Week 42-- Is it illegal to put a donkey in your bathtub in Arizona?

Tjena familj o vänner!

We've been nice n’ busy this week teaching lessons and following up with interested people!

We had a few school visits this last week to talk about America, and two this morning actually which have been fun. Here are some of the funny questions the Swedish teens asked about USA:

If someone walks on your property, are you allowed to shoot them? Do you walk around with a pistol?

Are the girls hotter in America or Sweden? (asked in a class of 29 boys and 1 girl)

Is it illegal in Arizona to put a donkey in your bathtub?

They had some other funny ones about America too ha ha it's always interesting to hear what these 16-year old come up with.

This week has been SM Veckan which is Swedish Masters Week here in Skellefteå. They have competitions in all kinds of sports here during the week up on Vitberget (white mountain) and stuff going on downtown too like a concert every few nights. That's been fun to walk around and talk to people during. Everyone here buys these SM Veckan beanies and wears them to sport their Skellefteå pride too which is something I haven't seen before.

Our investigator P is progressing nicely. It's both rewarding and humbling to see his life change as he reads more of the Book of Mormon (almost 2 times through now!) and is working to quit smoking. ( We purchased him some goodes (Swedish candy) to eat everytime he gets a craving. I love that man, he's becoming like a brother to us. He's a great role model to me of faith and enduring well during the hard things he's going through. He's all on track for his baptism coming up here soon too :)

We've been teaching more lessons this transfer than I ever have before on my mission. We got to meet up with and teach a few people we didn't expect to so our teaching pool is increasing! It's cool to see the work here change from where it was when I got here. While Skellefteå branch, held together by the 5 members and 2 missionaries, appears to be on the brink of distinction, it's definitely making a comeback😎 I just hope I can be here long enough to see the full results of the work we're doing. 

We are getting our own smartphones, something new in the mission. We’ve only had one between the two of us. We will be able to access videos and the scriptures on the LDS Church app. It’ll be nice to cross reference and take notes, that I can save forever, while I do my scripture studies.

My spiritual thought this week comes from a question we were asked by an investigator. Why is it sometimes that when I pray for something, I get the opposite? Another similar, more general question can be Why do bad things happen to me/others? I'm sure many of us have asked or thought of these questions before. Something I have realized while teaching this week is that following God takes trust, even when it seems like he is messing up your life. For example, quitting smoking will be hard, but it takes trusting in God to get through it and eventually be blessed for it. Paying tithing when you may not have much money to begin with will be hard, but God will always come through and throw us a bone. I'm blessed to be able to see God take care of His children when they trust him and follow him. 

Life is good baby. We see more and more sun each day which makes up for the last 4 months without it :)

Much Love,

Äldste Gordon

I think I worked him too hard, he needed a nap!

The sunsets are beautiful here. I still haven't seen the Northern Lights.

The classiest department store, of course!