#FreeElderMaughan

 Hola de nuevo familia y amigos. 

I only have 1 1/2 weeks left in the MTC, isn't that exciting!! My Espanol is nowhere near perfect yet but I am a whole lot better at it than I was when I started this journey so that's a win in my book. I am so excited to end the beginning chapter of my mission and move onto the real thing. And lucky enough for me, I finish the mtc the day before general conference so that will be super super bien. 

This past week in the mtc has been nothing short of miraculous. I was able to watch all of the Book of Mormon videos in order on Sunday and that strengthened my understanding of the Book of Mormon in incredible ways. I've also had many good experiences with the gift of tongues. Last week I was evaluating my spanish skills and I was not confident at all. Then I prayed for many specific blessings to help me learn this maravilloso language and I was able to receive these blessings. My spanish seemed to flourish overnight. The day after I prayed I was in class and I finally could understand almost everything my teachers were saying. Things finally started to click and it has been awesome. I also had the opportunity to go to lunch with a few of my missionary friends and returned missionary friends and that was awesome. I learned so much about mission work and that I am going to be ok. I also had the chance to finally leave the house so that was cool too. 

Ok now for the topic of this email. These past two weeks I had to take care of some legal actions that occured like 8 months ago. (I blew up a spray paint can in front of a cop on accident) Because of this I had to go to court and deal with all that extremely entertaining and not at all boring stuff. Anyway they ended up dropping my case so it's not on my record and I have now fully been forgiven of that sin. Although God has forsaken this sin, my district hasn't. I texted our group chat that I was in court and they asked me why and everything so I explained it to them. As if the torture of being a young missionary in a room full of drug dealers and other criminals wasn't bad enough, my district started flaming me in the chat and in the preceeding classes. Luckily for them I am a good sport so I started to play along. I changed my zoom name to Ex Con Maughan and started the #FreeElderMaughan campaign. It was an instant hit and now it appears in almost every chatroom, group chat and email me and my district communicate in. I've also taken the name of Lil Maughan due to my impressive rapping ability about the Book of Mormon. 

I guess I have to explain that now too. This week during class we had to make a video on the Book of Mormon and I got put in a super dope group so we all unanimously decided that we were about to drop the most fire rap in all of history. After a few minutes of writing some of the hottest bars of this century and a few minutes of filming over zoom, our rap was released and a star was born. Like any other rapper Lil Maughan had legal trouble in his background but has since ceased his days of crime and started his days of rapping. His first song "The Book of Mormon: Another testament of Jesus Christ" was an instant hit and might be dropping in some future emails. 

Ok now let's get real. This past week I have studied a lot about Ammon. Ammon was a friend of Alma the younger, so during his younger years he was far from perfect and he committed many sins. Then an angel visited Alma and Ammon and all their friends and basically told them to either shape up or perish. They all followed this prompting and were spiritually reborn of Christ. They all were very powerful teachers and they preached the gospel in many ways. Ammon was prompted to go to the land of the Lamanites. He is captured and brought to King Lamoni, who was so impressed with him that he wanted him to marry one of his daughters. Ammon declined this offer but did agree to be one of the King's servants. While he was guarding the King's flocks with a few of the other servants, a few Lamanite robbers scattered the flocks and the servants feared for their lives because whenever this happened the King would slay his servants. But Ammon stayed calm, told the others to go find the flocks and waited for the robbers to come back. When the robbers came back he threw rocks at them and singlehanded chopped off every arm that was raised against him. Following this, Ammon went to ready the King's horses. The servants were astonished at this and went to tell the King the things which they had saw. The King was astonished as well and asked Ammon who he was and if he was the great spirit. Ammon then explained what gave him such great power to the King and he believed and long story short, repented of his sins and was born again of Christ and so were many of his people. Ammon was amazing because he never ceased to serve. He was purposely captured so he could serve King Lamoni, then during his service he went to great lengths to accomplish the tasks at hand, performing many miracles through the power of God and his faith in Christ. This led to King Lamoni's curiosity and eventual baptism. Through Ammon's simple and somewhat simple service, a truly great thing was brought to pass. 

I write about this today because service is one of the focuses of missionary work. Through service we help others and by helping others we are serving God, and when we serve God he will bless us with his Spirit and power. I testify of these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

I hope you all have a good week and you can feel free to email me separately if you'd like, just don't respond directly to this email. 

Con Amor,

-Lil Maughan, Ex Con Maughan AKA

Elder Maughan