MTC

Just over thirteen years ago we dropped our son Eli off at the Missionary Training Center (MTC), he was preparing to serve a mission in Mexico. I thought how brave he was to leave family and friends for two years armed only with a suitcase and a testimony.

As “Senior” missionaries, Kathleen and I have just spent a week at the MTC. It is quite an experience to get an inside view, and to rub shoulders with the hundreds of young missionaries that are preparing to serve in destinations throughout the world. They are abuzz with energy and anticipation, and so willing to invest themselves in the Lord’s errand.

I would say that the MTC operates like a well oiled machine, but that would discount the great effort of the hundreds that serve here, to do all that they can do, to make the MTC the place it is.

When I was a young man, I worked on several projects that were remote, where the workforce was housed in man camps. A few of them housed comparable number to the MTC, but the size of the population is the only real commonality because unlike those projects, the MTC isn’t about gas or oil or gold, it’s about sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I have to admit, that I initially grasped at the need for me to spend a week in the MTC – I am serving in ‘Physical Facilities’. I now see that if I had arrived in Nauvoo without it…I wouldn’t be a missionary.

I am grateful for our week at the MTC. The trainers, devotionals, and general environment of the MTC made it an uplifting and inspiring experience. A suitcase and a testimony is what I arrived with, and I am leaving with the same, but both are filled to abundance!

Artwork abounds at the MTC – inviting the Spirit, touching the heart, and stirring the soul. Here are some of my favorites…