Dåb nummer et!

Davs!

 

So Davids was baptized this Saturday! It was great to get to be a part of that, I showed up after he had made the decision and been taught most of what he needed and so I was just part of the official preparation for his interview and then just got to watch him seal the deal and join his family in the church! His nine year old sister gave a talk at the baptism about how she was happy he was joining her so that was really neat to watch!

 

 

Davids had a family friend from the Ward baptize and confirm him. He's all set to go!

 

So I forgot to tell you guys something in my last email. I gave my first Blessing in Danish! This was the day before we talked to that naked guy. Me and Ældste Larsen made an appointment with a member named Daniel Pedersen who wanted to just talk with us. We went in his house and the guy had a PMG, Quad set of scriptures, the Liahona, and everything else you could imagine lined up on his table ready to go and had the nametag of the missionary who baptized him as well. He was nearly impossible to understand because he slurred his speech and had Mo-Tab music on really loud right behind him. According to Elder Larsen he's hard to understand anyway because he is kind of an odd guy but really loves the church. We shared a thought on Alma 32 (basically my favorite chapter in the Book of Mormon) and after asked if he needed anything. In his response I caught that he mentioned a blessing, but what I hadn't caught is that he asked us, and specifically asked me if I'd give him a priesthood Blessing. So that kind of scared me because I literally had the amount of time it took to open the White hand book to make sure I got the translation right for the first part to prepare for it. I hope he got something from it. I was able to speak clearly the Whole time without ever needing to pause for a Word so that was cool to see how the Words weren't as big of a block as I thought they would be.

 

This week itself hasn't been super eventful. We've been focusing on Fredjuf and transitioning because this next week is Elder Larsen's last full week. I'm a Little worried about Fredjuf though because we are going to have to move his baptisimal date back a bit. After talking with him some more we kind of got the feel that he didn't quite understand how big of a commitment it was. To give him a better idea we brought him to Davids's baptism and talked with him and the bishop about how it was representing a promise and how he needed an answer. He told us it was a bigger commitment than he had thought and he didn't show up to church yesterday.

 

:(

 

Regardless I still think he'll get there, we just need to have a few more talks with him where we make sure he knows that this is totally up to him and that we aren't going to pressure him. That's something me and Ældste Larsen were worried about. We just figured that we was set because he had been the one to come to us and ask us about baptism. We were more focused on making sure that he got all the lessons officially taught and that he was all set for the 2nd as his date rather than making sure he had a real Desire. That was a lesson learned. We'll be trying to fix everything and make sure Fredjuf keeps that excitement that he's had the past few weeks about everything that we've been teaching him. I know he's ready, but it's hard to judge exactly what he needs when he answers a lot of our questions by being unspecific and mumbling a half of an answer... With Elder Larsen leaving soon I hope we can get this set.

 

We also made pumpkins this week for Halloween!

 

 

 

We made them with the Hall Family. Ken Hall is a stellar member. Each of the missionaries that serve in Odense that meet Ken usually earn a nickname, and usually it's degrading haha. He calls me Pee-Wee because he says I look like a blonde PeeWee Herman. I don't think so.

Anyway Ken is putting on a haunted house for the missionaries to invite less actives or recent converts or even investigators to come and have a good time (MEMBER MISSIONARY WORK FOR THE WIN!). This is great cause his Family has been through a rough time the last two years with divorce and the economy but he still makes this effort to give his kids a fun halloween and to help the missionaries out for being a good example to his Family. I'm pumped because Mik told us he's gonna stop by.

 

Mik is the coolest guy ever. I don't have time to tell his story but he's great.

 

Other than that I've just been enjoying my life in the promise land of Odense! I literally can't imagine a better area. We had a new missionary meeting where I got to see almost my Whole MTC group again and everyone told me the great Things they've heard about Odense. It's a really cool city with an incredible Ward and when you walk Down the street sometimes you run into Things like this just chilling on the side of the road:

 

 

 

I think it's supposed to be HC Andersen. They love that guy here. Like even the streetlights in Odense are the outline of a guy with a cane that is supposed to be HC Andersen. It's kindof over the top.

 

It's rains a lot

everyone is blonde

still a lot of bikes

 

Oh! I did some actual door contacting this week. We've mostly been busy with Fredjuf and Davids getting baptized and the other people we usually stop by but we had an appointment fall through and got stranded in a college home for an hour so we knocked and I realized just how much I still can't understand Danish. I can talk a lot but I can't listen and that's the most important part. DONT WORRY IM WORKING ON IT! I translate everything in church under my breath to make sure I'm actively listening cause it's so easy to let a foreign language go in one ear and out the other.

 

Anyway, I'd been having a bit of a harder time earlier this week feeling almost like the reason a lot of missionaries where out here was just because that was our culture as Mormon's and that that included me. Well knocking doors helped because there was this one college student who tried to use some ridiculous logic to disprove our message and I WANTED TO SPEAK SO BAD! But I couldn't because I was only kind of sure what he was saying. Regardless I told him what I knew and then we left. It really helped remind me that I trully do believe this message can help peole and that even though I may not have that unshakable faith Elder Holland talked about in Konference last year I need to hold my ground in what I do know. It's been great to learn that in this last week.

 

So BARE YOUR TESTIMONY TO PEOPLE cause sometimes it helps it grow.

 

Anyways, this is Peewee signing out.

 

Till next time!