Sunsets and Sunburns

(Written Tuesday, December 2, 2014)

Hello friends and family,

It sure felt good yesterday to go home with rosy cheeks and a rosy nose after sitting in the sun for forty minutes. That´s right folks, while all of you are probably feeling very cold, I got a sunburn on December 1st. I love you all! I hope it isn´t too cold where you are! It´s been a really great week!

Not too many big things happened that I could share, but there have been some great moments. As you know (probably better than I do) it was Thanksgiving this past week! I was a little worried about getting a tad homesick on my first holiday away from home, but they made it really special for us. Latinos don´t celebrate Thanksgiving and most of them don´t even know what it is. It was pretty funny too, I was talking to my teacher about black Friday and when I told him that people fight each other for really good deals he just started laughing. We Americans really are crazy! But anyways, they set up really nice tables, made the tradition meal (the turkey was amazing) and they even played Christmas music in the background for us. Our district ate together like the cute little family we claim to be. I didn´t feel sad or lonely, I just felt grateful to be able to celebrate this holiday with these guys if it couldn´t be my family.

We also got to go teach Casy again this week! She has become one of our greatest friends and we are sad we only get to teach her one more time. I am sad that I am leaving and won’t be able to see some of these people for a very long time, if ever again. It saddens me. But good thing we have the internet right?

I also had quite a bit of luck outdoors this week because I got a lot of really cool pictures of the birds here and also some beautiful sunsets, but you will have to go look at the blog to see more pictures this week! Check out the MTC photos a day area too because there are some other photos that won’t appear in this blog post because they are just random and don´t have to do with anything, but you can see more of my house and where I do things!

We also were very blessed with kids who got pies for the holiday season but couldn´t finish them so they gave them to our district. We had pie in class almost every day. It was great!

We also got to learn a little bit about the history of this beautiful campus that we are living on right now. Originally in the 60s and right up until a couple of years ago, this campus was a Mormon School for Latinos. If you visit my blog you can see how underdeveloped this place was in the 60s! On January 29th, 2013 this campus was turned into a Missionary Training Center like the one that they have in Provo, Utah but for Spanish speaking missionaries. Since June of 2013 over 6,000 missionaries have come to learn the Spanish language here from 48 of the United States and have gone back to the US to serve in 34 of the states. It was pretty cool to see how much has changed and grown over this time!

At any rate, It´s December now which means that Christmas is going to be here before you know it! My spiritual message for all of you this is this. We had a lesson about faith on Sunday and how faith requires an action on our part. We have to exercise our faith in order to increase our faith, just as we would have to do with our muscles. A scripture in the Book of Mormon was shared. It is from a prophet by the name of Alma Alma 32:28--Now, we will compare the word unto a seed. Now if ye give place that a seed may be planted in your heart, behold, if it be a true seed, or a good seed, if ye do not cast it out by your unbelief , that ye will resist the Spirit of the lord, behold, it will begin to Swell within your breast and when you feel these swelling motions, ye will begin to say within yourselves--it must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to Enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth to Enlighten my understanding, yea it beginneth to be Delicious to me.
Swell
Enlarge
Enlighten
Delicious

I love this scripture. We talked a lot about giving place to Christ and the gospel in our lives. We all have 24 hours in the day, but it is what we choose to do with that time that counts. I would encourage all of you to take this challenge and find somewhere in your life that you can give place to Christ or the gospel or to pray or to reading your scriptures daily and let it Swell within you and become something greater than you are. I know that as you do this, you will be enlightened because any time devoted to God blesses us and the things you do will become delicious unto you. With this time of Christ, invite Him into your life, make room for Him and you will see His blessings.

I love that I get to go out into my mission field right before Christmas to share the beautiful message that Christ lives, Christ loves all of us and that we can return to him and our Heavenly Father with our families forever. I love you all! Have a fabulous week!

Hna. Alayna Nelson