¡bienvenido!

Spencer Michael Henze served a 2 year, full time mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints among the people of Oaxaca, Mexico (pronounced wa-ha-ka). This is the week-by-week account of his service. Elder Henze returned with honor March 21, 2012.

Monday, October 24, 2011

Elder Duncan

Hello again to all you who read this!
This week was pretty cool. the coolest news is that we had the
opportunity to have a member of the first quorum of the seventy come
and visit our mission! Elder Kevin Duncan is his name.
First on Sunday we had a special meeting with all the recent converts
and investigators in the three stakes that make up what is called "The
Istmo." That was really cool because the mission president and a
general authority were able to reaffirm the things we have been
teaching them with their even more powerful testimonies. It was
perfect. one of the guys we´re teaching named Abram has been unsure if
he wants to get baptized because he´s seen people do it in other
churches and later go right back to their sins they did before. He was
worried that he would be a similar case and did not want to mock God.
Now of course we answered this as best we could explaining that first
comes repentance and that it is a change of heart and the holy ghost
would help him afterwards to stay away from sin if he kept on "the
whole armor of god" by keeping up with his scripture study, praying,
going to church and seminary, etc. but he was still a bit unsure. So
later when we were inviting him to the meeting (1 hour away in a place
called Juchitán) we told him that if he would go then his doubt would
be resolved by something the general authority would say or by the
Holy Ghost communicating something to his heart. and probably both
haha.
well, thats exactly what happened. Elder Duncan talked about exactly
that. he basically said what we had told him but in a different way
and coming from him it was way powerful.
I was way happy that the youth from Morro were able to go to that
conference. We brought 17 youth from this little pueblo by
coordinating with Mario (the mission leader out there who´s a suuuuper
impressive person... i´ll tell you about him later) and we contracted
a little transport to take us all the way out there.
I had the unique opportunity to make this happen for these youth. what
happened was that the branch was going to use the money from the
budget they´re allotted but the branch president decided that going to
see a member of the seventy wasn´t a good enough reason to spend the
money and that it would be better to save it for the Christmas
party...
Sunday Mario came to us and informed us that they would not be going
because he didn´t have enough money personally (he usually pays these
things out of pocket) and didn´t get paid until Wednesday so after
prayerfully thinking about it I decided to lend him the money so that
the youth could have this awesome experience. He´s going to give me
back the money on Thursday when we go out there again so its all win
win. I felt way good to have been able to make this possible for the
youth. they had a great time and their testimonies were strengthened.
so after that a couple elders that came from quite far stayed with us
in our house because we had to travel back today and it was way
cheaper to travel from salina cruz than go all the way back to their
area. and the trip is not reimbursable... cool right?
so basically I got 2 hours of sleep last night and woke up sick to my
stomach from not eating much on Sunday but had to go travel an hour
with these and other four missionaries to make sure everyone from this
side got there on time and safely, then help run the zone conference
with my top notch condition haha. it was interesting. what was most
interesting is that the Lord strengthened me a ton. once the
conference started I totally forgot about all of that and had a great
experience! Elder Duncan was really straight up with us and taught me
a lot of stuff. I am excited to go out and apply this stuff and bring
about the renewed vision he was able to transmit to me.  so needless
to say, All is well :)
I hope you all are doing great!!!! I love you and thank you for all
your prayers, love, support, good wishes, and all that. I know it
helps a ton.
The church is true. God the father lives and so does his son Jesus
Christ. I know it because I feel their support and love every single
day that i´m out here and with every trial or challenge that I face.
Without being able to feel that I would have given up long ago. but
here I am after 19 months. I know that they love each and every one of
us and that everything they do they do for that exact reason. 2 Nefi
26:24; 1 John 4:16; John 3:16-17 :)

Love,
Elder Spencer Henze

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Adventures

Hi again!
Just reporting in the new update from Salina Cruz, Oaxaca! today´s
been a good p-day! Me and my district leader Elder Piña took a short
trip over to the beach! its right here about 10 minutes away so we
went to see what was up out there. it was pretty saweet. we found a
pelican and chilled with it for a little bit. It even let us touch it!
so we taught him the plan of salvation.
we also walked about 3 miles along the beach to a huge pile of rocks
which we then climbed up like bosses. then walked back.
as for the work this week we reached almost all of the goals we had
made for the zone. everyone except for one area put baptismal dates
this week! we also baptized a little girl!
we´ve got tons of work in a little pueblo called morro. there's this
dude out there who´s just a super-person in the church. the dude
baptized 580 people on his mission and is working miracles with the
youth out there in the pueblo so we´ve just been helping him wherever
we can and teaching the youth who come to his seminary class so that
they can get baptized and from that we are able to get in to teach the
entire family! it´s so pilas out there!
also while working in our main wards area this past week we went out
contacting and had one of those "miracle" experiences. we were feeling
kinda bummed out about the area and how little work there was for us
out there and all that when I decided that we should just go
contacting and see what we could scare up. well, we chose a random
street / hill that looked to be vertical. seriously, so steep that
about halfway up the road ends and its just wide stairs! we started
with the first door and went from there getting rejected time after
time, when finally at the very top of the hill, the very last house,
we contact it and the lady was interested! so was her husband! they
let us in and we had a super awesome lesson with them and they
accepted to be baptized!!!!! the only obstacle is that we need to get
them married so... could be tough but we´ll see what happens.

well that's about all the exciting news for now! I love you all and
hope you have a terrific week!!

love,
Elder Spencer Henze


Monday, October 10, 2011

First Week as ZL


Hello again!
another week done in the mission and here I am again to report to all
my favorite people from back home!
this week was CRAZY!!! haha. we definitely had lots to do. It was WAY
fun though! so get this... oh Thursday we packed up our bags and took
a fancy bus to OAXACA!! turns out there was a conference for only zone
leaders for the entire mission there in Oaxaca and the mission paid
for us to go to Oaxaca and participate! On the way there we saw three
accidents. one where a bus had bonked an old man throwing him to the
ground, then a building materials truck that crashed on the twisty
highway, then the coolest but scariest was a double gas tanker semi
truck went over the railing on a suuuuuuper steep slope and got
destroyed. kinda loco.
at the conference I was kinda nervous because we had to give a report
in front of all the leaders of the mission about last month´s
achievements in the zone and we had no idea what their approach was or
what their goals were or any of that so we just kinda reported on what
we did know and what our plan of action was this month. we set a goal
of 30 baptisms for the month of October! I`m excited to see how it
goes.
Oaxaca was legit. After the conference the president took us up to
Monte Albán!!! way cool as always. this time it was all green and
pretty up there. We got rained out hard core though and lightning
struck really close by seeing as how when the rain came we were only
about 100 ft below the clouds. The rain soon cleared though after we
all got soaked and joined the stampede out of there. I absolutely
loved being in a cool, dry climate again. it was breezy and everything
and I was in heaven.
after that we didn`t leave until 11:45 at night so we had some time to
hang out and go out on the city! I went and ate at KFC with Elder Ford
:) he came with us to get Visa stuff done.
we got home at 5:00 am after a long bus ride during which I could
hardly sleep. It made for a long day on Saturday but we got to sleep
in a bit to recharge our batteries.
well, we`re going to hit it hard this week to make up for lost time.
Thanks for the inserts you sent me Dad! they ROCK! and I know they`ll
help me a ton.
I love you all and hope you have a great week!!!!! hasta la proxima!

Love,
-Elder Spencer Henze




Monday, October 3, 2011

New Assignment SON!!!

Hey!!!! how´s it going everyone???
haha man, I´m quite content right now. not gonna lie. reason number
one is that I'm officially done being companions with Elder
Fuenzalida!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did my time and survived!! haha. after
his bus left the other elders that were there with me at the bus
station crowded around me and just started congratulating me and
patting me on the back and stuff. it was hilarious!!!
I´ll have to give you more details on some of the things he did this
week later when i´m back with you all. the biggest thing was that he
scammed me out of just a little more money the other day after elder
Enriquez joined the companionship so I called him out on it as he
tried to make it look like it was my fault and he stopped talking to
me for 2 full days. this was on Thursday. it was actually great
because I was able to teach our investigators with elder Enriquez who
teaches well and wants to teach, AND i was able to participate in a
large part of the teaching and baptizing of a 21 year old guy who´s
one of Elder Enriquez´ investigator. so it was almost like having a
baptism this past change!!!

Alright now for the other big news. Turns out I was taken out of my
area (yes after just 6 weeks) again and they put me 30 minutes west in
an area called Salina Cruz as ZONE LEADER!!!!!!! not just zone leader
but SR. ZONE LEADER!!!!!!! =O Not exactly sure why they gave me such
an assignment but i´m going to do my best to magnify it. I´m pretty
nervous to be honest. Today I had to oversee the changes for the whole
zone with only about a couple of hours to learn how to do that, learn
the areas in the zone, who was there, where they were going, and who
was coming and seeing to it that they got here. Luckily Elder Johnson
(the old ZL) took care of the most part of the people who were to
leave in the morning so I was able to get packed last night and sleep
for a few hours before coming out here. its been pretty intense.

aside from that in Cosijopí we found and were teaching a kid who is
going to get baptized next week. next week only because I was sure I
was going to be there to finish the teaching (like one lesson more)
and baptize him. oh well. so it wasn´t a completely dry change :)

well my friends and loved ones, the Lord is great. He has been
orchestrating a learning experience like none other for me here in
Oaxaca and I have learned and grown a ton thanks to his help. I know I
am being prepared for the rest of my life here and even though its
really hard at times i´m grateful for every one of the quickly passing
moments I´m given to be here.

oh ya CONFERENCE!!!!!
definitely a booyah. for sure. and guess what else? it was my last
conference in the mission! that means I´ll be back in time to watch
the next one with you all!!! :)

The church is true. never forget that!

-Love
Elder Spencer Henze