Week #33 Taunton

Hey Family and Friends,

    Started off this week pretty good with a solid District meeting to get everyone pumped on serving the Lord!!(: Elder Cox and I gave a presentation on listening to the promptings of the Holy Ghost while doing missionary work. When we are able to listen more intently to the spirit we will be able to work smarter and be more effective in our efforts to teach. I felt like it went really well but one cool thing was the senior couple joined us this time (Elder and Sister Rampton) and Elder Rampton shared a cool story from when he was in the FBI. He was trying to get this guy who was robbing a bank in Houston, Texas to hand him the bomb he had in his hand. Elder Rampton told him if he took one more step he was going to shoot! He said he could tell the man was terrified and he knew what he was doing was wrong. The man kept walking and right when he was going to pull the trigger the spirit constrained him from doing it. And when that happened the man handed him the bomb. He bore his testimony about being still and listening to the promptings of the Holy Ghost. Such a cool story and very spiritually uplifting for the district, always grateful to learn from the senior couples. Love stories like that... after the meeting we went to an all you can eat buffet with the Ramptons, they spoiled us for passing our flat inspections as a district! Love them(: haha! I love the meetings we have...  One of the new rules we have is that we have quad conferences so four zones with interviews each transfer and a zone conference and district meetings in between to keep us motivated and up to date.  I love it!  I'm in the process of getting my drivers license here in England and this week I passed my theory test!! So sick! It's known to be kind of hard so I was pumped when I passed and now I'm working on taking driving lessons to pass my practical test this transfer so we will see how that goes! 

     Friday, I was on exchange with my boy Elder Burningham from Bountiful, Utah (we followed each other on Instagram before the mish) and we met up with one of our friends Paulo and played a little football (soccer) with him. It was great to hang out with him and become better friends because it then opened up the opportunity to talk about the gospel and teach him for a little. That night we brought Paulo with us to play some basketball at a local college and ended up playing for a bit. It was so sweet! We talked to a lot of them about the gospel while crossing them up! They have a local team called the Taunton Dragons and they go play all over Somerset and after we played a few games against them they tried to recruit me on their team!  Ha!  It was pretty funny, I had to explain why I couldn't come play with them all the time, which opened up conversation for why I was in England.  They play pick up ball with the locals on Friday nights for more practice and now we go play and us "locals" beat them every game! So funny! I guess it's the first time they have lost to a bunch of random people like us! Yeah, I can't join the team, all good but I still love to go, bring Paulo and teach the gospel to all of them. We've found tons of potentials at basketball night that we can start getting ahold of more often! 

    Had a couple teaches with our investigator Leah this week that went really well! Last lesson we talked a lot about how to receive answers through prayer and scripture study because she said if she found out the BOM was true she would be baptized! Need to keep on bringing the spirit into the lessons so she can receive her confirmation(: love being able to teach people about this wonderful message of happiness and love! I don't know what I would do without it in my life!!  I'm still loving England and my mission!

Thanks for all your support!

Have a good week! Love you all!




-ELDER MCSPADDEN

                                                        Futbol with Paulo

                                                          Elder Burningham and I

                                                 Train Life!! Headed back from Bristol

                                             View of a Taunton Sunset outside my flat!

                                       Walking, walking, walking...  On our way home!

Week #32 Taunton

Hey friends and family it's your fav England Missionary Elder McSpadden!!(: 

    It's been a good week filled with tons of different things which keeps it fun and interesting! We found this former investigator named Leah this week and we have been starting to teach her!! She met with missionaries awhile back and started to read the BOM but then it all just stopped. The first lesson we extended a baptismal date and she said if she found the BOM to be true she would get baptized but didn't want a date yet.. but it's okay she will feel the sprit if she has the desire(: 

    We also found a good man named Clay this week from Jamaica who loves the message we shared and said he would come to church this week! Very busy so it's tough but pray he will be able to keep meeting with us and come to church!!

     I had District Leader training in Bristol and Zone Conference right in a row so we have been traveling by train to Bristol a lot! And we asked for permission to go there for p day! We had a great lunch at Five Guys(; We went to Bristol Cabot Circus which is the mall there and walked into Hugo Boss and guess what?? The lady who was working there said, "Hey Elders"!  She's a member and started talking to us for awhile and she then said we could have 50% off anything in the store.  Elder Cox got a new suit and I finally bought myself a winter coat, which I've needed for quite sometime. Mom will be happy!  Bristol is so fun and I love the big cities like that!  I had a good exchange with the Elders in Weston Super Mare again and we found some pretty solid people for them! I love going on exchanges and being able to experience new areas and meet new people!  

    Our investigator Elizabeth is sooo hard to get a hold of but we're going over there tomorrow and we have an appointment with her on Sunday!  Keep her in your prayers... One thing that was a struggle this week was we went to a teach with a man named Nick and everything went so bad, haha. He's a very intelligent guy and had so many questions but this random dude was there and the whole time he was just bashing on us. We had brought a member with us which was good and he seemed to take the situation really well and was calm. We finally ended up just walking out but we're going to go back when the other guy isn't there because he ruined it. After the teach we went back to our flat pretty mad and upset so before we went back out again we knelt down to pray and after we prayed we just started laughing and crying so hard about the situation. It was so frustrating and I was working really hard  to not get upset but it was trying my patience for sure! I wanted to just punch the guy! After we prayed, I think the Lord knew we just needed a good laugh!  Elder Cox and I laughed for about 20 minutes it felt good but I was so glad the member was there to help us out!  

    I'm honestly loving my mission right now! Being a DL is rough at times and with Elder Cox going home soon it can be hard but the Lord just keeps on blessing me with good days and reasons to be happy! My area is awesome and Elder Cox and I are getting along really well so that's great! Overall it's been a good week and I'm keeping busy! This next week is going to be busy as well, district meeting, two exchanges and moves so that's going to be interesting! I think I'll be staying until Elder Cox leaves and I'm okay with that! 

Love you all and I hope you have a smashing week(: 

-ELDER MCSPADDEN 

                                                               Five Guys in Bristol!

                                                   Cabot Circus, the mall in Bristol!

                                                                 Downtown Bristol...

                                             Turkish barber that cuts our hair!  The best!!!

                                                                Taunton Graffiti! 

                 New dress coat... Members keep donating coats to me because I haven't had one!  :)

Week #31 Taunton

    Started off the week with a great district meeting that I felt like helped the district a lot! We talked  about having faith to find and being more persuasive teachers to those we meet.  The spirit was very strong during that meeting! After that I went on exchange with the Bristol Zone Leaders, Elder Dennis! We were all pumped up on the meeting and wanted to get out and find some new people to teach and we did. We were in the area of Chippenham and in 2 hours between the four of us we found 5 new investigators!! It was a miracle for us for sure. Strengthened my faith during those hours to know that there are always people prepared we just have to find them!!

    Finished up the exchange and we trained back to Taunton! When we came back one of our legend return missionaries Luke Tutton came out with us for the rest of the day! We came across a former investigator who was way solid awhile back named Patrick and he said he wants to learn more so we are meeting up with him again this week as well! For lunch that day we went to a place called USA Fried Chicken, haha. I walked in and asked if Americans got free food and the guy laughed and said no... but then gave us free drinks so that's good! We then went up to the Bridgwater investigators baptism which was sweet. Seeing that man make those promises with God was a very spiritual experience! 

    Did some service for a struggling member in the ward by doing some gardening for him. While we were doing it we kept seeing tons of frogs so we started catching all these frogs haha. Just having a laugh once in awhile is nice!

    Sunday night we were doing some finding and found three new investigators which I'm pumped for! Two of them are these sweet police dudes Raf and Mathew that we met. They seemed pretty keen on what we were saying so it will be cool to see what happens with them. And then an English doctor who had some crazy questions and we are meeting up again Sunday to teach him more!

    Went on another exchange with an Elder in my district that I roomed with in the MTC. Elder Dicky from South Africa!! He's a beast missionary and it was so fun to be out in Weston Supermare working with him. We made some brownies for these members and it turns out they were struggling pretty bad so that was something they needed! Crazy how the Lord puts us in the right places at the right times. 

    Finished up the exchange and trained back to Taunton. When we came back it was raining so hard and we were praying that it would clear up because it was freezing and wet while contacting. As we did that it cleared up and this sweet rainbow came out! Elder Cox and I decided to do rainbow contacting... wherever the end of the rainbow was pointing to is the house we would go knock on and try to get our "golden" investigator! Didn't find them but we did talk to some great people and might have planted some seeds(:

    Each day my faith in Jesus Christ is increasing! It happens by small miracles we see or by just simple life lessons learned I can see the hand of the Lord in this work! I know it's real and that it's eternal!!(:

Much love from Taunton! God speed.    

-ELDER MCSPADDEN 

                                            Elder Cox, Elder McSpadden and Luke Tutton

                                   Baking Brownies with Elder Dicky from South Africa!

                                                                     Service and Frogs!

                                My Homie Elliot from my Taunton ward!  Love this kid!

Double rainbow in Taunton! 

Week #30 Taunton

  Hey, 

    Started the week off with a family history night with the ward. We invited some investigators who have done family history in the past but they didn't show up, which was hard! It turned out to be good though because we were about to leave and then some of the older members wanted us to help them. So we connected them all to WIFI, typed up their emails and set up family search for them. Haha, they couldn't figure it out on their own so I think we were a good help to them. We then got a ride home from this member who is 93 years old, Brother Birchel. He about killed us 10 times on the ride home. I think the reason he never crashes is because angels are watching over this man... love him though. 

    Friday, we taught one of our investigators Gordon in Wiveliscombe which went pretty well. We talked about the importance of the Book of Mormon in conversion. He said he's going to start from the beginning and read the whole Book of Mormon. Love that commitment!  We haven't been able to meet with Elizabeth this week... A lot of times I find that they say they want to meet but then stop answering phone calls and she wasn't in when we stopped by. She's so ready for baptism but we just need to keep working with her to get her there. She's a caretaker for a member that's really sick so I think that's another reason why it's been hard. She's been pretty busy taking care of her. 

    Sunday, was awesome because it was the Taunton Ward's Conference. After the Ward Conference we had a munch and mingle where everyone brings food and we eat and chat. After that I had the chance to do my first Baptismal Interview for a man from Hungary named Imi. (one of the other Elders investigators in my district) During the interview the spirit was so strong and you could tell this man was ready and excited to make covenants with God.

    I went on exchange with an Elder who is getting trained right now in Washford. His name is Elder Stein and he's from Germany! It was great to be with him and help him out during these first couple weeks of being a new missionary. It feels like yesterday that I was being trained!! Time flies(: anyways we went to a part member families house for dinner, Bill and Christine. It was great but since the member liked to talk we didn't really get to teach Bill as much as we wanted to. We are good friends with him now so hopefully we can keep on working hard to get the gospel in his life! 

    Another funny thing is when we went into their house and they found out Elder Stein was German they kept saying "oh you flippin Nazi" I was laughing so hard!! After the DA Elder Stein said that was the first time someone has called him a Nazi so many times in a row!! Haha good stuff. He took it well(:

    We also had the Worldwide Broadcast that most of you probably have heard of! It was great to learn what else I can do as a missionary to further the work here in Taunton and what we can do as a mission to do better! I love the leaders we have and I can tell that they are servants of God through the spirit they bring to meetings like this! I love the gospel with all my heart and I'm so glad I'm out here doing my best to serve Heavenly Fathers children 😊 

Love, Elder McSpadden
  "Elder Stein and I! We are going to be life long friends and I would love to go visit him in Germany!"

                                                          "Mobbin the streets!"

                                                              Priorsfield

                                    "Criddle's from Taunton, Somerset! Our ancestors..."

                   "Another Criddle, their son...  He's pretty swag looking, runs in the blood!"  :)