Spencer Marks Kiribati Mission
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Letter of February 22, 2015

BERU IS HOT!!! Okay, to all you folks back shivering in the snow, I
know you're all thinking, "No duh, Sherlock, you're in Kiribati. Quit
complaining and enjoy the heat." But you guys don't understand. It is
HOT. Like, while I was on Tarawa Ieta, it was comfortable. There were
even times it was cold, from our view. But Beru is NOT! It is SO
HOT!!! So I'm not dead yet, but I'm going to be a little brown boy
when I get back. :)

Beru is tough, not gonna lie. We have almost no investigators, and
there is a lot of opposition from the Catholic and the KUC (Kiribati
United Church). So we have been tracting like I've never tracted
before! (Honestly, I think I'd tracted maybe 2 or 3 houses in my
mission before here. So it's a change!) But we're starting to get some
people, and we will CONTINUE to get more people until this entire
island is taken up into heaven or we collapse trying to get it there!
:)

Best part of my week was definitely last night. We did church all
day, up and down the island, and after the last one, the unit we did
it with invited us to dinner. As we were eating, they pulled out
guitars and started playing and singing. They were good! They even
knew a bunch of Country songs and Christmas carols! There was one of
them who didn't have an instrument, so he grabbed some spoons and
started hitting them together to the beat. Then he went to eat, and I
was done eating, so I grabbed his spoons, a glass, and a metal ladel,
and when combined with the sticks we were sitting on and a folded up
portion of the mat we were on, I made a pretty mean drum set. Started
singing along with them too, and they were blown away, because Elders
before have been pretty terrible singers. So we just
sang until it was time to go home (we don't work here after dinner,
because it's dark and most people don't have light in their houses.)
SO MUCH FUN. I don't think I've ever gotten so into singing "Jingle
Bells" my entire life. :) Also, taught them "Hark the Herald Angels
Sing". Almost cried. :P I love Christmas carols so much, especially
that one, because it's just pure praise and joy for Christ! It's
glorious. :)

Also, just saying, there is cold Coke on the island. I'm really glad
that the First Presidency came out with that thing saying that
caffeine isn't against the word of wisdom, because that's pretty much
the only drink here. Still wary of caffeine, so I don't go crazy on
it, but man, cold drinks! SO GOOD! :)

Anyway, my companion is done emailing, so I should probably be
rolling, but just saying, the gospel is true! Read the Book of Mormon!
I love you all! Keep up the good everything!

Love,

Elder Marks





Letter of February 15, 2015

FAMILY!!!! AND EVERYBODY ELSE!!!!!!

First of all, it was SO GOOD TO SKYPE!!!!! Ah, that just gives the
last little bit of juice to make everything glorious for these last
couple months here. Ain't nothin can stop me when I've got folks like
I've got praying for me!

Also, last night, I got to interview with President Weir. 4th
interview of my mission. And just saying, I don't mean to bad talk any
other mission presidents, but my president and his wife are most
definitely the best on planet Earth. :) I love them both SO MUCH. I
got to interview, we renewed my temple recommend, and then just
chatted about the work on Tarawa Ieta and Beru. It warmed me heart. I
haven't heard from him in months, really had no idea what he thought
of the work we were doing out there, and it was a REALLY rough area so
I was worried he was going to be disappointed in us. He said that we
did a "miracle" out there. (Reminder to future missionaries: Obedience
brings blessings, exact obedience brings miracles.) 

(Lest anybody think I'm bragging, I feel like it's an Alma twenty six situation. Ya,
we went, we were obedient, and we worked hard, but looking at the
individuals that made the changes in our lives, it was NOT us that
wrought those changes. That was the Holy Ghost. Like, Buddy, AWESOME
reactivated member, got reactivated because we were going to lesson
with his wife, and asked him to sit in with us. He said, "I've been
baptized, I went to Moroni (the church high school),, I don't have any
problem. You guys just need to work with this girl." And he had an
earring and was drinking and smoking and not coming to church. But we
kept asking, and told him that we weren't allowed to lesson with just
a woman. Lots of missionaries in Kiribati don't keep that rule, but
President Weir says it's important, so we do it. ONE LESSON. Not even
that spectacular. We lessoned on the Sabbath, and that week, Buddy
came to church. 

Now he's completely active, has been bugging our
branch president to get home teaching going, and even went out to do
it by himself when they all agreed to meet and do it and nobody showed
up. THE MAN. 100 percent change. And that's the kind of thing that
happened all over Tarawa Ieta. Just because we were out working, and
keeping the rules, God put people in our path who were ready to make
the change. It was SUCH a hard area, but a lot of good things
happened.

Anyway, that was a long explanation on that one, got a bit side
tracked. :P The interview went super well, I almost cried when
President Weir closed in prayer, the Spirit was so strong. He prayed
that I would receive the very things that I've been trying to
cultivate so hard lately, and even thanked God that I was trying to
develop them. (I did NOT tell him or hint or anything.) He is an
inspired man. He also told me that my time would finish out on Beru,
unless I really wanted to work Tarawa, and then he'd have me in right
away. Meh. I've spent my whole mission roughing it on outer islands,
don't want to spoil a good thing by spending my last month in a nice
house with air conditioning and fridge and stuff. :) And he said I
MIGHT get to train again, so here's hoping! :)

That was done, he had an interview with Elder David, who I trained on
Nonouti, and then we were about to leave, and I mentioned that there
was NO ice cream on Tarawa (I know, right? None. In ANY store on the
island.) And Sister Weir said, "Oh, I think the last ice cream on
Tarawa is inside our freezer!" Because they basically work two
missions, Tarawa and Marshalls, they had some that had been sitting
there for months with nobody to eat it. And it was just enough for 3
bowls, one for me, one for Elder David, and one for Elder Davis, my
first child and the Zone Leader who was taking care of us. They sent
us over to Senior Couples house to get chocolate syrup, cracked open
peanuts, had some cookies, and even pulled some maraschino cherries
out of the fridge (of which I had 3, because the other two don't like
them. :) ) So my mission president made ice cream sundaes for us at
his house at nine fifteen at night. (We figured it was okay to stay
out late, because he made us do it! :) ) Hence, my mission president
and his wife are the best in the world. :)

So then this morning I woke up at five in the morning to get on an
airplane to Beru! I'll talk a bit about it since most people didn't
get to skype. Beru is a little island south east of Nonouti. HOT. Just
like Nonouti. Famous for eating "mud", which is actually this moss
stuff that grows on a lake. I don't remember what all I told the
family, so I'll just not make a line between stuff you guys know and
what you don't. My companion is Elder Tarati, Kiribati, four more
weeks to go until he's done, and the MAN. President says he's one of
his best Elders, and just meeting him today, he's not kidding. Way
good guy. 

Elders coming off here always call the house "that hole",
but they're just pansies. It's nice brick, we have cooking stuff,
plenty of space, we're sleeping on kies and it's going to be great.
Honestly, it's nice. And what's even better, the Elder who I replaced
got a package a week ago, and you really don't have space to take
extra stuff because we only get fifteen kgs, so we have a good chunk
of a very large, new elder from America's quality package. :) Just had a
nice cup of Crystal Light! 

Elder Tarati says that the work is pretty
hard here, because they whitewashed the area (both Elders being new,
rather than the usual of one getting moved at a time so that the one
who stays can show the area to the new one) and a lot of people don't
want to listen.  So it'll be hard, but that's good! We've got two
ridiculously experienced Elders out here, and we're going to kill it
for this last month until Tarati goes home, and then I'll kill it with
my new comp until I go home!

It's strange! Being on Tarawa, I was the oldest missionary I saw. I
spent a couple hours working with an Elder from Fiji because his comp
had flight issues and wasn't there yet. I was thinking, "hey, this
guy's pretty good! I wonder when he came in?" Turns out, I trained
somebody from his intake at the MTC. It was the second person I
trained. CRUD I'M OLD!!! It's scary. And it's so interesting. Being on
Tarawa is a whole different feel. I feel like it's more like another
mission would be like. There are Elders, there are district meetings
and such, and it just feels... I don't know. I just feel more like the
kind of Elder that worked back home. Outer islands it's you and your
comp against the world, back on Tarawa you're part of a team. I don't
know, it's just a way different feel. 

So now I'm back on an outy, it's like being back home. :) And I'm so excited! 
It's going to be hard, and we are going to work it! But it was really good being 
on Tarawa, getting that battery recharge from all the missionaries, interviewing,
skyping, the whole gig. I'm definitely pumped to finish out hard on
this!

Well, this has been long, and my comp is Kiribati so he's fast with
email (future emails will probably be shorter until he dies the end of
next month.) So we'll probably be rolling! But I love you all SO
MUCH!!! Keep on praying, prayer is the only way. In so many things.

Keep on keeping on, and I will email to y'all next week!

Love,

Elder Marks


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