Changing the Mission

Well Once again I don’t have very much time. This work is crazy, we just got our change call and no one out of all the groups that came to Finland with me got switched because we aren’t done training yet, but our dear SIsar Nielsen is getting moved up to Kuopio today. It was way sad to hear because she is basically my twin, we do missionary work the same, we testify the same, we both got this gospel fire going on and power each other to push harder. So it’s hard to see her go and we have basically been together 24/7 for my entire mission so it will be a change, but the people in Kuopio obviously need her! So good luck to her, we will keep storming the castles here and Tampere and she will be doing the same with her new companion in Kuopio.

This week was once again crazy we have been praying so hard to know who and how to invite to baptism, our President Rawlings has given us countless council that the baptismal date is not what we pull out when they are ready, it is how they become ready. The reason why people drop is that they don’t have a direction, they just learn a little think its enough then leave. Its because they don’t have a real question or intent to act on promptings when they pray and read the scriptures, because they are just reading it to read. This gives them something to pray about, something to have a question for when they are reading the scriptures. Needless to say, its is still some times a little nerve racking when we plan to invite someone that we have only met once before. But this is the council and promise that we have been given so this is what we will do. If the President was inspired to give this council, then the Lord means business. 

So I have talked about K. before in my emails, well here is her conversation story. The first time we met K. she was brought by her friend M. to Sähly (floor hockey) and we had a great time with her and invited her to church. She came with M. she enjoyed it and came again. We talked to M. about talking to K. to learn more about our church from us, she already is friends with us, has come to church and said yes, why not. We went over to M.'s house, where K. feels comfortable, we taught and testified of the first vision, and the relevance of why it is so important. That it shows we can receive personal revelation still from God, M. had already given her a Book of Mormon with her testimony in it. She said that she would read it and said a beautiful kneeling closing prayer with us, brought tears to all our eyes. And her friend M. hugged her sooo tight at the end of that prayer. The next time we meet her was on Tuesday, we gave her a tour of the church and what each program (ex. young womens) is and why it can help us. We ended in the baptismal room and explained what it is and how we can become pure and clean, and the burden of guilt can be lifted off our shoulders. Then we went and taught her the second part of the first vision of how the priesthood was restored, and all the blessings we can receive from it, especially the gift of the Holy Ghost and the comfort and peace we can feel. We then showed her a Mormon Message, ''The Power of God'' that showed the priesthood in action. Then M. shared a story of how the priesthood has blessed her life, then Sisar Nielsen brought the spirit in with a power punch of her story how the Priesthood literally saved her little brothers life when he was 7 years old and cracked his skull on the cement, and after a blessing all was healed. This story was so powerful of why this gospel is important how it can save our lives, give us peace and lasting happiness. Nothing like this can be found anywhere in this world. We were all crying at the end of this and Sisar Egan then asked, ''K. will you accept all these blessing that we have talked about today that this gospel brings by being baptized.'' Her friend M's face literally dropped she had no idea we were going to ask this. And K. simply said, ''Yes'' we were all crying, M by this point was balling, the spirit was so strong and she agreed to prepare to be baptized by December 7th. (Earlier that morning we had prayed about a date, and all of us kneeling on the floor asking Heavenly Father to tell us when his beautiful daughter would be ready to enter the waters of baptism, and we all got this very strong spiritual confirmation that December 7th was the date, the day her life will be changed for ever. When she is thirty years old, married in the temple, she will be telling her kids that she has this amazing life, this amazing light in her life because of that date that she was baptized and received the most amazing gift of the holy ghost. We were all crying by the end of our prayer because right in front of us we are seeing one of his daughters preparing to make a sacred covenant with him.) That was such a beautiful and powerful experience. 

On the hilarious side, Sisar Nielsen and I are probably the most awkward people in all of Finland, maybe that is why the people like us, we actually make them laugh by how painfully embarrassing we are. Nielsen the other day tried to walk the wrong way through an automatic closing door and got stuck in between it and had to shimmy her way out, Sisar Egan just shook her head and said, *Can you get more awkward?'' Then later we were on the bus, coming back from Turku, and Sisar Egan saw someone that we knew so we jumped off the bus with our backpacks and small suitcases ran down to talk to this lady. Then we see our other bus coming that we cannot miss so we start running once again for the bus, I’m booking it and little do I know that my backpack has become unzipped and I’m sprinting for this bus, its freezing and I do not have the time or patience to wait in the cold for another bus, so I’m running and then all of a sudden all these pamphlets and cards are literally flying out of my bag, Sisar Egan yell to be to stop, I quickly turn around making more things go flying gout of my bag. Didn't realize what was happening and that it was by bag making the mess, so I keep running to catch this bus, and I hear Egan scream, ''STOP RUNNING'' now it feels like everything is going in slow motion with the Rocky theme music going on while pamphlets and book of Mormons alike are being thrown in the air and are showering back down on me and Sisar Egan. I finally stop and see that I have left a huge trail of everything that was once in my backpack now on the cobblestone sidewalk. I awkwardly scurry to pick up all my stuff as Sisar Nielsen goes to stall the bus driver. I look over to 3 feet away my boot that I had just gotten fixed just chilling on the side of the street. I awkwardly try to gather all the things up at the same time trying to get my bus card out, look up to see Sisar Nielsen saying, ''Oletko OK?'' and the whole bus turn to look at me awkwardly struggling, to get my life back together. We finally get onto the bus, Egan is carrying a pile, and so am I and Nielsen is just dying laughing, and these stone faced Finns are even trying to side their smiles.

Wow, can’t take me anywhere. 

Well times up! Love you all, do work!

Sisar Hubner