Hej allihopa! Hur står det till?
It's fair to say that stress has been a big part of my service here in
Utby. Although, I feel like it is getting better slowly. We currently have 6
investigators that we are meeting with on a regular basis. One of them is a
Finnish man named Eero (pronouced: Arrow). We have met with him 3 times over the
past 5 days and we're meeting with him tomorrow. He has been drinking for a lot
of years. He has basically lost everything he has. His kids don't want to talk
to him, he has no wife, he lives alone, and he can't stop drinking. But he wants
to change! We are working intensely with him. So far, he hasn't taken a drink
since the first day we met with him. That is already incredible improvement from
where he was when the missionaries first met him (he was dropped a while ago).
Pehzman is coming along. We met with him 1 time this past week. We talked a lot
about Priesthood Authority. He told us that our church claiming to have the only
authority was a big claim. That bothered me for a few minutes. I thought we had
scared him away. Thankfully we haven't. Working to get him baptized within the
next few weeks. We have a meeting tonight with a guy named Johny. He came to
church for the first time my second week here. This will be our first official
meeting with him. He's really positive so we'll see how things go. We are also
teaching an 18 year old kid named Jacob. He has a lot of interest in religion.
Met with him once last week and we have a meeting with him in a few days. So as
you can see, we have a few investigators. We have a few others but they will be
mentioned as we find out more about them.
I have discovered a lot about other religions recently. We try to avoid
JW's because they just want to bible bash with us. That's not to say, however,
that they don't contact us. We have been contacted by several JW's. Discussions
on the street can last well over 30 minutes. It's definetly not worth our time.
But it is interesting to see the difference in doctrine. We had an investigator
whom we dropped this past week. He is Muslim. He is the same guy who asked us
the simple question of why we need a Redeemer. We went back and answered his
question. When we got there he said "I know without a doubt (he's were I started
to get excited) that Islam is the true religion (and then came the big sigh)."
We tired to say "okay, well, we'll see ya later" and leave, but he just kept
going and going. He explained how they want everybody to be Muslim and they are
willing to take arms to do it. I didn't know that! Kinda creeped me out. So, as
you probably know, we won't be going back to that guy any time soon. But like I
say, learning what other religions believe is interesting. I never would have
though that coming on a mission to teach OUR doctrine with cause me to learn so
much about other doctrine.
I got a good story for ya'll. On Tuesday we were with a family for dinner.
They live about a 25 minute walk from the church. We had a meeting at the church
right after dinner. We missed our bus to be at the church on time so we tried to
ask for a ride. It didn't work. So we either had to wait for a bus or walk. It
was 5 minutes faster to walk so that's what we decided to do. We pulled out our
handy-dandy GPS and routed our map to the church. We looked at the phone and
decided that we could cut through the little forest to save 10 minutes of
walking. It was raining, so we needed to save time anyways. We are walking
through the forest and everything is going good. FInally, we get to right where
we are suppost to meet up with where the GPS said we were suppost to be walking
again. At the very edge of the forest we discover a 50 foot cliff. It was
raining, it was slippery, it was dark, it was scary! But the sight was beautiful
over the town. Lights were on and you could see the enitre city lit up. We
started going back the way we came from keeping an eye on the cliff and making
sure we were a good ways away. Finally, we made it back on the correct path. Now
that we were on the correct path walking to wards the church, we were out of the
way of harm. We could see, however, as we were walking past the cliff, how big
the cliff was and how dangerous it could have been. We finally made it to the
church and by some miracle we were only 5 minutes late. What story is this
related to? I'll give you a HINT! Its in the Book of Mormon. It is also a dream
given to a Prophet. YEP!!!!! THE TREE OF LIFE. Our GPS was our iron rod. The
Tree of Life was the church. The cliff was death and hell. The beauty of the
city was temptation and sin (sometimes sin and temptation look pleasing and we
want whatever it is). We gave into temptation and let go of the rod! We almost
fell off the cliff and died and went to hell. Figurativly speaking, of course.
And just like in the story there was mist and darkness and they couldn't see. We
couldn't see the cliff because of the trees, the rain and the darkness. It was
scary! So if we just take my version of the Tree of Life and apply that to life,
its the exact same thing. If we let go of that rod things are going to get
slippery and scary. Don't seek the worldly things too much or you will let go of
that rod. Sure, you can get back on the rod, but its much easier to stay on the
rod the entire time. Don't let pride get in the way. Don't think you know what
you're doing. Because you dont! Things arn't always as they seem! So that is my
wise words of wisdom for this letter. Stay on the good side of things. It's much
better and it's still fun :)
Sorry about the pathetic letter. But that was my week. In short: fast,
stressful, eventful, and a good week on the mission. If I remember anything more
I will send it if I have time. Have a good last full week of March and we sees
you around! HA DET BRA!!!!
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