Week 02 :: Thanksgiving
Happy thanksgiving!
Before I begin, quick shout out to the Seiuli Family, Uncle Mike & Aunty Tema, Tutehau, Samisoni, Raider, Logan, and my own fam for the care packages <3 mahalo nui :,)
Here at the MTC we have three devotionals for Thanksgiving. I forgot to mention I'm in the choir, we've been practicing this great piece called, "let zion in her beauty rise", for the first devotional and guess who shows up to speak to us...President Uchtdorf! So crazy. He talked about gratitude for the good things and also for trials. “If Trials make us turn to God, challenges become a tool that can refine us, Ask Heavenly Father what lesson you are going to learn from this experience. He mentions another way we can show gratitude and that is recognizing the talents and gifts God has blessed us with, and making something more out of them. "Practice true repentance and you will receive forgiveness, practice true forgiveness and you will receive forgiveness". One of the greatest things to be thankful for is the atonement and its ability to make things right with God.
We later had thanksgiving lunch in the cafeteria, did a service project making breakfast for needy families in Utah, had sack lunches for our thanksgiving dinner haha, watched the Other Side of Heaven and ended with a musical devotional starring Tanner James (previous contestant from The Voice team Usher) and Michael Dowel (another well known musician). It was beautiful.
I learn so much everyday about the language and spiritual things. I wish I could share everything on here but my time is very short for emails. A quote I really like is, "We are not earthly beings having a spiritual experience, we are spiritual beings having an earthly experience", I keep this in mind as I prepare to teach and love my brothers and sisters in Japan that God has been preparing to receive the Gospel.
Love you all,
Horito Shimai
