"We're adults-- well, kind of...Depends on the day, but we're trying to be!"

This week's title comes from Ældste Eriksen in our District Meeting, and it describes missionaries perfectly! It's basically hilarious how accurate it is and you'll see that throughout my weekly email.

Last Monday was basically the best day ever. By far the best day in the field we've had since I've been here. I did not know that P-day's could be so effective. We had our normal routine of emailing and such, and then we had a break from our P-day activities and went to teach a lady named Henrietta. It was a little annoying having it in the middle of the day, but that's what missionaries do: Bug people until they realize they could be happier in life. So we taught her and it went quite well! She doesn't think praying should happen every day though, just when you really mean it. So we'll work on that, especially because you say a ton of prayers as a missionary and you really mean every single one. But she wants to learn more and we set another appointment-ish with her. She said we could come back at a certain time to set an appointment. Then we resumed P-day! That evening, we had an eating appointment with two non-members, Finn and Dorte, that had met missionaries 30 years ago and loved them. They are awesome! They're hilarious and very open. They fed us some very good food and kept trying to feed us more. As we were eating, their son Niels came in! So he joined us! Dorte also gave me quite a few pep talks about making sure I opened my mouth and didn't let a new language get in the way of talking. It was quite funny. We taught them all the Restoration and they were happy to have us back today for another eating appointment!! They're awesome!! They also invited us for Christmas dinner already, so if I'm still in Skive around Christmas, I already have an appointment set up!

Tuesday continued the eating with investigators! We drove out to meet with Mitzie, who is the mother of a member and she's investigated the church for a really long time. So long, in fact that she has started a binder of the missionaries that come and visit her, because she loves missionaries. She's quite a character. She basically refuses to read the Book of Mormon because she's worried that she'll know it's true and become a member. I'm not sure why that's so scary for her though, because she likes the church and the members. We'll keep whittling that down though. Ældste Brown became instant friends with her and we tease her about being baptized. She's also obsessed with Elvis Presley. We found her house because she had Elvis Presley BLVD by her driveway! Then she had an Elvis picture over her window, twenty records of his in her kitchen, wore an Elvis shirt, and anywhere you looked had at least 4 pictures of Elvis or Elvis related things. It was hilarious!

Wednesday was the slow day for us and not too much happened. I did meet Elna though! She lives in Viborg and has been investigating the church for a long time as well! She's a super sweet lady who has two kids but just gave up twins for adoption because she can't take care of them on her own. She was happy to see us and was very kind and loving! We talked with her about the Plan of Salvation and set another appointment for Friday. We then visited Carl, a member, who had two guests over. One of them was his daughter, Helle, who wanted to read the Book of Mormon with us and then set an appointment for Friday too! 

Thursday was District Meeting day! We talked about Christ walking on water and how we need to get out of the boat in our missionary work so that we can walk on the water and come closer to Christ. It was super cool! Søster Peterson also gave us permission to buy gummy bears, because she did that on a hard day and they found an investigator. We then brought Ældster Christensen and Christensen back to Skive for splits! They are not the same person, but have the same name so we also call them Senior and Junior. (Which could also be confusing because Æ. Christensen Senior is actually younger than Æ. Christensen Junior!) I was with Ældste Christensen Senior and we went to Viborg! We visited the Kvist family and met Brian (Ana's brother who is being deported this week) and Steen (Ana's son/Jacob's little brother)! Neither of them really talked to us though. We're trying to be friends with Steen so he won't avoid coming to church with us. But Ana and Jacob both committed to come to church. And they get a ride with another less active, Leslie, so she would get to come too! Then all four of the missionaries visited Rune. He was very kind and we had an awesome meeting with him! He basically testified himself that the Book of Mormon is amazing because he thought he'd gotten everything he could from it until he prayed and then read! It was awesome! Hopefully we can get him coming back to church soon too!

Friday was the pinnacle of randomness. We first split up to try and print the tickets for the Christensen Ældster so they could get home, but they hadn't gotten the email from the ZL's. So Ældste Christensen Sr. and I went street contacting and found some potentials. Then after lunch we went to Viborg to teach Elna and Helle. We talked to Elna about how the Plan of Salvation can bless us in our life and how through Christ we can be strengthened in our trials. She was very accepting and said she would try to come to church! Meanwhile Ældster Brown and Christensen Jr. helped Helle move a couch out the window because it wouldn't fit through the door, and then committed her to come to church too!! We basically spent the rest of the day trying to get the Christensen Ældster back to Aarhus. We couldn't find anywhere to print their tickets so we decided to stop at a candy store to buy some gummy bears! Because that was now legal for us! ;) We drove back to skive with a bunch of "gummy" candy that all turned out to be rock hard. It was hilariously fun! We also found some jelly beans that taste the exact same way that church cleaning supplies smell, so that was quite nasty. Then we sent the Ældster off and visited Karsten who had Jeppe over, and they both said they'd come to church!

Saturday was a really slow day because I just really wanted to go to church the next day! We also didn't have too much time and the potentials we visited weren't interested.

Sunday finally rolled around! That morning we got several texts from people saying they couldn't come to church for whatever reason. It knocked out Mitzie, Elna, and Finn. We stopped by Karsten's on our walk to the church and he wouldn't answer the door or his phone, which we could hear ringing inside his apartment. I then anxiously watched the door as we talked to the members. Finally Helle and Carl showed up! She was the only investigator that actually came who we had talked to that week. It was kind of depressing, but she had a really good experience and Ældste Brown casually asked her what she thought of being baptized. And she was really positive about it! She said she wasn't ready yet, but maybe sometime! It was great! We also had a random guy walk in for Sacrament meeting who was taught by missionaries last year! So we got in contact with him and he wants to learn more! We then spent the rest of our day driving to Jimmi and Vivi's house. They're a young less active couple who are going through a really hard time. They love missionaries and usually feed them every week, but they've been going through some legal complexities (with their kids who the government took and they really want them back) lately that was stressful for them. But they're incredible nice people and I loved talking and being with them! We were able to talk to them about how Christ can comfort us because he's felt exactly what we're going through. 

So that's my spiritual thought for the week, Christ really can comfort you! We all go through really hard things, and so many people know Christ can help people, but not too many people realize that Christ can truly help them personally!! He truly loves You! He wants to help you in any way he can! The application of His Atonement in our lives can truly bring us an enormous amount of hope and joy! It's amazing!! So try and use that for yourself, even in small frustrations or stress because Christ really does care about everything you're doing! 

Thank you all for your support! Have a wonderful week! Hej hej!

--

Ældste Bryant Jepsen

-Cruesli is amazing! That's basically chocolate granola and it is heavenly!
- A weird Wall of Smoke we drove through but looked cool! 
-Some dinner selfies! (healthy broccoli included!)