Hello for today

Hey All!

First of all, happy birthday to Ian, Melanie, and Dad!! Second of all, this week was awesome!! It started out with our devotional which happens every Tuesday night. Honestly, the speaker was maybe a little bit boring, but he had some good things to say. The best part of the meeting, however, was the choir. I was in it and we sang "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" which sounded incredible. One of the things I like best about the choir is the director. He is very funny and talented and at the end of each practice (2 a week) he leaves us with a cool spiritual thought about the song. This week he talked a little bit about the part in the song where it says "Here I raise mine Ebenezer" and how for the children of Israel the Ebenezer was a big stone where they engraved how the Lord had help them win a great victory where they were impossibly outmatched and had to humble themselves. After that time, whenever they were having troubles, they just raised up their Ebenezer as a reminder of how greatly the Lord had blessed them and how with his help, they could accomplish amazing things. He then told us that for us, our mission should be our Ebenezer, and that if we perform valiantly, we will be able to look back the rest of our lives and see how greatly the Lord had blessed us and how we can do very difficult things. Very cool.

This week, and every week, has been crazy. The time just disappears and the days blend together. Our teachers are great, I'm getting along great with all the people in my district and I love my new companion. He and I study well and teach well together. (We have a practice teaching appointment every week.) He struggles a little bit in Spanish, but we are both working hard. Our last two teaching appointments have been in English, and this week is not required to be in Spanish either, but we have both set the goal that we are going to work our hardest and teach our lesson this week in Spanish. We have also instituted an English fast on one day this week where we can only speak Spanish the whole day, and then next week we'll fast two days, the next week: three, until by the time we get out of here we will speak only Spanish!! Not to say that we don't speak in Spanish the rest of the week, of course, but this forces our hand.

This week we had a mission conference since it was fast Sunday, and it was awesome (we scored really good seats again, second or third row). They talked a lot about goals, obedience, faith, all that good stuff. I don't have time, otherwise I would write some of it.

Another cool thing we do is on Fridays we have movie night, where we watch a devotional or fireside that's been recorded. This week we watched this really awesome one by Elder Bednar about following the spirit. His basic premise was an answer to the common question: How do I know if it's the Holy Ghost or just me? Answer: Quit worrying about it. Be a good boy/girl, keep the commandments, press forward, and the Lord will guide your feet, put words in your mouth and thoughts in your head when you need Him to.

Be a good boy/girl! The church is true!

E Spencer