Week 4 - MTC - October 28, 2014

Ola Familia!  Bom dia!

I wish you all could have experienced and witnessed the miracles from this week at the MTC.  I have learned so much of how our Father in Heaven works and how much He loves us as His children.  Last Tuesday evening Elder Godoy (From the Seventy) came and spoke to all of us missionaries.  He is from Sao Paulo, and we are great friends with his son who is an Elder here going to Italy.  He gave an amazing talk in broken English.  It was incredible to see a wise man, with such knowledge in the gospel struggle to share what he needed to say, but to feel the Spirit so strong with his words.  He spoke of the four types of missionaries, and where we should strive to be as a missionaries.  The first type of missionary is one that tries their best to stay worthy on their mission.  They fix their problems and addictions before their missions, but all they can focus on is trying to stay worthy.  The second is a missionary that focuses on good works.  This missionary will talk to anyone, they keep goals, and go after challenges.  They try not to think of themselves, and they might even see some baptisms. The third type of missionary is one that is praying continually.  They pray for anything and everything.  Each morning and night they have a 'personal interview' with their Heavenly Father.  The fourth type of missionary, and the one I am striving to be, is a missionary that exercises faith.  In order to be this missionary, I need to be all four of these kinds of missionaries.  A missionary that exercises faith will see miracles on their mission.  They open their mouths and say what the Lord wants them to say.  They act on revelation and aren't afraid to.  They're able to know exactly what their pesquisador needs and what to do about it.  They have the faith that the Lord can do anything anywhere. I want to see miracles on my mission, I want to exercise faith.  My ultimate goal as a missionary should be to get to the state where I can have hope, exercise faith, and receive miracles.  

While I was listening to Elder Godoy talk about this kind of missionary, I felt the Spirit tell me something very important.  Why would I ever lose faith that God could bring me my visa?  Why would I ever doubt that He could do that for me.  I had resulted to thinking that I was not going to see a miracle, and that I would have to be reassigned.  I had the strongest feeling, and so did all of the other sisters in my district that if we excercised faith, we would be able to see a miracle.  My whole heart was filled with hope, and although I knew that I would only want God's will for me, I wanted to exercise faith in Him.  I talked to our District about having a special fast for our visas, and they all agreed that it was a good idea.  Wednesday night we started our fast, and Thursday was an amazing day.  We kept running into scriptures that talked about faith, hope, fasting, much prayer, and miracles.  We shared them with each other throughout the day.  It was amazing to see all of us working together to keep each other strong in the faith.  We ended our fast with a prayer all together.  The next day (Friday) later in the day we decided to check on our visa status'.  And a miracle happened!  Half of our visas were ready to be sent to the MTC!!  We couldn't even believe it!!  God had let us see that when we have hope, and exercise faith, He will show unto us miracles!  Me, Sis. Johnson, Sis. Hennefer, and three other Elders have our visas ready to go, they should arrive here at the MTC this week!  It was just amazing.  There were so many tears and firm hand shakes... haha!  I have never felt the love of my Heavenly Father stronger than in that moment.  Sorry that was such a long story!  But I just had to give you all of the details!  We thought that maybe we would be sent out today, but we will still be leaving on Nov. 10th.  We'll get our flight plans I think next week!  

Elder Harden, Elder Leung (on the violin) and I auditioned on Thursday to sing in Devotional.  We sang "Abide with Me".  It is a beautiful prayer.  Sister Nally, the Mission President's wife, loved it.  She asked us to sing it in Relief Society.  So on Sunday we performed in Relief Society.  It was so much fun to share the song with all of the sisters.  And we all had a great laugh that there were only a few elders in a huge gym full of sisters!  Maddy's teacher from last year came up to me after, and asked if I was her sister.  I guess her husband is a part of a branch presidency here!  That was fun to find that connection.

I just need to testify that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God.  We watched the Joseph Smith movie on Sunday night and it was the most powerful movie I have every seen.  I had seen it before, but this time it was especially powerful.  Please watch it!  Joseph Smith did see God the Father and Jesus Christ. He did every thing that he could to establish the true church on this earth.  The sacrifices that he made were tremendous.  I am so grateful for that man.  I love the Gospel with all of my heart, and this is because I have repented and seen what Christ can do in my life.  I know Christ lives, I know He sacrificed for us.  He is the only way.  

I love you all with all of my heart, Sister Cordner