Return Missionary Next Chapters

Spencer Johanson - Flashes of Light in Darkness: Overcoming Unwanted Habits and Addictions

• Sid Bassett • Episode 3

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0:00 | 46:58

In this heartfelt episode, Spencer Johanson vulnerably shares his journey through darkness — from personal health struggles, grief over the loss of a nephew, to battling addiction and finding hope in the power of Jesus Christ’s love and repentance. These stories are not only a testament to resilience but also a guiding light for others navigating their own difficult transitions after serving a mission or facing unexpected hardships.

In this episode:

  • Spencer's childhood in a musical, faith-filled home and the roots of his testimony
  • The profound impact of his nephew Oliver's diagnosis and passing, and how it shaped his faith
  • His decision to serve a mission amid personal trials and how the mission transformed him
  • The realities of transitioning back home, including grief, cultural adjustments, and mental health
  • An open discussion on the challenges of pornography addiction, shame, guilt, and the path to healing through Christ
  • The concept of "flashes of light" — divine moments that illuminate faith during dark times
  • The importance of repentance, ongoing self-improvement, and trusting God's love and power
  • Practical advice for missionaries returning home, emphasizing listening to God and embracing the next chapters

Timestamps:

  • (00:01) The fire within long before the mission: Spencer’s childhood and faith foundation
  • (01:23) Growing up in a musical family: roots of creativity and love
  • (03:06) How a spiritual experience during baptism shaped Spencer’s testimony
  • (05:23) Grieving the loss of nephew Oliver and finding peace through scripture
  • (08:08) Wrestling with faith and theodicy during a heartbreaking season
  • (11:07) Deciding to serve a mission amid expectations and family tradition
  • (13:12) Serving as a COVID missionary: blessings, challenges, and memories
  • (14:42) Returning home amid loss and emotional transition
  • (17:40) The struggle and hope regarding pornography addiction — honesty and faith
  • (24:42) Turning to Christ through repentance: pivotal moments and spiritual renewal
  • (33:23) Flashes of light: divine miracles and divine interventions in everyday life
  • (34:47) Discovering type 1 diabetes post-mission: a surprising blessing
  • (40:36) Overcoming shame and the importance of divine love and forgiveness
  • (44:54) Words of encouragement: listening to God and embracing future chapters

Resources & Links:

SPEAKER_04

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another edition of Return Missionary Next Chapters Podcast. I am your host, Sid Bassett. They say trial is the furnace of the soul, but for Spencer Johansson, that fire was lit long before he ever put on a mission tag. Imagine growing up the youngest of eight in a home filled with music, only to find yourself years later living in a cold, perpetual silence, the kind that comes from the darkness of unwanted habits, the shock of a post-mission type 1 diabetes diagnosis, and the heavy grief of losing a young nephew. In that darkness, Spencer questioned his own core values and often felt he wasn't worthy to be a good guy. But today he's here to talk about the flashes of light that often emerge when you're sitting in the darkness. We're diving into a journey that moves from the chapel pew where a sacrament prayer finally rang in a teenager's ear to a mission field where personal struggle was forged in profound empathy. This isn't just a story of overcoming, it's about the messy, the beautiful, and the complexity and the process of becoming. Spencer, welcome to the show. Great to have you.

SPEAKER_02

Thanks, Sid. It's good to be here.

SPEAKER_04

Thanks for coming on. Let me start with your youth. So I you told me that you are the youngest of eight children and you grew up in a very musical home. Tell me about that.

SPEAKER_02

That's true. Yeah, my family, there must have been an instrument always going on in my family, and especially during the younger years when everybody was, you know, still in high school or younger. And there's jokes constantly around the, or there were around the dinner table about people just annoying each other with the instruments tinkering in the background. But, you know, it was a great environment. It was lots of love. My parents really, that comes from them. They're the musical ones. My dad minored in piano at BYU. And my mom has just been able to pick up any instrument she ever plays. So yeah, she's been in different orchestras and bands and has traveled around, but never decided to do it as a as a professional. That was always in high school and just and just did it as a hobby in college.

SPEAKER_04

So it was more of an orchestra than a choir, I guess. You you didn't sing as much as you did play, or did you do both?

SPEAKER_02

Oh, I do both. Uh not all of my family sings. Not all of them play instruments, too, but there's enough of us to go around. So I will say we had a rule at the dinner table that we couldn't sing. Just it got out of hand too many times, I guess.

SPEAKER_04

I love that. To keep the peace, perhaps, in the family. Of course. Um, I grew up the baby of seven children, so not quite eight, but I had aspirations. Osmonds, Jackson Five, the Bassett's. But as I got older, I realized that it was meant just for our home. That's great. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so you grew up in the church, and as all of us do who do grow up in the church, you have to find your own testimony, your own conversion of Savior Jesus Christ. How'd that work out for you?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, so um my parents were really, really good at teaching us children all of the stories of the Book of Mormon. If you would ask me in seminary or even in Sunday school after church, I could give you the answer to every question. But I I don't think that quite equates to your testimony. I feel like that can resonate with a lot of people. You you can know the right answer, but you don't really know it, right? In your heart. You don't really feel it. It's not a part of your testimony yet, even though you know, you know, you know, exactly what Nephi did each time he was looking for the plate. So you can tell the story of Am and how he cut off the arms. They're not really a part of you until you have a spiritual experience with them. And that was my experience. I I don't really remember my baptism. I actually only I almost failed my baptismal interview, which was kind of fun as an eight-year-old, right? So that that moment wasn't really.

SPEAKER_04

Okay, I'm sorry, I got asked the question. Do you fail?

SPEAKER_02

I remember I remember being in that interview, and his name was Bishop Hill. Very nice guy, good family friend. He actually lives right down the street from me right now. But he, I don't know, I was just scared out of my wit's end. I didn't know what to say. And he asked me about John the Baptist. And in that moment, I had no idea who John the Baptist was. And I was just giving him a blank face, and then he nudged me, you know, like, you remember, you know, the baptism of Jesus? And then it clicked for me. I was like, oh yeah, I know that story. I know who that is, I know what this is, I know why I'm here. So I did get baptized. I I remember, I remember I passed that interview, but those blessings and that covenant didn't resonate with me until much later. I was a teacher, so 14 or 15 years old, in a sacrament meeting, and I was ushering, and I just remember, for some reason, feeling oddly guilty. I was just guilty and felt bad about myself, like I had done something wrong. And I remember closing the doors, getting ready for the sacrament, you know, that ritual, invite the peace into the sacrament meeting. And I remember listening to that prayer, the sacrament prayer, and just feeling the spirit rush into me. And I remember just bawling, just sitting there with my arms crossed in front of me, just guarding the door, just bawling my eyes out in front of the rest of the ward. And I don't think anybody saw me in that moment, but I remember feeling very vulnerable. But I also remember thinking that that's okay. That's okay that I feel that way. And I just remembered feeling that love of the savior for me, and that my covenants make me whole that I can be clean again. And that was very profound for me.

SPEAKER_04

I love that. You we will talk about these pillars of light you've mentioned in our conversations. And then that sounds like one of those for you, kind of an anchoring point to your conversion to the savior. So just before you were going to go on a mission, I'll talk about that decision here in a minute. But you had the loss of a nephew, which I think impacted you pretty, pretty deeply. Could you talk about that?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, my brother, my brother's son, his name's Oliver. And Oliver was born when I was in high school, right near the end of my high school. And about six months after his birth, so my brother and his wife, they were noticing just something different about the child. It wasn't meeting all of the the um, what are they called?

SPEAKER_04

The milestones in the child's life. Yeah. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02

It wasn't meeting all the milestones, and everybody around them is telling him it's fine, it's fine, just wait. He'll get there, everything will be okay. And eventually got to the point where they just took him to the doctor and they started a grueling process of trying to figure out what was happening. And eventually Oliver got diagnosed with Taysax disease, which is a genetic disease, you know, it's passed on. And my brother and my sister-in-law just both happened to be recessive donors of that gene, and that gives their child a decent chance of developing this terminal illness that historically takes the child anywhere between the ages of two to five. And however much you treat them, it gives them a little bit more time here on earth, but no child really makes it into their full toddler age years. This was devastating news for my family.

SPEAKER_04

But uh yeah, it's kind of a heavy subject, but well, it is, and you know, it's interesting because as we talk about missionaries and missionary work, how often in your mission did you hear the words, you know, I don't believe in God? How could he let good things happen? Or sorry, these these b bad things happen, the bad things happen to young children. And so how did you reconcile that as uh 18-year-old?

SPEAKER_02

You know, it was really, really hard at first. I can remember the exact time and moment that I heard that my nephew had passed away. I got a phone call from my parents through tearful, you know, just a tearful conversation, let's put it that way. But I remember that whole next week just sitting in my dorm room and I didn't say I didn't want to talk about it. I wasn't ready for that. And the only person I told was my roommate, and I said, Look, I'm not okay. I'm I'm gonna be crying the next week, just so you know this is why I don't need your help. I just need you to know that I will be okay. And so I kind of just marinated with this for a week, just not wanting to do school, not wanting to do anything else, and I just cried a lot and eventually just started looking towards the scriptures and trying to find something that could, you know, take away that pain or give me some understanding as to why. Um then I won't get into the details of Oliver's uh death, but I will say it was a it wasn't a peaceful death. You know, it was something that made me further question not only why did you take this child, but why did it have to be in this way? Why did it have to be so hard for everybody involved? And I came across a scripture, it's in 3rd Nephi 22, um 22 verses 7 through 11, and there's a song written about it. I don't know if you know it, but it goes, For a little while have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. And the mountains shall depart, the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee. And I just remember bawling my eyes out and thinking, God who has power over everything, he can move the mountains, he can raise the valleys, right? And when all that all that torment is around you, all that destruction, his kindness still hasn't left. And I remember feeling an immense amount of peace and knowing that even though I don't know why, and I don't have that answer yet, I know that God hasn't left me. And I know that those answers will be clear to me in the future.

SPEAKER_04

And that's I mean, you were uh two years away from being the smartest you've ever been at the age of 16, and you're having to grapple with some of the hardest emotional, complex things that uh we have to deal with. And I love that you turned to your knees, you turned to God, and you looked out with faith for that piece that uh came. And that maybe there'll be an answer sometime in the future that you more readily uh connect with. Thanks for sharing that. I know that's a pretty heavy one. We're not done with heavy yet, though, in this conversation. So All right. So now you let's segue that into you deciding to go on a mission. And were you always gonna serve a mission? Did your older siblings serve a mission? It was just kind of part of the rite of passage as you got older as a Johansson. Tell us about that decision to ultimately serve.

SPEAKER_02

Those are great questions, Sid. And the the honest answer is it was kind of expected of me. And not that I didn't want to, but I am the seventh child to serve a mission. You know? Almost all of us did it. And I have a sister who did it. She's great. She's great. She didn't need to serve a mission, but I just felt like that was what we did. The last four of the siblings were all boys, and the oldest, my brother Devin, he started this lawn mowing business and he passed it off to each consecutive son, right? And we all made enough money from that lawn mowing business to pay for our missions, and that's just what we did, right? We had this account that we would fill up until it got to the $10,000 mark, and there we were. And then I remember my senior year, it switched to $2,500, right as I, you know, reached the $10,000 mark, and I had to go back out and make another $2,500 to pay for the mission, but I did it. And that's just what we did as a family. And I never ever questioned that decision. It was never if I was going to go, it was when I was going to go.

SPEAKER_04

So Yeah, I I understand that um I followed all of my brothers. And my sisters did not serve, uh, but my all my brothers did. And it, as you say, it seemed like the thing, this is what we do, and this is how we do it. And if you didn't do that, you have to do a lot more explaining than if you did do it. So for me, it was just, yeah, let's just go the easy way out. Of course, the mission's not easy, and you have to fight for um that relationship, you uh kind of a new relationship with God. So I don't want to skip over your mission, but give us the elevator pitch on how your mission went for you before we go to the end of uh your mission.

SPEAKER_02

Well, I was the COVID missionary, so that's actually why I decided to go a year after college, just because COVID was happening everywhere around me and just kind of wanted to get that proselyting experience. So I waited a little bit, ended up getting reassigned to Idaho for the first two transfers, and then served the rest of my time in my assigned mission in Guayaquil, Ecuador, Guayaquil, Ecuador East. And it was a great time. I can think of how I was blessed in every single transfer and how every transfer led me here. I will say it wasn't an easy mission, lots of fun stories, you know, that's dangerous stories, some ones that make you cry. I just I loved it so much.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I met with you um for the first time. It's been a number of months now, but you were always telling me how much you loved your mission. I love that you, you know, again, it goes back to being a choice. If you choose to have a great mission, there's a good chance or a a lot better chance you're going to have a great mission than if you choose to play the victim card of being a COVID missionary and not being able to get, you know, go outside and do all the things you want to do. So I appreciate your attitude and perspective there. I think that's a good thing for all of us to learn from. Okay, so you go on your mission, have a great mission experience, you come home. And tell me about those first week or two after you return home. What was that like? Where'd you come home to? And let us let our listeners know kind of what another story is those first weeks back.

SPEAKER_02

I guess for me, it wasn't as simple as I just went home. I actually didn't go straight home. I went to my grandparents' house in California. So over my mission, my grandpa passed away. And he was he was, I want to say 86. You know, so he it was okay, you know, it was sad, but it was okay. He had lived a great life, and I got to sit in on the Zoom meeting for his funeral. So I felt very connected to the family, but we just didn't know how long my grandma was gonna live after that, so it was a big priority for me to get there as soon as possible and just spend some quality time with her. And she's still alive, she's still with us, but we just wanted to make sure that I had that connection with her. So I got released in the Denver airport. I'm from Denver, and I got sent back to Denver, got released in the airport, and then flew immediately to California where my grandma is.

SPEAKER_04

From the airport. So you landed, and then you just wow.

SPEAKER_02

Yep. Yep. I got released there, and it's emotional getting released as a missionary. I'm sure you've sat in on some of these meetings, Sid, but it is so hard when they look at you and tell you to take off your own plaque and then like give it up. You know, take this mantle off yourself, and you're like, no, why would I do that? There's everything in my life for the past two years has told me that this is who I need to be.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah, you earn that. You earn that tag. You earn the right to wear that tag. It's emotional.

SPEAKER_02

They're means in those interviews, those state presidents or those counselors. Man, they they really can make you cry. I remember I was terrified though after I took off the tag and and when I started wearing shorts. And I was walking outside with my phone on my mission. We never got to walk around with a smartphone outside.

SPEAKER_04

Oh, the rebel side news coming out of here. Yeah, to rob us.

SPEAKER_02

And not only that, just looking over my shoulder, like thinking, who's gonna rob me in this moment? Who's coming around the corner? We were eating dinner at this restaurant and we chose an outside seat, and my back was towards the street. Terrified. I couldn't, I couldn't focus at all. It was bad. But I uh after a week settled in and I don't know, the joy just kind of started hitting me. I went on a run alone without a companion. Felt great. And uh I just kept to my scripture study, kept to my prayer, and kept the spirit close. And really the transition wasn't all that bad.

SPEAKER_04

That's great. Well, so I want to transition into a topic that we haven't talked about much on this show, and it's about the struggle that many of our members of the church face, or especially our missionaries still face, and that is the plague of our generation, as I've heard it called, of pornography. You'd mentioned this in a conversation, and you were willing to talk about it today, and you've talked it over with your wife, Rachel, as well. So, do you mind just giving our listeners your journey from when you were young all the way through up through, you know, even today, what that looks like for you and how you found a way through this?

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I I want to start off by saying I am in no way an expert on this subject. I am I feel very honored to be able to talk about my experience and help other people through it. But I I'm not a therapist, and I just hope someone else can find a little bit of direction in what I say. But take my words with a grain of salt and find out. No.

SPEAKER_04

Well, I'll tell you, Spencer, I am a licensed therapist, and I do talk to a lot of people about uh addiction recovery and trying to get past this, but it is in the individual story that makes it more powerful. So your willingness to share with us is greatly appreciated. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02

Well, I'm I'm great, I'm glad that we're both here then. It's not just me. But uh yeah, this topic is a great one, and I think it needs more attention. So I'm happy to share. And I guess my journey with pornography started back in middle school. I was exposed to it after searching for some images on Google for a school project. It was on ancient Egypt, and I just remember seeing some images that you know probably shouldn't see as a middle schooler, and you know, I'm sure some would consider it art at the time. But for me, I was just very curious, and it was a curiosity that led to this habit that honestly plagued me most of high school. Actually, all of high school. But I remember my use was on and off, and I remember going to my dad and telling him and saying, I just feel so guilty, so empty. And he would talk to me about it, we'd work through it, I'd go talk to the bishop, and it'd be fine. And I'd go through these cycles where I was good for a number of months, and then I'd slowly slip back into that habit again. And every time you do that, the cycle just gets worse and worse. The guilt you feel each time just perpetually just eats at you. Um I would I would just talk to my dad. I would never talk to my mom because I didn't want her to know I was too embarrassed, right? But I remember right before starting my senior year of high school, I made a resolution with myself. I say, I don't want this habit to plague me anymore. I'm gonna go into senior year, I'm gonna be fine, I'm gonna be able to go on a mission like I want to, and we're not gonna have any issues. And I made this like just plan, this goal that I was, you know, just gonna stick to. And I honestly probably went nine months with nothing. And I thought in the middle of that, I was fine. I was like, I did it. I reached my goal, no issues have happened, and then COVID hit. I got into some habits because of boredom that I shouldn't have. And then it started the worst cycle of them yet. I went low this time. It was not good for me. And I just I can't even describe to you the guilt that you feel. Especially when you've made yourself, you know, you you've made this goal, right? You've broken it. Your parents think you're doing fine, your bishop thinks you're doing fine, you know, you're the poster child in the ward where everyone looks at you and says, Wow, why can't my kid be like that, right? And you know inside that you're living a lie. At least that's how you feel. And I don't know if you've met other people who feel like that, but that that was my experience.

SPEAKER_04

Without question. I mean, as a mission leader, you deal with this all the time. You like not to, but it is something that and you it's not that you don't want it because you don't want to hear it. What you don't want it is for what it does to the missionary, what it does to the individual. Because, you know, you use the word guilt, which I think is fair enough. You know, we need to feel a level of guilt when something happens contrary to our spirit. But um, shame often came into the conversation. And shame is is quite debilitating, and it's not what the savior or heavenly father want for us where we become broken and bad, that we are the problem as opposed to this thing that I've done that then I feel guilt over. So yeah, no, absolutely. And the cycles that you talk about and I want you to continue with the cycles is something I saw a lot.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I just I remember when people would compliment me or I'd I'd do something good or someone would thank me for any action, right? I remember thinking to myself that I wasn't worthy of that thanks. That I wasn't worthy to be the good guy. And that hurts inside you you start to feel numb and you the spirit completely leaves your life. And it's just it really is just a cloud of darkness that is around you. And the worst part about it and I know this now but it's yourself that gives you those feelings. Those feelings don't come from God. The guilt maybe we need a little bit of guilt to repent, right? But that shame and that darkness is not not heavenly at all.

SPEAKER_04

It certainly doesn't give you the strength to overcome it the next day or the next night. I mean when you're feeling that low and empty and isolated that's breeding ground for pornography and masturbation as well.

SPEAKER_02

So well I remember one night that my my shame and my guilt just became so heavy that it outweighed the embarrassment of going to tell my dad what had been happening. And I remember walking up to him and just you know outpouring my soul essentially just bawling my eyes outside Dad I messed up again and it's bad and I need to tell you everything. And honestly it was it was a very short conversation but he looked at me and said I love you. We're gonna get through this and he told me to go pray. Just go pray go talk to God because he's the one I really need to repent to and getting on my knees that night I distinctly remember just saying the name Heavenly Father and then the spirit just rushing into me again. And it is the most vividly I've ever felt that power in my life. And now I have that moment ingrained in my mind with that contrast of how I felt right before and right after. And I can look back to that moment and say I know what the spirit feels like and I know what the spirit doesn't feel like and I know what that darkness is and I don't want that. So I'm gonna strive to live a life facing towards Jesus Christ where that spirit can grow.

SPEAKER_04

Let's let's play into that a little bit more if if it's okay with you. So you um one of the challenges of the addiction or the habit of pornography is that it is very enticing especially when you like you said you've sort of lived in a place where you you didn't feel really great about yourself anyway. And so you really have to pull yourself out of that. And one of the things that we talk about in the gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of repentance and the ability to actually reset or become whole again and again and again and I love the talks that we've heard recently from some of our church leaders that really emphasize the power of repentance and even the consideration that President Nelson raised of daily joyous daily repentance how did repentance sort of feature into your um you understanding where we're coming or at least the journey through your habits of addiction Yeah I uh there's a quote that I love from it's Elder Holland he gave it in a BYU speech and he says it takes as long to repent as it does to say I will change and mean it.

SPEAKER_02

And you know he does that in classic Elder Holland fashion he's yelling over the pulpit right like just change change and then prove that repentance and I love that because my understanding of repentance greatly changed in that moment because I now understood what it feels like when God accepts that repentance when it's genuine and I and I understood essentially how to do it. I just need to turn towards Jesus Christ. It's not like I I only get like seven of these repentance cards and then I'm done I can just I can move towards him and work it out and try every single day. And it just it was so empowering to me to to feel you know that repentance and it gave me the testimony that I needed later in life to one keep on repenting and two help others with their repentance process. I can testify of what it feels like. And I've taken that testimony with me wherever I go now it's it's always here.

SPEAKER_04

Love that I had a wise bishop I was serving alongside I was an advisor or maybe young men's president of the time I don't remember but I remember being in this conversation with a lot of priests and he said something that I'd never heard before and I don't think that it's going to be in the conference talk one day but it was just his view of the world when it came to repenting after engaging in something like pornography or masturbation. And he said in that moment, once you've come to yourself and you're ready to repent in that moment is when you need to be on those knees. You need to that like you were seeking help after Oliver's passing you need that peace. He said if there's ever a time then God would give you that peace it would be that moment. He really does want you to feel his love. And it's almost as if you shut the door or shut the window as it's sometimes talked about and then it just opens because even though there may be work to do to get past the the habit or the addiction you know at that moment he wants to say I love you. Right? I mean it's just that powerful like you said it was so powerful to hear the just even say the words Heavenly Father you know the words son, daughter, child, those are words that we always yearn to hear when we are at our weakest, our lowest, our darkest. And I love that that's how you felt those feelings at those times. So this is this is a bit of a plague for us. And and when I was younger of course I was one of those stories that you know you got to find a magazine you got to order. You got to be above 18 or something it wasn't as accessible to me as it is as it is today. And so you know it is a challenge and you've been very open about that with me. This is why even the topic came up but you'd even said you've been this open with your your wife of not that long. You're still in your honeymoon phase, you know, that first year of being married. So you said you had the conversation with her as well.

SPEAKER_02

What did that go like or how did that go I should say yeah I know this is a very important conversation to have with anybody I think you get serious with but yeah I've been married for almost six months now and this was a conversation that came up a a few months into dating. So we she had known this about me from nearly the beginning but obviously on the first date you shouldn't go around saying you know I have or I had a a pornography habit right back in the day. I don't think that would go over well. And in preparing for this question me and my wife talked about how this went over because we didn't really remember it too well but we both remember that originally I didn't just flat out and say it I had shared my spiritual experience with repentance before ever telling her what I was repenting of. So I shared just enough just a little bit you know I never went deeper than the depth of our relationship on that subject. I like that but as we got closer and closer you know it's just a conversation that you need to have she needs to know and I think it shows great maturity on both the parties if you're if you can have that conversation and walk away closer. So I remember bringing it up as something of you know this is a this is a habit that a lot of people have and I'm not immune to that. It's something that is is everywhere and I remember eventually that conversation switching to you know when we have kids how are we going to help them through this and protect them from it right um and other parts of that conversation were you know reassuring her that my testimony now is strong I've learned so much from it I've changed and that I am constantly working towards sorry I'm constantly working towards keeping myself away from that because that is something that you need to work on every day. It's not pornography doesn't just go away it is still as accessible now as it was back then in high school and it'll just pop up everywhere on Facebook, on Instagram on YouTube, right? So you need to actively walk away from it.

SPEAKER_04

And it's not even it's not gone even when you don't have your phone or even when you're not you know the internet because it still can be in your mind and harbor its thoughts because our mind is a curious thing and it can come back to you even in those minutes. I'm very impressed with your willingness to talk about it. I'm equally as impressed if not more so incrementally than your future wife's acceptance of of that conversation it can cause a lot of people to run and I understand right we all understand that's that's the great worry that's the great concern and you know for her to take on that and still establish that open transparent relationship which builds on trust because trust is the foundation of most relationships and so that's very that's very impressive. You're glad you hung on to that one huh?

SPEAKER_02

Absolutely yeah she's she's my anchor she's amazing she tethers me to Jesus Christ for sure.

SPEAKER_04

I love that it's a tricky conversation because on one side you don't want to condone the activity but you also cannot have people suffering in the darkness for long because that that leads to worse things. It can lead obviously to much worse things. And so you know for me personally this identity with repentance is also hers to appreciate for you. And it's not just for us as individuals, but it's also those we love. And I know that when I've made mistakes or when my children have made mistakes for me to dwell on those mistakes is not appropriate for my faith, for my own belief and ethos it is that they have that power through repentance to become clean and whole and to be forgotten, frankly, if God the Father can remember him no more, I guess that's up to us, right? To do this Okay, so I do want to talk about this concept of flashes of light. You brought this into the conversation could you talk about this idea of this flashes of light and the combination, the culmination of those flashes of light that have sort of inspired you through the years.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah so this idea of flashes of light comes from Stephen J. Lund in a BYU address. And essentially all his speech was was him sharing the pivotal moments in his testimony that allow him to be a witness of Jesus Christ. He puts all of these flashes of light together and when they're all put together and viewed at the same time they allow you to see beyond the veil. And he shares some amazing life experiences just miracles that happen in his life where God was present and he could not deny it. And I listened to that speech and it changed my life I started writing down my own flashes of light and it became one of my journals I've got this journal entry that's called Flashes of light and whenever I I have a miracle that I could not explain without divine intervention I know I I know it's Heavenly Father telling me that he's there and he's giving me a glimpse of the other side of the veil.

SPEAKER_04

I love that and when you're in the darkness we've we've all had that flash of light whether it's a picture flash of light or it's just the door opening quickly it it does illuminate much and it allows you to see beyond your present moment. I I think that's very powerful. That's a great teaching thanks for sharing that thanks okay just a couple more things here first off um type 1 diabetes postmission that's something you don't see all the time tell us about that journey that must have been a bit of a surprise for you.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah diabetes postmission this was okay so this was the day after my 23rd birthday that I got diagnosed. The night before we're all together it was a party that my now wife Rachel had thrown I was drinking juice I was eating cookies I was you know doing doing all the things you do at a birthday party right and my mom for my birthday had gotten me it's called the continuous glucose monitors the little patch that sits on the arm that tells people what their blood sugar is and all my friends are looking at me while I'm opening this gift thinking that I'm the weirdest dork in the world like why would I want one of these as a as a gift but I I love nutrition. I love science I want to be a doctor someday so this was I was just so excited so excited to open this and I put it on the day after my birthday and I thought it was broken because it was telling me my blood sugar was way too high and it was in fact so high I couldn't even read it. It couldn't even give me an accurate reading of what it was and I was like well this thing doesn't even work so I just had this nagging in the back of my brain like what if it is accurate so I went out and bought a separate glucometer to test my blood sugar and it told me the exact same result. Tested it on my friends they're normal but I just kept getting this error message that meant my sugar was way too high. So that was my diagnosis which in and of itself is a miracle. Yeah I should say because the alternative to that is I keep going I I lose you know 15 20 pounds I get admitted to the hospital I go into what they call diabetic ketoacidosis where my body just begins to shut down and I wake up with a diagnosis and some insulin in my arm but I caught it early which was a a huge lifesaver not only for my health but my semester at college I was still able to stay in most of my classes and that early diagnosis has allowed me to ease into becoming diabetic rather than just having it being thrown upon me.

SPEAKER_04

So your mother just you want to be a healthy guy maybe a doctor one day she gets you a glucose mother that's pretty inspired did she ever at the end of the day think that you might have it or was this seems I mean my mother's never given me that for Christmas all these years.

SPEAKER_02

I just don't understand why you know why she of course is an inspired woman she is incredible but I think the reason why she got me that glucose monitor is because I'm a nutritional science major at school and she was like this would be great for his nutrition and and she's a nutritionist and she's tried out these monitors and you just put it on and eat some food see how high your glucose gets and it's a fun science experiment and I think that's what she was expecting but it turned out to be so much more than that.

SPEAKER_04

Wow I should say so you took it in stride or it was a bit of a struggle I mean that's not an easy thing to find out at the age of 23.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah you know I think if you ask my friends and my parents and even my wife Rachel she would tell you in the moment I was taking it in stride. I was I was really calm collected and put together but I'll tell you my personal experience is I I was really down in the dumps. And I I've never struggled with depression fortunately but I can say that these those two first two weeks or however long right after that's the closest I've been I didn't want to do any school I was consumed with calling insurance and doctor's offices trying to get one get an official diagnosis and then get a a viable treatment that works for me. And it took a while and it consumed everything for a minute or two.

SPEAKER_03

And it's part of your life forever at this point.

SPEAKER_04

If I could harken back just a little bit to the question. So you're talking to a missionary or return missionary or somebody who's 50 years after their mission and they're struggling with the habit or addiction of pornography and they're in their darkness what do you tell them?

SPEAKER_02

That's a great question I'm assuming actually I know that if this person is coming to me and confiding in me that they have this struggle that they feel like crap. They they're not doing great they know what they've done they feel that guilt that shame they feel the darkness surrounding them I just want to know first and foremost if they're okay. I want to empathize with them just give them a big hug and be like I am so sorry that you feel this way. But I can't imagine if it was the savior having that conversation with that person that the savior would you know look at them and say you know why are you doing that or judge them you know it's not like they have it's not like they want to do it.

SPEAKER_04

No, we can create the demons in our mind if we choose but I love that imagery of just allowing the savior to talk to them directly what would he say? Think of the different scriptures that talked about those in sin and how he he couldn't obviously you can't condone sin so there's a balance there. But he loves the sinner and he absolutely will be there to strengthen you through Helling Father Spirit. I think that's great.

SPEAKER_02

What I would like to add is is next, just like you said, I I would really want to separate the sin from the sinner. And we go in and when we feel that shame we separate ourselves from the presence of God and we give up essentially our birthright when we sin, right? And those are devastating things but there are also things that that we don't do when we sin or or things that don't happen after we sin. I feel like when we sin Satan tries really hard to get us to take that sin and then he pushes it just a a little bit further down the path and he says oh because you sinned you're worthless because you've sinned you no longer have the agency to choose God's path right and we need to separate what Satan says about that sin to what God says about that sin. Because we can get caught up in all the lies that Satan tells us but the reality is we are still the covenant children of God we still have that power to repent. God hasn't taken away that power to repent from us. He never will and I think that's really just an important distinction to make right Satan tells you the the atonement doesn't apply to you but that's just not true.

SPEAKER_04

He doesn't have a pathway back to completeness and wholeness. He only has a pathway and to further darkness or shame or you know putting yourself in isolation and that's there's no really good way through that one. I remember years ago I was in a basement and we lived in New Jersey and I turned off the switch on the far side of the room and it went pitch black. I mean there was no light at all. It was nighttime there was no light penetrating and um I needed help because I didn't have a phone back then. I didn't know how to find my way to the stairs to get my way up I already hit a number of things and I asked somebody to turn on the light and the moment that light turned on everything changed right your perspective completely changes and Satan doesn't turn on the lights he wants all the lights off. He wants you to cower in a corner away from any light. And God the Father through his son Jesus Christ and his spirit they are light they are the essence of light they they emanate they're the origin of light and if you can just open up that window or that door or that flip on that switch you will see more clearly who you are and what you need to do then to put yourself back in a place where you feel that that spirit so strongly so I appreciate you sharing that.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. In the uh I think there's a couple reasons why missionaries feel encapsulated by darkness and it's because they they tell people all the time on their missions like if you break this covenant you're separated from God. Right? And then these same missionaries here, if they break those covenants that they'll be in Satan's power right and I know that really touched me. I I haven't been perfect after the mission I've made mistakes and I've even had some run-ins with you know this pornography and masturbation it's it's not something that's completely gone away but I have figured out how to shut it out quickly when it comes But then I thought, who's saying those words? It's Satan, the father of lies. He's the one telling me that I'm I am in his power, that I'm powerless. And then when I thought of that, I was like, I'm still a covenant child of God. I can go to him right now. I can I can ask for help through this and I can get out of this hole that I'm in. And I remember thinking that was and that was very empowering to me. I'll say it that way.

SPEAKER_04

Yeah. I shared that same empowerment when I realized he's the master of lies. He loves half-truths. And anything he said, I was very skeptical of what he was trying to get to. So Wow, Spencer, this is your last last question to send us off here. What would be those words of advice you would just give more broadly to the missionary who's returning home as trying to navigate the next chapters of their life?

SPEAKER_02

You know, I had a friend reach out to me the other day, and we're both kind of struggling with how to fit God into our crazy busy schedules with school. And the consensus that we came to together is we both need to take time to listen to God. We can fill our time with praying to Him, but how often after the mission do we just sit and listen to what God's trying to tell us? And if we can shut off and take a moment of silence to really hone in on what the Spirit is saying to us, then we're not ever going to leave His path. We're we're going to be doing the right things that get us to our future, towards a life, towards a job, towards security. And that is the path that's going to lead us to joy. So my advice to them put simply is just listen. Make sure you got those quality prayers.

SPEAKER_04

And that will lead you to the path of joy. Thank you. Spencer, you're amazing. Good luck on uh all the new chapters of your life, and uh, we'll stay in touch. Thank you, Sid. All the best.