Andersen

Pictures 

1. District with Brother Holmes

2. My cousin Elder Engemann

3. District with Brother Muir