Hello Family and Friends!!

 

  What a great week it has been! its been a better week than last week and yet its not that we have had much success but a lot of good experiances! Many times on a mission you see how the lord blesses you and even though its such a simple thing it can raise your spirits to go through out the day! just like last weeks expirance with the old lady, its those types of things that help! same with the people that will actually talk with you at the door and complement you on your fast learning of a language with 100s of dialects! these simple things (even though they wont listen) will make any missionaries day to help you go forward with preching the gospel to everyone! They will all know some day and appoligize is what i say:) and then we laugh and keep going:) since all of our investigators have been baptized besides the two younger children (who live far away and the mother who is a member is so stressed and they are working on moving to oslo which will be better for them in the long run witha ward and friends of encouragement) we are in the process of "filling the funnels" which is the hardest part of missionary work, that being mission work in itself, but we have found people on the street this week but yet end up being potentials that dont go anywhere even though they are so positive and golden on the street it makes you think that they are getting baptized tomorrow and then call the next day and their husband said absolutly not in this house and she says sorry and hangs up...! but like i said before its those moments that count! I remeber after teaching that lady that elder johnson and i after we went around the corner started jumping and going nuts and felt so great about it! haha we all know how those feelings are of encouragement! its most important not to get down but to only keep you levels of spirit high! one way of doing this is listening to uplifting talks by John Bytheway! they will always give you a great laugh and the spirit you need to go back out! one other talk i found by a member giving it to us to listen to is called the converstion of a catholic priest! its an incredible story and i strongly suggest listening to it! its about 1.30 min but its so uplifting!

 

  One thing that did happen this week is we had a training meeting in oslo at least my comp did since he is District leader! i on the other hand got to go out for 6 hours in oslo! contacting in oslo is so awesome! for one its way warmer than Mo I Rana! Tonz of people on street! not to mention crazy people and nice and just a bunch of narko men on street as well! i got the privilige to take out two younger missionaries and show them how to contact? pssh i dont even know how to contact that well sincei have only been in small cities! Although it went so well! in the space of the day we had 4 teaches and two numbers with set appointments and were super interested in seeing us again! i gave out 3 mormons book in the street and had a great time but i have forgotten how fast people in the east of norway speak! it was quite hard for me since i have started picking up a dialect that people in oslo dont like... haha and people in north norway dont like east dialect! its quite funny but good thing its more of my tone and fall than actual words! being with a bunch of younger misionaries reminds me how hard it was for me to understand! i still have a hard time understanding but i get usually 90% on a good day! depending who i am talking with....old or young haha! offering simple words of encouragement and i could tell they were satisfied with what i said:) while in oslo we got there at 12am friday and i couldnt sleep very well and woke up early to get ready and that night got home to Mo at about 11.45 and then a taxi ride home! not alot of sleep this week haha!

 

  well i did have a quite interesting experiance with this week also since we went to sandnessjøen to go see a museum that we were told was great! after waking up early to go see it catch a bus at 7.10 and getting there at 11 and then the bus to the museum left in 2 hrs so we walked around and then got on the buss missed our stop had to go around again finally got to the museum and then it was 3. had 30minutes to look around before our bus back home left! got home at 7.10 that night! it was a very tiring day of bus after bus! rode 10 different busses with 2 ferries to cross to different islands!!

 

  well thinking of a challenge i have come up with this for you all! Read Moroni 10 mainly from verse8 til the end and find all the qualities we are able to achieve in this time of probation! list the ones that you want! list the ones that you have and see how you can abtain these gifts! i know these gifts on the spirit are real! i have experianced some of these!! i hope you all have agreat week and i miss and love you all!!!

 

elder farnsworth!

HELLO FAMILY AND FRIENDS!!

 

  Well i wont lie...This week has deffinatly been a trying week! we have spent many hours in the rain and snow with almost no teaches! The weather in this past week decided to just go nuts and start snowing then raining for hours and then having hail storms out of now where and just CRAZY WIND!! its made this week pretty intense when it comes to contacting and when there is no one out on the streets we have resorted to finding anything to occupy ourtime! Anything from offering service, extra studies, visiting less actives and new converts even though most of them are out of town so that didnt really work! all of our appointments fall through so we end up trying to do something else! we have done a lot this week in other ways of finding such as offering english classes and yet no one shows up so its hard to hold classes with no one there!

 

  During this week of difficulties we have managed to still have a good time! during the times when it was way slow we decided to start reading Jesus the Christ together and it has really helped our spiritual sides when things are way rough! we have prepared lessons and practiced teaching and studied up on other ways to use time effectivly! we have focused on our spiritual needs when times are not so great and we have seen the difference!

 

  Mo I Rana is deffinatly starting to become more alive even though people wont accept us they are starting to smile at us when we try to talk! its a good booster since for the past 9 weeks people have had there head down! so we have made a goal to see how many people we can make smile aday to keep ourselfs going:) such small things can go a long way and since Elder Johnson and i have been here we have seen the difference in people that we have seen day in and day out have a different look on their face when they see us!! for example norwegains are very to themselfs a lot and do not accept help... even when they need it! one day when we were out in horribly icy weather we came across an old lady that was having a hard time going across the street and i asked if she needed some help and she actually said yes and i had a great little conversation and she went on her way! she still smiles at us when we see her!!:) little things like that will make your day!

 

  well thats our week not anything to exciting but we had a good time anyway! i have been thinking of what to give as a spiritual uplifter for everyone and i thought of this! having some expirances with moral issues with people here in norway i feel inspired to ask you to read a talk( since i cant get enough reading from conferance and i have read through it a couple times now) from President Thomas S. Monson! Dare to stand alone! its such a great talk and my question for all of you is how are you helping yourself be built in the world but not of the world...! random challenge i know but i hope you will learn from it!

LOVE YOU ALL!! have a great week and cant wait to hear from you all!!!

 

 eldste Farnsworth!! 

Another Awesome Week!!

 Hello everyone and Familie!!:)

 

  How is everyone there in utah? heard that it has been pretty warm and of and on weather snowing raining and what ever else it will! i will only add the same witness but yet in Norway! it was 8c outside the otherday and it felt great! the next day it was cold and we got 2inches of snow and the next day was rainy and crazy ice rink slippery! fell multiple times and sometimes right when i got back up again! bruised elbows and tailbone anyone!!?:) as far as weather goes here its crazy! its 0 right now and sunny! the sun has come up a lot in the last couple of day! it was light outside a little when we woke up this morning and we could see the sun on the mountains at 9! its only getting lighter and lighter everyday! good thing i will be in Mo I Rana for a while! found out last week on monday that elder johnson and i will be staying together another transfer and we will be making havoc here for another 9 weeks:) so i still have another good 41/2 months here! i will get to see the midnight sun here in the north! ill get to keep strengthening the branch here! it only gets better the longer missionaries are here! havent topped more than 12 in church but its been consistent with about 2-8? big range i know but its getting better:)

 

  we have had some Very interesting experiance in this past week! not that we had alot but we did have a lot of fun! well we have gone to selfors which is about a 40 minute walk 1-2 times a day so we have got our walking in this week thats forsure! on solid ice or with 3 inches of rain coming down the street! days where its been sunny and days where its blowing us off the bridge and days where we are soaked going into investigators homes!:) good ting they are always so nice....the ones that let us in that is haha!:) so we have been working on knocking this area for the past 8 week! we finally finished the whole left side and are working on the right side! we found 3 investigators out of the hundreds of doors we have knocked on!:) you can see the numbers are about 80 to 1 usually...haha so it takes awhile but we were never told that everyone will be willing to listen at all! it takes effort to find and hours of searching in norway that is to find people! its a very different mission than in america or even other europian countries! so the crazy experiance that we had was with the absolute last door on the left side! a kid answers the door and we ask if we can talk to the owner of the house....a kid with his shirt off comes to the door and we tell him why we were there and he invited us in! 4 boys come out of random places in the house and come down and listen...some with just boxers and some with out shirts and it was quite funny i thought it was a joke! little did i know that they all wanted to listen and sat down and listen and participated the whole lesson! we ended up coming the next two days as well and teaching them! out of all of them which we taught which was (7) all together through the teaching sessions we ended up getting 3 numbers to come back!! how the lord blesses us! we have seen blessings this week with them and teaching them the restored gospel! we have been strickly obediant and you can always get more and more obedient and we made an effort to be out right when pday finished at six so out the door a 1 before and being like the ride of the valkyries! so watch out Norway!;)

 

  well we have basically been finding all week and going through the hard times just makes you be humble on your mission! its not easy at all when you feel like nothing is happening but the lord is testing us and seeing if we will keep turning back to him to lead us! He is preparing people but we have to go through the process to find them! everyday we are out walking the baron streets of Mo talking to the same people everyday. sometimes enduring is what we need the most! i have seen that and i have gone through it and will continue to go through it! its part of a mission haha:) since we finished our area book and have kept trying the people who didnt answer or told us they were busy we ended up knocking in to one of them yesterday! a Very nice penticostal lady! she has been busy but has wanted us to come over and actually offered us a ride to come meet with her when she had time! she has had some amazing experianced with angles and other very cool experiances! she took mormons book and was very greatful for that! she will be interesting to teach! for any of you that are familiar with pinsy people here is a very common statement..... ARE YOU SAVED? HAVE YOU FOUND JESUS YET(just like in forest gump?) IS YOUR FAMILY SAVED? HALELUYA CAN I GET AN AMEN!! praying with her was a great experiance and we ALL had to offer a prayer! it was very funny! it was a great experiance and she was actually quite open so we will be going back this week and see if she read what we gave her:)

 

 The lord is preparing people in Norway and in all parts of the world! its not easy all the time but thats a mission its not suppose to be simple or easy! or it wouldnt be called a "MISSION!" same as it would be if you were in the army a mission is something you endeavor to overcome or to finish a task! i am so greatful for the tasks i have been given and how humlbling they have been and continue to only be more humbling everytime! i would not be out here if i didnt know that this is Gods true church or else i could be doing other things to use my time, but since i know its true i devote myself in learning and envelope myself with the gospel to be a better teacher and missionary everyday! the lord has big things instore for all of us but its upp to uss to increace our knowledge! he wont force it upon us! we have our free agency! i read a great talk this past week acouple of times in fact Waiting upon the Lord: Thy Will Be Done by Robert D. Hales! another about waiting upon the lord is by Quinten L. Cook which is marvelous The Songs They Could Not Sing! and he is a quote from that talk --3. See Boyd K. Packer, “The Play and the Plan” (Church Educational System fireside for young adults, May 7, 1995), 3: “In mortality, we are like one who enters a theater just as the curtain goes up on the second act. We have missed Act 1. … ‘And they all lived happily ever after’ is never written into the second act. That line belongs in the third act when the mysteries are solved and everything is put right.” See also Neal A. Maxwell, All These Things Shall Give Thee Experience (1979), 37: “God … sees the beginning from the end. … The arithmetic … is something we mortals cannot comprehend. We cannot do the sums because we do not have all the numbers. We are locked in the dimension of time and are contained within the tight perspectives of this second estate.” this second estate is not ment to be a perfect life but we need to go through it and test us! my challenge for you all is to read these two talks and answer the questions...how am i dealing with my waiting in hard times? also why do bad things happen to good people?

 

  well ihope you all have a great week and strive to wait upon the lord and do all that is necessary to go forward! i love you all and i hope you all have a great week!!

Another Awesome Week

HEI HEI and hello to everyone!!:)

 

   Well i am proud to say that the lord is blessing us here in the small town of Mo I Rana! even though the people walk with their heads down usually and can ignore us better than any person i have ever met in my life the lord is puttin his spirit into the people here! since the sun i starting to stay in the sky way longer people are now starting to look up just a little bit and we are starting to see those faces:) so news on the sun is that its so bright it burns my eyes sometimes just seeing it hahah:) but its been super foggy this week and its getting cold again! when we do see the sun we are just so suprised at how high it is in the sky again! we will go a week with out seeing it and then we will again see the progression of the sun way above the mountains! well enough about the weather i have some crazy experiances which i hope will raise everyones spirits and will just give you that smile on your face!!

 

   Well let me give you the first thing first! so in the past week and a half my companion and i have started to pray to find a family since i have heard about people doing it and then WHABAM family out of no where! so we though HEY why not us!! so we started to pray for a family and after two weeks of knocking and with repeated doors slammed in our face and even getting a little discouraged at times but we always had to remember that as we pray with all our hearts sometimes we just have to do a little waiting sometimes! just for a little test!:) well on monday we went knocking and we knocked all night! we had a lady do the window contact which is quite normal in norway and you step away from the door and look up and usually people will yell and ask what you want and then you usually get a window slammed in your face! incredible i know! but this lady said i dont have time come back another time! so we were knocking on thursday and i knew that we were going knocking that night and i had been thinking about that lady all day sayilng we need to just go see if we can come back, while elder johnson on the other hand had no desire to go back! we prayed and he said ok its the door with out the door bell i remember! he then said pssh what ever you get to knock the house! i pleaded with my father in heaven and said please dont let this fail we walked all this way please let this work.....and in a split second the lady opened the door and said Yes please come in! i turned back with a huge smile on my face and almost with a pridefull look said haha TOLD YOU!!:) as well as my jaw was on the floor! we went in and taught her and we pointed out the pattern of apostacy and she said well it would make sense to have another one then right? well slow down lady were getting there but yes we have one! living? yes! a real man she said? yes!! haha we are meeting again next thursday and i cant wait to go back! we went off on prayer for her to find out if god was there and i cant wait to see how its going!

 

  well we had been preparing our baptism in Mosjøen all this week and keeping kontact with our guy and he said he is ready! well we were supposed to visit him friday night and make sure everything is good and friday was a crazy day! we had distrikt meeting but we have to walk 40 minutes to get a computer for meeting and skype! then  we have to walk back and go reserve the pool for sunday and then run to the bus stasjon to get to a members house who invited us to dinner! second one in MO!!! then be there for 35 minutes and then go catch our bus to the center and then catch our bus to mosjøen! well we finished eating and we go to the bus stop and no bus has come yet and we are getting nervous so we call a taxi! we have 2 minutes to get to sentrum before our bus leaves and end up chasing the bus in the taxi for like 10k and our taxi was so nice he called to find where the bus was and a arranged for us to be picked up and then we were on our way to mosjøen! we got there and our investigator was busy and there is nothing to do in mosjøen so we waited at the train stasjon and he finally came and we met and he said he didnt want to get baptized tomorrow but elder johnson hahah he said NO you are getting baptized tomorrow and i came right in and just promised blessings and he said .....ok thats better! so he leaves and we find out we have no money!! i dont know how we havent spent any money all week besides today and we cant get train tickets! johnson was able to buy his somehow and then i am just praying my guts ouut to some how get money since i know i have money in my account but my card isnt working! after an hour of going to atm after atm johnson tries his and was able to get a little money out and i had a little cash and we were able to get home!

   next morning we have to catch the train to mosjøen and we have no money! johnson remember he had extra cash and payed for the both of us to get there! all morning while we were getting ready we were way scared since the guy who is suppose to be the other witness has not answered his phone! we had prayed and felt comforted that all will be well and to go to mosjøen so we go and get there and still no answer and we are trying to find where he lives and he lives in the boonies far away! so no option of going there! we now have NO money! not even for the way back! we are calling people and we call our branch president and his wife said ill talk and see if he will come down but dont count on anything! we keep calling and then he calls us back and said he was coming! thats a 2 hour drive! he drove down and made everyting possible! we had to have a car afterwards since i was baptizing him in a river and had to run into a car that was warm afterwards! i will say that it wasnt nearly as cold! but the weather was way colder! -10 outside but it was such a great baptism! what a day and since he drove he gave us a ride back!! wow the lord was on our side i can bear solid testimony on the lord and his blessings for us!

  

  The lord is here! i want to ask all of you How are you using the lord? are you applying him to your life! Like i have said before Bind the lord! DC 82:10 is one of my favorite scriptures! if we bind him and plead with him will he show us how to achieve our goal and will make it possible! i know that is true and that is just what has happened here in the last week! prayer is one thing that i have a very strong testimony of! IT WORKS!! i have read alot out of the general conference edition lately and a simple phrase in Stand in holy places is a quote by P. Thomas S. Monson-Since that time of long ago, I have had countless prayers answered. Not a day has gone by that I have not communicated with my Father in Heaven through prayer. It is a relationship I cherish—one I would literally be lost without. If you do not now have such a relationship with your Father in Heaven, I urge you to work toward that goal. As you do so, you will be entitled to His inspiration and guidance in your life! find your relationship with god! i LOVE prayer! i hope you all can find your relationshiop with god and strengthen it! remeber, its always better to look up!- Elder Carl B. Cook oct 2011! have a great week everyone! look forward to all your emails next week!!:)

Awsome week

HELLO FROM ELDSTE FARNSWORTH:)

  what more can i say then its been a great week and i dont really know what to say but i hope the spirit guides me as i write this letter and be able to cover all the awesome events that have happened in this past week! well just like any other week its been busy and been full and its been empty but mostly at the full part! having a baptism, meeting with investigators, flying to trondheim for zone konference and then planing on another baptizm and going to visit him before the baptizm, preparing lessons for sunday! so its been crazy but its been a seriously awesome week:) well i want you to all know that the spirit of the lord is in norway and we are seeing the lords hand in our work!! all the knocking pays off with a nice person that will talk with you and maybe wont except it but will give you courage to go the rest of the night, or on the other hand finding the one person after hours of knocking! I love being here and its incredible to see everything that is going on!!:)

   well first things first! THE BAPTISM!! so let me just first start of by saying a lot of worry went into this baptism since we had to find a ride to get to where our investigator wanted to be baptized! Our driver hadnt been able to drive out of his drive way for about 1 week and so we were deeply finding other ways to figure out rides and how we could get to Aldersund! well i hope you all looked up Alersund and were jealous of the beauty;)! so as we prayed from sunday to tuesday i will tell you my companion was going nuts for those two days but little did he know that i had gotten the answer when we first prayed that all was going to go fine and nothing was to worry about! i told him many times and he would just say....Ya...but what if....haha O ye of little faith!;) well we were able to get ahold of him that morning of tuesday and he said he was able to drive!! so we picked our investigator up after school (for those that have forgotten he is 17 with a real testimony:)) and we were on our way as it was snowing outside allday so far and its 1 1/2 hours and by the time we got there it wasnt snowing but we took forever deciding on the place to baptise him and i had ran down to a couple different lakes to se if we could break ice to do it and most of them were way to thick but we found a place where we first had decided and we said "yup this is the place" and we proceeded into the river of ice chunks floating around us! for those that have baptized before know you cant wear shoes in the water so bare feet and jagged rocks go great together:) its ok though since we had to walk in snow already to go down and you couldnt tell the difference from water and snow and just got in anyway:) he didnt have his glasses on so he almost fell in....but i caught him and we moved on and i asked him many times to tell me his middle name but he was in such shock he couldnt hear me so after standing in there for 45 seconds he finally said his middle name and i said the words and i threw him under that water and ended up hitting his head on the ice behind us and broke the ice right in half (head prind and everything:)) we ran out of that water so fast and to show that you dont feel anything my feet had actually frozen to the rocks on the bottom!! i also had cuts all on my feet and ankles to prove that haha!! we got in the car and warmed up as fast as possible and drove home! I have him the Holy Ghost and we went back to our pad and celebrated with some pizza and watching a movie and a lesson we prepared!!:) it was a great spiritual day!!:) plus to end off the night we had the best northern lights i have seen yet! Green and Purple! it was so incredible and pictures dont really give it justice!!

  well not only having a baptism we had to go the next day and spend the whole day in Mosjøen and talk with our other investigator who was so excited for his baptism and we shared with him a home teaching messege since he has been taught everyting and has read all of the book of mormon and DC and Pearl of Great Price manytimes and just loves the gospel so its hard to share something that he doesnt know but the lesson we prepared went so well and it was just what he needed to hear! he was so ready for baptizm! he ended up getting sick on friday night and that he wanted to do it next week but assured us he wanted to do it next week no matter what but he could hardly even breath on the phone so we understood! so this coming saturday is when its going to happen! he has been trying to be baptized for years but just hasnt been able to! He is so excited! so i will be baptizing in another river this saturday......

  As this week proceeds after we were at his house and getting home late since there is only one train back from his house and waking up at kl4.00 and getting ready and going to Trondheim and getting an awesome pump from the missionpresident as always and going contacting in a place that people actually stop is great! we got 5 teaches in 2 hours plus 2 numbers 3 books given out so it was great and we felt so humbled as we could hardly put words together i am not use to having so many people! all the places i have been are the same people on the street everyday and you basically are known by everyone! we had a great time there and saw how different our areas were! all i can say is we were very humbled!! we slept in a tiny pad there with two other elders and then caught our flight the next day and took us 3 hours to get home! usually only 45 minutes but bad weather delayed us horribly! its been snowing all week and snow is just building up! to give you a little example to get to a house we went through waist deep snow to get to this house!! took 20 minutes to get to the house!!

  we are so blessed here in Mo I Rana and we are going to have 2 other baptizms on either saturday or sunday depending on which day is cheaper to rent out the pool!! i am so Greatful for all the challenges of a mission and i wont lie they are so tough sometimes and many times it seems like trials are never ending! as most stories go its that last house that you find someone and its true! it takes the effort or the courage to go to the end! i love being out here and its so much fun to see peoples lifes change! our investigator who got baptized on the 14th is considering a mission and he was ordained yesterday as a priest!! hes a real stud!! i love this work and i know that god lives and Through the Atonement can we all be saved! i know The Church of Jeses Christ of Latter Day Saints is Gods restored church on this earth today and i am so greatful for all that our savior has done with his infinite atoning sacrifice! i hope you all have a great week!!:):)

Snow Snow and More Snow

HELLO EVERYONE!!:)

 

  What a great week it has been in Norway! This week has been quite an off and on busy week! from having a full day of contacting and knocking doors all night, to having full days of no time to breath and hardly time to even eat and not even taking a full hour to eat since its just been busy! To a degree there is alot to tell and at the same time not to much to tell haha! Everyday is a new day in missionary work! its weird to look at the time through out the day and wonder where the time really has gone! you look at the clock at lunch then at dinner and then realize that its already time to go to bed and then by the time you know it, its time to wake up already! for those of you that served missions did you ever feel like you fall asleep, have no dreams, and then wake up and yet you feel like you just barely closed your eyes? Of course you have its life as a missionary:) but yet you are usually for the most part well rested! its incredible how that works!

  So this week has not been that cold and actually has been about -5 to 3C so its been snowing alot off and on and then when it gets above 0 just starts pooring rain and then freezes so just lots of ice everywhere! i cant even tell you how man times i fell this week walking on ice and as much as it hurts to have bruises all over your arms you tend to get up and just bust up laughing....since your companion just told you to be carfull an then He just slipped too:) Weather is so interesting! so i ended my no sun at 35 days! my Companion ended at 95! sunday was a day of triumph as we looked out the church building which faces west so we saw the shadows of buildings and we ran outside and just started giving thanks for the warm sun on our faces!:) its hard to appreciate the sun when you always have it! when you dont have it you really start to miss it and just the meer sight of seeing it makes you shout for joy! Especially Elder Johnson! Well it wasnt a big deal to run out of the church at that time, i mean we only spent an hour preparing a lesson for ourselfs anyway! no i have the experiance of not having anyone in church! it was quite interesting! Elder Johnson and i got BIG peices of bread;)...and ate til we were full....no im kidding....partially:)

  So Great news for everyone! since being in a place that missionaries usually go to end there mission and not having much success or not much to do here, we as obediant missionaries went through the area book and we have now gone through all our formers all 85 of them since 2005! we had no success at all after going through 78 and then the last 7 of them we got return appointments!!! so it takes patience:) so it pays off going through the area book:)

  I am so happy to tell you that our investigator who was baptized last week is getting the priesthood today and is going to be a witness at the baptism tomorrow since he couldnt make it to church yesterday:) he is was excited! he gets to witness his best friends baptizm! he wont go in the water or else he would baptize him haha:) so i get the great honor in going to a very beautiful place called Aldersund, Norway! i encourage you to look it up! its gorgeous! they both are so excited and it fills my companion and I with joy to see how much happier people become after their own baptism! feb 14th a valentines day actually worth remembering:)

  We have done lots of contacting in the past week and lots of knocking on doors with little to no success, but thats ok:) we are so blessed anyway! to get as random as it gets our investigator who wants to be baptized called us this past week and we made a baptismal interview super fast so we had to have the elders in Bodø come down on a second notice take a three hour train ride and come down for a partial day sleep over and go to his house in the day time which almost got canceled but we ended up scheduling it earlier in the day so that we could make it down to his house in Mosjøen which is another hour south and you take a train which we were lucky to make!! then after interviewing him he said he wanted to wait until next wednesday! so thursdays are planning but we were busy all day so we had to do planning after we interviewed him since there are only 3 trains that go through there all day! 1030 330 920! so we sat in the train station from 630-920 planning and trying to get things planned for this week which is super busy with zone konferance and also 2 baptizms! its going to be a crazy week but i know the lord will be with us to help us get to all our appointments!!:)

  I love you all so much and thanks for all our support! i love being out here in Norway and not just because its an incredible place but its where i am suppose to be and i love serving here! norway is full of people waiting to here the gospel! in a conference not to long ago with all the europian missions our mission president was told that the lords light is over Norway and that there is going to be alot of amazing things that are going to start happening!!:) I can promise you that that promise is true and its only becoming more true as the days pass on! i love missionary work and i love serving the lord! i am so thankfull for everyday i have to be on a mission and it truly does go by so fast i can hardly even believe it sometimes! the lord blesses us in mysterious ways that is just to hard to comprehend sometimes! i know this is Christ`s Restored Church! i know that we have a living prophet today which is so incredible with all his apostels and his other workers! i know the Atonement is the bridging gap for us here in earth and has made it possible for us to come back to live with our heavenly father! i love this gospel with all my hearte and thats why i am here! To serve our lord and savior and show him my own willingness to serve! i hope you all have a great week and cant wait to here from you all!!:):)

           -ELDSTE FARNSWORTH

HELLO FRIENDS AND FAMILY:)

 

  What a great and very intense week it has been! there is so much to talk about and i really dont even know where to start! So even though the weather here has just been way cold as the sea breeze comes in and just having wind with water freeze your face we push forward anyway with the long days of contacting!:) Mo I Rana is a small city and even smaller than my last area! its more of a industri place but yet only a couple industries are even here! We contact the same people everyday hoping they will eventually start to come the their senses one of these days haha!:) Or the best is when the old ladies grab your arm and tell you to go back to home to mommy which is always funny and actually keeps your sense of humor high or sometimes they will go for the cheek pinch which i Do not like!:)

 

 As far as this week goes we MOVED IN TO OUR NYDELIG APPARTMENT!! Not that its crazy big but its very nice and it has been modernized with nice lights and a modern kitchen thats quite big actually so we have been making a lot of very delicious food lately with our investigators( waffles, pizza, soups)! its also very warm and i am so greatful for a warm place to study and not peeing in a bottle to later empty it out downstairs since the bathroom upstairs didnt work in our last appartment haha! now we have a great bathroom with a real shower!! well we managed to but together our bunkbed with no tools...dont ask how...haha and it works just fine...until the night came and the planks that support the bed on the top and elder johnson just about killed me and good thing i was already up and i rolled out of bed real fast and he came down to the bottom bunk! so we called our neighbor in the morning and borrowed a drill to tighten down the bed planks for the mattresses!:) its been fine eversince!:)

 

  Thursday i took my first train to a place called Mosjøen well actually two busses to there and then we road a train back! we had an investigator call last week and tell us that he moved out from his girl friends and was quiting snus and told us he is ready to be baptized! so we said SAWEET and we got there as fast as possible! he has already read mormons bok, D&C(multiple times) and pearl of great price! we went through the questions for baptism and he passed all of them and now just finding a date when he will be intown! the ways the lord blesses us as we do our best to do everything we can to be obedient! it is truly incredible and mysterious how the lord works sometimes! So as for another investigator who we have been working with, decided that he wanted to get baptized on sunday the 5th so yesterday and decided that on monday! We were very shocked at this response but we did everything to make it work and i sometimes just wasnt sure with how everything was going and oh boy how the lord blessed us as we fasted and prayed and this past sunday (yesterday) it all worked out! ill attatch some pictures so you can see where he was  baptized....lets just say it was -15 out yesterday and he knew of a spot where he wanted it so we drove there and jumped into a FREEZING COLD FJORD! Not me anyway but my comp and it was hilarious watching them! its was incredibly spiritual even though it was the fastest baptism i have ever seen in my life haha! wonder why right?:) but the most amazing part was when we conferred the HOLY GHOST and it was like i could feel the spirit through my hands on his head just enter into his body! i have never felt anything like it! it was truly spiritual! we spent all the rest of the day with him and made great food and watched some videos with him! When we gave him his brand new mormons bok he freaked out and was jumping with joy and told us how much he had been wanting one! he is such a great kid! Our next baptism is for the 14th and he is so excited for it and after he watched the baptizm it only made him have a stronger desire! His testimony is getting stronger and stronger everyday!!well looks like i will be freezing next week in the Fjord! not to mention we just got a foot of snow today! I LOVE THE SNOW IN NORWAY its just like utah! i have heard some say utah is still better for skiing, maybe one day i will find out:)

 

 well to tell you an incredibly awkward moment...try district meeting over webcam in a library with lots of people and then doing a practical....yea it was quite the experiance and the looks we got was quite funny! good thing everyone here knows us right?:)

 

 so i also got to see very good northern lights this week which are always beautiful and everynight as we are out we probably look like retards as we are looking straight up in the sky spinning in circles and asking where the lights are!:) when ever you see them its just one of those reminders to me that god truly does miracles and they are one of them! So also one Incredible thing this week is we had a full house in church today almost all the 15 seats in the church were taken up! we had 10 ppl in church and my companion and I! 12 thats a new record! plus to investigators! so it was a great turn out and actually the mission president was there since we havent really had a branch president so he came down to decide on one:) it made the lesson go alot smoother i just say that:)

 

   Wow its really been a week that as i look back i really see how blessed we have been! after the long hours we put in contacting and knocking with out a single teach does pay off trust me it really does! even though you just want to throw down the book of mormon and go home its at the time that the lord will test your patience most! trust me i see it everyday but when you have a good attitude about being out it makes a world of difference! i can see the lords hand in our work as we push on with faith that he will bless us but first we have to test our faith as in ether and in alma! excersize the faith! let the seed grow and if it grows you know its a good seed! i love being a missionary and it truly is one of the most blessed times of my life i am sure of that! i know this church is true and that we have the whole true church which christ restored to the earth and know that we have restored again to the earth! i love the book of mormon and it truly can give you answers when you really try to find an answer! put all your heart into finding out what is the next step in your life and the lord will give you the answer when you truly look for it! remember it takes a trial of your faith before the lord will do his part! we have to meet him 1/2 way before he will take the other 1/2! i love this church and i love and miss you all! hope all goes well with you all!!!:)

 

 eldste Farnsworth