What did we do to deserve this........

Hey guys!
I Don't have a ton of time (I never do....)．We are in Asahikawa for a
Zone meeting and we are going to go bowling as a District with another
district! WOOOO BOWLING!!!

But this week was......amazing. We have an investigator named
Nakabayashi- san that we have been teaching since I came. My comp
didn't think there was much potential but when I talked to her the
first time I knew she was going to be cool. I've met with her on
splits a few different times and she has quite a bit of interest. She
told us a few weeks ago that she wanted to come to church and see how
it was.....and then she walked for an hour and made it there early.
She loved church and every lesson happened to be about the Plan of
Salvation which was the pamphlet we had given her a bit before. So I
met with her again on Wednesday on splits and summed up the PoS and
she told us that it all sounded very familiar to her. One of the
members that we brought told her that it was because she had heard it
all before before this life and we were just telling her something she
had forgotten. We asked her to pray about it and she said she would.
Then she came to church again yesterday and we had the sister
missionaries help her so that we could pass her to them. We taught
another lesson afterward with the sisters. I started it and asked her
a question about how church was and then all of the sudden I had a ton
of questions about how she felt and what it would mean if she found
truth in her life and........she turned to me after talking for a bit
and asked, "what do you need to do to join this church?" I told her
about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon and the sisters shared a
scripture about baptism. The sisters invited her to be baptized by
someone holding the proper authority of God and she looked at me and
said, "受けたい。 お願いしたい。 I want to be baptized. I would like to ask you to
do it." I can tell you that that lesson was pretty all over the place
at times, but that woman has been prepared to meet us and has found
something, has felt something that is so familiar and good that she
can't ignore it. I am so glad to be a part of something like this.
There is no way that this message that I have the opportunity to share
isn't true. I know from the bottom of my heart that my Heavenly Father
knows me and has people here in Hokkaido that I am supposed to find
and help. I love that gospel and I try my best to show my gratitude
everyday.

I love you guys!

Elder Spurling

Yuki Matsuri..... Snow Festival

Yuki Matsuri..... Snow Festival

Hey fam!

No voice mail this week. Sorry. But this has been an amazing week. We had a Zone Conference this week and every single missionary ended up in the city of Sapporo at one time. It was a really good meeting and we learned a lot of great things and got a lot of dendo fire! We're ready to go out and work. 

We met with a college kid here that My comp and the last elder had had some trouble actually getting into sharing the message with. I went in and just got to know him. He is actually fluent in English so he didn't want to speak Japanese. But we just talked about our jobs and music and The Killers and just whatever. Then my comp threw out a super blunt question related to the message and we just started goin for it. We probably talked for an hour and I actually didn't ever teach him. All I did was tell him what this gospel has done for me and how much happiness I have felt from it. I didn't tell him that he needed to do anything I just promised that if he prayed and if he wanted feel what I have felt, all he has to do is try it out. It was the most heartfelt testimony that I have borne since I have come here and he said that he felt it. It was one of the best experiences that I have had so far. 

We also had a WAY cool woman come to church yesterday! She had to walk for almost an hour on the ice and snow but was there early and ended up absolutely LOVING the messages that were shared there. She has a lot of interest and a ton of faith and I can't wait to see what happens with her. 

I'm doing really well. We have been seeing SO many miracles and I actually feel somewhat confident as a missionary after a whole year. I didn't do anything to celebrate though.... didn't really remember. 

I love you all! Till next week,

Elder Spurling

Hey Fam,

Here's another one for ya. It's not very informative probably. Kind of later at night buuut......It's me and Elder Brackner. Elder Brackner. He's a total boss. His Japanese is awesome and he's totally fearless when it comes to dendo. I'm seriously learning a TON from him. I think he should be the senior in this companionship. But besides that, he's WAY fun. I probably get along with him better so far than I have with any of my other companions. Not to mention we are actually getting opportunities to teach. It's ben a crazy two weeks already. I love this area and the ward and everything.  DL has been fun. Having a leadership responsibility has really helped me focus WAY more on my calling as missionary and on how I can become more charitable and Christ-like. It's one of the best things so far.

Elder Spurling

There's even more snow now.....!!!!

Hey guys,

I actually only have 5 minutes. We went to an onsen today and the bus didn't come and the train was late and I have to go sing at a big mission FHE in a few. 

I got transferred to Ebetsu. One of the snowiest places on this island and therefore Japan. I'm with another elder that just finished training and he's a total boss! We get along super well and im learning a ton from him. Elder Shoell actually came with me and is still in my apartment.....

I also became the District Leader so I have to take care of everything that goes on in my area and the one over. I also have to do an 1:30 workshop every week for everyone in Japanese......pray for me. I feel super busy, but we actually have investigators and are teaching lessons everyday!!! It's super great here!!!

Love you, 

Elder Spurling

Zone conference in December

Farewell to Shinoro.....

Hello Family

I am making this voice recording at 10 o'clock at night so I have to be quite. We are laying in bed but do not actually have to be asleep, we have lights out but are really just chillin.   Sometimes we use flashlights and just hang out.  Actually my trainer Elder Jones who is an AP came to do splits with the other elders in my apartment, the zone leaders, and we talked till way late in the dark, it was way cool.... I love Elder Jones, he is my bud.  He is going to "die" (go home) next transfer which is REALLY sad, Elder Watanabe goes home too. It is going to be way lonely in this mission.  I will be one of the oldest non Japanese missionaries.  

This week was super fun, last Monday we had a ward party.  We all go and they make some special rice. We pound the rice with hammers, you may have seen it before but we pound it with hammers and it makes it really soft and mushy.   Then they take it and put in all these ingredients and it is super good, I LOVE it!!  I unfortunately did not get to do it, I lost the opportunity to the primary kids, it was sad for me but the kids are crazy, they are fun kids. After that we had music practice for a concert for the whole mission coming up.  Otherwise, this week we have been feed 7 times this week, which is seriously unheard of in this mission, in Hokkaido.  Nobody feeds the missionaries here.  One of those was today we went to a ladies who was a NA- not active and she was SO COOL!  She had all four of us over with her husband and 2 kids, 16 and 13.   They are all super talented, they love music so we all got to present or do our music talent.  Elder Roenberg played the guitar, and Elder Watanabe played the piano and he is apparently better than we even knew, he is the boss on the piano.  Another family we saw was a mother and son who are both active.  The son is getting ready to go on a mission soon and they are way cool.  We had a super fun time with them, everyone seemed to have fun and we taught a nice little lesson that go pretty deep and then we found out the next day that the mom had called the mission home and said she never wants the missionaries to come to her home again.  Apparently one of the elders offended her but what she said he did, he did not do so we think she is a little bit crazy.  When we left she said "please come again" but I think I will go back again before I leave...... oh yeah I am being transfered this week from Shinoro.  I said good bye to lots of people at church, I love this place and am really really sad to leave. It has been my home for 6 months.  I hate to leave,there are alot of good things happening here.  We taught a lesson this week, it was great.

On Sunday I taught the Gospel Principles class, unprepared, and it wasn't half bad, it could have been better but it wasn't terrible...

So I will tell you where i go, the last few weeks in Shinoro have been awesome.  The ward is great and this apartment has been way fun.  I am super, super sad for us to be separated but it has to happen.

Alright Love you family, talk to you next week

Elder Spurling 

Elder Roenberg had a birthday and his family sent Star Wars stuff so here in crazy Darth Vader masks

They sled in their driveways....no kidding they really do

Good morning family
this week was New Years.  We were busy all week long.  We had a Book of Mormon Day where we read all day long, 10 hours straight.  I did not get very far, some do but I got to 2 Nephi.  I was looking for some specific things and not rushing.  The bad part was that we were fasting, it was so hard.   Especially since we had a crap ton of snacks, candy and bread from our ward sitting everywhere.  I really loved Book of Mormon day, I prayed alot alot alot.  At the end of the day I really felt how true the book really was.  I was so grateful for that day.
The next day was New Years.  It is completely impossible to teach so we spent the day with members.  It was great we spent about 4 hours with one family and then went to another.  That is really all we have done this week is connected with members.  They celebrate all week long so we really could not do anything else.  It was awesome though, there are some way cool people here in Shinoro.   I don't want to leave them but I probably will in the next few weeks since I have been here for 5 months.
The day after New Years we had a deep clean day.  We literally spent the entire day in our apartment cleaning everything.  Took everything apart, cleaned it, and put it back.  It was dumb, and I don't think Elder Shoell liked it very much, but it turned out kind of fun.  It was something to do.
This week we got a ton of snow!!!   You cannot imagine how much snow.  Last week we watched it snow during scripture study, then we got ready to leave and I stepped out the door and it literally went up to my shin.  It got progressively worse the rest of the day and it was seriously knee deep.  We were the only ones out walking in it so we waded through knee deep snow all weekend.  It is INSANE.  They do not clean the snow off the streets.  We have been shoveling driveways like crazy.  Piles of snow are taller than Elder Shoell and he is over 6 feet.  They have to shovel snow into very specific places and they make these piles that their children sled down.  Seriously they sled down their driveways.

I love everybody, I think you are fantastic.  Please tell my Primary class hello, I was thinking of them this week about how awesome they are.
Take care
Elder Spurling