Hallå allihopa!
And the craziness continues...... beautiful trip to
beautiful Stockholm with my lovely companion. Funny side note: she was craving
Mexican food the whole day. Girl just wanted a taco. I said, "okay, we can
try to find you a taco, but I don't know what the likelihood of it is...we are, after all, in Sweden."
We walk down the streets of Stockholm and look down this
side street...big letters: "TACO BAR." My companion was in heaven--so we
quickly captured the moment and made a sharp right to fulfill some dreams.
This has also been a week full of splits craziness! Örebro Systrarna kom på tisdag--6 sisters in one apartment. The dynamics were a
little fun there! No more work-overs here. It was all good though--not too much
of a struggle!
I was with the sister who is being trained, and it apparently was a
scary experience for her. Okay, not really but you'll see why.
So, this day was
for some reason the day all of the Book of Mormon bashers wanted to come out. Now, what I have found since being on my mission is that I have definitely
gained a backbone when it comes to defending the Book of Mormon. If trash is
spoken, things get fun. Well, it's all done lovingly, of course!
But all
these people were bashing, and I'm just here to give them a reason or two not to do
so! 9 out of 10 times, things end quite splendidly. Let's just say I ended up
sharing part of 2 Nephi 29 with one of these guys--if you're not familiar with it, give
it a go! It was done completely respectfully, but it does give them a reason to start
to listen.
The sister I was on splits with was apparently quite impressed, and went back to tell her
District Leader about it--and when we called him later that night, he said,
"So, I hear sister Campbell lays down the law!" Haha! I just don't deal
with crap. That's what I've come to find.
As we were walking back to the church for lunch, the only thing
we could relate the feeling of numbness that we were feeling to, was as if we were walking in those air-walk shoes--you know the ones that have way more tread and cushion than ever
needed? Well, kind of like walking on clouds. So, despite the throbbing pain
everywhere else, that actually felt pretty cool!
Next day we had District meeting in Eskilstuna, and basically
had a great meeting--but afterwards, we realized that our phone locked us out. We had
our tickets on there, and we had no way of getting home! Lots of calls later and
bothering our poor Office Elders, they said they would meet us at our chapel to
fix it.
Now, to get back to the church was the problem. So, we had to get a ride
from the Elders, got to the church, and just about passed out from hunger and
tiredness from being on splits the past 72 hours. So, we were just waiting there for
the Office Elders, and then our Elders gave us a call, and and said that "their
Mark and his minions" (their investigator and his friends/followers) were on their way to the church for a lesson, but they already had a different lesson planned, so
they needed us to take over. He was just having his last lesson before baptism, and needed to pick out his clothes and all that stuff, so we said,
"Yeah! We would love to!" We glanced at each other--and a couple of pep talks
later, they all show up.
So the POE's (proselyting office elders) take our phone, and we were left looking for
all the clothes we don't know he even needed. Lots of fun stuff later, the Elders
finally show up just in time to help pick out the underwear. Perfect timing.
Well, he got baptized the next day, and that was great--a big
guy being baptized by a little guy--but it actually went a lot better than we all
thought! Help from the other side is so very real.
But yesterday we had this really great lesson--we taught
this guy from Syria. We taught Frälsningsplannen, or The Plan of Salvation and Jesu
Kristi Evangelium, The Gospel of Jesus Christ in 30 minutes without him
speaking any Swedish or English. I think that might be a record or something!
Great converstaions were had via Google Translate which really didn't pull
through. Absolutely nothing he typed made sense, but we didn't have the heart to
tell him, so we just smiled and nodded in agreement and told him to come back for a lesson with the Arabic-speaking Elders on Skype! So, hoping things will
go well!
I typically would say it's been a pretty normal week--but it
really hasn't. And next week will be even more so not so normal--always adventures
to be had. But thankfully, I've got a companion to laugh through it all with, so--things to be grateful for!
Now, a couple of little quotes to leave you with that I just
love:
"The Lord did not make it easy but he made it
possible."
"Even miracles take a little time." -Fairy
Godmother
"Don't let the world change your smile, but rather let
your smile change the world."
And one of my favorites to think about while being in this
lovely work--
That's something I definitely need to internalize more but it is
something that I have felt on occasion. Now, to just develop that even more. If only
we actually knew what a blessing it is to be a missionary. If we only knew what
it truly meant to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints--I don't think any one of us would want to complain about anything. I
don't think we would have any problem opening up our mouths to share the
glorious truths with others.
So, until we get to that point, "It is our
duty to be better than we were yesterday and better tomorrow than we were
today."- -Joseph Fielding Smith. Find that conviction and run with it! The world needs
exactly what we have!
So now, choose one of those quotes--which ever you will--and
run with it! Apply it and try and see just how truly blessed you are.
Syster Campbell:)
