Merry Christmas!

 I know this isn't what you want to hear for the last email before Christmas, but this will be a short one due to complications of time. I'm finally starting to get over my cold. This is faster than normal, so I'm convinced it's a blessing from the Lord! 

     Highlights of the week-

     Monday, Rony, Favio's brother, not a member, gave me a bottle of cold medicine :) Champ!

     My voice was gone on Monday, and I was worried because i had to give the big discourse in Zone Meeting on Tuesday. After much prayer and faith, my talking voice came out just fine for the meeting, and my talk was great! I spoke on our purpose, or the Doctrine of Christ. It was pretty neat. Elder Romero gave a talk on obedience. It was kind of a spanking to the zone. I'm disappointed in how necessary it was. The elders of the zone had gotten out of controll; I didn't even know before just how bad. 

     So when Pres called to talk about the meeting afterwards, he had this big potential picture for the future, and I honestly got overwhelmed because this zone is not close. And I've been feeling a little under the weather on my faith. Especially in that people can change their nature. I'm not going to lie. While on the phone, a manly tear rolled down my cheek. I felt like the blind leading the blind. After we hung up, I said a prayer begging for peace, and it came. Man, did it come. The Lord is so good to me! 

     the next day, we went on exchanges. It was different. We both went to Galveston with the Spanish Elders. We were together for a lot of it just to see what they're doing together. But we split up, and I was with Elder Juarez, and Elder Romero with Elder Huaraca. I was the only white guy! Crazy! haha. That's what the picture was from. I never thought I'd get to take another picture right there in that apartment. It was a good exchange. We visited together Hna Perez who had gone less active since her mom passed away. We had a saving lesson, and gave her a blessing. It was inspiring seeing her change. Then, with Elder Juarez, we saw the Rivera family. I love them! We pulled up on our bikes, and Janitzy (one of my 29 year old friends) is sitting in the car with her boyfriend Emanuel. She sees me and yells, "Elder Spjute!" It was pretty cool :) I love being remembered. She wants me to come back for her wedding in December. I may just have to ;) 

     There's an older lady in the branch, love her to death! We went to go visit here, uninvited on Saturday, and her husband was there. He's not a member, but he just sat and argued at us. I felt so bad for not asking her if we could come over. She said, things were a little different on Sunday morning with him. I love this lady so much; her name's Hna Rosales. I know that Heavenly Father will bless her SO much for her patience with him.

     Yesterday was the Christmas program in Church. I couldn't sing all the verses of Silent Night. I choked up haha. It was a very sweet spirit that one felt there. I love the holidays. I love you all, and wish you the Merriest of Christmases!

-Elder Spjute

Raging Cold!

 No people, not the weather. The weather is still in the 80's occasionally. On Friday while we were planning, out of nowhere, I felt my throat start to get a li'l sore. I had a bad feeling about it, though. By Saturday morning, it was a pretty intense throat pain. Sunday, add congestion and plugged ears. Sunday after choir practice (the elders quorum and relief society are singing in church next week), the voice was gone almost completely. I took an hour and a half nap due to my body's demands; that was beautiful! Sunday night, add a little chest cold to it and some minor coughing. As of now, my voice is slowly making a come back. I hope I can sing by next week!

     So far, things are good with Elder Romero! Funny story. This week, in our personal time right before bed one night, he was watching a video about the Restoration and the Book of Mormon on our DVD player. As it ends on a Spiritual note, he closes the DVD player and with a straight face says slowly, "the Book of the Mormons." I laughed pretty hard. It's funny because in his Hispanic accent, that about what you'd expect to hear from an investigator haha.

     We're obedient. We work efficiently. We're doing well. 

     Side note: one of my new favorite Hispanic food traditions is corn on the cob with mayonnaise and Valentina hot sauce. So good :)

     I entertained Elder Phillippi on an exchange here in Kemah on Wednesday. Elder Romero went to Galveston in English for the day with Elder Abner. I told Elder Phillippi that if he and I combined our age and Elder Abner and Romero combined their age, they'd be 15 years older than us haha. They're old!

     On Thursday, we went to Sugar Land for a conference. They had Elder Hill and Ex San Diego Mission Pres Lee Donaldson come speak to us. It was pretty cool. They talked about how we must always be focused on the Doctrine of Christ. That is our purpose. Invite and help people to have faith, repent, be baptized, and endure to the end. They also showed us how to plan more effectively. Quite frankly, I didn't get all of it. It was really confusing. There were also parts that I strait up disagreed with. But for the most part, it brought the Spirit, and I learned. 

     I did however have to face the reality that I don't have enough faith that the Lord will change the hearts of the people here. It is something I'm struggling with. I struggle with the Hispanic culture. There are too many people that will not keep their commitments even after we've completely laid out the doctrine in front of them. I love them so much, and want their salvation, but man, it can be hard. So, that's something I'm facing for now. 

     Well, we're working hard! We have some investigators with a lot of potential. Please pray, if you would, for Cesar Agosto. He's learning a lot, and just needs to come to church a bit and accept a date. Thank you once more for your support. I hope the holiday season is treating you all well. I wish you good health. Really good health. And I love you all!

-Elder Spjute

This was the rainbow that hit yesterday. :)

Also, we had our branch Christmas party. This is Elder Romero and Luis, and some little kids. Luis and we were the three wise men.

Just Some Long Lost Photos

Hey Everyone,

We recently found some pictures of Elder Spjute that may or may not have made it onto the blog. They were taken around the middle of this past June. Whenever we get to see pictures of him, it makes us happy, so we figured it would make the rest of the world happy too. [CAUTION: There are a couple bloody pictures. Nothing obscene, but if there is a really queasy somebody out there, I've added those last.] Thank you all so much for your continued support of Elder Spjute. He appreciates it, and we, his family, are grateful for all the additional prayers in his behalf. Merry Christmas, and enjoy. 

This post brought to you by the California sister.

                          Hno. Rodriguez and his daughter.

Then the happy couple.

Us on train tracks.

My toe wound from the nail. :)

Transfers

 The pics are of me and good ol' Cap'n Mehew at transfer meeting :) So Elder Sharp is gone. Elder Leszynski, my second in-field companion, is the new AP (cool!). I'm chillin' with my 5th Hispanic companion, Elder Romero. He is 26, a convert of 6 years, and has been in the states for 10 years. He's from El Salvador, but has been living in Corpus Christi. He teaches amazingly, which is nice. I love not having to worry about my companion's Spanish! He's also really obedient; that will help me. 

     We've had a pretty decent week! Sorry, this will be a very short email. Elder Sharp and I had kind of a rough end to the companionship. Elder Romero is learning the area, so I've kinda been taking him to meet everyone!

     Even with transfers, we still managed to have 20 sit-down lessons, which is pretty impressive, honestly. We will be working very hard this transfer. I'm ready to baptize again. 

     I got a phone call last night from the mission health lady, Sis Mecham, who told me she needed me to come to choir this morning. That means driving up to Sugar Land for a practice for the Christmas conference on the 22nd. I told her I'd do it if I could take Elder Mehew. So I did :) And it was fun :) My voice is not used to singing like that any more! I'll have to work it back up to it. 

     Please pray that this companionship will be happy and productive. Thank you all so much. I love you, and hope your December is going fantastically! 

-Elder Spjute