Almost a week in the MTC!

So we have 12 people in our district. 6 sisters, 6 elders, which I don't think is super common but it's a good balance. 4 of us are going to Orlando, 2 sisters and 2 elders are going to Lubbock Texas and the other 4 elders are going to Adelaide Australia, we are all speaking English. Our teachers are incredible!!! We have Sister Miller and Brother Alley and they both served missions and have been back for a few years.

The next day on Sunday was when I had my emotional breakdown. Seriously the first 4 days I did great, which surprised me but I'm so grateful for. And I'm doing great now but Sunday was hard. I just couldn't stop crying. Ugh we got to sacrament meeting and I thought about how it would be a really long time until I would go to church with you guys and church just never feels the same without my family and that you guys were probably in sacrament right now and I could have been with you guys but I wasn't and after that I just could not stop. But my district sisters were really nice to me and all gave me hugs and told me they loved me which was really sweet. Also thank heavens for the Branch presidency!! Oh my goodness they are angels sent from God! Sister Webb the Branch president's wife came up to me during sacrament and put her arms around me and asked me what she could do for me. I told her it would be nice to talk to someone by myself. Later when we had a little break Pres Webb took me into a classroom and talked to me for awhile. He is seriously the most genuine man I've ever met. He kinda reminds me of Pres Eyring. He just told me that I never have to apologize for my emotions and talked to me that God loves his missionaries more than almost anyone else and that he was looking specifically into my needs. He told me to immerse myself in the scriptures and maybe look into how other people in the Book of Mormon have overcome their trials. and then he asked if he could pray with me and it was the most sincere prayer on my behalf I've ever heard. Seriously that almost made me cry again. So I'm so grateful for them. They are just like our pretend family. So there are miracles. They just happen slowly.

We had a miracle the other day with teaching our first TRC's. That stands for Teaching Resource Center but it's where we teach people who are playing investigators. The scary part is that we don't know which ones are members and which are actual investigators. I guess they had 5 baptisms last year from teaching in the MTC. So that's kinda cool but intimidating. Both of our girls are college students around our age so I feel like we could relate to them really well. We kinda slaughtered our first lesson. We taught the plan of salvation and probably went into too much detail which led our investigator to some questions we couldn't answer. And we stumbled over our words a lot and kept repeating things and we tried to connect with her in the beginning but I didn't feel that she trusted us or felt like we genuinely cared. She took our invitation to read Alma 7 to learn more about the atonement and then pray and write down her feelings. She wanted to know about Joseph Smith next so we'll do the restoration. But yeah I did not feel great about it. But it was our first ever so that's ok. It's all good learning experiences. So we regrouped and reevaluated and really REALLY simplified it like we were teaching primary. And then we decided that we should use our individual strengths more. Because she's not extraverted and I wanted to make her feel like she still played a role in our lesson, but small talk is not her strength. But it is mine. I'm really good at asking the questions to get to know people quickly. So we agreed to let me start out with the conversation and if she wanted to pipe in she could. But then she started the lesson and introduced the topic. then we kinda scripted out who would take which part and it was Soooooooo good!! a million times better than the first time. And I truly believe that was because we trusted each other, but mostly the spirit. We both felt so in tune and preached from the heart. We related her life experiences back to the gospel and shared how it had helped us with the same experiences she was going through. Seriously I almost cried. She was so invested with us. We taught simply so she could understand and put the focus on the atonement and how its the sole reason why we're here on earth. And she seemed really excited about our challenge too. So that was good! Seriously, God is so good! He was the one that led that lesson because obviously we are not talented enough on our own. It was all him. And I'm so grateful.

I'm learning so much and developing so much gratitude and love for Jesus Christ and God. I love focusing on nothing other than the gospel all day. But also I want to go to Florida right now. I want to be free! not stuck on this cold campus. If you have any tips about companions, scripture study, or how to stay focused I'd appreciate it. Love you and miss you sososososososo much!!

~Sister Grant