nate morris west indies mission

Hey everyone!

I wasn't able to email last week due to QUARANTINE! What an interesting experience that was. Most of the time I spent was sleeping, reading theBook of Mormon, and studying Preach my Gospel. It was extremely hard to focus when I was surrounded by sick Elders that just felt like joking around the whole time instead of buckling down and getting some work done. I outlined all of Lesson 2 during my 5 days there. Not as much as I would have liked to get done but I actually came out ahead of my district. It was a tough 5 days. I couldn't receive packages but I got notices of 3 packages from my district so I wasn't able to open them until the following monday, which was... 2 days ago! Thank you so much for your packages sent Mom & Dad! I got the backpack and all the stuff inside. Thanks for the picture album as well! Ya know it's pretty cool, we get a 40 percent discount of mostly everythingin the MTC bookstore. So Like i got this water purifier water bottle for the mission which'll be good for clean water, usually 50 bucks. got it for like 33. I appreciate the get well package as well! I couldn't get it until after I was already better but it's been fun to have and was a nice gesture. I appreciate your fasting as well. You didn't have to but I felt much better all around knowing that. Your prayers work you guys! For some reason it won't let me use the enter button so I'll have to just do it in one big paragraph now. You guys are asking for some details so here they are! So what we do each week is this. On Mondays we have TRC appointments. (Teaching Resource Center).Volunteers come in and are fake investigators. We teach them a 40 minute lesson, go out and think about what we taught and what we didn't do well, then do a 10 minute follow up with them. We taught the first lesson on Monday and it went really well! Ya know the spirit works in different ways all the time. Last week Elder Bednar came and spoke to us in a Devotional. I was in quarantine but they broadcasted it to our tv that we had. He talked about the question "How do I know if it's the spirit or just me? " His answer? "Don't worry about it." He used many examples on how the spirit doesn't manifest itself as the spirit most of the time. He told some interesting stories about how he just did something for some weird reason then later found out how important that decision was and that it was the spirit. We don't always know when the spirit is telling us to do things. He said as long as we are diligent and working hard at our calling, the Lord will guide our footsteps and the Spirit will be with us always directing our thoughts and our hearts.It was an absolutely phenomenal talk. Like really? The talks and devotionals here are so much more meaningful it feels like. I dunno what it is. Well yes I do. We are missionaries of the church of JESUS CHRIST and we are his messengers! The spirit is so strong here all of the time. Well in our TRC appointment monday i felt that. I didn'tknow why but i started talking about more of the first lesson, and Ifelt that the investigator actually needed to hear a testimony of the restoration. So I did talk about that! We testified of the restoration and this 19 year old kid started to cry. It was a great experience and we felt that even though this was a volunteer, that he did actually need to hear that and the spirit was guiding our words.

It worked! (The enter bar) Well more about the MTC. We get one hour a day each of Personal study and companion study. Classes most days with teachers about 4 hours each teacher. 45 minutes for lunch and dinner,30 for breakfast. My district is AWESOME. We all are great friends now.

I am loving it here at the MTC. My testimony is growing tremendouslyand I am working my butt off! People CAN'T come into the MTC expecting a few classes and learning a bit. You learn TONS and work extremely hard.We are always so tired after classes.

I loved your stories about the cabin and all that stuff. You guys are working almost as hard as me!

BTW: My flight leaves SLC monday morning at 7 AM. I have to report to the travel desk at 4 in the morning with everything ready to go. I am excited and scared!! We transfer in Atlanta and will get to Trinidad atabout 7:30 at night Eastern Time. I am sad i missed 5 days here for I feel like i could have used 2 extra TRC appointments to help me get better at teaching.

Letters home have been tough. I was able to write every day in quarantine but it takes longer to get home than expected. Also I can only write on P-Days which are wednesdays and this is my last one...

I can't finish up all I wanted to say so I'll send a letter home withsome more details of life at the MTC. I will write it after I end this email talk.

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH. I can't wait to serve the Lord. Keep it real!

-Elder Nathan Morris