Ready or not, here I come!!

I can't believe that this is Grady's last letter from the MTC. In each letter I can tell that he is continuing to learn and grow. This week I was interested to read that he is aware of how hard he is on himself. He has always expected so much from himself. I'm glad he realizes that after he does all that he can do, the rest is in the Lord's hands. I know he'll do all he can do to be the very best missionary he can possibly be. We're so proud of him and we love him so much.

July 14, 2009 Hey everyone! It was good to hear from you again. How is everything? Sounds like the river was fun and Olivia’s tonsils are doing great. Well, this is the last time you will hear from me from the MTC. I am so excited. The MTC has been great but I just feel like it is time for me to go. Thanks for all the food and stuff. I keep on forgetting to thank you. To tell you the truth I haven’t eaten much of it. If I do I won’t be able to fit in my pants. I haven’t weighed myself in a while but I have a feeling that I have gained weight. I just get so much food to eat here in the cafeteria and stuff but I do appreciate it. This week was good. David Nielson and his comp. were called as the new ZLs. Me and Wiser Choro get to train them this week. We had a good talk last night with my teacher Wilkes Sensei. He talked about how most people think that if they have enough faith then everything will go great. He is very honest and tells it how it is. He went to Hiroshima where there wasn’t much success. One of the elders in my district’s brother served there too at the same time. He didn’t get one baptism and Wilkes Sensei said he was the hardest working, most diligent missionary that he ever saw. This missionary woke at 5 every morning to study. Many people in the church have this concept backwards. Faith is the most important thing in the gospel. I know this but our faith doesn’t take away free agency. This would be Satan’s plan. This hopefully isn’t tough for me to grasp because I am hard on myself. What my job is to do is to have great faith and follow the promptings that I receive. That is all the Lord asks of me. This isn’t my work,-- I am an instrument to the Lord. If am like Ether in the Book of Mormon, so be it. Ether didn’t see any success while preaching to the Jaredites and he was a prophet with great faith. Of course I want an Ammon like experience but I realize that after all I can do and if I have great faith it is in the Lord’s hands. This doesn’t mean that I mess around and wait for some answer. This is wrong also. Faith comes by exercising it and making it happen. I hope I won’t struggle with this once I get to Japan. The Japanese is going well and I love speaking it. It will be so nice to have everyone around me speaking Japanese. I won’t be able to understand but at least I will try. . I will be in LA at 10:45 so be expecting a call between 11 and 12. Oh, and I am going to have to send the extra stuff home by mail. It is a rule. I am going to leave now because I might need to send you something later today because I am packing. Thanks again for everything and I love you all.

I had to laugh that he tells us what time he can call from Los Angeles, but not which day!! His Visa Application said that he flew out on July 22, but his MTC address said July 20th so I called the MTC and he leaves Monday, July 20th. I can hardly wait to talk to him!!