HELLO TO ALL
This week was really good, I made some solid growth and learned a lot and saw miracles and I really love being a missionary. Life is good.
This past week I hit 9 months as a missionary, 5 months in Ecuador, and one year of having my mission call. Crazy. I still sometimes am in awe that I actually am in Ecuador and that I actually can speak Spanish and that people can actually understand me. Being a missionary is the best.
We had Zone Conference and interviews with our President this week as well. We weren't able to have them last transfer because of all the protests, so it was really nice to be able to receive some counsel and advice from President Barlow. He's a really good man. He said something that I really liked and that I think can apply to every one of us. He said, "There's no growth in the comfort zone, and there's no comfort in the growth zone." Change is really hard, but it always makes us better. Whenever we take that next step to push ourselves, the Lord gives us the strength we need to deal with the discomfort. I have definitely seen that principle in action in my time as a missionary, no doubt about that.
I spent a good chunk of time cleaning our apartment this past week. It was super gross. I would send pictures, but I don't want to make anyone sick. Okay, it wasn't that bad, but I am normally a very clean person and I hated living in a messy place. I cleaned the stove, the refrigerator, the toilet, the shower, the sink, the windows, and scrubbed the mold off the walls and ceiling. I still have a lot of work to do though.
I had some interesting experiences with the Ecuadorian women this week. The first one happened as we were walking to go contacting and I said hello to a middle aged lady on the street. She said hi back, then did a double take when she saw me, then proceeded to kiss her hand and then shove it in my face. Thankfully I was able to back away in time, but it was still pretty uncomfortable for me. The next one happened probably an hour later, as we were contacting in a little community off to the side of the main city. Some women who had obviously been drinking walked passed us. We mostly ignored them, but one of them got really close to me and smiled and did a little finger wave and said "Ooooh, hola hermano." I just kept walking, but then probably 30 seconds later I heard her yell, "HERMANO" So I turned around (don't ask me why), and she blew a couple kisses at me. Then she drove passed us and tried to get my attention again, but this time I just ignored her and she didn't do anything. Thankfully, experiences like this are an anomaly, but it was still pretty interesting. Elder Santiago was really enjoying it and has brought it up every day since it has happened, haha.
All of us missionaries gave talks this week in our branch and they asked that we all give a 6 minute talk about missionary work. I prepared a 6 minute message and was ready to go, but the other 3 missionaries hadn't. The meeting went a little bit like this: 1st missionary; 3.5 minutes. 2nd missionary; 4 minutes. 3rd missionary; 5 minutes. Me; 10 minutes. Hahah. It was pretty cool though because I was able to come up with something on the fly and it applied to the topic and it made sense. There was a family from Utah visiting the ward, and the mother came up to me and said, "I do believe I saw The Gift of Tongues working on you during your talk, that was amazing." I had prayed before I spoke that my Spanish would be clear and that my message would bring the Spirit, and this sister confirmed to me that my prayed had been answered. It was a really cool experience and I am so thankful that Heavenly Father answers prayers.
I didn't take that many pictures this week, so sorry about that.
That's all I got this week, hope everyone has a super duper week and that each of you make some steps into the growth zone!! Love and miss you all!
Elder Spangler
The "Egg Roll" that I made
The moon
The view from our apartment
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