WOW! So much has happened this last week and i don't know where to begin. I'll start out again by answering some of your questions. The new missionary is great. His name is Elder Van Wagoner from Highland Utah. He graduated in 2011 and his whole family has gone to BYU. His dad is a financial advisor for merrill and lynch. He likes to boat, ski, and ride mountain bikes. His language is pretty good for just starting. It has been a huge responsibility but i have already learned a lot. The house looks really good and if i was home i would probably be up there inspecting it everyday haha. It was so good to hear from all of you on the recording. Having a greenie reminds me a lot of home for some reason. I miss you guys like crazy and it has been kind of difficult this last week. I love you guys so much and i love hearing from all of you each week. There really isn't a better present in the world than just hearing from you all. The house looks really good though and it looks like your going to have a decent size backyard. I still haven't seen snow yet but i know that its just around the corner. The other day i had my thermals, sweater, scarf, gloves, and coat and i was still a little cold. I had on everything i own haha. That worries me but I'm sure I'll be fine. It has been in the mid 40s this last week. I have been getting a lot of hot chocolate lately. I bought this cup at the gas station for like 30 bucks that gives me unlimited hot chocolate for one year. Not a bad deal in Norway. It has been getting dark now at about 4:30... DEPRESSING. The mission has made a goal to get 20 baptisms each month for the next three months. This has made me kind of stressed because i want to get a baptism each month. I don't think Ive ever been so stressed in my life. I want the greenie to have a really good experience and i want to have success. It has kept me very busy. I need to relax and put my trust in the Lord. I shouldn't be so stressed out about things but i am. I think i get it from dad haha. A lot happened this last week. This week I've seen so many miracles. I told you about Andrè last week. He is a Norwegian kid that is 19 years old. I've been able to become really good friends with him. We met with him on Tuesday and committed him to be baptized on Dec. 2. It was an amazing experience and the spirit was so strong. We met him at the institute center that just opened downtown. We didn't have time to park outside of town so we payed for parking downtown. The lesson went a little over what we expected so when we got back to our car we were four minutes late and had a 700kr parking ticket. Over 100US bucks! That wasn't to fun but we couldn't really get mad because of what just happened with Andrè. I have been keeping in contact with him everyday to make sure we don't lose this kid. He was in Farslund over the weekend so he wasn't able to come to church. He also hasn't answered my texts in a couple of days. I have been so worried about that and maybe that's why I'm so stressed. I have fasted and have pleaded with the Lord that everything will work out with Andrè. On Wednesday i picked up my new companion at the airport and we dropped off his stuff at the apartment and got to work contacting in the city. We have given out 4 baptismal commitments this week and we have been very bold in inviting others to repent and come unto Christ. On Wednesday we went and visited this investigator who is trying to stop smoking. His neighbor does not like us at all and was yelling at us and telling us to leave. We went inside and shared a message with him that went really well. When we walked out the door his neighbor was waiting for us. He started chewing us out and yelling at us. He came up to me and started pushing me around and than punched me in the arm. A guy came running up and got the guy to calm down. I'm pretty sure my greenie was scared out of him mind haha. I'm alright though and the punch didn't really hurt. On Friday we had district meeting in Arendal and it was probably the best district I've been to. The District leader is Elder Bennett and his companion is Elder Wandtke from my group in the MTC. Elder Bennett used to be AP and is a really good missionary. He has his whole life planned out after his mission and he actually reminds me a lot of myself. We got side tracked after the meeting talking about business and all things were going to do haha. His meeting was focused on following the spirit. He told to pray to God for specific things and with Faith the Lord will answer you. So that night we put it to the test. It was getting late and we had 45 min to knock on doors. We said a prayer and asked for three specific things to happen. Receive one return appointment, one lesson, and just nice people to talk to. This first door we knocked on we got a return appointment. The last door we knocked on we taught him the plan of salvation and everyone we talked to were really nice. Prayer really works and that experience strengthened my testimony that God is really there answering our prayers. A similar experience happened on Saturday and God answered all our prayers. On Sunday we had a really good meeting and Elder Van Wagoner gave his first talk in church in Norwegian. It was really good and than i gave a talk after him. I feel like it was by far the best talk I've given. After sacrament meeting was over a member came up to me and was telling me that she can hear the Kristiansand dialect coming from me. If I'm starting to sound like a Norwegian I'm very happy.
We have a fairly large pool of investigators but not many of them are progressing. We have met some really cool people this last week so hopefully some of those start progressing. I will be going to Stavanger this week for zone conference on Thursday and will probably drive back that night. Pray for Andrè that he will be able to get baptized. Tell Grandma thanks for everything she does. I will be writing her a letter today. I will go look at back packs today and i'll come back and tell you prices later today. I love you all and i hope you have a wonderful week.
Eldste Godfrey
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