Week 69 Drammen Norway

 This week was awesome! 

     We set a Baptismal date for Bjørn which was great, he's receiving a lot of support from his family now which is awesome! He's doing great and this week the bishop gave the opportunity to come speak at a youth fireside. Let's just say, he killed it! I was so happy for him and grateful he shared his life story with the youth. He let them know he hasn't had an easy life but that he still never got into drugs or crime even though he was surrounded by it all growing up. He always felt like God was watching over him but he just didn't know how to better connect with Him until now. When my companion and I started coming to his house he said he could feel the positive energy we carried and it just emulated every where we went. He said he knew it wasn't normal for two 20 year old boys to pay to leave their life and families to go around and talk to people about Jesus, so he wanted to learn more. Then when he read the Book of Mormon in Alma 32 where it compares faith to a seed he connected really well with that. And now he said he has come to know that this church is true and wants to be baptized on the 12th day of December! All the kids were so engaged and were asking so many questions, it was awesome. The bishop was just as excited and thought he did such a great job. Then he started talking about his time as a world champion weight lifter it was so funny, all the kids were so impressed. 

     This week we also did a lot of planning for zone conference and preparing presentations and assigning musical numbers, the conference was amazing! We talked about consecration and how we need to be "all in" not just as missionaries but as members and decide right now the path we want to go on. Very inspiring and uplifting! President Tew is such a legend and can be the funniest coolest guy but then invite the spirit into the room in an instant. Mad respect for that guy. Other than that we've been filming a lot video ideas for FB which should be good. I never would have thought I'd be editing and filming videos on my mission but that's what's working so I'm just gonna go with the flow. Hope you all have a good week 🙌🏽

Eldste Spaddy 

Bjorn and I 

Week 68 Drammen Norway

 Another week down, it was a busy one too! 

       We had so many member appointments and lessons it was great. We've been trying to grind and get all the members to help us out on FB and it's been working. The members just think the missionaries are still locked down doing nothing but we're showing them what we've been up to and they all get super excited to help! They want to be in on the videos and even want to use they're expertise to help us make them so they look better and it's been sick. On Monday, one of the members was a HOMIE and made Costa Vida sweet pork burritos with the spicy ranch and homemade salsa, it was cash money dolla bills! One of the best member dinners I've had and we even had apple pie with ice cream for dessert! Bjørn is doing good, we should be setting a baptismal date with him on Friday so that'll be exciting to hear! Then some other investigators are improving as well which is good. On our way to an appointment this week we were at a bus stop waiting and it was freezing cold outside (we woke up to a blanket of snow this morning) so we looked behind us and saw there was a Methodist church welcoming people in, we decided to head on in because it was Sunday and we were cold. We walked in and they were so kind and accepting. We watched as they were all singing and dancing,  playing the keyboard singing hallelujah! When we sat down, I glanced over at this man sitting on the back row with his family. He had his head bowed and I knew he was talking to our Father in Heaven in prayer. He may not belong to our church but that man was having a conversation with God and you could just see he believed! His little son was sitting next to him praying as well and it made me realize that there are so many good people in this world who really believe in God and know he's there despite all the craziness. I didn't get the chance to talk to him because I had to catch the bus and he hadn't stopped praying from the time I walked in to the time I left but his great example certainly impacted my day. I started the Book of Mormon over again and I have been studying the individual accounts of all the witnesses and learning more about who these men were. And even though most of them left the church they all testified of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon till the day they died and never denied it. One of the sentences I liked said something like, " I held the cold heavy plates in my hands and leafed through the thin gold pages and felt the engravings of the sacred text by the power of God" it was so cool and very powerful to have these witnesses testify of the plates. I love reading from the Book of Mormon, It's amazing! 

Hope you all have a good week! 

Eldste McSpadden 

Pizza for YSA activity...  Eldste Affleck, McSpadden and the Sister missionaries in our area.

Week 67 Drammen Norway

 Aye this week was super busy! 

       Wednesday we had moves and we picked up my new companion and Elder Meldrum's new companion and drove them to their apartment in Sandvika. We helped them carry stuff into the house then came back and had some calling and appointments to make. Then the next day we had to plan splits with all the District leaders in our zone and figure out which day they're coming so the assistants could buy plane tickets which took a while, then we balled some dudes up at the local park. That night we visited a less active family to get to know them and It was probably one of the most spiritual filled visits I've ever had. We came in and their house was filled with pictures of Christ and I felt the spirit as soon as I walked in, I was kind of caught off guard because usually that's not the case when we visit less active members. Then we get talking to get to know them and we asked how long they've been members and the father was like well we've got a pretty cool story honestly but it takes a while to tell.  I then asked them if they were willing to share it and she said yes! So to keep it short this girl believed in God from the time she was young but her family wasn't religious at all and never talked about it either and then one day her grandfather passed away at like 60 or something and they were all distraught. So she decided to pray and ask God why her grandpa died and where he was at? So when she did she felt prompted to go downstairs, so she did and she proceeded to checked her parents room and they were sound asleep as she turned around she immediately saw a light there and then heard a voice say, "hey it's me grandpa, God let me come and talk to you and I'm here to tell you that I'm ok and I'm learning a lot right now but I need your help!" Then her grandpa proceeded to tell her all about the plan of Salvation and that after he is done learning what he needs to learn he will be going to "paradise" and finished with explaining the 3 different kingdoms that people go to afterwards. As a missionaries you hear a lot of stories and sometimes you can tell or feel that they are making it up or exaggerating but when she said that the spirit just filled the room. She had some more dreams and visits from her grandpa throughout the next few years telling her that he needed her help but she didn't ever know how to help him? Then when she was about in her 20's she started dating this guy who was a member but went inactive when he moved from France to Norway. She ended up telling him of this experience and he was like, "oh shoot ya,  I know where we need to go" so the next day was Sunday and they pulled up to the church house so she could talk to the missionaries and he asked the missionaries to teach her the plan of Salvation. When they did she was in shock as she realized it was exactly what her grandpa had taught her years ago.  Then when they told her about baptisms for the dead and explained that is the way people in the spirit world can be baptized it clicked and she knew that was how she was suppose to help her grandfather. So she got baptized and then had the baptism done for her grandfather and then the dreams and visits stopped because she knew she did what needed to be done! And the reason she hasn't been coming to church is health problems and some other anxiety stuff but that her testimony will never go away and she knows this church is true. Me and my comp were so shocked and so grateful she shared her story with us,  it was sweet. Super cool how God is always helping his children.

     I finished the Book of Mormon again this week in Norwegian and every time I get that same confirmation that it is the word of God. I agree 100 percent with Joseph Smith and the statement that the Book of Mormon is the most true book out of all the other books and that it can bring man closer to God more than anything else! We had MLC which was fun and we are grinding to get more people taught and baptized here, Bjørn is doing great and has been doing good with his plan! Hope you all have a good week. 

Eldste McSpadden

Week 66 Drammen Norway

 Aye wassup guys, this week was sick! 

      General conference was so fire, I love hearing from the Lords servants. They are truly inspired men called of God to lead us here in these days! President Oaks just threw it down on all the crap that's going on right now so I hope that gets people to screw their heads on right. But man is our prophet an intelligent man! When he was saying he was studying stuff in Hebrew I lost it! That man is a world renown heart surgeon, can speak English, Spanish, Chinese, read Greek and I guess some Hebrew as well. He's made a name for himself but he dedicated his life to the Lord and has used those talents to further the gospel on this earth. Truly inspiring to me and it makes me want to gain as much knowledge as I can while I'm on this earth because that's the only thing were able to take with us! Wish I would of payed more attention in Mr. Millers Spanish class, shout out to the OGs in that class, it was a party. But I also loved the way he talked about letting God prevail it's so true! I loved in one of the talks it said, "as we are students of the Book of Mormon...." and it made me think about what the definition of the word "student" meant so I looked it up. It says, "A learner who is enrolled in an educational institution or someone who by long study has gained mastery in one or more subjects" and I thought that was so cool! If we could enroll ourselves in the institution of the Book of Mormon and gain mastery of it then our faith and knowledge would increase immensely. It was also sick to get a shoutout from Elder Uchtdorf as he talked about the baptisms increasing in Norway! We get a little overlooked up here in the North Pole so that was swaggy. Bjørn is doing great with his plan and we are hoping to set a new baptismal date so that's super exciting. Sad news, Elder Meldrum is leaving tomorrow but I'm so excited to be getting Elder Affleck.  He's a hard worker, loves his mission and has an amazing voice. Elder Meldrum and I are homies and I'm grateful we were companions for 4 months. He didn't move too far so we can still mob on p days! This next transfer will be fun, crazy how fast time is flying. Got my highest max with Bjørn on bench this week too, so that was sick! Haha 

Hope you all have a solid week 🤘🏽

Eldste McSpadden 

Week 65 Drammen

 Hey guys hope your all doing well!

     Another week has flown by and it's been great! We started off by having splits with the other elders which was good but we had some bad luck honestly. We had to get our car serviced so we pulled up to the service station and then ended up waiting for almost 3 hours I kept walking up and asking, "like hey how long does it take to change the oil I've been here for awhile. I finally talked to the right guy and the dude said, "oh, we didn't know you were waiting here we thought you'd just like pick it up tomorrow" and I was like, "nah man we got things to do and places to go". He then said he could have it done by 4 but we had Elders coming in at 12 for splits. So we started calling all the members we knew that might help us out and one of the YSA came in clutch, he picked us up and dropped us off at the train station. We then walked with them all the way to the church and had to take studies and stuff there until our car was done. I guess all the bus drivers are on strike right now because they want to get paid more so we couldn't take the bus and really had no other options. It ended up fine and we were able to do some service and a bit of teaching, which was good. 

      On Saturday, we had our last tournament for softball! It's been fun to be able to go hit some dingers every once in a while but now the season is over. We played two quick games and pulled W's both times. Too bad the championship was on Sunday, as our team took 2nd, but they tried to make us feel good and said it was because the Elders weren't there! This ward is super cool and they love us so it'll be sad when we're transferred but because they like us so much, we've made some really good relationships with them. They're so willing to help us with teaches while inviting our friends over to dinners and stuff it's great. We also played some footy this week and if any of you know me I am horrible at soccer! I've been getting a little bit better, I pulled off a couple sick passes and made a few goals when we played with the young men and our investigators. But of course, it was after I had whiffed the ball on some kicks and missed some other easy passes haha. 

       We had a really cool lesson with Bjørn this week and we invited our bishop to come with us. He came and Bjørn had more questions for him and the bishop answered them perfectly. After the Bishop had answered some doctrinal questions Bjorn said,  "I think this is all logical and makes sense, I'm just scared if I make the wrong choice God will punish me!"  The Bishop responded by saying, " Bjørn your a good guy and I know you are on the right path, I want to ask you 4 questions that I think are so very important!" He then went through the first 4 questions in a temple recommend interview and Bjorn did great but then admitted he feels he needs to hear more from President Nelson.  The Bishop said, "well perfect he's speaking to the world this weekend and you can listen to him!" So it hyped Bjørn up and got him excited and ready for conference. He comes to church and stays for both meetings because he says he doesn't want to miss out on anything that was different from the first meeting! Can't wait for conference to listen to our prophet and apostles speak! It was really cool... Eirin came to church as well and Vilde was doing so well answering all her questions. She accepted her own copy of the Book of Mormon and is going to start reading it and praying. After church she said, "thanks for today guys I have so many questions now!" It was awesome! 

     Something I wanted to share from my personal study covering the famous story about the brother of Jared. His faith was so strong and so powerful he is often referred to as one of the greatest examples of faith in the scriptures! But like all men he wasn't perfect, when Babylon was so unrighteous he prayed to God to spare his people and let his people keep their language because of their righteousness. So God answers his prayers and then he asks where they should go to leave the iniquity of the people. God tells them they need to leave the city, so they obey and then after 4 years God tells them to build barges and leave again. The brother of Jared is very obedient and follows his direction but he keeps asking so many questions! God gave him what he needed and expected him to act and decide on his own. So when the brother of Jared asks God, "How are we going to have light in our boats?" God chastises him and says, "Well Mohonri, I have given you enough guidance and direction for what is necessary, what ideas do you have to make light in the boats?" And then the brother of Jared starts to ponder, pray and read in the scriptures. He learns that Moses had a similar problem and then received revelation that he should have the Lord touch stones and put light into them. So he comes back to the Lord with an idea and a solution to the situation he's facing and the Lord is pleased with him and his efforts. It makes me think about life today, we stress so much over the smallest things, I believe we definitely need to rely on God and pray to him often but instead of asking him to tell us what to do we need to rely more on what he has already provided for us. We need to take the scriptures, the words of our prophets, leaders, parents and make an educated decision and pray for a confirmation to God rather than asking more questions. Life will be a lot easier if we follow that pattern and strive to use that gift of agency God has given each of us. I know God answers our prayers and wants what's best for us and I know He has a plan but sometimes we need to act on our own and take that step of faith. 

Love you all and hope you have a great week! 

Eldste Spaddy!

The ladies house that we do a lot of service at wants these rock wall cage things. They're pretty cool, I may be hauling a lot of rocks in the near future.  I thought my mom would like this too.