6/16/14

Hey Guys!

Big wards are pretty different. I say big ward haha. I guess 150 ish isn't that big... For Norway its pretty big. I don't know how i feel about it. I like it. But at the same time, I loved skien because they were way involved with the missionaries.  The bishop here is pretty cool. He's not real involved with us. I've only talked to him a couple times outside of the time we ate dinner with them.  SO its just getting used to it i guess. It'd be hard there to get to know the missionaries in utah i think. TO be over multiple wards.  Especially when the ward is fully functioning and don't really need help from the missionaries at least... SO they think!!! I hope to help them with missionary work. In priesthood yesterday they talked about magnifying our call. And I thought about how the call of every member is to do missionary work.  We have to magnify that call.  One thing they talked about was how the spirit is vital in magnifying your call. You have to allow the spirit to guide to do that which is best in your call. So i am even more set on my plan to help the members.  They all have to have friends who are outside of the church. Somebody they just know at least. And when we visit members we kind of remind them how the gospel has helped them in their lives, and then ask if theres people they can pray for. And that we can pray for too. Also so we get a name so we can follow up with up with how its going. Its a process I took from skien.  Pray to know who you should help first if you don't think of anybody at first. Then pray for them and for opportunities to share the gospel. But you have to be looking for these opportunities as well.  And act on them. Then we after a couple follow ups ask them if they can invite them to an activity or to church or even just dinner or activity night with the family.  (with prayer included of course) and then ask them to invite them to meet with the missionaries. We are just getting this started and we are trying to start with the ward council and then onward. It is awesome. We have a couple names that we have gotten already.  Its a big ward so i think it is very possible to get a big list.  Our prayers every night will be getting very long.  :) I hope so at least.  It would help so much! Especially since here in norway they don't like talking about religion for the most part with random kids in suits on the street. But it's ok. Because missionary work still works! Bu i feel like it could go up so much more with the members help.  But yeah thats my speil that i have been giving my comp for a while now haha.  

Anyway sounds like you guys had a good week. I hope you and dad had fun. Its sounds pretty exciting.  Are you sure you wouldn't want to go to that? (olympic Park) It sounds like fun ha.  Good luck with school though mom!  SOunds like you're all super busy this summer. That's good though. Don't want to get used to not doing anything. That's never good.  Way to add your mark to the van jacob! I feel like that van is very personalized by us haha. At least mine didn't damage the car that i hit... haha This week was pretty good. We taught **. Hes an investigator that has been meeting with the missionaries for a while. HE comes to church pretty much every week. He really wants to get baptized. He knows it's true. HE just has to get some paper work back from the government so he can find a new living situation... Then he can be baptized! So We keep praying for that.  We visited a couple members this week and got started on the plan for member work. THat's pretty exciting. The members here for the most part are super nice and helpful. So i am excited to get to know all of them. That will be nice.  I've got quite a few down though!! WE taught another investigator named ***. Hes awesome. Hes a JW. But he doesn't follow all their rules. Like he's not that scared of us, so i don't think hes passed the class, and he meets with us by himself. And he doesn't argue and try and prove his church right without listening to our side first. It's pretty cool teaching him.  This week we gave him the talk called the blueprint of christs church by elder callister. Its super solid and just shows our church doctrines from out of the bible.  We used a cup tower thing to Demonstrate it. It stumped him on a couple things. So hopefully he will actually pray to know if its true.  I hope so. Its cool seeing the spirit work in people though! SO powerful! Even when they don't believe in the spirit its still there! WE tried some banking and kontakting this week a lot. I learned that the world cup is going on after a few people told me i should be watching the cup not disturbing everyone else when they're watching the cup! So that was fun. But it was a good week everything is going awesome! *** went back to bergen again... So hopefully she goes to the missionaries there.  But i am doing great! Love you guys hope you have a fantastic week!

Love Eldste Blake NEwey