MTC II

Pre-MTC: Saying farewell to puppies and (below) to siblings.

Hi Family!

Mom thanks so much for your email! And thanks Mel and Dad for writing me letters :) I really, really appreciate it. I finally understand why missionaries love mail so much. You see everyone else getting it and then you say, "Hey! Doesn't someone love me too...?" You know they do but seeing that letter in your hand with words of love is the best part of some days. So I really appreciate it :) Haha it sounds like everyone is doing great! Melanie is such a goober. You were really eating pizza with a numb mouth?! You are a silly girl! I'm glad you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. It was really great here too :) OH!!! And I absolutely ADORE the picture of Athena and Churro, Mom! Hahahaha! They are sooo adorable! I miss them almost as much as I miss my amazing family :)

So as per usual, I feel like I have to crank this baby out as fast as I can. Everything else will have to be responded too through snail-mail. Deep breath.... HERE WE GO! I'll start with Thanksgiving. It was a really great day. We did a service project, got to watch a movie and eat popcorn, we went to devotionals, we had an AWESOME turkey dinner and were otherwise VERY spoiled. The best part was the General Authority Devotional. Elder Holland adopted us as his own for the day. He made a great pseudo-dad. (I hope he writes me at Christmas like a good dad should). They put on a cute program with his grandchildren and then he stood up and pounded us with the Spirit. It was incredible. You know he is a prophet of God because all of his words hit you directly and you always find you want to change for the better after seeing him. But he also pours out an amazing spirit of love. I love him :)

The rest of the week has been full of learning and teaching. Sister Bauer and I have had some very powerful experiences. I had a rough night on Sunday (Sunday seems to be the hardest day for me. I always start to miss my family so much) because I was feeling inadequate and just wanted a hug from my parents. So I sat in a quiet room and read my Patriarchal blessing, cried and prayed. The Lord did bless me with peace and then he more than made up for my sadness these past couple of days. The first was on Monday. We teach a less-active member. From my journal:

"I had a very powerful experience today. Probably the most powerful yet. It was in the TRC. We had planned for a 19 year old investigator. We had prayed A LOT for guidance as we studies and we had been directed in two different directions. Then, it was time and "C" didn't show up. We had a new less-active member. We walked in. She was a sweet, older lady, Sister "A". EVERYTHING felt so easy and so natural. It was as if we were sitting with an old friend. She said she was looking for relief from feelings of pain and anger. She didn't know where to go anymore. The Spirit entered the room with such force. God filled the room. God's love filled the room. Everything we said was guided by the Spirit. Our planning had been guided by the Spirit. God loves her SO much! The power and enormity of God's love is so powerful that every time I put myself back in that room I'm filled with a buzz. A spiritual high. And the only reason I got there was because I was sent to such a humble, low place the night before. The Lord lets us sink to depths to help us reach a higher place. I love Him so much. I wish I could really explain what happened.. All I really know is that the Spirit was INCREDIBLE! And it carried into the other lessons we taught today too."

The amazing thing about this experience is that as much as I remember what happened, I couldn't tell you at the same time. And the Spirit was literally pouring through me like a waterfall. It was so intense that afterwards I was completely exhausted. God needed her to feel it. And he allowed us to be the instruments. The next day we had two more similar experiences with God's love pouring through us and the Spirit guiding our words. Both of our Tuesday investigators experienced something incredible and are ready to take the next step. "L", the hard lesson we had the week before, was one of them. She opened up about her life. She was in a shooting when she was younger and felt that God had spared her. She has cancer. She wants to be with her Mom, who was a drug-addict, again some day. Sister "B" picked up on this and the Spirit directed her to it. We determined what she needed and next thing we knew, her countenance had changed and she said she would do anything to be with her again. Wow.

I can't believe that I've really only been here for two weeks. It feels like I have grown so much already. The power of God's love says it all. There is nothing in the world like it- and I want to help everyone experience it. I love you all so much Mom, Dad, Melanie, Jaron and Zach. So much. When we talked about love in class, I realized how incredibly blessed I've been to have you there for me my entire life. Some people don't have that. That is why I'm here so that somehow God can touch their lives and their hearts with His magical, changing touch. The gospel is true. Jesus Christ lives. He loves us. He loves me. He loves you. I am praying for you. I pray for you a lot :) You say so many prayers here :) It's amazing. If you haven't talked to God in a while, you should. He wants to hear from you. I love you! Please have the best week and be safe. God loves you. If you don't know it, know that I do.

Love you so much!

Sister Alicia Johnson

Alicia! 11-21-13 First MTC day and First Email

 Family breakfast at the Village Inn SLC. Mel found a sign and felt it was appropriate to take a pic of Alicia.

They actually gave us a chance to say goodbye and take pics. We had nice Elders who said, "Take your time." She's way excited to start her next 1-1/2 year of being Sister Johnson! 

Date: Wed, 21 Nov 2012 13:47:09 -0700
Subject: Check it out! I'm totally at the MTC

HELLO FAMILY!!

How is everyone doing? I hope everyone is doing well :) Mom says you are already seeing blessings. That's great! Because I am too. I am learning so so so much! They just jam-pack your brain full of information. It's absolutely nuts. Anyways- I am going to quickly reply to some of your messages but I really want to handwrite some messages today too. So if my response doesn't seem very good to what you all sent me, just expect an answer in a letter k? Ok! I love you!

So I have received dearelder mail from Dad and Mom twice and Melanie once. You guys should write me ALL of the time :) getting mail really is the highlight. It is crazy how some of the missionaries totally depend on it. Honestly, I am ok either way. After learning how to wait for a year with Michael mail, I have the blessing of being able to handle it just fine. And I got a letter from Dad. It was good to see Dad's handwriting. I sure love you all :) Ummm... ok. So MTC stuff. My companion is Sister B from Arizona. She was inactive for 6 years and completely turned her life around. She has basically seen everything of the world. It is amazing looking at her now because you would never guess that she would do all that crazy stuff. She has a strong testimony of missionary work because the missionaries were the ones that helped her turn her life around. Other fun facts about Sister B: during her 6 years of inactivity she went through a hippie phase. She had a dred and everything! WICKED AWESOME! She has a dog that she loves. She loves Lord of the Rings and she loves to quote funny movies. Also she is a massage therapist- major blessing! She has helped me relax after all of the tension of class time and teaching lessons.

I got called as a Coordinating Sister. It is almost like the Relief Society President and I have finally felt why callings like that are so difficult. You have so many Sisters to look after and make sure are doing ok- it can be quite stressful to think about. Luckily, the Lord also gives you strength. And He knows exactly what you can handle. When I had an emotional-stress breakdown, they were all there for me. See the thing is, my whole life I have tried to do everything right. I live by rules- in fact, I can't function if I am not living by the rules- and I can see my vision and my purpose for being here. Others, however, are still figuring that out. Out of the group of Sisters in my room (there are four of us total) I feel like total Molly Mormon. They have all been more closely associated with things of the world and have used the Atonement in other ways. I don't judge them at all. In fact, I totally adore them. The thing is sometimes their conversations feel totally unrelatable to me. I mean, most of my friends hadn't even kissed boys.... It's just different. It is good though. I learn a lot from them.

The MTC actually does have good food. I am really grateful that I figured out how to eat before I came though. I haven't felt this good in a long time. I mostly just eat eggs in the morning and lots of salad for lunch and dinner. They have other good things though like meat and potatoes and hamburgers and ice cream... Mmmmm today they had coconut macaroons. Ya :) So the food is really good actually. There is enough variety.

As far as the learning here goes- wow, wow, wow is it wild! What a wild ride! Boy is it wild! They literally cram you crazy full. You are in class or studying ALL day long. MELANIE!!! READ THROUGH THE LESSONS IN PREACH MY GOSPEL!!! Just do it. That is the one thing I DIDN'T do and its hard to find time to do it here. BECAUSE I am already teaching investigators. That's right. In fact, yesterday was the most heinous? lesson of my life. Her name is Louanna? Lowana? (It just makes me think of Lafownduh). Anyways, she was this very blunt little black lady that really was not going to let us in. More info- so they do teaching called TRC (Teaching Resource Center). They do Zone teaching and they do class teaching. Within each of those teaching sections you are teaching several investigators or less-active members. I have a total of 6 people to teach. Usually about 2-3 a day. Anyways, the TRC gets people (less-active or investigators) who COULD be actors- or they might be real. As far as I can tell, the ones we have are VERY real. At least it feels that way. So it is way intimidating because you don't know very much and you don't want to mess up. Well, my companion and I went in to talk to Lowana (I'm just gonna spell it this way) and we had NO idea what we were doing. We tried to just ask questions and get to know her. We talked about her belief in God. And 20 minutes in we had nothing left to say and 25 more minutes to fill. We were gonna try to teach the first lesson or the Book of Mormon or anything but our minds both were drawing complete blanks. She started to fight with my companion a little bit. I was getting more nervous by the minute- but I was honest with her the whole time which seemed to help. I was able to step in and start teaching a little bit- but words were practically impossible. Then by some miracle, right before we were about to leave, she said that we had been sent by God to help her feel His love around the holidays which is usually a hard time since she isn't close to her family.

We stepped away feeling like we had learned a TON. Be prepared. Always. But even then, the Lord won't allow you to fail completely if you are really trying. Then one of the Branch Presidency shared a thought about how as long as we help people feel God's love, we are successful. That made me feel better. What a growing week..... So much to tell and literally only one minute left on the timer.

I LOVE YOU ALL!! I wish you the Happiest Thanksgiving! Have fun with the family at Grandma's house!

Love always,

Sister Alicia Johnson

Alicia! 11-14-13 Leaving for the MTC

Sister Alicia Johnson has been called to serve in the Tennessee Nashville mission. She reports to the MTC on November 14, 2012. She will be there for a period of three weeks. Melanie, with the recent age change for mission calls, has begun preparations to put in her own mission papers. She anticipates that she will be leaving in the spring of 2013. This will be a blog to report the happenings within both of the girls' missions. If anyone is interested in sending mail to Alicia her addresses are as follows:

MTC address:
Sister Alicia Johnson
MTC Mailbox # 186
TN-NASH 12102005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604-1793
USA

Mission Home Address:
Sister Alicia Johnson
Tennessee Nashville Mission
105 Westpark Dr Ste 190
Brentwood, TN 37027
USA

We will be updating this blog with area changes and changes of address throughout the period of the girls' missions. Thanks for all of your love and support for our sweet sisters in the service!