Hey!
Another week down.. This past week, the mission office gave me a call and told me that they have bought my plane tickets home! So, that's a sign that I'm getting closer. It's crazy how fast time goes... Anyways...
This week, the weather has actually been pretty dry! It snowed here and there, but that's 10 times better than rain. They called Bornholm the "Sunshine Island," so luckily we've had quite a bit of sunshine. It's sunny today at least! I think the winter here will be much better than how it was in Randers, just because we break freezing point a lot easier and the sun shines more often...so I'm more dry! The problem isn't the temperature, but the wetness.
Anyways, we were able to get in contact with some of our previous potential investigators and we've finally got most of those narrowed down to positive potential investigators. It's tough to find them all home, especially when they won't make a scheduled appointment, nor give us their phone number. So we work by written cards jammed into their door frame. It works better than you would think! So we schedule appointments on the card, show up and hope that they are home! So, that's what we're working with. We actually started doing some finding in smaller towns called Svaneke and Nexø. We found a Satanist who is interested (I'm kinda scared in all honesty for him) and a lady that wants baptized. We had an incredible first lesson with her and she asked herself to be baptized. After explaining that the material can't be learned in one day, we tried scheduling a new appointment. She isn't free until 2017....well, we pushed her, but she insisted. So, we at least start off the new year well. We'll keep regular contact with her though. All in all, we're scratching at the surface, but the surface is made of granite, so it's coming little by little. It'll surely come though! :)
This week, I thought I'd share an interesting scripture. In 1 Nephi 15: 6-11. It's right after Lehi shared his dream about the tree of life. Laman and Lemuel were of course complaining and bickering about what the dream meant. Lehi's dreams prophesied that Laman and Lemuels seed will perish, so it makes sense, anyways, Nephi was tired of all that arguing and complaining, and now we read from Nephi's words, "6 And it came to pass that after I had received strength I spake unto my brethren, desiring to know of them the cause of their disputations. 7 And they said: Behold, we cannot understand the words which our father hath spoken concerning the natural branches of the olive tree, and also concerning the Gentiles. 8 And I said unto them: Have ye inquired of the Lord? 9 And they said unto me: We have not; for the Lord maketh no such thing known unto us.10 Behold, I said unto them: How is it that ye do not keep the commandments of the Lord? How is it that ye will perish, because of the hardness of your hearts? 11 Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hath said?—If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you." It's interesting that Nephi's first question to their response wasn't, "Why don't you think God can make that known unto you," but it was, "why aren't you keeping the commandments?" Keeping the commandments and living the gospel is a way we show our faith unto God, which allows us to be humble enough to receive the spirit of the Lord. We don't receive an answer just by asking in faith...we have to ask in faith, believing we will receive it AND abide by the commandments, allowing the spirit to be with us. After the spirit is with is, then will we receive the answers and guidance we're looking for. We have to take the step forward in faith and allow God to lift us up, carrying us to the next step.
I love and miss you all!
Love,
Æ. Taylor Howes
Wednesday, November 16, 2016
Monday, November 7, 2016
Happy November!
Hey!
It's been a pretty good week. Today is the first day of the season that it has snowed....so it's started early...that's not a good sign, but I'll be able to push through the winter without any problem. Easy!
A lot of things happened this week. First, we had a Halloween Family Home Evening in the branch last Monday, so we all dressed up, ate sloppy joes, dessert, played some games and had a spiritual thought. For those of you wondering why I was a dog - well, that wasn't the plan. You can't really find Halloween costumes in Denmark because it's not a recognized holiday, so after I emailed last week, I scrambled around town to the very few shops that are here. H&M is always a reliable option, but of course, you can't find costumes there, but I did find orange socks with pumpkin faces on them, so I bought those, and a Halloween colored plaid shirt. I was just going to come as a Halloween themed looking person, but I figured I've got to do more. I ran into the dollar tree and found dog ears and a tail.. Perfect. That's a little bit more. So, that was my costume. Kinda mix-matchy, but whatever. Better than nothing! It was a good turnout nonetheless.
We also moved this week! Yahoo!!! We got a super nice apartment. So we spent a couple days moving the senior couple in and out as well as us. It was also Elder Teynor's birthday on Friday, so we ended up celebrating that at YSA/Institute. The day before, the senior couple took us to a sit down restaurant, so that was nice of them. Good food too! It was also Stake Conference on Saturday and Sunday...we didn't get to go back to Copenhagen, but it was live-streamed into our church building. It was pretty cool. I thought the Stake Presidency did an incredible job. They talked about the necessity of member-missionary work and the Book of Mormon. The new temple president and his wife bore their testimonies and gave talks as well, so that was cool. The new temple president used to be the Europe Area President or something high up in the Seventy. His name is President Olson. He's from Sweden. I was also mentioned a couple times in different sessions by the Stake President in an example of working with the missionaries. That was pretty cool! Needless to say, it was a pretty good Stake Conference.
I haven't left a scripture in some time now, but I found a really cool one in the Bible! It's in 2 Timothy 3:15-17. It says, "And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." It pretty much explains itself. It tells us exactly why scriptures are important. We've known about the scriptures since we were born and we've been told that we have them for our benefit. Scriptures lead us to salvation and teach us how to develop faith in Christ. Notice that the scripture doesn't say that we receive salvation alone by faith in Christ, but it says it teaches us how to become more righteous, more perfect, more correct - it teaches us to become "furnished unto good works." Furnishing takes time, like furnishing a house. It comes one step at a time. This is the Paul's testimony of the scriptures. Let it become yours!
I love you all, have a great week! Here are some pics of Elder Johnson's visit to Denmark, Rønne, Halloween and the new apartment!
Æ. Taylor Howes
It's been a pretty good week. Today is the first day of the season that it has snowed....so it's started early...that's not a good sign, but I'll be able to push through the winter without any problem. Easy!
A lot of things happened this week. First, we had a Halloween Family Home Evening in the branch last Monday, so we all dressed up, ate sloppy joes, dessert, played some games and had a spiritual thought. For those of you wondering why I was a dog - well, that wasn't the plan. You can't really find Halloween costumes in Denmark because it's not a recognized holiday, so after I emailed last week, I scrambled around town to the very few shops that are here. H&M is always a reliable option, but of course, you can't find costumes there, but I did find orange socks with pumpkin faces on them, so I bought those, and a Halloween colored plaid shirt. I was just going to come as a Halloween themed looking person, but I figured I've got to do more. I ran into the dollar tree and found dog ears and a tail.. Perfect. That's a little bit more. So, that was my costume. Kinda mix-matchy, but whatever. Better than nothing! It was a good turnout nonetheless.
We also moved this week! Yahoo!!! We got a super nice apartment. So we spent a couple days moving the senior couple in and out as well as us. It was also Elder Teynor's birthday on Friday, so we ended up celebrating that at YSA/Institute. The day before, the senior couple took us to a sit down restaurant, so that was nice of them. Good food too! It was also Stake Conference on Saturday and Sunday...we didn't get to go back to Copenhagen, but it was live-streamed into our church building. It was pretty cool. I thought the Stake Presidency did an incredible job. They talked about the necessity of member-missionary work and the Book of Mormon. The new temple president and his wife bore their testimonies and gave talks as well, so that was cool. The new temple president used to be the Europe Area President or something high up in the Seventy. His name is President Olson. He's from Sweden. I was also mentioned a couple times in different sessions by the Stake President in an example of working with the missionaries. That was pretty cool! Needless to say, it was a pretty good Stake Conference.
I haven't left a scripture in some time now, but I found a really cool one in the Bible! It's in 2 Timothy 3:15-17. It says, "And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." It pretty much explains itself. It tells us exactly why scriptures are important. We've known about the scriptures since we were born and we've been told that we have them for our benefit. Scriptures lead us to salvation and teach us how to develop faith in Christ. Notice that the scripture doesn't say that we receive salvation alone by faith in Christ, but it says it teaches us how to become more righteous, more perfect, more correct - it teaches us to become "furnished unto good works." Furnishing takes time, like furnishing a house. It comes one step at a time. This is the Paul's testimony of the scriptures. Let it become yours!
I love you all, have a great week! Here are some pics of Elder Johnson's visit to Denmark, Rønne, Halloween and the new apartment!
Æ. Taylor Howes
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