New Missionaries, August 2, 2021

Hello! I hope you have all had a great week! Mine was a good one!

I got to say, new missionaries are wonderful. My new missionary is wonderful. They are full of the spirit and faith. They are super excited to share the gospel with everybody in sight and want to bring many souls unto Christ. My faith has been strengthened as I have observed these young missionaries. It is amazing what a few weeks of the MTC and innocence can do. 

I said goodbye to Elder Hatch this week. He was a great companion. I will miss him. We laughed a lot and worked hard; and our hard work has brought forth fruit in Spanish. A new Spanish area has been opened here in Springfield by two hermanas! It is very exciting and wonderful to see the Lords hand in the work. 

Elder Jacks is the new missionary I am training. He is from Las Vegas. He taught me how to play poker, has a younger brother and a younger sister and he loves lightning bugs! He is a good missionary and is prepared to be here. I will basically try to help him gain experience and guide him. The Spirit will help him learn the most as a new missionary. 

A highlight from this week was a GOLDEN referral we received on Saturday! Her name is Laura and she reffered herself! She wants to read and discuss the Book Of Mormon and we set up an appointment with her tomorrow morning over zoom! We are way excited! We hope she is sincere and really wants to learn! 

I love you all! 

Love, Elder Spencer

Me with Elder Jacks!

A picture with almost all my companions all in the same place! (Merrill, Hatch, and Decker)

Goodbye Elder Hatch

                                                                                My zone!

It's a Boy! July 26, 2021

Hello everyone! I hope this week was a good one for you! 

Transfer calls came last night and I found out I am staying in Ingram Mill and training a new missionary! I will be receiving a missionary that is fresh out of the MTC. Pretty amazing. I remember when I first came out to the field and met my trainer. Now it is my turn to be the trainer. I am feeling ready for this opportunity but also not because I have never done this before so we shall see. Learn by experience right?! 

I had an amazing study on the power of the word of God this week. I was reading in 2 Nephi 1: 24-27. This is where Lehi is talking to his eldest sons Laman and Lemuel. He is talking about their relationship with their younger brother Nephi, which has never been good. Lehi says "I know that he hath not sought for power nor authority over you, but he hath sought the glory of God and your eternal welfare... his sharpness was the sharpness of the power of the word of God, which was in him; and that which ye call anger was the truth, according to that which is in God, which he could not restrain, manifesting boldly concerning your iniquities." That is powerful. It reminded me of an experience Joseph Smith had when he rebuked his jailers who were using foul and offensive language. The Spirit can cause one to speak the truth concerning sin and that can have cause to be sharp to the hard of heart. When Paul asks us to put on the whole armor of God, the weapon he describes is "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God:" (Ephesians 6:17) So scripture study brings truth and truth brings the Spirit and the Spirit brings power; it brings the word of God. 

Stay safe everyone! Love you.

Love, Elder Spencer

                                                        Elder Hatch is studying, shhhhh

                                                                        My farm boy outfit

A big bug

President and Sister Collins, July 19, 2021

This week I met President and Sister Collins in an interview this week! It was wonderful. It was only supposed to be 40 minutes total but we talked for 2 hours. That was amazing. I am so grateful I could be with these two amazing people. We talked about many things but our main focus was Jesus Christ. He has been with me as I have been on my mission and it is awesome to look back to see how He has been involved in my life. 

I went on an exchange with Elder Nash! What a great guy. I love him and he is a wonderful person.

A verse that has struck me this week in the Book Of Mormon is about the Book of Mormon. "Harken unto these words and believe in Christ. And if ye believe not these words believe in Christ. And if ye believe in Christ ye will believe these words, for they are the words of Christ." (2 Nephi 33: 10-15) I believe these words are true. The Book Of Mormon is another testament of Jesus Christ. We can learn more of Him and what He invites us to do through its words. Come unto Him and repent. He can bring you peace and hope.

Love you all! Love, Elder Spencer

Oreos or Not? July 12, 2021

Hello all! Did anyone else have oreos this week? Cause I did. Let me tell you about it:

Elder Hatch and I did an object lesson with oreos and agency (the ability to make a choice.) We did it with a friend named Joe and his two kids Rocko and Ruby! They have some good friends who are in our ward. So it is a member referral essentially. With some of the oreos we scraped out some of the cream and filled it in with toothpaste. When we got to their house we arranged the oreos on two plates. We planned out specific spots to put the toothpaste oreos and the regular oreos. We talked about choosing good things and bad. Some choices are better than others. We had the kids choose a random oreo and eat it. After a couple more oreos they both got a toothpaste one 😀 we taught them how they can make better choices by asking their parents, praying and reading the scriptures. It was great!

We did service for a lady named Kym this week who is an amputee. She couldn't work on her yard because of it. She was really stressed about it and prayed to God to help her. The next day she saw an add for free service by the missionaries. We contacted her soon after that. Her prayer was answered. I am so grateful we could be right where He wanted us and that He gave us the help we needed from the ward to clean her yard up. We were blessed.

Sorry this is so late. I sometimes get carried away with other missionary activities on PDay. Stay safe out there!

Love you all, Elder Spencer

Construction on the church building

                                                    Our zone with President and Sister Collins!

In and Out, July 5, 2021

Hello everyone! Hope you all had a great weekend!

This week President and Sister Strong left. They are back in Utah right now. Fantastic couple. Did a great job leading this mission and they will be missed. President and Sister Collins are here! A mission wide zoom meeting was held and they introduced themselves to us. I love them! Very loving people. I will get to meet them tomorrow in person. I am looking forward to that. 

Our friend Neil came to church! This made me really happy! We haven't been able to help Neil come to church in a couple months so this was great! We also had a lesson with Neil. That was nice to see where he is at with everything and from what he said it sounds like he is going to commit to meeting with us once a week. Fingers crossed.

We had a second P day last Tuesday because our mission reached our goal for our Find Him and Be One Facebook pages! That was exciting. We got together with our zone and played pool, ping-pong, corn hole and darts! We had pizza and ice cream and all of this was provided by a really kind member! Such a fun day. 

Elder Hatch and I have been studying D&C 121-123. Those are the sections that Joseph Smith received in Liberty Jail. He and his friends endured a lot of really hard things while there. It was winter, they had no blankets, the food was poisonous, the guards were cruel and they got sick. It was hellish for them. In desperation the prophet calls out to God and receives the previously mentioned sections. One verse that really stood out to me was in section 122:8 "The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?" So even though Joseph and his friends were going through some really hard things they were still not as low as Christ was. He descended lower. He can succur you because He has felt it. Turn to His outstretched hand and you can feel peace. Love you all! Elder Spencer

Tired, June 28, 2021

Hello everyone! Is everyone getting ready for Canada Day this week?! July 1st baby! Woohoo! Also, a little Independence day action on the 4th! Fireworks and hopefully parades galore! 🇨🇦🇨🇦🇺🇸🇺🇸

President and Sister Strong leave this week. They will be missed. I am grateful I could learn from them in zone conferences and interviews. I am gonna miss them. A time of change and growth for everyone involved. The missionaries, the Strongs, the office staff and of course the new president: President and Sister Collins. 

This week I just got tired. Physically, I had to take a couple power naps so I could keep my head from bobbing the rest of the day. Intellectually, Spanish was hard on my brain. Socially, I didn't feel like talking to anyone. Spiritually, I did not have a plan for my personal studies so they were all over the place; not very effective. Today I have been a missionary for 8 months. Maybe that is part of it, or at least that is what Elder Hatch said. I got so tired that he noticed. He said when he hit his 8-10 month mark span he just hit a wall. It is a time where you have been a missionary for a while but you still have over half of your mission left, which is a lot. Staying motivated and energetic is hard sometimes. You can't feel motivated if you've never felt lazy and you can't be energetic if you've never been tired. So that is where I am at. The principle of enduring to the end is coming in handy right about now. 

On a more happy note, Elder Hatch and I caught a ton of fireflies in a jar and put it beside our bed for a nightlight! That was pretty cool. Have a great week! Love ya! Elder Spencer

Fireflies:

Outside, June 21, 2021

Hello everyone! Happy day so everyone! Hope it is not raining where you are like it is here in Springfield, Missouri. Unless of course you love the rain, which is great because the plants need it. 🌿

This week I did a lot of service! It felt so great to be outside and helping people. I helped a spanish group set up a garage sale, I trimmed some trees and bushes, and I helped 2 people move! In one of the moves there was a 100 year old upright piano. That thing was massive. It took 8 of us to move this guy. We had to deadlift it up 3 stairs. Intense for sure. We got it in safe and sound with no injuries! 

We had a missionary devotional this week! Our first one. 6 of us missionaries each talked for 5 minutes. Some members came from my ward and they said they really liked it! They gave us some great feed back which included inviting members to bare their testimonies. I think we will apply that in our next one this week!

Hope you all are doing well! Love, Elder Spencer