Friday, February 7, 2014

Elder Christian Tanner - Hope, Hard Work and Being Tired


Hey,
We have been so busy the past few weeks that it feels like the weeks are turning to days and we just take a nap for a few hours at night. I feel like my eyes weigh 100 pounds constantly. It doesn't matter how much sleep I get, I am always exhausted. I always knew it would be tiring to come on a mission, but not this bad. I remember in my interview with the stake president he said: "You are going to be so tired. It will be the most tired you will have ever been in your life. Yet somehow, you will want to keep working." And it is so true. So true.

This past Sunday was great! It felt like everybody wanted to talk to us. We have been trying to do splits with some of the ward members for a long time now. In fact, it has been a long time since anybody has gone on splits with the missionaries here. And by a long time I mean about a year. A brother came up to me after Priesthood and said "Wednesday. 6:00. Splits. Can you come?" Looked on the schedule, yep we can come. After Sunday school he came up to me again. "How about we meet earlier on Wednesday and you, me and your companion can go visit an investigator or less-active before we do splits?" (We just got offered a member-present lesson without even asking anybody!!?? What is this?) Then, after sacrament meeting he came up behind my companion and I and put his arms over us and said "Do you remember how to get to my house? How about before we even go visit a less-active member, you come to my house for lunch? Then we'll go visit people." Never before have I experienced anything like that. Its so great. There was another member who never could figure out how to get onto his LDS.org account. So, we helped him out with that, now he loves us. He was just all excited to see us. Now our dinner schedules is filling up more and more. Its awesome!

Each month we, as a mission, choose a Christ-like attribute from Preach my Gospel and work on that attribute. For January I chose Hope. It was a good one for me to choose. I have really needed a lot of hope over the past month. I have had to have a lot of hope with Trollhättan. I had to hope that the Lord would help us. I have had to hope that we would find. I had to hope that we would teach. I had to hope that we gain trust with the members. And it was good! I can definelty say that I have grown from learning to hope. But, more than hoping is hard work. There is no substitute for hard work. Nothing happens with out hoping and working hard.

I have reason to suspect that this transfer I am transferring to Stockholm as District Leader. Let me tell you why. Thomas texted me this week and asked if I was still in Trollhättan. He heard that I was in Stockholm. I haven't set foot in Stockholm since my first day here. So, it could be possible. And also, we had interviews with President Newell this week. In fact, he picked us up in his car and drove us to Göteborg. We had companionship interviews in the car. It was really awesome to spend some "quality time" with President Newell. We usually see him for a few minutes at a time. This was a WHOLE 45 minute drive. I loved it. Anyway, when we got to Göteborg we had personal interviews. He told me "Make sure you're still being obedient. We need obedient District Leaders." It caught me off guard, actually. It would LOVE to go to Stockholm as a District Leader. That would be SO awesome! So I am kinda anxious to see if he calls on Saturday to see if I am getting transferred.

Also this week I went on splits with our current district leader, Elder Simmons. We ended up discussing some way deep doctrine. I love those conversations. It kinda drives me nuts but it definitely strengthens my testimony that this church is not man made. There HAS to be a God who loves us.  
So yeah. That's about what I can think about to write. I hope everyone has a very nice week. Love you all lots.

Kram,
Äldste Christian Tanner

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