Yay! Still at the MTC!
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| We just wanna go to Taiwan!!! |
We have no idea what's going on. We've heard so many different things! We could still potentially leave for reassignments this week, but if we don't leave by Thurday there's a rumor that because of holiday blackouts we could be here until Dec 30th!!! That is such a scary thought!!! But we really don't know. And we're getting a new Taipei district Wednesday who is supposed to move into our classroom! Craziness! Our 5th set of Sister Training Leaders/Zone Leaders in the MTC got called Sunday! We've been here foreverrrrr! (Note from Annie's dad: I'm calling the travel office tommorow around 1:00 MST and they should have more information then on when she'll be leaving. I'll put a note here when I find out more.)
There's a ton of construction going on at the MTC right now. They moved all of us sisters in the newer nice 17M into the old 3M that's all the way on the other side of campus today. :( The rooms are smaller and there's not a lot of showers. We've been in 17M since the very beginning in October so packing today was a pain! Plus we're leaving soon so none of us want to unpack anything. Our Elders are SUPER awesome and helped us move our luggage all the way over to 3M. I love our district so much. It's been a crazy PDay!!
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| Chips & Queso party! Nothing like Texas, but you take what you can get here! ;) |
So about 3 weeks ago we got 2 sisters put in our residence room with us. They're going to Taichung in January and their names are Sister Gardner from Pocatello, ID and Sister Carlson from Georgia. Well they're adorable and we're so glad they got to move into our room! We were pretty sad last Monday night after another week had gone by with no news on our visas or even leaving. We got back to our residence and had an awesome surprise! There were 2 big bags of chips, queso, and spinach artichoke dip sitting on a table in the middle of the room. They also put up Christmas decorations! :) <3 We were all so shocked and happy! They bought it for us just in case we were leaving. They are so cute and we love them(:
One cool experience we had this week was Thursday night. All of the Taiwan missionaries from both zones who were supposed to leave Dec. 1 or today all got together and prayed. We said a prayer not that our visas would all come in, but that we'd be able to know what else we needed to do here at the MTC. We wanted to see the Lord's hand in this process. We wanted to know and do His will for us. It was a pretty sweet and unifying experience. The next day, after lunch, Sister Kirkham, Hendricks, Good and I went to the French building to look for one of our old substitute teachers who we love! So we looked all over for him, but didn't see him.
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| Walking up to the temple with the adorable Sister Haupt! Who thankfully is going to Taipei too! (: |
As we were leaving, this cute Hispanic guy with a gold name tag on started asking us questions. When someone has a gold name tag that means they're just at the MTC to see how it works and kind of "investigate" the church. We told him we were learning Chinese and had been here for almost 11 weeks. He was really interested in how we've been able to learn so much from just our short time here. He said he's struggled with his English, so then we told him that if the Lord could help us learn Chinese, he could definitely learn English, too. He then started asking us about how Joseph Smith could really be a prophet. We discussed the restoration with him and some of Joseph Smith's story. We also taught him that we need to exercise our faith in order to receive answers. We were able to testify of Christ and His Atonement and how it could help him in his life. He started to tear up at one point when he was feeling the spirit. We were all talking to him for about 40 minutes! It was an amazing experience to be able to teach a real person. He had real concerns, real desires, and real questions. We know he has a real desire to be happy and find truth. He even set up a return appointment with us, tomorrow at 11! Even though we were in the French building, there was a Spanish Book of Mormon sitting on a table right by us! We gave it to him and asked him to read Alma 32 before our next meeting. It was so perfect!! We all really loved the experience actually impacting someone's life and helping them have happiness. It made us sooo excited to go to Taiwan, but we've got a little more motivation to stay here. We all left that meeting with a renewed desire to preach this gospel and help others turn to Christ.
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| Our cute district at our 3rd "last temple walk" |
Earlier today, Sister Hendricks and Sister Good saw him and his wife! They told us he said, "You know those times when you're really thirsty and you just want a drink of water? I felt like you guys gave me that water Friday." That made us all feel so good! That's exactly what we hoped we did for him. It reminded me and Sister Kirkham of a scripture we read during Companion Study this week. John 6:35. "And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst ." We know God was looking out for us and Jose by making our paths cross. I believe we needed this experience just as much as he did.
I am so grateful for Heavenly Father's perfect plan for us and all of His children. I know Christ is the Living Water. We truly will never hunger or thirst when we are turned to Him. The Lord is my light and my salvation. He cares for us, cries for us, and prays for us more than we will ever know. I am so grateful for Christ and His Atonement. One bright spot of still being at the MTC is getting to have some Christmas spirit. All of the devotionals and everything lately is so focused on Christ and God's love for us. Christmas will be so great in the MTC if we're still here. I really hope we'll be in the field somewhere, but it will be cool to be here, too! Well I'll talk to you guys later!
Thank you for all the Dear Elders, letters, emails, and packages! I love them so much(:
-Sister Oviatt
