Transfers and lovely possibilities!

Hello everyone, 

This week has been just lovely. As the title states we received news about transfers! I will be staying here on the island of Bornholm for a second transfer and I will be companions with the other missionary that will be staying on the island. That means that we will be the only two missionaries on the island for a period of time until we receive a senior couple in about a month. 

As the second part of this email states, this next transfer will be filled with possibilities! It has been quite amazing and we love the opportunity to continue in what some would call impossible conditions! This week particularly has been good because of two things: 

1. This week we got to have a branch party! We got to grill some food and played something called "Kongespil". This game is played by setting up 5 wooden blocks on two sides of the king wooden block that stands in the middle. Two teams take turns throwing 6 sticks trying to knock down the 5 wooden blocks. Only after they are all knocked down can you knock the King down.

2. The next best part of this week was the experience of getting to make some good friends this week! We got to really see that sometimes our efforts don't show fruits right away. This really can be a blessing and I have found that I learn so much from these experiences. 

However, one experience in particular stood out. On Sunday after church we decided to go out and find people and ended up having some discussions with people that instead of just telling us to go on really wanted to tell us why we were wrong! Although there was anger in my heart at first, through some prayer and deep consideration, I came to peace a lot faster than I think I could have before (my patience has increased a lot)! We then proceeded to have a really good lesson where we invited the two people, whom we had planned to teach later that day, to simply ask God their Father if he was there! It was good to see how much love is in such simple truth! Sometimes it sounds weird and too simple but we just need to go back to the basics and feel God's love for each other and for ourselves.  

Other than that, this week we got to eat some really good food! I made some homemade bread and during our splits we did this week we made this really delicious soup! I'll attach some pictures of the bread below! 

Here is the Danish word of the week:

Balladmager - Troublemaker! 

We look forward to the work and thank you all for the prayers and support! I'll see y'all next week! 

Love,

Elder Lines

Another Zone Conference and a Long Trip!

Hello everyone!

Another great week. Each day had good things and I'm really happy here in Denmark. 

We journeyed over to the mainland to Copenhagen to enjoy a zone p-day and a fabulous zone conference.  It is such a blessing to see old missionary buddies and new ones too. Our new mission leaders are really kind and it's been good to get to know them. I miss my old ones and enjoy getting to know new ones. It's how life goes. All are inspired and I am learning a lot. I'm grateful to them and enjoy learning from them. So. Much. To. Learn.

Zone Conference is always a great time. We talked about how we can better apply the resources we are given to our missionary work! We had some good discussions and some of the best things we learned were: read through the resources, apply what they say, practice and ponder, and finally review when you feel something needs to change! These resources are really given to us as the way we should work and teach! They are very inspired! And, I plan on applying them to my work. 

After Conference we got to go to the temple. I love the Copenhagen temple. I'm so grateful we get to attend it from time to time. We reflected on everything that we had learned and just took the time to think. If you know me, you know I'm not super quiet in general. But, having time to sit in the temple quietly is something I look forward to. I have come forward from our zone conference week with the strength to overcome the challenges I face! Let's go!!!!

The journey home from Zone Conference was fun. We woke up early (5am) for the fourth day in a row and drove through Sweden to the ferry where we then took it to the island. It is a long trip but it was very nice to get back. That same day we had a Family Home Evening and had some friends come and we sung some songs while just hanging out! Honestly a very positive experience to just hangout with some Danes and sing some songs. Bornholm is a special place. 

Other random things we did: service projects, edited a cool video about rubiks cubes (for a purpose), talked to so many people!!!!  

My dad asks me for a Danish word of the week. I keep a pretty lengthy list of new vocabulary words and teach him one that is funny or especially hard to pronounce. This week, the word was:  Tandkirug. It means dental surgeon and I knew he'd especially appreciate it. 

The miracle of the week was having two friends come to church!!!! Our branch is so small so having two people come is just amazing. I spoke and felt filled with the spirit. It was wonderful to be together worshipping. 

This week was filled with good energy and some positive people! We love the work and keep moving forward! 

Thank you everyone for your prayers! i look forward to writing again! Here are some pictures of Bornholm and of us in our different activities! 

Love, Elder Lines

A Normal Week

Hello everyone, this email will be a bit shorter as today has been very chaotic! I have indeed had a busy week but a lot of it was just knocking and finding! 

If you follow me on Facebook you can probably see the post I made about family history! I decided to post about my ancestors that come from Bornholm. They were very dedicated and faithful! During just a normal door contact this week I had the opportunity to talk about ancestors for a sec. I shared my testimony that my ancestors are supporting me knowing that I am serving the ancestors'  of people they knew so well and giving them a message they deserve. I know that all of our families are supporting us from the other side. I have been feeling that very powerfully this transfer especially. I'm grateful to my grandma for sharing stories with me and helping me connect. 

The rest of this week was filled with fun activities with members and a good amount of editing for some social media videos we run on the danish Facebook page! This week has really been a highlight that Social media work is strong and helpful. 

Today was a zone P day which means we hung out in Copenhagen! We had a blast! We drove through Sweden to get here and ended up stopping at IKEA. We got some food and tried speaking Danish to the Swedish but they didn't like that. It was fun to be there and just see Sweden again! (We were in Malmö!)

I'll be here in Copenhagen until Thursday. We have conferences to attend and then will travel back again through Sweden. Copenhagen is lovely and it's nice to have a break from the island for a few days.

All in all it was a good week! Thank you everyone for your prayers and for the support you show!

Love,

Elder Lines

Here are some pictures of Sweden and us throughout the week! 

A good week and some good times!

Hello everyone, 

This week was amazing and I am really happy!  The highlight was when a senior couple came to Bornholm and did an apartment inspection (we passed!). We ate dinner with them and got to talk for a bit. Always good to see and interact with wise, fun senior couples.

The beginning of this week started out with something actually really cool. On Tuesday we are out in a city called Aakirkeby! We had knocked here a bit and wanted to visit and found a few friends that said we could come back. We visited three people and each of them were home and answered the door (miracle)! We ended up having 3 unplanned lessons and got to even eat some food they offered to us!  It really felt like the hand of the Lord blessing us that day. We were told we could come back and we look forward to those visits.  We hope to continue teaching and finding those that want to listen. 3 in one evening is really a miracle for us. 

On that note I wanted to talk about something that I believe is very important. A big part of the work that we see is how open people are after we have offered to serve them. When we were knocking these 3 doors, we asked 2 of them if we could come back and serve them. After asking they were very happy to speak with us! I believe true service comes from a desire to help God's children instead of trying to help ourselves sometimes. I hope to be able to develop my skills in that more. A good reminder and lesson for all of us I think. 

One thing I do in my personal study to help me focus more on true service, the love of Christ,  is that I add in modern day general conference talks and other good church material my dad and brother recommend to me. It's really helped me round out my study time. This helps me find ideas that stand out and help me apply them in more meaningful ways and I find myself looking through the scriptures or words of Church leaders for a similar topic! I do enjoy this study time so much and learning more about how to be like Jesus Christ. 

To end this email I thought I could share ten things that I have learned from my companions on the mission. 

1. To be more patient when you don't understand

2. To develop meaningful communication

3. To serve even when irritated

4. To laugh and smile as much as possible

5. That I sound like a drunk person in a hallway if I sing 

6. To be open about criticism 

7. Train your muscles to failure

8. Eat to failure

9. Find peace in every moment

10. Love and Trust in the Savior

I  have been blessed with the best companions and we have such a great time together serving and learning. 

I hope you all had a good week! I look forward to writing next week! 

Love,

Elder Lines

Here are some pictures of some things we saw and some really good Indian food I made from scratch! Also, Denmark right now is just so beautiful.