JUly 24th

July 25th, 2016


Eating out with Dylan the bro member

Home away from home

Splits with district leader Elder Nielsen




 I got it stuck in the stump second try. Not bad.

Tom Cruise in Cahoots with Random Swedish Guy

Tjena y'all! 

Exciting news! Elder Halterman is in the office now as our new AP, I was good friends with him at BYU. I remember the time he ate a grape out of my bellybutton, that's an interesting story...Anyways, we had a good week here in Norrköping, it was pretty busy with zone training, two service projects and a big ward activity. Felt like one of those weeks where numbers wise the things that you can't always count, do count. Three investigators came to the activity and church, lots of ward integration! 

Mireya is going forward with no problems, she came to church for the first time as well as the activity! She just gets it! Her husband doesn't understand why she wants to come to church every week cause she never did that even when she was in other churches. She told him it's because she really believes in this. So wonderful. 

 Matias came to the activity and church and we're working with him right now to either get married with his girlfriend or move out before his date. He's positive and wants it to happen! 

Alex came to the activity and church and seemed to really enjoy himself. The third hour I was translating to English for him and the lesson was pretty deep on temples and family history so I just whipped out the gospel library app and we looked at pictures of temples during the lesson. Sometimes you gotta improvise for the investigator's sake. His favorite was the Laie Hawaii temple. 

So we met a guy yesterday out contacting who is creating a new religion with Tom Cruise, Will Ferrell and various other hollywood celebrities. He knows these celebrities because they take a magic drink that acts as a psychadelic and makes them dream in another dimension then he comes and talks to them. One celebrity he hasn't been able to meet or work with but really wants to is Mitt Romney cause he believes he is Joseph Smith reincarnated. 

 I got some insights from Alma 32 this week,  "40. And thus, if ye will not nourish the word, looking forward with an eye of faith to the fruit thereof, ye can never pluck of the fruit of the tree of life.

 41 But if ye will nourish the word, yea, nourish the tree as it beginneth to grow, by your faith with great diligence, and with patience, looking forward to the fruit thereof, it shall take root; and behold it shall be a tree springing up unto everlasting life". 

It's that simple, just nourish it and be patient! 

Sending love from the other side of the pond,

Äldste Hainsworth

(written on July 18th, 2016)

From Tiny Suburbs to Big City

Hey family and friends! 

Transfers are in annnnnnnnd I'm excited to head to Norrköping, following in the tracks of Elder Baquedano my dear old French companion. My new companion will be Elder Barnes and he's a stud, he slept over at our apartment for a zone conference a few months ago. It was hard saying goodbye to so many wonderful amazing families and friends from the Vendelsö ward. I was told when I first came to the area 4.5 months ago that the new chapel would be open in about 2 weeks from then. The date rolled around then passed by, no chapel. This was a pattern that continued these last couple months and finally on sunday, yesterday, my last time at church, we had our first sacrament meeting in the brand new chapel. It felt right to get up and bear my testimony on my last sunday there. It was a sweet farewell. 

Busy busy last week in Vendelsö! The investigators are doing well and I feel good leaving this area with the work that's been done. Vendelsö is a happening place right now! Our big new investigator, Kasim, is a refugee from Turkey that has been living in Sweden for 15 months. He's completely alone here and has managed to learn some Swedish, pick up a job and a modest apartment to live in. He met with the sister missionaries in Västerhaninge two weeks ago and they've passed him on to us since he lives in our area. He's read the Book of Mormon seven times in these last 2 weeks and been to church both weeks. He wants to be baptized because he has a strong testimony of Jesus Christ and the Book of Mormon. He always talks about how once he's Mormon the 3 of us are going to travel back to his homeland of Turkey and do missionary work and baptize thousands! You never know what the future holds! We've been meeting with him daily and working to help prepare him, especially by quitting smoking, so please keep him in your prayers! 

Mikael is on track to be baptized the 16th of July, it's too bad I can't stick around for that but he's in good hands with Elder Groberg. Kasim is also progressing quickly towards baptism and is going to make a fantastic member. Mayra and her daughters are doing well and are reading and praying right now, willing to act on the answer they receive. The member missionary work is improving as we work with our awesome ward mission leader Kent to get members involved in the missionary work. 

Elder Groberg and I have been tossing the football around in the front yard a lot this week cause it's so nice. We work on verb conjugations by having to conjugate a verb every time we throw the ball. My spiral's getting better but I'm no Russ Wilson yet. 

I have a testimony of hindsight and perspective. There's so much I miss in my day to day happenings because my head is down and I'm not paying attention, figuratively speaking. There's so much to be gained and so much satisfaction that can be obtained from taking some time to look back and reflect and see how far you've really come. That's a pattern that has done me a lot of good and taught me lessons that I otherwise would miss. As I look back in hindsight on a day as I write in my journal, a week as I write these letters, or an area as it's time to move on to the next one. I pray that like Paul of old, I can say "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith". 

Catch ya next week from Norrköping! 

Love,

Äldste Hainsworth

 The district! 

Mayra and her fam! 

Watching the Book of Mormon movies with my boys

 Samuel and Angelica

Blessings upon Blessings+Mission Tour

This week was amazing, there's just so much to talk about and not enough time to talk about all the amazing things that happen every week but I'll try and capture some of the highlights. Also we haven't gotten our phone back yet, the hunt continues...

We've been struggling and praying and trying to get Mikael to church in the last 4 months I've been here cause it's the only barrier keeping him back from baptism. Well we met with Mikael on wednesday and he told us about a friend of his who's pretty shy but could really use the gospel so he said he's going to bring him to our next meeting and he did! We met with Mikael on friday and there next to Mikael is Peter, a less active that Elder Baquedano and I worked with when I first got to Vendelsö. His health wasn't so good so he didn't want us coming by so we haven't seen him in the last 3 months. My mind was blown, I turned to Mikael and asked him if he knew Peter was a member and he said no so I turned to Peter and asked him if he knew Mikael was investigating the church and he said no! They've been friends for years! Well we invited Peter to come to church with Mikael and they both did! Peter's first time in over 6 months and Mikael's first time ever! I never would have expected that to happen but I wouldn't want it any other way. I know the Lord blesses and consecrates our humble efforts. 

Wednesday evening we had some missionaries from other areas stay the night at our place in preparation for Mission Tour the following day, so we hosted Elder Walton (old comp) and Elder Olson from Uppsala and Elder Pfost and Elder Porter from Gävle, all but Elder Porter have served in the Helsingborg district together so we had a blast catching up and reminiscing on the "good ole days". I learned tons from thursday from both President and Sister Beckstrand about recognizing the Spirit and being Seekers of Him, as well as from Elder Dyches about being a Master Teacher. They gave us some challenges, like 1.) Ask God how the Spirit talks to me, 2.) Ask God how He feels about me 3.) Wake up and live like the Spirit is talking to me. I have a testimony of personal revelation, I went into the mission tour with some questions and I came out with some answers. I know those leaders were inspired. 

There's so much happening in Vendelsö, we have had a fantastic week of finding and teaching on the street and we actually ran out of Swedish Book of Mormons, people are so positive! We've gotten numbers from some prepared people. We do pretty much all our contacting in Brandbergen and we'll usually do a "victory lap" as we call it which is the long way on this path to go to the bus stops to head home. It's happened almost everyday this week that we miss our bus because we end up meeting some positive person and teaching a lesson during our victory lap. I know blessings come when we do that little bit extra, just go a little further, just talk to one more person. Just one example from Friday is a girl named Sara Betina from Poland who's high school\college age, she believed in God but wasn't satisfied with the organization and everything in her church. We gave her a Book of Mormon and she was excited to meet and learn more. She was the last contact of the day, you could see the bus stop from where we stopped her. 

I know that this is the most important work in the world and I'm supposed to be here in Sweden right now having the experiences I'm having. Last but not least, happy fathers day to my dad Stanley Hainsworth! He is an inspiration and example to me and has been a constant source of love and support since day one. I love him so much.

Have a fantastic week,

Äldste Hainsworth

 Football on p day

Planting flowers at the temple

Inside joke from Julia Olsson, we told her at a dinner how Swedes put cucumber on everything so she left 5 cucumbers at our door one night!

Bellevue Stake represent! So glad Elder Hawkins is in Sweden! 

Group reunion at mission tour

Solo Special Ops Mission

Hey guys! Happy p-day! It's gonna be a good one, we've got a nice zone bbq/sports day planned at a park nearby and the weather is sunny and gets up to 21*.

This was a stressful week since Elder Groberg and I didn't have a phone so no contact with investigators or members. We had a good time when the Olsson family booked us for dinner on wednesday at 6 so we show up and turns out they tried to call us a few days ago to cancel sine since something with work had come up but we never answered our phone so she felt bad, nothing they could do though! It's kinda funny looking back on it now. Elder Groberg and I also went on solo special ops missions into the bus office lot area where they keep the busses and keep the lost and found. They sent us off last time and we figured it was cause we looked like missionaries big time and there were two of us. So we each went on a solo mission into the bus station office so they'd actually help us find our phone, Elder Groberg didn't get much out of em speaking Swedish so I went in after him and pulled the American card, spoke English with em and acted as confident as humanly possible. It worked, they gave me a ton of information and actually let me look in the dang lost and found box but in the end it turns out they'd sent our phone to Stockholm to the lost and found there and it won't get there till the end of next week! So we got a temporary phone from the office for the time being. Hope that all made sense, it's a bit confusing.

We cleaned the temple this last wednesday and it was the best, it was my first time in the Stockholm temple and I loved it! Ooh random thought, I realized that when Americans say something is the best, like a person or food or whatever, it can just mean it's a good thing, not that it's literally the best. Swedes don't really say that so when we say that in Swedish they get confused. If that makes sense! 

Angelica is making some good progress, we had a fantastic lesson with her yesterday where we showed her the "Because of Him" Easter video the church has made and talked about how we have the gospel of Jesus Christ because of Him. The Spirit was strong and we tried so hard to point it out and help Angelica recognize it but she wouldn't admit anything. We're going to keep working with her and being bold with our promised blessings because through the Spirit " he that preacheth and he that receiveth, understand one another, and both are edified and rejoice together". 

Otherwise we haven't met with any of our investigators due to the aforementioned problem, but stuff is set up for this week! 

1 Corinthians 2: 9-16. I challenge you to read and ponder these verses! This concept that is taught so beautifully and so plainly in Corinthians. This might be the number one thing that I get to explain and testify of to the Swedish people because they don't get it! For so many it's just if you see it, you believe in it, if you don't, it doesn't exist. If someone can come to understand the difference between "the natural man [who] receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him" and "the Spirit [which] searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God" then they can come to know God. It's that simple, opening your heart. This story was shared (in Swedish) at our ward council this last week and I loved it, here it is in English: In a mother’s womb were two babies. The first baby asked the other: “Do you believe in life after delivery?” The second baby replied, “Why, of course. There has to be something after delivery. Maybe we are here to prepare ourselves for what we will be later.” “Nonsense,” said the first. “There is no life after delivery. What would that life be?” “I don’t know, but there will be more light than here. Maybe we will walk with our legs and eat from our mouths.” The doubting baby laughed. “This is absurd! Walking is impossible. And eat with our mouths? Ridiculous. The umbilical cord supplies nutrition. Life after delivery is to be excluded. The umbilical cord is too short.” The second baby held his ground. “I think there is something and maybe it’s different than it is here.” The first baby replied, “No one has ever come back from there. Delivery is the end of life, and in the after-delivery it is nothing but darkness and anxiety and it takes us nowhere.” “Well, I don’t know,” said the twin, “but certainly we will see mother and she will take care of us.” “Mother?” The first baby guffawed. “You believe in mother? Where is she now?” The second baby calmly and patiently tried to explain. “She is all around us. It is in her that we live. Without her there would not be this world.” “Ha. I don’t see her, so it’s only logical that she doesn’t exist.” To which the other replied, “Sometimes when you’re in silence you can hear her, you can perceive her. I believe there is a reality after delivery and we are here to prepare ourselves for that reality when it comes….”

God bless you all! Love you! 

Äldste Hainsworth

 Elder Hart a good friend from BYU

National day in Stockholm

Some swedish race? 

The Old Town

Happy Birthday Sweden

Hey everyone! Happy Swedish National Day! It's not quite 4th of July in the US, Swedes like to show their patriotism in a more mild manner. We asked our neighbor as we left today what her plans were for National Day and she said they're going to raise the Swedish flag on the flag pole. Not quite the fireworks, parade, and BBQ I'm used to. 

There won't be any pictures today since I left our phone on the bus on saturday! Luckily we got in contact with the bus driver and he gave our phone to the lost and found so it's safe. However cause of the weekend and holiday today we won't get it back till tomorrow! 

We had quite the meeting with Betul this week. She really opened up and told us that she didn't know about switching religions. She was worried about upsetting her dad and didn't know if it was right for her. We told her we absolutely understood and encouraged her to pray about it and find out God's will for her. 

Super random experience after Betul, we met her in the library and had our lesson then hung around a bit after she left at a table in the library. About 5 minutes later two Swedish strangers walk up to us, shake our hands and introduce themselves, say they'll be right back after they make the tea, then walk off! Elder Groberg and I were beyond confused and figured they got us mixed up with someone else since a white shirt and tie can pass for a lot of things. They came back later and turns out they have a free Swedish class every tuesday night in the library and assumed we were there to join in! Well we hadn't done language study so we figured why not, and had a good time asking some language questions and getting to know these two super cool Swedes. 

It was a week of lots of little random experiences, here's a couple more:

-some little kindergartener's tried to throw water balloons at us from their school playground.

-after we lost our phone we walked around to borrow someone's phone to try calling ours and everyone said no before we explained what we wanted, one guy I asked "hey could we borrow your phone for a quick second?" and he didn't even register that, he just started going off about how he hates religion then I asked him calmly again the same question and he got all surprised and a bit embarrassed. Don't be quick to assume! 

-we contacted a 92 year old Swedish lady with a roller and explained the Book of Mormon then held it out her and said here, you can have one and read it yourself! Well she took the Book of Mormon, sat down on her roller and started reading! 

We had an great lesson teaching Angelica. We were pretty stuck as far as what she needed to be taught, we as missionaries only see the tip of the iceberg of our investigators so it's hard to say what concerns we need to help them out with a lot of the time. So we planned a lesson with a few questions to get her thinking and planned to follow the Spirit and teach according to her needs. Well the golden question in the lesson was "what would it mean to you if this (everything we've taught you) is true?". She said she didn't know cause she'd never even considered it being true!! Well she went on and opened up about her dad who passed away about 5 years ago and how she has a feeling she can't describe that his Spirit lived on and that she'll see him again. Why didn't this come up when we taught the Plan of Salvation?! She even said she has felt him comforting her during an incident where she woke up to a thief robbing her apartment. The Spirit was strong and God's plan seemed to finally be relevant to her. We promised her that the Plan of Salvation is true and that she can really come to know for herself through reading the Book of Mormon and prayer. Elder Groberg were so grateful we followed the Spirit and were tools in God's hands to help Angelica on the path to receiving her own testimony. 

I'm so grateful to be a part of the Lord's work here in Sweden and I am loving every day! 

Ha en fantastisk vecka! 

Love,

Äldste Hainsworth