Week Two!

I was checking my email every hour on the hour until today's email arrived this afternoon! Sorry it took me a while to get it posted, but here it is!

I have seen so many miracles this week. Not like... part the Red Sea miracles, but miracles still the same. There is an Elder in my district who is the only member of his family (10 children) that is active and that served/is serving a mission. He said one of his main motivations was to be a good example to his older siblings and his Dad. This past week he got a letter from his dad saying that he went to church, and that he's thankful for his example. Good, good stuff.

Also, we had an amazing experience in the TRC. On Friday we had our second appointment with our "progressing investigator" L*. She was hard to teach because she just seemed so apathetic about everything! We made the mistake last time of not opening up enough, and just diving into the lesson so this time we really tried to ask her questions, get to know her, and really develop a relationship with her so she could trust us and more easily accept our message. Well, about 15 minutes in, I asked her this question, "What matters most to you?" and she started bawling. She said that she hasn't thought about that in a long time. That nothing really means anything to her anymore, that since her sister died in 2007 it's been really hard for her. She was crying more than we expected, though, and after a few minutes she stopped us and said, "I'm gonna have to break character. And I'm not supposed to do that, so I'll be sure to tell my boss, but I need to explain something that I can't explain while I'm in character." She went on to explain that her "story" as L* the investigator is actually her real story, 4 years ago. Her mom is a drug addict, she never knew her father. She was in foster care from the age of 9, and ended up on the streets and had cancer. Two missionaries contacted her and she was converted. She came to Utah with 20 dollars in her pocket and went to the Huntsman Cancer Institute for treatment. She has been a member for 4 years. She explained to us that she's been having an especially rought time recently, and that she hasn't been to church in about 4 weeks. But she said that my question made her realize what IS important to her. "The gospel's what matter. Christ's what matter. That what matter to me." She kept telling us that we really followed that Spirit by asking that question, and that she is so grateful for that reminder. She is just the sweetest lady. We were all bawling, and we closed by kneeling in prayer together, thanking God for such a powerful feeling of the Spirit. It was an incredible experience.

I cannot even tell you how fast time is flying here. I can't believe I've been here for 2 weeks already! The days are insanely long (sometimes when I'm writing in my journal I'll think, "Was that really just this MORNING? Feels like forever ago!") but it really is flying by. I LOVE being so busy.

I sang "An Angel From on High" in Sacrament Meeting this week. It was going to be a duet with Elder Morrill but he is a really light base, and my semi-truck of a voice was kind of.... destroying him. So he said it would be better to just have me do a solo. I fought, but he insisted. It wasn't me just being a jerk!! The performance was okay. Nothing great but not my worst.

Being here on the 10th anniversary of September 11, 2001 was an amazing, amazing thing. If you would have asked baby Melissa where she would be 10 years in the future, there is no way she would have said that I would be here in the MTC. Even LAST year on September 11th, I wouldn't have thought it possible. But here I am! And I'm so grateful. For our Sunday night Fireside, we got to watch the Music and the Spoken Word special edition with Tom Brokaw narrating. It was SO cool. If you haven't seen it - GO WATCH IT RIGHT NOW! I was (not surprisingly) bawling the whole time. For the closing song, we sang "Called to Serve." They didn't have us stand up (because the MTC is trying to get rid of traditions including standing when singing that song, and even tie exchanges! Weird, huh?) but I wanted to stand SO bad. By the time we go to the second verse - we were all standing. We couldn't be contained. It was SO powerful! I absolutely loved it. I couldn't sing because I was crying too hard, but just to listen to thousands and thousands of missionaries singing that with such power--it was an expericnce I'll never forget.

We got our travel plans this week! I'm the travel leader which means I have to call church headquarters if anything goes wrong. Nice. We are going to be on Delta flight 270 leaving at 9:45 am on 9/21. It's the 4 of us from our district, and another four from another district, I think Spanish speaking. Should be cool! I'm sad to leave here, but excited to get to Boston! Perhaps being outside of Provo, this mission will feel a bit more real.

Anyway, the weather has been just incredible and we study outside every chance we get. It's hard, though. Being in Provo and thinking about BYU. I miss it, but I know this is where I'm supposed to be. I'm so lucky to get that confirmation so often.

Love you all! Thanks for everything,

Sis. Broekhuijsen