I decided today that I will post parts of some my journal entries from my mission. I hope they will help each of you know a little more of what to expect of missionary life. And hopefully get you excited to serve a mission. :) (All names have been changed.)
3/26/2007 (I had been in the mission field for just over a month)
We had an amazing lesson with Amy [an investigator about 40 years old] today! I didn't understand all of it, of course, but I understood what was important. Brother and Sister Hansen from the ward came with us, which ended up being a very smart decision. They're originally from Finland but have lived in Sweden for most of their lives, just like Amy. AND Bro Hansen has dealt with depression so he knows what Amy is going through. AND he's a convert. It was so wonderful to hear his testimony and to have someone she can relate with. They're getting her to come to general conference with them next weekend too! At the end of the meeting, Amy started crying! I don't really know what that means, but hopefully it's because she realized how much we care about her and want to help her. We had a really good lesson about prayer and how we can ask God for help whenever we need it. So hopefully, just maybe, she'll pray herself. We've asked her before, many times actually, but so far she hasn't. But maybe she will this time.
4/5/2007
Matthew's [an investigator about 25 years old] doing pretty well. We've taught him up through the 2nd lesson now. He's awesome and actually a lot of fun to teach. I'm getting to the point that I don't really care about making mistakes while talking to him. I guess it's because he's already heard me make tons of mistakes so why not make more. Haha. Anyway, the thing I'm worried about is that he says he hasn't gotten an answer about The Book of Mormon yet. He says he doesn't feel anything different about The Book of Mormon than any other book. And we he prays, he doesn't feel bad, but he doesn't feel good either. I want him to get an answer so bad. I know it's true and I know that he can know it's true too. He would make an awesome member. But what if it's not the right time for him right now? I would absolutely love to see him get baptized. But I know that as long as we do our best, whatever's right for him will happen.
We had the chance to get 3 new investigators this week! We were so excited! But all 3 of the appointments fell through. One of them was sick, so we'll reschedule with him, but one called and said she wasn't interested anymore and the other didn't show up (for the 2nd time). I guess we'll see what happens.
4/25/2007
Exciting news! We have a new investigator! His name is Steven and, well, I don't really know that much about him yet. We taught him the 1st lesson today and it went really well! He listened intently to everything we said then promised to read the parts of the Book of Mormon we asked him to and to pray about it to know for himself that's it's true. And he wants us to come back! He seemed to really like the fact that we want him to pray for his own testimony rather than just relying on ours. He must really like cats though, because he has 10 of them. Weird... Anyways. I think I did pretty well. I probably made a million mistakes, but he understood me so that's good. And in the middle of the lesson he asked me how long I've been here, and when I told him, he said that I speak Swedish really well for being here such a short time. And then he talked about how hard it must be to come to a new country and speak a new language. So that made me feel better. He's pretty cool. I'm trying hard to have faith that this very well could lead to another baptism, but the doubt and fear are still there. Satan is sure trying hard to destroy my faith... but he's not going to!
**For Personal missionary experiences Part 2, click here.
**For Personal missionary experiences Part 3, click here.
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