It's Not About Time, It's About Priorities-Drammen Week Eighty Five

Exhausting week for us here in Drammen. Pday was a crazy hiking adventure up near this dam thing so there has not been any catching up on the lack of energy today. The good news is that the dam jokes were kept to a minimum, I guess you mature a little bit on your mission.

Elder Shanklin and Elder Nielson

Elder Shanklin and the amazing view

Selfie

Elder Nielson, Elder Arnold, Elder Naumu and Elder Shanklin

Elder Shanklin, Elder Nielson, Elder Naumu and Elder Arnold

Splits

This week we had an opportunity to go on splits with two sets of the missionary companionships in our zone. The first one was simple because I just stayed in Drammen while one of the missionaries from Sandvika came down to work with me. It's always super humbling when these young missionaries come and they have to drive around because I don't have my license. Not a big deal but yeah, it's also super lame. That splits was a little interesting because the giant ski race was set up in the city that day which made contacting super difficult. So we had other missionary things planned and it ended up working out. Our second splits was a trip down to Porsgrunn. The story from that trip is the muslim guy who became christian and wanted to talk to us on the street. I started getting the vibe that he was a little crazy. Mid conversation this guy pulls up and starts yelling at us and tells us to stop preaching the bible to him because he's muslim. I was totally prepared for a drive by shooting. I guess it would have been a glorious death. He finally drove away and then they guy told us "yeah that guy killed my best friend two weeks ago for no reason"....uhm okay well that's our que to get out of here. Fun times. The porsgrunn trip involved a nice two hour road trip there and back. It was way fun. We got some snacks for the road and drove safe. Seriously though, we were out in the middle of nowhere and this one car was going super slow. like 50 in an 80. So 6 cars were driving behind him but the roads were so curvy you couldn't pass. You could see that every car wanted to. Then in a moment of pure awesomeness we hit a straight part and like half of the cars all together passed him. It was hilarious. This poor guy, his car was a piece of poop and probably couldn't even go faster!

Elder Shanklins bed while on exhanges

A view from his bed

A beautiful v iew

Zone Results

After the week of all of our firesides the zone had a really awesome week. Our area did pretty good as well but it was just great to see all of the missionaries perform at such a high level this week. They all work hard and so it's great when they get to see the fruits of their labors. The sisters in our zone are doing especially well. It's almost unbelievable how much they contribute to our zone. So shout out to all those missionaries who make my job as a zone leader very easy.

The Sisters

Elders And Sisters

Elder Shanklin and Elder Nielson with a member

Truth be Told

Truth be told this was just a good week. It is always nice to be left feeling so exhausted. We definitely are giving it our best as we push towards the end. Elder Nielson is a great companion and we have fun together. I had a profound realization this week as we have been trying to impliment a new strategy to get members to help us on our teaches. We have a sign up sheet each week where members can right down the times that week they might be available. The list was quite short. What if each member thought of it this way: So you get the sheet and you decide you're busy so you don't write your name down with times because surely someone else will. Imagine if this was your sons mission, or your grandsons mission, or your nephews mission. Whoever you want. Now imagine, if every person in his mission thought the same way YOU did, then he would get NO help. How sad, if everyone in your sons mission was like his own MOTHER or FATHER then nothing would happen. Sad thought. People just need to change their perspective. It's not about having time, it's about prioritizing. Go be the change you want to see in the world.

Clear Eyes

Full Heart

Elder Shanklin