MEMBER MISSIONARY WORK IS THE WAY

Dated:  6/24/13

This has been an interesting week. Not much has happened that I can think of. For P-Day, Elder Snow and I played some 1 on 1 basketball. It was a ton of fun! The highlight of the week was probably the broadcast last night. That was great! O man, member missionary work is the way. Do it. :D. There is this lady that we went to give a blessing to. She fell and broke her hip, and she was telling us that while she was in the ambulance, she was telling the nurse about The Book of Mormon and told him to go find missionaries and have them teach him about it. I thought that was very awesome. Jesus Christ changes lives though the Gospel. That is the way we have everlasting joy, peace and eternal families. The Gospel has been Restored because God Loves us! I love serving the Lord by being on a mission. I love being a Missionary!
I hope everything is going well with all of you back home. I love you all!

Love,

Elder Spencer

(sorry for the short letter, not much happened this week. But it was still a good  week)

ONCE AGAIN, I VENTURE TO COMPOSE MINE EPISTLE

Dated: 6/17/13

Howdy Y'all!!!

So, this has been a good week. I need to give a special shout out to Grandma Spencer and my Sister Rachel for sending me some awesome packages! Grandma sent me the recipe and ingredients of her to-die-for Vegetable dip. O man, That made me so happy inside! She also gave me some great cookies and fruit leather and granola. O man, I was just so happy when I got that. So if any of you see Grandma Spencer, give her a big hug for me and tell her thank you so much! Rachel, I really liked your package too and I LOVED the letter. I thought it was so funny that you sent Elder Snow a notebook to write down "everything I say" and for us to use it as a "grocery list." He is definitely writing down things I say. It is fun. I am grateful for all of your prayers and everything that all of you have done for me. I realize that the growth of the church is not just because of the missionaries. It is because of the unity of faith and the unity of prayer of all the members of the church.

Elder Snow is great. We have had a fun time together. This week we helped a family in the branch load up a U-haul trailer. They are moving to Idaho, and driving there.

We had Specialized Training this week. It was great. President Pitt and Sister Pitt are so great. They are so loving and you can tell. We learned about how God creates everything spiritually before he creates them physically. He related it to our planning, and how when we make plans in the evening, we are spiritually creating what we are going to do the next day, and then we go out and physically create it by actually doing it the next day. He also related to us Moses 1:39 and pointed out something that I haven't noticed before. In that scripture it says "For behold, this is my work and my glory to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." Notice it says "man" not "men." This tells us that God focuses on the individual. Yes, he wants all of man kind to return to him and have eternal life. And he brings this about by focusing on the individual. He knows each of us, and each of our unique situations. He knows what each of us is going through as an individual. When Jesus Christ suffered for our sins, trials, afflictions, pains, troubles, etc.. in the Garden of Gethsemane I don't believe He just felt a general pain. For example he didn't just feel how it felt to lose a child. No, He felt exactly what 'Sally' felt like when she lost a child. He felt her pain, her sorrow, her anguish. I know He felt our pains for us individually. He did this so he knows how to help each of us as individuals overcome our trials and afflictions and know that we are NEVER the only ones that "feel this way."

Over and over again I keep on learning how much our Heavenly Father loves me, and how much he loves each of His precious children. Everything He does is for our good. The commands are there for our good. Why would we not want to obey when it is all for our good? Read, Pray, Go to Church, Keep the Commandment, and Thank God every day for Everything that he has given you, and then show your gratitude by serving someone. A friend, a parent, a family member, a co-worker, and companion, an investigator, anyone. Lift someone's burden.

I have also been thinking about the Temple a lot lately. I miss going to the Temple. I love the Temple. I encourage anyone who can who reads this to make a special effort to attend the Temple. Going to the Temple before I came on the mission was one of the most (for lack of a better word) amazing things ever.

Love you all, Keep your heads up, and when you feel you can’t, keep your knees on the ground.

Love,

Elder Joshua R. Spencer

Note to Readers

I have become aware that for some reason, the blog is not allowing comments.  I believe I have remedied the problem, so feel free to leave comments.  If it is still not working, please email me and let me know.

All comments will be shared with Elder Josh, so feel free to leave a message if you would like and I will be sure he gets it.

Thanks for reading!

Patsy

ONCE AGAIN,GOD SHOWS ME THAT PRAYER WORKS

Dated: 6/10/13

This week has been a great week. I already told you about the early part of the week, but now I will tell you about Wednesday on. So, after I emailed you on Wednesday, all of us in the district went to the church and played basketball for like 4 hours. O man, I was so worn out after that. It was a ton of fun though.  Later, Elder Ochsenbein and I went to a High School Graduation for one of the members that we have been teaching for the last few months.  It reminded me of my graduation.  O, the place that the graduation was held is Liberty University. All the other missionaries were telling us that if staff at Liberty sees us there, they will ask us to leave because we are missionaries. Luckily, no one saw us though. They don't allow LDS missionaries on their campus. That night, us 4 missionaries that were staying in Lynchburg/Gretna all stayed at the 4 person house and all the missionaries transferring out went to the other apartments. So the next day, we had 4 cars and 2 missionaries that could drive, so we spent Thursday shuffling the cars around and getting them all to the church. Then we waited for the transfer train to get down to Lynchburg. It came at 7:00p.m. So my boy (Elder Snow) was worn out. That five hour drive from Charleston is a real trip.

That's my new companion’s name, Elder Keric Snow. He is from St. George. He is 19. And he is a great missionary. I am looking forward to working with him. It has been a good couple of days training so far. Nothing too crazy. One cool experience. Elder Snow lost his watch. Brand spankin new $50 watch. He had a thought where he might have lost it. So before we left yesterday, we said a prayer we would be able to find it. We drove to the area where he thought it might be and we got out of the car and I walked right to it. I was just walking, looked down and boom, there is was. Once again, God shows me that PRAYER WORKS.

Yesterday in church, Elder Snow and I taught Young Women's. We talked about the different responsibilities of the different quorums of the priesthood. It was interesting to be teaching the young women. Funny thing was, we weren't asked to do that until Saturday, so we had to come up with a 45 minute lesson in all of about 1 hour during our study time on Sunday. It wasn't bad though.  O and on Saturday, we had a baptism, OK well not really. It was for a little girl in our branch. She turned 8, so she was baptized. Elder Snow and I were able to stand as the Witnesses. The first time her foot came up, so I told the person baptizing that he had to do it again. It went better the second time. So ya, it has been a good week, and I am looking forward to the next 12 weeks. Whoopee, I love being a missionary!

Love,

Elder Spencer

Elder Snow and I

I AM GOING TO RELY ON GOD MORE THAN EVER

Dated:  6/5/13

Hi Family:

So, this week has been a good week. Elder O and I have had a lot of fun working together this transfer.  He is transferring to Spencer, WV. Kind of ironic. I am training and my new missionary (my boy) will get here tomorrow. That is going to be a good experience. It will have many challenges and it will be tough, but with God all things are possible. I am going to need to rely on God more then ever and act in faith more than ever too.

Not much interesting has happened this week. Elder O and I had a slow week teaching investigators, but we were able to visit many less-actives. I am so glad that you sent me the GPS so quickly. I really appreciate it, and I know it will come in handy. Today is P-day and we are up in Lynchburg to hang out with all of our district. This transfer is going to be crazy. There are currently 3 missionaries being trained in the district. (i am one of them) and all the trainers are being transferred out. So all the new missionaries are getting new trainers except for me, I am going to be a trainee and going to be training a new missionary. Our DL is being transferred out, and another set of elders is getting transferred out and they are putting in sisters. Another missionary is opening a new area in Lynchburg. We are getting a ton of new people to the district tomorrow. It is going to be interesting. Work down in Gretna has been good. We haven't had any baptisms yet, but I have a feeling that some will be coming. There are so many old people that are just so content with just staying where they are at. Some people are funny when they come to the door. We knocked on this one door, and this lady came to the door. She was not happy we were there. She has a sign on her door that said "no solicitors." We are not solicitors because we are not selling anything, but people look at it the same. So she answered and just looked at us out the screen door, and Elder O and I didn’t say anything. We weren’t sure who was going to talk, so we just stood there for an awkward few seconds, and then Elder O started to say "We aren't solicitors" which was kind of funny, but as soon as he talked, she just said No, and closed the door. It was kind of funny. It is not funny that these people don’t accept the gospel. But I am learning how to find happiness and humor in things so as not to get discouraged.

Anyway, I’ll email again on monday, but until then I wish you all well. Read, Pray, and go to church. Keep your chin up and rely on God because he loves you! :D

Love you all!

Love,

Elder Spencer

P.S.  We also helped the Smoots load up about 1000 lbs of meat from a cow they had butchered.  O man, there was so much beef!

Momma C is Momma Covington.  She is the mother to the missionaries down here in Grenta.  This is her new license plate.

So the Smoots gave us a filet mignon.  I cooked it up on my grill and made a marinade for it.  It was very good.  :D