Hej, hope everyone is doing well.
First things first, we got transfer news and I will be leaving Borlänge. If you have not been able to tell from my emails I have not been a huge fan of this area but of course I have met countless amazing people that I will be sad to say goodbye to. My new area is Linköping, which is the 5th largest city in Sweden, a couple hours west of Stockholm. I am definitely very excited to be going back to a big city. As far as my new companion, keeping it simple I have not heard good things about him, but I am trying to go in with an open mind hoping we can both learn things from each other.
This past week was decent. We were without the car the whole week because it is in the shop, so we had to use buses and the bus system in Borlänge is pretty horrible. We did have a cool miracle with the buses though. Our first day we went to get on the bus after visiting a member, and we were going to go to the train station to take a train up to our friend Tommy. The trains only leave every couple hours so we could not miss this train. When we got to the bus stop there was a stop on both sides of the road, but for whatever reason the bus stops here don't have any information about the bus routes or anything like that (every other city I've been in Sweden has that) so we ended up taking the bus that got us to almost the same location but went around Borlänge instead of going straight there like the other one. Well on this wrong bus that we took, a lady that I had met at the mall earlier that day walked on the bus and I was able to talk to her again and we were able to message her about church the rest of the week and although she didn't come there is a good chance she will in the future. Well after we met that lady the problem was we got dropped off at a stop like a 15 minute walk from where we needed to be and our train left in five minutes. We started jogging so we could make it and when we had moved a little bit I looked at the time again and we had three minutes so then it turned into a full sprint the whole way to the train station, ran through the station to our platform, ran down the stairs and walked out the doors to see the train doors closing, but I was able to shove my hand in the closing door and push it open so we barely made it hahaha.
We taught Tommy about tithing and went more in depth into priesthood this week. He has still had no objections or problems with anything we've taught so his baptism being in 2 weeks is still looking good.
We had a lesson with Sabrina for the first time in a while. If any of you remember she is an 18 year old girl from Eritrea that has been taught by the missionaries since last summer but has had a hard time understanding priesthood authority and prophets. We have been inviting her to pray about President Nelson being a prophet and listen to his talks, and this time she said that she is starting to receive answers to her prayers and she thinks President Nelson is speaking truth. This is such a huge thing for Sabrina, if I'm being honest because of how stubborn she is I never expected this to happen. After she told us that we tried to teach priesthood authority again, this time with me drawing stuff on the whiteboard and showing a lot of pictures, and she finally understood and said she will think about baptism. If you are wondering what she looks like, I got a picture with her this week. She is the girl that is half of my height and looks like an 8 year old. I promise she is 18😂.
The other interesting things from the week were just a bunch of negative interactions that we had that I do not have the motivation or desire to write about so the negativity will be spared from my email this week lol.
This week in church and seminary the lessons had a big focus on what a miracle the Book of Mormon is (because the end of 2 Nephi prophesies a lot about it). I love being a part of conversations like this because it just helps remind me the gratitude and love that I have for the Book of Mormon, as well as Joseph Smith. Me and Zach had a good conversation yesterday about our appreciation for how much Joseph Smith sacrificed to bring forth the Book of Mormon. The talk "Safety for the Soul" by Elder Holland is an inspiring testimony of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, and here is an excerpt from it. "... tell me whether in this hour of death these two men (Joseph and Hyrum Smith) would enter the presence of their Eternal Judge quoting from and finding solace in a book which, if not the very word of God, would brand them as imposters and charlatans until the end of time? They would not do that! They were willing to die rather than deny the divine origin and the eternal truthfulness of the Book of Mormon." The sacrifices of Joseph Smith to bring forth the Book of Mormon are immeasurable, as is how much we can learn and grow closer to Christ from and through the Book of Mormon. And a reminder of what our prophet has promised us if we read the Book of Mormon "My dear brothers and sisters, I promise that as you prayerfully study the Book of Mormon every day, you will make better decisions—every day. I promise that as you ponder what you study, the windows of heaven will open, and you will receive answers to your own questions and direction for your own life. I promise that as you daily immerse yourself in the Book of Mormon, you can be immunized against the evils of the day." This is no deep spiritual thought, but of course is of great importance to me. I have come to love and appreciate the Book of Mormon so much on my mission. As I said when talking with Zach yesterday, there is nothing else that I am more sure about in my life than the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and the gospel. Come and see for yourself if you haven't already:)
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