Buck's Address-Sucre 220 Oficina 504 Edificio Bulnes Antofagasta Chile

Elder Buck Howard's Address-
Sucre 220 Oficina 504 Edificio Bulnes Antofagasta Chile

Friday, January 6, 2012

How to celebrate New Year's in the MTC

HAPPY NEW YEARS!! I hope everyone had a great new years.. and hope no one else has already broken their new years resolution.. Because I sure did! hah Well its starting to become just a routine with everything here, but I don't want that to be the case. Ive been learning so much and if I just go through the motions I won't be getting anything near as much as I could if I gave it my full effort.
Here are a couple way cool experiences I had this week.
This last week we had an Elder in our district get really sick, he had mono before he came into the MTC and had been experiencing extreme fatigue, loss of appetite, throwing up, and it got to the point where his eyes were turning yellow. I was super scared for the elder so we made him go talk to the front desk and they rushed him to the hospital. But the cool experience came after that.. I decided to fast for help/comfort with the language, and on his behalf. (the next day) was new years day.. We went to sacrament meeting and had a testimony meeting. There were some elders that told their conversion stories that really touched my heart.. It made me realize how no one is ever TOO far gone to be saved by the grace of Jesus Christ. And that is my purpose in my mission, to help all people, to give all people unconditional love so they may have to same joy that I have been blessed with in my life. Then later that night, we had a devotional with the whole MTC... It was uhh.. lets just say not that enticing. however, after that devotional we had another testimony meeting in our classroom with our district members. There is an Elder in our district named Elder Larson. He is 6'0 220 and I may not have ever seen a more jacked man! His arms alone are the size of both my legs. He is 22 years old and a paratrooper in the armed forces. This is his experience. One day while he was serving overseas, he was in a country in southeast Asia. A few of his army buds were walking around town at night time.. they were just messing around being the immature 21 year old kids they were. They were checking out random buildings and having fun. But eventually they found themselves walking into a human trafficking "house". After they realized what was going on they got scared.. they saw all the guns the men were holding.. and saw the girls being held captive and distraught. Then he made eye contact with a girl who had more sorrow in his eyes then he had ever seen in his life before. She said through her eyes "help me". He didn't know what to do.. he was surrounded by men with guns and he was defenceless.. they left the place immediately. but that woman's face was stuck in his mind. She was being held captive, she was in bondage. He had a dream later that night that they were both in Heaven, they were best friends. She told him that she would be stuck in that situation and he promised her that he would save here( at this time, he was filled with tears). After he woke up, he couldn't live with himself! He said to himself he couldn't let down another person he had already made a promise with in heaven. He decided to serve a mission at 22 years old because he couldn't live with himself knowing that people are waiting for him.
This was such a powerful experience we had as a district! I know people are waiting for me, and I know that I have the answer to their happiness. I WILL NOT let them down!!
There are 2 types of pain- 1. pain obtained from Hard Work!  or 2. Pain obtained from regrets.
Pain from hard work will go away! Pain from regretting not giving my all will tax forever on my soul!

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