1st week in Denver

Hello everyone!!!!

Can I just say, it is so good to be talking at you! haha. P Day Yay Day! I love the mission, but I love seeing pictures and reading emails from my awesome friends and family! It helps me remember me.

I have had a really crazy week.  Good and emotional. Surprise Surprise I've cried a lot. (in drill team I always was winning awards for my awesome and over-productive tear ducts! ahaha)

I have never felt home sickness before even after 2 years up at Utah State, because mama Sheri was always just a funny txt message away.  But being out here I just missed her SO BAD! I was just fighting back tears all day for most of the week. I was so blessed to have my awesome trainer, Sister Burnett helping me out.  She understood what I was going through and so we laughed and talked and cried a lot together this past week.  She is awesome, and will be a lifelong friend, I just know it.  The Lord was really kind, and didn't put me with someone I had to learn to love, cuz I love her already!!!

It was really really hard missing home and family SO MUCH, but in a way, it's kind of a blessing to realized just HOW MUCH I love them.  I know that I am separated from my family for a time, so I can help God be reunited with His family forever.  I just want people to be able to experience the joy that comes when they know how to be able to come to God and Jesus Christ, and how to be with their own families forever!  (When I was tracting, I felt a prompting to ask a man how he would feel if he knew he could be with his loved ones forever?.. Turns out his wife had passed away... but sadly he said he wasn't interested in hearing and turned us away. I'm sure his wife on the other side was like "come on man!" but hopefully he will soften his heart and come around eventually)

I had my first Sunday out here in Thornton and it was awesome and crazy! I bore my testimony to introduce myself to the ward and after the meeting some people came right up to me! One was Brother Sean Rasmussen's brother!!!! WHAAAAA? I told him I loved having Brother Ras as my seminary teacher, and that his son Josh is one of my best friends!!! So it was so crazy how small of a world it can be.  Also another guy came up and he was a Scottorn from Fillmore and knew Daddy Hunter from school so that was fun too!

Yesterday was just a miraculous day.  We invited Dede and Ray to come to church with us. they live a kind of rough life, but they are humble and awesome people! They came, with 3 CRAZY kids. like seriously wild. At one point the little boy Jack, 2 yrs, was running around naked in the bathroom haha, I thought of all the times I have chased and caught little baby pigs on the loose and had to smile. I don't think she would've appreciated that. haha. We taught them later that night, and seriously EVERYTHING they told us let us know that the Gospel is what they and their family needs! We have been praying to find a whole family to teach and bring to the Gospel, and I think this might be the family! They are so sweet and humble and offered to feed us at our next lesson, and they are going to come again to church with us hopefully. It was seriously a miracle!!!

Also, we have an investigator - Milan - who is from the Czech republic.  there is a little bit of a language barrier, but for the most part he speaks great English. He is just a really nice man.  There is a guy in our stake that served in the Czech republic, so he is coming with us to lessons and it's amazing to hear them speak Czech back and forth. I don't know exactly what they are saying, but I felt the Spirit, and I knew what Bro Oliver was teaching was true. Man, the GOSPEL IS SO GOOD!

So I borrowed a bike from an awesome member, and so yes, I will be riding a bike some days when it's not our turn to have the car (I can't remember if I told you we are sharing with another pair of sisters) and so it is going to be an adventure. Hopefully I come back from my mission lookin better than ever. Not that it matters at all, but I'm just trying to think of every positive thing about the bike situation! I really am stoked, and I think me and sis Burnett are going to have a blast! But I know it will be tough too.!

So the members feed us every night for dinner, and last night we ate at a member's house was a bass player in a band! I told him I played bass and guitar and that I missed playing guitar so much! My callouses are peeling off. gross. i know. But he got out his acoustic guitar and I played come thou fount! It was so nice to play again! I felt like me again after a wild week. I just remember the things I love and the people I love and I just continue to be me, the best me that the Lord wants me to be for these people!

I just want to tell everyone that is reading this that I love you! I miss you all, but I am excited to work so hard these next 18 months so that when I get back, I won't have wasted a single day. If you want to email me do it at makinzie.hunter@myldsmail.net, or you can write! I loved hearing from those who have sent word (haha) and it meant a lot. Getting mail is like, YESSSS!!!!!! (happy dance, neighbors watching.. oooo awkward. turns around, walks away, not ashamed. haha)

Enjoy the simple things! Listen to your favorite song for me, alright? I miss my music, but it's fine! I'm loving the "nearer" album. check it out. "How Great Thou Art" by Chris Moffitt is phenomenal and makes me way happy!!!!

My spiritual thought comes from a Jeffrey R. Holland talk. I'm really paraphrasing here, but he talks about how we already know who is going to win. Jesus Christ is going to win. This church IS the true church.  But sometimes it's hard for us humans to figure out what jersey we want to wear. Well, I'm here wearing His jersey - my nametag. I'm grateful to be able to be playing on His team, and I know He will be with me. He already has been with me. I just hope that every day each and every one of us will wake up and choose to put on His jersey, and try our best to do what He would have us do. He is the perfect Coach, He is our Elder Brother. He is our Shepherd. He is our Savior. He will be with us.

Onward Christian Soldiers!