Sziasztok barátaim és családa

Sziasztok barátaim és családaim!

Let us take a moment to consider the fact that I am starting week 4 at the MTC. So far the food hasn't completely destroyed me from the inside out but I wouldn't put it past the cafeteria staff if they up the dosage of laxatives in literally EVERY meal. There are good days and bad days but mostly terrible days and I don't know if I'll ever recover.

Hungarian classes are getting to be really fun because we can understand our teachers at a level similar to how I could understand French after 4 years of it in high school. Except - remember how I said that there are about 1,000 different endings you have to shuffle through when you want to conjugate a verb? We had a new teacher the other day come in and ask us about ourselves like a normal person would and when it became my turn I said, "Martin Elder vagyok, Szent Louisból jöttem, és szeret- *fumbles for an appropriate ending* ...-lek". I was meaning to say "I'm Elder Martin, I'm from St. Louis and I like to play piano" or something along those lines but what I actually did say roughly translates as "I'm Elder Martin, I'm from St. Louis, and... I love you". Needless to say it was definitely the most intimate experience that I've had with a teacher here in the MTC. The other Elderek definitely aren't letting me live this one down. Now we all greet everyone in the MTC "Szeretlek" to which they amicable reply, "Oooh, is that hello in Hungarian??" to which reply in the affirmative. Or we just troll and say "salad" or "sea lion" or something like that. The wonderful thing about Hungarian is that it has almost no English cognates and a rather complex grammar system thus rendering it utterly indecipherable to unfortunate passers by. I guess what I'm trying to say is, the upside to learning a language that no one learns/speaks is that no one has the slightest idea of what you're saying, which comes in handy (Fuchs Elder and I utilize this facet quite blatantly in front of unsuspecting Senior Missionary couples / anyone who dares cross us). But we only say things that would keep the companionship of the Spirit, because He definitely understands Hungarian :).

On Tuesday, an apostle came to speak!! Everyone is always speculating who it's going to be (with literal bets placed on Bednar or Holland) and we were all pleasantly surprised to see Russell M. Nelson, President of the Quorum of the 12!! He gave an excellent devotional, from which I gleaned the importance of temples and the wonderful promises we make there, both to God and to our spouses. The coolest thing by far, though, was to see the Christlike love that he has for each of us missionaries almost physically radiating from him.

On Friday we taught another real Hungarian! (picture below) His name is Jenő, and he used to be a DJ back in the Homeland and then moved to America after he joined the church. He said that he will most likely meet up with us again in Hungary when he goes back to visit in a year. We understood a little bit more of what he said this week than we did of the woman we visited with last week. It's marvelous to see the progress we can make with the Lord's help.

For Sunday night devotional, Jenny Oaks Baker and her family came to perform! She is an amazing LDS violinist with both Curtis Institute and Julliard under her belt. Among the hymn renditions that she performed were I am a Child of God and A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief! I performed both of these renditions with my mom in the last 2 years, and the evening brought back warm memories of home and family. Afterward, Fuchs Elder and I went up to talk with her. I got the chance to shake her hand and tell her about the two pieces we had in common, and then I was planning on getting a picture with her so Fuchs Elder said in his German accent, "So now I will get a picture with you two!" to which a security guard shouted, "No pictures! this is a chapel!" because apparently the devotional room is a chapel. She was super nice, but as we left and as I told Fuchs that I was a bit bummed that we couldn't get a picture, he said, "I got pictures of you two talking the whole time!" (see below) Thankfully I have a companion that has no qualms about taking pictures of/with ANYONE (see below).

Jenny Oaks Baker also spoke a bit about faith in between her pieces. She was relating an experience when she was in Israel on a study abroad and her mother was diagnosed with cancer. She said she prayed in faith for her mother to heal, but her mother continued to get worse and worse until her eventual death. She was really confused why this had happened. She said that she thought she had enough faith to heal her mother. But that's when her Dad (Dallin H. Oaks) said to her, "I believe that the only true faith is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His will." This was a mind-opening statement to me. I have been wondering a lot recently how exactly it is that our faith affects temporal outcomes here on earth. Jenny said that she shouldn't have had faith that her mother would be healed, but faith in Jesus Christ and that whatever happens, He would make up the difference. In Ephesians 4:5, it says that there is "one Lord, one faith, one baptism." It sure makes life a whole lot easier to just have faith in Jesus Christ than in life's many, ultimately arbitrary dead-ins. I think so, at least.

Thank you all for your support and prayers.

With love,

Martin Elder