T Minus 18 weeks---Happy New Year and heading southwest to Gothenburg

January 15, 2019

T Minus 18 weeks---Happy New Year and heading southwest to Gothenburg

Last Week

Musical Tracting - Elder Strong is like a savant on the guitar (but he's good socially) soo he had the idea to go out and sing children's hymns for people at their door. We were a bit unsure how it'd go, and I brought my Irish flute as back-up on of the nights we did it (shout out to Elder Craun for leaving that for me in the apartment). Here's how it'd go down: "Hey! We are volunteers with the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints here in town, and we are out tonight to sing children's hymns that contain a nice message. Is it cool if we sing one?" Surprisingly the reaction was a lot better than we had anticipated. We were in an area with mainly families, so when you get the kids standing behind their mom or dad at the door and hear us say that of course they say "JA JA!" (yes!). So through the course of the night we got to sing (with Ä Strong on guitar and vocals) simple kids songs that talk about topics from Jesus Christ, to loving one another, to God's plan for us. It was one of the most successful tracting stunds I've had my entire mission. Music has a special ability to invite a good spirit to be there, and it's easy right after the song finishes and the quiet sets in to explain what the song means and apply it to them. The flute didn't get broken out yet, but we've got some plans for this last week of the transfer😏

I had a cool experience this week with a family that wasn't active in church 5 months back. After meeting this family (a mother and husband, and their two boys ages 8 and 11), the dad came back to church and became active after 3 or so months. There were some underlying concerns with the family that made it so he was the only one that came, but after months of getting to know them, getting to be like brothers with the little boys, much prayer and some fasting, they were finally all together in church this last Sunday. It's been rewarding to see the change the gospel has brought to their lives. They know what's right, as do most of us, but for whatever reason let other less important things get in the way or hold them back. They just needed some love, support, and honesty to get them to do what's right.

This Week

Here are some highlights from the week:

While out doing our "musical tracting" there was this kinda run-down house that we went to. We went up and knocked nice n loud on the door and this old lady peers through the window at us looking confused, so we gave her a big wave and flashed the pearly whites. She opened the door, and we asked if we could sing a nice song for her. She said in accented swedish "Are you mormons?" We explained we were with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and she said she's seen us before. Come to find out, the accented swedish was due to her being from England. Also come to find out, this lady, while looking maybe 80 years old, was 100!! Turning 101 in April. It started to make more sense as we talked and she repeated herself quite a bit saying in mixed swedish and english to "watch out for the swedish girls, they're dangerous" and informing us that she "was a school teacher ya know, so bob's your uncle". It feels like a rarity to meet someone so old, so I try and listen to what they say thinking maybe they'll say something wise. About the wisest thing I could get from her was the phrase "The world's not so bad if you're peaceful". On the other hand she followed that by telling us there are goblins in the forest that come and shovel her snow for her haha ya never know who is gonna be on the other side of the door!

We had a member meal with an older lady in the ward and for the first time ate some älg kött (moose meat). Turns out it tastes like regular beef.

A swedish man came walking into the church about 2 months back during our Sunday meetings because he felt drawn to it while walking by. He came in, talked to the other set of missionaries, they gave him a Book of Mormon in Swedish, and his contact info. Those missionaries transferred out, so he was referred to us. After several attempts of not being able to reach this dude, we decided to let go of him and hope God would help us meet him again. Aaand of course the next day we take the same tunnelbana (subway) and chat with him.

About a week or two after that we got a random call from him saying he read the book he had received and would like a copy in English (while this guy is swedish, he has insanely good English, better than mine I would say. He was using words and phrases I didn't even understand in English). We met him this week to give him the book in English and ended up sitting in the foyer of the chapel talking about faith and God for about 45 minutes. After a great discussion, he asked us on the way out what our plans were so we told him we were going to record a song to sing and put on Facebook. He left, and about 1 minute later we hear the doorbell to the church ring, so we go to answer and it's him standing there. He was like "I'm back ha ha I felt a prompting to come back and ask if I can sit in on the session while you guys sing. Is that cool?" So he sat there and listened to us practice singing Barnets Bön (A Child's Prayer) and then filmed it for us in the church. It was a cool experience to see that God directly prompts people to do the right things. He had said to us "We often wanna say we are the ones pulling our own strings, when really it's God that pulls the strings in our lives". This guy is big into music, he works with music as his profession, so it was cool to see the power that music had to touch his heart and feel God's spirit in a way that would reach him.

Last but not least, I'm transferring out of Stockholm TOMORROW! After serving 9 months in Sweden's biggest city (3 months in Jakobsberg and 6 months in Gubbängen), I'm leaving this beautiful city and heading to Sweden's 2nd biggest city Göteborg (Gothenburg). I'll be in an area called Västra Frölunda with the one and only Elder Moss from the Reno, Nevada area. I met him about a year back. He's a hard working guy, well self-disciplined, and is in good shape so hopefully he can help me drop the Christmas snacking weight I've picked up. Göteborg I've heard is beautiful, and I'll be serving in a congregation of about 100 people, so just a bit smaller than the one here in Gubbängen.

Way stoked to see a new place and experience a new part of Sweden! It'll likely be my last area for the next 4ish months.

With love,

Aldste Gordon

My New Address:

Äldste Rylan Robert Gordon

c/o Majid Mazda

Bronsfatsgatan 1B 3

Västra Frölunda

42160