Wild Week, February 22, 2022

Hello everyone! Hope you are all doing well! 

This week flew by and lots happened. We were still in quarantine for the first little bit of the week so we continued to have online lessons and did the best we could. 

This week was a little hard with our friends and their progression. I felt like at times our friends weren't getting anywhere and it made me sad. But as I studied the Book of Mormon peace came to my heart and soul knowing that Heavenly Father knows what these people need more than I do. So I resolved to just do my best and let Him take care of the rest.  

As many of you probably already know, my Great-Grandfather Gail S. Halvorsen passed away recently. I was able to call him and speak briefly to him before he passed Wednesday evening. He is such a great example to me and I will always remember him as a kind, caring individual who could bring smiles to anyone around him. I'll miss him lots but I know that I will see him again. 

As I was doing my best to work and learn thoughts kept coming to me that it's not about me. Even though I wanted to stop the work and mourn my grandfather's passing, I knew that the Lord still expected me to work hard so I did. I continued to study and pray and did my best to help all those around me. 

I was blessed with energy and strength to do the Lord's work for which I am grateful for. 

To wrap up before transfer news we had an awesome miracle this week. So we got home from church and we got a call from someone saying there was a couple at the church who wanted to speak to us. We got over to the church and met Rudy and Chesca. They are from Peru and are interested in learning from us. They have met with missionaries in the past but didn't feel ready to be baptized but this time around they said they were ready! We are meeting with them on Friday so we will see how that goes.  

Transfer news. So Elder Davis is leaving and so is Elder Jensen and Olson. Their area is closing so we are going from a 4 man to a 2 man. It'll be an adjustment for sure but I'm looking forward to the new challenges that will arise. 

Hope you are all doing well!

Elder Spencer 

COVID and Some Awesome Miracles, February 14, 2022

Hello everyone, hope you are all doing well! 

This week was kinda crazy to say the least. Last Monday we had an emergency mission-wide meeting for the last couple hours of our P-day, we talked about how we needed to step up our game and focus as missionaries and servants for the Lord. It was really mind opening to me. My mindset on missionary work has changed yet again and it's making me stretch and grow in different ways but it is good for me! 

We had our zone council and President Interviews this week, those were both really good! President Bell is just so awesome he helps me see clearer my purpose and helps me focus on what's important. This week I did lots of just focusing and re-shifting on what is most important to focus on and the answer I kept getting was "it's not about you" keep focusing on the friends we teach, the missionaries I lead and the members in this area and everything else will work out! That was really comforting to hear and feel in my heart. 

Well the other set of wild news is that I tested positive for COVID, that was interesting. A while ago I started to get a sore throat and a cough. I thought it was just a cold but one other Elder in our apartment got it too and for a few days we didn't think too much of it. This other Elder went to the hospital to get it checked out. They tested him for COVID and he was positive. So we decided that I should test as well, we have a few rapid tests in our apartment and I tested positive. By that point my symptoms were pretty much gone but we quarintend ourselves for the next few days and today we are finally out of quarantine so that is nice it was a tough few days of being stuck inside. 

We saw some super cool miracles come even though we were stuck inside however. We were doing some aera book calling and we felt prompted to call Gary. He answered and we started talking for about 10mins about prayer and how he wants to come closer to God. At the 10min mark he told us that he had joined someone else, Stacey, to the call and she had been listening in for the whole time! That was so cool, we kept talking for another 20 mins and set some awesome expectations with them both, Gary said he was willing to do whatever it took to follow Christ. The cool thing was that Gary said he never answers calls from numbers he doesn't know but he felt prompted to answer our call. Stacey said that when Gary puts her on hold she almost always hangs up on him but this time she felt prompted to just wait! It was so cool to see the hand of Heavenly Father in those small details!! 

Well that's about all that happened this week. Oh, our friend Elizabeth came to church even though we weren't able to go and an awesome member, Sister Allan, sat with her and interpreted for her. It was so cool to see the ward helping her out!! If you ever have the chance to help the missionaries I highly recommend it!! 

Hope you all have a great week! 

Elder Spencer

Snow, Snow, and One Wild Ride! February 7, 2022

Hey everyone! This week was super fun! Lots happened including getting hit by a couple giant snow storms in the middle of the week! 

Tuesday was MLC in-person in St.Louis so we woke up early and drove down there for it. Elder Davis and I gave a training during the meeting that went pretty well, I was glad when it was over but I'm also grateful for the chance to grow. On our way home we had planned to do exchanges with the Effingham Elders who live about one hour south of us. So we switched off only briefly thinking that something could happen with the storm rolling in the next day but we were like we'll be ok let's just go ahead with the exchange. So we do just that. 

Tuesday night was fine, just a little rain but then bam! Wednesday it snowed all day from l;ike midnight till 5pm and here in good old Illinois they do not have the best snow removal services. Cars were getting stuck like crazy, the roads were near impossible to drive on and basically everyone was freaking out. I loved it tho, it was just another storm I've seen many like this from my days in Canada so it felt like home. That day we had a brother in our ward drive us around to shovel some driveways that was fun. 

During the whole day Wednesday we were wondering if we should switch back that night or continue to extend the exchange. We thought and prayed about it because the roads were pretty bad, we had heard. However it had stopped snowing and we felt ok with it so we decided to switch back. We met at the halfway point so we each only drove 30 mins but with the road conditions turned into about 45mins each way. But we all made it home safely and the roads had actually been cleared pretty well at that point so we didn't get stuck. 

Thursday the snow kept coming down all day so we got out and cleared a few more driveways and then it stopped. The last few days it has been melting away, I think it'll stick around for a couple more weeks. 

We had a few great lessons despite all this snow we got. Lots of people were just staying inside so it made it easy to talk with people. We taught lots of lessons this week on prayer and the Book of Mormon, tow powerful ways of learning truth and discovering it. I'm always grateful for the chance to teach and to help answer people's honest sincere questions. 

It got me thinking about how sincere are my prayers, am I just speaking without thought or am I truly speaking from the heart? So that has been a goal of mine lately is to make my prayers from the heart and I can tell you all there is a big difference in when you pray form the heart versus when you don't. So if you pray I'd invite you to do so from the heart. If you don't pray but would like to learn how just shoot me a message! 

Elder Spencer

Zone Activity and Great Lessons, January 31, 2022

Hello everyone this week was super awesome!! 

We worked hard this week and saw some fruit come from our labors. It was great! We started off the week with an exchange with the YSA Elders. I got to go into their area and be with them. It was super fun to walk around the campus of the University of Illinois and to talk with as many people as we could, it was super cold out but there were still lots of students out and about so it was fun!  

We had two birthdays in our apartment this week so it was fun celebrating those! I love living in a four man apartment. It is just the best! 

We had another great lesson with our friend Cheryl this week. We brought a member with us so we could go inside and we were able to teach her the restoration! She felt the spirit quite strong and she wants to continue to read the Book of Mormon so that's pretty awesome! We had a few awesome member lessons as well which always uplift and encourage me! 

This week I felt lots of little prompts on how I can improve as a missionary. It has been uncomfortable lots of the time but I know that while I'm uncomfortable is when I'll grow the most. I've seen it over and over again on my mission and I'm excited to see how I'll grow in the near future.   

We had a zone activity today. It was quite fun. We did jeopardy, Elder Davis and I made it and it turned out pretty good. We then played chair soccer and had a spiritual thought and talked about where we want to go as a zone. 

Well that's about all, we had a blast working hard and this upcoming week will be just as crazy! 

Elder Spencer 

Goats, Fruit Loops, and the Book of Mormon, January 23, 2022

Hello everyone! I hope all is going well with you! I hope you are staying safe from COVID and staying happy! 

This week was super awesome! Started out with an exchange with the Elders serving in the Paris area. I got to go to Paris for the day, that was fun. They are the farthest away from everyone so not many missionaries interact with them which is hard on them at times but I enjoyed being there and giving any advice I could about combating that loneliness they feel. We had a couple good lessons on the exchange with some members and tried to talk to as many people as we could while walking around.   

The rest of the week was so good. Right before the exchange with the Paris Elders we had a Zone Conference, that was great. We talked about enjoying it to the end. I learned a lot. It was a great conference. 

We had a couple great lessons I want to briefly talk about and then one more really cool miracle that happened. First off, we had a super great lesson/experience with our friend Rena. She has been going through a lot but has made some pretty significant changes in her life to align her will more with God. It has been really cool to see the change in her in even just the last 5 days. She says that her head is so much clearer and she feels like she knows what God wants her to do. 

Another great lesson we had and this is where part of the subject line comes from was with our friend Amy who was baptized about 3 months ago. Turns out she has two goats. Lucifer and Ruby. We were on a Zoom call with her and she showed us the goats. Ruby came into her house and to get her out she chucked some fruit loops out and there she went.. lol it was pretty funny! We then taught a pretty powerful lesson on tithing. 

Our miracle that happened, happened on Saturday. We stopped by our friend Cheryl's house. We had scheduled a time to come by that day and we weren't able to bring a third with us so we had to have our lesson on the porch. Anyhow, we got started talking to her and built on a common belief of Jesus Christ. We shared some scriptures from the Book of Mormon about Christ and then asked if she had heard about the Book of Mormon before. She had heard about it, unfortunately what she heard was that it was good on the surface but that ultimately it wasn't a good book. We asked her why she thought that and she sat there in silence for about a minute. I could see the Holy Ghost touching her heart and mind and all of a sudden she looked up at us and said: "The Lord is telling me to throw away my preconceptions about the book and to read it." Wow, as soon as she said that her countenance changed and she became happier. She accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon and told us we could come back. I re-learned an important truth. We are but instruments in the Lord's hands; the real converting power comes from the Holy Ghost and the Book of Mormon! 

I love being a missionary and there were so many good moments throughout the week but also a few sad moments, life isn;t always rainbows but is a million times better with Jesus Christ! 

Love you all! 

Elder Spencer 

Meetings and Phone Calls, January 17, 2022

Hello everyone!! Not the most exciting subject line I know but bear with me this week was wild! 

We were running around like crazy all week going from one place to another and we saw many miracles from the Lord. 

Elder Davis and I are relying on the promise that the Lord will lead people to us or us to them and we saw both of those this week! We went out and about after we had prayed where to go and we ran into people to talk to, sometimes the people we talked to reached out to us. 

There was this one man named Donnell, we had commented on his jacket as we passed by him and he thanked us and continued on his way. Well we crossed the street and then we heard yelling and we turned around and he motioned us over to him and he asked us if we had a message for him. Man we were floored that never happens! We started to talk to him, he has a strong faith in Christ and shared a cool experience with us. He gave us his email and we'll be reaching back out to him this week. 

We also had a super amazing lesson with our friend Denise, she is super awesome. We came in and taught her the Restoration, she loved it and she has been reading the Book of Mormon quite a bit and says she feels peaceful and calm when she reads it. We extended a baptismal invite to her and she said she wants to be baptized. It is just a matter of when so we are praying for a day that she will be baptized. It is awesome! 

We had lots of meetings this week, I enjoy counseling with others on how we can move the work forward. It has been good, tiring but good. 

We had a very difficult phone call with one of our dear friends. She is experiencing a lot right now and while on the phone and afterwards the only thing Elder Davis and I could think to do for her was to point her to Christ and lay her burdens at His feet so He could take them and make her life more peaceful. 

I know that if we turn our lives over to Christ, which is not easy, we will find peace. I have found immense comfort and joy from doing just that and I promise the same to each and every single one of you! 

I love you all, hope you stay healthy and safe out there! 

Elder Spencer 

Covid Troubles and Freezing Rain, January 11, 2022

Hello everyone! I hope all is going well with you all!! 

This week flew by once again and it was a wild one for sure! COVID-19 has been spiking here in the Champaign-Urbana area which is a real bummer because most of our teaching pool has it or is just battling some other sickness so most people aren't up to talking. So it was a little slower teaching wise. 

We did have a few good lessons with members over Zoom. ( we had to quarantine, I'll get to that in a minute) but they were solid lessons we also had a few over the phone lessons. I definitely like in-person lessons the best but I'll take what I can take I guess. 

So about COVID. One of the Elders in our district tested positive and me, my companion and the other two elders we live with were all exposed to him spo we had to all go and get tested. gratefully we all tested negative! However while we were waiting for our test results we had to quarantine so that was interesting. We were able to do lots of work via facebook and the time still went by pretty quick. I'm definitely glad to be out of quarantine and a negative result.

The freezing rain was interesting for sure. We woke up in the morning and there was a thin layer of ice all over the whole ground. It literally felt like walking on an ice rink the whole time, it was crazy. We weren't gonna go driving anywhere but a member called asking for a blessing (we were already out of quarantine) so we whipped over to the hospital and gave a blessing and only had a few close calls while driving... :).

Transfer news came in! Elder Davis and I are staying together. I'm glad that there are still lots of things I need to learn so I'm glad I don't have to lead out quite yet in this area. The other two elders that we live with are staying together as well so we've all the same. I'm happy about that! 

Anyways I hope you are all staying safe and happy out there!

Elder Spencer 

Merry Christmas! December 28, 2021

Hello everyone! Merry Christmas! I hope you all were able to feel of the love of Christ this year! 

This week was really great! We had a Christmas Zone Conference on Tuesday down in St.Louis. It was a great conference, we got to do a little skit and we all shared gifts it was great! I got chocolates from that, it was great! I learned lots about Christ and the Atonement that He performed for us, that was  great! 

We had great exchanges this week. I stayed in my area and the Elder I was with is so awesome, we got lots of contacting in and worked hard it was a blast! 

We had another great lesson with Elizabeth, Eduardo and Angel! They are such a great family and I love when we are in their home teaching them! A highlight was that they all came to church this week, that was awesome to see! 

Christmas day was a blast! We got up played some bball with some other Elders and then made a great breakfast, I talked with family which was great then I opened some gifts. We also had a couple member meals that night one which was a family from the Congo and they fed us FoFo which was pretty good. 

This week challenged my patience with myself and some of those around me. I am however grateful for those experiences because they have helped me and will continue to help me grow and become better! 

Hope all goes will this week, have a great New Year's celebration! 

Elder Spencer