Fantastic week. This is going to be long, jag ber om ursäkt.
Elder Childs packed up his bags and was off on Wednesday. 😢😢 I waited with him at the train station for his tåg to arrive and we said our last goodbyes as it pulled in. These two transfers with him were truly the fastest 12 weeks of my life!! I loved them.
When the train pulled in, I helped my no-longer greenie lug his huge bags up to the door of the passenger car and then helped to situate them in the isle near his seat. As I was walking back to the door to get off of the train, guess what happened?!?!? The train started moving! It couldn't have been stopped for more than 60 seconds! I was in panic mode. I didn't have a ticket for this train, and the fine for riding without a ticket is way too high! I was quite nervous for a few minutes, but luckily the train stopped in a town after ten minutes and I was able to hop off before tickets were checked. It ended up that Elder Olson had to switch trains in the town where I had gotten off, so I was able to meet up with him there and ride back to Växjö. Close one!
Not having Elder Childs at my side was strange! But Elder Olson is awesome! He is most from San Antonio,Texas and has served in Boden and Jakobsberg as I have! After taking his bags to our apartment, we got to the church and had a fabulous lesson with Mats. President and Sister Stokes skyped in and they were a huge asset to the teaching. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I love Mats!!! He is super honest and it makes it easier for us to teach to his needs. Thank you for praying for him. After the lesson with Mats was another great teaching appointment with Ilir. We had invited our friend Diego to follow along in the lesson, but because he was unsure if he could make it we also invited a member named Thomas. Diego was able to come in the end, so Ilir's lesson had many guests. Ilir is also doing well, he loves feeling the Holy Spirit and learning more about the Restoration of Christ's Gospel.
A huge focus for Elder Childs and I last transfer was seeking to find and teach people between the ages of 15 and 25. We prayed diligently to find people in that age group during virtually every prayer we offered. As we biked to coordination meeting with Brother Cabillero last week, there were some red houses that we felt like we should knock. We knocked them after the meeting and met a great young man named Love! Yep, his name is Love. It's pronounced LOW-Vey and is not actually an extremely abnormal Swedish name. We taught Love all about the Book of Mormon and he accepted a copy!! Elder Olson and I went back to his house on Thursday and had a great chat with him and his dad. Love had to go to mow the lawn but we continued talking to the dad. As we walked away from talking, we saw Love once more. Our friend Diego has written a song about mowing the lawn called "Klippa Gräset" and we were able to send a link of the song to Love. The great thing about that is that now we have contact with Love over Facebook Messanger!! Please pray for him. We'll be teaching him again this week.
Elder Olson is a fantastic district leader. His first baptismal interview was on Friday (the day after his first District Council ever!) and he did a wonderful job. The man being interviewed, Chris, is a guy that the Malmö elders (Elders Callor and Burns) have been teaching for just a few months. It was inspiring to hear about how Chris started believing in God a year ago. Now he has an ardent testimony of Restored Truth! It was cool to hear about his progression and to meet him in person.
I have been keeping track in my journal of how many days I have lived on this beautiful Earth. I hit the 7,500th day on Wednesday, and that happened to be the day I started working a special study called "My Plan" for returning missionaries. Part of "My Plan" so far has been reviewing quotations from various prophets and apostles. This quote from President Eyring was one that hit me especially hard. President Eyring refers to a habit he developed of daily pondering about and recording an instance during the day when the Lord's hand was evident. He said this: "As I would cast my mind over the day, I would see evidence of what God had done for one of us that I had not recognized in the busy moments of the day. As that happened, and it happened often, I realized that trying to remember had allowed God to show me what He had done." I have tried to apply this principle this week, and the results have been awesome. Elder OIson and I have been running every day (yep, it's actually way awesome!) and we saw some houses one morning that we felt we should knock. We did so later that evening and met a great man named Jon. After "casting my mind over the day," it was clear that us meeting Jon was the result of many small impressions that Elder Olson and I received and acted upon, beginning with following a prompting to run to the left at a certain point in the trail instead of right. That led us to seeing the area where Jon lives. The Lord's hand is present in our lives from the early hours of the morning and on! In other words, always!
I know that this has gotten quite long... sorry. A somber page in this week's adventure: A member in the branch named Dallin will be going home to the U.S. this week, and he won't be back until long after I've left Växjö. I think I've mentioned Dallin before. He consistently provides meals, health tips, insights about the gospel, and support on lessons for us here in Växjö. I love members in Sweden!! And I don't like when we have to part ways.
Another thing I love: the Book of Mormon!!! I finished reading it last week and after about two seconds decided to turn to 1 Nephi 1 to start over reading it through again. I am doing a special study from Preach My Gospel where I mark every time a name of Christ or a pronoun referring to Him is mentioned, every time a principle of His Gospel is mentioned, every time an attribute of Him is named, and the words he speaks.
This study has been super enriching, and I look forward even more to personal study each day because of it. I remember not really caring to understand some chapters in 1 Nephi last time I read through this great book, but this study has opened my eyes to how awesome they are! I know that the commandment to study the scriptures is important and that it is an essential aspect of living the Gospel.
Have a wonderful last week in May!
Love,
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