Yay for CHURCH!

Well this past week has been pretty amazing. Last Monday, after 6 oclock we went to see this part-member ish family. The miracle of it all was that we arrived at the door and discovered that it was port-coded. So we called up to the house and there was no answer. So we were pretty down and just as we were about to leave a Swede walks up to the locked door and walks in... we being the rebels we are grabbed onto the door and entered the apartment building. We took the elevator up and rang their door-bell. The person who opened that door was that Swedish man that unlocked the down-stairs door and we said we were from the church of Jesus Christ and asked if the wife (who we were looking for) was home. She came up to the door and welcomed us in and sat us down. The husband left.. (avoiding all religious matters) and we were able to talk to the wife, her daughter who is 12 and the 3 year old son. We were able to get along well because she is from chile... (speaking fluent spanish) who can also speak English because she was taught that language and is the language her and her husband use to communicate (that being her second language). And she can also speak Swedish pretty well... and since we were american she wanted to practice her english with us. SHE COULDN'T DO IT! I have FINALLY found someone that knows how I feel! I KNOW I knew portuguese so well... and here in sweden it just CAN'T me out! So that was a cool bonding moment. ANYways... we talked to them and the mom's situation is that she has talked to the missionaries before in Chile. Her mom is LDS and her brother had served a mission recently. She never joined the church because she had some problems in joining the church. But her 12 year old daughter had gone to church in Chile with her grandma and that is why she came last week... because SHE LIKES TO BE IN JESUS' HOUSE! i LOVED it. The mom said she had no problem letting her daughter go to the church because she KNOWS it's a good place to be. As we were saying our goodbyes... we were leaving and the little girl uttered, "thanks so much for coming! I will be coming next sonday too!" The awesome thing was that she didn't only come... but she brought her friend Camilla to church and had an amazing time in Primary! We should be meeting the mom and her (chaviera) sometime this week to see if we have permission to BAPTIZE her!

Joakin & Sebastian - Tuesday we talked to them about obedience and receiving a witness after the trial of their Faith.. and so we challenged them to Baptism... No luck... but they are still willing to read, pray and come to church. They just feel like it is taking a big step and they feel like they need to feel something from praying before they commit to baptism. The next visit we talked about Fasting, following the prophet and the Word of Wisdom... they said it made sense... but that they drink black tea... It's ALL about this answer they get. They are doing great.. they read and pray sincere prayers during the lessons... SLOWLY but SURELY!

Princess - we are unpleased to say that she hasn't been answering texts, calls go straight to answering machine... and have tried going to her house.. no Answer. Not the Lord's time I guess.

We were able to go to the campus and look up a few religious teachers and ask them some questions if there was any religious groups available to talk to. They said that there was.. but that the year is ending and everyone is studying for tests... and then moving away... wrong timing of the year... but a good thing to do... get as many people to teach as you can!

We were able to teach Marvin a little lesson and then taught his younger brother Benjamin who is 16 years old! We taught him the whole first lesson and said he didn't have any questions and that him and Marvin talk a lot about it together.. Teens are tough! But we had a chance to watch a CES fireside yesterday at the church and he came with and he enjoyed the talk elder Rasband gave. Surrounding yourself with good friends to influence you to make correct choices. Amazing.

Pan our other recent convert has been a little slack in coming to church so we decided to show our support by going to a Sushi night where she made sushi and she was really thankful.

District Meeting was combined with another district because of visa renewals... come to find out it was a holiday.. so the immigrations office was closed. District Meeting was amazing where we talked about MIRACLES coming by Faith. Elder Takahashi showed us an equation which was AMAZING!

MIRACLES=FAITH^p

Faith^p= (Hard WorkxObediencexprayer)^p

What does ^p mean? PASSION... our DESIRES... make sure our desires are in hard work... obedience... and prayer... and if they arent... try your hardest and pray so that these things can become your desires. And When this happens... so do the MIRACLES! awesome!

After that we knocked on a potential investigators door and he answered and let us in... it also just so happens that another Potential Investigator was in the same house. So we taught them both the message of the restoration! The only difficult thing about it was that ne was Muslim and the other was Christian... hmmm... it went really well and we commited them to come to church and one of them.. Efrem from Ethiopia did! He stayed the first two hours and enjoyed my chopped up translating skills!

Somayeh - after we had told her that we can't keep teaching her if she doesn't take steps we stopped calling her. But without fail she calls us up and asks to meet and we ask her if she read and prayed and she says YES.. then we ask her how it felt and she says.. good. And then we ask how her reading went and she said it was nothing new.. Haha We asked her if she wants to get baptised and she says yes but she can't do a date because she doesn't really know if she will be in Sweden and is too busy with tests right now. Confusing I know... but slowly but surely.

Other than that the week has been amazing. Marvin and his brother went to a musical in Malmö about how the church started in Sweden and they said they liked it! Marvin blessed the sacrament and he was way nervous but I told him I would do the bread first and then he could do the water... he did it perfectly the first time through and it really has been such a blessing to see how far someone can come because of the small and simple things that they do... but really make a difference... Read.. pray... come to church...

We were blessed to have 5 investigators in church today! 1 woman and her child from germany... the 12 year old girl and her friend.... Efrem... and Sandra (the Sambo problem woman)'s daughter who came to church. We were really blessed this sunday.

So it really is amazing how fast this transfer has gone... 2 general authority visits.. general conference.. mothers day call... AMAZING things!

But now has come the time that next week is transfer week so I will surely let you know if I stay or if I go! I will be mailing you guys on Wednesday instead but I am looking forward to transfers who knows if I will get to see more than the South of Sweden?! Haigh! But any news on the house in Mantua yet? you guys could email me a picture of the iPad & the whoosie... maybe even the house in Mantua... why not?! Well I love you all and thanks for your love and prayers! The church couldn't BE any more true! Everyone in the fam has a whoole week AND A HALF to write me so get er done!

Peace,

Äldste Wad

P.s. I think this letter is long... ma bad