November 20, 2014

To my friends and family,

Today was as expected, a much less exciting and busy week. We are pretty settled into the routine at the MTC and teaching two investigators at a time (yes in full Korean). I've just been loving watching the progression of the missionaries spiritually and in the language. Oh and basketball is pretty fun as well.

So the Korean lesson for the week is about verb conjugation. So just like other languages, you can conjugate the verb into different tenses, the three main tenses being past, present, and future. In addition, there are also different stages of honoring a person: high form for addressing those at a higher level or strangers (Missionaries generally use this), middle form for addressing friends and people at the same level, and low form for only close friends, family, and children. It takes a while to get them all strait and conjugate them on the spot, but its pretty cool once you get the hang of it. 

MTC District

So I learned a lot about Christ this week, but the best lesson was from a video that I saw from Elder Bednar, called the "Character of Christ". His argument was that to really be converted and to really follow Christ, we have to have his characteristics, especially charity. Elder Bednar describes that when Christ suffers, instead of turning inward and being selfish like the natural man, he turns outward and helps others. During my hours of studying the New Testament and Jesus the Christ, I've found so many examples of this divine characteristic. I encourage all of you to look to the scriptures to find how Christ acts in all situations and try to implement that in your own life.

Finally, I had another amazing experience with the restored gospel this week. We were teaching one of our investigators about who Joseph Smith was and how the Book of Mormon can bless her life. So we read a lot from the scriptures and showed her the history; however, she wasn't convinced until she got on her knees and prayed. Just as James 1:5 directs, we can receive an answer to all things if we "study it out" and then "ask god if it be right" (D&C 9). 

With Love,

Elder Coleman