Halfway Point

So I officially hit my half way mark, way crazy feels like yesterday I was leaving for the MTC not really knowing what to expect but just being insanely excited to share what matters most to me. Sisar Pack made this day way exciting, I got out of the shower in the Morning and she had made me half sized crepes for my half way mark, then at lunch she gave me an half of a half of a half kilo of my favorite salmiaki, then she gave me a half bar of Fazer chocolate after dinner, and made me a sign with only half of it written, and a half tube of ice cream (aino apple flavored YUMMM love me some finnish jäätelö) and then gave me a can of peach halves! Too funny, we took pictures but there is no Place to upload them on this computer. Next time.

On Tuesday this week we had to opportunity to have the car and go out to Sastamala to visit some less actives that no one has seen in church for a long time. One of the ladies after asking what the Savior means to her, just started sobbing and explained how hard her life has been with a past abusive husband, and how she feels as if her life is in piece and knows that the savior can help but she doesn't have the energy to really try. It broke my heart, we tried to explain more and show her love that she has so much worth. She is a daughter of a King, and her broken hope can be fixed through the atonement. It is so hard to see people that are struggling so much and know the answer and how it can help but don't have the energy to ask their savior for help and then following through. We are praying that the ward can get involved and help her feel this love again and recognize that she does have the energy to be healed.

So my whole mission since I have been in Finland I have only served in Tampere. I love this Place so much! I love my ward! I love the children that run around on Sunday, I love the elderly couples that have learned and experience so much from life. The young members who are standing strong even though it’s not easy to live in the world today. I love them.

We have been working with them to set up member mission plans to help them recognize that this can be fun sharing the gospel if we have the right mind set. We want to help them understand that they already have a ton of missionary opportunities and we are here just to help them practice how they can be more effective in sharing their testimonies with their friends, family, and strangers.

Cool story of the week. Referrals are soooooooo hard to get, or at least have been for a really long time. So we came up with an idea that if we learned how to use this ancient referral system that the church has, then the Lord would bless us to find someone through it. It took me so long to figure out this system but we finally did and we had one number that actually went through and we were able to contact this mysterious guy P. who has a Book of Mormon. That is all the information we had before we called. So he sounded pretty excited to meet, so we were too. He cancelled the first meeting........oh well. But then he set up another meeting. We were lucky enough that President Rawlings was in town and he came with us to the teach. So great we had a church tour and at the end P. prayed with us. Then he cancelled the next meeting and didn't come to church we were bummed to say the least. But then we call him Sunday night last week and he says that he was in Helsinki that weekend and found the church and went for all 3 hours! We had an awesome lesson with him this week and surprisingly 2 more members showed up then we expected.......haha that is a story for a different time. Then he went to church again in Helsinki, and we were trying to figure out which chapel he was visiting and informed all the missionaries down there to keep an eye out for him. Turns out, he went to Marjaniemi and the missionaries there told us that he actually has visited that church many times before they just never knew who he was!!!! It was loistava!! So exciting we are hoping to set a baptismal date with him this week! Pray for his heart to be softened.

On Sunday we had an opportunity to teach Sunday School and it was all about the atonement. It went so well and we did an object lesson of giving rolls to the class and for every person our missionary had to do 5 pushup and it really struck them of how the savior has already paid for us, and how we can make sure we are using it daily.

I love this work.

Gotta run

Sisar Hübner