Elder Parker Enger Mission Letters

Hello everyone, This week was the final of the MTC. It was bit sad saying our goodbyes, but I can't wait to get out into the field. In our Monday classes, we mainly practiced teaching the whole Plan of Salvation and discussing the importance of the Book of Mormon for us and for those we teach. During my different breaks, my mom and I played with the dog, and we started playing Ticket to Ride: Europe because we're probably the only ones in our family who enjoy playing that game haha. So far, we've each won two games, so it's been pretty close. On Tuesday, we started practicing Lesson 3: The Gospel of Jesus Christ (i.e. faith, repentance, baptism, gift of the Holy Ghost, enduring to the end), and had a devotional this week where we watched a video about President Ballard and Elder Holland answering questions about missionary work, and they talked for a bit about how essential the Book of Mormon is and why we as missionaries should be disappointed when people don't ...

To whom it may concern, It's my fifth email, and I'm already starting to run out of ideas to open these, that's not good. Regardless, this week has been pretty good, though I have been getting a bit antsy as I wait to go out into the field haha. On Monday, I definitely started to feel more restless as I prepared for my classes, and I had the opportunity to give my dad a blessing after he had given everyone else father's blessings for school/mission. It was pretty neat; I got pretty hot while I was speaking, and I think that was a combination of both the Spirit and me feeling like my awkward self haha. It was good though, I'm grateful that I could participate in that. Tuesday was more or less the same in regards to my classes; this week, we've been focused on teaching the Plan of Salvation. We also did a fun activity in which we (as companions) practiced bartering with a vendor for ingredients to prepare a meal (we were learning about Tagalog words for food). ...

Dear friends and family, This week was more or less the same as last week. I could notice by the end of the week that my teachers were using more and more Tagalog when explaining instructions to us (they use some English here and there), and we're expected to use it a bit more than we have, but we're still mainly expected to just use what we know and speak Taglish to the best of our abilities. In my classes, we've continued to memorize phrases for each principle taught in the first lesson, and we've been practicing teaching each individual principle. So far, I think my smoothest and most clear subject I've practiced teaching in class has been talking about the Book of Mormon, so I hope I can continue to have that confidence and composure when it comes to that topic at least. We've also been doing more roleplay scenarios in Tagalog to practice meeting people on the street or getting to know them or resolving their concerns. Sometimes I feel a bit awkward as I s...

Mahal kong pamilya at mga kaibigan, This week was the first week in which my classes were completely (mostly) in Tagalog. It wasn't as bad as I was expecting (though our classes are a bit more quiet haha), but it was still interesting. For example, whenever I try to translate something I want to say in my head, any leftover English that I don't know how to say Tagalog immediately is translated into Spanish because I've been in the English-to-Spanish mindset for so long. Sometimes, I even have to stop myself from talking in Spanish to my Tagalog class haha *facepalm*. It's all going well though, and my teachers and tutor say that my Tagalog is coming along nicely. My classes were slightly different this week. Instead of studying the doctrine that we teach and how to better our teaching skills, we've also focused on learning grammatical concepts in Tagalog, how to better develop the gift of tongues, and practicing teaching different principles in Tagalog to the best...