Hey fam!
viernes 4 agosto 2017 CCM dia 10
Today it was my companion Elder Clark's birthday! He got a fidget spinner and some notes and some chocolate from his family. He also got a letter from his girlfriend back at home in Dallas. We got together with some other elders at our bunk bed and he read it and we were all aching for the guy. I was tearing up; these two were definitely in love.
sabado 5 agosto 2017 CCM dia 11
Today I didn't get as sleepy as usual thankfully. There was plenty of funny stuff too. This morning the next door study room got noisy so one of the elders in our district Elder Cederlof (from Utah) just said "Hey how's it goin" and we were chill. And the elders on the other side shared Deut. 23:12-13 and so I looked it up. Never have I seen such a funny verse. I was busting a gut, you should have seen.
Elder Cederlof was getting sick so as a district we gave him a blessing. Most of us had never done it before so it was really cool... really powerful. Elder Christensen, his companion, gave a short and sweet but sincere blessing. He eventually got better later in the evening, but during the day he took a 3 hour nap so he was able to catch up on sleep.
Almost forgot to mention, just the other day, these two gave a legendary lesson with Gabriel (a roleplayed investigator). They were talking about commandments with him.
A little background, our favorite teacher Hno Castillo was acting as this investigator, and he's been dating this girl Gabriella. He's such a boss; he made a cake and wrote a poem to propose for her to be his girlfriend. Anyway, these elders gave him a Law of Chastity pamphlet to look through. Right on one of the pages is a picture of a young man and woman together, and these elders... they put the names CASTILLO and GABRIELLA by these two people in the picture in pen. I am giggling just writing (typing now) about it.
After a session of TALL (Technology Assisted Language Learning) one of the elders asked Hno Vasquez (another MTC worker and teacher) where the mission office is. He pointed in the direction where it is, but unintentionall brought his other forearm and his forehead together and let out a "psh." Everyone who saw this thought it was funny because well... It just looked like a... yeah and I did NOT think I would see that outside of the United States. It took Vasquez a moment to actually realize what he did. I laughed a little too much after that.
domingo 6 agosto 2017
Well today was a very interesting, very spiritual day.
Today all of the Guatemala East missionaries got together in a room and we talked and waited to speak with our beloved mission president President Christensen and his wife. It was District Mateo (all of us are going City East) and like 4 others from Rama B in the MTC. It was so cool. We all clicked so well.
Ever cooler was talking with the mission president and his wife in the flesh. They answered our questions about food, housing, GANGS, lots of things. But the thing that got us most pumped was this: our mission president received an apostolic blessing on behalf of us, and we are needed. We have the gift of discernment. And as far as we keep the mission rules, we will always have it. We will need it desperately because of how many gangs there are, how dangerous it is in the "Triangle" (El Salvador, Honduras, y Guatemala).
We are all now well aware of how necessary it is to obey the rules, how important it is to have the gift of discernment, how important it is to NOT eat from the street vendors, how impoverished the area is, &c. I am a little afraid because I don't even have a lot of street sense, let alone in the EEUU, and I'm going to need the Spirit to protect me from potential shootings and robberies. But I'm moreso excited because of how much it will grow my testimony and my personal relationship with Heavenly Father. He has already put so much trust in me just sending me to this area, so I just hope I won't let Him down. I am so excited.
The following evening was a horribly traumatic event for everyone in the main devotional room. We were watching an MTC Devotional given by Elder Holland a few years back. Amazing devotional, and I took lots of notes, but we were not able to finish it.
At one point, Elder Holland said, "We need missionaries who can teach with power and authority." In response, some elder in the back yelled, "I have power and authority!" I'm going to have to condense this narrative a lot because I'm running out of time to type, but basically this poor elder kept repeating that phrase. At first, no one minded. Then we were like, this Elder is being a bit over the top. Then we were thinking, we really need to listen to the words of an apostle, this Elder needs to sit down. Then he kept going. He was yelling, with voice cracks and everything.
"I HAVE POWER AND AUTHORITY, ELDER HOLLAND." He literally begins to address Elder Holland as if he were there. This was starting to look really weird. I was getting a headache. People were starting to feel bad in the stomach around me.
"ELDER HOLLAND! ELDER HOLLAND! I HAVE POWER AND AUTHORITY!"
I look over to my companion Elder Clark. "I'm starting to feel real bad for this guy."
"I know. I can't focus. And I'm having the worst feeling right now."
This shifted from uncomfortable down to distrurbing down to haunting real fast. The Spirit was being shoved out of the room. This was horrible. This was suffering.
Eventually we were all evacuated. This Elder got sent home. (He had started to cry out on his knees after being talked down to by President Morris). We talked in our districts. District Mateo was thankful for the gift of discernment, to know when the Spirit is present and when it isn't, and I recognized that feeling with my fellow Elders; the Spirit was not present in that room.
I have to end now but all is well now!! This was a great learning experience, gotta get off now because it's 2 o clock.
Yours truly,
Elder Dredge
Elder Braden K. Dredge
Guatemala Guatemala City East Mission
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