WEEK ONE - LOST BOYS AND DWARVES IN BOXES

Hello Dear Friends and Family!

Wow. The MTC is a very interesting place.

On Wednesday we arrived at the Salt Lake City airport around 10:00 AM. I was with a few other elders waiting for the shuttle to the MTC. I met Elder Cook, who is going to Calgary the same time as I am! He's a really cool guy. We decided to start missionary work early and go and talk to an older woman sitting alone in the airport. Of course, we should have assumed that any nice old lady in the Salt Lake City airport is probably a member of the church, which she was. We had a nice talk with her that passed the time until we got on the shuttle.

We arrived at the MTC, and were brought into a room where we got everything we needed. We were quickly thrown from one station to another getting our nametags, keys, and iPads, until we were spit out the other side. It was very confusing and overwhelming. Then we were herded into another room with 600 other missionaries and sang a song and were talked to. After that everything is really jumbled in my memory. I did find Sister Ogden (Molly) and Elder Pang (Daniel) though and that was very comforting.

My companions (we're a three person companionship) are Elder Rice and Elder Blaine, both from Utah. They are such awesome guys that love to have fun, but also are able to get to work and have awesome testimonies. We work so well together and I love them already.

On Friday I started off the day still not feeling pretty great. On the "Missionary Stress Scale", I was a yellow. (Green, Yellow, Orange, Red) Later in the day, they told us that we would be teaching an actual investigator on Monday. That tipped it into a dark yellow. I was feeling pretty terrible. It was only the third day and I was already feeling terrible?! We went to class and our teacher, Sister Barrick, told us that we were going to be walking down to the gallery of pictures of the Savior, without talking at all, just thinking. I walked over to a picture of the Savior and a little boy and I just broke down crying.

It was an overwhelming feeling. I didn't know if it was because the picture was so sweet or something, but I knew the Holy Ghost was trying to tell me something. Next to each of the pictures is a little scripture and the one next to this picture was Matthew 18:3 which is, "Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven." I realized that the Spirit was trying to tell me that I needed to be converted to the Gospel. I've lived my whole life without a very strong testimony, and recently I've realized that I need to gain one. It was such a real experience. I am so glad that I was able to listen and learn from the Spirit. The rest of the day went smooth and wonderful.

I promise my emails in the future won't be as long as this, but this week has been a crazy experience, so I thought you would all want to know how it went. :) I love you all! Please feel free to write anytime! I love hearing from you!

Love, Elder DeWitt

P.S. I forgot to tell the story that the title of my email is based on... our residence hall got together for a group song and prayer for the night, and some of the elders pulled out a big cardboard box and laid it out in front of the room. The zone leader said, "Alright you new guys, grab a Book of Mormon." One poor elder walked over to the box, and a really...small elder jumped out of the box and scared the heck out of him. It turns out that we have an elder with dwarfism in our zone! He's a cool guy with a great sense of humor.

Companions, Elder Blaine and Elder Rice

District at the Provo Temple

Doing laundry on P-Day

P.P.S.  Mom, I have been taking really good care of myself these past few days, exercising every day, taking the vitamins, brushing my teeth every morning and night and getting up on time. I wish it were possible to get more sleep.

The food is good! I'm actually worried about gaining weight, because some people gain 20 pounds while they're here, and I need to fit in my clothes... but I'm exercising and actually trying to eat healthy so hopefully I do good! I've been eating apples and fruit and avoiding "junk cereal" and eating Life cereal instead. You would be proud of me I think!