November 28, 2011

Kjære familie og venner

I had someone tell me last night that my Facebook has been blown up by Happy Birthdays. I dunno whether to be happy or insulted....did that many people not realize I've been gone from Facebook for 8 months!? Haha no worries, I'll thank everyone in 15 months =p

So yeah. I'm 20. I was thinking about that the other day. This physical body I'm walking around in has been running for 20 years now. Does anyone realize how LONG that is!? 20 years ago, the FIRST Bush was President, and Apple computers looked closer to something from an old James Bond movie rather than the iPads we've got now. I mean jeez, imagine a 20 year old apple (the fruit) or a 20 year old computer. No one wants those!

That's alright. I had a mini pre mid life crisis haha. All the parents and grandparents reading this right now are patting me on the head and saying "That's ok sonny, give it another 20 years" It is a nice feeling to not be a teenager anymore though, I have to say. I've been telling people I'm "almost 20" for 6 months now haha.

So this week has been insane! I got old, my companion got better, a reporter got a ton of pictures of me, and we all got a ton of new people to teach. I think I'll explain each of those in turn. ;)

So yes, Elder Bird is now better. I'm actually sending this email to him too, so here's his shout out haha. He finally got off his deathbed on Thursday and went out with the AP's that day. He still gets tired quicker, but he's not coughing anymore so that's good. There's a Norwegian saying that I absolutely love. "Han er frisk som en fisk" which means, "He's a fresh as a fish" Isn't that a great image!? Anyways, the two of us finally getting together worked out really well, and in combination with the Assistants, we were able to add a bunch of people to our teaching pool.

That just reminded me. I have a huge announcement for those who have been following the epic saga of Ane Rebeka. She set a baptismal date with us! She is the one who has the family who is not fond of the church. She has really taken off the last few weeks, especially since she attended Jan and Kent's baptism. She finally decided she's going to tell her family she'll get baptized. So February 11th is the date to circle on your calenders. I'm way stoked for this one. I just hope that the Lord lets me stay in Bergen for one more transfer, cause that's halfway through the next one.

The reporter. Some crazy guy with a camera got it into his head that my life is interesting and that he wanted to follow me around and take pictures of it. Haha not so bad, but we have had a freelance reporter who is doing a project on the lifestyle of mormon missionaries and Elder Perry, the district leader, and I were obligatorily volunteered to be the ones in the spotlight. It's been kinda interesting, but he's been in on a couple of lessons that we've taught to people this week, and it's been funny how his chair slowly comes closer to the table during the course of each lesson. By the end, he's usually listening intently. In fact, he's actually been in on every single lesson that we teach as missionaries, and he's talking about coming to a baptismal service this weekend. For not being an investigator, he's sure showing a lot of progress haha.

New people to teach. Ah yes. Well actually, as far as new progressing investigators, there's only two. Ane Rebeka (who wasn't really progressing, but still positive) and a guy named Thomas. He's pretty cool and he came to church yesterday. Luckily, Bergen has an awesome YSA program which just sucks people in. So he's been pretty positive with the teaches we've had with him since Friday, but it'll be fun to see him try and resist the hugs from Pilar (RM from Peru), the chillaxity of Arju (RM from England), or the straightforward honesty of Renata (another YSA I threw in here to make the sentence sound complete.)

Elder Perry and I had an awesome teach with Marie while on splits on Wednesday. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she agreed with everything we taught! Unfortunately, I don't think she realized that by agreeing with us she was going against the things that her church actually teaches, but I didn't know how to tell her without offending her. So Pilar, who used to be Catholic, has used her secret weapon of hugs and Facebook to pull her in and she's planning on talking to her about stuff. It's a little different, less threatening maybe, coming from someone other than a missionary.

Helene also met with us again and she completely understood the authority issue, which is what we missed with her last time. She didn't understand how our church was any different and so we had to explain our belief that the authority to baptize and administer other sacred ordinances was lost after the apostles, and was brought back with Joseph Smith. Proof of that being an answer of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. It clicked with her, and she had no problems setting another appointment with us to hear more. She didn't want to come to church, but she did invite us to her church service, and I was definitely down. It wasn't the first Pentecostal service I had been to, but this one was aimed more at university aged students and it started out exactly like a rock concert haha. They had a nice message at the end as well. It's always fun to see how other churches work from the inside.

It was funny, I actually celebrated Thanksgiving more here than I did at home. Well, it may have actually even out....no football game =( but I did get two full Thanksgiving dinners! The institute dinner for the YSA's was a turkey dinner, and then we had dinner with a member on Thursday for legit Thanksgiving.

This email turned out to be very long. But we had a ton of stuff going on this week, and I felt like I hadn't written a lot in a while. So if you've made it to this point without falling asleep, I congratulate you =)

Til next week!

Elder Sessions

November 21, 2011

Kjære familie og venner,

Elder Bird and I have had a tough week, to say the least haha. I'm feeling 100% better, but he's still got pneumonia. He has the antibiotics for it, but the doctor said they would take about a week to kick in, and that's proving true. It's been interesting having to tie a lasso around my new missionary and keep him in bed, rather than the other way around. I told him I'd much rather he took too many days off than too few, but that's proving easier for me to say than him to do. I can honestly say that I sympathize, though haha.

We do have a couple of people that we're teaching however! I managed to keep pretty good contact with them while I was sick, and I got out this weekend to meet with them while I was on splits. One of them is a girl named Marie. She is the sister of a recent convert of about 8 months. It was kind of random, I just met her on the street a few weeks ago and she said that her brother was a member. I didn't even know he had a sister! So that was cool. Elder Bird and I taught her on his first day in Norway, and we've got another appointment with her on Wednesday afternoon, so hopefully he'll be feeling well enough to go out by then.

Another girl we're teaching is named Helene. I set an appointment for Saturday with her about 2 weeks ago. So I finally met her and totally screwed up the teach haha. I felt like we should change the lesson we were going to teach her, and it ended up being that the Preach my Gospel lesson was exactly what she needed to hear. Those prophets and apostles really knew what they were doing when they put that thing together haha. I had to fight for a return appointment, but we did get it for next weekend. This time, we'll be sticking to Preach my Gospel =P

That's pretty much all we've got going on right now. It's really just going to come down to finding more people to teach at this point. Kent, who was baptized two weeks ago, is another person we'll be meeting with this week. We had an appointment with him, but then I got sick so we missed it. Being sick really throws things off, but we're getting back on track....I think haha.

Fun fact, I actually saw Elder Bird before both of us were on our missions. I went to a concert in Las Vegas last year while I was at BYU-Idaho. Turns out that Elder Bird was actually at the exact same concert, and at some point he got it in his head to climb the light pole in the center of the concert. Everyone there at the concert saw him up there including myself, and it was definitely one of those memorable moments. So as I was telling Elder Bird about this concert (since he is from Las Vegas), he says "Yeah, do you remember a guy climbing up a light pole at that concert? Yeah, that was me." So that was pretty cool haha. I told him he's not allowed to climb the light poles in Norway though.

That's all I've got this week. Maybe I'll write something interesting next time ;)

Elder Sessions

November 14,2011

Kjære Familie og Venner,

Well everyone's heard about how I'm sick. President Johansen put me on mandatory bed rest since Saturday night. It's helped a little bit, but I'm still quite a ways from being back to normal. I figure it will be at least another couple of days of bed rest before I can get back to work.

I did discover how expensive and unhelpful the Norwegian health system tends to be. The doctor completely disregarded everything I told him about this illness, which I have had several times before and finished the visit by doing a test "just to make sure it really is the virus you say it is." Needless to say, the medicines he gave me aren't much help, but hopefully the bed rest will be enough to help me relax.

Well, I did get to sort of be a trainer for about 3 days before I was put on bed rest haha. Elder Bird is a way hard worker, and I'm excited to get back out on the streets with him. I still try to do companionship studies with him in the morning, so that we don't get too far behind on the 12 week program. It's going really well, and I'm learning a lot as well. He is from Las Vegas, so he'll be my second companion from Vegas =)

I got a little bored yesterday just sitting around the apartment, so I made a sign to hang on the front door, which I then took a picture of. I'll send that picture along with this email.

That's about all that's going on with me right now. Thanks for all the prayers and support. I'll be back on my feet in no time =)

Love,

Elder Sessions

November 7, 2011

Kjære familie og venner,

Got a few pictures this time! All from the baptism this weekend. More on that later. The first picture is all of the missionaries with both of the brothers, as well as their younger brother who jumped in at the last second.   The next is Elder Perry and Elder Argyle with Jan, who they taught.   The third is Elder Spencer and I with Kent, who we taught.  And the last one is a picture of the whole family together, minus the member sister who is in the states.

So yes. The baptism. It was freakin awesome. The branch is really on board with the brothers and they are way excited, which is good to see. They were baptized on Saturday, and on Sunday they were both confirmed and ordained as priests. Jan was actually ordained first, and the branch president surprised everyone by letting him stand in on the ordination of his brother Kent. It really was a great family story, the less active mom and dad were both at the baptism, and the Dad sang a song for the musical number. We even got permission to skype Victoria, the sister, in from Utah. She was baptized 3 years ago, and she was way bummed that she would be in the states for the baptism, so we set up a laptop so that she could watch it too.

It was crazy to see the change with the brothers in such a short amount of time. A little over a month ago, we hadn't even started teaching them yet and they had been standoffish with the church pretty much their whole lives. Now they are ordained priests in the church, and they are way gung ho about everything and they really are excited about working on their testimonies and faith. We ate dinner with the family last night, and none of them could stop smiling.

Kent invited one of his friends to the baptism, and he looked like he enjoyed it. I didn't get a chance to talk to him on Saturday - things were kinda crazy - but he'll be at an activity tonight, so I look forward to talking to him about what he thought. 

Well, on Friday Elder Perry and I got on a plane to Oslo for a training meeting. They just recently released a new 12 week program for trainers and new missionaries, and so they have a training meeting for new trainers just before the transfer starts to introduce the program. It involves a structured companionship and language study schedule, and a couple of other cool things. I've been going over it for the past couple of days and it looks amazing. I'm way stoked to start training on Wednesday. BTdubs, the new elder's name is Elder Bird. I'm not sure where he's from, but I'll find that out in a couple of days =p

Elder Bird and I will have our work cut out for us. We managed to get a couple of appointments for this next week, with some new people, but for the most part after this baptism, we'll be starting from scratch. I don't want to spend a ton of time contacting with him, so hopefully we'll be able to find some new investigators quick so we can get on with teaching them.

I saw an old friend in Oslo on Friday. Elder Bekker was also at the training meeting, and it was the first time in six months that I had seen him...since we were companions in the MTC. I've talked to him on the phone a couple of times, but that was the first time I've seen him in person since May. He'll be getting a new missionary too, so that was pretty exciting. I found out that Sister Fredrickson, also from my MTC district, is moving here to Bergen. So my entire MTC group is going to have served in Bergen within the first 8 months of our missions. Fun Fact =)

That's pretty much all we've got going on right now. We won't be fishing today. Unfortunately. The other night though, we did eat the fruits of our labor, and that was very satisfying. Norwegian grocery stores have a great supply of fish sauces and gravies, and we chowed down like our lives depended on it. Oh man, I'm gonna miss the fish when it comes time to go back home.

Busy week behind us, and we've got another busy one ahead. Sånn er livet =)

Elder Sessions.

October 30, 2011

Kjære familie og venner,

Elder Spencer didn't go fishing with us. I went on splits with the other elders last week for P-Day. And actually, we did it again this week, and went fishing with one of their investigators. His name is Jan Åge, and he's fished his entire life. No exaggeration, he caught a fish nearly every time he cast out the line. By the end of the day, the three of us had caught 2 fish, and he was working on number 8. 

We had a Halloween party the other night for the YSA's. Our district performed a couple of line dances to the surprise of every one else there haha. We managed to find some extra time during the week to practice them and it turned out pretty well. I had someone record the first dance, but the file size limit on this email system won't let me send it. I did, however, win the prize for the best costume. I can send a picture of that. It's my dead missionary costume haha, and the man standing there with me is George, who had been baptized earlier that day.

Jan and Kent, the two brothers who we have been teaching, decided to postpone their baptism until this Saturday, because their mom was out of town last weekend. The bright side is, it gives us an extra week to get them ready, and to advertise the baptism. I told Elder Passey, our district leader that I wanted to knock out the back wall of the baptismal room and into the nursery, in order to make room for the people who will be attending the baptism. That's my goal anyway. I think it's pretty realistic....at least, having that number of people there. I don't know if President Johansen would be too happy with me if I knocked out a wall in a chapel.

I got a call from President Johansen last night. He told me, officially, that I'll be training next transfer. I've got a training meeting in Oslo on Friday. They're gonna train us how to be trainers. I'm pretty excited, on top of the fact that I can get a decent kebab while I'm there in Oslo. We don't have any good kebab shops here in Bergen. After that though, transfers is a week from tomorrow. It's crazy how fast the last 9 weeks has gone. 

President Johansen also did tell me that Elder Spencer and I have gotta work like crazy to find some people to teach this week. We've been having a lot of trouble recently, getting anyone new to stick. It will be much better for the new missionary coming here, if he doesn't have to spend the entire day contacting. I remember how much I disliked it when I was a new missionary, so I'd like to avoid it as much as I can, in favor of teaching lessons at appointments. That requires new investigators, however, something we have been in short supply of here recently.

I spoke with a man the other day, who told me that I didn't know the Bible as well as he did, and that I needed to read it more to be saved. I took that as a bit of advice, and did a study on the subject which we were discussing. He asked me whether or not I thought God allows bad things to happen to us here on Earth. I told him I did. He didn't like that much. He felt that God loves us, and that he would never allow bad things to happen, that it comes purely from the adversary. It raised a huge question in my mind, until I read this scripture, the next day:

"There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it."

That was 1 Corinthians 10:13. It says that God doesn't suffer us to be tempted above that we are able, which means that he has at least some sort of control on the amount of temptations we suffer. That doesn't mean that God is the source of our temptations. As we know from the story of Jesus Christ being tempted in the wilderness, Satan is the source of temptation. But God allows us to face that opposition, in a way that would be most beneficial to our learning and experience. He prepares a way for us to escape, so that we can bear the temptation or trial, and not only bear it, but learn from it.  

A great scripture from the Book of Mormon talks more about it.  "11 For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my first-born in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad. Wherefore, all things must needs be a compound in one; wherefore, if it should be one body it must needs remain as dead, having no life neither death, nor corruption nor incorruption, happiness nor misery, neither sense nor insensibility.12 Wherefore, it must needs have been created for a thing of naught; wherefore there would have been no purpose in the end of its creation. Wherefore, this thing must needs destroy the wisdom of God and his eternal purposes, and also the power, and the mercy, and the justice of God. 13 And if ye shall say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin. If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness. And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness. And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery. And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished away." (2 Nephi 2:11-13)

That is why we have trials, and temptations, and hard times in life, and accidents, and death, and all manner of horrible nasty things that this "unfair life" subjects us to. It's not because God doesn't love us, or because Satan is more powerful than God. It's because God does love us, and he knows what we can and cannot tolerate, even better than we know ourselves. He is more powerful than the adversary, but allows us to face opposition in order for us to appreciate our blessings, and even our hardships for the things we learn from them. 

It's something I have experienced, that in the hardest times in my life or on my mission, that is when I learn the most. We don't learn much of anything when everything is going great. What have we to learn from lollipops, fairies, and grassy meadows? It's the mountains we climb, which give us the great view, but only after we've sweated over the steep incline. I'm grateful that my Heavenly Father loves us enough to test us, so that we can grow.

Til next week!

Elder Sessions.

October 25, 2011

Kjære familie og venner,

Sorry, the email is a day late. We had a proverbial circus here yesterday, and I read all the emails, but I haven't had time to reply to any until now. 

Couple of cool stuff this week. Mainly having to do with fish. First of all, I tasted whale! Norway, Japan, and Iceland are the only countries in the world where it is legal to serve whale. I guess I got lucky, cause whale actually tastes amazing. I'd have to describe it as a rubbery beef jerky. Sounds strange, but it's way good. Unfortunately, it's also pretty expensive so I won't get it too often.

Secondly, the reason why we were so busy yesterday was because me and two other elders from our district went out fishing by a member's home. Norway is, of course, known for its fish, so I was pretty stoked. We managed to catch one fish each, but only Elder Argyle's was worth keeping. Mine was pretty small haha, and Elder Perry's we used for bait to catch Elder Argyle's fish. His turned out to be pretty big by my standards, but the Norwegians we showed it to just laughed at us and patted us nicely on the heads. Apparently, if the fish isn't bigger than you, it isn't worth keeping. Whatevs, it'll still taste great when we eat it haha.

And finally, the big one, we were busy last night meeting with Kent and Jan, the two brothers who will be getting baptized on Saturday. We just found out that one of the other companionships here in Bergen is also going to be baptizing a man named George. So we'll be having a triple baptism in Bergen on Saturday. By South American standards, that's a weekly thing, but for Europe that's huge! So it's pretty exciting. I'll definitely have some pictures to send home next week.

Speaking of which, I've got some pictures I've been meaning to send home.

I'll describe them by the file number:

337/338: The view from our apartment =)

344: Elder Argyle and I got new ties!

Little Note From Sami: He looks so grown up in his mission wear doesn't he?  :)

346: "Old Bergen"

358: Elder Argyle and his fish

We've got a busy week ahead of us, so I'll get to it.

Vi snakkes!

Elder Sessions

October 17, 2011

Kjære Familie og Venner

I do know Elder Knudson. He is in my zone and I just met him at a zone conference last week. It's his first transfer here in Norway, he just got here from the MTC about 7 weeks ago. I didn't have a chance to talk to him too much, but he did sit right behind me for the whole conference. Crazy small world.

I did get the hoodies, but there weren't any shoes. We just got another package slip the other day, so if you sent them separately that may be what that is. The problem is, they moved the place where our packages get delivered to and it's about a kilometer or so out of the way. Kind of annoying, but in any case we have to walk over there sometime this week and pick that up.

It has started to get cold. I've started thinking in Celsius so I can only tell you it's been around 5 or 6 degrees during the day and then dropping below 0 overnight. That's about 45-50 degreesish Fahrenheit during the day. No snow yet, but snow isn't a huge feature of Bergen anyways. 

Norwegians attempt to celebrate Halloween haha. It's just starting to catch on, but apparently the kids have a tendency to dress up and try to get candy on the 30th and November 1st, hahaha. They'll get it eventually, I'm sure.

We didn't manage to find anyone really positive this week. Kent and his brother come to pretty much all of the church activities during the week, so we see them several times outside of teaches. They are doing pretty well though, and things seem to be moving forward towards their baptismal dates in 12 days. Apparently these brothers have a long history of investigating the church off and on for years. I spoke to a sister missionary who taught Kent about a year ago, and they never made any real progress with him. So it's really exciting to be around when he starts to make the decision to be baptized.

I did talk to a couple of chinese guys this week. That was really cool. It's amazing how little they know about religion and the outside world in general. They were extremely intelligent, and they knew quite a bit about history and those sorts of things, but as far as experiencing the world outside of China, they got nothin'. But it's made them extremely curious and a very humble people, and a lot of fun to talk to. Unfortunately, I don't know how much they understood of our message....there was a pretty huge language barrier. But their little eyes just about popped out of their heads when we showed them a chinese translation of the Book of Mormon. I don't think he had a clue what the book actually was, but he seemed excited just to read something in his own language. We'll invite them to some of the YSA activities this week, but I don't know how far we'll get in teaching them. But we'll see.

My district attended a funeral this past friday for the family member of someone we know. It's a part member family, so the funeral was held in a Norwegian State church. This was the second time I've attended the State church's services. It was a very nice ceremony, but a little sad. The grandmother at one point stood up and said, "I don't understand why this happened." The priest later stood up and tried to offer comfort. The grandmother again stood up afterwards and said, "I still don't understand why this happened." The priest herself said she didn't know why God allows bad things to happen. It was sad and frustrating to sit at the back of the church watching this grieving family's questions not be answered. We decided it wouldn't be tactful to mention the Plan of Salvation, but it certainly was tempting. The part of the family which are members later came up to us, and we were able to offer some comfort. It really made me appreciate the answers that the Gospel and the knowledge of God's plan bring to us. 

Oh and I almost forgot! I might have mentioned before about how we have been taking advantage of the sunny days by drawing the Plan of Salvation in chalk in the middle of Bergen. Well we did it again this week, and attracted the attention of the local Bergen newspaper. There was a man snapping about a million and a half pictures of us drawing and then he asked a couple of questions to another one of the missionaries. It was a nice surprise to see the branch president hold up the HUGE picture which was in the Saturday edition of the newspaper during Priesthood yesterday. There wasn't an article to go with the picture, but we did get a caption with a quick explanation and a quote from our missionary.

That's all folks!

Elder Sessions

October 10, 2011

Kjære Familie og Venner,

We had a pretty decent week this week. Kent, who is our baptismal date for the end of October is still progressing great. We talked to him and his brother yesterday about the Priesthood and they both seemed excited about that. Their sister called us yesterday (she was baptized about 3 years ago), and asked us what we did with her brothers. I was a little confused for a second...."Uh, last time we saw them, they were at the church....?" Apparently she meant that her brothers have changed completely since we started teaching them haha.

OH YEAH! News flash! Elder Spencer and I were watching a Seminary collection of videos the other day about the Book of Mormon. There was one short video called "For Our Day" It was a video of different youth from around the world bearing their testimonies of the Book of Mormon. There were a couple of youth from England and one of them was a teenaged Rebecca Cain! I was shocked when she showed up on the screen, and Elder Spencer looked at me a little oddly when I pointed at the screen and shouted "I know her!" He didn't believe me at first haha. But just thought I would pass that along. I don't know how long ago the video was made but she looked pretty much the same as she does now.

We were able to see 3 of the 4 general sessions of conference live, although that meant we had to get permission to stay up late for the last one. They were way good though, I used up about 10 pages in my journal on notes. It's better than last time though...I used a whole 75 page spiral notebook on that. I decided to consolidate my notes a little bit this time haha. 

I've been thinking a bit about the Atonement the past few weeks. President Johansen has told us we need to look for weaknesses we have and improve on those things, through the use of the Atonement. It's been really interesting to see how the Atonement applies to more than just sin. It makes up the difference on anything which is holding us back from reaching our potential as perfect beings. But I've discovered that it's important to constantly ask for the Atonement to be applied to our lives through prayer. It's not just to say the words every time you pray, but it's to realize deep down that you NEED to ask for that help. It's a part of humbling yourself enough to realize that we can't overcome our weaknesses without some measure of the Atonement to help us out. As I've remembered to ask for that help in my prayers, it's made a huge difference, and it's a difference which is tangible. Not just something I imagined up cause it seemed convenient, or coincidental timing.

On that same vein, I was reading in Nephi's account of the Tree of Life vision. I don't have my scriptures with me, but I'm pretty sure it's 1 Nephi 11 or 12. He asked to see the same vision that his father, Lehi, saw so that he could figure things out for himself. I think it's interesting when he realizes the symbolism behind the tree itself, is after he sees Jesus Christ in vision. It's only after he sees the mission of the Messiah as the Redeemer of the world, that he realizes the tree represents the love of God. To Nephi, Jesus Christ and his Atonement was the best example of God's love, and that is what prompted his realization of the symbolism. The tree of life is a representation of the Atonement, and the blessings we receive when we reach our potential, which only occurs through application of the Atonement.

Many people wonder what the heck the purpose of this life is. I answer that question with 2 Nephi 2:25. "Adam fell that men might be, and men are that they might have joy." Our whole purpose and reason for being here is to have JOY! We grab hold of that happiness through improving ourselves piece by piece, applying the Atonement when needed, and following the recipe of success that our loving Heavenly Father has given us through the scriptures and the messages that his prophets teach unto us. The Plan of Salvation isn't a treasure map to some obscure happiness that we can maybe achieve in some future life. It's a blueprint to how we can live our lives NOW so that we can have that joy in this life AND the next.

As a missionary, I wasn't sure when I came out here if this whole thing actually worked. I don't think I had taken the time to really apply the gospel to myself. But the Lord has blessed me with the chance to see how the Gospel can improve other people's lives, and that has helped me realize that it really DOES work. Maybe I could imagine all of the "improvements" and "happiness" I see with myself. But I cannot deny what has happened to the people around me. As I see people finding that joy through the message that we share, it builds my own testimony of the truthfulness of it. And it makes me recognize all the blessings that I have received. An atheist told me he doesn't believe in God because he's never had an experience that proves the existence of God. I say that everyone has those experiences, but if you are looking to PROVE the existence of God, you will never ever recognize those experiences when they happen. You find God when you look for him, and that means really wanting to find Him and you are willing to change your life to feel His presence in your life.

I don't know where I went with that one. I started off talking about the Atonement, and ended with finding God. I guess everything is related in the Gospel in any case. Hopefully, you all will be able to follow the thread I was throwing all over the place.

Have a great week!

Elder Sessions

September 26, 2011

Kjære Familiemedlemmer og Venner <-------- that means family members and friends haha

We don't have a whole lot in the way of investigators right now. We have one girl who loves the church and has started to get a testimony, even a desire to be baptized but her family is dead set against the church. They have a misunderstood view of what we stand for. But it's a major roadblock for her and it's really going to come down to her having the courage to be baptized despite the family challenges. She is old enough to legally make that decision, so that's not what I'm worried about, but we just worry about the effects that it would have in her family relationship.

Other than that, our funnel is kind of empty. It's actually been an issue in Bergen for a couple of months now, we just can't find people to teach. Our mission president was here this weekend and he gave us some really good advice which I think will help alot. We have an awesome district here and some great missionaries. The branch is really starting to warm up to us (which is remarkable for Norwegians to happen so quickly), and we have got a lot of potential. Just need to keep working on being diligent to find people and then we'll see some success.

There is a YSA here who was baptized about 3 years ago. Her mother and father are both inactive members. She has 1 older brother and two younger ones who are not baptized. She has had a tough time of things the last few years but she has really started to see some real blessings with her family as she has stuck with it and been faithful. Her father has asked to be visited by Elder Spencer and me, and just last night her older brother told me that he wanted us to teach him as well. Her younger brother is being taught by another companionship in the district and he has a baptismal date in October, as well as her youngest brother who is being taught by yet another companionship. Her mother was at a branch activity last night with the whole family. All in all, we have begun teaching her family piece by piece and she is shocked and amazed at what has happened the past couple of weeks. Things look positive, so we'll see how it goes.

There's actually a funny story involved in that. We had that branch activity last night, and this YSA's family were all bunched in a corner and not really interacting with people at that point, yet. President Johansen was still there and he comes up and mentions them to me. He "strongly encourages" me to "get in there and get an investigator or two." I didn't have much of a choice haha. So I walk up to their group, which consisted of the oldest brother (who had not at this point asked to be taught) and his friend he brought to the activity, the father and the step mother. My first attempt did not go so well. I've become pretty ok at starting conversations with people, but I have never seen one die quicker than this one last night. One by one, the whole family walked away and I was left there stuttering, trying to think of something to talk about. I reported my failure back to the President and he encouraged me to keep trying. I was really happy to be able to go back at the end of the night and tell him about the older brother wanting to be taught....President gave me a high five. (We had already set up an appointment with the father a couple of weeks ago.)

I have quickly had to learn the art of "working a room" as President Johansen calls it, especially on Sundays. There are just a ton of people here in Bergen Branch (it is the biggest branch in the world!), and missionaries are a sort of celebrity for the church in Norway. I have learned that I have absolutely no desire to be famous....there's just too many people to talk to haha. But I enjoy it a lot...just meeting people and learning about them. Plus, it feels good to be needed here. The tough part is when you are running 4 conversations at once. I can testify that it is very possible, yet difficult haha.

President Johansen told me on Saturday that I will be training a new missionary in November. It's a terrifying prospect to be a senior companion after 6 months in Norway, let alone training someone completely new from the States. I'll just have to work extra hard on the language over the next month and a half to get ready for that one haha. I'm pretty excited though, all the missionaries I've talked to have loved training.

It's been good to receive emails from everyone and hear how you are doing. Time is flying, and I feel like there's a billion and a half stories I just don't have time to write down in emails. I look forward to having the chance to tell them in person....it's better that way anyhow.

Long Time, No Type (September 19, 2011)

It literally feels like forever since I've sent out one of these. I'm not entirely certain if I've written one since I came to Bergen. Either way, it's been a while.

First a little about my new city. Bergen is the second biggest city in  Norway, all the ways on the western coast. 3 blocks from the centrum is the Atlantic ocean. Bergen is famous for its giant fish market. The prices are way jacked up for tourists though, so I won't be partaking of that on my limited budget.

The dialect is crazy here! All Norwegians speak the same language....sort of. There's something like 50 different dialects and Bergensk is very different from Tønsbergsk. It took a little bit of adjusting, but I can understand just about everything now. There's some missionaries that try to pick up the dialect, but I'm going to try and stick to the Bokmål, which is the pure textbook Norwegian dialect that they speak in the capitol. My companion scared me the other day when he noticed that my accent has changed a bit, so I've been working hard on keeping my language pure the past few days haha.

There is a done of stuff to do on Mondays here. So far I've climbed two mountains (well, actually one mountain two times), and today me and 3 other missionaries went a little nuts in a Dressman, which is a giant men's formal dress store....basically missionary paradise. I managed to come away with only one tie....my companion was trying on Norwegians suits when I pried him away. 

The church members here are amazing. They have a large young adults program here so there's always a bunch of activities. Bergen is a huge university city and most of the people we end up teaching fall into that age group, so it makes it easy to invite them to cool stuff. Once a week we have a bible class, sport night, movie/game night, etc. We don't go to EVERY activity as missionaries, but most of them. It's pretty fun.

Besides my companion and I, there are 8 other missionaries here in Bergen...including Sister Ray who was in the MTC with me back in March. So that was a fun little reunion. It's a lot of fun when the district (all 10 missionaries) gets together, we have a ton of fun.

I've talked a lot about fun things. I promise we do work as well =) But we manage to have fun with that as well haha. I sent home pictures last week of my companion and I teaching in the Bergen centrum. We had drawn out the Plan of Salvation in chalk in the middle of the busy centrum, and then we would walk people through it. It was crazy fun, and it was a nice change from just walking around all day. The thing with a big city is there is always a lot of people around and always a lot of people moving in and out of the teaching pool. The trick is getting one of the many people we meet to stick around. So I'll let you know how that goes =)

Havin a blast in Bergen!

Elder Sessions

September 12, 2011

I once again find myself short on time, but I'll attempt to get at least a little bit in here.

Bergen is awesome. There's about 150-160 members who come to church each week, so it is quite a change from Tønsberg. I expected that though. There's an awesome YSA program here, and they are all pretty awesome. We use them on teaches with investigators quite a lot. A lot of the YSA's are the only members in their families so it's really amazing to see them operate in church only on their own testimonies. I like em alot, and they have a lot of activities during the week that the missionaries usually go to. Plus, it's just fun to hang out for a little while with some people our own age who are not missionaries haha.

On Saturday, all 8 missionaries in my district got together and drew the plan of salvation in chalk in the middle of Bergen centrum. It was alot of fun, my companion and I taught 11 people the Plan of Salvation in a matter of a couple of hours. People would come up and look at the drawing and then we would offer to take them through it and explain it. One of the missionaries snapped a really good picture of my companion and I teaching someone back to back, which is the picture I'm sending this week.

Bergen rains alot. Reminds me of England. My umbrella has become a part of my body. But the winters aren't too bad so that's a plus. I'm sure you've already sent the package, but I hope you included a hoodie. I didn't get a chance to reply to that email you sent, but that would be very helpful for P-days.

I've got to send my letter to the President, and the sister missionaries are breathing down my neck for the use of the computer. It used to be just me and my companion we had to worry about, but now we have to share the computers with 6 other missionaries, so it complicates things a bit.

These are pictures from my first P-Day in Bergen today. It was a lot of fun, we climbed a mountain and found an abandoned camping site where we waited out a rainstorm with a campfire and some hot dogs.

Love,

Elder Sessions