- Serving in Sweden -

October 5, 2015

Hejsan!

I hope you all had a great weekend and were able to listen to the amazing talks that were offered at General Conference this weekend. IT WAS AMAZING. I loved every second of it. I really enjoyed Elder Nelson's talk about covenant keeping women, and how essential the women in the church are. I also really liked Elder Hollands talk about mothers, it was definitely spoken out of the heart and through the Spirit because it really October 5, 2015

touched me. Lastly, I LOVED President Uchtdorf's talk about simplifying the gospel. It isn't meant to be complex or complicated and there is no use making it like that, it just causes added stress!

This week hasn't really gone at all how we have planned, as per usual.

We went to the Trejos for lunch before a member present lesson (that ended up cancelling at the last minute). We had a TON of Columbian food and it was SO good. We shared a spiritual experience together as the wife shared her concerns and struggles in life and how she has been able to overcome them through the gospel and the blessings the Lord affords to faithful members of the church.

We had dinner this week with a younger couple in the ward and we were able to bring our investigator Mathias to it! It went really well and the two recently returned missionaries were just killing it during the lesson. I was super impressed with both of them and their willingness to help out our friend.

We visited a less active that we have been trying to meet with and that went really well too! We played a little bit with her kids and her and then shared a film about Christ. She said she would come to GC, but unfortunately didn't make it.

We met another less active and he ended up bringing a non member friend to the lesson. We taught the Restoration with the less active and it all seemed to be going well. The other man then asked to marry Syster Nielsen and I. Oh well, we gave him the opportunity and a Book of Mormon and we will see if we end up meeting with him again! And the less active came to 2 sessions of conference! And he LOVED it! So that was awesome.

We had a lesson with a man who left the church but wants to come back. We had a member there and it went super well! (notice the trend of having members there). The guy got a little choked up and cried a little bit talking about a spiritual manifestation he had. He can't deny it and now he feels awful where he is at and how far away he feels. We talked a lot about how it isn't about the fall, but it's about the rise. It was just, perfect.

Not too much more than that, life is good! I love being a missionary so much! My new motto for the month is "Be better, climb higher" and I can't wait to see what a new month brings!

Love,

Syster Jordan Lund

Fall colors

Church building

Companion love

Missionary work


Colombian food at the Trejos

"Hump Day!" 9 months out and burning my sock.

October 12, 2015

Hejsan hej!

This week has been super packed as we had a lot planned. Granted lots of times things fall through, but we had a pretty bomb week!

This week we have eaten like queens all thanks to Sister Nielsen's fabulous soup making skills haha. We have had taco soup and chicken noodle quite a few nights this week and it still isn't getting old!

I also hit my half way mark on my mission! 9 months in and 9 months to go. I burned a sock because I'm going to need my tights this winter haha. Nothing feels too different, just gotta keep working! Life is good though.

We got permission from President again to go and visit the exchange student's (Sys. Nielsen's family's new exchange student) family. We had dinner with her parents and her grandparents and were able to get to know them a little bit and try to talk a little bit about the gospel. Oh and we had reindeer for dinner. They gave us a ride home and we were able to chat a little bit more and elaborate on the Restoration and Plan of Salvation. Nothing too detailed but sort of gave them a taste - they seemed to like it, so we'll see!

We had a great day planned on my 9 month mark with 3 lessons with investigators that we had planned 3 members to come with us, it was supposed to be amazing! It was too good to be true though haha. One of our investigators bailed for who knows why, but then we went to our next lesson and had a bomb member present about the commandments and the Law of Chastity. It went great until we asked our investigator to keep the commandments and he said "Vi får se" aka "we'll see" haha we broke it to him that if he wasn't willing to change to be better than we wouldn't be able to meet with him as often. I think we might have frightened the member a little bit, but Syster Nielsen said it in a really good understanding way. The last lesson canceled as well. SO out of the 3 awesome member presents we had planned, 2 of them fell through and the one we did have, we ended up dropping the investigator. I also broke out my tights for the first time for this winter #Icaved. It has gotten so cold that my teeth actually chattered the other morning when we went out running.

We met an investigator this week who is really into medieval fencing and shows and stuff like that so it was interesting to get a peek into those hobbies. We are working on him come back to church, but as far as I know, it's a pretty complicated process. But he's got the motivation and he knows it's true!

We went to a later district meeting Friday night and we were able to stay for the first part of a baptism for Jönköping! The guy being baptized was so presh and it was both of the missionaries first baptisms. The Spirit was so strong there, indescribable.

We attempted a free english Swedish class this week to see if maybe we could help out some of the thousands of immigrants cruising into Sweden now. Out of like the 10 people we invited and texted to remind about it...no one came haha. But, we gave it a shot, maybe next week.

We had a ward activity Saturday night too! It was an apple pie contest between the Borås församling and the Alingsås församling. We actually made a very rushed pie for it too (it didnt win...)! The best part of the night was that we had 4 investigators and 4 less actives there!! Holy moly we were so happy! And stressed. We wanted to make sure they all had good experiences and were able to integrate properly into the ward. It was a great night though with lots of success!

That success proved fairly good on Sunday because 3 of those investigators from the night before came to church! It was Testimony meeting and the overall theme was Jesus Christ which was perfect for one of our investigators (if not all). Unfortunately, he wasn't too interested in it, so we will see how that goes :/

Also, SO MANY PEOPLE here wear glasses, so I tried an experiment trying to wear glasses to see if more people talk to us...it works. We'll see what I decide to do for the rest of my mission haha

Life is going so great over here in Borås!! I love being a missionary and I love this area so much! It's chock full of amazing people that I have been able to get to know over the past 4 months. I'm pretty sure almost every bus driver knows us and when we take the bus to the church they drop us of in front of the church rather than the bus stop. We're homies.

Have a great week! I love and miss you all!!

Syster Jordan Lund

Recycling in Sweden

Syster Nielsen bought me two of my favorite things for my 9 month :)

Art gallery for one of our investigators


One of our old investigators little yap dog (it yaps until you pick it up)

Språk study on the way to Sisters Conference

October 19, 2015

Hej hej!!

Another week has come and gone and this week has been soooo hectic. We've been (basically) out of our area for 3 of the 7 days of this week. But it has been a blast!! And my journal has been all over the place so forgive me if this email is all over the place too haha.

I went on splits this week with one of the sweetest and kindest sisters ever - Syster Sandberg. We had a fun day planned with a few member present lessons, but unfortunately only one of them went through. But that ONE lesson went really well! It was a spanish lesson with an investigator family we are teaching. The lesson is basically all taught by the members (after discussion with us before). And the father of the member family was a branch president in Columbia so it usually works out nicely. :) the investigator (just the wife this time) went from not believing anything about the Plan of Happiness to being on the same page as us and agreeing with us within about an hour. It was awesome!

We had Sisters Conference this week too! We hopped on a train Wednesday evening and finally made it into Stockholm around 22.00 where we found the other sisters waiting for us. We stayed the night with some awesome sisters including my trainer (mommy) and her trainer (grandma) and a sister that was in the MTC with me! We went to Västerhaninge the next day for the conference! It was so so SO amazing to get to go back to VH. I miss that place like crazy! The theme of the conference was Frozen...but instead of Frozen it was Chosen. Clever haha. We learned about building eternal families, finding the right man, and letting things go. We even let some balloons go outside with stuff written on it that we needed to let go. It was super fun! We had a little extra time after the conference, so Poulson and I ran over to a less active we used to teach every week when we were there. He stopped meeting with the missionaries, coming to church, and reading, soooo we kind of did a lay it all out lesson for him. With him we have always done a "shovel to the head" approach rather than a "beat around the bush" one. It worked well and the Spirit was just as strong as I remember it 5 months ago there! He said he'd start reading and praying again.

On Friday we had a preparing missionary come on splits with us for most of the day! We taught her how to do the studies, AB, and street contacting. We also had a really good lesson with Jackie and a new investigator from Eritrea. The lady from Eritrea was so hard to communicate with and I just wished so badly that I could speak whatever language I wanted to ALWAYS. Seriously, I've never wanted so badly to speak Arabic, Somalian, or Bosnian in my life. But it worked out, and her member friend is probably going to help us translate next time.

We also had Stake Conference this weekend! The stake president had been president for something like 9 years and had been in the stake presidency for 26 years. TWENTY SIX YEARS. So it was big. Saturday night we were in the chapel and it was super good, and then Sunday we were in this big stadium thing in the middle of Göteborg. We heard lots of testimonies about the Book of Mormon and trusting in the Lord. It was super awesome! And two of our investigators came!

Today is Sister Nielsen's birthday!! So far we have gone for a really long run (I rode a bike haha) and studied, and cleaned. But more fun to come later!

It's beginning to get cold too! No snow, but man is it chilly out there...I might have to start investing in this whole winter coat thing soon.

I love and miss you all lots! Have a great week and remember to let anything go that is holding you back from doing the things the Lord would want you to do!

Love,

Syster Jordan Lund

Mommy and I

Gifts from my trainer :) she spoils me..and a new scripture case! I've been searching everywhere for it...

Syster Nielsen lost what are the odds and had to lick a tire...hahaha what a champ

Massive sign outside of the stadium we had our conference in

All of my past companions - I've seriously got the cutest ones.

Selfie with President Beckstrand

Took Hilda (Borås member) with us for a day! #tripan

Stake Conference in Göteborg (we stayed with the Kungsbacka sisters)

October 26, 2015

Another month has come and gone!!!

This week has been great! Just like every other week in the mission. Probably the biggest news of the week is that I will be transferring!! I'll be moving to Södertälje which is just outside of Stockholm. I will be with a sister named Syster Johansson and we will be Sister Training Leaders!! Woohoo!! New experiences and lots to learn. I am excited for a new experience, but super sad to leave Borås :(

ALSO, thank you to everyone that sent me sweet birthday wishes and emails! They made my day and my birthday was a normal missionary day full of fun with the focus still on the Savior :) One of the systers here even boosted my confidence by saying that I had escaped teen pregnancy! Sick. We had district meeting and a funeral service for our dear Elder Stoeltzing who will be dying in 2 days! It went well and we even tried SURSTRÖMMING!! Well, me and a few of the elders. The sisters thought it was nasty, but one of them caved at the end and tried a bite. So surströmming is basically rotten spoiled fish that has been packed away in a can for like years (I think). And it smells SO BAD. So bad that it is illegal to open it inside a building. We opened it outside UNDER WATER. haha it didn't actually taste THAT BAD. Basically like pouring salt in your mouth. It's more the texture that gets ya. haha but I didn't throw up or gag at all! Birthday complete.

We helped a lady this week move too! She had been a member before but left the church because her husband didn't approve. Well, he is out of the picture now, and maybe there is a chance she will want to come back!

We went to a baptism on Saturday of a cute young boy in our ward named Sebastian. It was a great service and the Spirit was strong. We rushed out to make it to our Ward Mission Leader's wedding open house! They looked amazing!! BEAUTIFUL COUPLE. We also met Peter Lundahl who just got back from his mission in Utah! He is super awesome and ready to help get the working moving faster here.

This week was filled with a lot of service, but it was meaningful and the people we helped appreciated it. We worked in one of the members' gardens and helped clean out her greenhouse and tear out all of the tomato plants.

We met and invited Mathias (2) to baptism and he said he would pray about it, so hopefully he will pray and read and come to church.

Church was even more hectic than usual. It was Hilda's mission farewell and Peter's homecomig. There were SO many YSA kids there. We translated for a family from England that had come for the wedding too! I passed out my thank you notes, and that was probably the most stressful part. Goodbyes are the worst especially because this ward is awesome. Some of our favorite less actives came as well!! It was really great. We sang the traditional "Gud var med dig tills vi möts igen" song and the Spirit was so strong as we welcomed an elder home and sent a sister out. We went to the Karlssons for dinner! We shared a fun lesson about the Holy Ghost and set up an obstacle course in their house for one of their kids to go through only listening to her dads voice while we were screaming different things. It was fun.

Today we had a fun pday! We went to a castle outside of Göteborg! It was locked but we walked around and hung out with some sheep. It was fun anyways to adventure.

Thanks again for all the birthday wishes and prayers! Love you all!

Love,

Syster Jordan Lund