Querida familia,

Wow, I only have 30 minutes to read all my letters and write my email. This is gonna be a fast 30 minutes. I found out if you sign me up for dearelder.com, I can get free same day mail versions of my emails I get here in the MTC. Then I can have more time to read your wonderful emails and also more time to respond to them. If you guys could also update my friends with that, it'd be great. I also recently sent you guys a letter in the mail. It should arrive within the next few days. In it, I describe all of the people in my district. It's such a great district, with many strong testimonies. I especially like Elders Cedeno and Porras and Hermana Ordonez. They have very strong testimonies. Cedeno and Ordonez are both converts, and because of that have a very strong desire to share the gospel. Elder Porras has a very strong testimony and love of the gospel, despite not always being active in the Church. Me and Porras especially seem to get along.

As for my companion, well, I'll just say we're not a perfect fit. I find it very difficult to work with him. He has no filter for what comes out of his mouth. It feels like a punishment for how I was in Middle School. He also doesn't have as strong of a sense of obedience that I have, and so I have to be the bad guy and always keep us on track for what we're supposed to be doing. Still, I'm glad that I get the opportunity to work with someone that I don't get along especially well with here in the MTC. He's a good guy, and he wants to share the gospel just like I do, but our personalities just don't seem to fit. I'm trying to find ways to practice my love and humility and see the opportunities to learn skills I'll need for the field, where certainly I won't get along well with all of my companions.

We had the Men's Chorus concert on Sunday. It was great, but they changed the rules this year and we couldn't applaud and former members couldn't go up for the last song. Me and another former member were super disappointed about that. I felt like a child that had their Christmas present taken away. Still, I see the reasons for why the changed the rules, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to learn humility and obedience. I had a prompting about halfway through the concert that seemed to say "Elder, you're not going to go up." I didn't listen to it, but when I looked back I was grateful for the warning from the Lord.

The language is coming along, but I still don't understand everything, especially if they have a weird accent. It's very intimidating being in a class of native speakers, but it's also a great blessing to work with people who don't have terrible Utah accents. I'm slowly learning gospel vocabulary, and they certainly don't teach you such things as how to pray in school. Still, it's cool to be the only "guero" (which I learned means white person) in the advanced classes.

The MTC has been a very spiritual experience so far. I don't know how many times I've been touched by the Spirit and cried while watching a talk by a general authority or bearing my testimony. It just feels different here than anywhere else I've ever been. I should feel a lot worse than I do right now, with the amount of things I have to do, and the amount of sleep I get, but by the grace of God I feel pretty good. I'm still learning to accept that I'm not perfect, even though I'd like to be, but I feel as though I can be a great missionary. I think I'm starting to understand a little of what is meant by having Christ-like love. I don't have it yet, but at times I've felt it this week.

I love you all, and I'm glad to hear you're all doing well. Your gingerbread houses looked fantastic, especially Claire's. I'm sad that I won't be there for Christmas, but I've heard Christmas here is fantastic. Claudia's been sending me packages. I'll try to write her a thank you letter, but if I don't have time, be sure to thank her for me.

Besos y abrazos,
Elder Grasley