Mercy on my soul. There is so much to say this week. Hopefully this doesn't reach the 'of war and peace' status that many of my previous letters tend to fulfill.
Sooooo...this week my companion asked if we could wake up at 6 instead of 6:30. My first thought was "heck no". Don't get me wrong. The Shank goes HARD on missionary work. But I also believe in working when we work and resting when we have time to rest. I see no problem there. However, since I am such a charming soul I gave in. I had a condition though in my head. I prayed and told the Lord that if he wanted me to wake up at 6 every week for the rest of my mission I would gladly do it, but that I wanted this week to be awful. It made too much sense to me that if you wake up early you'd have success. So I wanted the refiners fire to put me to the test. Yeah that just sounds like a really dumb idea but whatever. So let me jump to another story and then I'll finish this...
The Beginning and End of the Fire
Well on Tuesday we went to a members house and ate some dinner. Our plan was to ask them to pray for one of our investigators. That investigator would then in turn accept a baptismal date. The family would be strengthened by the miracle. We'd ask them to bear testimony of it in church. The whole ward would love missionary work. Norway would become the highest baptizing mission in the world. Cake walk. Well they agreed. The 4 year old said a bomb prayer at the end and the spirit was strong. Well...we got a text from that investigator saying something like "I love being catholic, the book isn't for me, in fact I wanna give it back, thanks for the chat though, I'm done, blah blah blah". (the text began with 'Hello my dear' which was super weird....whatevs though). So now we have a family praying for an investigator that is no longer an investigator. Boo. Yay for the refiners fire. Not to mention I awkwardly announced my gluten allergy as cake was halfway onto my plate. Sometimes I am just an awkward dude. The fire was blazing, but it quickly came to a simmer...
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Elder Jones, Elder Shanklin and other missionaries.
This dinner looks so yummy!! |
Test continued...
The family we visited was the end of the fire. The week went straight uphill from there. Easily the best week I have ever had on my mission. We got another 5 new investigators. 4 baptismal dates. 10 teaches. A guy came to church. Yeah. Way good stuff (I know you Mexico missionaries probably have those as daily numbers but guess what, I have hot water, toilets, annnnnnnnnd a heating/airconditioning system). So yeah. I was really confused. The deal was that I'd wake up at 6 every day if the week was terrible....and it wasn't. At all. I still feel guilty though going back to 6.30 after such a bomb week. Oh well. I'm sure I'll make a decision somehow.
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Elder Shanklin showing off for the South American Missionaries.
Nice heated building means you can wear shorts in the cold in Norway. |
White Thunder
On Wednesday we found a brotha from China who is crazy, but is also awesome. His code name will be White Thunder (he has an epic white trench coat). So this guy met with us Wednesday, and Thursday back to back. Craziness. Then he skipped our appointment on Friday and we didn't hear from him. Like what? We were kinda worried but on Saturday at like 1:00 I get a call that went as follows:
WT: Hello?
ME: Hello WT what's up?
WT: I'm not doing so good
ME: Why is that WT?
WT: I have been sleeping since thursday...
ME:.......(as I do math in my head trying to figure out if it really is Saturday)
WT: I don't feel so good.
ME: WT...that's like 40 hours.
WT: I know.....I can meet tonight at 7 though
ME: Cool we'll see you then.
We love this guy. He's a little crazy. Maybe a lot of crazy but he's fun. He'll be an adventure to teach. He wants to meet every day before his scheduled baptism. So there will be a lot of WT in the future. He came to our teach that night and while I was on the computer I heard him telling Elder Duncan a story. All I heard was 'I was burning porn CD's'....In my head I'm thinking "Heavenly Father...why must everyone have a problem"...so he comes in and I probe him a little bit and come to find out, the dude literally, LITERALLY, was burning porn cds. With actual fire. He was angry and that was how he took out his anger. The guy is crazy but at the same time totally awesome. I was laughing so hard! He ended up burning his house down in the process. Now you maybe see what I'm working with here. It's gonna be a great time though. Game on.
Crazy District Facts
Elder Jones went AP on Sunday. Saw it coming. Woot woot.
I got a call Friday night and my elders out in Nordstrand got emergency transfered because of something going on in Sandefjord. So now I got 2 other sisters in their place. It was way sad because they literally had like 5 hours to pack and leave. These sisters will be good though and we should continue head strong.
President is coming to my district meeting this week to 'observe'. Pressure's on. Wish me luck.
Closing Remarks
We were just super blessed this week and I am lovin life here in Oslo. It can be stressful, way stressful at times but in the end it is just a great time. It is amazing how fast these last 4 weeks have gone by. Easily the fastest transfer of my mission as of yet. I love all of you who stay in touch and keep me truckin, and like 32% of you who don't. Heartless. Haha. My testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith is probably the most precious thing to me right now. It really keeps me fired and going. We had two experiences where the first vision during the JS movie got interrupted this week and I couldn't help but laugh after. Satan seriously will do anything to try and stop us, it is just a huge testimony to us as missionaries that we are doing what is right. So props to all you future missionaries out there. My favorite quote this week came from one of our APs. We had a leader training meeting and at the end he was bearing his testimony and he said something along the following lines..."If you feel like you're not good enough...if you feel like the call you've recieved is above you...if you feel like you can't do it and the Lord should have picked someone else...then guess what...come join the ranks. That's why we have Jesus Christ".
Clear Eyes. Full hearts.
Elder Shanklin
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