Of former NFL players, tiny miracles, and missionary growth

Selamat pagi kawan dan keluarga,

First, thank you all so much for the emails and letters and love. I try to reply as much as I can but there's never enough time. I have a suggestion, you can use DearElder.com to email me, it's free (you have to make a screenname I think) and then they print out the email and give it to me the night of. I think it would be nice to get your notes throughout the week instead of just on Thursday all at once...hint hint. I really do appreciate all of the emails. They are so encouraging and you seem to say exactly the things I need to hear. As of Tuesday, I'm officially halfway done with my MTC stay! Three more weeks to go. I feel like there's still so much for me to learn. I am getting more comfortable speaking conversational Malay and hardly need notes as I teach the missionary lessons save for a couple vocabulary words.

I saw Sister Amy Chirinos all day yesterday. She got transferred from Main Campus to West Campus. I gave her a huge hug and was so glad to see her. Then, this morning, I saw Sister Alex Morgan, and gave her a huge hug, tried not to cry, and asked how she was doing since yesterday was her first day here. I can't begin to tell you how nice it was to see familiar faces from Salem. It's nice to have a taste of home, even though I should stop being a sissy because it's only been three weeks. I also saw Elder Austin Johnson at Tuesday's devotional a couple weeks ago, and a girl I lived with in the dorms at BYU who works at the MTC West cafeteria. And another girl from the dorms who's a missionary herself now. Small world, eh? Also, one day during class, a new MTC teacher walked into my classroom to train with the other Malay district, and I said, "Alex?!" He turned around and I awkwardly asked him how his mission was and how cool it was that he's an MTC teacher now. We went on a couple dates when we were freshman at BYU, and I had a huge crush on him, so the whole time we were talking, I guess my face was super red. So my district really likes making fun of me now for that. Perfect. At choir practice, I turned around and saw a Sister with the nametag "Sister Griffin" with katakana under it and exclaimed, "You're Sunny's sister!" We talked about how her sister served with my brother in Nagoya and how I went to school with Sunny. I'll send a picture that I took with her. It was so cool to meet her.

So the tiny miracle - last Thursday night, I felt myself starting to catch a cold, then all weekend I was exhausted and miserable throughout my classes because I had no energy. I was also coughing a lot and had a runny nose. It was terrible. On Sunday, I got a blessing, and immediately felt better. If you want more detail on that experience for me, ask my dad to forward you that email because it's personal to me and I wasn't sure if it would be good to put it here haha. But seriously if you're curious, ask, regardless of how well you think you know me.

Last Sunday, our branch presidency announced that we had 330 missionaries on West Campus now, and by October, the number should exceed to over 1,000 and then exceed the number at Main Campus. How crazy is it that we have so many missionaries willing to serve? Anyway, I'm glad I'll be gone for most of it, I liked having my small MTC campus. They're starting to fence us in and build gates, I don't like it at all haha. Here's an article I read about the growth: http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/mormon-missionary-life Mikel, can you post it on my facebook, along with the video about the Elders? I think it really hits the nail on the head about why we're here serving and how our purpose is to bring others closer to Christ. I want all of my friends to see it.

For Sunday's devotional address, Vai Sikahema spoke to us about his mission. He played for BYU in college, and then was the first Tongan-born player drafted into the NFL. He played for the Eagles, the Cardinals, and the Green Bay Packers! Living with the Gilberts made me like the Packers so I was really excited when Vai said that. He continued his career as a sportscaster in Philadelphia and covers the winter Olympics. He said a couple things that made a profound impact on me. He said something like, "I've worn many iconic uniforms. I wore the iconic Green Bay uniform. I've worn a Cardinals helmet. I wore a BYU helmet. I wore an Eagles helmet. But none have been as important in my life as the white shirt, tie, and black name tag. The uniform of a missionary." He continued to say, "My career has taken me to many exotic locations. But they pale in comparison--pale-- to my mission in beautiful South Dakota." 

He continued to say we become advocates and ambassadors to the people we serve. We should love the people so much that we identify as one of them. If we serve in South Dakota, we should consider ourselves South Dakotan, Japan, Japanese, Texas, Texan. And so on. I know it sounds funny, but I hope I can consider myself at least in part Malaysian. I really think my mission will be that big a part of me.

Yet again, I'm out of time. I really wanted to write a little about each Elder in my district so you can get a sense of how wonderful, how funny, and how fun my district is. Maybe next week. Ever since I got my mission call, in every prayer, I say to God, "Look, I can't do this by myself. I can't learn Malay on my own, it's really hard. I can't learn the doctrine on my own, there's no way I'm articulate enough to teach the lessons by myself, or have enough energy to get through the day with all that I have to do. PLEASE help me." And He does. I'm so glad He loves us enough to help us do extraordinary, impossible things. Last week I heard we can't do this work (especially as young as we are), but it's not our work, it's God's work, and we're just here to help. This gospel is true. Injil ini benar. The church is true. Gereja ini benar. I love that the gospel gives all of us a way to access the atonement and we can be forgiven of our sins and feel peace and joy. I was pretty stupid not to utilize the atonement for some of my life. Never again. I can't believe how happy and how exhausted this work makes me. I love the missionary version of myself.

Hati-hati,

Sister Ellen Wynn

With Sister Griffin, whose older sister served in the Japan Nagoya Mission with Sister Wynn's brother!