Week 92 & 93 Oslo Norway

 Wow what a week! 

    I didn't have much time to write last week but we had a lot of lessons and teaches it was sweet! Our friend, who was self referred, is doing well and reading the Book of Mormon. Hopefully we can get a baptismal date with him soon. We also did a lot of finding because we knew we would be traveling a lot this week so we found 3 new people which was solid. Then we went to the golf range and hit a few balls last week with the member who is a pro golfer and owns a course here in Norway, which was a blast. She's an awesome member and golfer! I'm a bit rusty but finally hit some nice shots after a couple of hard slices. 

    Sunday night we caught our flight up to northern Norway for splits and Zone conference. We arrived in Harstad and went on splits Monday and grinded with Elder Ence and Graff. They're solid elders and good guys! My companion was able to meet his grandpa for the first time too, we have dinner with his moms aunt tonight and was able to say hi to his moms childhood friend while we've been up here. Then for P day we got the chance to visit the Lofoten Islands!! It was literally a chance of a lifetime and a dream come true for me, it is considered one of the most beautiful places on earth! We went on a dope hike and saw the city of Reine from the top of some mountains, it was amazing! The people who live here fish, hike and eat dried cod heads. Then we drove down to Bodø and will be having zone conference there tomorrow. Then after that we will fly down to Bergen and go on splits there then have the last zone conference for the transfer. It's always fun to be able to travel around and go on splits with people and hold zone conferences it's been a blast. Being on the Lord's errand is always amazing! I've been reading in the Book of Mormon in the war chapters. And it's crazy to see how many insights you can receive from chapters that are filled with so much fighting. One thing I have seen is how guided Moroni was during all the the wars he went through. He was patient, humble and relied so much on the spirit. Even during times of fighting and hatred he was listening to the whisperings of the spirit which was motivating to me to know that we can always rely on the spirit even in crazy times for both spiritual and physical things. Hope you all have a solid week and remember to rely on the spirit in all things.  

Eldste Spaddy 🙌🏽

Week 91 Oslo Norway

 What a week! 

    Man conference was legendary holy cow! We didn't get to watch the last session live because of the time change but when I woke up the next morning and my phone had blown up with so many messages, I really thought people were messing with me so we pulled up the talk and we LOST it! Agh this is literally going to change the game for missionary work and members here. We can just imagine the missionaries in like 3 years taking all the investigators through the temple open house and so many Norwegians are going to love a big beautiful building like that so they will all wonder what it is. And then getting all the members here going through the temple as well! It's a big problem here that people have not received their endowments and you can just tell they are missing something. So it will be a big turn around for this beautiful country! Elder Bednar came to Norway awhile back and gave the saints a promise that if they start helping with missionary work and following the commandments that there WOULD be a temple built here and that they will have to stop holding talks in sacrament because they will be confirming so many people and giving them the gift of the holy ghost. And its amazing to be a part of that prophecy as it's being fulfilled! Definitely a conference to remember for me. The talks were amazing as well! I loved so many of them I don't even know where to start. But one of them was by sister Jones when she talked about the importance of helping kids gain their testimony! Conversion is not a coincidence, it is nurtured and cared for in the home! I wish more people would get that here because they let their kids decide what they do with there lives at 11 years old. Then another one was by Renlund about how things are not fair and we can't get offended. Being offended is a choice and not something that other people can force upon us. And then President Nelson's talk on faith! That man is such a stud he is definitely a man of God. 

    We had a solid week teaching wise as well! We had been in the office for hours doing some office work and then we just pulled out the old paper area book and started calling people. We found 2 people to teach that had previously met with missionaries because of it and then we got my first SOLID referral on my mission! It was a self referral who requested a Book of Mormon. His name was Alex Locke and I told my companion "I bet he's a British bloke that was raised here!" Low and behold we show up and the dude tells us his parents are from the UK but he was raised here. Then we started asking about how he knew about the church and why he wanted a Book of Mormon? And he proceeds to tell us that he was playing Star Wars Galaxy on the X Box with some returned missionaries from Utah and he asked them about what they believe and they told him to go to cometochrist.org and request a Book of Mormon and the missionaries will be on your doorstep within 24 hours. So after he got done playing at like 2 am he got online and ordered one. Then when we woke up we got ahold of him and had a solid lesson at 11 that morning! Super solid guy was stoked to read the book and watched all the general conference sessions.... Live! So it'll be exciting to see where this bloke goes. We planned our zone conferences and bought our flight tickets to Northern Norway and Bergen for zone conferences this transfer! So that will be good. Crazy to think this is my 2nd to last set of zone conferences which is weird to think about. But I'm excited to grind and keep the ball rolling as summer comes and the weather is getting better and the days are getting longer! Being a missionary is awesome and I'm excited to finish strong! 

Eldste McSpadden

Week 89 & 90 Oslo Norway

 Sorry I didn't write an email last week I didn't realize until it was to late! 

    So I will just go through the past two weeks. It was the end of the transfer so we had to get moves all figured out and planned which is a big sit down session. Planning out how all the missionaries are going to fly, drive or take a train to their new areas while having a companion and getting all the keys and sim cards to the right people can take awhile. So we grinded that out last week and then it was so satisfying to see our plan just unfold perfectly until one of the  elders flight was cancelled because of bad weather so then we had to get a hold of his companion up north and tell him to miss huis flight so that the young elder up there wouldn't be stuck at the airport with no companion and no driver's license! Everything worked out. 

    This week was the beginning of the transfer and we had mission leadership council so we figured out all the corona rules then planned according to those, but come to find out they switched them and then we had to cancel a ton of flights for the zone leaders and STLs flying into Oslo. But we had a good meeting on zoom and then President Tew asked me to bare my testimony because he doesn't know who will be on MLC next transfer and that was weird to think about! It's crazy how fast time is going, we've just been trying to grind and find as many people as we can. We found 2 solid people this week and had 2 great lessons with them before they headed back to Croatia! They had friends who were Mormons and they knew a BYU legend who was from Croatia and played at the Y then was converted and moved back to Croatia and basically opened up the church there. His name was like Coşić or something but they were super positive and were so interested in the plan of salvation. So they are stoked to meet with the missionaries there. We met a group of theologians on Facebook and have had some group calls where  we just study together and read from the Book of Mormon. They haven't been to bible bashy which is good but we'll see. Something I read from my personal study this week was in Alma 32. It's a chapter I have read countless times but I pulled some new insights out of it again. It talks about how the poor are the ones who are humble because they were forced to be humble but were more willing to accept the message of Christ. But think about how blessed the people will be who choose to humble themselves before the Lord and accept his message. There are a lot of people in Norway who have everything they want and they don't think they need religion which is sad. But the people who choose to humble themselves and accept His message will be blessed in an even greater degree! And it's a blessing to be able to see that. 

Hope you have great week!