My p day has been moved up because I will be leaving the MTC tomorrow at 6:30. We will all arise at 5:15 and get ready for the day eat breakfast and then we have to get all our stuff on the bus at 6:15 then go straight away to the London mission which I have been told will take 4-6 hours by Coach. I just said good-bye to all the Birmingham missionaries who left this morning, Elder Gilbert the missionary whose mom who contacted my mom through face book with the picture from the Atlanta airport. I’ve made a lot of friends while I have been at the MTCand I hope I will be able to stay in touch and contact with them and at the very least I will have about 108 more Instagram and Facebook friends.
The MTC experience I’ve had has not been shared by with everyone, some kind hearted and sweet missionaries who I love dearly have already decided to go home. One of them I flew over with and the other was a very good friend who I taught how to shave and do laundry, they both are good people but the mission is just not something they can handle.
I never understood until I got out here how amazingly hard a missionary schedule was (be I haven’t even gone out in the field hardly yet) they left not because they weren’t "man" enough to handle it,they left because a mission isn’t for everyone. I wish the best for them and pray for them every night.
I will cover some things that have gone on. We have been in the field and done street contacting, it went over very well for my district, District Benjamin. We contacted, handed out book of Mormons, mormon.org cards, shared messages of the Restoration, and just had good conversations. I talked to this language interpreter from Morocco and he was a very intelligible guy and we talk for about 40 minutes. I handed him a card and he went on his way, I’ll find out what happened in the Celestial Kingdom, I guess. In our reports none of the other districts shared our success, so we have been blessed with good righteous and productive missionaries. Like I said in my last email or if I didn’t I’ll say it again.
The MTC President had an interview with me, he,said that the Lord has blessed me with many characteristics of a leader and he has also blessed me with this calling to help guide this district on the path the Lord wants for them. When we got here on August 17th the MTC President issued a challenge to the District Leaders to make their district a small family in this MTC and through a small effort on my part and the spirit bringing us together in unity we have become that. Sure we annoy each other at times, and I now know what Savannah feels like at home with doing my laundry and having to baby me all the time. (Savannah is a saint from heaven) I have grown to love each of them.
When you come out here on the mission you miss the simple things first. I missed having all my inside jokes with my family and being able to look across the room and with out a word make some one laugh. I miss hanging out with Jacob till 1am in the morning and talking about literally nothing and everything, I miss Savannah doing my laundry for me, I really miss going up stairs and telling my mom about my day. These things I will always miss, but I know that I am out here doing the most important progressive work I will do in my life and that I need to focus.
My district made a joke about me, I always quote elder Holland who said " 6:30 to 9:30 will make or break your mission" so at 9:30 that is the only time I will even think about talking about home and the stories I have. Grandma will be happy to know that all my dating stories really amuse the other missionaries, every few nights everyone gathers around to hear a date story of Elder Massey’s; Grandma was right no one believes them. But they like hearing them anyways.
Just to tell one mission story of me being district leader. One of the things my district struggles with is getting up on time, so me being a district leader I would very promptly and loudly wake every single one up at 6:30am. This obviously brought up many complaints and what I heard from an elder "some one swinging at me". I talked with my district and I listened and said I understood they didn’t like getting up at 6:30, I read the white handbook with them and still they didn’t like it.
So allowing them to exercise their agency one morning I got up at the alarm at 6 am (I work out from 6 to 6:30) I got in the shower and got ready for the day while everyone kept snoozing their alarms. Then at 7 am I started reading my scriptures at my desk. Someone woke up and realized it was 7am and now had to hurry to get ready, but the shower line was already a mile long and then it dawned on them why their district leader, Elder Massey, loved to get everyone up on time. So they could enjoy the first hot showers, the first pickings of breakfast, and the firsts to be in their classrooms for personal study. I have not heard a complaint since this sudden inspiration to finally get up on time and we have been 5 minutes early to every meeting.
I am thankful to my family for teaching me that being on time and even 15 minutes early should be the standard, not only to be the "firsts" in line but to be a dependable person and a good missionary who represents Christ in everything that we do. My family has been foundational in my missionary work (which I haven't started officially yet) and my family will never know how much it means to me how grateful I am that they have been good influences and examples to me that help me be the best missionary I can be.
I did call a Sister Missionary by the wrong name a few days ago but my name memorization is getting a lot better, I know its only because of my families and my sincere heart felt prayers.
The temple here is really cool but also very small, the celestial room is like the size of Grandma’s family room so a full session can’t fit inside it. It has made me appreciate the importance of the Temple because that is one of the things I miss is my big temples, I want to invite everyone to go to the temple this week because I miss being able to go to the temple and sit in the Celestial Room. Most of the time I stand and give up my seat to a Sister Missionary.
I love you all and please email me with updates of your day. I can check my email every day; I just can’t email you back until my p day. I will try to send you a personalized email every so often but know that every single one of you is in my prayers and I miss you all.
Love,
Elder Massey
This picture above is the first mission home of the missionaries, where quite literally the adversary attacked them and the veil was thinned and they could see the devil’s angels surround them, so for an hour they cast every single one of them out, in the name of Christ.
This is the first mission home of Gordon b. Hinckley where he famously received the letter that said "forget yourself and go to work" apparently one of the many reasons he wanted to go home was that he was allergic to the pollen of the gardens surrounding his home and could not take it.
This picture above is the bridge where the first saints literally raced to see who was going to be baptized in the river Rebel first. We also held a friendly elders race where I came in 3rd (I cant be perfect in everything)
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