2014!!! i think this is the best year yet!

2014!!! i think this is the best year yet!

Hei hei!

How are my people doing? I've been praying for you!
I have to think really hard about everything that happened this week. Let's see...

all the oslo missionaries. the senior couple was so nice to let
us be loud and have a little party at their apartment.

Well, the sweet senior couple here in Oslo invited all the missionaries over for New Year's Eve. We started our party after everyone had planned for the next day and got permission to stay up until midnight (and then die the next day). They live on the sixth floor in a little apartment with a balcony and Norway knows how to do fireworks! 2014. I am so excited!

I think that I've talked about Umar before... he's really cool. He just wants to know what the truth is. He has been meeting with us for about 2 months now and we have been trying to help him understand the importance of prayer because he has to get his answers directly from God. He says he has always wanted to know the truth. He finally agreed to pray with us on Thursday night and it was so powerful. We asked him to kneel with us and he was so nervous! He kept saying, "Okay, I just need a minute to think. Okay. What if you think I say a weird prayer? Okay. I'll just do it." We just sat there with our eyes closed waiting. He said the most beautiful prayer that was completely from his heart. He said, "I know that sometimes I forget you, but I know you never forget me." We weren't even sure if he believed in God and after that prayer, we knew and he knew. We all just kind of sat there and of course Sister Frampton and I had teary eyes. He said, "I don't know why I'm just sitting here." And I said, "Yes you do. It's because of how you feel. You feel safe and warm and you don't want to leave." And he shook his head and said, "But... Yeah. You answered my question." We testified to him that God hears our prayers and that what he was feeling was the Spirit. I love being able to point out what the Spirit is!

We got to visit the oldest active member in Norway too! He is 94 and completely healthy and happy. He says people ask him what his secret is and he says, "Live the Word of Wisdom." He and his wife got married a few years ago after both of their spouses died. Their families had been friends their whole lives and then they just decided to get married! But they made sure to tell us it was in the temple but only for time. Haha I had never heard of that. He is an opera singer and she said, "Now you play the piano, right? Could you play 'Deilig er Jorden' so he can sing?" It was 

so glad i got to be with this girl through all the holdiays!

such a neat experience! His voice was stunning and the Spirit was so strong. He asked us if we had set goals for the new year and encouraged us to do that. And then he told us that his goals are a little different cause he doesn't know if he'll live through the whole year. But he said being old is a wonderful experience because you have all of your memories. They fed us all these fancy little finger sandwiches and these beautiful homemade Norwegian waffle cone things and ice cream and chocolate and oh my... they just kept giving it to us.

Speaking of old people, we were knocking the other night and we got to this confusing apartment complex. The trick when you're knocking in Norway is to find the front door. It's always complicated. So we rang one of the doorbell things and the door just buzzed and unlocked to let us in. But we didn't know which apartment we had rung. So we started walking up the stairs and this old man came out with a fat belly sticking out of his unbuttoned shirt and told us that none of the people in the building were interested. Thank you, grandpa. We found nice little families to talk to in the same area though, so it was okay.

The ward had their Christmas tree party on Saturday. Our investigator, Gustav, the one that read half the Book of Mormon last week came with us. He told us about how he agrees with the Book of Mormon and he is amazed how it agrees with the Bible. He is really starting to develop a testimony of it and he has a lot of questions. The ward danced around the tree and sang and we ate a bunch of hot dogs and bread and cheese and cookies. Gustav even danced and sang with them! And the missionaries added some American Christmas songs.

they had a tree party at the church and they really
do all line up and dance around the tree and sing!

I'm learning that being a missionary means so many different things, but really all it is is loving people in every form and teaching them that life is happy and good. I found this Mother Tereza poem the other day:

life is an opportunity, benefit from it.

(just orange soda)

life is a beauty, admire it.

life is a dream, realize it.

life is a challenge, meet it.

lite is a duty, complete it.

life is a game, play it.

life is a promise, fulfill it.

life is a sorrow, overcome it.
life is a song, sing it.
life is a struggle, accept it.

life is a tragedy, confront it.

life is an adventure, dare it.
life is luck, make it.
life is life, fight for it.

I know that Jesus Christ lives and that is why life is happy and good. I am so grateful for Him. Share the knowledge and have a good week. I love you!

Love,
Søster Pyne