The Other World, Interviews with Mission President, The Return of the Ginger? Institute

 Tuesday March 26, 2024

Hey everyone! Kinda a crazy but fun week. Our friends are progressing really well. Simon lost his phone so he hasn't been texting us (we know because we saw someone post about his lost phone and wallet in the community FB chat, so we're trying to get in contact with those people rn), Toni is doing great, he told us why he chose to start meeting with us too. So basically he was praying to God for truth and direction in life, and when we ended he looked out the window and saw us! So he self referred himself right after that to our church, so that's super cool! Kasun is also doing great and so are the rest of our friends. Finland is a really happy country with a ton of good people, but you also see a lot of horror stories that I've left out of my emails. Refugees from Countries that are falling apart, there's Russians and Ukrainians absolutely everywhere that flee here and they can't speak Finnish or English, so they're just kind of stuck here not able to do anything for one, but there's people from all over the world for the same reasons, middle east, Sri Lanka, Romania, etc, you see a lot of people struggling here and it's really hard to see people in the circumstances they're in. Just in these last two weeks we've found people fleeing from their countries not able to reveal themselves to the government because if they get deported back they'll be killed, we had one person in Hämeenlinna who is getting deported back to his country soon, but he's not in danger thank goodness. Its really horrifying to hear some of the stories that some people have about how they ended up here. However after all of these horrible times they've been through, it's always those same people that are ready to hear the gospel the most it feels like, and that just shows the importance of the gospel and the peace it brings to people, it definitely motivates me to keep working hard. There's a lot of people running from something here, and its no coincidence they've ended up running into us. The gospel blesses lives, I've seen the impact and heard the joy it gives to people who are at the lowest they can possibly be. Its a really hard world, but trusting in God makes it so much better, he gives strength to you when you're at your weakest, he provides support when you feel yourself falling, he's the light in the darkness guiding you through the unknown. Never underestimate what God can do for you in your life, because to these people he's become their joy and their strength, and I promise that as you exercise and work for a faith in God, and trust in him always, and turn to him always, that you'll find peace and joy in the hardest of times. This is something the Book of Mormon talks a lot about, I feel like half of Alma just talks about the power of faith and what God can do for you, it's not a coincidence that it's repeated over and over, the Book of Mormon is a guide for our day, and our day is only going to get harder. However these people know where to find comfort and sanctuary, and its in God. Never underestimate what God can do in your life.


So I was teaching the YSA a little bit of cool stuff in the Book of Mormon that points to the truthfulness of it, not from a theological perspective but rather just from a strictly logical point of view, I like talking about all of these things now, I love learning the innerworkings of our faith, the evidences and the truth, so I've been listening to a lot of scholars and theologians and finding out more and more and I taught them some stuff on Sunday and they want more, so now I'm going to teach the YSA some deep church history and bashing defenses I guess is the best way to put it haha. The church is really small in Finland and people are pretty anti here, because it's small, our YSA don't really know our church history or really how to defend themselves in arguments against the church. Now i know that you don't get a testimony based off evidences and this stuff, but i think it's good for people to be able to defend themselves and know why our church believes certain things, and where we get things from. So now I'm teaching the YSA some stuff since all I do in my free time other than work out is listen to scholars (I listen during the workouts too 😂). Its incredibly fascinating to learn a lot of this stuff. So also though the YSA want to dye my hair ginger. On Saint Patrick's day I was very vocal about the celebration and 😂. And now the YSA want me to become ginger to fulfil my Irish blood, so they're probably going to dye my hair soon which is epic because I want my redder hair back 😂.

I also had the opportunity to go to institute for the first time and man was it awesome, i got to see tons of Other missionaries which is really cool because even though there's about 90 of us in the mission, we all feel like a big family.

My Finnish is infact improving which is epic

We also had interviews with pres yesterday which were great, he's amazing and super spiritual. Me and him were talking and he brought up how I'm probably going to move areas to which I said jokingly "oh no" we laughed a bit as i explained to him that Hyvinkää is the blessed land. He said "how do you even know, this is the only area you've served in" to which I said " I think the words of Alma say it best, Faith is having a hope in things which are not seen that are true, and i believe that this is a similar circumstance" we laughed about that for a bit too. I'm actually ok with leaving though, he knows that I'll go wherever the lord needs me.  

We also went to one of our inactive members concerts at their school and oh my gospel was it great.  Shoot out to my dad because the opening song of the first band was Money for Nothing by dire straits.  They played loads of other great songs like ones from ABBA, Nirvana, Zombie by the Cranberries, etc.  Needless to say it was FIRE!!!

Ok we need to talk about some not good news...
My English is absolutely starting to fall apart. Its like actually suffering and I've forgotten some common rules which is tragic but whatever. So forgive me for the grammatical errors that are probably in this and my past and future emails.

Take care everyone, love you guys










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