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Sad missionaries? Contemplative missionaries? Silly missionaries? Yes, that.

September 23, 2013

Hey MOM!!!!!

I'm sooooo happy right now I could explode!!!!!! I literally have nothing to complain about other than the fact my knee hurts because I played dodgeball too hard :) FRee for ALL!!!! Styel :) So thats my story. I have 30 minutes starting now to write you and change. Darn it. You at least will get the idea that i'm happy :) Not stress free, but happy. :)

I'll respondere first :). yes I have a car NOW. I didn't then :) We just borrowed the Broughs (senior couple) car. so pretty. sometimes we drive around with him. All the time we are driving right next to beautiful still water, or through tunnels. No end of fun. I love driving here :) um. yeah. The Broughs got emergency transferred to oslo as of this morning. So for 6 weeks I'm in charge of their car, their apt., their Ysa, their missionaries, and Sisters Broughs beautiful orchid that needs a  good name :) Something elegant. I was crushed. I love them. They cant leave. Especially not now when we actually have some good momentum. in the month or so this district has been in bergen it has been incredible. I've had some of the most powerful spiritual meetings this week. One with the bishop, and with the missionaries, and the broughs, and just knowing how to plow forward. We just get it now. We are going hard in the paint, throwin bows in the lane. :) Its been incredible to feel the whole spirit of the district go up. Soo col. 

so yeah now I have a car for the first time :) Its pretty cool. I can just use it if I want. Yay! 

um. mom. I'll look that up when I have an English hymn book. I can't really look that up here. sorry. :) Id lvoe to. And I'll just make sure that you can norwegian and then you guys will be the only one's whithout a secret hemmelig språk :) heh. anyways. 

yeah. I had a way fun splits with Elder Clarke this week. That was pretty fun. Me and Garrard had like 3 miracles yesterday even though none of our people showed up, through just random things that we were doing we still found people. We havent had any time to contact hardly at all and yet we are still finding tons of way prepared people. This week I had a finding experience like I haven't had since oslo. We prayed and felt led to walk up this street. Amid hundreds of ungdom, we found this one lady who I decided to stop. It started out normal but the she was like: oh yeah, I'm a mormon. ... awkward. This happens especially when you know you don't quite know everyone in the ward. so.... which uh famliy are you a part of? The Johansen famiily she says. But me and my mother havent been to church for a long time. Like ok. cool. now i'm getting a little pumped. you can often find less actives on the street that can be way cool. But then she said. yeah she left like right before I was baptized.... ok. so are you baptized.'

no. 

ok.... uh..... What do you believe in? yeah. i'm christian. But i'm mormon christian... but your not døpt? nope. have you read the book of mormon. Of Course! Thats why i tell people i'm mormon. Cause I really do believe that its true. ok

wait. We tell people why baptism is so important. Well I have time friday at 11.... uh..... okkkk.? (is this a joke?) 

Yup

I met someone who believes they are mormon but isn't baptized, and yup. I just about died. It could not go anywhere, but she was super prepared. That's all I really have to say about that.

There are so many other things. It was a boss week. I have been able to really help the people around me, and I'm seeing it more than ever. Me and Garrard get along great, and I've never had a companionship that i've felt the spirit this constantly. Its like... all the time. United together and with God. the coolest thing for me as a DL is just to be getting straight revelation about how I can help my district even if half of them are sisters. its pretty cool. and super fun. anyways

I love you mom! I need to send some pictures, but you'll get those eventually. my words can only come once. :) 

love,

Christopher

September 16, 2013

Hey momsidile! :)

I live in a suburb of Bergen called Paradis. Norway isn't that big so they don't have really big addresses. :) I mean come on... There are less people in the country than the state of utah. :) Yes I live in Paradise :) And I got some letters from Kristy this week so that address really does work. :) 

My life is good :) I really don't have that much to say really. Hmm. I'll talk about that first. I love being a district leader. I actually feel like I really know what I'm suppossed to be doing here and I really feel like I have the opportunity to do a lot of good things in that respect. There is a lot of things that need to be done with the ward and with 8 missionaries you kind of need someone with enough experience to kindof lead out and take the lead on that. So that's been fun. Its also been fun to really find out how I can actually help them. I feel like I actually influence people a lot more now than I did even when I was a zone leader, just because Bergen is the one big city in Norway that really doesn't get much contact with anywhere else. And I really almost have more to do here than I did in stavanger. But it's been super fun, I I've been super grateful for that I actually have been given some inspiration on where to actually put my efforts. And the same really applies to my companion. :) Elder Garrard is a pretty funny kid for as quiet as he is, but we've really become really good friends, and he's helped me a lot to finally just kinda go for it. This really is the part of my mission where time is flying by so much faster than I thought possible, and all you can do is just try to do everything that you can to be your best. As a returned missionary in the ward wisely stated: 'You know, you two really have quite the dynamic companionship. I think it works really well. He then pointed at me and said: so you must be the disobedient one' :) yup. Ok not really, but when put side by side with a greenie who makes salads out of herbal tea and olive oil, because he just has to make a salad, and it just has to be perfect, I guess I am the one that takes things at a slightly slower pace. Except when we run. I think we run more uphill than I ever have in my life. And we do it pretty fast too :) Thats what you get with 2 rival cross country runners :) (no we don't race, its just that even taking it slow we are pretty fast :)

In other news, we have made some way good progress with some of the YSA in the ward. We taught one of the new converts Bob, who.... I love. I have a straight man crush on the dude. He speaks this funny version of the oslo dialect where he'll say something REALLY fast, and then just pause like norwegians do by keeping a constant tone and then finishing even faster. A lot of the members dont even catch everything that he says. He went hiking wtih us, we made food together, and yesterday I went on splits with him to go visit some inactive YSA. Despite the fact no one answered, and it was pouring rain, we had a great time skipping rocks at the oceans edge whilst we waited for the bus. I loved it and had a blast :) We visited another dood who let us in and we had a way chill talk with him as well. I tuned his guitar for him (i'm picking up all kinds of fun skills on my mission :) and we played some music together. We taught the boyfriend of 4 years of one of the YSA who is an atheist. Not like a religion hater, but someone who truly believes that we are animals on a random planet. It was a super interesting teach, and I loved being a part of it actually. Her testimony was fantastic and he'll probably be just one of those people that take a little bit of time :) 

hmm... What else? I think thats most of it :) We hiked up a mountain last pday that was super cool. At the top we were going through the clouds, and up almost a straight up slope all there was was a big iron rod that wound up the mountain. The cool part was that you could only see about 20 feet in front of you so more than half the group you could only hear and not see :) I caught a frog, and then we ran down the mountain... carefully :) 

Evelyn is now a member, and from what I've heard it was an absolutely incredible experience for them yesterday. :) .... Yay :D Thats all I have to say about that. My heart ached to be there, but I was needed here. Literally actually. I'm the only missionary who can translate, so I ended up translating all three hours yesterday. It was pretty fun. The little primary program was super fun, the only problem was that some of those little girls talked waaaaay to fast and I missed parts here and there. The people on the recieving end said I did a good job though :) 

We had a baptism here on saturday and we had a super cool experience with one of the nonmember friends that came. We went in and helped her make food and just talked to her about things and she almost died i think because she just kept saying over and over how utrolig flink we are at the språk and she was just really impressed. :) But afterwords we talked to her and we are teaching her and her famliy this week after she feeds us homemade pizza! Again, random cooking skills on the mish that come in handy :) Then to top it off, Brother Mørklid, (who I will just have to describe later.... he's just ... fun :) (he's the guy who gives everyone ties if you've heard about him) came walking down one end of the big hall whistling the western dueling song, and after he did the first line I just whistled the second and turned around and we had one of the moments ever just walking down the hall slowly guns ready whilstling at each other :) You would have to have been there :) 

Life is crazy. I have way too much to do. But I love it all. I'm just enjoying the ride right now :) And doing everything I possibly can to help everyone here succeed. I've never felt drive and love like this before in my entire life. I will go and I will do. And when I fail, I'll just get back up again. Because guess what matthew. It comes back :)

Love,

Christopher :)

PS. mom. All I can talk about is skipping rocks :) So painting rocks must be much cooler. My life would sound cool if you could actually come here and see how incredible this place is. Its unbelievable. As we drive around i can't get over it :)  To answer that part of your letter last week. Don't give up on your dream of coming here. :)

September 9, 2013

Heh, Momps. I could do this all day :)

Anyways, Ill just read you letter later today. We are going to hike one of the mountains that surrounds bergen today so that should be pretty fun. And besides I don't really know what to say anyways. 

I'll prolly start by talking about how legit stavanger still is :) jk, but really that place is straight the best. The Haugens my adopted grandparents(senior couple missionaries) came up and I straight flipped out with joy. They were telling me about all the things that have been happening in stavanger and is pretty much legit. Evelyn and sven are getting DØPT!!! This weeek!!! YEsss!!! she made it! Another guy I taught is gettting baptized in two weeks, and Christian this sweet swedish cagefighter super nice quiet guy also said he wants to get baptized. .... REally. I want do die from joy with thta place. 

On a more spiritual note, I had a very interesting thought about all that. In Stavanger by the end, I loved everyone missionary and member and investigator alike, I probably prayed harder for them than anyone else in my entire life. By the end it was almost just a plea of, I don't even care if i'm a part of it, just let them succeed! just  help them. In a way I had made a promise with God which was, Help these people, and I don't even have to be here to see it, or have anything to do with it. Leaving was the hardest thing in the world. It tore me apart. but in a way more real than ever before, God answered my prayer. Or the prayers that I said all the time. I thought that was kinda cool :)

Bergen is a pretty cool place too :) We are teaching some way cool people. A greek kid named Achilleas came to chuch just randomly yesterday which is pretty much like the best thing ever. Super cool :) We taught a guy named paul, who was completely enthralled by the book of mormon musical and just couldnt resist the urge to actually talk to us and get one :) We are starting to get to know the members a lot more which is sweet, and things are just doing better. I also feel more awake and more energized than I have in probably 7 or 8 months. So the iron pills are definatly helping with that :) My companion is super cool to actually. We have developed a way good relationship where we just learn a lot from each other and we are probably more focused than I've ever been before on my whole mission. He's kinda like some of the kids I used to hang out with before who were just super smart and didn't quite knnow what to do with it :) He really enjoys all the times that I just analyze situations and people around us. Apparently I've gotten really good at that. Takk for det eldste Anderson :) 

Really though. I don't have too much exciting to say, other than that a gay guy tried to squish my kbab this week :) Or that we missed our bus because it went into a secret underground tunnel. and then got lost walking around in the rain for about an hour with our completely soaked little map :) fun times. :) 

ANywyas. Have a great week. I might add some responses later to whatever you say but we'll see. I love you sooo much! 

love,

Christopher :)