6/29/15 | Another fast week

Heyo Family!!!

This week was so hot!! It's been the hottest year so far on record and it's not even July...

We baptized Latah yesterday! it was great to see her husband (alluri) baptize her. We found a lot of people to teach and have a solid family we are working with.  Elder Kamalamalama and I have been doing great! I like working with Polynesians, we have a Samoan in our district, they're very chill and always happy, its hard not to get along with them.  

We saw a huge miracle this past week!  We felt prompted to finish knocking this apartment complex that we started a few weeks ago, for some reason we didn't feel like we should finish knocking it until that particular day when the Spirit told us to.  On the last door we knocked in that complex we found our elect family of 4 that we had prayed for!  Ashley is the mom's name, they had just moved in the night before and Ashley had prayed and asked God to let her know which path she needed to follow and to let her know what she needed to do to live with Him again.  The next day God sent us to answer her prayer! It was such a miracle!  She has been reading the BofM and is solidly committed for baptism on the 18th!  It strengthened my testimony that God does hear and answer every prayer. It also reminded me to make sure we stay in tune with the Spirit, if we hadn't listened to the Spirit we wouldn't have found that family.

The biggest lesson I learned this week is to make the most of the time we have.  There was a couple of occasions when we had a few minutes before appts, so we decided to knock another door. each time we found another elect investigator to teach, it was great!

I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Love,

Elder Spencer Bailey

6/22/15 | Another week in Paradise

Hey Family!

First off, Happy Fathers Day yesterday!!  We are very blessed to have you as our dad!! Hope you had a great day!

I'm loving being a DL over here, it's been quite the challenge with this particular district, but it's been helping me become more Christ-like and have more of a desire to acquire the needed gifts of Charity and Patience.  I've been working hard on helping Elder Kama become a better missionary, he missed out on a lot of stuff while being trained, so we have been studying PMG hard and role-playing frequently to help him out.  It's also helped me become a better teacher.   Elder Kama got real sick with the flu this past week, but we didn't let that stop us! We worked out some exchanges with the ZL's so we could work both areas and we saw so many miracles because we were out there working instead of letting sickness keep us in.  

The biggest Miracle we saw this past week occurred last night.  We were very disappointed because only 1 investigator came to church and we had so many more people set to come.  We felt the Godly sorrow but we didn't let that bog us down, we decided to work with what we had and to change the game.  We went out with the faith to find and to set EVERYONE with a date for baptism.  While heading out we got lost and found ourselves in a  random neighborhood that we had never seen before, we didn't feel too good about it so we were driving out when we got a subtle prompting to try this 1 particular house before we left.  We went and knocked on the door and found a family of 6!!!!!  We prayed with the wife and after the prayer the husband came out of the back of the house so we taught a simple restoration and got the husband and wife committed for baptism!! Such an awesome miracle!!!

I was studying a lot this week on how to help my district have more unity so that we can work as effectively as possible.  I was reading in Mosiah 18 and the BofM study guide and found a lot of good stuff.  in verse 21 it reads,

 " there should be no contention one with another, but that they should look forward with one eye..having their hearts knit together in unity and in love one towards another."

It reminded me of the scripture in D&C 38:27, "Be one; and if ye are not one ye are not mine."  

It's pretty straight forward, if we are not unified the work will not progress.  We will be focusing on improving our district unity this week.  President Eyring gave us the how in this quote, "If we are to have unity, there are commandments we must keep concerning how we feel. We must forgive and bear no malice toward those that offend us."  

We will be working on applying that this week! It all starts with Elder Kama and I being the example.  

Oh yeah, we went over to see Alluri (RC) and we were set to get his wife (Latah) baptized this month.  We started teaching the restoration and she said, "I've been taught this before." Turns out Alluri has been teaching her this entire time in their native language!!!! So we talked about Temples and eternal marriage and that baptism is  how you can enter the Temple and be sealed someday.  She loved that a lot and committed to be baptized this Saturday!! We had Alluri receive the Priesthood yesterday so he can baptize her, so cool!!

Love,

Elder Spencer Bailey 

6/15/15 | Ft. Meezy

Dear Family!!

I got sent to Ft Myers this past week and will be greenie-breaking a big poly and district leading! President drops the ZL's for their last 1-2 transfers to either DL, train or just finish as a regular missionary.  My comps name is Elder Kamalamalama (easy way to remember: 1 kama 2 lama)  he's a native Hawaiian and is very humble, we get along pretty well.  My district is a bro-district, meaning we only have elders which is ok with me, no more sister problems to worry about:)  There are 6 of us total in the district and President specifically sent me to this one to "liven things up a bit".  I could see why as soon as I got here, all of their faith was shot because ft. myers is a bit more difficult to work than the east coast of the mission.  Did my first district training on creating success and creating faith in our areas.  It went very well and our district did exponentially better than the entire last month.  All it took was faith!  

We named the district the "Dunk City" district which is appropriate because we will be baptizing a lot this month!  

It's been weird recognizing places here.  When we came here for the bball tournament 2 years ago, I never would've thought I'd serve a mission in the same area where we came. There's been a lot of members who watched Lone Peak play at that tournament so I already have a lot of friends in the ward:)    

The biggest transfer week miracle came after District training on Friday. I did a training on creating success, so Elder Kamalamalama and I went out and had faith to create success.  We went to a new area to knock doors and again had the faith that we would find a lot of people. Within the hour we met and taught 3 families the restoration and got them committed for baptism, it was amazing to see the power of faith at work!  

I was studying in Mosiah 7 this morning and asked the question, "why be obedient?" in verse 29 God answers it pretty bluntly, "For behold, the Lord hath said: I will not succor my people in the day of their transgression; but I will hedge up their ways that they prosper not; and their doings shall be as a stumbling block before them."  I'm really going to be focusing on obedience for my district, we won't be able to achieve anything if everyone is not exactly obedient.  

also We baptized this past weekend, huge miracle!! I was praying so hard that we would be able to baptize when I got to Ft. Myers and we did on Saturday!! His name is Alluri, from India and was converted to Christianity some time ago and found the church when he ordered a free Bible, cool story!  

I love you all!

Elder Spencer Bailey

6/9/15 | Goodbye Hollyhood

Dear Family!

This past week flew by as usual!   We qualified for miracles as we worked hard and focused on the task at hand.  Our area is progressing a lot, we had 8 people at church and will be baptizing a lot of them this month.  I'll also be transferring tomorrow! I'll miss the ward and area a lot!  

We saw a huge miracle yesterday on pros-monday.  We went out with faith that we would find a family of 4 who was elect and ready.  While knocking we found 2 elect individuals who we taught, but we still hadn't found that family. We continued knocking and on the last door we knocked we found a family of 4!!! we had specifically prayed to find a family who hadn't been going to church and they were looking for a home church to attend.  While talking with them, we found they haven't been going to church in a long time and would love to find a church that was family oriented!  It was such an amazing miracle!!

President told me where I was going next transfer with one week left!! Took  a lot to make sure I stayed focused.  I'll tell you all next week where I get transferred too:)

I felt the Spirit speak to me a lot during studies last week.  I had been praying and studying a lot to have more faith and trust in God and in His decisions.  While in Jacob 5 I came across this passage 

"71 And the Lord of the vineyard said unto them: Go to,and labor in the vineyard, with your might... and if ye labor with your might with me ye shall have joy in the fruit which I shall lay up unto myself against the time which will soon come.

 72 And it came to pass that the servants did go and labor with their mights; and the Lord of the vineyard labored also with them; and they did obey the commandments of the Lord of the vineyard in all things."

I realized that I need to listen to God and gladly work wherever He needs me. 

I love you all a lot!!

Love,

Elder Spencer Bailey

here's a pic of a family we've been working with that's supposed to be baptized this month. the black guy on the right is my friend Ahmad, he comes out teaching with us all the time, so cool!

6/1/15 | Baptizing Haitians

Heyo Family!

this past week was great! we saw so many miracles occur as we worked hard and strived to become better. Louis was baptized wednesday nightand Yolain and David were baptized Saturday afternoon, it was awesome!! Now it's time to do it all again this upcoming month! 

The biggest miracle we saw this week was the miracle of the atonement within our investigators. We've been teaching a family for the past couple of weeks and taught the Word of Wisdom Monday night. The reaction of the family was priceless! The dad is addicted to cuban coffee and drinks on occasion and he really likes his iced tea, when we taught the WoW his jaw dropped and stayed dropped the rest of the visit, but by the end he told us, "I believe this is a commandment from God and I will do my best to live it!" Well, on Saturday he got drunk and we went over that evening to visit with them. When we walked in he was in a fetal position on the couch and was constantly telling us sorry for drinking and that he felt terrible! It was a perfect opportunity to teach about the power of forgiveness. He liked it a lot and committed to never drink again because of the godly sorrow he was feeling and that he would ask for forgiveness right away. We will be baptizing his family on the 20th of June, they are all so elect!!

I have continued my study on Pride this week and found a scripture in Jacob 2:16 "Let not this pride of your hearts destroy your souls!" Also read the talk, "beware of pride" by President Benson and he says, "Pride is a damning sin in the true sense of that word. It limits or stops progression." In order for us to qualify for miracles in June we need to constantly be changing, the only way to change is to be humble. 

We also got to help Elder Garrett pick up some new cars again and help move some missionary apartments.  We had an elder go home last week from sickness and we have 2 others sick with whooping cough so they're quarantined right now, crazy stuff!!  

Love you guys lots, have a good week!!

Love,

Elder Spencer Bailey

despite the look on louis' face, he was happy to be there:)

here's a pic of Yolain's and David's baptism, I also forgot my tie...oops