(no subject)

It was a pretty jammin' week! Lots of good things happened this week so we were kept pretty busy! I'll just jump straight into it!

It started off pretty awesome! We on Tuesday woke up to it snowing a ton! So we got all our winter gear on and headed off into it! It was really fun to be in the snow, but being in the city means that the snow gets packed down and pretty slippery really quick! I haven't fallen yet but I don't think that that'll last too long. Having everything look so snowy and with some lights getting put up has been really cool and has gotten me excited for Christmas. But sadly the snow already melted! I expect it to come back soon and I really love how 'Christmasy' it makes everything look.

But before we really get into Christmas I have to talk about Thanksgiving. Our district of 8 all had Thanksgiving together, and we had a senior couple come that was kind enough to make us the food! So we had real turkey! And then also mashed potatoes and stuffing and all the other stuff! So that was tons of fun and was a good reminder of home and the holiday. It was awesome!

Well, I this point I'm realizing that most of the stuff this week was pretty typical, so I don't have a ton of stuff to talk about. But there was a really cool thing that happened to us this week. We were at the Book of Mormon musical passing out books and talking to people like normal. Like was typical we passed out a ton of books and had several good conversations with people. But then as we were about to return home for the evening at about 11:00 at night (we have special permission to stay out late for it), we were approached by a person. She started asking us questions and was really interested in our message and our church. She said she had seen the musical before and had several questions about us. And then she asked us if she could meet with us and we said, 'definitely'! It was really cool to find someone so interested who sought us out, and it reminded me that the Lord does prepare people for us to meet.

Well, I best be going. But I do know that the Lord is looking out for all of us and that he puts people in our path that we can help. We should always be looking out for the chance to be an example and to let our light shine. Oh, and everyone should do the Light the World initiative!!!

Have a fantastic week,
Äldste Nelson

Pic 1-2: The view outside our apartment and of the church near our apartment
Pic 3-4: The snow at the park in Karlaplan (where we live)
Pic 5: Our Thanksgiving (sorry, it's the only picture I have!)
Pic 6: Some cool moose light things. Fun fact, those moose lights are like 20 feet tall (haha, I walked under one of them!)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

yeah yeah, I know that Thanksgiving hasn't happened yet, but I can still appreciate Christmas before Thanksgiving is over! Especially because there are a ton of lights being put up and it's beginning to snow more! This week has gone by really well, and there have been some really cool miracles that we've seen here in Stockholm. Anyways, I'll just hop into it!

All of our investigators are doing well. We've continued to meet with Brandon who was recently baptized and he is still doing really well. We are still working with him towards the goal getting him to the temple to do baptisms soon. We also have been making some progress with another person who is from Sweden, so hopefully that continues on and he keeps progressing. Not a ton of movement, but things are still going.

This week was Stake Conference for us, so we went to a session on Saturday night and on Sunday. On Sunday I was asked to look up the scripture that were referenced during people's talks in English so that the person who was translating could read them. And it was more stressful than I thought it would be! Someone would mention a scripture reference and start reading so I had to find them fast so that the translation wouldn't be held up. Someone would say 'Isaiah 55 kapitel 8 till och med 9' and I had to turn there as fast as fast as possible. And it wasn't too bad or anything until someone quoted a scripture in 'ordspråkboken' and I had no idea what that meant! It turns out that that is the book Psalms in Swedish (maybe proverbs, I still can't remember). But the translation person turned to me and expected me to have the scripture opened up but I was just sitting there not knowing what to do. But besides that it went really well and I really liked Stake Conference!

We saw several really cool miracles this week, and I think I'll tell one or two of them really quickly. For one of them we were just walking down the street while going to the Tunnelbana (The subway here) station. We just decided to stop and talk to someone on a street corner, and as soon as we started talking we realized that they didn't speak English or Swedish. We couldn't really communicate with them, but we tried our best to explain who we were and that we were talking about Christ. The man spoke Spanish and kept gesturing to himself and us saying something. Turns out that he is actually a member from Colombia who is visiting Sweden! Through the wonders of Google Translate we were able to find out that he was lost and needed help getting somewhere. We were able to help him and he also wanted to know where church was this Sunday, so we gave him that information also. It was really cool to be able to help someone out so much and to just be there to give them some assistance when they needed it.

The other really cool thing that happened this week was while we were grocery shopping this week. We were looking at tortillas or something (Not important to the story) and then a person came up and started talking to us. She asked if we were Mormons and we were like, 'uh, yeah, that's us!'. She turned out to be a member who had moved here. She told us that she hadn't thought there was the church here because she was from another country, but we were able to help her and give her the address and time of our ward on Sunday. It was a strange meeting but was a cool way to help someone out.

Anyways, this week has been good and it has been a blessing to see how the Lord really looks out for all of us. He knows out circumstances and will help us when we need it. It was a blessing to be able to be someone who was able to help 2 of those children out when they needed it. Remember that the Lord knows you and cares deeply about all of His children, including you. Have a wonderful week!

Äldste Nelson


Pic 1-2: There is a church that we are near. It was pretty awesome inside!
Pic 3: The view over the water near Gamla Stan
Pic 4: It's me!
Pic 5: Christmas lights are coming!!
Pic 6: We walked out of our apartment and there was a horse... so I took a picture of it. Yup, that's the whole story!

(Elder Nelson's Mom here: Sorry this is sideways.  It's right on my computer and I can't convince Blogger to change it.)

(no subject)

Hello all! So actually not that much happened this week, it was just a normal week. But there were a couple things of note so I'll talk about those!

We officially have started to teach Brandon (the guy who was baptized) the post-baptism lessons! And they've actually been really fun! The first one we did was the restoration, and we changed the teaching up a little bit. We did a roleplay-like thing where Brandon and my companion acted like the missionaries and they taught me (a fake investigator in this senario) the first lesson. It was really cool because we could see his depth of understanding and also it was a blessing to be able to hear his testimony. It worked out really well and I feel like it was a success! Things are going well, and we hope to go to the temple with him in around 2 weeks or so!

Christmas is coming up pretty soon! And the stores here seem to know it. There are a ton of lights being put up near T Central (The big central train station) and it looks beautiful! You really get to appreciate them with how early the sun goes down! In anticipation to Christmas me and my companion have started listening to Christmas music that he has (hooray MoTab and Vocal Point). But we also have a lot of Christmas hymns that are in Swedish to listen to, so that's adds a bit of variety to our music choices. A bit of a side note here, we actually haven't had much snow or anything yet. But it's now been around 2 degrees Celcius during the day for the last day or two. So I'm expecting it to snow pretty soon! It'll be exciting!

Things weren't really that exciting or different this week! We went to the Book of Mormon Musical a few times and handed out books, which was fun and exciting like usual. But besides that we did a lot of contacting on the street (hoooray!). It is really slow work sometimes, but it is awesome to see the miracles that sometimes take place. For instance, I stopped someone on the street and began to talk with them. I found out that they had a really strong faith in Christ so I began to give a really quick overview about the Restoration. He had to leave to catch a train, but he gave me his phone number and I left him with a Restoration pamphlet. Then a few days later we called him and he sounded like he really enjoyed the pamphlet and that he had read through it. We met with him once and it went well. We had to refer him to other missionaries that were nearby because he doesn't actually live in Stockholm, but they recently told us that they started meeting with him and that things are still progressing quickly with him. It was a cool experience to be able to help someone learn about the truths that I believe and that our contacting led to some success!

Anyways, I think that's all for this week. I hope things will go well for you all this coming week!


Äldste Nelson


Pic 1: Me on Drottninggatan, the high pedestrian shopping street in Stockholm
Pic 2-3: The water and pier right down the street from our apartment

He got baptized!

Hello everyone! It's been a pretty good week here in Sweden. The exciting thing is that the investigator we have been working with got baptized on Saturday! And it was really awesome. He is from El Salvador and has been living in Sweden for several years. He also speaks Spanish and Swedish which is cool. He had began being taught about a month ago and progressed really fast and is just a solid dude.

My companion actually did the baptism and he spent a long time learning to say it is Spanish, so that is what the actual baptism was done in. It sounded awesome and I think was more meaningful to Brandon (the person who was baptised) that way. I gave a talk at his baptism (yeah, my second one this week!) and that went ok. It certainly does not get less scary to give a talk in Swedish on your second try! But everything for the baptism went smoothly and we were able to get a lot of people to show up which was really good.

Brandon's confirmation then took place in church on Sunday and it was done by a member in our ward who has become friends with Brandon and spokes Spanish also. So his confirmation was done in Spanish too. It was a really cool experience even though I couldn't really understand anything he said. Haha, but that's not super uncommon for me right now!

Another awesome thing that took place this week was that we had my first Zone Conference. And it was really fun and I was able to learn a lot. It was especially good to see the other people in my zone that came out with me to Sweden and were in the MTC with me. I didn't think it would be that awesome to see them again but it was! In zone conference we learned a lot of stuff and how to better communicate and converse with Swedes, but we also had some interesting news. We are going to be made a technology mission! I think that's going to be really helpful and improve how things go here.

It's been a really good week here. I have loved watching Brandon progress and to see his testimony and faith grow. He bore his testimony after his baptism and it was just great. I felt so happy for him when he was baptized and I believe the Lord did also. I hope everyone has a good week!


Äldste Nelson


Pic 1-3: My companion, our investigator, and myself
Pic 4: All the Stockholm area missionaries (Elders and Sisters)

Fwd: Baptism on Saturday!

Hello everyone, I hope your week went well! Things are pretty good here! Firstly, we have an investigator that is going to be baptized this Saturday! He has been taught all the lessons, had his interview, and now has the service planned out for it. He really is such a stud and is awesome. It's been such a good experience to work with him and teach him about the gospel. I will let you know how the actual service goes next week.

It has officially gotten pretty cold here! The temperatures are just above 0 C (it is 2 C outside right now) and that is just around 35 degrees or so in Fahrenheit. So it's pretty chilly! And it is so strange because the sun sets so early already! We had daylight savings on Saturday, and that made it even worse. I think that the sun set at around 4:00 yesterday:( but its ok. It is strange for it to seem like it is late at night so early though.

This week we had the chance to go and do service at the temple here in Sweden. We planted flowers and worked at the grounds there for around 5 hours. And I enjoyed being around the temple so much! It felt good to be on the temple grounds and to help make it a more beautiful place. It was pretty cold that day, but it was still a blessing to be able to go out and help make it look awesome! (I'll attach a picture I took of it).

This week I got to go on splits, and it was exciting because it was my first time. A split is where you trade companions with another missionary from another companionship for 24 hours. And what made it even more exciting (scary, actually) was that I was put with another new missionary. They had only been out for around 8 weeks. So with the two of us combined we had about 11 weeks of living in Sweden, which means our Swedish was pretty horrible! But it turned out to be really fun! We couldn't understand a lot, but we did our best to talk to people! We also had two lessons to teach, so that was interesting also! We did our best and things turned out pretty well, and I was able to learn a lot that day.

I also had the opportunity to give a talk in church on Sunday, and that was an experience! I had the whole thing written out but I was still pretty worried about it. I don't really like to give talks in English, so having to give one in Swedish did not make it any easier! I gave kind of a simple talk about the role of the Savior in our Heavenly Father's plan for us to return to Him. I felt really good about it before I gave it, but I did get really nervous. I stumbled my way through it though! It wasn't super understandable, but I think I was (sorta) able to get my message across. People in the ward told me I did a good job for being here only 3 weeks, but I think they were just being nice. But it's ok because I got through it, and I was grateful for the opportunity to share my testimony of the Savior.

That's about all for me this week! I hope that you all had a good week and that things will go well for you this next week too!

Vi ses,
Äldste Nelson

Photo 1: Me, in Gamla Stan (Really old part of the city)

Photo 2-4: More pictures of Gamla Stan. The streets are super close together!

Photo 5: The Sunset we had Sunday night. It was only 4:00 in the evening!

Photo 6-7: Planting flowers at the temple

The Streets of Stockholm

Things are finally getting into more of a routine, which is a beautiful thing! And the jet lag is gone, which is also very appreciated. The week has been really good for us in Stockholm. Our investigators are progressing, the weather hasn't been too cold or anything, and all the beautiful leaves on the trees have started to fall. It looks amazing right now!

Our investigator Brandon is doing well and is still on track for his baptismal date on Nov 4. Hopefully things keeps going well! He has been coming to institute and FHE, and he also came to church this week. And the church was awesome! It was the Primary Program in the ward here, and it was the most adorable thing I've seen. It was just a bunch of little kids singing Primary songs in Swedish and it was so cute! I think our investigator thought it was good also.

We have also been having some success with a less active we are working with, and this week was the first week he came to church in a while! And we have finally started to help an old investigator who hadn't really progressed much want to come to church and learn more, so that's good too!

Sweden is a really similar place to the US in some ways, but also really different in others. For instance, it feels like all the cars here are super nice and expensive! We see super expensive cars all the time, and we also see some other kinda strange sights. For instance, we have seen several taxis that are Teslas! It is just so strange to see a Tesla used as a taxi, but it isn't uncommon. And also it seems like all the garbage trucks and a ton of construction trucks are Mercedes, and it is just strange to see!

Things are going well, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to invite the people here to come unto Christ and to help them do that. I can see the hand of God in the work here as we have worked with people and with the members.

Until next week,
Elder Nelson

I'm officially in Sweden (and have been for a week)

Wow, I have a ton to talk about. So I'll get right into it. So we packed and got ready to leave the MTC a week and a half ago so we could leave on Monday morning at around 4:50. Sunday night turned into a pretty late night because it turned out someone in our room had not begun packing until 10:00 that night. But it was still good and it was actually really sad to say goodbye to everyone else in the MTC and the people on our floor. But even though it was hard, we got up at 3:45 the next morning and headed out around 4:30. We had a little time in the airport before we left and so we stopped to get breakfast burritos at the Cafe Rio at the Salt Lake airport. And it was so awesome because someone random in front of us in the line payed for all of the missionaries who were there (there were 9 in line) without telling us. It was really nice of them!

Anyways, out first flight left at around 10, we stopped in Minneapolis for a few minutes and had to hurry to our next flight, which was to Amsterdam. That flight was really fun because it was 80% empty! So we could spread out a little bit and so were able to sleep a lot better. I was able to get around 3 or so hours of sleep there, which isn't great but it did feel really good. And then after Amsterdam it was a short flight to Stockholm Sweden.

Right at first we were able to meet our mission president and all of the Assistants and everyone. It was exciting! It was also weird to have all the signs in Swedish! That day we did a lot, but as part of it we explored Stockholm a little with the assistants. And it is really so beautiful! We stayed in the mission home that night, and it was some of the best sleep I've had in my life. I had only had around 6 hours of sleep in the last 50-60 hours. It was some very needed sleep!

The next morning we did a little orientation in the morning, and then headed to my chapel to get assigned our areas and senior companion. Our group of missionaries got spread all over the country, but I was assigned to the Stockholm Area with Äldste Olaveson, my trainer. He's been out here 4.5 months. Our area is the area in the center of Stockholm. We have an apartment right next to the ocean and get to street contact in the busy streets of the main city in Sweden. There is always a lot going on but it is such a beautiful place.

Right now we have one investigator who is really awesome. His name is Brandon and he can speak Spanish and Swedish, no English. But teaching him is awesome! He had agreed to be baptized already when I came in and he is such an amazing guy. Whatever we teach him he grasps so quickly and agrees to it. He came to church with us on Sunday and if things continue to go well, he should be baptized on November 4th or 5th. Besides Brandon we have a few other people we are teaching. We are meeting with one or two less actives and then (trying really hard) to keep meeting with another person. It's fun and enjoyable to teach the gospel, but my lack of Swedish is pretty frustrating!

I think my favorite things we've done so far is pass out copies of the Book of Mormon and the Book of Mormon Musical. It is a play that is pretty against the church and makes fun of a lot of things, but we hand out copies of the Book or Mormon after it's over because a lot of people are interested after the play. It is awesome to have people actually interested in what we are saying (usually when we contact of the street people aren't interested at all) and it is just fun to do it with a lot of other missionaries! We usually hand out a hundred or more at each showing of the musical, and I personally have gotten to do it 3 times since coming here.

This is pretty long so I think I'm going to end it now. The language is coming along pretty well (well, kinda) and this is such a beautiful place. Have a great week!

Sincerely,
Elder Nelson


Also, I'll send some pictures in another email

Pic 1: Me and my comp, Äldste Olaveson

Pic 2: Street view near T Central

Pic 3: The view outside of our apartment through the window

Pic 4: All the missionaries at the Book of Mormon Musical