Training at the Provo MTC w/ General Authorities! [JULY 2025]
Welcome to the roughly monthly email to update friends and family about the life and adventures of Kirt & Emily Christensen as they lead and serve a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for 3 years in the heat and humidity, and chaos and craziness of San Pedro Sula, Honduras!
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July 2025
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On June 18th, we were set apart to be Mission Leaders over the Honduras San Pedro Sula East Mission by Elder Dale Renlund of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. I talked last email about what Elder Renlund told me after setting me apart, and I’ll never forget it, and the feeling of positivity and love that came over me…
The entire “Setting Apart” experience is quite unique. We met in his office, in the “Church Administration Building”, next to the Joseph Smith Building on Temple Square. I had always thought that all the offices were in the “Church Office Building”, but apparently most of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve are in the “Admin Building”. The building itself is not open to the public, and has very strict security protocols, the instructions we received on how to arrive at the meeting, and the timing, were very specific.
We met up with Emily's parents, Mark and Karen Spear, at the hotel we were staying at a couple of blocks from Temple Square. Our daughter Katie and our son Garret were already with us at the hotel. We walked over to Temple Square and met my mom, Connie Christensen, who drove out from Vernal for the meeting.
We were instructed to get everyone in our party together, and wait outside the building. At 15 minutes before our designated appointment, we were instructed to step into the entryway, pick up the phone on the wall and let Security know that we were there. They let us in, escorted us to a waiting lobby, and a few minutes later, escorted into Elder Renlund’s office. He had the exact amount of chairs needed waiting for us, and had us all seated and then started by asking Emily several questions. He was very kind, funny, and made us feel at ease, even though the reality of the calling ahead now seemed much more real than it had a few days before. When Elder Renlund spoke, the weight of it finally hit me, that yes, we had indeed sold our house, and most everything we owned, and soon would be leading a mission in Central America for what seems like forever. (3 years!) Meeting him was wonderful, and his advice for Emily was extremely timely and helpful!
We then headed down to Utah County for lunch with some of Emily’s extended family, and then went to Emily’s Uncle and Aunt’s house, the Worthens, to drop off our luggage, we stayed there while in training at the Provo MTC. They live across the street, and 2 blocks away from the MTC front gate, making it a nice, easy daily walk back and forth. It somewhat mystified the MTC security, as we had to explain several times that, yes, we were mission leaders, and yes, we’d just be walking to where we’d be staying.
Katie and Garret drove us to the MTC to drop us off! We’ve never had the Provo MTC “drop off” experience, as all of our kids had gone to foreign MTCs. So, like hundreds of thousands of other missionaries before us, we drove to the Provo MTC, went down the ramp into the parking garage, took a quick picture with the 2 kids, gave them a hug and started our journey at the MTC.
The “Mission Leader Seminar” only happens once per year, for 4 days at the end of June, from Wednesday to Sunday. Mission Leaders from the entire world attend, many travel from homes in far-flung places, spend a few days at the Seminar in training, and then head back out to missions, also scattered across the world! It’s fascinating to be able to meet new Mission Leaders from Africa, the Philippines and India, among other places that are represented.
The Missionary Department of the Church is in charge of all the organization, the logistics and the scheduling is done by some of the same staff that we’d been talking to for months on the phone and by zoom calls. As we entered the MTC grounds, the first person to stop us was a brother that had done our very first zoom calls after we were called, Sheldon Packard.
Upon entering the greeting area for all the new Mission Leaders, you pass by all of the employees from the Missionary Department and they are cheering and clapping their hands, shaking hands with you, and they immediately pin on your new missionary tags, and sign you in.
We hadn’t had our official church portrait taken down before the seminar, so that was our first stop. This is the photo that they put up in the Church Office Building, and also appears in the Missionary Call Packets when new missionaries are called to our Mission.
NOTE: There are 450 Missions world-wide, each with around 120-170 young missionaries. There are 19 missions in Central America alone, so each Mission may still be quite large, but small enough to get around to all the far reaches of each one…
The rest of Wednesday was mingling and meeting other new Mission Leaders, and Church General Authorities. We met Garret’s future Mission Leaders, the Lillos, from Chile, who were returning back to Chile to serve in the Chile Concepcion Mission. We met the Williams, whose son Jack Williams is in our Mission, and the Graves, cousins of the Hawkins Family in Spokane Valley, who will be serving in the Michigan Detroit Mission.
We had the very fun chance to meet one of our missionaries who was actually the only missionary going to our Mission that was in the Provo MTC at the time, Elder Trux Wood from Cardston, Alberta.
We also met, in person for the first time, the Spencers, from Chile. It is the most amazing thing, my Bishop when I was a teenager in Albany, OR, was Gene Chidester. Gene later served as a Mission President in the early 2000’s in Uruguay, where one of his missionaries was Ricardo Spencer, from Chile. This year, both Ricardo and I were called as Mission Leaders, and we’ll be serving in Central America together, with the Spencers going to the Panama, Panama City Mission. Bishop/President Chidester has provided some amazing advice, such a blessing to get his input!
Every day at the MTC, the training was packed with training, breaks with different types of snacks and food, and more training! (and more food!)
Thursday, Day 1 of the Seminar, started with Elder Holland, Elder Cook, Sister Wright, a counselor in the General Primary Presidency, and Elder Renlund. In the afternoon we had breakout sessions and our session was with Elder Carl Cook of the Seventy and Elder Peter Johnson of the Seventy, and their wives, and Brother Weidman, who is the managing director of the Missionary Department.
In the afternoon we had Breakout Sessions, and we happened to be in the room that was being recorded and broadcast to Mission Leaders already in the field, so no pressure 
Later on, we were sent off to teach a district of missionaries that were in training at the MTC. Our District was awesome, All of them were Spanish-speaking. They were going to Barcelona, Madrid South, and Texas. They have been in the MTC for 5 weeks and are going to their missions on Tuesday.
Friday, Day 2 of the MTC was another packed day, We got to hear from Elder Eyring (he was there, but his talk was pre-recorded), Elder Bednar, Elder Anderson, Elder Gong, and Elder Rasband in the morning.
We got to have lunch with Elder Stevenson and his wife! He LOVES fishing, and are from Cache Valley, UT. I mentioned that the Christensen family was from nearby, Mink Creek, ID, and he was very excited, he said he loved to fish there, and had been there many times. We teased Sister Stevenson a little, in that Elder Gong had his wife participate in his talk during the morning, and we asked Sister Stevenson if she was planning on helping out, and she said, “Oh no, no thank you, I’m good!”, so as they left we said, “Hope your talk goes well Sister Stevenson!”, and she just laughed.
In the afternoon we did break out sessions and we got to learn how to invite someone to sacrament meeting taught by Elder and Sister Ringwood, Elder and Sister Boom, and Brother John Boswell III. Then we got to go meet with another district of missionaries and teach them how to invite someone to sacrament meeting.
There are 19 Missions in Central America, which includes Guatemala, Belize, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. 8 of those Missions got new Mission Leaders this year, this is the photo of all of us, with the newest member of our Area Presidency, Elder Gregorio Cassilas:
From Left to Right: Pincays (Guatemala), Urizars (Guatemala), Langfords (Guatemala), Spencers (Panama), Christensen (Honduras), Venegas (Nicaragua), Galan (El Salvador), Hyatt (Honduras)
We met so many amazing couples during our short time in the MTC. Lots of opportunities to meet and talk with everyone during breaks, and at meals. We ate all of the meals in the same dining hall, together with the General Authorities. It was a chance to laugh, share stories and relax a little between the instructional sessions.
We met President and Sister Wallis, heading to the Mexico Mexico City West Mission, and had a couple of fun meals with them. Please include the Wallis family and Mission in your prayers. You may have seen the news that President Wallis was shot during an attempted burglary during the early morning hours last week. The bullet went through him, but didn’t hit any organs, and he’s recovering now and intends to finish the mission he just started.
We were lucky that we stayed with Emily’s Uncle and Aunt, Kevin & Peggy Worthen, who live about 2 blocks from the entrance of the Provo MTC, so every night and every morning, we “escaped” the MTC by ourselves to walk home. Most Mission Leaders were put up in hotels on the south side of Provo, so they had a little bit of a wait coming and going each day, as there were buses to shuttle everyone back and forth.
On Day 2, all members of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles were present in the meetings, except for President Eyring, and President Holland, and they were there on other days as well.
Days 3 and 4 of the MTC were a total blur, more meetings on Day 3, Saturday, with a full MTC Devotional with Elder Soares and the entire MTC at night, Day 4 was our last day, with a Sacrament Meeting with the General Authorities, a recorded video message from President Nelson, and the sacrament passed by current MTC missionaries.
Time was structured and packed, but we had a few free moments to wander the MTC:
Saturday night, all the new Mission Leaders serving in both the areas of Mexico and Central America, had a smaller dinner meeting with Elder Gong, and most of the Area Presidency General Authorities. We were seated at a table with 2 new Mexican Area Mission Leaders, our friends the Galans, going to El Salvador and Elder and Sister Marcus Nash, of the Presidency of the Seventy.
Talking with the General Authorities and their wives is super entertaining, as most of them have also done a stint as Mission Leaders, so they are very excited, happy, and proud of what you are about to do, but also know the specific challenges that you’ll be facing.
The Sacrament Meeting on Sunday was a highlight of the week. Look to your left and you see the couple going to Moscow, Russia, look to your right and you see your friends going to Detroit, Michigan, and all around you are the General YM Presidency, General Authorities in the Missionary Department, like Elder Peter Johnson, Elder Mark Bragg, who was our Bishop in LA 20 years ago, and on and on…
Most Mission Leaders left for their missions that same day, Sunday, or some left on Monday. So Sunday afternoon was a bit nuts with goodbyes, people wheeling their luggage back and forth, and getting on buses bound for the SLC airport.
The highlight of the entire experience was the chance to interact with the General Officers and General Authorities of the Church. They are normal, fascinating and often very humorous people. The feeling I got from almost every single one was, “I’m not really qualified to be doing this, I was a regular member of the church, and now I’m asked to serve in a very different way. I love God and serving, so I’ll do my best!”
Because the Mission Leader process is drawn out over months, the General Authorities have seen your photo, talked about you in committee meetings, prayed and received directions on which mission to assign you to, read your bio, and know more about you then might make one comfortable…
Two examples: One of the days we walked into the cafeteria, and as we walked past a table that had a few couples sitting there, Elder Michael T. Ringwood and his wife being one of them. (He’s serving in the Presidency of the Seventy.) He shouted over, “Kirt, come sit with us…” I heard him, but thought I had mis-heard, as you don’t often hear first names in these sorts of gatherings… I kind of paused and looked around, and he looked right at me and said, “Kirt, bring your wife over here and sit down, I’ve got some questions for you!”. Fortunately, the questions were pretty easy. :)
Another day, we ran into Elder Craig Christensen and his wife Debora. I introduced myself, and pointed to my name tag, and he just started laughing and said, “Of course I know who you are Kirt! I’ve got a good story for you!”. He and his wife actually have a son named Kurt, and we’re about the same age. He’ll probably be called as a Mission Leader next year. Elder Christensen said he knew who I was early on in the process, due to my name, and he had many of his General Authority colleagues asking about me, thinking it was me. He said that I should get ahold of son, as we’d be good friends, and have a lot in common, and even look a lot alike. :)
We hadn’t had a chance to see my family in Vernal, UT this spring/summer, since we were swamped with selling the house, vehicles and getting our stuff ready to ship to Honduras, so we “negotiated” a couple of extra days in the US, by talking with the outgoing Mission Leaders, the Ostlers, and making sure it worked for their schedule as well.
So, we drove out to Vernal, with Katie, Garret, and Kyden (at the time Katie’s boyfriend, no fiancé and getting married in December!) to Vernal to stay with my parents. All of my brothers and sisters were in town, except for Aaron, so we had a fun couple of days!
We started the trek to Honduras on Wednesday, flying from SLC to ATL, and spent the night with my mission friend, Jared & his wife Claudia Justice, in ATL, who then took us back to the airport the next day to continue on to San Pedro Sula!
Our farewell to Garret was in the Delta Terminal, before his flight back to Spokane to begin the Home MTC a few days later…
If hadn’t figured it out, I’m just a *tad* behind on the monthly letter, due to the crazy workload here. Some days we leave at 7PM, and get back at 7PM or 8PM after being in meetings or interviews all day. Some days I go out with the missionaries in the field, walking the muddy streets of San Pedro Sula, some days we drive to small villages on dirt roads, every day is HARD, but very rewarding and enjoyable!
I’ll have the August letter out soon, which will catchup with our first months and adventures after landing at the San Pedro Sula airport on Thursday, June 26th to a warm reception from the Ostlers and the rest of the HSPSE office staff!
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