March 11, 2013

Dude.

Sorry that's not a very good way to start a letter to my mother but I feel like it is appropriate for how pumped I am right now. Like just way pumped. Best week ever. Officially. Unfortunately for both of us we have almost no time to email, cause we just barely got to the church here, after flying down an hill covered with the slipperiest ice i've ever seen. I'm sittering here with my superest awesome companion eldste Burt, eating marshmallows, and listening to Zelda music :D Ok wooa. I have way too much energy. Way too much has happendd.

I unfortunately didn't even get to write in my journal about the entire last week until today. thats how busy we've been. 

dude dang it I have way too much I could say! I love sushi! Elly doesn't though. That's ok cause he's up in Narvik with my favorite man ever :) I'm excited to see how he's doing. Tuesday, we went and saw Laila one last time. Shes the cake lady :) sorry eller kake means, or cake. I was just trying to get you to look up some norwegian cake. Look up BløtKake if you can. it means moist cake. sorry I'lll try and get better at translatilng the wierd things I say sometims. :)  guess what everyone!!! I can now email anyone I want. (outside of mission boundaries) So just let me know how things are going! And I may or may have time to send things back. If you prefer handwritten I can do that too... just let me know! :) 

I was way sad to see my greenie go. I don't think I realized just how much fun it was to train him until he was gone. It was pretty much one of the coolest experiences ever. He is a way cool kid and he'll end up being a way good missionary. Wednesday was the weirderst best hardest day of my whole ever. I hugged my greenie goodbye that morning, only to see Kim running up to me. Finally the Zl's got there so I went inside with him and talked with him for like.... 5 hours. Then we went and got food. I'm not sure if you know this but I could talk about a convo. with Kim for all day. Especially one that long. My last feelings were just it was so cool how he talked about how much he loved getting to know me. all his friends hate me, because I steal all of his free tiem. :) He is one of the those people whether he eventualy gets baptized or not he will be one of my best friends for life. We jsut talked about everyting and to be honest thats just how I worked with him, and how he worked with me. It was sooo cool. With no companion I just got to spend time with the coolest guy ever. And just talk. I absolutely lvoed it. I love him. Best last day ever. Then Andre came all the way from Drøbak just to take me back to his house to have one last time with his family. Again. Best thing ever. 

It was soo cool to be with their family and jsut talk to them about everything that had happend. the Growth that I saw in myself and them samtidig was just incredible. Sooo cool. Kristoffer Anderson made fun of my girlfriend. I may be a missionary but whooo. It's going down man. :) its alright. You should invite Kristy over when Andre comes. Then she could meet him! so cool! He wants to meet her :)  Saying goodbye to him was literally the worst thing ever. Short of leaving all of you. It was way cool. He was sooo nice to me. Best experience ever. 

When I got on the train the next day and it was leading out of oslo it was super weird as I saw all the places I had been and remembered all the things that I had done. When I got off Elder Burt gave me a big hug and we were instantly jelled. Like. it was weird. He reminds me a lot of Kaleb actually if that makes any sensse. He's jsut a way cool guy. He had a hard time with his last companion so when we came together it was just instatnly awesome. He says he can't put into words just how right this little comp. is but he knows that it is. His greenie prolly wont get here for another few weeks so i'll have a chance to get to know moss pretty well. To answer you question about whether or not they feed me the answer is there is no better place in Norway to be fed. Moss is a town of about 30000 but about 200 of those are members. The ward is huge, and all of them are super young families. I felt like I was back in a Utah wrad ysteersday. It was weird. There are way too many of them. I am super way weirded out by how small this place is, but destpite that we have jsut had a balst and have foudn some way cool people. 

On saturday they did a talentaften, or talent show, and it was legit. Super funny. Way cool activity, just super chill :) to give you an idea of just how big food is to these people I think me and Burt got asked at least 30 different times whky we didn't have food in our hands. :)

 it's been way different here. I feel like I almost don't even know how to do missionary work here, and there are way too many people in the ward for me to keep track of. But we have experienced tons of miracles, and had the most fun ever along the way. There really hasn't been a still moment for us. There is always someone to move, help lay concrete, or stop randomly on the street. we've preayed a lot and felt like there would be someone at the talent show to find, and sure enough, there was a norwegian lady who said she felt the spirit way strong in the activity and said she would love to hear about the gospel. She also said she never would have let us in. :) Woa. Miracle. Referrals.... dude. :)

There is a man who has been coming to church for 3 weeks but only speask persian. Miracle = happened. Less active gone for a year randomly shows yesterday speaking persian. Woa. appt. on saturday. We can do this! 

K I gott gooooo sorry!!!! I lvoe you all! I can't say enough. The lord is helping me way more than I can even realize. Me and my companion are on fire right now. Literally. We are loving life, and each other. And we are witnesses to how much he loves us. I'll tell you more about being a DL later. it's crazy man. but fun :) 

I hope that you all have just as much fun as I'm having! I wish I could write more!

Loves!!!

Christopher!

PS DUUDDE MOM! I GOT GLASSES I CAN SEE! THEY ONLY COSTED LIKE 15 BUCKS TOOOO. WOAAAAA.!!! PICS LATER!

PPS DOOOOOOOODE I LOVE NORSK SUITES!!!! I GOT ONE FOR 500 KROWNS!!! THATS LIKE 80 BUCKS!!!!!! FOR THE BEST LOOKING SUTIE EVER ITS SOOO BOSSS!!!!!! PICS LATER AND WOS..

March 4, 2013

Hi, everybody!  This is a really great letter.  I just thought I would clarify who a couple of the people are, because when I talked to Dave about it he didn't have them all straight.  Kim is the investigator that Christopher has been teaching since last fall, and he is the atheist/psychiatrist who is in his forties.  Andre is Matthew's age, and his father is not a member. 

Hope you enjoy it.

Love, Rosana/Mom

Mom,

Unfortunately, I have noooo time. I will throw down everything I can in 20 minutes and then I've got to go.

Basically this week was incredible. As to the jist of wats happeneing this week, there are visa problems, so I'm actually going to serve in Moss for a couple weeks before I go to Sarpsborg. I'll talk more about Sarpsborg later but it's a tiny little town right by Fredrikstad that I will be opening up for the first time. They already have bought the apt. and everything but my district is just missing it's two greenies so i'll be in Moss for a few weeks. As for postage, just send everything there for now. When I move suddenly I'll let you know and I'll just get the mail from Moss at District meetings.  And yes, I am now the District Leader of what he calls the østfold. Basically everything to the sout east of oslo will be in my district. I will have 2 new greenies, and it should be way fun. We'll be the youngest district in the mission, with the youngest District Leader :P  My thoughts on that are basically... yeah well... ok. If that's what you want me to do. It would have been nice to have a little break, but hey that has never and will never be my lot in life. :D

This week was incredible. Basically the pinnacle of my mission, and the coolest miracles ever happened. But I can't tell them all. We got in with a less active member which was super uber cool. We are now teaching his girlfriend, and that was way fun. Wednesday we went on splits, and I loved Elder Peterson. He was absolutely what I needed right at that point in time. He has no idea but he really helped me a lot. I had felt like I wasn't good enough for a little bit, and as we worked hard together, we also had some time to just chat. it was cool. No time. 

Thursday was really hard. We had 3 people cancel on us but finally the last one who was an old man i've been teaching since october finally said he'd come to church. And that he had developed a faith in christ from meeting with us. Seemingly out of nowhere things were going really well with him. He said he had thought a lot about our visit which had been like a month ago and he had really deepened his his knowledge of the Book of Mormon and had a desire to read it. The spirit had softened his heart. It was incredible to see how the spirit had taken him from someone who refused to pray, refused to come to church, and refused churches in general. We almost dropped him, but almost out of nowhere he just started to get it. It was me an member that went to teach him and it was really fun. I decided what I was going to teach... during the opening prayer. :) And it went awesome. We worked really well together and it was boss. That's all I have to say about it. And very rewarding. He came to church and it was absolutely awesome. He changed. I wish I had more time to talk about this one, but watching the whole process, makes it all the more real for me. I know that it's real. 

Friday was way cool. I talked with an inactive for about an hour on friday night. I just broke down and said alright dude. lets get real here. why'd you leave? When we got to the end of that conversation, I wanted some silver bullet, something I could say that would convince him, but in the end all he said was God is not important to me. Having the most friends is. And I don't have that in the church. it was a reallly cool conversation and I know that he walked away from it differently than he started, but it was cool. I almost stole the assistants investigator on accident too. :D 

On sunday, I was soooo sad to leave. I couldn't stand to say goodbye to some of those people. but. Hey. Keep going :) Kim left town so he couldn't come to church but as he knew I was leaving he came back early so we could take him to dinner with us to Andre's family. It was sooo. Awesome. After church we took andre and had a companionship study with him where we planned probably the most important teach I've ever had on my mission. As we studied together, I could feel that the Lord was putting that lesson together. There were scriptures which I normally don't use, and things we talked about which I had never done before. All of us were super stoked and before we left we said a kneeling prayer and then ran out of the center guns blazing, and epic Motab music playing in the background. (of our minds) ...(ok maybe just me=) 

We met kim, he ran around, and we took a taxi. 

The Rosenkilde family was the best. It's was super awesome and super fantastic. Samtidig. I remember going downstairs to get my scriptures, and just thinking.... This is my mission. This is what I've been waiting for for 19 years. In the words of Book of Mormon Prophets, The great importance of the salvation of souls weighed upon my mind. It was awesome. The lesson was not eloquent. At all. Nor did I ask good questions, explain things perfectly, or keep it short enough. But there was such an incredibly awesome spirit there you could have touched it in the air. I felt the prayers of many poured into that moment. The last hurrah with Kim. The last shot for me in Oslo. The farewell. It was the coolest experience you could ever have. You are teaching him and Andre's dad is also there. You can feel the power of God manifest in the spirit that was there. He said to me, you're weird man. I've talked to Andre about this. It's like you glow or something.... with weirdness. :) I don't remember exactly how I did it but we committed him to be baptized, and read and pray every day, and he said yes. April 20. duoood. Dang. I'm leaving... :( But I gave it everything i've got. I hope it was enough. I'll just throw in my 2 mites man :) The Sisters can keep cruising in their ship with tons of dates. I got Kim. There was so much more. He looked over at me on the bus home and said: you realize what you just asked me to do? Yes kim. Yes I do.

We destroyed it. It was sooo much awesomeness. I can't even describe it. Pray for Kim. He has to get an answer. He blames his whole life on me up to the point I found him. I know he will.

Many new andventures ahead! so excited! Love you all! Missions Are the BEST! DUDE! 

Loves!

Christopher

FjordVeien 18 

1532 Moss

Norge :) 

Ps. ooh mom! learn to make something norwegian! Cake! Eller Kake. 

February 28, 2013

Hey Mom,

I'm offended :) Let me show you my reasoning for being in the 'sixties'... I was companions with Elder Anderson for 18 weeks, slightly over 4 months. I was in the MTC, for 9, and I've been with Elder Ellsworth for 6... I've had a weekly planner with 9 weeks in it to count. So do the math with me. 18 + 9 + 6 = 33. Did you follow me? good. now here I did make a mistake. I subtracted from 100 and not 104, but thats ok because my release date is actually two weeks early. that would make 69 all told :) I hit my 1\3 mark in just a couple of weeks, sooooooooooo stop counting for me :) I don't want to think about it :) It was only an estimation anyway!!!!

In other news, I.... am leaving Oslo. I can't really express or describe exactly how I feel about this. I'm excited. President told me that I'm opening a brand new area with a super gamel... old missionary (that I might be killing) so that will be way different and way fun. THat means small town time. But I feel super jipped that I only get to train for 6 weeks. It seems way too short of a time. Right now our area is having more success than I've ever seen before on my mission, and I feel like I really have a good grasp on everything here. I can't really share every single experience that I've had over the last week in the kind of detail I would like so you are just going to have to settle for the few things I have time to tell you :) 

I'll start with Thursday. Thursday was a day. That's about all I have to say about it. :) President told us that I'm leaving and I didn't really like that. Then on the streets not a single person was even nice to us, so I was nearly done. I then got a text from Rakel (the woman who had read the BoM who me and Elder Anderson had found... one of my coolest spiritual experiences) saying that she didn't really think any of this was for her. I've tried to ask her why but I've completely lost contact. So I was having a hard time. But we prayed more than ever before, and we prayed specifically that we could see miracles that day. To that point, things really hadn't gone our way. I was in a 'oslo can burn' sort of mood, but we kept going. And what happened that night was one of the best things ever. Sadi the man that we have been teaching for about a month, had us over and we started talking about baptism. I mentioned it and the second I did he leaned forward on his chair just a little, and asked: What is that? So we told him. He grew up muslim but since had lost his faith in God entirely. So we explained very simply Christ and His Atonement and finally commited him to baptism. E. Ellsworth did a great job with the commitment, and to what I still can't understand, he said yes. I talked to him a little bit more, and talked to him about what he was commiting to but he said he understood and really wanted that. This had been a man who the week before had tried to drop us. Who we thought was lost altogether. And now this. Me and Elly didn't know what to do. We walked back to the train in half shock, amazement, excitement, and extreme fear. Went home, I beat him at a couple more games of chess after we broke out the bottle of Julebrus we had been saving just for this occasion, and I just remember looking across him going: oh man.... I did not expect that at all. What next man? Worst day ever, turned miracle. 

The next day we met with another really positive investigator who we've been trying to meet with for a couple weeks, and we met in the middle of the Oslo Train station, and had a really good discussion. He said he would read, pray, everything. He also had grown up in a muslim culture but didn't believe in it. He said Christ was the way, he just didn't know how to get to that... Ok. Greit. Cool We can help you with that :) Sweet you'll come to church... Awesome. That night we went to Laila's and had a way fun time. (She's the nice little old norwegian lady we visit and she gives us cake :D mmmmm cake ) Great day. New cool investigators. People saying they were coming to church... It was looking to be the best week by far we'd ever had. Look out sisters. We're comin for ya :) 

Back down again. Saturday I felt super sick. Not feeling well. We weekly planned but it took ffooooorrever. All our appts. cancelled. We practiced calling Sadi because we had to get him to church. When Ellsworth called Sadi answered... and said he's done. Doesn't want to understand. Says he felt way good when we were there, but that he just didn't want to change. Really liked us, and had felt something, but said he just had no desire. I really tried to talk to him with all the energy of my soul, and he just said no. I committed him to pray but we haven't been able to get in contact with him since. At that point we had one person who was coming to church. All the others cancelled on us. Defeated, Elly tried to make koolaid. Unfortunatly he's never done this before. So he takes two small packets and pours them into one glass. when he tastes it he spits in all over the place. I then inform him that for the amount of powder you just did you need 2 cups of sugar and 4 quarts of water... he had one small glass. It was disgusting. We didn't even have any sugar. Throwing in the towel man. :) In all honesty it was really hard but not quite as hard as it was with Anderson. Me and elly still had quite a bit of good going for us. But it still sucked. :) 

That night we had the worst planning session ever :) We made some stupid joke about making a key indicator for hours spent recieving dream hours and I was just laughing and crying samtidig. Then out of nowhere our phone buzzes. I pick it up and it's Kim. We had invited him to dinner with us with the Rosenkilde's but he hadn't answered, and he said he had been super busy before. but he answered for teh first time in about 2 weeks and said sure! he said yes! unfortunatly we had to reschedule it so it would work for him, but the cool part is we invited him to church and he said yes.... he said yes! no way! Begin Dance Sequence...

Next day, we have several appt.s and two people coming to church, but we get texts from both that they are either very late or can't come... come on. Throw us a bone here man. Can something pleast just be normal? Anyways. Kim came. and we talked with him for forever after church. We rode home together, and Andre had helped us the whole time. After Kim left at about 5 we invited him to come eat with us, so we went back to the center and made food together. It was the funnest thing ever. I love that kid. All of our other investigators that day k'babed or dropped us... We got dropped by a lot this week....

When I think about Oslo, I will remember the growth, my companions, and the people. So much has happened. I love it all sooooo much! It hasn't hit me at all that I will be leaving soon. Oh well. THat's still a ways away! I have way good time again! Just the thought of having to leave makes me sad though. That's just a few stories from this week. There are so many more, and a lot that don't even get in my journal. but that's ok :) I feel good about everything. ANd this week is going to be awesome. We have a dinner with Kim and the Rosenkilde's planned with other way cool stuff. I'm pumped! Let me at em! I'll prolly talk more next week about leaving pains... maybe not :) 

I love you guys sooooo much! Enjoy all the fun new toys you guys are getting! I'm going to go get some supa' slik norsk bukser. (slacks) I'm pumped. Also the weather here is suuper nice. it's like 1 degree! yeay! and I can see the sky for the first time in months! yeay! I've been too long already. sooo good luck! That's my life sort of!

Love you all soooo much!

Christopher :D

ps. Sorry ... ahem.... ahhhh ahem. ya... I'm leaving oslo. so not doin briller here. Mayber later. (glasses)

February 18, 2013

Hey Momsicle!

We're going to go with no organization today ok!?! I'm bored of orgainizing things... so i'm just going to go completely at random.

First of all, Lykke til with the moth war. One day I will return with reinforcements. I always did find a sort of pleasure out of destroying all of them. 

Second of all, this week was really. Hard. Monday was fun though. I took my companion out knocking for the first time, and it was way supppper cool. We decided on an area to go and you can get there either by tram or by subway. Subway is faster but for some reason I just randomly decided to take the tram. This was beyond what I just chose because when I got on a couple stops later this 20 year old girl got on and sat on the seats just across from where i was standing. Immedieately she started staring at me, so embarrassed I looked away of course. But she kept staring at me. So finally I just walked over to her and started a conversation. For as weird as it was, it was actually way smooth, and it ended with her giving me her number as she was running off the tram. Soooo that was way cool. She is studying to be a priest for the Norsk State Church. So that was fun. I also continue to be fascinated with atheists. There was this man that we stopped from England, and when we mentioned religion he told us we should probably move on because he was militant atheist. Sadly I did. But the whole night I was pretty fired up... I wish I had talked to that man :) Anywasy. THen when we went knocking the first house that we knocked on let us in. let us in. It was cool. Lucky bug gets in on his first time :) There little boy Phillipå was hillarious. Also I can't back this up by we may have seen a little bit of the northern lights that night. Or we were just crazy. I'm almost blind now so I can't trust my own eyes. (seriously , .... I'm almost blind. I can tell I'm getting worse and worse.) Question: if you have bad eyesight and you don't wear glasses do you eyes get worse faster because you are straining them to see everything? I'm pretty sure you guys know that one :) 

Moving onward, the middle of my week was really hard. Don't really have a good explanation for why, I would just wake up and feel terrible. But we kept fighting. And even though more than half of the things that we had planned this week cancelled on us, we still met with a lot of people and had a lot of success :) And some funny things happen. We taught this one guy named Paul, who is pretty much a big cheeze in norway. He is a professor of philosopy, the producer at the opera house, a strategic guy for Norway. Cool right? Well anywaze, he basically started out by saying, I've read about 50 books about atheism, so I won't just smash those all over your head, i'll jsut try and listen. DId it go well... yeah :) But we were supposed to be getting off to an open house that was about an hour south of Oslo, so we tried to get out but my companion really had to use the bathroom. So finally after I talked with this guy in the hall for like 10 minutes we booked it out as fast as we could. AFter running as fast as we could and catching subway's ands stuffs, we finally learned that we missed the bus. So with basically nothing else to do we just wandered around the docks in Oslo trying to find someone. :) If only he hadn't needed the bathroom... Maybe that was just funny to me. Then later when we were walking around this one kid just stops us out of nowhere and asks me if I can hold his antenna down for him. Sure why not? So he leads us into this parking garage, and gets in the oldest dinkiest little car i've ever seen in my life. And as he drives out i'm wakling beside his car holding this ridiculously long antenna down. It was pretty comical. :) And then a man asked my companion if he would marry him to his boyfriend. Unfortunately he had no idea what this man had said. Looking back though we've had some good laughs about it. :)

We had someone who tried to drop us this week as well, who we went and convinced him not only to keep meeting with us but to read out of the Book of Mormon 10 minutes every day. :) It was cool. He is a way nice guy! We finally had people that said they were coming to church, and we actually had this way cool guy named Ken come. So that was really good, and I had an incredible experience with the sacrament. Beyond helping Hakim the new member here to Bless the sacrament for the first time, I am always amazed by how powerful the sacrament can be. For just those few minutes, you don't need to worry about being a missionary, or anything else, other than focusing on the savior and what He has done for you. it was really cool. All of my studies this week have been fantastic as well. As I continue to study the general conference talks and the scriptures, I conttinue to be amazed by just how personal my studies can be. If I am trying to learn something, everything that I study will connect together, and teach me something new, each and every day. That happened almost every day this week where I would just get exactly what I needed. I particularly love Elder Eyerings talk about The pavilions that cover us. When you are willing to pray in humility, that is when you can align your will with the Lord's. There is nothing left that hides you, if every day, you kneel down and you pray with all the humility you can muster. The most part of what I have learned on my mission and I continue to learn is this: I can't do it alone. So stop trying man. Maybe one day I'll actually be able to stop :) 

Random thoughts: I'm glad you're making a list for me mom. I'm going to need that :) Also, It's weird to think how things are going at home. I'm glad Grandma is doing better! I read the package that dad sent me :) We're going sledding today so I need to get off soon, but i loved it dad! I'll prolly say more later! I don't really have a whole lot of money for postage right now though... I'm kinda poor :P Also, random thought of the day.... There are only 60 somethin' links in that chain in the picture you guys sent me :) I love you all so much! I hope you guys swell with joy and don't fry your brains on that TV. 

ALL THEEE loves! 

Christopher 

February 11, 2013

Hey Mom! Happy Mother's Day!!!!!!!

Ha en kjempe lykkelig Morsdag!!!! Happy Norweigian mothers day! And Valentine's day! It was cute to see all the little Norwegian kids to sing the songs that are all so familiar in Norwegian yesterday. Even though I don't get to call you yet I still thought of you :) Soon... ok not really. :) But hey I feel special!

Let's answer some questions then!

- When is Andre coming?  And how do we get ahold of him?  We would love to have him over!

André will be coming about a week before school starts in August and staying until the next July.... So I'll probably just miss him :( Oh well ... can't win them all. To get a hold of him he'll have to get a new phone number, but once it gets a little closer matthew could look him up on facebook or something. I guarantee Matthew could find him at school too :) 

  - Why does the president go on appointments with you?  Does he do it with all the missionaries?  That would totally freak me out.

You know I think he just wants a first hand look of how we actually do everything... It was just really weird to have him there... I dunno. It's more that it was my first teach ever where I went from being led and talking maybe 30% of the time to going to like 75% and leading. Now it would be fine. No problem. It just had to be on our first one. :P And with a guy who it made kinda uncomfortable too... anyways. it's ok. But it was way scary. And he at least has done it with a couple others in Oslo. He's also studied with me before, and gone contacting. 

  

   - Tell me three ways that you and your companion are alike, and three ways that you are different.

Alike: We are both super goofy. We both love zelda. We are both tall and skinny.... This is actually kinda a hard question...

Dislike: I eat a lot differently. I'm a lot more sarcastic. I went to college. I a little bit more bestemt on what I want to do. 

     - Tell me something funny that happened to you this week.

This week...... I was sssoooooooooooooper worked up over Atheists. I want them all! You! Come talk to me! NOW! It was funny. Because I would talk to one and just be way super opptatt about it for forever. I couldn't stop thinking about it. IT was soooo annoying. Just to talk to people on the street and literally all that they can say is A:They are too lazy to try to find God, or B: Just are too lazy to change. Norway is the Non-religious capital of the world. So... I may not be able to destroy the baptists from the bible belt. But by the end of two years of this.... I'll have heard it all :) I will know how to beat an atheist. Especially those who think that they are very 'learned' ... I think those are my favorite. The one's who just use athiesim as an excuse not to believe in God are just annoying. those who have a: I can do whatever I want because I don't believe that anything will happen to me, sort of attitude. Yes you have lots of money now. And a cute samboer who makes you feel lonely sometimes... you have it all :) The throwup on the streets every saturday morning... real nice :) I'll see you on the other side buddy.... then we'll chat. Ha det godt da. I guess it's reallly not all that funny... it mostly just perplexes me. And makes me a little sad. When people honestly can't give you a reason why... They... just say no.  :) I would say the funniest thing from this week is how many times my companion would say something and all I have to do is smile at him for him to ask what was wrong... He usually figures out what he said was wrong. :)

In terms of all the numbers that we got last week, a lot of them ended up never answering their phones, or just setting an appointment, kbabing us, and then saying no. And they went nowhere. Dang it people! Oh well. Things are moving forward. I'm determined to make things happen here, even if it's after I leave. 

     - Tell me something spiritual that happened to you this week.

That's a really good question. On wednesday, I really really wanted to give a good spiritual thought to Andre's family. I was on splits with my DL and we spent all day trying to figure out what to do... Finally right before we left I had it. I was in charge and I just didn't feel right about anything else... So finally I had a topic... but no plan :) So when we got there I gave the thought and it was probably the most fantastic unplanned lesson I've ever given in my life. It was awesome... and then in front of us Palmyra asked her husband to take the lessons from us.... he just stared at her. It was super intense. he said no after we left, but he's not completely closed. We'll see how that goes. It was just a cool testimony of diligence to me. The right one literally didn't come until the last moment. 

     - Dang.  I thought I had more questions than that.  Make up your own question and then answer it.  :)

Coolest Worst thing ever?

There was a dude who we stopped on the street a couple weeks ago. He was super cool and said he had seen missionaries at his house and wanted to talk with us... Last monday he sent a text asking if you could become a mormon.... I said of course almost thinking he was joking and when I tried to set up an appt. he said sure the next time i'm in Oslo. Appartenly he lives in Fredrikstad which is about 2 hours south.... NOOOOO. So I gave the referall and forgot about it. On Saturday after eating a way good dinner with my good friend Bjørn again (he said I could come stay with him if I come back to Norway!!! Actually... he was serious about that... it was pretty cool) so after dinner. I had a text from Fstad to call them.. . So I did and they said that they had just met with Niål and that he told them he had gone onto mormon.org like I had told him to... loved all our values and wanted to become a member. He said: How long would it take? They said you have to come to church 3 times... He said cool! Lets start next week! .... Elder Weaver (cool guy from my group... like 'the' cool guy) and Elder Morris(trained by andy too) were basically yelling praises over the phone. It felt so cool to be able to be a part of that so far. But come on!!!! I'm trying so hard here, and I can't seem to get anything like that... :) oh well. It was cool. 

other thing. Last Monday we'd tried to visit that lady who had read the MB. And after me and Andy's failed attempts and it seemed like she avoided us... SHe was there... And intersted. So we taught her. :) It was soo cool because I had 0 problem understanding her this time. I don't really have a huge problem with anyone :) And shee's still supper cool. Unfortunately she wanted to read the Bom in Norsk this time so she wanted a couple weeks to read before we could teach her. SHe is just a member of the State churhch and she's also a psycologist.(really man what is up with me and pyscologists?!?) But i'm way excited. 

K. THat's a lot of random things but thats about the gist of my week. I'm gonna do some pics now. We had cool teaches, and cool things. But it's still just waking up everyday and keepin on going. Thank you so much for the love! Have a great week! 

Love 

Christopher

February 4, 2013

Wowza! (I don't know why!) Just because

Mumnum,

You really shouldn't have given me that ammo :) I like that one. It's catchy. 

Anyways, what the heck is Ethan doing already having attention problems... I mean, I knew he was cool and all, but wow. He's just going to be like this little angel child that just runs around with everyone. Also in terms of the weather here, it's still just chillin a little below 0 all the time but the bonus is that we've gone from just seeing some daylight to having the sun completely horizantal to you at midday. :) I've never experienced quite the same blinding power as walking into the sun here has had. For some reason too it always seems like we have to walking into the sun.... Oh well. :) I talked to my old friend Elder Badger who is up in Tromsø right now and he says he barely sees the sun for an hour at a time... sad day. Oh well. in a month They'll have more light that we ever had back home :) It changes fast. 

In terms of superbowl.... wow. It sounds like your talking about spaceships from another universe for all I know :) I'm now to the point where Elder Linge called, the point of no return... Where you think about home, and it doesn't even exsist anymore. For all I know I've been doing this whole mission thing for as long as I can remember. But it's way fun though. It has been a lot of fun to get to know Elder Ellsworth so far. The problem is that we're both kinda goofballs... so we'll see if we can actually accomplish anything, but our balance is really kinda funny. In somethings I'm a little bit more uptight, and in others I don't stress at all. Like, I used to stress hardcore when we'd go visit people... but now now that I'm in charge of understanding everything and leading the whole visit, i'm just like yeah sure cool whateves. I should probably be a little bit more upitght but I'm really not. We had some really good first teaches with some new investigators because of that. Kim continues to be an adventure. I told Kristy in my letter, to just think about being a 19 year old punk kid and trying to tell some 40 year old Norwegian psycologist how they should live their life, or that God exists. Anyways. Every single person we're teaching right now has 0 belief in God which is an incredibly interesting challenge in and of itself. It's definately not something I could do alone. :) If there is one thing I'll be able to do after my mission, I may not be able to destroy baptists from the bible belt, but I'll at least have a lot of experience talking to atheists. The good thing about atheism, is that it's a pretty lazy argument. :) It's pretty hard to argue against trying. :D Which is all I can ask. 

In terms of stories of Bravery and Faith, I would say my first teach as senior with Kim, with a new companion, and with the president there, was pretty scary. But it got better. Our dinner appointment went really good, and I told matthew this but the 17 year old name André in that family is going to Lone Peak!!! Oh BABy!!!! YOU GUYS SHOULD INVITE HIM OVER FOR DINNER ONE NIGHT AND ASK HIM ABOUT NORWAY!!!! I've spent the last 3 months getting to know him and he is literally the coolest kid you will ever meet.... liek ever. He travels out to help Kim with us and we have had some way cool experiences together. Like. I would say that's been the coolest teaching experience so far on my mission is to have him with us and to see him change and our investigator. We are still trying to help his dad, and its way cool to get to know all of his little siblings. It's cool to just see my own confidence and teaching skills improve as I just .... I dont know. do it :) I also taught the invs. Class on sunday with about 20 minutes notice. So I just had to use memorized scripts and it actually went pretty well. ... there were only like 30 people there :) (me being the youngest other than Andre :) No pressure right?

We watched HOw to Train your Dragon In NOrwegian this morning and it was soooo legit :) I want it soooo bad. :) And Norwegian pants. Literally. They own. Sorry that was a little sidetracked :) I should be more serious and stuff....

But really. We saw miracles this week. In one day we found 9 people who wanted to meet again and gave us their number.... 9! That's like half of what i've gotten on my whole mission... do you realize that!? ok prolly not. But I do. I'm just trying to do everything I can to make something happen here. The ward is so much better and I love the people here, we just need to see something come of all of this. :) It's hard but I will always keep going. When I truly think about how cool it is to just go out on the streets and talk to people about the best message the world has ever known, I feel very honored. There is no greater call :)  It's super fun to train Elder Ellsworth. He's almost too much like me... in some ways. Not in others :) But it's fun and it'll be way cool to see both of our progressions here and throughout our whole missions. We have so much left to do! 

Anyways, I'll stop boring you with all my not so brave or faithful stories :) I love all of you so much! Thank you so much for all the love! Keep on being awesome! I should leave some sort of spiritual thought or something.... hm. I can think of lots. I've had the opportunity to bless the sacrament in Norwegian the last couple sundays... I don't know why I chose that as my one, but I know that the Authority that we have to do it really does bring the spirit of Christ. There is no better time of the week in my mind :)

Anyways.! I love you all!

Christopher

p.s. I called Anderson this week. Wow. I felt like I was talking to like.... a part of my life or something. The things we experienced together I will never forget. I almost cried just talking to him. I never realized just how much he had meant to me. Still don't. I just love him soooo much :) Not enough to creep him out with pillowpet hugs though :) I'll just steal all of those :) 

PPS: Check out the new mormon message man. Dud. stud. TIs bomb.

January 21, 2013

Hey Mom!

hmm... I don't really know where to start with this one. Sometimes I very cleverly arrange my thoughts into something that works but I don't think that's going to work for me this time. And we have A TON to do today. So I can't spend all day emailing either even if I wanted to. So I'll begin by saying there is about a million percent more to say than can be said with anything right now. So sorry :) 

Firstly. I have been called to be a Trainer to the new Elder, Elder Ellsworth from California. I would like to point out at this juncture, that I'm going to die. Also that this is not very normal. I will be training him in Oslo, which means I'm going to be here for a loooonng time. Probably til may. Of the many things that I could say, I will simply say, WHAT I'm training my second companion? What, there are only 2 missionaries coming in, and I'm supposed to train one of them? WHy? I've never even seen or expericienced anything else. LIke. Wow. President told me about this on tuesday of last week. Apparently, he told Elder Earl right after he told me that he had asked that because he was laughing so hard at my reaction. He thought he was going to have to pick me up off the ground because, he thought I was going to die. 

Mom I'm glad that you are not suprised that I'm training because that makes one of us at least. I'm pretty much freaking out. I'm finally getting my second companion, who, I will now be senior over, and be training, and teaching, and languaging... med en gang. Samtidig. All at the same time. It's scary to change companions for the first time, and to go senior, and to train. If it was just one of those things I wouldn't be so worried. But I have just as much work to do on myself as I have to do on him. Do you realize... right now, when we are are in a teach, I look over at my companion and he always knows what to do... I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm terrible at teaching, and somehow I'm supposed to figure out how to help this area, and help the souls find eternal salvation as 2 19 year old kids. One who can mostly speak the language, and one who... well I don't know yet :) 

I had some really good thought to explain my sitiuation and how I feel in a really witty way. Hmm... I can't think of it now. Really though, it was a good one. We're going to go have all you can eat pizza now. I'll try and think of it there, and then finish this email. :) Hey I'm back! 

Picture in your mind a 4 year-olds rendition of the mona lisa when this child uses sidewalk chalk. THen it gets rained on. Then a dog pees on it. That's me! :) 

Jk. But seriously. I'm scared. But. Lest everyone feels as terrible as I am, I am way super duper excited! Dude! I get to train! The coming months in Oslo will be 100% nothing like what I have experienced thus far. Assuming my companion is a cool guy, we are going to hit the streets hard. And we're going to have a blast. Will it be one of the hardest things I ever do? Yes. Will it also be AWESOME and super fun to be with a completely new missionary... yes :) I just went through the whole process of figuring everything out, and learning pretty much life anew, and now I get to help someone else through that same process. 

K well I need more time which I don't have. But. wow. Oh yeah. Ridiculousness. Hmmm :) This week was fun. Wednesday we found this lady who took us into her work and let us teach her, and afterwords we had to get from Carl Barners Plass to Jernbanetorget, in 5 minutes. No this doesn't mean anything to you. But normally when we walk it takes 25 to 30 minutes. We did it in 5 :) I remember just running around on the icy streets like a dork, literally like a full out run. I cought the trikk (tram) barely, but My companion did not. So just as the door was closing I watched him hop the rail and try to get on... just as I kept going. So he kept running. And we made the bus through a miracle. but we made it :) it was fun. We barely missed the train last night though... by like 5 seconds. I'm going to kill myself. I gave myself a haircut and cut a huge bald line on the side of my face. it's skikkelig morsomt. funny. Heh. Dropped toilet paper in the toilet, and almost burned our apt. to the ground. Fun stuff :) 

I have 0 time. .. but. I would like to say a little about how much Grandpa's death has actually affected me. When you think about it, this is the first person I have really fun clear vivid memories with. I was talking to my companion about it on saturday, and at that point I could feel that he had passed away. I wish I could be there with you all. Especially you dad. Just know that I send all the love and thoughts i can home. I honestly didn't know how much it would affect me. But it's a good thing too. I'll be there with you all this week. And I need all of you to be there with me. I'm going to need all the prayers I can get. When I write you next week I will have probably died several times already ... :) And hopefully I'll have more time to write.

I love you all!

Christopher