Week
94; August 31, 2015 – Finding Americans in Sweden
It’s
crazy to have less than two months remaining in Sweden… It just doesn't seem
real to me! There are so many good things are happening right now. It’s truly
one of the most special times of my mission.
We went to Göteborg on
Monday with our friend Daniel and we talked more about serving a mission, it was
pouring rain the whole time! Later, we found a luxury guitar shop that had all
kinds of cool custom guitars. My favorite was a signature-edition, exact-replica,
Rory Gallagher guitar, the musician who Jimi Hendrix revered as the best
guitarist on earth. It was perfect!
Tuesday was packed! We really
hit it off with a guy named Peter. Peter is s less-active member, but he does
his best considering his carrier. Peter is an international hedge fund
manager. Yep… Pretty crazy right! He flies all over the world and was just
about to leave for a meeting in Ukraine to discuss currency futures with
investors. What's crazy is he has a condition where he can't use his arms,
so does all this with his feet on his laptop! He defiantly makes the most out
of life’s challenges, and he showed me that it’s what's in your brain that
really matters most. That’s pretty cool because I worry about my own
difficulties a lot. We had a great talk and he said he'd be my financial
coach when I get home!
Afterward, we went to visit
our friend Nick, a chiropractor in the ward, and he was a huge help to us! My
back has been killing me, so we went to get my back adjusted, it hurt like
crazy… Haha! But then it felt amazing. So, I was really thankful! Elder
Blackburn’s jaw has been hurting too, so he helped him out a lot as well! It
was a great favor and we’re probably goanna help him with some service projects
at his house to pay him back!
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| You gotta love the rain! |
The next day we met with
our new American investigator, Cody. He contacted us when he heard us speaking
English on the bus! He's just going through a divorce and he’s trying to get his
life figured out, but he was super cool and open to talking about church! We’re
excited to see where this goes!
 |
| Working in Goteborg |
Thursday was our district
meeting and it was super fun. I was a little disappointed with the last
one I taught, so I put a ton of time in on this one and I got my speaking skills
all polished-up again… It went great! We talked about preparing for lessons by
role playing (Something that most missionaries hate). I started by playing
a motivational speech to get the district pumped up! Then, I went through the
entire Preach my Gospel handbook and found over 50 situations a missionary
could possibly encounter with dozens of variables to identify more than 1000
situations that could be rehearsed. Role playing gets really boring
because the same situations get used over and over again. This tool helped
us to create some unique role playing situations and we totally laughed our
heads off as we acted them out!
Some of the good ones
were, teaching a 63 year-old Estonian diabetic the purpose of fasting, as well
as trying to connect with a modern-day Viking while riding on a bus... All
situations that could actually happen in Sweden, trust me, I've seen weirder! That
was a hilarious exercise and it gave the district a new perspective on role
playing as something they can actually look forward to! We gave them one last activity
where Elder Blackburn pantomimed the story of Captain Moroni (from the Book of
Mormon) writing the Title of Liberty, complete with him ripping-off his
shirt... It was pretty awesome!
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| Flying away on a wing and a prayer... Believe it or not, it's just me! |
On Friday we went to an institute
of religion kick-off fireside with Mattias, he's very excited to participate.
We met another American
guy on Saturday who drove us to our appointment and came to church with us. He
was awesome!
On Sunday, a sister missionary
returned to her home ward. It seemed weird because she left on her mission only
a month after I got to Sweden. It seemed crazy to see her again! She just
got back from serving at Temple Square in Salt Lake City. It made me feel
pretty trunky… But I’m staying focused on the work!
I'm goanna sprint to the
finish! I love you guys and I hope everyone has a great week!
Aldste Stoeltzing
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