Rain rain rain rain RAIN. Lots of rain. Also, I am very pale.
In Norway, people know who the missionaries are. And not all of them love us very much. It's so funny to be walking down the street and have someone see us and literally cross to the other side of the street to avoid us. HAHA but the best one this week was this man who was standing by this building doing nothing, so we decided to go up and talk to him. When we got up to him, we said "Hei" and he literally turn around and RAN into the nearest building. IT WAS HILARIOUS haha and then also this week when I was contacting on the bus, I saw a very friendly looking man and asked if I could sit next to him. Without missing a beat, he (literally) yelled "NEI DU KAN IKKE" (no you cannot) and it was so funny I tried so hard not to laugh.
I love Norway. I absolutely LOVE it and would recommend it to everyone. Especially the food. (Aaaand of course the people)
We have two baptisms this weekend!!! I am so excited! Miracles are happening in Trondheim. I'll begin with the two awesome people that are getting baptized this week: The first one is Jan. He's Norwegian and he's 73 and the cutest person in the world. He took missionary lessons when he was 20 years old, but stopped for some reason. Well, he was recently back in Trondheim to have some cancer treatment done, and he came back to the church looking for missionaries! How cool is that!! So we've been teaching him, he's a stud and he's super sassy and speaks reaaaally crazy Norwegian that we can barely understand. So that's Jan. The other guy is Nati. I love Nati. He's in his 20s and he's from Eritrea :) So the sisters before me were the ones that found him, but they had only had one lesson with him and he stopped answering their calls. My second week here, Søster Leland and I had a really strong feeling we should just go visit Nati. So we did :) turns out, he quit smoking ALL BY HIMSELF (without knowing about the Word of Wisdom) just because he wanted to feel closer to God. We were so happy for him and we taught him about the Word of Wisdom and then about baptism and then committed him to be baptized in that lesson. He has been so excited and he's been working so hard. He was originally supposed to be baptized next week... but he was too excited and asked it to be moved to this Saturday. He's so great. He called us this week and said it was like God sent him angels from Heaven. And then he said, "I think you came to Trondheim just for me." :):) It's amazing to watch the gospel change these peoples lives!!
We are really being helped with finding people to teach lately. The Lord has placed so many people in our path I can't even begin to explain it!! For example, yesterday, we had an appointment fall through so we decided to go contacting. We went downtown and stopped a group of 10 (I was so nervous!) and they ended up all being interested!! They are from the Philippines and they are actually going back soon, but we are giving them all Tagolog Books of Mormon tonight and we are so excited!! Another cool thing from this week was this girl named Tuve that we got to teach. It was our first teach with her, so we met her at a bus stop and she had brought a friend with her!! Søster Leland and I were so happy that we could teach two people... but then we went to sit down with them in this student study place and two of their other friends joined us!!! Crazy! That was one of the most spiritual lessons we have taught yet. :) The Lord is too good.
Also, the ultimate struggle is switching back and forth between Norwegian and English. I'm actually really surprised how naturally Norwegian is coming to me. We taught the plan of salvation in English last Saturday and I was genuinely struggling. I'm interested to see what it will be like in 16 months... hahaha :)
Yesterday we got to hear from Elder Jeffrey R. Holland and that was AWESOME. Elder Holland is an incredible speaker. It was a northern European conference, so he was speaking in Scotland and it was broadcasted all over Northern Europe :) it was way cool. He spoke about the Book of Mormon and just bore this hardcore Elder Holland testimony that made me feel so empowered. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and that Joseph Smith was called as God's prophet to translate it!! While he was bearing his testimony, he said something that really got to me. He said, "I KNOW that these things are true because I have seen things that I can't talk about, that I'm not allowed to talk about. I know Christ lives and that this book is true." Elder Holland is the man.
Last little thing: At the conference, this super cute swedish girl gave a talk. She spoke about a time when she had almost lost all hope -- she felt like there was too much darkness around her, and she wanted to just "give up". She was constantly thinking to herself, "I just can't do this." I think we can all relate to that feeling on some level. After a couple of weeks of fervent prayer, scripture study, and temple visits, she said one night, the feeling lifted. The feeling of fear and doubt was replaced with an overwhelming feeling of love and peace. She said she knew that the feeling she experienced came from Christ, and it came because she had renewed her testimony of Him. I've been studying a lot about faith this week. In Preach My Gospel, it says that "doubt and fear are opposed to faith." When I read that, I thought about all the times I have let my faith falter because I have been gripped with fear, or all the times my doubts have overcome me and I've felt hopeless. I know many times I have experienced the fear of "I just can't do this." But one thing that is so important to remember is where the doubt and fear comes from. It does not come from Christ -- it comes from Satan, who will do anything to see us miserable. We need to cast our doubts and fears away and seek Him. Only through Christ will we find the peace that we are looking for.
John 14:27 - "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid."
I LOVE YOU ALL! Have an awesome week! <3
Til vi sees igjen,
Søster Sims
This is the cutest old lady that we visit. We love her!!
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