5th MTC email

By now you've probably discovered that my weekly letter is late. Due to unforseen circumstances (I forgot), I was unable to post it until this past Monday.

Actually, most of the reason was that I ran out of time on P Day, and didn't manage to finish it. Then I forgot what I was going to write to finish it, and then finally posted it Sunday night, when I had enough time to wrap up the ending in a very disjointed way.

So to make up for it, I'm writing to the family first with my email time, so as to be able to write a nice, long letter.

First off, thank you very much for the British stuff; one Elder in my district found it very funny when I was singing "I am British, I have a Teddy Bear!" Thanks lots, everything in the package is really cool. And it got here surprisingly fast, too!

Speaking of which, the postcard you sent to me from Devon took about 2 and a half weeks to arrive, but it was a beautiful postcard, so I'll forgive Royal Mail. Just this once. Thank you very much.

This past Monday I got, in total, seven letters and a package. I got a letter from you, a letter from Granny and Grandad, a letter from Julian, a letter from Grandma and Grandad,a letter from Chris, a DearElder from you, and a package from that same person from my forum who sent me a package this time last year. How cruel of her! She sent me a big box of comics and magazines! I've since locked them securely in my suitcase, where they can't distract me.

I actually feel, however, that I have been blessed a lot for my obedience in this manner. My concentration has inceased and I've been more focused, and far less distracted. I feel like, even though I wasn't really struggling to leave comics and games and stuff behind (certainly not as much as my companion is struggling to leave American football behind), making the pro-active step of locking everything away and saying "I've been tempted, but I won't give in" has helped me to strengthen my resolve, and the Lord has blessed me with an added measure of resolve for doing so.

This past Saturday we taught a lesson to a pretend investigator in Cantonese. It was horribly, horribly simple, but we did it! That's the important thing. And as we shared our testimony with the investigator, the spirit was really strong and we gave a powerful and convincing testimony of what we know to be true. My lessons have gone from being very powerful and impressive, to being very simple but very centred around teaching by the spirit, which is the whole point of the MTC. Learning a language is just an appendage to the real work we do here - learn to, as D&C 50:14 says, teach by the Spirit.

Being a District Leader is a very different experience to what I was expecting. The best part are the Leadership lessons we get, where we're taught how best to lead others. The District Leader before me, who is now Zone Leader, is a very military man who went to an Air Force academy, so he commands a lot more respect than I do, and leads through strictness and commands. I'm trying to lead more out of love than I see him do, but still want to be able to have the presence that he has when he's at the front of the classroom. A member of our Branch Presidency, Brother Hitchcock, leads through love. He gives all the Elders hugs every time he sees them, and always wants to know how we are doing. I want to be a leader more like him. He seems to have a great deal of respect for me, and a lot of expectations for me, so I'm striving to live up to that.

Elder Matthew Loffhagen

PS If you do go to Legoland, can I add a pirate's Eyepatch to my request of a Boba Fett keyring? More will become clear when I get around to sending you more pictures! :P