Spencer's Adventures: Keep your head up and keep working

Some of my favorite animals!

This was a pretty good week.

I cannot describe how much I enjoy studying the scriptures nowadays. I remember when I started the mission I was so tired and didn't understand a lot of things (oh, Isaiah chapters) and just fell asleep so much during studies. Obviously I didn't want to, but that's life.

Now, I really feel that I feast on the scriptures. Every day's like an adventure for me opening the Book of Mormon and reading all of the stories, interconnecting and understanding the details, and looking for the principles and what God wants to teach me.

And I think that God really wants to teach me something these days. We've been working hard but just not seeing the success that I'd want to see. I have the surety that we're trying hard, but we're truly in search of what God wants us to learn. And we're keep searching :) I was reflecting on it this morning and realizing that the easy times don't make me a better person or better missionary, but rather these challenging times where I really have to look deeper to see what needs to change. That's where my biggest lessons are learned.

But it is still so sweet to teach the Restored Gospel to people. We've been teaching G. a lot these days, getting him nice and ready for baptism on the 30th of this month. While he couldn't go to church because he was busy watching our for his brother, we went there last night and taught him about following a living prophet, and what a great blessing it is to have a living prophet and apostles on the earth. He, as always, had lots of good questions really looking to understand deeply the principle, and after the lesson it was so sweet to hear him give thanks to God for the opportunity to have living prophets and apostles to guide us. There is nothing in this world which makes me happier than knowing that someone else has found the restored gospel and really wants to follow it. It reminds me of the prayers that Cristofer always said in Paso Ancho.

Yeah, I really love hearing sincere prayers. Actually, that's generally the moment where I know if someone's going to pass the baptismal interview or not; in their opening prayer.

In short? I love this work and I love prayer. And we're going to find the way to have more success :) That's life, day after day, week after week. Keep your head up and keep working. I made a promise to my Heavenly Father that I'd keep working till the last day, even if He didn't want to let me see those fruits of my work while I'm here. It's fine. I'll just thank Him for the challenges and the opportunity to grow a little more.

Have a great week everyone! Keep a smile on your faces :)

-Elder Henry

This sweet family sent Mom a photo on Saturday!