Love the MTC

Dear family,

I can not even express how much I love your letters! Thank you, they are always such  a blessing to me! Well my time at the MTC is coming to a close, we signed our visas yesterday, and we will be getting our travel plans tomorrow! I am very excited, but also quite nervous, my Spanish is pretty good, but it is soo hard to understand native speakers when they are just talking. I can understand most of it, but like with the consulate yesterday it was hard to understand him about 25 percent of the time, because he just talks so fast, and slurred, but its all good, I know I´ll pick it up quickly!

This week has been amazing, I really have been able to feel the Lord working through me. One experience that was very humbling for me. On Friday, I had the opportunity to take one of the elders who was struggling aside, and just talk to him. It was amazing. We had been talking a lot about listening, and the power in just listening. This elder has been struggling to love his companion. As we talked his attitude was not really changing and at one point he told me that if i continued to try and help him and if i told our branch presidency that he was struggling, that he was not going to talk to me at all, and was just going to ignore me. I don't know why, but when he said this it really struck me to the core and I started becoming teary. I think it was because of the love I felt for him, and I realized how difficult at times my calling is. There are times where I have to sacrifice of myself, so that I can serve others, and that is what a calling is really about, serving others. At this point, I proceeded to follow the spirit, and I used mom´s age old question, and said "Elder who are you listening to?". We talked and I  started to understand his attitude. We just kept on talking, and i was crying, which was weird for me, but I feel the lord blessed me to be able to do that, to show the elder of my love for him. Well we talked, and his attitude didn't really seem to be changing all that much, but I tried my hardest to follow the spirit, and eventually I really just felt the need to listen, and let the spirit work on him. As I listened, he opened up, and shared with me some really hard experiences from his life. It was amazing that after we talked about that for a little,I realized how inadequate I was on my own, but with the spirit, I was able to help this elder change his attitude. He has has been really improving, there is still a lot to be done, but they are progressing, and that is all that really matters.

This week my teacher decided to stop having us teach the difficult investigator who couldn't read, because he felt that that was way too specific of an investigator. So we started teaching my teacher, and try to bring him closer to Christ, as himself, a rm going to BYU, it has proved to be very interesting, and we are going to teach him tonight.

Our other investigator Ramon, we have set a baptismal date with, and we are working with him, it is amazing the power that comes from having a testimony of the Book of Mormon which he has. We prayed with him, and we all felt the spirit witness to him, and everything else has been soo easy!

I know the lord has blessed me in numberless ways, I know that! I count my family among my most precious blessings, I know that pretty much everything that I cherish in my life, is because of you guys, and you striving to follow Christ. I love each of you so much! I love the Lord,vHe can make us stronger than we could ever imagine, all he asks is that we show forth our faith through our actions, think about that.

I love you all, have a great week!

love, Elder Zimbelman