Växjö week 17! Wow.
Well, it was another awesome week!
Elder Callor and I were on what we believe was our seventh splits together. I love Elder Callor!! We had a great day of missionary work. We had a lot of fun conversations with each other and others. One cool thing that happened was that we were knocking doors next to the coolest stream and forest ever. One man that lived on the banks of the stream was not interested at all at first. We kept finding new ways to bring up the Gospel while we talked to him and by the end he promised that he would read the copy of Mormons bok that he had inside. He claimed to have a copy with a white cover instead of the classic deep blue.
Mats is awesome. We gave him a "triple combination" (a book that includes the Book of Mormon as well as the Doctrine and Covenants and the Peal of Great Price) and at church yesterday he showed me the "small amount" he has read in his new copy of the scriptures. He's at 1 Nephi 19!! I think that's like 10 chapters since last Sunday. This man inspires me. He even made his own bookmark out of a fancy red ribbon! Mats brings his own little cushion to put on his chair at church each Sunday. We had the idea of just having him leave the cushion at the church during the week so that he doesn't have to lug it to church with him each week. Brilliant!
A miracle happened with Björn. Elder Childs and I have been talking a lot over the past few weeks about how we can help him become friends with members. One obvious solution is to have members on the lessons we have with him, but as of last week the lessons we had with him were never planned in advance. We only ever taught him if we happened to be at his house when he had time. Our plan was to invite him to get a tour of the church so that we could invite a member to the tour and they could meet Björn. But guess what?? When we went by his house this week he said, "Wow, I am glad to see you! I was going to text and ask if I could get a tour of the church this week. Would it work for me to come on Thursday?" We were thrilled! So Björn got a tour of the church and met a member. It was a way good tour thanks to the member. Björn asked so many questions and seemed pleased with how things work here. He mentioned, "it seems like my church is very influenced by 'tidsanden' (the spirit of the time/age) but I love how this church places emphasis on following den Helige anden (the Holy Spirit).
Another cool thing is that Björn worked up in Umeå for a while doing something with Swedish records (the kind used in family history), so when we showed him our family history center he already knew a ton. One last miracle with the tour was that both the member who we were with and Björn grew up on the same street in the south of Växjö! They know a ton of the same people. The final part of the tour was an idea that Elder Childs and I had toghether. We decided to play a version of "Joseph Smith's First Prayer" while we all read the Swedish text to that song. It was powerful! We weren't sure what Björn thought about that at the time, but he texted us yesterday and asked for the link to the song! I know that the Spirit is real. I felt it as we listened to that hymn together during the tour and I am grateful that we place an emphasis on den Helige anden in the Lord's Restored Church. Thank you for praying for Björn.
Yesterday, Elder Childs and I had some great time to find people to teach. We went to an area called Frövägen, and on the way to visit a person who we want to teach in the area Elder Childs said that he felt like we should talk to people in a specific building. As we climbed the stairs to the top floor, I had a neat thought about what it means to take upon ourselves the name of Christ. My thought was, "Christ has many different names, like the Prince of Peace and the Light of the World. Taking his name upon us can have new meanings with each new name." It was cool because of a poster that was behind the second door we knocked on. The man who answered wasn't interested, but the poster on the inside of his door listed "names of God and their meanings." He explained that the poster belonged to his wife and that we could come back later to talk to her about it. I don't think it was just by chance that I had the thought about Christ's names right before seeing that poster and talking to that man!
Love you all!
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