Dååååååååp (Baptism)

Hello! 

This has been the most beautiful week! My favorite day of my mission was on Saturday. But we have to start with Monday.

We aren't sure what to do with Else Marie. We were talking to people on Monday night and she came walking over and waited until we finished talking to someone. She asked if we could sit down and talk. She told us she has felt so confused and overwhelmed the past week. Sister Robbins and I were praying so hard to be able to know how to help her and what to say. We boldy testified to her that her next step is baptism and Satan is doing everything he can to confuse her and lead her off the path she is on. I don't think I've ever testified that boldly, but I don't know what else to do to help her. She listened and seemed to understand, but then she didn't come to the baptism on Saturday or church on Sunday... so... we've been praying and we feel that we need to give her a break for now even though it makes me really sad. 

We didn't have very many appointments at all so we planned a lot of finding and decided to set specific goals for the day of a lesson on the spot and giving the Norwegian Book of Mormon we were carrying away to someone. That's a hard thing to do in these parts, but we wanted it so bad! 

Ok so the weather this week has been ridiculous. It feels like Mississippi or something and I am so grateful I got called to Norway because it has been so humid and hot. It's been a nice change, I guess, but not when you're outside all day. So we talked to people for a few hours and didn't have much success. The Book of Mormon was still in my hand and I said, "Heavenly Father, I just want to be able to give this to someone, please." There was a really cute girl coming toward me and I stopped her because I wanted to ask her where she got her shirt. She seemed like she was in a hurry and told us she was on her way to dinner. I don't even remember what we said-- something about the Book of Mormon, I think, but all of the sudden she stopped and held still and said, "I have ten minutes." So we sat on a bench, taught her, and gave her the Book of Mormon. It was so cool!  Heavenly Father always seems to wait until the last second to make sure you have faith and trust Him. 

We also got bored talking to people for so long, so Sister Robbins decided she wanted to talk to all the "dudes" and by "dudes" she means black men with a lot of jewlery and muscle. So Heavenly Father kept setting the dudes in our path too and she would get so excited everytime she saw one! We made a few new friends. I love black people. They're so happy about life.

On Wednesday it was more finding in the hot hot wet. I felt like I was going to die haha I'm such a baby. But we said lots of prayers and asked for more miracles. We met this really cute girl again that said she had been praying to find out how to be closer to God even though she didn't know how and then she met us! She's from Slovakia but she speaks really good English. We got to teach her for a few minutes, but then she had to go. The next day she texted us and said she's not sure she's ready, and she lives an hour and a half away from Bergen. We were so sad! I don't think it's just over with her, but there are so many ups and downs all the time. It was a tender mercy to meet her though because it was really encouraging right when we needed it.

Ahhh I was leaving someone a message the other day (I hate leaving messages) and I started saying, "We hope you have a good day and in the name of Jesus Christ.. a..." and then I realized what I was saying and hurried and said, "Talk to you later! Bye!" I looked over at Sister Robbins and she was just dying. I guess my brain thinks that leaving messages and praying are the same and that's probably a bad thing because I don't want to just leave messages with Heavenly Father. I'll have to work on that this week.

We have an apartment in the city that we teach people at sometimes and it has an elevator. Mostly we just use it when we're going to pee our skirts and we're in the city. So we were coming back down and Sister Robbins got out of the elevator and then I went to walk out and it shut. It wouldn't open and it was so hot and I was freaking out. I don't know why, but Sister Robbins and I call each other "Choncho" so I could hear her on the other side of the door yelling, "Choncho! Choncho!" Haha I pushed all the buttons and told her to stay there. Finally it started going up and then let me out on a random floor and I walked down the stairs. I'm just glad no one came in while she was yelling, "Choncho!" at the elevator door. That would have been a great representation for the church. 

Saturday morning we woke up to go running and we opened the door and there were two drug guys across the street talking really loud. I looked at Sister Robbins and said, "I don't want to deal with this today." I shut the door and they heard it and looked up and started running at us yelling, "Excuse me!" Sister Robbins yelled, "Go back in!" I had to hurry and get the key in the lock and we ran in the door. We were both still half asleep so we just sat there for a minute and stared at each other. Then I opened the door a crack to see if they were gone, and we ran the other way. Haha that night we thought about it and laughed our heads off at how weird it was but we didn't even think about it. 

After we got back from running we texted Anders and told him we were so excited for him and praying for him and we asked if he was nervous. He said he wasn't nervous at all and that he knew it was the right thing for him and his family. We had promised him that when he was baptized he would receive a spiritual confirmation that it was right so all day we just prayed and prayed that the Spirit would communicate to him what he needed to know. He showed up at the church just grinning and asked us if we were nervous. Haha we told him to go try on his pants. He has the funniest sense of humor. They had been on vacation all week and got tan so he came out in all of his white and asked Mina if he looked like a brown angel.

Getting the program took a lot of time and we ended up finding people that we thought would be good, but little did we know how good! The member that talked about baptism talked about how it was just the first step and priesthood, callings, and temple will follow. It was perfect! Then the sisters sang "Savior, Redeemer of my Soul" and it was perfect. Anders sat on the front row and just cried. Then he got baptized! I've never felt the Spirit like that at a baptism before. Everyone that was there said there was a really unique, strong Spirit and I think it's because of who Anders is. 

One of the members had just gotten back from Hawaii the night before and he was completely jet-lagged, but he called us on Saturday morning and said he had been thinking of Anders all week and wanted to make sure his talk about the Holy Ghost was really personal. He talked about starting to learn to recognize the Holy Ghost and gave Anders a book to write down impressions. He asked me to write Anders' confirmation blessing on the first page in the book. I was so scared I was going to miss things, especially because it was in Norwegian, but it all worked out great. After his talk he gave him a white envelope that said, "Receive the Holy Ghost" on it with two conference talks about the Holy Ghost inside. I could have kissed that man's feet! Then Anders got confirmed and it was perfect. The blessing was really neat and talked about how he will be an example to other people as he lives the gospel. 

The perfect amount of people were there and just the right people and things couldn't have gone any smoother. Sister Robbins and I smiled all day. After the refreshments I was sitting outside talking to Mina and Anders came and sat down by me and said,"This morning I was thinking about how I was going to be baptized and I wondered what would happen if I didn't feel anything. But Sister, Pyne, I felt it. Especially when I came up out of the water. I felt a feeling-- my back was so warm-- I know that it was the right thing to do." I just grinned at him. I couldn't really say anything. 

We found out later that the day before Linn, his wife, had slipped on water on the aiport floor and hit her head really hard and had a bad migraine. Then, their plane was late and Mina got really sick and had to go to the hospital and by the time they got back to Bergen in the middle of the night, their car wouldn't start. Do you think Satan was trying to stop it? Their family is so powerful and I know that they are going to be future leaders. They are going to get callings as primary teachers soon and they will be perfect! I can't wait for next year when they get to be sealed!

I feel like I forgot a bunch of details and none of this makes sense because I'm trying to type it all really fast. But I know that the gospel is true. I know that Heavenly Father loves us and  that baptism is exactly what we are supposed to do. I love Him. 

As for this week, it's looking about like the last minus the baptism but plus finding out where I'm going next transfer so... send prayers this way! I know we'll see miracles again. I love you guys, of course!

Love,

Søster Pyne