Christmas in Norway

Hello family and a MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

 

  Well i first want to say how awesome it was to talk to you all! i was almost dreading it because i didnt know how hard it was going to be to say goodbye! saying goodbye once was hard enough and doing it more is just hard! as i pushed the call button my heart pounded i was so nervous i almost past out! As i heard all your voices i had tears strolling down my face and could hardly even talk! it was an incredible moment and i start to realize how much i do miss everyone! when you are out here its crazy that i just try not to think about everything at home its just hard and makes you cry everytime you do it! You never know how much you could miss people back at home until you actually see them for the first time in 6 months! i hope everyone had an incredible christmas and that you all had a great time and had the chance to think about your savior and the price he paid for all of us to give us the oppurtunity to receive eternal life! Talking to everyone really made me think about how incredible families are and i am so greatful to have a big family with neices and nephews running around! how i love all of you and how you make my heart swell with joy! i wont lie being away from the family at Christmas time is not easy at all and it made me miss you all so much! you all are so special to me and to be able to see my whole family was a huge blessing for me! i think about all your kids and how much i love spending time with them and how happy they make me! to all my sisters i love all your kids and that is one thing i miss so much about home is having the kids run all over me taking me with them playing with them laughing and going crazy with them! your kids are great always remember how special they are to you no matter how much you want to wrap your hands on their necks sometime!:) i hope everyone had a great Chirstmas and i love all of you so much!!

   well as far as my christmas went i got a ton of chocolate from the members! thats all me and my comp got was food! the best food you can buy in norway that is! we are set with chocolate for the rest of the mission i swear! well for Chirstmas on the 24th we had the great oppurtunity to spend with the family jacobsen and they made us like a thanksgiving dinner well in a way with turkey and some other norwegain food! it was great!! we had another great oppurtunity to go over to an older couple and spend a couple hours with them as well and we ate a little with them and talked with the daughter who just got back from spain or somewhere and we all together sang Christmas hyms and talked about why we are here on our missions and why it was important and it really helped me see my own reasons for being out here because honestly sometimes you forget why you are here! not meaning i dont work as hard but sometimes you just forget your own personal reasons of why we go on missions! we all have or have had our own reasons of why we want to serve! so the questions is for those who are and have served missions....what was your reason? yea we all want to serve the lord and learn and what not but WHATS THE REAL REASON YOU WENT? my challenge to the men that have or did:) being with that family reallly helped me alot in my own purpose and i thank them so much for that:) later that night we spent a couple more hours with another family and watched them open some gifts and play fifa 12 the soccor game and it was a blast to be there and just feel the love for family! The one thing about Christmas here that is so different from Chirstmas in america is how much more family is important! you dont leave your family for almost a week! you are with them constantly and they just enjoy each others company! Family ONLY! its absolutly incredible with the norwegian people they really are so loving:)

  This past week that really helped me to prepare for Christmas was going to mission conference! we had a great oppurtunity to watch a movie i really have wanted to see for the past six months since mom and dad told me about it! 17 miracles! it just happens to be all about levi savage our great great great great grandfather or maybe one more great i have no idea:) but to watch and see how incredibly small my trials are compared to them just makes me want to press on more and more to be a better missionary to work harder everyday! it strengthened my own testimony watching that and seeing all the trials that were gone through for us! i am so greatful to have watched that movie! we learned alot at the Conference but we watched that movie and it strengthened every one and it stuck out especially to me! it made me really stop and think again! well its not a long email but i hope it raised your Christmas spirit and helpled you in your own testimony as you celebrate(d) chirstmas i hope you all have taken a moment and thought of why we are here and how one single person ( the son of God our lord and savior Jesus Christ) has over come all our trials and sicknesses and pains and our sins and has already forgiven you for them! i love our lord and savior Jesus Christ and i have a testimony of this church and i love this amazing plan he has worked out for us inorder to bring us all back to him! i know pray works i have seen it in my own life work! i love being here and it truly is making me a better person and has helped me already so much andi cant even tell you how much i myself have changed! a mission is the best thing for me right know and i love being here and serving our lord and savior Jesus Christ! i know this church is true! pray for me and help me:) i love you all

  elder farnsworth

Short and Sweet

HELLO FAMILIE AND FRIENDS:)

 

  its a truly interesting experiance to say that there is no snow anywere to be found on the ground right now....its colder than utah from what i have heard and Christmas is this coming saturday and sunday! saturday if your a norwegian:) its going to be a completely new experiance being with someone i hardly know on Christmas and not being with my family but these people have deffinitely become my own family! even on JULAFTEN which is the 24th we have to split between 3 families and its going to be so hard! 3 dinners....but whats new with that thats basically everyday;) but all the members want us to be with them and they are all asking for the missionaries to come and see them and eat and sometimes you just cant fit everyone! you have to pick and choose especially in a ward thats no different than living in utah for the most part! so we have a christmas tree at the church and they are putting a bunch of gifts under it for us!!! how cool is that!  i am way excited for that! its going to be way cool!

 

  well this is not going to be the longest letter since i dont really have pday this week and next week because of the mission conference we have on the 22 23 and then we have 24 25 and we need to keep filling the pool for the new year with more and more investigators! we are so excited to work towards our new goals which are set very high especially for norway but we are working hard and we are starting to get more investigators! as we go out and contact people we are finding more everyday even if we are only out for maybe 2 hours we have been finding usually about three people that set up a another time to meet! weather that falls through is another story;)

 

   well this week has been maily finding and teaching our 3 main investigators and doing service! we have been working on painting this ladies house and its not the cleanest house.....hadnt been cleaned in about 13 years.... atleast more than picking up and doing dishes and some vaccuming but other than that there was like a 1/4 inch of grease in the kitchen and it was nasty had to take that off before we started painting! i have figured out that i love painting and its way relaxing and finding out that i can understand most of what she was saying to me helped me feel way good:) but here kitchen is down painting it took awhile but its done and we start after Christmas on painting the rest of the downstairs:) i have had a lot of good experiances with just being happy lately! when you are wanting to go out and talk to people and just have a good attitude about things it makes a huge difference!! cant say i am amazing at the language or that i understand everything but when you go out and show the lord with a smile that you want to work he will open up the heavens and pour you out a blessing just like he says he will in mal.! the lord watches over us all and wants to help us but like i have said before you have to show him the sincerity of what you want to do! we have been finding people and its so great! we went from having 26 people investigating to 3.... so its a little drop and finding is what we have todo to help get our hopes up to make our goals as a mission:) i love this work and i am learning more and more everyday! i love reading mormons book and the inspiration it gives to me as i read it and i study! i know how true this gospel is and it makes complete sense! i love being a missionary! i love norway and its people! i am so thankful for the atonement i have a chance to use everyday in my life and its only through our lord and savior jesus christ that we have this amazing oppurtunity to live with our father in heaven again someday! i cant wait to talk you all well if your family members....sorry everyone else! but my love and regards go out to everyone during this special Christmas season! remember Jesus Christ and his Atonement and how we can use it everyday:) i miss you all and have a great week! keep up the work at home and i hope the light of chirst can infuence your Chirstmas:) LOVE YOU!!!

 

Eldste Farnsworth:):)

We Got Snow!

hello hello family:):)

 well as i have been sitting here reading through all the emails i have gotten and the main question is always about the weather? let me be quite blunt with you its freaking hot here! i have been lying to you and its way hot......OK that's just the biggest lie!! this week had a new experience with this white stuff that falls from the sky....SNOW!!! we got three inches i think on Tuesday? then again on thrusday! that was so so cool! as my last companion explained it to me he said its like wooville from the Grinch! my oh my was he right! seriously snow here is just different here and it truly is magical! its so cool! well with snow comes cold weather but it really didn't effect me! i couldn't get over the fact of how amazing snow in Norway was and it kept my spirits high while contacting! what better thing to do then go out contacting in snow and show that we are committed and see the lord work miracles right before us and blessed us with two new investigators!! one is a guy from IRAN who is a newly baptized christian and the other a J DUB but yet the nicest one i have ever met! doesn't argue with us but has quite enough to say about 7th day Adventists....its actually quite funny, he seriously dogs on them! hopefully all will go well with them and i know that it will as we follow the spirit:) i will say i hope you all can come here and see the snow and be here for Christmas!

  To answer the last question is what is Christmas in Norway like? well its a party of course! there are way more days to celebrate and it is really going to be interesting to see what its going to be like! so tomorrow is the 13th and has something to do with Sweden and Norway and so we are waking up early and going to the state church to see what the commotion is all about:) then also JUL which is Christmas here is celebrated on the 24th! but they celebrate 23th so the EVE of JUL also the 24th 25th which is the first day of JUL also they celebrate the 26th the second day of christmas and then they have the in between time til new years which is also celebrated but not quite sure how yet ill let you know as i celebrate it:) then they celebrate new years of course and then they celebrate the 4th of Jan which is called Juletre which is literally means christmas tree and its a big family event and really big in the church as well:) Norwegian JUL food is amazing! we have been eating it lately and it is quite good! along with chocolate which i need to send to you all:) so that's basically what its like here in Norway just a party:) from what i am told i am not sure how it works but we will be with members on 24th and 25th and probably the 26th i am not sure if we go out or what not because its only a time to be with family? i am not fully aware of what is going to happen!

   well this week has definably been a good week and we have been having our time filled up more than we know some how and then its hard to get to all our appointments on time! its funny we start our day off with almost nothing and figure we are going to be finding all day but people call us and meet or need help with something so we are always busy! Although since last week we lost most of our investigators we still have a lot of finding to do! we are working hard though me and my companion and everything will work out as long as we strive to work harder everyday and make good goals that will help us to achieve our goals! now to mention goals... we found out our mission goals for this next year well one of them anyway! our baptismal goal is 100 before July!! now keep in mind how big of goal this is seeing that our final numbers will be around 130 for this whole year! we have been promised that we can make this goal and i fully agree! The lords light is over Norway! as we push for this we can do miracles and we need miracles as missionaries everyday! we are so blessed to have most of our whole society in the church of jesus christ of latter day saints that pray for us! we have basically one chance in life to be prayed for this much and i have said it before but its a HUGE blessing!:) i love being a missionary its so fun and by no small mean is it easy! trust me i struggle everyday! i know i am here for a reason! that reason i am not always so sure about but i keep looking for it everyday:) its so disappointing when investigators just dont see the point in getting baptized no matter how you try to help them they see no problem with living there life how it is because they are necessarily doing anthing wrong!  its so hard! as we keep loving them and trying to figure out to help them find one point that will apply to them its not an easy task but there is a way:)!

    One thing i decided to study this week thanks to MOM was something we all have to much of which is charity....ok false i deffinitely could use some help on it:) so i devoted a day to helping me study charity and love! one thing i have been good at i think is loving people around me! i get along with basically everyone and can talk to anyone! which is why i have no problem going door to door and telling people about the messege we share...on the other hand my companion hates that!:) but as i have studied and learned its not only loving them but its what else we can offer them! its finding the meaning of charity to ourselfs and what we have to offer others in helping our father in heaven`s children find there way to him once more! i have a golden oppurtunity everyday to give this to everyone and its my duty to give of myself a little more to achieve this goal! charity is not easy but as said in moroni 7 that it will be well with him who has it in the last day!

   well disappointment comes and goes on a mission and as far as baptisms i have had none yet but i dont see that as anything to big i have been here for three months! its no mexican mission where you baptize and forget all the people you baptize......just kidding calm down:) but its deffinably just different! but once you make a friend here they will be friends for life! that is true! i am so thankful to be here in norway and to serve the lord our God! i love being a missionary and i have gained a great love for the scriptures as i learn more and more everyday i learn to love them more and more:) i have a strong testimony on prayer and answers! HE WILL ANSWER YOUR PRAYERS WHEN YOU PUT FORTH THE EFFORT AND LISTEN! i know that Jesus Christ is our savior and redeemer and through him we can be saved through his mercy and by our own works! i love this gospel with all my heart and i hope you all have a great week! my love and prayers go out to all of you:)'

ELDSTE FARNSWORTH

Cold in Norway

Heisann Familie og venner

 

well how is everyone? how is the weather back home in the promised land? well Norway update... its getting COLD! its been about the same tempeture everday but its been an interesting year here, seeing that we havent got snow and last year they got snow in october and already had a ton of snow and it was already -20c everyday! so its deffinatly not that yet! its been about anywhere from 8+c to -6c in the past week! so its up and down and cant make up its mind! its been quite rainy and wet so i wouldnt doubt that snow is coming soon! i love it here and there is so much todo here in MOSS! we are seeing our efforts start to increase and we are also seeing our trials being laid before us in huge amounts this past week! not a lot has happened this week and the lord has deffinatly been testing us to the edge of every trial! seeing if we will break or keep moving! i have never been pushed to limits as i have this week and there is only more to come....its comes with the package of being a missionary! As we push forward in the work the lord does bless us and will put everything in line after he test us! as in Ether 12:6 we all know its after the trial of our faith that the lord will bless us and later on in verse 27 thats says i"If men come unto me i will show unto them their weakness. i give unto men weakness that they may be humble and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me for if they humble themselves before me and have faith in me then will i make weak things become strong unto them!" now its this scripture that has become one of my favorite scriptures and has helped me through so much as i have been out here!

  well this week like i said has been a stuggeling week and we have lost A LOT OF PEOPLE! let me just tell you a little quick story and it begins like this... when you pray for things the lord will give you trials right...right! i prayed for patience.....the next morning we lost half of our investigaters....i told my companion i prayed for patience and for oppertunities to excersize that faith.... he said great what have you done! the story goes dont pray for patience! no im kidding its what needed to happen anyway we need to get people that are really going to investigate and not eternal investigators and the lord knows what will be better for us even though we dont see the whole puzzle he does and he knows what will fit into place and how it will fit into place! oh how the lord will test us and try us! i know that as we try our best and follow the rules with nøyaktighet that we will be blessed and the lord will see our efforts towards him and will put people in our path!

   its quite sad to say that i am now not what is considered a "GREENIE" since our transfers are 9 weeks you are considered ONE til the end of 3 months is whats said! so today is my end of an extra hour of studies and now i am a normal missionary! what a said day! well i would like to say that the language is deffinatly getting better and that i am starting to understand more and more everyday! its only the speaking part that is still hard to make a correct sentence even though i still could care less if i am grammaticaly correct i just speak and for the most part i say things mostly correct its just there are better  ways of saying it! so thats they update of the language!

  Me and elder Lillywhite are having a great time together and we are living by the law! literally and it is one day going to pay off and we are not going to give up! we will show the lord how committed we really are and MOSS is not going to know what hit them when we have a bunch of things going on and they cant even keep up:) i pray for that to happen!

  Well to be honest i dont have much to say so i will give you all an awesome challenge to help enlighten your week and try to bring the spirit into your life!i want all who read this to read Ether 12! to go through it and find the challenges that we have in life and to go through them with the strength of the lord! to have charity this week because in moroni 7:47 it says all will be well with those who have charity at the last days! strive to have the spirit with you! pray to have missionary experiances and to be able to share the gospel to friends and families we know who are not in the church or are less active! as we do this the lord will bless our efforts! i love and miss you all and sorry for the short letter! next week will be a better letter i promise that:) i hope you all have a great week and follow up on this little challenge! miss and love you all!

 

eldste farnsworth!!

November Is Ending

Well heisann familie FRA NORGE:)

 

  What more can i say other than i love NORWAY and the peole in Norway! lately i have realised that people are way nicer than i think sometimes! although many people we talk to say they don't have time or i have to catch a bus... even when they are headed the wrong direction... which always makes me laugh and sometimes i will call them out and they will start walking the other way...one time experience it was way funny! People in Norway are very set back but many people say that there is a Norwegian wall... no there is no wall that is just the people they are a little stubborn but who isn't and don't forget a little pride full but as well we all get that way;)! this week as i have realized has been a great week and we are well on our way to coming close to our goals for what the mission president has set! November will be coming out with17 baptisms this month which is the highest in Norway all year and probably for a long while! as our goals are to have 20 baptisms for December and will be our goal every month from now on! This is what is required from us missionaries and members if we want the second stake and to be able to apply for a temple! we need to show the traveling 70 and of course the prophet that we are in need of these things and the lord will then grant it unto us! we are well over our goal for this years baptisms already! we still have a month left and i think MOSS is really going to pull through this next month! we have 5 dates scheduled! 3 of which are triplets! as we have prepared ourselves daily in doing everything that we can and using our time in the most effective ways as possible! the lords spirit is really over Norway and is softening the hearts on people all over this land! i absolutely love this work and it gets better everyday with me and my companion elder lillywhite:) the lord is watching over us!!

 

  Norway is an amazing place i would just like to say! as me and Lilly work our hardest we are blessed and are really starting to recognize the lords hand in our daily work! weather we talk to one person a day or weather all our appointments fall through it doesn't really matter because its not up to us, but is taken care of by the lord and his loving ways! we have been finding more and more people to add to the teaching pool and its surprising even as young as me and my companion are and as much as i worry sometimes we have been blessed with the spirit as we teach and testify to the people we find and we are becoming in the hearts of the people! we do a lot of finding lately and as we look we find! and when we find we teach and teach with the spirit! i know my language is not amazing by any means but its grows more everyday with the help of the lord! still hard to understand everything but getting the gist or most of what said is help full but always asking if you heard them right is a great way to learn!

 

  Well our teaching is getting better as a companionship and we are adjusting to each others teaching styles and its starting to take off for the both of us! we are getting almost 20 teaches a week on anything to random lessons to full first and second teaches! people are preparing themselves more and more for baptism but its just the last step of faith that many people struggle with! if they could only see the end result sometimes that knowing will come with time and that even our knowledge is not perfect by any means! i learn everyday new and interesting things from the gospel and i am so blessed and we only want the same for them! that first step of baptism by no means is the end but the beginning of all things! learning that Joesph smith was a prophet that Jesus Christ was the son of God and that god lives along with Jesus Christ! baptism is only the beginning to a happy life and will only increase your faith everyday afterwards!

  

 We teach a man who is this same way and is just struggling taking that last step to the new beginning! he is so close and i know he will get baptised so soon but its just he wants that almost perfect knowledge no matter what. As much as we talk to him it comes back to that same thing but he is someone that actually reads and prays and comes to church everyweek! he is a REAL stud! it is incredible to see him grow and to watch him go from no church every in his life to knowing as much as i do for the most part! he has the best questions that really make myself think and i have to go study them and get back to him sometimes! he really wants the fullness of the gospel! He is super smart and bright and he is well on his way to making that first step to the new beginning! i cant wait for that day when i get to see him in the water! before my mission one thing i never realized is how close you become to your investigators and begin to love them like you brother and only want the best for them! you watch them grow and you desire their salvation! i truly have love for my investigators and they make me grow stronger everyday that i meet with them! its hard to explain in words but you truly care for everyone that you meet! that is something that i have realized and is something i will always look forward to in my mission and through out my life!

 

  i know the lord blesses us and along with the world! as a missionary just think how many people pray for missionaries? well probably about at least 5 million people wouldnt you think? when at any other time in life will you be blessed more? i really dont know! it really makes you think of why you are blessed on a mission! we have almost all LDS people in the world praying for us and even the prophet prays for us! now thats intense! even as missionaries we pray for other missionaries through out the world and especially in our own mission area! well i just want all of you to know that i have a strong desire to serve the lord and its not always easy some days you break down and cry and wonder why its so hard! well we go on missions to build ourselvs and to grow and to have trials thats one reason we are on the earth is to face trials but to stick with it through thick and thin and in the end we will inherrit eternal life! its promised to us in the scriptures many times if we 1. have faith 2. repent ourselves 3. become baptized by the proper authority 4. receive the holy ghost 5. endure to the end! thorugh these simple steps we can inherit eternal life! who wouldnt want that? i know that i do and as i serve a mission you realized more and more how much you want it!i know my savior lives and that he atoned for my sins so that i one day can aspire to live with him again! i know joeseph smith was a prophet and restored the church so we can have the fullness of the everlasting gospel here on the earth today! therefore we have a living prophet today who leads and guides us(Thomas S. Monson) through all our hard times! i love being a missionary in norway and i am so blessed to have a family that everyone have been through the temple and are worthy! i love this gospel with all my heart might mind and strength! i hope you all have a great week and strive to have the spirit with you!

ELDSTE FARNSWORTH

 

ps for those that were wondering i had thankgiving dinner on saturday with a random non member family and it went great and they were very nice the man was from america and they served us a wonderfull thankgiving! they want us to come over for more dinners but are not interested but they are a super awesome family:)

Humility

Well the mission.... i couldnt love it more being out here and loving the people i talk to everyday! i love the people of norway! One thing i have noticed here is the more you love the people here the easier it is to talk to people! you start to gain peoples trust and they can see that you are doing everything you can to bring people to the knowledge of the restored church member or nonmember they see our efforts daily! for anyone that reads these that is not sure about a mission....just go! the lord has already prepared you and you are more ready than you think! we have all been called to this marvelous work and he needs us to bring people back to the fullness of the gospel! being on a mission will teach you many things and one thing i work on everyday is called HUMILITY.... not so great at it but i work my way towards improving my ownself! the mission really does relate to basically every thing that is ahead of us after the mission we can always use what we learned on our missions to apply it to our lives after the mission! A mission will bless you lives more than you know! just go!!:)

   well as any other week we face challenges head on and have to use the lord to figure out what me must do! we had a zone conference this past week on wednesday and it was a great experiance for teaching for me and my new companion! as we still adjust our teaching skills to match eachothers teaching skills we can see how we both need to work better as a team and we got a lot of tips from the meeting! zone conference is always such a boost in confidence for everyone! we also learned (since president had a conflict) how to have comebacks to people that argue on all sorts of questions from god doesnt have a body to women priests to many other subjects so i guess we are prepared to help people understand that take stands against us? since he said "we are bullet proof" which is by all means true but we try not to take on the arguements but if they happen we can help people address their concerns:)

   as far as everything goes with people being prepared for baptism....there of course are quite a few but its just getting the dates to stay! getting people to make that step of faith! its really getting hard to keep the dates that people make no matter how prepared they are they will just never do it! we found out that one of our investigators wont be baptized this week because he just hasnt had the confirmation on the full things yet but yet we thought he had by his experiances but  i guess he doesnt feel it so we are working to see what else is going on because we know he believes its just getting over that stump what is in the way? he is super great though he is becoming a great friend and he will be baptized before i leave Moss! i know that for fact! he is there and ready just needs to take the step of faith! like i said before there are many people that are becoming more prepared and actually today i was invited to thanksgiving dinner over the phone from some random person i have never met? guess my last companion has met her once or so but really wants the missionaries over with them?! so i would not pass up that oppurtunity thats for sure! they are not members either so its a perfect oppertunity! other than that we have got some new investigators that really seem to be progressing well and i think there will be alot to come out of the new people we are teaching so just stay tuned:) the lords spirit is over norway and big things are going to start happening soon!!

  This week has actually been a great week and a very tough week and its strengthened both me and my companion and we are moving forward well together! president johansen is expecting a lot out of Moss from the two young missionaries ( me and lillywhite)! i believe everything will turn out great and that we will have great success and more things will start to happen more and more!!

   not much else to say but to give you a challenge! i have been studying the book of mormon of course but also preach my gospel! chapter four is all about how we can recognize the spirit and how we can come closer and feel in harmony with the spirit! so my challenge for you is....have you felt the spirit lately? if not or not so much? what can you do to feel that peace in your life? what can you do to bring that spirit and that bright light into your life? i know as i go through my own person struggles and trying to do everything i can as a missionary to be completly diligent that when you know that everything is working out the lord will bless you and things that we pray for will help us and provide us with strength! i know that prayer works but it does take time and effort on our part we can not just have faith because faith with out works is dead! i know that god will help us through our struggles and will provide us a way IF we are willing to put some work in on our own part! i love it here i know there is no better place for me than in norway! i love my savior Jesus Christ and he lives and loves me! Joeseph Smith restored the church through the very power of god! we have a prophet on the earth today who leads and guides us to live our lifes in harmony of the spirit! i hope all have a great week and i love you all cant wait to hear from you have a great week:):)

  

    ELDSTE FARNSWORTH

New Companion

Well this week would be the week to put the lord to the test in many different ways! the first one i would have to say is that as we go through companion exchanges i had to say good bye to my trainner and say hello to elder lillywhite who is only one transfer ahead of me! to start this letter off i want to tell you a little about the norway mission! well when i first got here we were at 62 missionaries inthe land of norway! from september to january we will have lost a total of 25 missoniaries making our mission soon to be a very very young mission! there will be a total of about 10 missionaries that will have been here for more that 6 months about! our mission is about to become very young! As we pray everyday for guidence we can see alread how the lord blesses us and wants to give us more blessings as we strive to be better missionaries and to live as best we can according to the mission rules! Me and my companion are now going to seriously stay to the rules for this new reason... so our goal this year before it ends that is....is 115 baptisms....we are very close! we had a mission call on saturday morning telling us that that number is not enough and that in the next three months our goal is 20 a month...we have some serious challenges coming our way and living exactly to these rules is how we are going to have to get all these 20 baptisms! the lord wants to bless us and i am striving to get those blessings!

   As this week being with my new companion we needed alot of help and still do! we have two missionaries assigned to be traveling AP`s to help new missionaries like us get everything on track! they were here for 3 days and helped us very much! we were able to get weekly planning done and to get things on track and to see how its done in a better stand point from experianced missionaries! we have alot of goals that are going to help us and we are going to accomplish these goals by doing our best as usual of course but with a higher expectancy than normal! the lord wants to bless us! we need to seek for his guidance more than ever! My companion and i are really getting into the work this week and he is great! pictures soon will be coming so youwill get to see him soon enough! he is from layton utah and is a very hard worker maybe a little to much to over the edge but it will be good for me!

   Well there isnt to much to share this week we did a lot of finding! since the AP`S were here we wanted to add to the teaching pool and try to get some more solid investigators and with having 4 missionaries in Moss its possible! we found 2 new investigators and we are starting to teach them and its going very well actually! we met with a girl today from germany actually just here to be a nanny and she is now a serious new investigator and she is really excited about everything so i am as well very excited!

   ok well i know everyone is wondering about a batismal date that was on friday right well as everyone has their freewill he thought it was a little to early so we held off on that and we set a date that is pretty concrete now for the 26 and 27 so we are really getting ready for it and he is getting super excited about everything and i think he is ready! we have not taught him everything so we are just keeping hiim reading and understanding and going back through the lessons:) This kid will be a kid i would always stay in touch with he is WAYYYY cool! very out going and is like a good friend that i cant communicate with very well....hate that but its getting better:)

   as far as the kid that walked into the church to find out what we believed....well its going.....well its interesting but we teach him lets just say its a story i will tell you eventually:)

   well this week i have been reading in ALMA! lots of good stuff in there and a lot to learn! have you ever read alma 5? well lets just say thats my challenge even if you have! its almost like a list that you can go through and see if you are ready to meet god? i deffinatly and not but maybe some are...;) so a little message to everyone is to take our weaknesses and make them into strengths! non of us are perfect and this scripture will hopefully show a lot of us how much more we can do in our life! i read it and even as a missionary i said WOW! there is a lot to take out of it!

   well i just want to share my own testimony that i love this chuch and as i have found out for myself that it is true through my own reading and praying that joeseph smith restored his church in these latter days and that it was by the power of god that this chuch is here on earth again that we do have a prophet that does lead and guide our church and that we have the priesthood keys to administer these sacred ordinaces to help us receive eternal life! i love being a missionary and its so fun! everone talks about there mission even after they are old and you wonder sometimes if they really did have all those experiances! or if they really could have done everyting! As i have come to find out the mission really does prepare you for life to come in the REAL world which is to shortly come to me! we are out teaching everyday and helping people with their problems and we can truly help people if they will take 15 minutes to listen to us! i am so thankful for my parents at home that support me and for my five sisters that are such a good examples to me and always have been! i pray for you all the time! thanks for all the letters you send and email and what not they really are inspiring and help me get through the rough times as a missionary! i love and miss all of you! have a great week:)

One Amazing Week

Well i got a lot of news to share with you all! it truly has been one of those amazing weeks and who knows where the time goes! ill tell you where the time goes, its all devoted to the lord and he blesses me and my companion as we try our hardest to keep everything going and get everything oraganized! he is such a great companion and i dont know what i am going to do with out him,.......since 9 weeks have past and it is now time for new changes to occur! well ill get this out of the way first and guess where i am heading next....yea thats right MOSS im staying in Moss! which is totally fine there is so much todo here and i just hope i can keep up with all my companions goals and what not and be a great missionary like he is! well he is going to Stavanger! what an amazing place and they have a sweet dialect! Anyway my new companion i get on wednesday! his name is elder lillywhite! he is in hamar right now so he is in the stake and he is only one transfer ahead of me! i wont lie i am a little worried about the language since we are both pretty close but he is super smart and i know the lord will bless us and boost us with crazy spirit no matter the situation! there are so many here that will miss my comp since he has been here for 6 months and they know him so very well but dont worrie everyone that knows me and gettting know people just like at our own ward at home knows i get along with grown ups and kids like they aare my best friends! i am so excited for all the things that are coming up!
    well anyway celebrated halloween this past monday and lets just say its not the same here when it comes to halloween! for one pumpkins are pretty scarce here in not easy to find and to mention that fact me and the comp carved mellons:) i carved a cantolope and he carved some other type of mellon! also went trick or treating with 6 of the 14 kids and that was lots of fun running around to the houses that would actually answer! when they do give you candy its not like "oh here take a hand full.... its more like here is a jelly been savor it...! the kids were so happy anyway and didnt want to go home! and good thing that we had fredriksted elders with us to or we would have never rounded up all the kids!
   well this week to no suprise was busy as alwasy and filled with awesome experiances to help me grow! learned how more about the spirit world while teaching a guy from seventh day in venice or what ever its called! sat at his house and argued for an hour and we couldnt even put a breath in he wouldnt even let us speak! when we finally could we just said ok listen we are not here to argue but simply to ask you to read this book! all these questions you have and arguements that you try to argue can be answered and we want to answer them but you need to just calm down and listen! he was freaking out! but all went well and havent really taught him yet but he came to church! also invited us over to play gutair and record music and talk a little! learned some chords on the gutiar and my comp made some musik with him! we are teaching him this week but is still way timid on the fact of the bible says this is my gospel nothing else....ok man take a step back reread the bible and read this as well and you will see how they are used in comparison! he is a stuborn man but very fun to be around!
  well we had a ton of teaches this week and referrals and just were so busy so with everything but we did a great job this week! havent gone contacting or knocking in like three weeks basically besides on splits but thats because i was in fredriksted and the work in moss is just incredibly different and i love the work in moss! i am getting better with using members and they are such a great help in learning and helping investigators! what a great testimony they can always add and help me when i dont understand alot of what is said when i am getting yelled at and thats when it gets hard to understand! '
  so i have a great story for you that people always here about and always say to themselfs "i wish that would happen to me"! its that kind of story and its incredible! well so we usually have district meeting on fridays but had to switch it to thursday since the fredriksted elders were going to oslo on friday! so we had it at 19:30 and it went well of course and we walked out and there was a kid in the church talking to an older guy. we went up to him and were saying good bye and the man said "hey heres the missionaries!" then told us that this kid read our news paper article a couple weeks ago and wanted to find out and wandered into the chuch and say a man and yelled to him and asked if there were any mormons here? oh boy did he find out fast that he was in the right place! we taught him on saturday and talked to him about being baptized and he was like thats so cool that i can do that! came to church and loved it and i was talking tohim and he said his mom toook away his book of mormon and asked if he could have another one! me and him walked to the car real fast and he told me and he is going to go to utah and go to the salt lake temple and go inside! i simplly said well if you want to go in you have to be a member and he said HOW DO I DO THAT? are you kidding let me just hit you with some knowledge and baptize you now! ha! well he had taken some leohona`s from the church and read all about temple marriage and loved it! we are meeting him later today hopefully and he is just a dream investigator!
  well we have the other member referral we got who is straight on track for baptism and he is so awesome! he is also a dream investigator he askes some amazing questions and has put me in to study more on the millenium since he has been coming to church for about six months he has a lot of questions! no other investigator would ask about the millenium and i found out how little i iknew about it and even harder to explain in norwegian! he is trying for friday and we pray and fast for him all the time and he is getting those good feelings and now is just trying to figure out what they are! he is such a cool kid and is very smart! he reminds me of a friend back at home and looks just like him! he is a man that the lord has truly prepared to receive the gospel and is ready to be a member! whether its this friday or not this kid was inspired to know about the gospel!
   well studies this week have been in mosiah! i love mosiah and there is so much to learn from that book! everything is going so well here in norway and i love it here! i could not have asked for a better place to go on my mission....oh wait i didnt ask...I WAS CALLED! the lord knows what we need best and this is where i know i need to be! the people here are so great! some are a little pridefull but thats everywhere around the world! well my weekly challenge is to find out more on the millenium! there is some absolutly incredible things to learn! i know that as you try to do this you will learn so much and see even more how true this church is and how much knowledge we are able to receive from this wonderful gospel! i want my learning and understanding to go more and more and thats why i study everyday and try my best! may not be the brightest bulb but the lord will bless me as i try and i know the lord will bless you as well! well i hope all is well and thanks for all the emails! its so great to hear how everyone is doing! keep up the good work!!
ELDER FARNSWORTH

Another Busy Week

This week has been absolutely crazy and filled with teaches! we have been VERY busy this week and we have really worked hard this week in finding and teaching as many people as we have! i believe in my last email that i told you how much potential is here in Moss that its ridiculous how many could be baptized and we are only getting more investigators it is crazy to think! we got five new investigators just this week and things are just exploding here and its hard to keep up most of the time! its a great thing i have a companion who is always on top of things and can always manage everything  and even better can remember basically everything! he truly is a trainer and the best at that! thanks to elder Korey Sutton the work goes forward in moss and then i am at his side ha ha! he encourages me all the time and helps me strive to be the better missionary! so like a said last week we are using members more and more! this week we had 16 member teaches to investigators! only in moss! the members really try to help when they are able to and i have to thank them for that they are so great! we have been all over the place this week and i am so excited to tell you what has happened that has made this week a great week!

  well there is a member who is from fredriksted who was baptized not to long ago in June! He is a true convert already and strives to go on a mission and shows that by coming with us for two whole days this week and saw what it was like to be a missionary and he surely loved it! he has already seen how missionary work goes forward and has gotten to see at first hand what we do everyday and how missionary work is hard but we still have tons of fun while out doing it! he always added great testimony being a brand new member they always have some crazy strong testimonies that really help our investigators! As we struggle with some more than others having that witness to say "hey its OK I'm still not perfect and still make mistakes but through the atonement of Christ can we be made free from all those sins" is just different than us saying it since they don't believe that we are not perfect which is completely false i still mess up everyday! that witness is so amazing though and i love hearing conversion stories it just adds to my own testimony that this is the true church on the earth! thank you to him one of our investigators is starting to get back into baptism and trying to find her answer again!

  well we have been waiting for a member referral for while meaning my companion has been waiting for one for quite a while! there is a family in the ward and their daughter is dating a kid who is not a member but yet has been coming to church with out her even when she is not there for almost a year now! he is one bright kid and is very easy to talk to and just and all around chill type of kid! so we finally got the go ahead to teach and we met with him on Thursday and were able to commit him if he knew it was right to be baptized and he said yes! we met with him again yesterday and he had read and he said he felt great and really like ready Alma 32! we talked about it with him and we read a scripture with him and he told us that he really like that scripture when he had read it and said it was very interesting (21) that he didn't need a perfect knowledge of all things just a hope of things! the lesson went great and the spirit was strong and we had prayed about a date and also thought how cool it would be for him to be baptized on 11 11 11 so i hope that all works out its soon but with prayer and reading and with god on his side anything is the world is possible! i know form my own experience that the lord will always fulfill his part if we do his! the lord truly is on our side and is watching out for us everywhere! he is a merciful god if we humble our self before him!

  well we had an opportunity to go to Oslo this week on Friday for an institute with some of our investigators and they really loved it! had a great time and were having fun and learned a lot of new things! they had dance class afterwards to learn a type of salsa dancing and i wish i could have joined it look so fun,but one of our investigators really liked that and said she wants to go back next week and we had a member say that she would take anyone that wanted to go so that helps a lot! since we had a crazy journey trying to get home last time and what not so that will help us on our part a ton since driving in Oslo is horrible and could compare it to driving in new york i think! GPS don't work in Oslo at all!

  well we started teaching a family from Italy but originates from Nigeria and Liberia? something like that! she has lots of kids and we play football every Saturday and were able to take five of her kids and they are freaking good at football and they really enjoyed it and they all want to be baptized its so funny but its up to the mom in joining before they do since she is a... J.W.. so if anyone have good ideas in helping us with here please write and not in a bashing way we all know how to do that but just good ways in helping her understand that would be legit:)

  i also got to see the first baptism this week just for a boy in the ward but man it reminded me of how strong the spirit is at baptisms! the spirit is there and there is no denying the power of that! i gave the talk for it and it was amazing the lord filled my mouth with Norwegian and it made sense! i felt so great and i felt like i got across exactly what i wanted to say! great example of the gift of tongues for you right there! when you need it most he will give it to you!!

 

   well that's basically my week of course there is more but its not like i am going to say we contacted all day or drove around all day because we didn't but that's the goods:) so lately i am going through the book of Mormon with serious intent on learning and taking my time as a go through it and highlighting to the death of my book of Mormon! poor thing is starting to fall apart i guess in a way that's a good thing ( ill get new ones when i go home;)) second nephi is full of stuff that is just incredible even though i will admit there is some boring chapters but only because i just don't understand Isaiah all the time! but i have been reading chapter 26-27 today and they are full of incredible detail of the coming up of false churches and then 27 just has some incredible Revelation of the coming forth of the book of Mormon by a man who is unlearned and will be the one to bring forth the sealed book to people and then the testimony of the three witnesses and also of the other witnesses (8). As i have been reading the book of mormon is both languages even though it takes me alot longer to read it in Norsk since there are so many words i dont know and even if i know the general meaning of a word i will look it up so i know exactly what it means! i understand what i read and take my time in both to get a greater understanding everytime! the book of Mormon is truly gods words here on the earth today and i challenge you all to pick it up and read it and i promise you that you will always learn something new everytime you read it! its an incredible book and will and can help you with every problem that we have in life!! i hope everyone is well and its so great to  hear from you that do write me! i love you and have a great week!!

ELDER FARNSWORTH

 

Busy Week

hallo hallo family and friends! this week has deffinatly been a crazy busy week with teaching all over the place and just time flew by this week especially fast! for those that have served missions and know how hard it is to get member teaches and what not to show a little bit of how much we did this week we had 9 member teaches! three of which happend all in one day! so me and my comp were on our way home yesterday from dropping some people off at the church and we were talking about how much potential moss really has in investigators that really should be baptized and that are basically ready but just not willing to commit quite yet!... we have over 20 people that said they would be baptized... but yet just wont be baptized? its crazy! we dont even have enough time in a week to meet with all of them because no teaching appointment can only last for 15 minutes when investigators have so many questions! its good to see all of these people wanting to hear more and to learn more! as i pray everyday for a better understanding for all of these people you can see the lord bless me and my companion to decern the needs of others! he truely is the key to this work with the holy ghost they are the ones who convert the people not us! As i realize this it only makes me want to understand more and to teach to the needds of everone! its not always easy and at times you may not find the answer right away and have to wait to tell them! but no matter what the case is it will be for the better and people like to see that we dont know everything but we will try as hard as we can to find what they are looking for! as missionaries we are here for them to help and guide that and its great when people realize that we are here to represent the lord in his work to support his children here on earth!

  well i doubt this letter will be to long but a short little experiance happened this week and a great answer to our prayers! as we have been praying for this area outside of moss for awhile now and just trying to find time to get there has been difficult but we finally made it to the great college town of Ås! we actually met a member there and he showed us around and good areas to go knock and so we had a great idea of where we could go to find people in the best ways possible and we asked him to pray for us as we always do and i believe with our prayers and his it just enough payed off for us to have 3 great teaches which both lasted for about an hour and ended up all being in english...Ås is 25% immigration college town so there are many different races there of people and willingly invited us in! so we got three new potential investigators and hopefully we will be going back this week sometime to talk with them and set up other appointments! its very interesting how many lessons i actually teach in english and it jsut amazes me when i think about it! when you think of getting called you think and are told you will not use english but you use it when alot in this case in Moss because its one of the biggest places for imports and the its one of the main places the ferry from denmark comes in! so alot of the southern parts of norway have quite a bit of euthnicity going on, but yet its so great and get a chance to meet people from all over the world!

  speaking of which we met a convert from nigeria who was actually baptized in Drammen,Norway and moved back to italy and now is back with his sister and her family and he introduced us to almost 10 new investigators and we are starting to teach their family when she will give us a time to meet! so hopefully soon everything will start coming together for us and her family to meet! along with his friends he introduced us too!

   well our investigators that have dates for next week were all out of town this whole week....coincedence? must be! but i pray that all will work out with them they are such great people and just need to excersize that faith and they will be more than on their way:)! but like a said this week has been so busy with teaches and yet doesnt seem like much to tell! but just so you are all aware here is another answer to a prayer! so i have been trying to find a coat that wasnt like 500 bucks! we knew a guy who works at a company started in Moss called Helly Hansen which is a super nice outdoor sporting winter store and we had been in there to look at jackets before and we found one that was 3000kr so like 510 dollars and it was marked to 2000kr and we told him that thats the one we wanted and we asked if they would be on sale and he said not really and so we said we would buy it now since we needed coats! he said ok well my price is 500kr.......wo wo wo what... yea we got a 500 dollar jacket for like80 bucks!! its super nice jacket and super warm ill send pictures of it soon!

  well for personal study i have just finished the book of mormon and the peal of great price and starting on the book of mormon agian but going through this time i am making a time line of events and a history chart or geneology chart of people! i am going through it slow and marking my scriptures will "real intent" and its going well 1 nephi 13 is great never new how much was in there and along with 22! but i have been going through plan of salvation this week and have another weekly goal for everyone who reads this! so 2 nephi 2 is all about the fall of adam and eve but it also shows the neccessity of why! my challenge for you is to read 2nep chapter 2 and see what it means for you and why was it all important! i have reallized more and more how important it really is and its so awesome that we have this gospel in our life! i know that god has given us this plan so we can be happy and he gives us weaknesses so we can be humble and his grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before him and have faith in him then will he make weak things become strong unto them! ether 12:27) he gives us weaknesses in this life so we can over come them and thats one part of the atonement the enabling part and we need to remember that we can overcome anything or addiction we have in this life because of jesus christ! he is our lord and savior i know this from my own personal revealation! i know this church is true!

   i hope all have a great week and can overcome any challenges that are here or will come! i love you all have a great week!!

 

Eldste Farnsworth

Another Fantastic Week

  This week has been great and as usual doesnt seem like i have done so much until i look back on everthing that i really have done!! well this week has been packed with so much stuff and yet we are not the busiest missionaries meaning we are not having appointment after appointment its just not how it works here in norway and i dont know what we would do if we had that! like i said in my last letter the lords time will allow you to talk with everyone who neeeds to be talked to on that day and if some appointments dont fall through its because someone else is out there to listen to us that needs it more! i still cant get over how fast a mission goes by already! well just a little insight for atleast my parents who wonder norway changes companions every 9 weeks because its so expensive to do all the travel well atleast thats what i have heard? but anyway so november 9th is the next scheduled event of changes! but to put everyting on track and not have elders that come out during december they are doing a 6 week transfer so elders wont have to stay for 3 christmases! so my next transfer will only be six week and for the most part i will probably be in MOSS for a while! Well, me and my comp are doing great here and we are starting to get more investigators that are reallly interested and we have four investigators almost six with baptismal dates and ipray so hard that they will fall through and that we can have the utter most success with all of them! being out here you can really see the lords hand in all that you do and being blessed with the gift of interpretations of tongues is one of those! this week i feel like my understanding has deffinatly gone up but speaking has stayed pretty level! which is fine:) and it will come as i keep trying to talk as much as i can in norwegian as possible but dont get me wrong its a frustrating thing at all times when you cant say what you want! well here is a break down of the week

   So this past pday we went fishing with the elders from Drammen and cooked some hotdogs by the dock and caught nothing....ok we caught things but they were not fish!! some how we manages to first catch a star fish? second we caught a hermit crab? and we tried to catch a jellyfish? but that didnt go so well! but let me tell you that hotdogs here are not the same as america! they are just better here and taste different! because in american i hate hotdogs!

  well on wednesday we had been planning me and my companion for the big missionary zone conference in moss! so from 9-5 we sat in the chapel and had wonderful insights from our mission president and they were so great everything that he said just could stick out to everyone and he truely is an inspired man and knows what neeeds to be done in the mission to increase our wants and also what is best for the mission! He speaks and we listen and our hands write as much as we can remember because everything he says has so much meaning! i hope you all get a chance to meet this man and i hope at one time he gets to be in the 70 or something he just needs to be there! truely an amazing man! well we had a lady make food for all the missionaries there and she is the nicest lady! she makes food for us every saturday in moss and wants to go on a mission and she will be a great missionary when every she does go! well we had members come so we could do practicals and practice on them and for the final task we had member splitts with all the missionaries so 1 elder to a member so we had almost 50 people go out knocking in moss and areas around moss and we got like five potential investigators which is pretty big!! so it turned out to be quite the success after all!!

   So after this great event we had planned splitts with fredricksted! so i spent the night for two days in fredriksted this week and had a great time there! we found some very interesting people through out the day and even talked with a muslim guy who tried to teach us on the street! but we turned that around pretty quick! he actually also sang us to prayers in some islamic language i have no idea but i could understand some? and he asked me if i know what he said and i explained to him what he said it was crazy!! but we got his number and kept going! all in one day i have never met so many crazy people and drunk or on some kind of drug i have no idea what they were on but we met some crazy narco`s! so me and elder burr actuall got some good teaches and some potential investigators!

  well this week we had a lot of people out of town so we did a lot of knocking and trying to find other ways to get peoples attention! one thing i did forget to mention is that we were in the newspaper last weeek!! i forgot to tell you we were interviewed and were followed around for like 5 hours and were interviewed and he went on a teach with us and he ended up writting a great article on us and i wll send it home after i copy it and what not or maybe ill will give you a link to it if i can find it!! but he got all his info right besides that he said we had a temple in moss but other than that he was dead on about everyting!!

   well so yesterday we had a great sunday and we found a guy on friday out knocking and he ended up coming to church and is trying to stop smoking and do everyting he can and wants to do better in life and clean up! answer to our prays right? yes! and yesterday also we had a guy in the ward want to to take something to his friends (a hammer he had borrowed) and we took it too him and he said the he had been waiting for us and now has a baptismal date for the 5.nov so its crazy to see the lord working his ways when we work hard to do all we can!! he truely does watch out for us and truelly is on ourside! so elder ballard in his email quoted DC 100:5-8 which is perfect in this example which says: lift up your voices unto this people speak the thoughts that i shall put into your hearts, and you shall not be confounded vbefore men for it shall be given you in the very hour yea in the very moment what ye shall say but a commandment i give unto you that ye shall declare whatsover thing ye declare in my name in solemnity of heart in the spirit of meekness in all things and i give unto you this promis that inasmuch as ye do this the holy ghost shall be shed forth in bearing record unto all things what soever ye shall say! love this scripture so like we try as missionaries to lift our our voices and they will be heard! i know thats true i have put it to the challenge and it works!! i love being out here and i cant wait for every new day i have that oppertunity to share it to new people! i love you all and i hope this messege brings you up to help you!

eldste Farnsworth

What A Great Week

well like i always say that the weeks go by faster than you can even imagine! i feel like i had just barely had my pday like a day ago and we had conference already over a week ago! time flys when we do what the lord wants us todo and the time is already moving so fast and as i look back i have been in norway for like five weeks now i cant even remember unless i seriously count back! its true when people say that the mission goes by faster than any other time in life because the lord does not want you to worrie about time but to be here to do his work and will! every night when i look back on what i have done and i am amazed and wonder where i spent all of my time and how fast i did everything! the lord truely doesnt need time and he lets us not worrie about the time and we will make it to all our appointments and everything will work out in different ways and in better ways that you could ever imagine! well this week has been filled with some interesting events and its been alot of fun and reviewing conference and watching and catching up since we dont get to watch it in the same manner and way everyone back in utah gets too!

   well this past week we have been trying to get a hold of our investigator from iraq and it didnt work out and he was busy and his baptism didnt work out which was very hard and when he doesnt speak norwegian and doesnt speak english and communication is almost impossible with out some kind of picture and its still hard! but i know he wants it bad and we just have to find the ways to get him better prepared and a better understanding and use a lady we know that speaks his language and he will understand and want it even more! but he is done smoking! so he is ready and ready to enter into a new lifestyle and thats what he said that he wants so we are working our best with him!

  well we have finally been able to meet the guy i have my first book of mormon too! after 4 weeks of trying to meet he finally realized himself that the devil just didnt want us to meet and he made time for us basically that instant! he is a very strong backrounded guy and knows the bible well and he understands so much! when we taught him the first time and talked to him about the restoration he was very entertained by the idea and understood very well and he wants to do whats right and he is really taking into consideration and wants to find out for himself about our church and is starting to read and pray more! he told us that he loves to pray and he prays quite often and he is going to try to get his answer! in some ways teaching someone like him is very fun and especially when they are so open to what we have to say! we gave him a date and he is working toward that date buy needs to ask his.....mother if it would be ok! well it makes sense his family has had a past where they are basically all pastors and been members of A catholic church! he has a strong growing testimony already and he came to church with us yesterday and he really liked it! we had to translate for him sense he is from holland and doesnt speak norwegian so me and him are on the same page!! but all goes well with him!

  well this week we have really been trying to meet with the lady with 14 kids and we love going over there and they love having us and the kids surround us like we are family! they love us and want to be like us as we set that example that they love and want to become! three of the kids talk about getting baptized like they are already members its great and they tell their friends and other families that they are old enough and are going to be baptized!! the little girl just turned 8 and told her friend after she was asked what she is going to do now that she is 8....she replied OH im now 8! so that means i can get baptized!! they want to be members and its funny! we are giving them a date this week and working with the whole family as well!

   well i had my first oppurtunity and hopefully my last as well to go to a funeral here in norway! it was a very interesting experiance since it was not at a lds chapel and i got to go into a state church for the first time and they are so pretty! and just filled with incrediblely huge pictures that are very interesting....haha! but i could just feel that emptiness as i walked into the church me and my comp both said to each other...."i am so glad we are members of our church....this church has no feelings in it of joy at all?" its was a very weird and empty feeling that i have not really experianced since to my recollection i have never been in another church that wasnt of our faith! as pretty as the buildings are its just not the same feeling we get to enjoy everyweek so dont forget it! its a great feeling!

   well for the first time since i left my mtc group i got to see them again and it was so great! on saturday we had a training meeting for all the new missionaries and their trainers and we talked about the new program and had some practicals and it was good to see how everyone is progressing in the language and how fun it was to catch up and talk to everyone like we are the best of friends! i realized how much i missed them i mean they literally are like family know and when i see them its basically like a reunion of family! after the meeting we all got lunch together and just sat there and laughed and had a great time and told stories til we had to leave and that was not easy but we get to see them again pretty soon!

   well our ward mission leader organized a very interesting event for this coming wednesday and its a BIG DEAL! we are having all the missionaries in our zone which is 12 sets of missionaries coming to MOSS and having a giant splitts! having a big open house at the church going knocking on doors with members and everything its going to be a great event and its will really help the work in moss move along at a better pace! when ever we have members with us and since basically all of them are from norway or in that case MOSS people on the other end are much more reseptive to letting us inn! its crazy to see how much more responsive people are when you are a native! maybe one day i will speak as if i am a native! i hope so!!

   well this week has been a spirit filled week with teaches all over the place and my norwegian is starting to grow more and more! its nothing like learning spanish or a break off of spanish because for one how many people have actually heard someone speak norwegian? basically no one! so hearing a language that you have never heard of before really gives you a little persective of learning a VERY foriegn language! but norwegian is beatifull and i cant wait for that day that i am fluent and can understand and know what people say and be able to respond more indepth! but the language is coming along and i am starting to realize what peple are saying more but its still very hard to know and pick out what they are actually meaning and its a good thing i have a great comp!

  well my little spiritual message for everyone is actually from an ensign the oktober one! its talked about remembering what the profet told us in general conference! we never know when that time comes up when we get to preach the gospel and tell them what the profet said in the last conference so i incourage everyone who reads this to watch some of the talks given especially by the profet! i hope everyone is doing well and i hope no one is forgetting about me and please write me and tell me how everything is going!! i love and miss everyone keep the updates coming!

ELDSTE FARNSWORTH

A Great Week!

Well what can i say it really has been a great week! this week we got to have quite a bit of fun in finding and we had a lot of great teaches this week and i had a lot of experiances! well i just want to say that i know the lord is on our side in all that we do as long as we keep our part of the deal! "i the lord am bound when ye do what i say but when ye do not what i say you have no promise"! i believe that this scripture right here shows us a lot especially as i notice in mission work when we do everything possible the lord will bless the people you teach to open their minds and let you into their hearts! As a missionary every experiance you have will strengthen you in some way and help you bring people to him!

   well the people we have been teaching are being blessed more and more and its truely incredible to see the lord working in their life and yet the people dont yet see it. they start to say things that are profound and something they wouldnt say and then you see if they can clarify what they are talking about and it comes across in your mind....so basically your saying you are a member of our church?.... so we are having a baptismal date on... is the feeling that you start to get in your mind and its funny because they start to say this and you ask them more questions to open their mind even further and they are still completly with you and its when you let them think it out and the spirit hits you to ask them to be baptized and to show their faith to follow our lord and savior Jesus Christ! we promise everyone the same blessings of the gospel and we testify of how it will work in their life if they will only test it and try it for themselfs! people dont realize what a small and simple pray and do in their life when they ask with a broken heart and a contrite spirit! its by small and simple things that big things are brought to pass! god knows the whole picture or puzzle that we are working for and as we ask for his strength and advice is when we will truely be blessed!

   well we have been working with a great swedish man and he is such a joy to be around and is a very open and interactive guy! he is very stuborn and very strong sided in putting out an athiest view on everything....which makes it hard to tell him to only excersize faith and these points of view no longer excist they are just questions that dont really make or break what he tries to throw at us it is just an uneeded question for the most part haha! but we asked him if he would prepare himself to prepare for baptizm if he would find out if our gospel was true and he said he would! the smile of joy came across our face because we have commited him to it before and said no many times! he came to conference this weekend well to the sunday morning session and he loved Irying and president Monson he thought they were very powerfull talkes and i prayed so hard the whole time we watched it that he would feel that spirit of trueth and boy do i hope thats what he felt and i am sure thats what he felt! i just hope he can see that that is what he felt!

   well we got to have a really great experiance this week and that was that we got to be interviewed by the newpaper and so he came with us on a days work and got to see how us missionaries live our lives and how it all works! well he met us in the afternoon and i told him our beliefs and i taught him the first lesson while standing there talking while my companion talked to another guy trying to find a JW church for his sister and we found  out he was mormon as well baptized only in febuary and he got to be interviewed a little as well! being an african and proud to have the "holy spirit" and just about shouting it to everyone infront of the state church....which was hilarious! but we had some appointments set up and he came along with us and was very interested as well so it made it even better to have him there! we taught a lesson and had a member with us and the interviewer and just taught like he wasnt even there even though he was taking pictures and writting in his notepad that he bought that day and by the end of the day it was filled with notes! We had to make sure we were carefull of what we said as well to make sure he didnt get the wrong idea and made sure we clarified what we meant and our specific duties as missionaries! he asked us if he could see us in action on the gå gate which is just like a big street that cars cant drive down with stores and what not and we had not planned contacting but turned out to go very well in just one walk down the street we got three teaches which usually doesnt even happen in a day in MOSS! and he almost started to ask us tips! he is a writter that has to go question people on the streets and he knows how hard it is to find people to ask them questions so we exchanged ideas and ways to find! it turned out to go very well! he actually came to fotball the next morning and talked with us for a little bit!

    well conference was great and yes i watched it in english! no other language can do it justice! you just dont get the same messege out of it in a different language and also i just cant understand everything they say so i decided to watch it in english along with half of the ward who would also rather watch it in english! well the way it works to watch conference here is we watch saturday morning on saturday night at six watch P.S the next morning the saturday morning session after then a big dinner and then sunday morning after that so i have not seen the last session yet as we speak but hopefully i will get to watch it soon! in the first session one thing that i have started to do is memorize a scripture a day and Richard G. Scott spoke on that a little and its one thing i am going to work harder on! Jeffery R. Holland spoke in the priesthood session and as we all know he is just an incredible speaker and he had two quotes i really liked

*Sign on and Speak up

*Be on the Team

*Dont dribble out of bounds!

the last talk that really hit me that i loved alot is president Monsons in the morning session on sunday! He hit hard on morality and also depending on prayer and to use it often to excersize your faith in prayer! prayer is something i have loved so much on my mission you pray so much and for so many different things through the day! prayer is our own communication to talk with our heavenly father and i think we talk it for granted more and more! its a truely humbling thing to do! prayer will keep us close to him everyday!

i love it here and the work proceeds to push forward! i know the gospel is true and its why i am here to show my own faith that christ lives and we can live with him again through our sacred covenants with god that we can be with him again! i know my redeemer lives!

Eldste Farnsworth

Pops

well pops i am glad to here all is well with you and that everything at home is going so well! i know how you feel teaching lessons! so this last week i forgot to put in my letter i wrote today but i had to give a talk yesterday in a language i dontknow! i mean it only had to be five minutes and i didnt really stress about it but i mean giving a talk in english is nothing for me and i love to talk in front of people but its hard when you dont know all the words you want to say! well i have a story for mom so you will have to read her email ahaha its pretty funny! and sad at the same time but, i cant believe the weather is so nice still! i wish it was like that here its getting cold already its been about 50 degrees or colder so i have gotten good use out of my sweaters which are amazing by the way! today we are going to look for coats probably on our way up to oslo since we are having like a stake volleyball tournement but i think i might not happen its starting to rain maybe we will play fotball instead:) i am really starting to like fotball and wish i would have played it! its super fun! but i bet its weird to have the bishop in the works know and i still think its crazy that doug is in i mean its so perfect but its hard to get used tothat! but the bishop is where he needs to be the deacon stage is a very critical time for younger kids and the bishop is very wise in helping and knows whats best!

   sounds like mom is liking her new job and i hope all is going well with her job and looks like they gave her time for her surgery or does she not really have to recover? well i pray for the both of you to find jobs and moms got hers so know we need to get you one! wanna go on a fast together? how about on tuesday? well i will for you pops!

   you got a call from y.s.a? thats hilarious i will laugh if you get put in there! but it would be a sweet calling for you and i hope all goes well with what every happens! bishop? haha i guess we will see! i hope moms surgery goes well!

  stepheno is your new comp? thats awesome tell him hi and i hope that he does go on a mission its an amazing experiance and he would never regret it! he just needs to remember those feelings he felt in brazil and how he wanted to serve a mission when he was there! writting the feelings down will help a ton! i hope you can have that influence on him and i will try to write a letter to elijsha soon tell him i will write him some time this week so he will get it this next week or so! did you get my letter home? with the pictures yet? i sent it on... monday or tuesday so it should be comming soon! but i love you dad and i hope work is well and watch out for mom and keep her safe! i love you both so much and always look forward to getting emails from you both! i love you!!

eldste farnsworth

I had to Talk in Church, with a funny hair cut

Well hello mother! its so great to hear that your job is doing well and that you like it and that they are the same age! i hope you get along with them well! did you tell them that you son is in the best mission in the world led alone the most beatiful one as well? haha well i see you work quite a bit and if you are ever feeling low remember your father in heaven loves you and wants to hear from you! its when we are down that we need him the most remember that mom! well i gave a talk in church yesterday and that was pretty crazy! its hard when you cant explain yourself especially when the story is funny! so i wanted to tell you a story and you might not think its funny but it was funny at the time! so i decided to cut my hair on saturday night since i had some time! so i got out the clippers you got me and i turned it on and its the loudest pair of clippers i had ever heard in my life! well little did i know that its because it was getting way to much power that it would in america and so it was a little terrifying to use them but i went away at it and next thing i new it was smoking in my hand and basically blew up in my hand... so i now dont have clippers... and my hair wasnt done so my hair on the top looks fine i finished that but my sides on the other hand are about half way done and i have almost like a little mullet on one side of my head so its pretty funny! but not my fault! and fredriksted came down last night and they were suppose to bring their clippers and forgot and we have some at the house but they dont work basically at all so now i get to deal with my hair for awhile and i now see the greatness of having a mom cut my hair for all those years!!  and that was the story i was trying to tell in my talk and they got the gist and laughed so it was good:) good thing i am a goofball:) well i love you and miss you a ton! love you mom:)

Weeks just fly by

Well this week has been a pretty hard week but it has been a very strengthening week that is for sure! well this week has been full of many different experiances with teaches and what not like normal! we have done a lot of finding this week and trying as hard as we can to be able to more people! we have done a lot of contacting and knocking this week from appoinments that ended up not falling though which is always a little disappointment! but that is the reason we have back up plans so we know what we can do to impove our time that was already planned!

   well we talk with A LOT OF PEOPLE of course thats what we as missionaries do and its our job to do the best we can to talk with everyone! one way we try to do that is going on splitts to help us try other ways of finding! i got to go on splitts with elder Burr this week on tuesday and he is from delta and is very funny and knows the gospel well! we had many things planned and not one of our appointments fell through! ok one did but that only took an hour of our time and still had to keep going! we did alot of contacting that day and ran into some members as well but for the main part we did a lot of knocking as well and it was just one of those days that is hard to understand when not a single person will listen to you and will just ignore you even in their presense! but the lord tests you to the max til you fell like you could just fall down and cry but its when you get to that point wheather it takes a few days he will see your dillegence and your humility and give you that blessing you have been asking and praying for for about the past couple days! i wont lie i have seen this happen and its not easy to go through! i want to just sit down and cry sometimes from a day filled with rejection but as i have seen the lord will bless you for your efforts and i had to go through a day of hardship to find it out and here is a couple stories:)

   well the first story i have is simple! after a hard day and much pray to find people the next day started off a lot better! we got three door teaches and two of them said that we could come back and wanted a book of mormon!

   the next day... well we have been working with a guy from iraq who was raised muslim but never practiced and had no belief in it at all! it wasnt til he traveled outside of iraq to find out other beliefs. he was baptized into a christian church about a year ago in denmark. he moved to norway for some reason and has been trying to find work and basically living at friends houses for the past six months trying to get by on what ever he can make! he doesnt speak english and doesnt speak to much norwegian but can understand enough usually to get out what he needs tosay! well he has been taught by a lady that speaks his language and understands the gospel and wants to be baptized! the only problem is he doesnt have like a statemenship is the closest i could put it in english that i can think of but anyway he is not registered to live in norway and he could get deported back to iraq and being christian in iraq is not good news and is penalty and either 3 years in prizon or alot of the time death! so we have been waiting for him to get that oppeltilatelse in norwegain haha! so he can be baptized! but we contacted president and he gave us the clear since he is already christain he said it doesnt matter what time so we have a baptismal date for the 8th of october:)! i hope it all works out but you can see how the lord blesses us!

   the last story was very random but another way! so here in norway we play alot of fotball!(soccor) and we borrowed a ball from a lady since a nice soccer ball her is about 1000kr why i have no idea! thats like 210 u.s. dollars! anyway we took the ball back to the ladies house and we had just eaten dinner but invited us in for dinner and there was a lady there and she is from chili and she was very open to our messege and wants a book of mormon so its crazy to see the little ways the lord blesses us! no matter the trials he sends ourway he will send us greater blessings if we are open to his trials!

   i hope everyone is following up on the challenge i gave last week!? well anyway mission work is never an easy thing but it sure can be fun if you make it! its amazing here and so many challenges and trials await me but i have the lord on our side! remember we must walk by faith rather than by sight! he is the one that knows the greater picture and willl guide us daily if we apply for the help! i love being on a mission and letting god sculpt me in what ever way he has planned for me! i know our savior lives and is here to answer our every prayer he is bound when we do what he says! seek with faith! i love and miss everyone and i cant wait to here back from all! 

  love eldste farnsworth

Some Pictures thus Far of My Mission