Email received November 25, 2013

Querida familia,
I'm sorry my letter kinda freaked you out last week. I guess i just couldn´t really think of much to say but i promise i had a fantastic week. I love you guys so much and thanks for the all the prayers. I hope you know i pray for you all as well. Ha actually last pday we celebrated thanksgiving here as a zone. Our zone is very american so we all decided to get together and have a little party. We couldn´t cook a turkey though so we just bought some rotisserie chicken ha it reminded me of some good times me zack and jeff had. My president is a really good guy. He is very spiritual and you can tell he has so much love for his missionaries and for the work. He is a strict man but very sincere and very obedient. There is a very real opposing force here to the work. I have seen a lot down here in just the past 2 transfers and things that really i just can´t share because they are very sacred but I promise i am totally fine. The lord loves and protects each of his missionaries and i have been blessed with strength beyond my own. We had so many less actives in church yesterday, it was truly amazing to see the capilla fairly full. I loved it so much. The work is really starting to take off with the less actives. We taught a lot of them last week and we are really only struggling with getting this one woman to return. I'm pumped for uncle Ben. That took a while but its good that it happened por fin. so about the humanitarian stuff, I would love if she sent some things but in truth i don´t think i could be the one to hand the stuff out. If she wanted to she could send it to the mission office or something and they should be able to distribute but I don´t think its a good thing for me to do. The hardest part about my mission so far i think has been having to tell people i cant help them out financially. Its super hard but i can always share a quick message, give them a pack of oreos, and testify to them of the love our heavenly father has for them. I thought a lot about the song love is spoken here this past week. I have seen some pretty messed up homes here. The physical structures and the families that live inside them are full of problems. I thought about the line, mine is a home where every hour is blessed by the strength of priesthood power. What a great line. I know its true in our home and it can be for their homes as well. Thats what i am most grateful for. I grew up in a home knowing that no matter what happened the priesthood was always there. I had a mother and father who taught me gospel truths my whole life. When i was blessed to know that everything would be ok with you guys when i left in my setting apart, i didnt really understand how until now. I know mom that we are a forever family, what else matters? I hope thanksgiving is a blast for you all. We do have fhe´s with the members but we are not allowed to eat there. I havent really been sick but we did eat some weird food from this one restaurant and my whole house including my native zone leader got incredibly bad tummy troubles. Transfer calls will be here on sunday and i am thinking my comp will leave. I will be finished completely with my training so depending on the amount of missionaries coming in, i will be training. If its the lords will of course. I did receive the package yesterday. Thanks so much for sending it.
I love you all,
Elder spencer w. hulsey


ps here is marisol at her baptism

(No Subject)

Email received November 18, 2013

Dear family,

First a big happy birthday to Caleb. I miss that little guy and I'm looking forward to talking with him at Christmas. Its weird because i cant even imagine what he sounds like. I learned a lot about patience and overcoming adversity this past week. Bani is a real make you or break you area. and we can only do so much but we still wake up and start working anyway. I love being a missionary. I hope all is going well for you guys. I really hope you are able to find more missionary opportunities as well. So i have only had one zone conference here but we have a big mission conference coming up in December. Interviews are every 2 transfers and my president cant speak too much English so its for the most part all in Spanish. Ha pero esta bien, mi espanol no es perfecto pero puedo entender y puedo contestar las preguntas. Estoy mejorando cada dia y pienso que ese es la manera que el Senor quiere. Well I love you guys and I hope you are having a great week.

With love,
Elder Spencer W. Hulsey

Re: Happy Veteran's Day‏

Email received November 11, 2013

Querido familia,
Yo tuve mi primero bautismo en jueves y fue confirmado ayer. Tengo mucho felicidad por eso! really i cant even express how awesome it was. She was so nervous to do it in front of everybody, we actually had quite a few people show up to it which was awesome as well, but we were able to calm her fears by having everybody besides the witnesses close their eyes and reminding her how happy heavenly father was for her. I don´t know if i will see many baptisms here or not but im so happy i at least got to see Marisol get baptized. And im still committed everyday to go out and find the people who are ready. Thats how preach my gospel says to measure success. Are you still studying it? I cant really answer your questions about how its different from the discussions but i trust you will come to know it soon enough. wow that is crazy about russel eh? it really does go by just too fast. Mom you have absolutely no idea how much you have done for me and how much you do for me. Thanks so much for not chatting with the other moms or anything like that. I feel all your love and all your prayers. Frankly i feel like i have the best mom in the world. Y entonces, FELIZ CUMPLEAÑOS!!!!!! Im so blessed to have you as a mother really. I have seen a lot down here. Too many struggling families and im always reminded just how blessed i am to have my family and the promise that if we keep the commandments, we will be together forever. Im going to be working super hard this week with emphasis on reactivation. The time is now. I know i am a part of the great and maravillosa obra de los ultimos dias. No puedo expresar mi sentimientos con palabras pero yo se que el Señor esta conmigo cada dia aqui. Yo se que ese es verdadero. Yo se que jesucristo vive y nos ama. Soy un representante de el aqui en la republica dominicana. Tengo mucho amor por ellos. Si es dificil, si muchas personas me odian pero eso no es importante. porque soy llamado por dios para ayudar a estas personas a encontrar salvacion. Dios quiere que yo haga eso. Caun grande es mi llamamiento? I really do love what i do. So we have these two sisters in our zone, and one of them has been sick lately i guess and they haven´t ben able to get out in a while. The zone leaders asked us to go to the hospitial here in bani to help them get some kind of a test. So we did and while we were waiting a cristiano pastor came and started to try and throw down some doctrine with us. Elder manubay knows the bible like the back of his hand but we refuse to contend. We just invited and despite the many traps he tried to trick us into the lord kept his promise. That if we opened our mouths they would be filled and we would not be confounded before men. He told me he just couldn´t believe in the words of joseph smith. I asked have you read them? and he said an interpretation of them. So i asked him to do this, read the book of mormon, which is ancient scripture translated by joseph smith but not his words, and forget his doubts but only have faith. And then you can believe by the power of the holy ghost that this is true. Salvation comes through Jesus Christ and these are his words. Its very nice to have the lord on your side and to know when you speak by the spirit you are speaking the exact words he wants us to say.
I love you all,
Elder Spencer W. Hulsey

Email received November 4, 2013

Dear family,
Sorry for writing so early for you guys but today is a holiday here. Halloween kinda works like this here i guess, its a whole weekend. So basically its been halloween for the past few days here. the 31st was super crazy though because the day before Boston won the world series and Bani is full of Boston fans. Haha we heard the loudest cheers and all manner of shenanigans that whole night. Something kinda funny about Dominicans is they dont know that the United States are more than just new york and boston. They always assume thats where im from so just to help them out a bit i say i am from a campo a cerca de Nueva York se llama Utah. Im honestly doing really well. For the first time in a while we had more than one investagator attend church. Its been raining a lot here and the problem with our branch is that its huge and people can only afford motorcycles so when its raining its almost too dangerous to come to church but there are definitely some faithful members. I was pretty scared to death yesterday though ha not for my life or anything but we had this guy julio nunez show up to church. We were absolutely thrilled and i explained that this is a fast sunday and we will hear testimonies of the members to him. Then Jugo stood up. We love jugo a lot but he said some things he really shouldn´t have over the pulpit and then to make matters worse the district president stood up and called him out on it in front of everybody. Testimony meetings are always super interesting ha but anyway julio said he really loved meeting anyway and that his door is always open and we could visit him whenever. we are working really hard to try and teach the members the doctrine now too. The thing is i know i was called here for a reason and im just trying to do my best to help out this branch. Its all i can do. Predicar mi Evangelio huh? Its a really amazing book. I don´t really know how you did the work before at all but everything in preach my gospel is supposed to be based off what the spirit tells you. We study it like crazy and its super helpful in creating lessons plans that should directly help the persons direct needs. If you guys can try and look up this talk by Jeffery R. Holland he gave at the mtc back in March. I got to watch the brodcast of that in the CCM and it was really helpful to me in trying to become a better preach my gospel missionary. I really love studying in Chapter 6 and also in chapter 10 specifically in the como comenzar enseñar part. I think those really explain what we try to do as missionarys. In truth we aren´t just here to preach the palabra in your faith but we are here to be representatives of jesus christ. So chapter 6 explains what we need to do to be a good representative. This past week we were out tracting and it was raining super hard and we didn´t have umbrellas or anything so we were just getting drenched which kinda helped because more people were letting us in but we came up to this one house and heard this quien invito las mormones? this woman then turned around starred me right in the face and said super sternly no we want nothing to do with you we are catholic for life. I simply told her pues esta bien entonces solo querremos ser amigos y ayuda le. She just kept shaking her head and saying bye so we kept on trudging through the rain. Manubay then talked to me and said its alright i mean we will see her at judgement day right? it got me thinking though. I don´t want to see any of these people at judgement day going in the wrong direction. It really hurts me to even think about. i pray really hard for everybody who rejects the message. I guess what i want to say is missionary work much like the life of Jesus Christ can not be for yourself. Yes it was raining hard and yes its terrible being rejected but its not important. I know its true. I know it will bless these peoples lives so its not worth it feeling sorry for myself. im so happy everything is going well at home. Thanks so much for everything i got a letter from grandma and it made me all teary eyed. Im so happy we are an eternal family. I might be needing a good sweater or two because di que, dominican for supposedly, it gets cold at the end of November.
I love you guys so much,
Elder Spencer W. Hulsey

Email received October 28, 2013

Querido Familia,
Muchas gracias por su correo. Tengo mucho feclicidad cuando estoy leyendo sobre ustedes. Mami te amo. Oro para tu cada dia. Te extraño mucho pero yo se que estoy donde necesito estar. I love being here mom. Its the best decision i think i ever could have made. I dont even know why people would ever pass all this up. Its a struggle as you know but even though there are a lot of bad times, there is always hope. I have a lot of hope for this area. We are trying so hard but the people are just very laid back. Its hard for them to understand the importance of keeping commitments. But I know i was called here for a reason. I know it wasn´t random. And i guess this is just the lucha. All we can do is work. I really love to read in the scriptures too. In spanish they are even easier to understand. I was reading about abinadi this past week. It was pretty obvious he knew he was going to die there and i to be honest he may not have known all the reasons why the lord had asked to do what he did, never the less he did it. He preached the word with power and authority and though was rejected by many he was able to touch one heart. Alma the mayor, and look at all the good that came out of that. I really don´t know everything but i know i have a sacred calling and i am going to fulfil it. What do you mean the time is going slow? its blowing by mom. My days sometimes feel like they are two hours long. Im really working hard and having so much fun along the way. They really love to play dominoes here. You often see a group of older people sitting around and playing a game ha it does make for easy contacting. Our pool is kinda growing. We get rejected a lot but if you read in preach my gospel it defines how our success is measured. WE have to be commited to find people. WE have to be commited to teach and to baptize and to reactivate. WE have to be diligent. I really love the obra mom. Church was different this week because it was district conference. President came and spoke at it and it was really amazing. He talked about the work of salvation. We did sing in the choir and it was pretty funny. I will definitely have some wonderful memories about it. We have one piano player and he is our zone leader Elder Gatherum. He is an american and hes not the one who cooks. Me and him do get a long really well though. This will probably be his last transfer here though because he is going home in january. Well things are sounding great at home. Keep faithful and strong.
With love,
Elder Spencer W. Hulsey

Emails received October 21, 2013

Dear family,
This past week was a very good one to end the transfers on. We had interviews with the president last Thursday and he said my Spanish is sounding super good. He is a spiritual giant. There is really no other way to describe it. I really love him. I haven´t had any problems with my kidneys. I am being as smart as i can with the water i drink too i promise mom. I don´t plan on wasting one second of the lords time y entonces no quiero tener problemas con mi salud. Its super important to have the spirit with you always. Its the thing that really gets you through all your ups and downs. You go through a lot on a mission. You experience a lot and people look to you often to do something you really have no idea how to do but god is a very smart man. He won´t put you in a wrong situation with a wrong person so just be obedient. Follow the proper counsels and use the spirit. Thats the only way to have success. Also its very important to notice the little miracles. Oh so im staying in Bani with Manubay for one more transfer. Actually our house didn´t change at all which made me super happy because we have a lot of fun here. Zack is absolutely right. Its the only way. I think maybe for people in the church we treat repentance and the atonement as such a scary thing. Its a hard thing but its not scary. In truth its just happy. It makes everything so much easier in the end. So never be afraid to use the atonement when needed because it was made for a reason. Oh acapella. Cant believe those days are over sometimes. I trust wilcok kept the choir in line. We have a choir here in our branch but i think it would make wilcok cry for all the wrong reasons. Not too many Dominicans have a good voice. But its still a pretty fun. Tell emma its really going to be ok. I have had to learn this concept here, The lord will always bless you with strength beyond your own in the moment you really need it when you are humble and obedient. Its all going to be ok. Halloween should be pretty fun it sounds like. I think dad should go in a gorilla suit though, or maybe save that for field day or algo como si. Pues muchas gracias por todo. Yo se que estoy en el mejor parte de mi vida. Me amo todos las personas aqui. Ellos necesitan muchos cosas y se que el senor quiere darles todos. Mom i had such wonderful experiences this last week. I want to tell you about them all but I think im a bit too nervous to do so. But do know that im so happy here. I feel so good. It is hard tu sabes but im growing a lot everyday. And everyday its getting that much easier. I feel that is the purpose of life. Not to get everything right away but precept on precept. Everyday I can tell myself that i did a little bit better than yesterday. I start to notice every little thing the lord does for me. I know he lives, i know he loves me. I want to help these people as best as i can. I don´t think the lord can experience more joy than when a lost sheep is found.
I love you guys,
Elder Hulsey