It feels strange to be sitting here AGAIN to write that another week has passed. Lots to tell about!
Transfers were on Tuesday. Elder Buckley and I spent most of our last hours here in Växjö saying good bye to people. Leaving an area is always sad, lots of people here in Växjö have really grown to love Elder Buckley.
He was here for six months, that a long time to make a lasting impression! We were on the same train headed up to Stockholm. We had prayed before the train ride to find someone whom we could teach, and of course our prayer was answered! A nice, well dressed older gentleman sat with us and we had a pleasant conversation. He seemed pretty shocked that Elder Buckley and I were only 20 and were here as missionaries. He mentioned that he and his wife talked sometimes about what they believe, and he asked us to write a report to him at the end of our two years as missionaries in Sweden to tell him about our experiences. It was cool to talk to him.
Elder Buckley got off of the train before I did and hopped onto another one headed for Eskilstuna. The past transfer was possibly the fastest yet! It was strange to say goodbye. I traveled onward to Stockholm, and my excitement grew with every mile. We arrived at T Central and floods of memories began coming back. Meeting Elder Petersen there, the flashmob, and others. I walked to the tunnelbanas and was happy to find two of the other trainers, Elder Hansen and Elder Nelson, waiting to catch the next one to the mission office. Elder Hansen and I were shocked when we hopped onto the tunnelbana to find that Mary, one of our favorite members from the Handen ward, was sitting there! What are the chances?!? It was joyous to talk with her.
We spent the night at the mission office with the other trainers and met the new missionaries at the Täby Chapel on Wednesday. There are five new elders and four new sisters, one of them is now in Växjö! Elder Childs! He is from Taylorsville, Utah and we have had an exciting past few days. Elder Childs is a fabulous cook and has already taught me a ton about making good food. He is the oldest of five kids and I am proud to say that I know all of their names now.
Do you remember the family we met at the bus stop last week who said that they would come to church? They came! They definitely had a unique experience because Stake Conference was yesterday! We watched the broadcast here in Växjö. Things kept going wrong with the connection, so we missed most of the first part of the conference and it was hard to hear the rest. I had to translate into English and it was a struggle to convey the messages spoken, but one lady came up to me at the end and said that she would be thinking about all of the things she learned from the conference. I know that the Holy Ghost taught her what my haphazard English translation attempt could not.
A cool experience from this week came after a companionship study with Elder Childs. We had been role playing street contacting and studying about finding work, and one part of Chapter 9 in Preach My Gospel about finding kept ringing through my head. It talks about people and goes something like this: the Lord will lead them to you or you will be lead to them. We had about 10 minutes after our study where we had a little time before our next activity and felt inspired to put into practice what we had studied. We walked outside of the church with the faith the the Lord would lead us to someone. We found that someone! We had only ten minutes but we found a man that is a true truth seeker. He has read the Book of Mormon and even met with missionaries but said that he had gotten busy and stopped meeting them. He has friends that are members of the Church and seemed excited about meeting us again! It was amazing to see our faith confirmed.
I hope that you have had a happy beginning to March!
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