Never a dull moment for sure!!

This week has been pretty cool :)

America will always own my heart <3

It starts off with a cool contact that we had.  For all the people that like Star Wars, listen up!  So Äldste Stoeltzing and I were contacting in the park and came across two girls who we talked to and they said that they were Atheists and didnt believe that there was a God.   We were then just talking for a bit and we realized that one of the girls was wearing Star Wars shoes and she said she really likes Star Wars.  I thought of a really good quote from Darth Vader from the movie and then I said,  “Your lack of faith disturbs me.."  then she just started busting up laughing and said, "touche!”   We gave them pass along cards (a way to reach the missionaries) and left haha!  I thought I would never get an opportunity like that again.... so obviously I had to take advantage of that.. haha

We went to the Bishops house and he found out that Äldste Stoeltzing and I are musicians, and he took us downstairs into his basement and it was full of instruments!  There was an early edition Grand Steinweg piano straight out of Germany from the mid 1800s, banjo, guitars, a bass, and drums.  Needless to say, I played all of them and we had a good jam session. :)

Another crazy thing!!  Since Äldste Stoeltzing is our District leader, he assigns splits and he had a feeling that I should take the new greenie (A greenie is a new missionary) that just came in on his first splits.  At first I was a little apprehensive because I’m still new and so is my Swedish.... but it was so cool!  We contacted a lot here in Borås, tracted, even gave a blessing, and had a ward dinner and service all in one day!  God blesses his missionaries.  That is really what I needed ~ to be in a situation where I wouldn’t have anyone to fall back on for my Swedish, AND every contact we had turned into a lesson.  My Swedish was feeling strong and I could understand almost everything!  Confidence is the key.

Two greenies on an early morning run

Last cool story is with a non active (a member who does not attend church) in the ward.  He is a young 18 year old that was baptized last year who is super cool and still hangs with me and my comp every week.  He just has been distracted by some things.  Very talented guy.  So this last week we went to a fast food place called Maxs´ Burgers and we were eating together later that night.  He then ask us for a spiritual message (which is really unusual)…. We really started to dig deep into him and he opened right up!  He was telling us about some of his challenges and was really struggling. The spirit in this fast food place was so strong and he began to cry and get chills.  He was telling us how he KNOWS the book of Mormon is true and wants to come back to church, but his family hates religion. This guy had to wait a year to be baptized because his parents wouldnt allow it.  I then said " You have been given these talents to help people.   There are people waiting for you to come and help them and share the message of the restored Gospel”.   We talked about many more things but he came to the conclusion that he should go on a mission and now he’s been going to church and mission prep classes and will be going on lessons with me and my companion.  Awesome to see the progression of people and see them come to Christ and the blessings that they receive from that.

Mattias´ new handcrafted CTR ring caption

Jag älskar er! 

Äldste Blackburn

We got in a bus crash! I can check that one off my bucket list