This week just flew by, feels like I was sitting at this computer yesterday, crazy how there's almost just a week left in this transfer here in Växjö!
Always felt at home on those 4 square courts
Jesus wants me for a sunbeam (a song that's sung in Primary which is like Sunday School for our 3-11 yr. old kids. The 3 yr old class are called Sunbeams.
To recap the week, on tuesday as in a lot of days when the work is slower, we go out contacting for an hour at 10 am after studies, it's a great way to get some fresh air and talk to more people! Then we had lunch and did some area book work in the afternoon. We swung by a potential investigator who couldn't meet at that time so we tracted some buildings after that. We taught our investigator Ann-Marie at night with Thomas, the first counselor of the branch. She starts making tea for all of us and is chatting with her friend on her bed at one point but we finally got the lesson going and it went alright. She's been sick so hadn't read the Book of Mormon chapter we gave her so we went ahead and read it with her and talked about it. We talked a lot about baptism again and why she needs to be baptized again. We hadn't had dinner after the lesson so we went to Pizzeria Excelle and talked about the day.
On wednesday we headed into town to get this dang bike lock figured out. We borrowed these 2 foot long wire cutters to try and cut the lock but we barely scratched the metal on the lock haha so looks like plan C it feels like at this point is the only option. We'll get a tire from the senior couple at zone conference and take it back with us and just take off the front tire and leave it locked to the bike rack and put the new one on. After the bike stuff we contacted a bit in the park and taught the Plan of Salvation to a nice lady. We met Jan-Erik at the church to help clean it, he's back from his honeymoon! Jan-Erik had to wait for Thomas for a meeting after we cleaned and we had open church so we just ended up chatting for an hour about anything and everything, so fun. After open church we headed to a member we home teach who has two MASSIVE husky dogs who are super friendly but I'm pretty sure my companion and I could ride them around Växjö if we wanted. After Tina we bumped into this guy in his mid-20's who was curious about us and asked us lots of questions so we taught him about our church, he wasn't interested in meeting again but we left him with a good taste in his mouth!
On thursday during our morning contacting we had some great lessons. A slightly crazy really old African man carrying a stick and waving it around invited us to coffee at this library cafe we didn't even know existed in our neighborhood, he said we're always out walking around and we need to sit and rest sometimes. We sat down and had some water and had a good chat about the Book of Mormon and how the gospel can solve many of the problems in the world today, his friend even joined in at one point. After that we went by a Bosnian lady named Amira and her son just happened to be coming over for lunch. So we sat down and taught the Restoration, she didn't speak Swedish well so he translated what we said from Swedish to Bosnian, soo cool! And a member we were supposed to meet who we were running super late to totaled his car and couldn't even meet that day so it worked out great! And the member's ok by the way. After that we got falafel then hopped on our train to Göteborg for zone conference.
It was great to be back in Göteborg and see some old missionary friends and meet some new ones! Sister Nielson from my group is serving there so I got to catch up with her, and Elder Perkins as well. Zone conference was all about becoming a Preach my Gospel missionary and I received some great personal revelation and have set some goals to improve that I'm excited about. After the conference we grabbed pizza from my favorite spot, I love Pizza, then took a train back to our area with the Karlskrona elders, Hart and Nielson.
On saturday we went into town and replaced the wheel on the dang bike so we have bikes back after a month! We held open church and did Fika with Americans again, still no one came in, it was raining though. After open church we headed to Teleborg and went by Allu's apartment then met the husband of a potential investigator that we swung by and he said we could come back! He also said he recognized us cause he's a bus driver, it's crazy how many bus drivers know the missionaries but we don't know many of them. After that we went by Marvin's and just had the best time as always, Marvin's been a member for 5 years and is so solid. He played us this windpipe flute instrument that sounded awesome and the piano.
This was the highlight of the week, sunday. We started off the day by meeting a Somalian lady named Susan who ended up walking to Church with us and we taught her for about an hour and a half at church. We had 17 people in sacrament meeting this week and that's including 3 visitors and an older man named Rolf who we met on the street who came. After church we went by Adam, a bigger muslim man but he was running late so while waiting for him we tracted some buildings. The last building we tracted, right before we were going to head back cause Adam texted us, we meet Lindah! She has an adorable baby and was just so nice and invited us right in, super excited for her and the future! Meeting with Adam was interesting, he's muslim and we basically answered lots of questions he had about christianity and things he didn't understand. We taught a lot and learned a lot about his own beliefs in the process. His wife was a Jehovah's Witness that converted to Islam, that was a new one for me! They invited us back for dinner though and they're super nice people. After Adam we tracted and met Ingajärd, a super old lady that said we could come back and teach God's plan for us. Wow it just felt like such a productive, busy day and a great way to finish the week.
I've been studying the Christ-like attribute of charity this week and have come to realize something maybe not profound but something new to me. To have charity for others, we must have charity for ourselves. We need to feel Christ's love for ourselves and our own infinite worth and divine purpose in order to feel that pure, perfect love for others. Once we feel that within ourselves it becomes easy, even natural to share that with everyone you meet, even in your very countenance. So don't forget to give yourself some lovin', you're more awesome than you think you are!
Love you all so very much!
Elder Erikson in action
Love this picture
Apple pie to get in the autumn spirit
(from Sherri: Love the "A" with 2 dots above it for the Swedish alphabet:) (and I love that these boys bake!)
Äldste Hainsworth
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