Greetings, fellow earthlings!
Welcome one and all to this week's episode of
Behind Swedish Lines.
This is your host, Äldste Ogaard, and let me tell you, what a show we
have in store for all of you today! Absolutely jam-packed with
adventure, intrigue, and heroics. But, rather than talk about how
awesome it will be, why don't we just jump on in, shall we?
OK, so to start off with, this week I think I set a personal
record for number of lessons taught. I tell you, it's crazy. Are you
guys ready for this? This week, I taught...
a whopping grand total of two lessons.
Yeah, when it comes to teaching, this was an incredibly slow
week. We worked really hard to get lessons set up with people, but for
one reason or another, they all fell through. Except for Hanna. Our
lessons with Hanna
never fall through. =) While this may sound
absolutely terrible, we are not discouraged. For reasons we shall talk
about soon, our hopes are bright, our footsteps are sure, and our bags
are very,
very heavy with copies of the Book of Mormon to give out to folks.
So why are we still so encouraged after such a astronomically
unsuccessful week? The answer lies first with General Conference. Holy
cow, my mind was BLOWN away at how awesome General Conference was! The
talks were absolutely amazing, and it was even more fun cause we were
chilling in Luleå for almost 2 whole days to watch it! it was like a
missionary party up there! Our whole district (6 elders) in one
apartment! It was
crazy! We met the new guy in our district,
Äldste Jonsson from Stockholm. He's a short term missionary (serving for
3 weeks), and he's super awesome. He's a guitarist for a band called
Like Torches, and apparently they're actually pretty big. As in "they
toured with Yellowcard" big. When he said he knew the members of
Yellowcard personally, I totally flipped; I mean, we're talking about
one of my favorite bands, and he's hung out with them, and knows them
personally!
OK, sorry about that. Rant mode disengaged. It was just really cool to
learn that there are such amazing people all around us.
Anyways, back to Conference. So I really liked the talk given
by Elder Uchtdorf for those who have left the church or are struggling
with their testimonies. It was a really touching talk, and it helped
remind me that as members of this church, we do not expect that we will
all be perfect. The Church is not for perfect people, it is for people
working to become perfect through Christ's atonement. Sometimes it can
be hard to remember that, but it is absolutely true. A truth is not best
measured by its believers (although it should be expected that they do
their best to emulate that truth); it is best measured by simply whether
it is true or not. It's like I always say when teaching people: we
don't base our faith on the example of the members, or the action of a
mortal man. Our faith is build upon Christ, as revealed and confirmed by
the Holy Ghost. If one wants to know if this work is true, don't look
at supporters and critics, or look for the flaws of imperfect human men
who God called (remember, Moses wasn't perfect either); no, if you want
to know if this is true, the way to do it is to
sincerely ask God in the name Christ if these things are true. It seems simple, and it's definitely a bold claim to make, but I and 15 million members like me make it nonetheless.
So yeah, basically, conference was awesome, this week is going
to be even more awesome (we hope to teach some of the people from our
English group soon!), and I am more confident than ever that I am out
doing the Lord's work: declaring His words and preparing the world for
the day of His glorious return.
I hope you guys forgive me for the brevity of this week's episode,
but I've got a work to do, and it's a pretty awesome one. I love you
all, and look forward to hearing from you all next week!
Love,
Äldste Kody Christopher Ogaard
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