Preparing to Leave the MTC

OK, so here is what has happened this past week. Thursday and Friday were pretty normal. Well I take that back. Thursday wasn´t normal because it was Thanksgiving. 

We tuned in live to a devotional with Elder Neil  Anderson, who was speaking at the Provo MTC. It was a very good devotional about the importance of staying grateful throughout our lives for what we've been given. After the devotional we had a Thanksgiving lunch which was pretty good. It was turkey and rice and everything nice. It was a very nice meal, but it made me somewhat sentimental. After that, it was a pretty much a normal day of classes and mock teaching. Friday was the same thing.

 

I´ve started playing beach volleyball a bit, which has been fun for my physical activity. Saturday was also pretty normal. Sunday we had church. Every Sunday at church, they randomly call on people to give talks in Spanish. This week was the last week for impromptu talks,  because this upcoming Sunday is Fast Sunday, and we leave for the mission field on 6 December. 

I didn´t get called on this week, and haven´t gotten called on in past weeks, so I feel kind of relieved.

Other than that, things have been pretty good. I´ve made some really good friends here. Elder Reeder and Elder McClune (use the first picture I sent of my district to figure match faces to names. I don't have much time to distinguish everyone. In the most recent district picture though, the two Latinos are our teachers, Maestro Acevado and Maestra Mujica. The lady on the far end of the group photo is just some random lady that popped into the picture. Also, I have a picture with Elder Olson who happens to be from Evanston, Wyoming, where Grandma Calvert was from. Like I said, use the first picture to match the name to the face. I´m sorry for the inconvenience).

Most of these pictures are from Tuesday night when we had the lighting of the CCM (that's MTC in Spanish). We had a member of the Seventy come and give a devotional. I can't remember his name but he was an Area Authority Seventy. It was a very good message. One thing he said that I really liked was that we are here to help the lost sheep, the sheep who is hurting, the sheep who needs a way back. We may get caught up in other things but that is not why we are here.  It was something that I really liked. 

We then watched a little video that the Church made. It´s the new Christmas video for this year.  It´s shots of Christ doing acts of service combined with shots of people today doing service today. It was really good and I enjoyed it.

https://www.mormon.org/christmas/light-the-world?play=hero

We then went outside and enjoyed refreshments and got to talk and enjoy each others company. It was really nice. Like I´ve said, I´ve made some really good friends here and it´s gonna be hard to say goodbye to them, but I really want to get to serving people. My Spanish is absolute garbage but I want to serve others. 

That´s pretty much it for me so far. Not anything else to tell really. I guess now all I have is questions. What place is Manchester City in in the league table? If you guys send me stuff for Christmas, could you send me a bunch of scripture marking tools and also some pens? The ones I have are good but they bleed a lot. How is everyone? How are Sam and Naomi? How´s the family in New York? How´s the nation? Bleeding still? 

Could you send me the talk about Loud Laughter that Samuel tried to give me before I left? I wish I had paid more attention to it. Could you tell him sorry for me? His advice has helped me a lot. Also the two random missionaries that I sent with out me in the picture are Elder Issac and Elder Garcia. Garcia played for the BYU soccer team in Hawaii. They´re some of the new missionaries that came in. The other Elder that you don't know is Elder Rompain. He´s from Canada and he´s a pretty funny guy. Also really good at soccer.  

Let´s see: what else? I can't think of anything else. My email day is probably gonna be changed next week because I´m going out in the field so stay posted. Love you all and miss you all so much. Hope you have a great week. 

Love,

Elder McMurray