Week 24

Hva skjer,

Since we were traveling at the start of last week, our week was super busy this week. Did a lot of stuff but don't have a ton to say about most of it.

First of all, we got transfer news this week. I will be staying in Stavanger for a 4th transfer, and will be staying with the same companion. Staying in an area for 4 transfers isn't super common, but I absolutely love Stavanger so I am really really grateful that I am getting a 4th transfer here. If you've been reading my emails you know how I feel about staying with my same companion; I'll just leave it at that. 

On Wednesday, we drove back from Bergen in the morning and got back in the afternoon. We quickly dropped our bags off and then headed to a lunch that we had with someone that my companion talked to on the bus last week. He was a talker. He is from Bulgaria and has only been in Norway for around a year. He had a lot of really strong opinions, and in the beginning we agreed with a lot of them. But he then said he is a strong supporter of a social media influencer who I personally believe opposes everything the church teaches, so it went kind of downhill from there. We were able to give him a Book of Mormon though and he agreed to read. We were on splits yesterday, so I wasn't there, but my companion and the other missionary met with him again. They said that it started off really good, as he was saying that he felt a really strong feeling when reading the Book of Mormon. But from there it went bad pretty quick, as they said that he started to talk about how Jewish people are horrible people, and that the Earth is flat😃. The gospel really is open to all, but idk how it's going to turn out with him lol.

That night we had our first lesson with this guy that we have been meeting with for a few weeks now. His name is Kelvin, and he is from Malawi which is a small country in Africa. He is pretty horrible at replying to us, so we've been trying to meet with him for a while, but we were finally able to this week. He came to our language cafe, and we met with him afterwards. We only had about 15 minutes, so it was kind of just seeing where he's at and how interested he is. We first just talked with him about his faith, and what is important to him in his life. He smiled really big as he talked about his family and the postive impact they've had on his life. I was delighted to explain to him that we have the knowledge that we can live with our families together after this life. He was pretty caught off guard, and needed me to explain it again. He said he had never heard that before, and he would love to take the lessons and learn more about what we believe. He's gonna be a bit of a struggle to meet with because he sucks at communicating, but I'm really looking forward to it. 

On Saturday night we had our weekly lesson with Idar. He is the one who struggles to believe in prophets if that helps anyone to remember. Basically, I have been discussing with other people, and praying a lot, and have came to the conclusion that only way he is going to gain a testimony of prophets is through the Book of Mormon (trust me, we've tried to discuss everything). So we had a lesson soley on the Book of Mormon. My overall feeling during this lesson was just how powerful the Book of Mormon is. If you would have told me before my mission I would have the feelings about the Book of Mormon I do now, I would of told you that you were crazy. I started off by just asking him what his thoughts are on the Book of Mormon, as he's read a little bit in it, and he said that he knows that it brings you closer to Christ, but he is not sure if it's true. Obviously we tried to assure him that is enough to know that it's true, but that's now how Idar's brain works. Anyways though, that was just super powerful to me that even someone who doesn't even believe in the Book of Mormon knows that it brings people closer to Christ. He has committed to read every day, so we are going to try and call him daily and discuss it. I have always felt really strongly about Idar, and I only have 6 more weeks to teach him, so I'm trying really hard to do everything possible to help him before I leave. I would appreciate it if you prayed for Idar to receive an answer :). Also, I called Idar on Pday to discuss a chapter, and I added Cole to the call so that was pretty fun. Idar can only speak Norwegian, so we were talking in Norwegian, but Cole was talking swedish and he was able to understand so that was cool. 

Directly after Idar's lesson, we had another lesson with the guy from Peru. It was fully in Spanish again. This time it ended up going for over an hour so I was really fighting to stay awake. We were talking with our ward mission leader about it the next day, and he just looked at me and just said, "so you just sat there and smiled?", hahaha. I'm pretty sure it went pretty good though; I'm looking forward to seeing his progress. 

The coolest part of the week for me was a lesson we had with this dude named Sven Erling. I might have mentioned him a few weeks ago, but I don't remember and am too lazy to look back. Basically he was a self referral, off of an ad about the Book of Mormon. When we texted him about it, he said that he was already Christian and had a Bible and didn't need a Book of Mormon. My previous companion just continued the conversation and asked what his favorite Bible story is, and then we were able to set up an appointment to talk about the Bible. When we had our first lesson with him a few weeks ago, he came and then started asking a bunch of questions about the Book of Mormon, so clearly he did send in the referral. But anyways, this week he came to church for the first time which is awesome, and we had a lesson with him during second hour. During the lesson he had a lot of questions about the legistics of how the church and priesthood was restored, but ultimately he said that he feels like he has been guided by God to this church and wants to learn more. Which is just super super cool especially considering our first contact with him. We also had Rafael (just baptized) to help, and he was super helpful in explaining how he grasped certain stuff, and also helpful for the Norwegian as well :).

On Monday we were on splits. I'm going to try really really hard not to be rude, so I'll just say that the dude I was with on splits was a very very interesting individual. But it was a cool testament to me that anyone can be a missionary, and bring their own uniqueness to it no matter who they are. We had a really interesting lesson with a guy that had previously been in contact with missionaries many years ago. It was basically the first time I had been asked about controversial church topics my whole mission, mostly because most people don't even know about the church at all here. He was really really respectful, so it didn't go too bad. It was a little bit difficult to answer questions that I don't really have a good answer for in English, in Norwegian, though. We also attempted to meet with this guy we play basketball with before we played basketball with him, but he ended up being late, so I basically just bought him a McFlurry, gave him a Book of Mormon, and then we all had to leave. We ended the night with a young lady in our ward from Venezuela making food for us which was good.

My last two or so weeks, I kept having the thought in my head to enjoy Stavanger while I'm here, because I don't know how long I'm going to be here. Fast forward a few weeks, and I'm here for another 6 weeks. Which I'm really happy about, but it still made me think about why God would give me those thoughts. As I've pondered a bit about it, I feel like it was God kind of giving me a slap in the face telling me to enjoy what I'm experiencing right now, even though there are aspects that make it difficult to do so right now. We are literally always going to have things, in every season of life, that make us yearn for better days, and look forward to time without current obstacles. Despite being crazy, that guy we met with from Bulgaria last week said something within his hour of rambling that stood out to me. I'm paraphrazing, but he said something like, "You have to live and enjoy every day, you don't know if you are going to suddenly die tomorrow." I didn't take much from that conversation, but when he said that it really stuck with me. We learn the same thing in James chapter 4: "14 Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away." It's simple, but our lives really are small in the eternal perspective. We all have chapters in our lives that we look back on and, in retrospect, semmed to have been a "vapour" that "vanisheth away". Within the same vein, it's easy for us to agree with the, "...many which shall say: Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die; and it shall be well with us (2 Nephi 28:7)". But as we practice "celestial thinking" while also enjoying each moment and day as it comes, I believe we will find true joy. I don't really enjoy serving with my current companion, but I'm in Norway, and in a city that I love! It's so easy for us in our imperfect human state to naturally let the negative parts of our lives overshadow the positive. To combat that thinking, I think of this President Nelson quote: "The joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives an everything to do with the focus of our lives!" 

Lyric:

"But it's a fact, live for today, f--- tomorrow

No tomorrow if your life's feeling borrowed"

-Loyle Carner